The Devil's Favourite Obsession

Cassian made a low sound against her lips, pleased, and then his hands closed around her waist, and he lifted her from the couch like she was feather-light, drawing her over and settling her astride his lap.

He loved her like this, close, closer, no space left between them. He loved the way her soft curves gave against the hard lines of him, the warmth of her pressed flush to his chest, the small helpless breath she took when he gathered her nearer still.

One hand splayed wide and possessive against the small of her back. The other slid up into her hair, cradling the back of her head, tilting her to exactly where he wanted her, and he kissed her deeper, slower, thoroughly, until she had quite forgotten there had ever been answers to ask for.

And while she was lost in him, the room began to change.

The elegant living space dissolved by degrees around them. The soft furnishings, the warm walls, the window with its evening beyond, all of it thinned and faded and gave way. In its place rose cold grey metal, floor to ceiling, seamless walls of it closing them in. They were no longer sunk into a couch at all. Beneath them was a chair, large and imposing, high-backed and severe, the sort of seat built for a boss to hold court from behind a desk, the throne of some office that belonged to a man used to being obeyed.

Cassian slowed the kiss.

He drew back by a fraction and opened his eyes.

Cixi, feeling him ease away, surfaced too, her lashes lifting, only to find him already watching her with that dark, unreadable attention of his. He eased his face back from hers, unhurried, and simply let her look, let her feel the wrongness of the air and the hard metal at her back and the cold that had not been there a moment ago.

He said nothing at all. He only watched, and waited, and let Cixi discover for herself exactly where they were.

Cixi looked around the room.

There was almost nothing in it. A table, a single chair, and a small lamp set upon the table, its glow the only warmth in all that cold grey metal. No windows. No pictures. No sign of the elegant living room that had cradled them a moment ago. Only the seamless walls, closing in on every side, and the quiet.

She turned back to Cassian, her heart quickening.

”Where are we?” she breathed, her fingers still curled against his chest. ”How did we even get here?”

Cassian did not answer at once. His hands settled gently at her hips, and he gave her a small, guiding press upward, easing her off his lap and onto her feet. He rose with her, unhurried, straightening to his full height beside her.

”Soon you will know,” he replied simply.

Then he took her hand in his, folding her smaller fingers into his own, and drew her toward the wall where a door was set. It slid open on its own as they neared it, parting without a sound, and Cixi followed him through, keeping close.

Beyond lay a long corridor, built to the same cold design as the room, every surface the same dull, gleaming metal, stretching away ahead of them. Their footsteps echoed against it. Cixi’s eyes moved everywhere at once, trying to make sense of a place that felt less like a home and more like the inside of some vast, sealed machine.

Cassian led her to a lift.

The doors closed them in, and the car carried them smoothly up to the first floor. When the doors parted again, Cixi found herself looking at a red door at the end of a short passage, the single spot of colour in all that grey, and two guards standing to either side of it.

The moment they saw Cassian, both men dropped, sinking down onto their knees and bowing their heads low, not a word between them.

Cassian walked toward the red door with Cixi at his side. The guards did not rise, did not move, holding their kneeling bows as he passed them as though he were something they dared not look upon. A thin beam of light swept across his eyes as he reached the door, a machine reading him, and with a soft mechanical sound, the red door unlocked and swung open before them.

As they walked further in, the air turned colder, a damp chill that crept over Cixi’s skin and settled deep.

Then she heard it. A whimper, thin and far off. She thought at first she was imagining it, the way she kept imagining things in this strange place, but the sound did not fade. It grew, swelling louder the deeper they went, until there was no pretending it was not real.

She glanced at Cassian, confusion plain on her face.

He looked back at her and smiled.

”Where are you taking me?” she asked, her voice small against the cold.

”Soon you will know,” he answered, the same words as before, gentle and unhurried.

When they turned to their right, she saw it. A door, or something like a door, set into the wall and fitted with heavy metal bars. She stopped short and stared at it, then let her eyes travel along the passage, and her breath caught. There were more. Numerous doors just like it, lining the corridor one after another, as far as she could see.

The whimper came again, closer now.

She let go of Cassian’s hand without thinking and drifted toward the barred door, drawn to the sound.

Inside was dark. She squinted, pressing nearer to the bars, trying to make out shapes in the black. Slowly, they came clear. A man. Chained, both his wrists and his ankles bound and fixed to the wall, his body held upright against the cold stone as though he had hung there a very long time. His hair had grown long and wild, his beard tangled and overgrown down his chest.

”Water,” he rasped. ”Water.”

It took Cixi a moment to understand the broken word scraping out of him.

Then his eyes opened, and he turned his head, and he looked straight at her, and Cixi stumbled backwards.