by Rhyll Biest
Shax wore his silvery-white hair inordinately long, its tips brushing his knees. He played with it endlessly, combing it with his fingers and curling the ends.
And that was the least of his festival of craziness. Under his horned crown he wore orange eye shadow to highlight his violet eyes, and the long orange lashes beneath his plucked-thin brows looked artificial. If not, she was truly jealous. But what were the odds that Lord Fabio Crazy-pants could find Lore? He looked like he had the brains of a pasture nymph. The aura surrounding him fluctuated between shit brown and khaki. Repellent.
The rap of a fan on her shoulder interrupted Valeda’s contemplation. A blue-eyed she-demon, diamonds studding her elaborate pompadour wig and fan, stared at Valeda’s gown. ‘What are you wearing?’
‘Possibly one of your relatives.’ It was true; the queen listed many courtiers as mortal enemies. It was the chatter. She hated chatterers.
The demoness gasped. ‘The Code doesn’t allow demon-based fibres to be worn at court.’
Only her ten years of etiquette training at finishing school prevented Valeda from rolling her eyes. The dreaded Code. She’d only been in the realm for ten seconds and already it had been quoted at her.
Orsolya frowned. ‘Are you sure that’s in the Code? I haven’t heard of that rule.’
The courtier sighed. ‘A clause was introduced while you were hobnobbing topside, dear. King Shax decided that seeing relatives worn as hotpants and knee-high fuck-me boots lowered the general tone of the court. Obviously.’
Snooty bog beast. Valeda flashed her a tight smile. ‘Well, I’m from the Ninth Realm, where the queen banned all courtiers, and those who didn’t flee quickly enough she had made into drum skins. And the queen doesn’t even like drum music. Though she does enjoy making drums.’
The courtier gave her an appalled look before drifting off to tell her friends about the monster in the room.
Valeda gave a dismissive snort and regretted it when her head throbbed in protest. The Armageddon in her skull had left it raw and tender—no more snorts, sneezes or yodelling for her.
The line moved forward and Orsolya nudged her. ‘We’re next. Are you okay? You look even paler than usual.’
‘I’m fine, just a little tired.’ And very low on juice, and battered by her failing memory wall. She gathered herself. Shax was an unknown quantity and she had to stay alert. She nudged Orsolya. ‘Probably best if you don’t use my title or mention we’re cousins when you introduce me.’
Orsolya raised an eyebrow but nodded.
When they stepped before the throne Shax stretched his pouty lips in what Valeda assumed was a smile for Orsolya, and then he raised his ridiculously orange penciled brows at her.
‘What have we here? Something lost?’
Valeda shook her head. ‘Nope, someone looking for something.’
Orsolya shushed her.
Valeda raised her brows. Was she breaking the Code by speaking for herself?
‘No, you are a lost thing. I am never wrong about that.’
Valeda frowned. Did he just call her a thing? If she’d had more juice she would have frozen his stupid, shiny lips into a pout popsicle.
Shax held his hand out and a courtier slapped something into it. When he raised the object to his lips and started tracing them she identified it as lip gloss in a jewelled case. Shax surveyed her while aggressively glossing his lips.
Orsolya moved restlessly. ‘My king, I’d like to petition you on behalf of my good friend Valeda. She wants to find an archdemon called Lore.’
Shax’s violet gaze settled on Valeda. It felt slimy to her, like she’d stepped on a bog nymph.
‘Valeda, Valeda, Valeda.’ He tapped his chin and some of the courtiers tittered. Valeda now understood why her mother had threatened to make drums out of them. Titterers deserved to be made into drums.
He narrowed his eyes. ‘You’re alight with lost things, my dear. There’s that heart missing from your chest, the archdemon you seek, and that thing you lost a long time ago that made you so sad. And there’s something else about you.’
My comparatively high level of sanity? She curled her hands into fists to resist the strong urge to back away from him.
He snapped his fingers. ‘Got it!’
‘You’ve found the archdemon already?’ Orsolya’s eyes widened.
Shax looked at Orsolya as if he was surprised she was still there. Then he smiled. ‘Orsolya, darling, you have brought me the most fab-o present. I will reward you handsomely.’
Orsolya frowned. ‘What do you mean, sire?’
Shax smiled at her, violet eyes glittering. ‘You’ve brought me Princess Valeda, and the Captain of Bloodshed and Slaughter will be so very pleased that I’ve found his lost object.’
Really? Valeda forced a cool smile. ‘I think you’ll find that’s not true. I’m not an object, nor am I lost.’
Shax chuckled and waved a hand. ‘Shax knows everything about a lost object; there’s no point arguing with him.’
Orsolya shot Valeda a worried look. ‘But, sire, Princess Valeda is my cousin.’
Valeda bit her lip and shook her head. It was clear she was in deep trouble, and there was no need to drag Orsolya down with her.
Shax took his time answering, happy to prolong the agony while applying more gloss before speaking. ‘I have spoken, Orsolya. Do not question your king. Step back.’
Valeda’s jaw ached with frustration. Infernal inflorescence, this was so not going how she’d planned it.
With a helpless look, Orsolya retreated and Shax nodded at his guards. A heavy hand descended on Valeda’s shoulder and a guard dragged her towards a pillar with a long chain affixed to it.
She reached for her demon power and found it near to nothing. Playing the royal card was lame but she had few options. ‘Do you know what Queen Marchelaine will do to you if you detain her daughter?’
Shax cocked his head, the deep purple striations in his violet eyes whirling like a kaleidoscope. ‘Detain you? I’m not detaining you, princess, I’m simply offering you my hospitality until your husband arrives.’
Oh, no, no, no. This was so not happening to her. She searched for something heavy to smash over the guard’s dome-shaped head but there was nothing in reach unless she counted courtiers.
So count the courtiers.
She ducked low and shouldered the guard into a cluster of rubbernecking onlookers, pulling free from his grip as he fought to untangle himself from the flailing, squealing crowd. Shrieks split her eardrums as she pushed her way through fussy, harebrained courtiers.
A hand found her gown and jerked her back. She whirled and swung a punch, losing her balance when she missed. A boot kicked her legs from behind and she fell to the stone floor, smashing her kneecaps.
As she swayed, body awash with pain, a rough hand grabbed her by the hair. The guard used his grip to jerk her head back and snap a steel collar around her neck before dragging her to her feet. When the monobrowed dolt smirked at his handiwork she slashed at his face with her nails, drawing five red streaks down his cheek.
He shoved her hard against the pillar and raised his arm to backhand her.
‘Stop.’ Shax’s voice rang out in censure. ‘Only nobles may strike other nobles.’
The guard muttered but backed away.
Thank Lilith, Shax was a snob. Bruised but determined, Valeda wrapped her hands around the collar and yanked at it, trying to pry the chain links apart. But the chain simply rattled its derision. Something slimy coated her fingers from touching the collar, and a thick scent filled her nostrils. Gorgon fat. Impossible to remove once it was married with steel. It would have blocked her from using her powers if she’d had any to start with.
Shax left his throne to mince over to her. He stroked her hair. ‘That’s interesting.’
The urge to headbutt him was strong. She jerked her hair away from his vile hand. ‘What is?’
His eyes, violet depths gleaming with malice, studied her. ‘
You were also a lost thing to your brother. But now that he’s found you he plans to keep you.’
Pain flared at the mention of her brother, slicing through her brain like a hot knife through butter.
Shax smiled. ‘Perhaps I should let him know where you are and see whether your husband or your brother claims you first.’ He smiled, a panther playing with its prey.
She choked as a steel fist clubbed at her skull.
Shax laughed before applying more gloss. With a wink he blew her a kiss with his obscenely glistening lips. ‘Must go now. Things to find, demons to do.’
***
Adriel created a bloody road of felled demons with his sword as his brother guarded his back.
He’d tracked Lady Icicle to another realm but had lost her where she’d used another demon’s blood portal. He’d had to return, empty-handed, to the battlelines. With a lupine snarl he whirled to behead an enemy demon. His dread mare caught the demon’s flying head in her mouth and crunched into it like it was an apple. He patted her neck. ‘Good girl.’
Tane, his hellhound, leapt up, a grey streak of muscle as he tried to steal a piece of skull from the mare. When she lashed out with a razor-sharp, steel-shod hoof Tane flattened his ears and slunk away to find his own prize.
Hakan grinned, the silver tattoo of a sword on his neck obscured by black blood. ‘Are we having fun yet?’ He let the multicoloured blood of his enemies run down his face and drip from his chin.
Adriel usually enjoyed smearing the blood of his enemies on his face too, but right now his stomach was eating itself in rage at the sight of the bodies of their fallen comrades lying in the mud, at their forced retreat, and at his failure to find Valeda.
He dismounted, sank almost up to his knees in mud and cursed. Another reason to hate the rainy season. During battle the muddy ground turned into a devouring mouth. As if they needed an additional opponent.
Hakan waded closer, not seeming to care that mud painted him up to the waist. ‘What’s that in your arm?’ He squinted at Adriel.
‘A saw-edged blade.’
His brother grunted. ‘Want me to pull it out for you?’
Adriel gave his brother a look to let him know he was mad. ‘Only a busty she-demon with gentle hands and lax morals is going to touch the thing, and only after a liberal application of analgesic spells, topside drugs and brimstone ale.’
‘You’re such a baby.’ Hakan grinned.
Adriel was glad they’d moved on from their earlier argument. When, earlier, he’d failed to find Valeda he’d taken his foul mood out on his brother.
A first for him.
And though he’d already apologised, the incident made him uneasy. The beast inside him had grown quicker to anger, edgier, and more restless with the passing of a single moon cycle. A few hours ago he’d fallen into a deep sleep of exhaustion before waking with his heart swelling in his chest, punching away at his ribs until its escape seemed imminent. Even more inexplicably, his four hellhounds had pushed their way inside his tent and crawled onto his straw pallet, licking and nuzzling him until his heart settled again. Something strange was taking place in his body, something the hellhounds could sense.
He rubbed sweat from his eyes with his uninjured arm. After he’d healed his wound he would search once more for his bride. Once he had her in his possession, he would bind her in gorgon fat-coated chains to keep her from escaping again. Then he could focus fully on fighting her brother.
He inspected the ragged notches in his blade. Perhaps it was time for a change of swords. His dread mare rolled her eyes, whites flashing. The flash of white reminded him of Valeda’s skin, the serenity of her enigmatic face.
A message from his advisor interrupted his reverie. Small blood vessels in his eyes burst as his advisor’s power tapped him. Cursing, he allowed Ipos to send him a mental message, the delivery of it causing a warm trickle of black to flood his eyes. Being messaged by Ipos was convenient—it saved travel and energy—but it was also painful.
He blinked the blood out of his eyes as the message formed clearly. ‘Captain, one of your spies has spotted your wife in King Shax’s court. Chained to a pillar.’
He blinked. Well, well. Demonic karma was a bitch. ‘Did your spy say why my wife was there?’
‘She arrived with Orsolya, one of Shax’s kin.’
Adriel frowned. What was his ice princess up to? He brushed the question aside. Whatever her scheme had been it had failed, and once he’d chained her securely to something very solid, they were going to have words.
***
Valeda frowned. Shax had returned but proceeded to ignore her. No doubt he imagined her sweating as she tried to predict what would happen next, whether her husband or her brother would come for her first.
She doubled over in pain as the memory wall punished her for thinking of her brother, had to decline Russian numbers by gender and case until her mind cleared.
How long could she expect to remain chained like a dog? She raised a hand to inspect it. The normal sheen of frost that sparkled on her skin had faded to nothing, her skin now a dull bone colour.
She tugged at the hateful metal clamped around her neck. Someone needed their face eaten for making her this unhappy. And she could eat her own face for making such a serious error in judgement by approaching Shax. What an embarrassment, a disgrace to her family name, to be taken prisoner by such a demon.
She had to free herself.
Without any juice or the ability to summon help, her only allies now were trickery, cunning and opportunity. She studied the courtiers. They threw glances her way as they laughed and whispered, and one grew bold enough to prod her with a bejewelled slipper as he passed, goblet and fan in hand.
She narrowed her eyes at the footwear around her. Most wore ornamental steel tips on their boots, some with embedded jewels.
Sheer vanity.
A few wore tiny ornamental daggers strapped to the sides of their boots. Wasn’t that against the Code? Lilith, now she sounded like Orsolya. She waited for the next prodder to come by, an elderly fop with a purple quiff, and tackled him.
She suffered a kick to the ribs as they grappled on the floor in a tangle, but she felt nothing but triumph as she yanked his ornamental dagger free. Curling into a ball she rolled away, clutching her booty to her chest to hide her theft. While the courtiers tittered she ran her fingers over her prize.
Between the dagger and her mother’s hairpin—still in her hair—she had all she needed to free herself.
Or die trying.
As much as she despised physicality and felt it was beneath her, in this dimension one had to approach violence like her mother did—with eagerness. She didn’t even have to dig that deep to find savagery after being chained for the amusement of a bunch of courtiers she wouldn’t wipe her arse with.
A guard approached, grinning. He’d kicked her once already, the steel cleats of his boatlike boots leaving bloody rake marks down her legs. As he neared she readied herself. If her attack failed she would be punished for it—painfully.
Too bad.
The guard reached for her and she grabbed his arm with both hands and yanked him forward. He stumbled and fell, his chest plate clanging against the stone, and she used the dagger she’d stolen to cut his throat.
But the dagger was so tiny and blunt that she botched it.
Grey blood spattered across her face and hands, hot and sticky and reeking of sulphur—so much mess for one little shivving—but the wound lacked depth and the guard fought back even as Valeda’s fingers closed around the key she sought.
The screams of the courtiers shredded her eardrums as the courtiers carried on as if they’d never seen a throat cut before. The guard reached for his dagger—twice the size of hers—and she grabbed for the hairpin in her hair. The dagger flashed before her eyes as her fingers found her mother’s gift. Killing a royal guard was no doubt breaching the Code big-time, but she hadn’t asked to be taken prisoner—and that was against her code
.
She dodged the guard’s slashing dagger while plunging the hairpin deep into his thigh. It slid effortlessly through his flesh and his back arched as if he’d been electrocuted. The click of his teeth snapping together as his jaw locked almost smothered the sound of cartilage grinding as his whole body went rigid. The scent of ammonia filled the air as he lost control of his bladder.
Best wedding gift ever.
The rest was lost on her as she whirled to face the boots pounding her way—two more guards, eyes dark with fear and rage. They dragged her by her chain to throw her at Shax’s feet, and the ornamental dagger slipped from her grip as she put out a hand to break her fall. She kept a death grip on the key in her other hand.
Her chain rattled, a hollow sound, as hollow as her hope of escape. Shax yanked her up by the hair and put his effete but surprisingly strong hands around her throat, his wild, violet eyes boring into her. ‘You dare violate the Code by spilling blood in my court?’
Fuck you, like you haven’t violated a billion fashion codes by wearing that particular shade of eye shadow. Well, that was what she wanted to scream, but his fingers were too tight around her airway.
Pressure built in her skull and darkness danced before her eyes as his blood choke took effect. She flailed, thrust a lucky palm under his nose and savoured the way it crunched. His head rocked back. He shook his head, spattering her with lavender blood, but his grip on her throat only tightened. Lucifer’s left nut, she knew she wasn’t the best hand-to-hand fighter, but surely a broken nose was a broken nose and should have loosed his grip on her a little? Darkness encroached as she kicked at his groin with her boot, but where she’d expected to hit soft parts there was nothing but hard thigh.
He hissed in her ear. ‘Nice try, but demons in my family have the ability to retract their sexual organs completely within their body.’
Gross. And just her luck.
The room dimmed to a thin, grey mist and a high-pitched whine stung her ears as she struggled. The key dropped from her nerveless hand.
Perhaps her plan had not been such a good one after all.
The pressure around her throat disappeared and she fell to her knees.