The Demon King

by Heather Killough-Walden

  Hesperos chuckled.

  Others at the Table began to smile or laugh as well; it was too hard not to. Darius had one of those grins that was utterly disarming. Which was why his bed was rarely empty. The Shifter King was possibly more of a playboy, in fact, than the Nightmare King. Roman almost shook his head at the thought when he realized the only men left at the Table to find mates were the ones least likely to settle down. He almost felt sorry for whatever queens fate chose to tame them. They would have to be the most patient women in history.

  “I’m okay with that,” said Hesperos with an heir of genuine nonchalance. Of course he wouldn’t mind not being in touch – he was brand new to the Table anyway. He was still in “loner” mode.

  “Then assuming the Dragon King and the Time King agree, it’s settled,” said Evie, who had clearly taken over, “the Thirteen Realms will meet only when necessary.” She glanced at the empty Akyri King’s chair. “Such as when we introduce new queens to the Table. Otherwise, we will convene without you party animals,” she said looking at the bachelors one at a time.

  They smiled at her unabashedly. Roman shook his head, grinning. That’s my girl, he thought. Controlling the chessboard. When Evie turned and looked up at him, she returned that smile.

  “What about the Demon King?” asked someone at the Table. The room fell into silence again. The Demon King, thought Roman. He hadn’t heard Lazarus referred to in such a manner in some time. But it was true that sometimes the Akyri were called demons.

  “He’s off the suspect bachelor list,” said Evie, still smiling. But there was a secret to it now, and laughter in her eyes. “And believe me, he has his hands too full to be plotting anyone’s demise.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Something urgent was niggling at the edges of her consciousness, a kind of busy knowledge that she was forgetting something important. There was an image in her mind that was blurry, out of focus. She couldn’t make it out no matter how hard she tried.

  Wake up.

  She floated, peaceful and comfortable, in the weightlessness of sleep, and there was a large part of her that wasn’t in a hurry to disrupt that feeling. But a small, more insistent part was telling her to wake the hell up.

  Wake up.

  Something had happened, hadn’t it? What was it? Flashes of images moved in that blurriness, fragments of sound like audio clips taken from a hundred different movies. There was static and she felt the heat of purple fire and she was staring into eyes the color of a tropical sea.

  Wake up.

  Those eyes… His eyes, she thought, finally able to form something coherent in her brain. His eyes. They were his eyes! More flashes, more sounds, and the shine of a badge on a belt. Gunshots, the crackling of purple lightning in a shield. A… dog?

  Something terribly important had gone down. She needed to wake up. Her brow furrowed, and like slowly pulling back heavy curtains, she finally managed to open her eyes. Confusion settled to stay in her mind when she was greeted with darkness. If it was dark, it was night. Why had it been so hard to wake up? And… had she been dreaming? She didn’t dream, not any longer.

  Riding the coattails of these jumbled thoughts was the dawning realization that she was not in her own bed. The blankets felt different. They were lighter, silkier, cooler to the touch. At home, she would cuddle under gobs of blankets and use magic to make the temperature in her cottage drop drastically. She loved the dichotomy of a cold face and warm body.

  She needed light.

  She whispered the words to a spell that would give her just such a thing, and the space around her was suddenly awash in warm, soft yellow light.

  If she lived another thousand years, she would not have enough time to describe the grandeur of the chamber around her. And like the cherry on top, a gold vase filled with ice sat on a side table next to the luxurious bed. Lodged into the ice, being chilled like champagne, rested two vials of Lifeblood.

  “What in the nine hells – ” Her statement of shock was cut short by what sounded like a bomb going off somewhere nearby. She squealed as the bed beneath her shook, and several pebbles of gold were knocked loose from the ceiling above her. The mirror in the dresser across the room cracked, and a chunk of glass tumbled to the dresser top. Sounds of screaming arose beyond the double chamber door, joined by the recognizable noises of spell casting.

  Dahlia’s heart hammered. She quickly scrambled out of bed, relieved beyond words that she was still fully dressed. Her mind spun as she looked from the door across the room to the gold vase filled with Lifeblood vials beside the bed.

  The yelling outside grew louder until she could identify several distinct voices. One, a male’s, repeatedly gave orders to several others, directing them toward an armory, to a portal of some sort, and instructing them to “man stations.” Dahlia’s panic continued to rise with these sounds, as she realized it could only mean a violent situation. She was in a room she didn’t recognize, she had no idea what time of day it was, and the room she didn’t recognize was in a building that was under attack.

  Think, Dahlia.

  The first thing she did was scramble for the Lifeblood. Whatever the situation and whatever happened, she was a few quarts low. If she needed to use her magic, the Lifeblood would give her the strength to do so.

  Suddenly, the massive gold-gilt double doors to the chamber slammed noisily open. “My lady!”

  A man rushed into the chamber, followed by a handful of soldiers. It wasn’t that they were dressed in fatigues or shining armor that gave Dahlia the instant impression of soldiers – it was the orderly way they filed in, the blank expressions on their faces despite the chaos that was going on behind them, and the fact that they divided themselves up evenly and stood on either side of the double doors, no doubt awaiting instructions.

  Light flooded the chamber from the hall beyond the door, and Dahlia could immediately tell it was sunlight. No wonder it was hard for me to wake up, she thought. During the day, she shouldn’t have been able to get up at all! What was going on?

  The man leading the soldiers was approximately six feet tall, had strawberry red hair so bright it was that naturally orange color that was so rare, and was wearing an auburn velvet blazer. These striking, readily recognizable things were the first to register for Dahlia. She recognized him as the same man who’d entered the portal yesterday to rescue them from what had clearly become a portal trap.

  “Bael… right?” she asked in a numb tone. “Bael of the Blood Moon Valley, messenger of the Grand Tenebrous Court?”

  The man stopped in his tracks and his jaw dropped open a touch. “I am impressed, my lady!” he said genuinely.

  “I have a good memory…” she said, but then added, “once in a while.” Her voice trailed off as the events of the last twenty-four hours flooded her mind, and a hard knot settled in her stomach. The Demon King, she thought, remembering the Detective’s words.

  “You must leave at once!” said Bael as he rushed toward her. Dahlia swallowed hard and braced herself. “I can take you to the prince, and then you both must hide some place safe. Your location has been compromised!”

  My location, thought Dahlia, as she contemplated that too. This must have been the castle that the man had transported them both to. She’d passed out shortly afterward.

  A second boom rocked the building, and more chunks of ceiling cascaded down atop them. Dahlia put her arms out for balance, and when she did, she saw the vase with the Lifeblood begin to topple to the floor. Suddenly, she was blurring, her body becoming half solid, half gaseous as it traveled at an impossible speed through space. She moved so fast, she grasped the vials out of thin air as if they’d been frozen in time. Once she had them, she spun back around to face Bael, and re-took solid form.

  His eyes were the size of tea cup saucers in his face, but his lips were slightly smiling, and his composure was mainly maintained.

  “What do you mean my location has been compromised?” she demanded before he could say an
ything.

  “The prince’s cousin has found you!” he said. “I believe he must have locked on to your magic signature in the portal where you were temporarily trapped. Which means he will have traced the prince as well. Time is of the essence!” he exclaimed, panic making its way into his features.

  Okay, absolutely none of that makes sense, she thought. But the questions piling up would have to wait until a less frantic moment in time. Right now, what was important was that someone who clearly meant her harm had located her, and she needed to be elsewhere.

  “You must drink the Lifeblood. It will give you the strength you need for action, but do not use any of your magic,” he told her hurriedly. “No spells! It will continue to give your location away.”

  All right, she thought. No magic. She popped the cork out of both vials and downed them one after the other. They were her least favorite flavor, but this time around they tasted even worse than usual. She almost gagged, but gritted her teeth against the taste, made a mental note to ask Bael how the hell he’d managed to get ahold of them and tell Lalura she couldn’t do this flavor any longer, then finished them off.

  Once they were inside her, she tossed the empty vials onto the bed and admittedly began to feel better. Her head cleared a little, and her body felt lighter, not as difficult to carry. She looked around, realizing something was missing.

  “Where’s Bowie?” she asked.

  Bael blinked, his brow furrowing. “Who?”

  “The dog!” she clarified shorty, getting antsy. “The dog that was with us when you brought us here!”

  “Oh!” said Bael, looking relieved. “My apologies, my lady. I’d forgotten. She is in the kitchens, eating.”

  “I’m not leaving here without her,” Dahlia announced. And it was true. She didn’t care what the danger was, Bowie was coming with her.

  Bael looked at her wide-eyed. He paled a little, the blood draining from his face. But it was clear he knew she wasn’t joking.

  “Very well,” he said. “I shall retrieve her.”

  When he said this, Dahlia somehow understood that what he was saying was that it would take precious magical strength to retrieve the animal, and especially to do so immediately. However, she really didn’t care. She wasn’t leaving without her dog.

  The redheaded man closed his eyes, whispered something in the language he’d used before in the portal, and there was a flash of light. When the light faded, Bowie stood beside him, looking confused but hyper aware. The canine gave a soft whimper, looked around, and spotted Dahlia. Her tail began wagging at once. She took off at a run and skidded to a halt in front of her as Dahlia knelt to scratch the dog under the chin. “Hi girl,” she said softly.

  “My lady please, we have little time for reunions.”

  Dahlia stood. “Thank you for getting her, Bael.”

  Her words seemed to take him a little by surprise, but he quickly recovered, and nodded graciously.

  Then Dahlia said, “Take me to the Detective.” The prince, her mind corrected. And then, like an epitaph, it corrected again: The Demon King.

  Chapter Thirty

  When Laz left Lenore’s house, he knew he was turning his back on his actual mother, flesh and blood. But at the same time, he couldn’t quite feel that way. The woman looked all of twenty years old, and he hadn’t seen her in thirty ears. She’d been through hell – literally – and she’d lived a lifetime, and he knew that she would do anything for him, as any mother would. But these were just facts he was reciting to himself, not necessarily emotions or intuitions. He wasn’t there yet. She may have told him her life’s story, but he barely knew her.

  There was so much he didn’t know.

  He turned back on the sidewalk to view the house one last time. Lenore had told him the house was in a dimensional bubble of sorts, one she could leave if she wished but that no one could enter without her permission. Not only could they not enter the house, they wouldn’t be able to see it if she didn’t want them to. The home would simply vanish.

  Most impressive of all was that it could travel. Like the bespelled bed knob Angela Lansbury gave her charges in Bedknobs and Broomsticks, the home was transient and magical. It was the perfect living space, providing everything and anything its inhabitants should desire, and traveling from one dimension to the next through portals all its own.

  Apparently casting this spell had taken the last of Astaroth’s strength. He’d done it to protect the woman he loved. Even knowing he may never see her again.

  “Astaroth did not make this decision lightly, Laz. There is a man who would do anything to obtain Astaroth’s crown and sit upon his throne. The man is Aster’s nephew Apollyon, and unfortunately he possesses nearly as much power as the king himself. He was only denied the throne due to the happenstance of blood, and he knows it. When he began making threats against your father, Astaroth brought me here…. He is healing now. In due time, he will return to the waking world and face Apollyon knowing that no matter the outcome, I will be safe….”

  It left Laz with a lot to think about, not only where his family was concerned, but where Dahlia Kellen entered the equation.

  Laz froze on the sidewalk as a hard knot of fear tightened his gut and began ringing in his ears. He didn’t know how to get back to the castle in the Demon Realm. Bael had taken him there the first time. Laz had left Dahlia in the hands of a stranger in a castle stronghold in a realm he didn’t know how to reach.

  A sour taste filled his mouth and magic flooded his hands in a fight or flight reaction filled with adrenaline, cortisol, and dark, potent power. He realized in that moment that it wasn’t just his anxiety over not being able to return to the Demon Realm that had him up in arms – it was something more.

  “Something’s wrong,” he whispered.

  A flash of light forced him to take a step back and shield his eyes. But it lasted a fraction of a second before it was gone, and a man was rushing toward him. Laz recognized him at once; it was hard not to.

  “My prince! I’m sorry to surprise you like this, but you must leave here at once. Your mother’s location has been compromised, and you and your queen are not safe here.”

  Laz stared at him. “Come again?”

  Bael ran his hand over his face. “It’s only a matter of time before your cousin sends someone here to dispose of your mother. I believe he is tracking you.”

  “He thinks he locked on to our magical signatures in the portal trap,” Dahlia interjected.

  Laz looked from Bael to her and then back again. “Then Lenore isn’t safe either.”

  “No, not for long. However….” Here, Bael straightened and seemed to compose himself, as if what he was about to say was very important. “Your father has awoken. No doubt, he is coming for her himself.”

  Laz saw movement beside Dahlia’s hip, and a head peeking out from behind her. The dog – Bowie. It would seem the Tuath fae was rather attached to the animal, and vice versa.

  Dahlia stood uncertainly, her lustrous black hair caressing her face in an unseen breeze, her smooth cheeks flushed, her expression one of helpless resignation. She even looked slightly embarrassed. No doubt, Bael’s referral of her as Laz’s queen was more than a little responsible for that.

  Laz really knew Dahlia by reputation only. He knew of all she’d gone through, he knew how head strong she was, and he knew how powerful she was. Her attractiveness was legendary, as even among the Tuath she was considered more beautiful than most. But just then, she seemed almost mortal. She was no less lovely, just less indestructible. In this moment of real innocence, a new layer of splendor draped over her. Like Buttercup in The Princess Bride, it was that new dimension that cemented her beauty in Laz’s mind.

  That was when he knew he was the luckiest king at the Table. Hell, he was the luckiest man alive. And riding the coattails of that realization was a hard spike of protectiveness that forced so much power into his blood, he felt dizzy.

  “Let him come,” he said suddenly. Power lace
d his words, causing them to echo in the night. Bael stopped in his tracks, eyes wide. “If some demented distant relative wants to have it out with me so badly, then so be it,” he reiterated. He was absolutely certain that just then, he could destroy everything and anything that threatened him. Especially if it threatened Dahlia.

  “He won’t face you himself,” Dahlia said, filling the silence that it seemed was the only thing Bael had to offer. Her voice was softer than he expected it to be. Its tone was one of confusion, and that tired surrender one possessed when they no longer wished to fight said confusion. “Not yet anyway,” she continued. “Your father’s nephew is a coward, if his actions so far speak for him. I know his kind. He’ll attack those your father holds dear first in the attempt to mentally destroy him. And whenever he can, he’ll have others do his dirty work for him.” She shrugged. “So he can save his strength.”

  Laz blinked. “How do you know so much about this?”

  Bael looked apologetic. “I had to take her to the apartment she keeps here in the mortal realm so that she could gather a few of her belongings. I filled her in on the way.”

  Now Laz was really confused. He put a hand on his hip and pinched the bridge of his nose. Now he really did have a headache. And there was that “wrong” sensation still bothering him, something waiting out there at the edges of his consciousness, something unnamable and un-placeable, like a voice you couldn’t quite make out. “Why did you take her to her mortal apartment?” he asked. He hadn’t even known she had one. But that would make sense. Anyone as old as most of the fae were was sure to have a domicile in several realms, like a wealthy human having a vacation home in another state.

  “We can’t use our magic,” explained Dahlia plainly. “Not if he’s tracking it.”

  Oh, thought Laz dumbly. And then he thought, Shit. That didn’t at all sit well with the massive amounts of power flowing through his system.

  “However as a messenger, my signature is untraceable,” said Bael. Which made no sense to Laz either, but he was assuming it was just another aspect to the demon world he would have to learn later. “I can take you anywhere you wish to go until the situation is in hand.”