by Maya Nicole
I slid out of bed and walked to the door. I knew exactly where Amari was. He never stayed in bed long after I fell asleep, even though I tried to convince him he could protect me just as well wrapped around me.
He stood in front of the door, his legs spread shoulder-width apart with his arms crossed over his chest. No one was getting through him. I put my hand in the center of his back and moved my hand down his spine.
His head slowly turned to the side, and his eyes moved to meet mine. His head turned forward, but he didn't move a muscle. I pressed my lips to the hard stone of his arm and then gently shut the door again and went back to the bed.
It was his job to protect me. I didn't like it that night after night he stood watch, waiting for some unknown threat to come after me. He was a first defense, and he would do everything within his power to stop someone or something from hurting me.
Even if that cost him his life.
I slipped back into bed and shut my eyes. I inhaled deeply through my nose, taking in the scents around me.
Surprisingly, there was a brownie here in the castle. I could smell his unease, probably because of me and the gargoyle. Brownies were rare, many being run off or killed by King Rian. It was rumored that Lilith had killed most of the brownies that were left because they refused to clean for her.
I inhaled again, taking in more scents. I smelled desire and want, and it wasn’t coming from Amari. I let out a grumble, realizing it was coming from across the hall.
When I had inhaled Samara’s delicious scent in the hall, she had smelled different. I would never forget her smell. She smelled of soap and something else. I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was.
The last thing I needed was to have her on my mind. She was a distraction that I didn't need. My father had sent me there to secure the throne. It seemed like that's what she was there to do too.
It had been many centuries since there had been a king. One that could enforce the natural order of Inferna.
I shut my eyes. I wouldn’t let my feelings for Samara get in the way of what I came to do.
The next morning, my eyes popped open to the sound of yelling in the hall. I jumped out of bed and pulled on a pair of pants before flinging open the door. Amari was no longer standing still as a statue.
Instead, he was holding up the squirrel against the hall wall by the throat. Nuts were scattered all over the floor. I stepped into the hall, the sound of shells cracking, causing Amari to turn his head to look over his shoulder.
"What are you doing?" As much as I didn't like the squirrel, I couldn't see why Amari thought it was okay to take him by the throat and shove him against the wall. He was a fucking squirrel, not a threat.
In a fight, a panther would win with one swipe of his paw.
"He was sneaking around. Then he wouldn't let me see what was in his bag." Amari did not do well with noncompliance.
Samara opened her bedroom door wearing a towel and nothing else. Her hair was dripping wet, and droplets of water were still on her skin. I licked my lips.
"What the hell? Let him go!" She walked right over to Amari, not seeming to mind that she was stepping on nuts with her bare feet, and grabbed his arm.
I could only see half his face, but his jaw tightened as he glared down at her. The squirrel was kicking at the wall with his feet, trying to get free. He and Amari were similar in stature, but Amari clearly had the upper hand with his gargoyle strength.
"You heard the woman. Let him go." I put my hand on Amari's back.
Just as I thought Amari was about to listen, the squirrel shifted into his animal and bit down on Amari's hand. He let out a shriek of pain, and his arm flew, hitting Samara in the nose with his elbow.
There are a few things that cause me to lose my cool. Someone hurting a woman and freshly spilled blood. Put those two things together, and throats would be ripped out.
I backed up into the opposite wall.
Fuck.
Her blood smelled so tantalizing that I didn't know if I was going to be able to control myself. My fangs descended, and I bit into my bottom lip, trying to stop the need that rushed over me. She fell to her knees and was clasping her nose. Her towel was practically falling off her, but she didn’t seem to care.
The squirrel climbed up Amari's leg and bit down on his thigh. Amari grabbed him and sent him flying clear to the end of the hall, where he hit the ground with a soft thump.
Amari stalked down the hall towards the motionless squirrel. He was smaller than Amari’s booted foot and was about to be stomped on.
Just as he was about to him, an arm reached out of a doorway, grabbed the squirrel, and slammed the door shut. I heard the lock click.
What the bloody hell?
Amari tried the door handle to no avail. He pounded on the door. "Open this door."
"Amari," I gritted out between clenched teeth. "I need you."
Amari’s head snapped to look at me. His eyes cleared, and he rushed back down the hall.
Samara got to her feet. Without a word, she slipped back into the bedroom and closed the door behind her.
Amari brought his hands to my cheeks, and I took several deep breaths. The smell of blood was still in the hall, but the source was now at least on the other side of the door.
I was not looking forward to attending the council meetings. Most of the council members were ancient. Not that we all weren't a little ancient in our own respects, but the rest of the members of the council were twice the age of Samara and me.
That meant that they would have a major issue with her being on the council. Probably even with me being there. My father was still alive, after all, but there was nothing in the bylaws about the eldest son stepping in.
A few hours had passed since the hallway debacle. Amari let me feed off of him, so the bloodlust was no longer an issue. I couldn't get rid of the smell of her blood, though. It lingered in my nostrils.
I had felt guilty that while I was sucking on Amari's neck; I was thinking of Samara across the hall. Amari watched me closely as I got dressed. His eyes narrowed slightly as if he knew. He seemed to always know.
I opened the bedroom door and stepped into the hall, the sound of nuts cracking under my boots. I sighed and bent down to start picking them up. It was the least I could do after Amari had assaulted the squirrel and Samara.
"What are you doing?" Amari asked from behind me. I looked up at him and frowned. "Are you really going to stoop down and pick them up?"
I shrugged and turned back to my task. I didn't really care what he thought. He could either stand there and watch me, or he could help me. I had an inkling that he was just going to stand there and watch me, though.
He was a stubborn bastard.
"I have to keep the peace. Make up for what you lack." I grabbed the bag that was sitting in the middle of the hall and began dropping the small pieces into it. Why was he carrying around a bag of nuts, anyway?
"It's not my fault." He was such a surly grump. Except when he was getting his dick sucked or pounding into me, then he dropped the act.
"If you were a real man, you'd help me pick these up."
He let out a frustrated growl, muttering to himself, and began helping me clean them up. I was surprised he had relented and gone to his knees, brushing them into a pile.
Samara's door opened, and she stepped out, dressed from head to toe in black. Her hair was braided down her back, and her nose was red from being elbowed. She looked breathtaking.
She glared down at us. "You're lucky you didn't kill him." She crossed her arms over her chest, her breasts pushing up slightly under her shirt. I wanted to bury my face in them.
"He bit me," Amari said through clenched teeth.
"It was well-deserved." Samara grabbed the bag from me after I scooped in the last handful of nuts. "Your heart is made of stone. Just like your body." She went back into the room and slammed the door behind her.
"You need to apologize." I stood and dusted my hands off on my
pants.
"Why do I need to apologize? I did nothing wrong." He crossed his arms over his chest, his eyes sparkling.
I laughed and ran my fingers through my hair. "If you say so. I wouldn't recommend you stay on that one's bad side. She might seem like a princess at times, but she has some claws in her."
Amari narrowed his eyes at me. "You sound like you speak from experience."
I started down the hall towards the stairs. He followed me, but I knew that he wasn't about to drop the subject, so I needed to give him some kind of answer. "We may have encountered each other a time or two when we were younger."
"Encountered each other?" I took two steps at a time as I went down the stairs. I didn't need to explain myself to him. Samara was in the past. He was my now and my future. "So you fucked her?"
I guess we were having the conversation I wanted to avoid. As I reached the landing at the bottom of the stairs, I turned around and faced Amari, who had a look of disgust on his face.
He acted like he had never been with a woman before. I knew for a fact he had. We had shared several. He wasn't immune to a nice pair of breasts.
"And if I say yes?" I stepped up to him and picked a small shell off his shirt. "Does that make you celoso?"
"Jealous of her? No." He licked his lips. "Have you tasted her?"
"In what sense?" It was an honest question that drew a rumble from him.
He was growing impatient with me. I could see it in the way a line was forming between his eyes. "You know what I mean, Valentino."
I shook my head and then turned on my heel and walked towards the council room. No, I had not tasted her in the way I most desired. I spent several months courting her, but not once did she consent to me tasting that delicious smelling blood pulsing through her veins.
My fangs descended at the thought of sinking my teeth into the juicy vein in her neck. It had taken every ounce of willpower not to sink my teeth into her at first sight of her the day before.
We were the first to arrive for the meeting. I wanted every one of the council members that came to know that I was serious about this. The twelve of us had a lot of important decisions to make about the future of Inferna.
One bad judgment and Inferna could explode in civil war. With no dream demon king to wrangle the masses, we had to tread carefully.
The king was the peacekeeper of the council, so to speak. With Samara in that role, I wasn't sure how it would work. She would only step in on decisions that were split down the middle six to six, but even then, most in the room would be hard-pressed to respect her if she had to make a decision.
Not that there would ever be the opportunity for a six to six decision.
"Did you love her?" I stopped dead in my tracks with my hand on the door handle to the council room.
Amari grabbed me by the shoulder and spun me around. His green eyes searched mine for answers when I didn't respond. "You did love her."
He moved his hand off my shoulder and backed up a step.
"Amari, don't…"
"Are you two going to stand there and bicker, or are you going to go in?" Samara approached us and stopped short when she saw the look on Amari's face. "Don't let me interrupt your lovers’ quarrel."
She turned the corner down the hall. This was such a shit show. My father could have at least warned me of her return. Instead, I was completely blindsided.
I pushed open the doors to the council room at the same time Samara opened one of the back doors. Of course, there was another entrance. I'm sure Amari was already aware that there was too. I was so distracted that I hadn't even bothered to pay attention to my surroundings.
She made her way to the table and sat at the head of it. She propped her feet on it and crossed them at her ankles. My dick twitched in my pants.
Both Amari and I stood there and stared at her. We finally ripped our attention away just as the squirrel walked past us. He bumped both of us with his shoulders as he passed between us.
"I don't believe we've been introduced." I walked across the room and stuck out my hand to him.
He looked me up and down in disgust, and I dropped my hand. "I'm Valentino. You can call me Val."
"Bloodsucker," he mumbled out of the side of his mouth.
Amari growled from behind me, and I turned and gave him a look. I couldn't blame him for calling me a bloodsucker. Our first interactions weren't exactly positive.
Samara let out a sigh. "This is Nicolas. Nico, this is Val and Amari." She moved her feet off the table and stood up. "Can't we all get along? You three are acting like children."
I grunted my agreement, and so did Nicolas. Amari just stood there with his arms crossed over his chest. She raised her eyebrows at him as she waited for a response.
"I don't like you."
Samara snorted and flopped back down in the chair, sending it backward about a foot where Nicholas stopped it. Judging by the look on her face, she was surprised that the chair moved like that. Had she never experienced a rolling chair before?
I guess she hadn't if she'd been with what we referred to as gypsies. Always on the move, never part of a village.
"You don't have to like me. But I do expect you to respect me. If you respect me, I'll respect you and allow you to stay here in this castle."
We sat in tense silence at the table until the other council members started filing in. I knew every single one of them.
The chair next to me remained empty.
"Where's Winston?" I inquired, acting like I cared. Like my father, he had also steered clear of Lilith. We were the more powerful factions of the council, so Lilith had left us mostly untouched as long as we steered clear of her plans.
"The raven returned with the message still tied to its foot. I sent a scout, and the village is completely empty. It's like they just up and left everything there. Food on the table, doors open, money in the tills for anyone to come along and take," one of the shifters shared.
"That's unlike them." Sammy had been a quiet observer until that point.
I furrowed my brows in deep thought. The entire village? That was concerning.
"It's possible that they were part of Lilith's grand plan and either went to Earth or ran for the hills once they realized she was dead." The shifter across from me had a good point, but the village was only recently abandoned. I wouldn't let them know I knew that, though.
"They were definitely not Lilith supporters. Why do you think they weren't present at the coronation?"
"Do we think she did something to them?"
Speculation swirled around the room, and I finally interrupted. "We can't make any decisions until we find out where they are."
The Infernal Council was run by strict guidelines. The reason no one had made any moves against Lilith was because she had gotten to a few of the weaker council members. The weak were much easier to sway with mind control than factions like the vampires.
Without full participation, our hands were tied. We were sworn with a blood oath that prevented any decisions from being made. When that happened, the king made the decisions.
"We need to send a search team out to find them." Samara was speaking in a firm voice, but no one looked at her except me.
"We'll send out a search party." The bear shifter glanced at Samara as he spoke.
Samara let out a small sigh and sat back in her chair. It had to be frustrating for her to be ignored. "We'll go look for them." Nicolas made a grunting sound from behind her but didn't say a word.
The other vampire laughed, and several other council members joined in. "You?"
"If word gets out that an entire village has gone missing, do you have any clue what the people will do? Especially with an open council seat. Some of the villages that aren't included on this council will fight tooth and nail for the seat. Is that really what you want?"
"She's right," I said. "This needs to be dealt with from within. If word gets out that we're weakened, that we can't make any decisions because we're missing one c
ouncil member, all hell will break loose. There's already been talk in some of the villages about doing away with the council altogether."
The vampire scoffed. He glared at me and crossed his arms over his chest. "Very well. You can go with her."
I was no pussy, but my stomach knotted. I didn't want to go to traipsing through the woods looking for a village full of people that had disappeared. The farther you went into the woods, the more likely you were to run into the demons we were always trying to protect ourselves from.
The lost.
The demons that gave demons a bad name.
The ones that pried off your fingernails, chewed them, and used them as their exoskeleton
Shudder.
I knew all the rumors about our kind. We were all lumped together. The damned. The evil. The forgotten.
The great and powerful (yet inexplicably irresponsible) Creator made us and then left us to rot. It didn't take a genius to figure out that we were supposed to be Earth, but something went horribly wrong.
The northern vampires were an enterprising bunch. Centuries ago, my great-grandfather had found a way to get through to Earth. It hadn't gone very well for most of them, but a few did make it back with stories to tell.
And books. So many books. I'd read them all.
If the other demons knew my family had a vault of Earth's writings, well, they would have stormed our estate and burned it to the ground.
I'm sure Lilith had spread some rumors about Earth to garner such an interest in following her. She had staged a mass undertaking and deceit in an attempt to bring Inferna to the other side, so to speak.
Most demons had no clue of what lay just a magical hop, skip, and jump away.
It was very similar to Inferna. You had your rich and powerful, and then you had the bottom of the pond, the ones that were mistreated and looked down upon.
I couldn't imagine if Inferna got through. Demons were highly intelligent, and with the light magic they had there, we would be capable of anything. I would finally be able to construct a communication device that allowed its users to talk from a distance.