“My king, we have far more coin in our accounts than the Third Realm, if that is your concern.”
Tegan sneered at him. “My concern is that I do not have such a thing, while my fellow kings do.”
“Why would you need one?” Raelin said calmly, his tone the one Tegan despised the most because it was meant to calm him and make him believe the male was on his side, wanting only the best for him.
This time, Tegan wouldn’t go along with it.
He was tired of this realm and their games.
“I mean to purchase more books with one, along with several other things from the mortal realm that have caught my eye, and the items my research indicates I will need in order to proceed with my projects.” Tegan waited, holding Raelin’s gaze, aware that the male was going to attempt to shut him down.
“Whatever you desire, we can arrange it for you.” Raelin smiled, one meant to placate him but one that irritated him instead.
Never had he seen such a hollow, false smile.
“What I want is to visit some windfarms.” Particularly one in Scotland, just in case the female lived in that locale.
Eryt held both of his hands up, dropping the ledger into his lap, his black eyes enormous as he shook his head, causing his wild black hair to tangle on his horns. “My king, we will send people to them and they can report back to you about these things. It is not your place to concern yourself about such visits and research. Others can take care of it.”
So they could keep him under lock and key in the kingdom.
Tegan leaned towards him and growled, flashing fangs right in his face. “I am king. I demand to know more about our accounts and other important things, not less. It is my duty to know everything and be prepared. It is my duty to lead my people and this kingdom. You will bring me debit cards and you will not question my need of them. Or must I run everything past you all?”
He looked at each of them in turn.
“Who rules this kingdom, you or me?”
All four males bowed their heads and answered as one. “You, my king.”
“Then I will hear no more on this subject. I expect debit cards to be delivered to me immediately.” He took his seat again, slumping into the tall-backed wooden chair. It creaked under his weight and he stretched his legs out under the table. “What other business do we have to discuss?”
Because he wanted to get moving on his plans now that his advisers looked as if they weren’t going to interfere. He needed to find males who would be able to visit the villages and choose the ones where the wind turbines and new farmland were most likely to succeed.
“The celebration, my king.” Sylas managed not to flinch when Tegan’s gaze snapped to him.
Tegan huffed. He had forgotten about the celebration. Sitting through the one for his finest warriors had been painful enough. He didn’t want to suffer another one.
“The invitations for the public feast were successfully delivered to the heads of the noble houses across the kingdom,” Sylas continued, an almost apologetic note to his voice as he looked to his right, directly at Tegan as he sank lower in his chair.
Another feast. Another reminder of the godsdamned truce that ruled every aspect of his life.
A truce that made his kingdom look weak, projecting an image of vulnerability when his enemies should only witness the might of the Second Realm. He was sure the other five kingdoms viewed the Second and First as weak, many of their warriors untested in battle now that a thousand years of peace had passed, liable to easily fold and fall during combat.
He was sure it was only a matter of time before someone dared to test them, believing them an easy target, a kingdom ripe for plucking.
Gods, Tegan longed for that day.
He would prove the might of his kingdom—his undeniable strength.
“We must honour the truce,” Raelin said, as if reading his thoughts.
Or perhaps his desire to end it was written plainly across his face.
He had never hidden it from them, had never concealed how much he hated it. They were all old enough to have seen how vehemently he had been against it when Edyn had proposed it all those centuries ago.
The only thing that kept him from breaking the truce was the fact he would dishonour Edyn’s name and those of his ancestors if he went through with it.
Although many of his warriors argued that being a peaceful realm dishonoured them in a more despicable fashion.
Hell, if Valdaine were present, his old friend would tell him to remove his advisers by force, seize true command of the kingdom and rip the truce to pieces.
Where was Valdaine?
The male had never been away from the castle for this long before. It had been almost a season since Tegan had seen him.
Eryt pulled him out of his thoughts. “There is word the Fourth Realm is moving warriors close to our borders, establishing a new fortress near the western lands.”
Tegan perked up. Was it finally happening?
Adrenaline poured through his veins and he sat straighter, leaned forwards and watched one of the candles as he gathered his thoughts, putting together a plan.
“We will dispatch two legions, one to the north and one to the south of the position of this new garrison, and I will go with the Royal Legion and oversee things at the closest point to it.” He had to bite back his grin as his mind leaped ahead, already picturing the battle that was liable to break out once the Fourth Realm got wind he had moved his legions to face their threat.
Raelin flatly said, “The Royal Legion has already been dispatched. Prince Ryker is leading them as usual.”
Tegan’s mood soured, the corners of his lips dipping sharply downwards as he frowned at Raelin.
His brother was getting all the glory again.
Gods, he wished he was as free as Ryker, as free as he had once been. He wasn’t sure when he had started to feel as if he was locked in a cage, but he felt it more keenly each day.
He paused.
Except for when he had been with the succubus.
When he had been around her, he had felt free. He hadn’t needed to be what everyone expected him to be, and it had been exhilarating, refreshing, and fun. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had fun.
He certainly wasn’t having it here in this damned meeting.
He stood, waved his hand and turned away from the four males.
“My king, we still must discuss the celebration.” Eryt made a valiant effort to stop him, leaping in front of him.
Tegan bared his fangs. “You do it. You all like controlling every little detail of things. Here is your chance to do that. I have things I must attend to in my quarters. I expect the debit cards I requested to be delivered before dinner.”
He swept past the male and out of the door, not waiting to see if anyone was going to voice a protest about his leaving. He had sat in that damned hard chair for five hours. He was done with it and his advisers.
He made his way through the black corridors, nodding to anyone he met as he moved up through the building to his private floors. A glare hurled at the two guards outside his door was enough to send them on their way. He pushed the heavy wooden door open, entered the drawing room, and closed it behind him.
His boots were loud on the wooden floor as he crossed the room to the open door in the opposite corner and turned right beyond it, heading up the winding stairs there to the next floor. He banked right again at the top of them, picking up pace as he neared his destination.
He passed the open door to his bedroom, his focus fixed on the closed one at the end of the wide corridor.
His sanctuary.
The door stuck a little as he pushed it open, the metal hinges squeaking and cutting through the silence. He closed it behind him and moved to his left, found the oil lamp and matches his aide had bought him last year from the mortal world and lit the wick. He placed the glass over the flame and turned the tiny dial, pulling more wick from the oil so the light brightened. He carried t
he lamp with him, over the plush furs that lined the wooden floors, to the tall green leather wingback armchair that stood by the fireplace.
Tegan set the lamp down on the low wooden table beside it and stooped in front of the grate, stacking logs and tinder in a uniform pattern before setting fire to them. He waited for the flames to catch and spread, devouring the offering of black wood, before he eased into his armchair. The leather creaked beneath his weight, a sound he had come to love over the years.
He leaned back and looked at this side of his library, only a small section of the entire room. Beyond the wall where the fireplace stood was another room, filled with wooden bookcases that were crammed with books. The ones he had already devoured were kept there. The bookcases that lined the walls in this smaller side of the library held the books he was yet to read. Hundreds of them.
Only Valdaine and Ryker, and his advisers knew of this place.
Tegan knew the image a demon king needed to project, and it wasn’t the one the succubus had witnessed last night. Few in his kingdom would understand his love of learning, even though he often read subjects with the intent of finding some way of using them to benefit his kingdom.
Even in this time of peace, his people still expected him to be savage and just, a powerful male driven by a thirst for bloodshed and a fierce need to protect, not a thirst for knowledge and a fierce need to improve the lives of his people.
He picked up the book on the side table and opened it.
Familiar guilt flared in his gut.
How many hours had he spent in this armchair, reading books when he should have been attending meetings with his advisers or doing other things? Reading had become an escape for him, but it didn’t lessen the feeling that he was shunning his duties as king.
In the early days of his rule, he had taken days at a time off, shutting himself away in this room, passing every hour reading in order to escape the hell that had become his life.
Sometimes, he still stole a day or two for himself, locking himself in his quarters and ignoring anyone who came to his door, losing track of time as he wrote down his thoughts and came up with plans, ways of improving the lives of his subjects.
He had drawn up thousands of blueprints over the years and hundreds of plans, outlines of projects that had never seen the light of day.
Yet.
Wind turbines to generate electricity and farms to provide sustenance and income weren’t the only projects he planned to put in motion. Education was just as important. Many of his people couldn’t read or write. Even some of his commanders lacked such basic skills, things he took for granted.
Things that made him feel like a spoiled bastard.
He had been educated by the finest tutors and had left his people and his warriors uneducated.
What sort of king was he?
One who intended to change that, although it wasn’t going to be easy. Demons were notoriously stubborn. If he announced his plans to establish schools in every village, his people would think he had been influenced by the elves, a species many of them still didn’t trust. He only wanted to improve their lives, but so many of them would resist him.
Tegan wanted to laugh at that.
His burden as a king wasn’t the constant threat of war, it was the pressing weight of wanting to improve the lives of his people.
Part of him would have preferred war to this. War he understood. War came easily to him. This was difficult. It required more strategizing, more study and cunning than the greatest battle.
A lunar cycle ago, when he had been shut away in his library attempting to find a way to bring education to his people without them resisting it, he had hit upon an idea, one that might just work.
He would enlist the help of the females who called the villages home. Since his kind couldn’t produce female offspring thanks to a curse placed upon them by the Devil when they had broken from him millennia ago, all of the village females were from outside the realm, a mixture of mortals, immortals and fae. Many of them were already educated to a degree and many of them had children with their demon mates. They would want an education for their offspring and Tegan didn’t know a demon male alive who could deny his fated mate something she wanted.
He grabbed the notepad and a device his aide had called a biro from the table beside him and scrawled a few ideas for locations where he could start implementing an educational programme. Once the other villages saw the project working, they would be less resistant to it, especially if he made sure the teachers in the schools pitched that an educated warrior was a better warrior and played up the swordsmanship and combat lessons he wanted to include.
Something he could personally attest to since he had been a damned awful warrior as a youth. It was only once his mind as well as his body had been trained that he had become the warrior he was, honed and skilled, using knowledge as well as physical strength to his advantage on the battlefield.
Tegan stared at the pen he gripped, mind whirling back to that night that seemed like a forever ago now.
He felt as if he needed to use all of his formidable skill as a warrior to claim her. She had been cunning, wily, led him on a merry dance that kept him on his toes.
Gods, he had loved it.
He set the pen down and tried to focus on his book, but windmills made him think of her now, and the black shirt he had draped over the back of his favourite armchair smelled of her. He shifted in his seat, a vain attempt to get comfortable, as if that would help him concentrate on reading.
There was little chance of it happening, he knew that deep in his heart. Normally, he could sit and read for hours, lost in whatever book he was devouring. Since meeting her, he had only been able to read in short bursts, his focus shot to hell.
Because he was restless.
Ached with a need to see her again.
His little succubus.
He growled at himself for the millionth time, rage curling his horns, causing them to grow past the lobes of his ears.
He should have asked for her name.
It plagued him, made him even more restless if that was possible. How many hours had he lain awake, wondering what her name was? She hadn’t even asked his. Had he meant that little to her? Was she truly not interested in him?
He rested his book on his knee. She had been interested. He had seen it in her eyes, smelled it on her, and felt it in the kiss she had pressed to his cheek. She wanted to see him again, had even given him her digits so it would be possible for him to speak with her.
Tegan pulled the sleeve of his loose white shirt up and rubbed his thumb over the numbers.
They were fading now.
The numbers weren’t the only thing that was fading. Her scent on his black shirt was too, and the weaker it grew, the fiercer the need to see her again became.
And his temper shortened too.
He reached over his shoulder and pulled the shirt from the back of his armchair, brought it to his nose and closed his eyes as he inhaled her sweet yet warmly-spiced scent. Calm rushed through him, easing the fire that had been building in his veins, and he sank into her scent, using it to smooth the edges of his temper.
It was no use.
He needed to see her again.
He stood and forced his horns away as he set his book aside and discarded the shirt. The moment they were hidden, a black hole opened beneath him and he dropped into it. Cool air rushed over him, comforting and soothing his ragged nerves, and then the scents of a thousand different things hit him.
The mortal world.
Tegan lifted his head, his eyes locking with the golden-brown ones of the brunette female behind the black bar of Underworld as she whipped to face him. The gasp that left her lips morphed into a growl as she shifted, transforming into a sleek silver feline with dark rings in her fur. She leaped onto the bar and hissed at him, her ears flicking backwards as her fur stood on end.
The door to the left of the bar area burst open and the huge silver-haired male he had seen
when he had visited before barrelled through it, took one look at the female as she swiped claws at Tegan, and launched at him on a feral snarl.
Tegan dodged backwards, evading the slash of the male’s claws. They raked through the air just inches from his chest. He bared his fangs, matching the shifter’s snarl, and kicked off, slamming into him and knocking him backwards into the bar. The male hit it with a low grunt and Tegan drove forwards, bending him over it as he grappled with him, attempting to grasp the male’s throat.
The male’s bare chest strained, every muscle flexing as he shoved at Tegan’s shoulder and face. His eyes brightened, turning silver as he bared fangs and fur rippled over his skin, revealing he was the same breed as the female on the bar.
She loosed a vicious growl and kicked towards Tegan, her right paw a blur as she batted it at him. He pushed away from the male and leaped backwards, evading her and the male as he quickly took advantage of his freedom, gripping the brass railing that ran the length of the black bar top and leveraging himself up with it to kick at Tegan with both feet.
The door shot open again, a flare of bright light that had Tegan covering his eyes so his sight didn’t dull and give the shifters an advantage over him.
“The fuck is going on?” Kyter’s familiar voice was a low growl in the dimly lit room as the door swung shut behind him.
Tegan felt Kyter’s gaze land on him and then shift away. He flicked a glance at the male, unwilling to take his eyes off his opponents for more than a second.
“Cav?” Kyter frowned at the bare-chested male, a flicker of concern in his golden eyes as he checked him over. “You alright?”
“Eloise,” the one called Cav breathed, his chest straining as he stared at Tegan, his irises a vivid silver now. “He attacked Eloise.”
“I did no such thing,” Tegan countered.
The female on the bar hissed and growled low, her eyes locked on him.
“I may have startled her,” he offered with an apologetic smile that didn’t stop her from hissing at him again.
Cav looked over his shoulder at her and her gaze leaped to him and then away, down to the counter she was standing on.
“Get her out of here. I’ll deal with our uninvited guest.” Kyter scrubbed a hand over his tousled sandy hair and yawned, the look on his face screaming of the anger Tegan could sense in him.
Seduced by a Demon King Page 9