Warriors of Poseidon 01 - Atlantis Rising

of his long-murdered conscience as they poked at his liver.
     
    Twisted in his brain.
     
    He was screaming with the agony of it before she'd completed her first sentence. And then he was unable to make any sound at all.
     
    He collapsed on his face next to the unconscious form of his general.
     
    "You grow stronger, Barrabas," she crooned in her poisonous lilt. "When last I saw you, you were sodden with your own piss long before I formed words."
     
    He wrenched his head to the side, tried to gaze into her face, and the ice in the air intensified. Turned his bowels to water.
     
    He'd pray not to soil himself, but to whom did dark lords pray?
     
    To the bitch goddess in front of him, of course. And she had nothing of mercy or compassion in her.
     
    He clenched his buttocks together and listened.
     
    She laughed. At the sound of her laughter, living things died. He'd seen that, too.
     
    A tiny blood clot in his brain burst, shooting blood out of his nose. He lay still while it trickled down the side of his face to pool on the floor underneath his cheek.
     
    Atlantis Rising – Warriors of Poseidon 01
    Page 181 of 351
    "Is that your offering to me, Lord Barnes! And, yes, of course I know about your pitiful attempt to disguise your true self from these sheep."
     
    The tips of her fingers and the bottom of her silken gown were all he could see. She wore white. A travesty, virginal white on the goddess of all lusts.
     
    Which is why it amused her so.
     
    She'd told him that once. Then she'd broken him.
     
    Again and again.
     
    He cringed to remember. Cringed to remember how, at the very end, he'd begged her for the pain. For the humiliation.
     
    Groveled for the twisted perversions.
     
    She gestured with one hand and released him. Suddenly able to move, he was afraid to do so.
     
    He was no stranger to her games.
     
    "Rise, my Barrabas. I hear from your cesspool of a mind that you remember our fun with… yearning. Shall I pleasure you again with my toys?"
     
    He stood, struggling to contain the shudder that threatened to devour his body. Her toys. Iron-clawed whips. Steel manacles that fit many more things than only arms and legs.
     
    Braving a glance at her, he saw that she was unchanged. If anything, more beautiful than she'd been three hundred years ago when he'd last seen her.
    Atlantis Rising – Warriors of Poseidon 01
    Page 182 of 351
     
    Last felt her.
     
    Almost died the true death from it.
     
    Silken waves of midnight black hair caressed curves of such perfection that they would drive a human male to drooling madness. Piercing eyes the black of damned souls gazed at him, a spark of red in their exact centers.
     
    She must be in a good mood.
     
    Maybe he wouldn't die.
     
    Maybe not this time.
     
    "Afraid to answer me, Lord Barrabas?" She infused the word with sarcasm sharp enough to flay flesh from bones.
     
    He'd done that with her, too. More of her "toys."
     
    "I… forgive me, my lady goddess. I have no words, before your beauty." He stammered out the words, knowing that flattery might have a chance to distract her. She was Death personified, but she was an ancient female death. Pretty words drew her attention like shiny things to the eyes of a crow.
     
    "Yes. Yes, I am beautiful, Barrabas," she preened. "And I have been constrained from playing my favorite games for far too long, due to Poseidon's curse. But this day and yester eve bring me great joy, my young one. Do you wish to know why?"
     
    Though nearly three thousand years old, the "young one" was afraid to do more than nod.
    Atlantis Rising – Warriors of Poseidon 01
    Page 183 of 351
    She caressed his cheek with a fingertip, and his skin burned and sizzled in the wake of her touch. He fought to keep from flinching.
     
    "The princeling himself broke Poseidon's curse. He has revealed the existence of Atlantis to one of the sheep, thus breaking the ancient stricture laid upon me by that prick of a sea god," she said, skirts whirling around her with the force of her anger.
     
    Barrabas gasped. "Atlantis? The lost continent of legend truly exists?"
     
    She smiled again, and her mouth was crowded with far too many teeth. Shiny, dagger-sharp teeth. He leaned toward her, hypnotized at the sight, but she laughed and turned away.
     
    "No, Barrabas. I am in no mood to sample your wares again. First, I will tell you of Atlantis, and how you will serve me in my plans. Then." She smiled again and prodded the motionless form of