“I will take that chance,” Erion stated flatly.
From behind the counter, the mutore laughed softly. “How brave you are, Mutore. I, however, have no interest in baiting a rabid shark with my blood. My death weighs heavily on my mind at all times—and my family’s.” He flipped through a file of papers on the table. “Speaking of which, where is my elixir? The one you promised me. The one you believe Cruen may have, the one that may prolong my life.”
Erion grunted. “I must get to Cruen to find it.”
“Then we are at an impasse,” the male said sadly. “I do not know where he is. He has not contacted me in some time.”
Erion’s eyes narrowed. “You know something. I can feel it, smell it.”
The male lifted his head, locked eyes with Erion. For one moment, he looked the true reptile his Shifter genes carried. Scales appeared on his face and neck, and between his teeth a forked tongue darted out.
“Yes, you know something,” Erion hissed.
The reptile retreated on a gasp, and left a bereft looking male with deep fear in his eyes.
The demon inside of Erion, the lion-like animal that clawed to get out, growled with possessive ire. “Cruen took something that belonged to me.”
“What? Your dignity?” Raine sighed. “Welcome to my universe.”
“A balas.”
Raine stilled, his gaze holding Erion’s tightly, curiously. “Why would he take a balas?”
“It belongs to me.”
The words took a moment to sink in. “It?” Raine looked horrified.
“He,” Erion said gruffly. “A boy. My boy.”
The words were strange on his tongue. It had been a mistake, the boy’s conception. After learning of Nicholas’s existence, Erion had been watching his twin for some time, was so curious as to his brother’s strange relations with women. Now Erion knew that Nicholas had only been carrying out a long stretch of torment from his past, a pattern of prostitution that his mother—their mother—had forced upon him as a young vampire. But Erion had seen only pleasure, connection, the bliss of being touched, in Nicholas and the females he mounted.
He’d wanted that too.
Fuck, he’d wanted that desperately.
He’d met with one of Nicholas’s females, allowed a mating to take place between them. It had been a good union, comforting. He’d had no idea she’d borne a child from their coupling. Hadn’t known until several months ago. He’d thought such a thing impossible as Cruen had told him and all the mutores that they were unable to breed.
A growl escaped his throat, rumbling through the dusty air of the mutore’s shop. Another of Cruen’s many lies. For too many years, the bastard paven had pretended to care about them all, pretended to be a father, when in truth he’d used them. They were nothing but tools , heavily muscled lab rats that Cruen hadn’t deemed worthy to breed.
Erion’s face and body language must’ve taken on a raw, hostile air, because Raine inched back, shaking his head and looking fearful.
“I am sorry he has taken your balas,” he said in a careful voice. “I wish I could help.”
“You will help,” Erion said, retreating from the blips of his past with barely suppressed rage. “I don’t wish to harm you, but if you keep something from me—something that would help me find the balas—I won’t hold my beast back from ripping you apart.”
Abject fear glittered in Rain’s eyes. “It is only rumors, rumblings.”
“Whatever it is, I want it all.”
Behind the desk Raine crumpled into a chair. He looked utterly miserable. “It is nearly too fantastical to be believed. I don’t want to send you on a wild, impossible ride.”
Ah, the male did know something. He had been wise to press. “Nothing is impossible when Cruen is involved.”
“This is true, but . . .” Raine’s jaw tightened. “If I give you the information I have, you must promise me something. My daughter is in swell. I wish to live to see this child. If you find it, this elixir you believe Cruen possesses, will you bring it to me?”
Making promises, making deals suggested weakness. But Erion could relate to the need this male had to see his line continue. As it was, they were both concerned fathers. He nodded. “I give you my word.”
Raine’s eyes closed and he released a weighty breath. “Believe it or not, I have heard he is to be mated.”
“What?” Erion roared.
The male flinched, but managed to nod. “Cruen is taking a bride.”
One
“Are you listening to me, your highness?”
Hellen drew back her bow, aimed it at the streaking ball of pale yellow light ten feet in front of her, and let the arrow fly. She waited for impact, for the impish little rogue demon to drop, but it didn’t. It ran away cackling.
She turned and glared at Eberny. “You must cease talking while I hunt.”
The ancient demon, a male/female hybrid, was undaunted. “You will be leaving us very soon, your highness. Your father has instructed me to make certain you understand your duties.”
Under the haze of auburn daylight, Hellen grabbed another arrow from her quiver and said in a dangerous voice, “My duties.”
“Indeed,” said Eberny, following Hellen as the young female demon suddenly took off, jogging along the perimeter of the Rain Fields. “How you are to conduct yourself.”
That little bastard, thought Hellen, her eyes searching for the lost rogue. Ah! There. It was ducking in and out of a cloud, grinning its toothless grin, toying with her.
With one easy movement, Hellen drew back her arrow and sent it straight for the cloud. It whizzed through the Rain Fields like a bolt of lightning.
Flash! A hit.
Hellen grinned as the rogue demon creature exploded.
“A worthy shot, your highness,” said Eberny in a contained voice before picking up the topic of discussion again. “It would be wise to recall the lessons learned in the Academy. The ones dealing with a female’s obligations to her male counterpart.”
Scanning the Rain Fields for more rogues, Hellen snorted. “Unfortunately I do not recall it. A much needed nap was taken during that bout of instruction, I believe.”
“Your highness, that is not at all amusing,” stated Eberny, the hybrid’s mud-brown eyes narrowing with disapproval.
And yet girlish laughter sounded behind them. Hellen looked up to see her two younger sisters skipping down the black-earthed hillock toward them, long, pale yellow hair at their backs and yards of fuchsia and gold skirt trailing behind. Levia and Polly looked like a painting, so demure, so female. Perfect demon royalty. While she—if not for her disagreeable red coils of hair—looked like their brother.
“Hellen, dear.”
“Pray don’t shoot at us. We come in peace.”
Each female gave her a kiss on the cheek. They smelled of fireflower, the only flower allowed to grow in the underworld. It was most rare, picked and bottled the moment it flowered, then made into a perfume oil for the daughters of the Demon King.
Hellen preferred the scent of ashes, of the black soot beneath her feet—of the death of each rogue demon.
She was strange that way.
She had been told many times that she was named for her place of birth. But over the years she had come to wonder if her mother had known what grew inside her womb, what she would be unleashing into the underworld. A true hellion. Had the female demon had a premonition about a fiery gust of flaming hair and defiant disposition, and then come to a quick decision about her name?
A sudden flash of light, bright blue and practically spitting off rogue energy, caught her peripheral vision and she whirled around, grabbing for an arrow.
“Your highness, please,” Eberny implored. “Listen to me.”
Hellen shifted the bow and arrow, following the muted blue light deep in the Rain Fiel
ds ahead. “My eyes may be on my target, Eberny, but my ears are open. What is it you think I need to know?”
“The male you are to be given to will expect certain behaviors.”
“Indeed. I spread my legs when instructed, yes?”
Behind her, Levia and Polly gasped. Hellen drew back her bow and grinned. She could practically see the girls’ wide blue eyes, their gloved hands covering their mouths. She would miss them terribly, miss their sweet ways and perpetually outraged reactions. But then again, she was glad to be going. Her sacrifice would be their safeguard, always.
Eberny’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Sexual relations are only a small part of being a submissive partner, your highness.”
Submissive.
Hellen’s urge to kill amplified and she narrowed her eyes on the acres upon acres of Rain Fields where the rogue demons, the excess magical energy her father, Abaddon, released within the underworld, loved to hide.
“Do not look him in the eyes when he speaks to you,” Eberny continued.
“Where shall I look, then?” Hellen asked with an emotionless tone. “Between his legs?”
Again, her sisters gasped. “Oh, Hellen, you are wicked,” said Levia, her voice muffled through her gloved hand.
Eberny turned to them and sniffed. “She enjoys giving me pains in my head.”
Very true. Hellen chuckled and drew back an arrow, waited for the flash of blue, and sent it flying. It missed by a good ten feet. The little bastard’s subsequent cackling killed her laughter.
“If you could just be more like your sisters,” Eberny said on a sigh.
Hellen glanced back at the lovely specimens of female demon and shook her head, her gaze affectionate in the extreme. Yes, she would miss them terribly. “I know. It would be easier all round.”
Levia and Polly laughed, rushed forward, and embraced her.
“You are perfect as you are, Hellen,” Levia crooned.
“Yes, indeed,” agreed Polly. “Except for the hunter attire . . . perhaps if we had something made in a soft shade of pink—”
The mute button was pressed on Polly’s appraisal of her clothing as Hellen spotted the blue rogue staring at her through a thin layer of cloud. It grinned. Hellen’s blood heated and she gripped her bow tightly. She had been hunting demon rogues ever since she could hold a bow, and they knew how to play with her. Pure, soulless energy, they weren’t afraid to die or to be hunted. On the contrary. Abaddon’s excess magic loved risk and chase and the possibility of being extinguished.
And so did Hellen.
Sir Ugly and Blue widened his yellow eyes and made a disgusting noise at the lot of them, then took off.
Hellen smirked. “I’ll be back.”
“No, Hellen, wait,” Levia called.
But Hellen refused to be deterred from the hunt. She raced into the Rain Fields. Drops of water as hot as ash fell from gray clouds only feet off the ground. She’d been inside the Fields hundreds of times, and knew how to maneuver through them without getting burned. Bow and arrow at the ready, she kept her quick pace, her eyes narrowing each time she lost sight of the blue flash of light.
It came as sudden as a breath; a rush of intensity, a familiar scent. Hatred and disappointment, sadness and intense power.
Hellen stopped short and dropped her weaponry. A forced and familiar action. As the bow and quiver sat in a small well of collected water, a tornado ripped through the Rain Fields and came straight for her, stopping just a foot away. The blood of excitement, of chase that had been rushing through Hellen’s veins a moment ago turned to black ice.
He was before her.
The Devil himself.
The Demon King, Abbadon.
Hellen looked up. “Hello, Father.”
In his present state Abbadon looked the very essence of a demon. Ten feet tall, red skin pulled tight over heavy, impervious muscle, eyes the color of the clouds that only moments ago parted for him. As Hellen stared up at her sire, she saw nothing of herself in him and yet knew that she of all her sisters was the most like him.
“What are you doing?” he asked in a voice unworldly and growlingly low.
Unlike her sisters, Hellen felt no fear when standing in her father’s presence. Only a desperation within her mind to be cautious and thoughtful with the words that came out of her mouth.
“Preparing myself for wedded bliss.”
His scaly skinned eyebrow lifted. “With a crossbow?”
“Perhaps this male you have sold me to will appreciate my hunting skills.”
There was a flicker in his gaze, a momentary flash of fury, but he contained it. “I allow you to hunt the rogue demons for me because frankly you are far superior a shot than any of my other male hunters I possess, but it stops the moment you leave my underworld. Do you understand?”
Hellen nodded, but her fingers flexed, ached to hold her weapon.
“You will not shame me.”
“I am rather good at it though, Father.”
Again the flash of fury clouded his already pale eyes. “Yes,” he hissed. “But after today the consequences will be dire.”
Hellen’s muscles tensed. “Today?” She’d thought she had more time.
The Devil’s grin made the black scorched earth below her feet tremble. “The time has come, daughter. You will leave us and take your place above ground—”
“With the bloodsucker,” Hellen finished for him, unable to retrain her acerbic tone.
Abbadon’s nostrils flared and he coiled over her like a snake. The air went silent and the rain ceased to fall. It was his attempt at intimidation. There was nothing the Demon King appreciated more than fear in his offspring. Especially from the one before him.
But Hellen remained cool under his taut, red-faced glare. This was never the way to get her to cower, get her on her knees, eyes down and shoulders trembling. Unfortunately, over the past few years Abbadon had found the way in to her fear center.
He cocked his head to one side. “Is that your sisters’ carefree laughter I hear?”
Hellen heard nothing but the deadly silence and the threat that hovered next on her father’s thin, reptilian-like lips.
“I will do as I am instructed,” she said in a quiet, noxious voice.
In a shock of movement and hot wind, Abbadon rushed toward her. Matching her height now, his face the color of rich, thick blood, he placed one long finger under her chin and lifted. “You had better.”
Or the two lovely demon females waiting for you on the bank of the Rain Fields will feel my true wrath, he didn’t say.
He didn’t have to say it.
Hellen pulled her chin from his sickeningly warm touch and said in a firm voice, “I will be the perfect little demon.”
Abbadon grinned and gave a wave of his hand to the fields around them. “You will be the perfect little female.”
The clouds instantly released their torrent of hot rain, sound returned to the air, and out of the corner of her eye, Hellen saw a flash of blue light.
“Now,” Abbadon said, his gaze sweeping over her. “Get back to the Dwelling. You leave within the hour, and you must be bathed, combed, dressed, and prepared.”
Prepared.
Hellen clung to the word as the Devil turned and dissolved into the hot, misty air. She had sacrificed herself, would give herself to this bloodsucker her father had sold her to, but that’s where it would end. And her most important bit of preparation would make it so.
The flash of demon blue hit her peripheral once more and she reached for her weapon. Without taking another breath, she had the bow stretched back and released. The arrow hit the target and Hellen reveled in her final kill as she walked out of the Rain Fields and toward her sisters for the last time.
* * *
Erion’s lip curled as beneath his feet, the earth rumbled. It wa
s a soft, uncomplicated movement, just a hint of warning to the animals thereabouts. Flee little ones, get out of the way before you’re run down by an ill-fated traveling party.
And a mutore paven who would kill anything and anyone who got in his way.
As he stood there, the earth’s easy tremble intensified. Granted, he was still able to hold his ground without issue, but the manic shudder made him not only cautious, but suspicious. Was this truly it? he mused, his fangs descending, his muscles flexing, tensing. Had Raine been truthful with this location? With the arrival of the parcel Erion had come to steal?
The bride he’d come to steal.
Cruen’s bride.
Erion’s gaze narrowed on the length of dirt road ahead. For Raine’s sake, and the future the mutore wished to see, he hoped so.
Suddenly, the shudder escalated into a severe shake that reverberated up through Erion’s feet, calves, to his gut, into his chest, and all the way to his jaw, making his teeth rattle inside his mouth. Around him, the trees creaked as their weight was redistributed and the birds took to the air en masse.
Erion dropped into a fighting stance and unsheathed his blade.
This was no wedding party approaching, he thought blackly, slowly rotating so he could see in every direction. This wasn’t Cruen’s bride. Couldn’t be. This was below ground, nature’s doing, inconvenient though it was, a cry of—
The thought died inside his mind as a massive shudder nearly sent him to his knees. Before him the earth cracked, one long seam, splitting apart with a jarring lurch. Christ! Erion jumped back as the plaintive wail of breaking rock and shifting plates stole the forest’s air. A earthquake—had to be. He was on California land, after all.
A few feet away, a mega blast of dirt shot into the air, raining down sharp, black pellets onto his face and body. He should flash. Get out of this particular line of fire. Return to France and demand a new location from Raine. Or maybe a strip of flesh from his lying hide.
He was on his way, his cells nearly transferred when suddenly, from inside the dust geyser, came a wail, a shriek so intense Erion felt it deep within his bones. Like a wave crashing against the shore, he heard it again and again. The sound boomed through the forest, pinging against the battered trees, then slamming back into Erion’s ears. He shook his head, attempting to clear the sound. As he did, his gaze caught on the crack in the earth. In the very center, where the sound seemed to emanate from. Though any sane paven would’ve gotten the hell out of there at that point, Erion drew closer. He couldn’t help himself. He saw something.
Eternal Beauty: Mark of the Vampire (A Penguin Special from Signet Eclipse) Page 8