Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 137871 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 689(@200wpm)___ 551(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137871 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 689(@200wpm)___ 551(@250wpm)___ 460(@300wpm)
Finding the proper color of hair dye was a simple task with today’s conveniences. Nothing like it used to be for women with all the lead, ochre, and horse piss. Once he paid for his goods, he returned to the vehicle. The woman sat where he left her, now holding a nest of fake black hair on her lap.
Cerberus drove to the hotel. As soon as they were alone, he stripped her of her clothing and gave her the box of hair dye.
She looked up at him with concern.
“Follow the directions. Then bathe. Come to me when you’re finished.”
He shut her inside the bathroom and stretched out on the large bed, folding his hands behind his neck, his mind retracing those familiar recollections of the one female that still haunted him to this day.
Lilias…
The mere mention of her name hit like a sweet opiate, and he calmed. Sometimes he hated her. Sometimes he loved her. But he never lost the urge to punish her.
She was always with him, tucked deep in the secret corners of his mind. His psyche had more fractures than the soldiers who lay dead at the Battle of Assandun, so perhaps he’d rewritten the truth over time and misremembered minor details, but her face and beauty were forever branded on his black soul.
Whether thinking of her fondly or enraged by the memories, his heart—to his annoyance—obsessed over what he could not have. Indulging in his fantasies never delivered the satisfaction of reality, but he did what he needed to do whenever he felt the urge to get her out of his head.
She was a spring flower on the coldest winter days. Her potent scent of ripe innocence enchanted him. But she had not been for him. She’d been a gift for the king.
As the King’s most trusted guard, Cerberus had been privy to the immoral and often perverse happenings at court. He not only served King Charles as a loyal guard, but he also protected His Majesty’s secrets. As a guardian of so many precious things, it only made sense that Cerberus would be entrusted with protecting Lilias as well.
Stretching out on the hotel bed, he folded his hands behind his head. His mind went back to that time when life was fresh and promising. He had yet to experience the duplicity of females, so he had not expected Lilias to be such a conniving little cunt.
Charles sat in the shadows of the opened wardrobe, his thin fingers prattling slowly over the gilded arm of his chair.
“You found her?” the King said by way of greeting, his thin lips curling about his blunt teeth with palpable anticipation.
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Mud and blood still dripped from Cerberus’s heavy boots, so he did not fully enter the king’s private chambers.
“Did she put up a fight?” Born a weak and sickly child, the King maintained fragile health all his life and a deep respect for Cerberus’s strength and immortality.
“Four guards were lost.”
“You were the one to finally seize her?”
“I did as you asked.”
“Good. Your loyalty to the Crown will be rewarded generously. Guard her with the attention and devotion you guard your King.”
“Of course, Your Majesty.”
A slow, wheezing breath filled the silence expressing the King’s excitement. “I want to see her.”
“She’s been taken to her chamber to—"
“Now.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
Pivoting out of the private chambers, Cerberus marched through the corridors untethered by ceremony. As a draugr, death was no danger to him, so protection was unnecessary.
The trappings of his armor added to his bulk and announced his approach with the alarming clamor of steel. And while he didn’t soundlessly glide like a ghost, he moved with inhuman agility for a male of his heft and strength.
Despite not knowing what he was, soldiers instinctively moved out of his path. When he passed by, women frequently fell into prayer. He towered over the masses and carried the cold essence of the underworld with him wherever he went.
He existed to serve the Crown and lived without fear of torture. He was the King’s greatest weapon of torment. No one within the kingdom's walls had the stomach to do the things he could do, and when the King needed answers or someone to blame, Cerberus was the first to get the guilty talking.
He did not resemble the men at court. From their feeble physiques to their foppish attire, they were perhaps the weakest generation of this race he’d seen thus far. The females were equally unappealing, nothing but wasted flesh on fragile bones.
It wasn’t his Viking height or the clamor of his armor that set them on edge, but the fire in his stare, shadowed by the hammered iron of the Viksø helmet that fit his skull. He could slaughter every last one of them before they realized their pathetic mortal lives were over.
They were weak. Even the royal army was preoccupied with belts and buttons fit for fanfare instead of war. Overthrowing the throne would be easy for any man willing to approach it logically. And while Cerberus served this king, he’d certainly live long enough to serve another.