“Without your children,” I corrected her. Another day, I would have kept quiet, but Dariola had the worst timing. I finally let myself relax and enjoy myself...and yes, I was thinking of Innis. Which is why my wife’s fish face seemed especially distasteful.
And I let it all out.
“The only thing I need from you is your children. If you give them to me, you’ll stay alive; in a convent and under lock and key, but alive. If you don’t, I’ll execute you here and now. You were a profitable match, and nothing more—and vice versa. But you weren’t even smart enough to stay faithful to your husband.”
“It’s not like you were faithful either!”
“You’re wrong!”
“You visited a brothel, I know that!”
“I don’t have that many friends to forget them.”
“Friends? That’s what you’re calling that?”
I put away the empty bowl of soup and moved on to the pot roast. The smell was captivating.
“Mistress Eliza really is my friend. She’s almost fifty years old, and I have never slept with her, if you want to know. But with her, I could rest, talk to someone clever while being frank, and her brothel got all sorts of interesting news, too—no reason to stop seeing her. But you had no right to demand a report from me. You kept writing letters to your...sweet nightingale.”
Dariola couldn’t help but nod.
“You...read my letters?”
“I did, recently. So what?
She really had written the letters, even if she had never sent them, putting them in her drawer next to her diary. I hadn’t particularly cared about that. I had known that Dariola hadn’t grown up in complete isolation, so while her fancy had been contained to messages, I had allowed it to continue.
“You...are a crowned wretch! A bastard!”
“The second is true. My mother wasn’t married when she gave birth to me.”
For a second, I imagined Argadon’s reaction. Honorable sir demon, I need you to father my child, but only in a lawful marriage...
He probably would have died of laughter, I’m sure of it.
“You’re just like your mother!”
“I hope so. So, what did you want?”
“I want you to... Alex, I’m the mother of your child!”
“And?”
“They’re treating me worse than a prisoner.”
“You aren’t starving, chained, or tortured. What more do you want?”
Lots of other things, judging by the look in her eyes. I chuckled.
“I see. You’ve tasted freedom and power, and you want them back. You want worship, veneration...power, and money. Sorry, but you won’t get anything.”
“I...”
“Yes, and I suggest you start coming to terms with it right now. It will come in handy in the convent.”
“You won’t change your mind?”
“No.”
Dariola was close, very close. In a flash, her hand moved.
One stroke, and a bloody scratch adorned my neck, while my wife stepped back.
“I’m sorry, but you’ve left me no choice.”
I pressed my palm against my cheek.
Blood. My brain worked fast. Dariola held something like a sharp-edged hairpin in her hands; the perfect weapon for thrusting and slashing, suitable for a woman’s hand. Its tip was coated with something dark and viscous. I snatched it from her hands and touched it with my tongue.
“Ritvish...”
It was one of the poisons from the East. There was no antidote; I had about two minutes to live.
Well, I would have, if I were human. Alas, ritvish had no effect on demons, just like most other poisons. I didn’t waste any time and changed to my second form, smiling to Dariola with two rows of sharp teeth. My wife collapsed as if knocked out cold.
What a bitch! If I were human, I would have been a corpse. I carefully opened the cut, so as to let out the blood and the poison. The blood poured out; it was blue and had a sick taste. I concentrated.
Everything seemed fine with me or would be, in an hour or two. Demon blood was toxic enough to dissolve iron, let alone poison. I could easily gorge on a wolfsbane salad! After a few hours in demon form, I would switch back.
I stared at my wife, lost in thought. She was a piece of work, to be sure. On the other hand...she was checked for weapons, not accessories. Even if it was poison, who would have guessed? And then, concealing poison wasn’t that hard. She could hide even a cooked demon among her creams, balms, and ointments, and three more, among her clothes. It would only be found if it reeked too badly, and even then, it wasn’t guaranteed.
She had pretty good chances, actually. If the king was dead, her child would become the heir, and his mother would be the regent. She could have become even worse than Abigail, burying me deep in the ground and forgetting all about me.
Well, until she gave birth, that is. I wondered what my dear wife would have done if she got a tailed and fanged baby. And she couldn’t have even gotten rid of him. Radenor blood was a rare thing. Only one child had it other than me, but where was that child? I would have never told anybody.
Without further thinking, I turned to food.
Demon or not, I wanted to eat. Or, rather, I wanted to stuff my face, and in demon form, even more than in the human one. The roast meat disappeared in an instant, followed by the meat in aspic and truffle paste. I finished the meal with a whipped cream cupcake and cherries soaked in wine. Delicious.
Dariola woke up when I was eating the cupcake, saw me at the table and got ready to faint once again, but alas—she was way too healthy for that. I smirked viciously.
“Did you get enough sleep? Well then, come sit at the table and we’ll talk.” I saw that Dariola hesitated. “Sit down, bitch, or you’ll be sorry!”
Dariola stood up, with some effort, and grabbed a chair, sitting down. I threw her a mocking glare, not even bothering to help her. Then I grinned.
“Yes, dear wife. That’s exactly why my father never married my mother. Demons don’t care a damn about our rituals, and that’s the best case.”
“You...you...”
She was a tough cookie.
“Yep, that’s me. Or, rather, my second form. Sorry, but I won’t be turning back for a while now. After the ritvish wears off, I’ll become human again.”
Disappointment burned through Dariola’s fear like nettles. I sneered.
“What did you think? Nope, you won’t become a widow. In this form, I can eat vipers and drink acid. Oh, and keep in mind—our child will also be—”
“A demon!”
“A quarter-demon. A quarterling.”
“Noooooo!”
“Oh yes. I was such until I turned sixteen. After that, I learned to transform myself.”
“You...you...”
“So, what should I do with you after you’ve tried something like that? If I were human, I would have been dead already.”
“I hate you, I hate you so much!”
“You’re welcome.”
I tossed the hairpin up, caught it with my palm, and licked the poison from the tip. Dariola seemed outraged.
“Tomorrow, I will walk into the square and I will shout that my husband is a demon! They will burn you at the stake! You are an unholy creature, you destroy everything you touch, everything!”
She was growing more and more hysterical. I looked at her as I drank stewed berries from a tall glass. She really was an idiot.
I spoke up only after Dariola finished.
“You won’t go anywhere. If you say a word, I’ll kill you.”
As soon as I said it, she threw a new fit.
“You’ll kill me? Do it, then! You’ve killed everyone, haven’t you? Kill me! KILL ME!”
“Oh no. After you give birth, however...”
“So all you need is my child? Yes? Well, you won’t get him!”
Another hairpin appeared in the thin fingers of her hands. I smelled poison from where I was, but I had no time to do anything,
as it left a scarlet trace on Dariola’s pale skin.
“No!”
It was only then that her bluish eyes of a fish flashed with triumph.
“Oh yes. Ritvish is deadly!”
In a second, I was standing next to Dariola. It was deadly, that was true. In a couple of minutes, I would become a widower, the second time in the last month. It was really becoming a routine practice; I was a bit afraid to get accustomed to it.
I had no time to persuade Dariola, so I hit her in the nape. It was a hard and sharp blow, and her head slumped back. I realized that she was dead...just as I had planned. Her heart stopped and wasn’t spreading poisoned blood through her body.
I had only one thing left to do. I didn’t need a lot of time to pull out my ritual dagger. It was sharpened well enough, so... Dariola’s dress parted under my hands.
Her stomach was round, soft, and warm. The heart of my child was beating inside, and it meant that...
Confidently, I dissected her skin, still warm. I was careful—I didn’t want to graze her womb. The blade split her muscles, her flesh, releasing a stream of blood, but I didn’t stop.
Finally, I reached the womb. The child was inside...if the fetus had enough time to mature, if it was able to survive, if...
I had no choice, but to risk it. The knife cut open the womb, shearing the crimson fiber, and amniotic fluids poured out of Dariola.
***
He was so small, my child. He could fit into my palm. But he had pointed ears, tiny fangs, and even teensy, transparent, claws, a short tail, and grey skin...
He was a quarter-demon. He looked at me with his murky blue eyes, and his tiny mouth opened in his first disgruntled squeak...
I looked back. My necromantic power gathered around us, enveloping both of us in warmth and the comfort of darkness, the peace of the night. For a second, he grew quiet...and I sensed a ghost next to me.
I didn’t care who it was; anybody would do.
“Call Martha!”
I didn’t have to wait long. In a few minutes, my mother was there.
She entered, shut the door, and froze as she weighed the sight in front of her.
“Oh, Alex...”
“Dariola tried to kill me. When she failed, she killed herself. However, I managed to save the baby.”
“Are ye all right?”
Nobody else mattered to Martha. Dariola was dead? Whatever. She would have killed her sooner or later anyway.
“I’m fine. But the child...”
Martha’s attention switched to the tiny body.
“Oh, Alex...”
“Mother...”
Martha took the child from me, resolute. She pulled the sheet from the bed and started to carefully wipe him. The baby squealed, hungry and annoyed.
“We need goat’s milk, ye should know it already. And fast.”
“All right, goat’s milk. And...we’ll have to raise him in the dungeon for a few months, and we also have to get this down there...”
I pointed my foot at Dariola. Martha raised her eyebrows.
“Whatcha want it for?”
“Mother, she died—and good riddance. I never tried to kill her. But...”
Martha was as quick on the uptake as I was.
“Riolon. The child...”
Human children would still need their mother’s womb at this time of their maturing. Dariola’s pregnancy term was well-known, thanks to the life mages who had examined her. Quarter-demons developed quicker than humans, just like half-demons, so our baby had a chance of surviving.
That was far from certain, of course—but until then, Dariola had to stay nominally alive. Which meant that...
I looked around. Oh hell, so much cleaning to do...
“We’ll throw the body into the dungeon and embalm it, or preserve it some other way.”
Martha had the same idea.
“I could borrow goat’s milk in the kitchen, tell them I had a craving. I’ll do it now, or he’ll start crying...”
“You think?”
“Alex, ye weren’t a quiet baby by any means.”
“But he’s so small...”
“The smallest creatures are the loudest.”
Martha disappeared behind the door. In ten minutes, she returned with a cup of warm milk. Over that time, I found that the baby really wasn’t going to stay silent and thanked my ancestors for the doors and the walls inside the palace. Nobody would hear the screams. That was a truly fortunate coincidence.
“Just like this. I’ll feed him meself,” Martha said and pulled out a feeding bottle she had borrowed from somewhere. Really, where could she find it at this time of day?
As she poured the milk into the bottle, Martha stared at me.
“Would be better if we added some blood.”
“Dariola’s?”
“Yours. Ye aren’t poisoned anymore, are ye?”
I concentrated.
“I don’t think so. Maybe getting worried quickened the blood flow, or magic burned the poison away...”
“Everything is possible. Transform, then, and give me yer hand.”
I obeyed, and a few drops of my blood fell into the bottle.
As the baby drank it, his eyes seemed a bit more focused. I remember all my life ever since the first moment. Does he?
The next day, we would find a she-goat and take it to the dungeon.
“We need a nanny.”
Martha sighed.
“Alex, I could do that, yer right, but keeping a child in a dungeon? That tiny thing? Ye aren’t thinking straight.”
“He needs necromantic magic to feed.”
“An’ also fresh milk, care, and secrecy. So...”
“Torrin?”
Really, instead of looking for trusted townsfolk who could keep their mouths shut I could simply get the child to Torrin. Rene could provide him with necromagic, and Auntie Mira, Cassie and everyone else already knew what to expect of a half-demon, so a quarterling wouldn’t be a surprise for them.
“You’ll go there, too?”
“No, Alex. Ye’ll need me here.”
“Why?”
“Dariola. Until ye’re back, I’m gonna take care of her body and the cleanup. We’ll think what to tell ‘em later.”
I sighed and agreed, kissing Martha’s warm cheek. Then I summoned Ak-kvir.
Who else other than my trusted steed?
***
The summoned demon didn’t seem especially enthusiastic and grumbled that he was about to turn into a horse or even a donkey. I had to snap at him and promise a bonus for menial work. Having made peace with it, Ak-kvir looked my child over.
“The muppet’s not bad. He’s a necromancer, too.”
“Will he be able to transform?”
“Who knows? In theory, he should, but when will he learn it?”
I hoped it wouldn’t be at sixteen, like me. On the other hand...let my children grow up in Torrin. It would be better for them.
I wasn’t sure it would be better for Torrin, but I would have to coax Rick into that.
I made myself comfortable on Ak-kvir’s back, pressed the baby to me, and he slowly grew quiet, falling asleep. The demon flew out of the palace right through the window, and we raced forward, through the hills and the valleys, woods, and wilderness... I had to get to Torrin and back again before dawn.
I wondered if the baby would need my blood again. Well, in any case, I would visit him once in a while. I told Ak-kvir, and he sneered.
“You’ll have to pay me and pay me well!”
“I will,” I agreed. “How about three men per night?”
“Seven!”
“If you keep being stubborn, you won’t get anything at all.”
“Fine, six.”
“Four.”
We agreed on five, of course. Thieves, bandits, murderers—whoever I found in the prison—I would feed to Ak-kvir. At least they’d be useful for something.
In Torrin, it was already dark and quiet. Everyone
was sleeping, as it was almost three o’clock in the morning. I scratched at Henry’s window. My teacher was a creature of habit, and he would have never moved away from his tower. Ak-kvir easily climbed the wall, as he was wont to do. Still, the doors were locked tight and breaking in meant triggering an alarm and losing secrecy.
Instead of a hello, I was greeted with a dagger thrown at my head. After dodging, I had to finally call him by his name.
“Henry!”
In a few minutes, a disheveled head peeked out of the window. And what do you think that madman said after seeing a full set of a demon, a half-demon, and a quarterling?
“Alex, are you out of your damn mind? Couldn’t you wait until the morning?”
“May I come in?”
Henry gave me a mocking bow and moved aside.
“As you wish, Your Majesty.”
“I’ll punch you,” I promised as I jumped off Ak-kvir’s back. Then I turned to the demon. “Wait for me here.” Ak-kvir nodded in agreement and I switched back to my teacher.
“Henry, I have problems.”
“What problems?”
The time for jokes was over. I pointed at the baby.
“This is my son.”
“From...”
“Dariola tried to kill me today. She almost succeeded, but to neutralize the poison, I had to change form. After seeing who she had married, she tried to kill herself.”
“And did she?”
“I decided not to stop her.”
After taking time to analyze my actions, I realized that subconsciously, I had wanted to free myself of my wife. Even if I couldn’t be with Innis, I hadn’t wanted to be with Dariola. If I can’t have the former, then let the Bright Saint take the latter!
“What do you want from us?”
“My child...”
“Say no more. I’ll go wake the others up. Wait here.”
***
The council gathered literally in ten minutes. Some were in bathrobes, some in nightgowns, but my family was here.
Rick and Mira, Rene and Cassie, Henry—they didn’t invite Henrietta; she wasn’t trusted enough yet.
The women took the baby off my hands and started to fuss over him. Wow. I could understand Auntie Mira having gotten used to me, but Cassie?
Yet she seemed full of affection, despite the child being a quarterling. Had she grown accustomed to such things after so much time spent with a necromancer? Or maybe any baby was just a baby to her, no matter what race?
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