The Demon King (28 page)

She inhaled shakily and her brow furrowed.
“Yes?” she asked softly, as if nothing untoward had just taken
place.

He blinked. God, she was
fucking beautiful. But he stubbornly reigned himself in
again.
Okay, she’s calmed down.
The spell had worked and the situation was
in-hand. Now he needed to bring her back down and deal with the
fact that he’d just used a shit load of magic, opening them both up
for an attack.

He concentrated on the spell’s antidote, a
cross-spell that pulled the drug-like magic back out of its victim.
His hands began to glow, he felt the pull against her body where he
held her, and Dahlia’s eyes closed again. She exhaled and moaned
low. He imagined that if the spell itself felt good, having its
antidote cast on her had to feel the opposite. His hunch was
verified when his power once more surged through his own veins and
Dahlia slowly turned her head in disappointment.

“
I’m sorry,” he whispered,
meaning it. “But you did attack me.”

Eyes still closed, Dahlia gritted her teeth
and spoke quietly but harshly. “That’s because you threw my phone
out the window, you asshole.”

Laz gazed down at her
profile. He took a minute to process her words and the reasoning
behind them. “Okay,” he said after a big breath. “Fair enough.”
He
was
an
asshole. All she’d wanted to do was play a video game and forget
about her problems for a while, and there he’d been sitting beside
her, trying to pull her attention right back into the pit of shit
that wanted to eat her alive.

“
I’m an asshole.” He let go
of her wrists and swiftly stood. She turned her head, opening her
eyes to follow him up. Laz bent and offered her his
hand.

She gazed up at him through
those wondrous eyes that were still green-purple, and he swallowed
hard. When she took his hand, and Laz felt as though she were
offering him the greatest boon he’d ever received. His fingers
closed over hers protectively,
lovingly
. With tender care and easy
strength, he pulled her to her feet.

“
What team are you,
anyway?” he asked as she absentmindedly brushed herself off and
looked around them. He looked around too. They were in the middle
of a field in what looked like a park. There were trees, there was
grass, and there were a few tall ultra-bright lights, but not much
else. In the distance, he could hear traffic. The Mercedes he’d
borrowed from Bax was in the field beside them, its engine idling.
The passenger door had been torn off and rested in the car’s
headlights. He had no idea where the hell they were.

“
Promise you won’t give me
a hard time?” Dahlia asked shakily. Her voice was thin, and when
Laz turned back to her, she appeared frail to him, despite her
plethora of otherworldly abilities.

“
Promise,” he said,
mystified as to why she would even ask such a thing.

“
I’m Team Instinct,” she
said, hugging herself. “Or I
was
.”

Laz felt something strange
go through him. It was moving and it was fierce.
“
Fuck
,” he
muttered harshly. Then he spun to face the car. He spoke a few
warlock words, and the door disappeared from its twisted place on
the ground and reappeared good as new on the side of the car. More
magic, but he couldn’t have cared much less just then. “Come on,”
he said, motioning for Dahlia to get in.

He knew she was stunned, so he gave her a
minute to process the command as he made his own way back to the
driver’s side. He opened the door and got in, closing it behind
him. A few seconds later, the passenger door opened. Dahlia slid in
beside him and closed her own door.

“
Hold on,” he instructed.
Dahlia stared at him while she pulled the seatbelt down and snapped
it securely in place over her.

He took a moment to lay an invisibility
shield over the car. Then he prepared himself, gripping the
steering wheel tight. He stared straight ahead through the
windshield. Things were going to happen fast. He had to be
ready.

Return
, he thought. With that, the world faded past the car’s
windows, and Dahlia placed her hands on the dashboard as if she
knew shit was about to go down.

Good
instincts
, he thought with a grim smile
and emphasis on the “instincts.”

The world beyond the windows reappeared in
the black and white blur of moving vehicles at night. Laz
deciphered the situation with the speed of practiced expertise and
a little magic. He put on the brake, stepped on the clutch, down
shifted, turned the wheel sharply, stepped on the gas, and shifted
again, taking them smoothly into the dwindling traffic. He was
fortunate that it was dying down at this time of night.

When there were no cars directly behind him
and he knew his appearance wouldn’t cause an accident, he dropped
the invisibility.

Laz could feel Dahlia’s eyes on him, but he
kept his attention on the road, heading to his destination with
firm resolve.

“
Where are we going?” she
asked, her voice still a little more delicate than he would have
liked.

“
You’ll see. We’re almost
there.” He rolled down his window and peered out, wanting a view
unobstructed by glass. “I think this was the place. And it just
figures that it would be over water.”

“
What place?” Dahlia
asked.

Laz pulled the car over to the side of the
road about thirty yards from the beginning of a bridge, and
switched on the hazards. Then he got out of the car and made his
way to the passenger side, opening Dahlia’s door for her as well.
She stared up at him from her passenger’s seat. “Where are we?” she
asked, undoing her seat belt.

Laz offered her his hand, helping her out of
the car. “Come with me.” He gave her a reassuring smile. At least,
he hoped it was reassuring. He was trying not to show fang, so with
luck, that helped.

They were on a hill rising to a bridge
they’d already crossed once that night. Beneath the bridge, running
perpendicular to MA-225 was the Concord River, a deep, slow moving
body of water. Laz navigated a small trail that led down from the
road to a concrete walkway that ran along the water. It was steep,
so he went slow, wanting to be certain Dahlia didn’t fall. When
they reached the edge of the river, they both stopped, and Dahlia
looked around. “What are we doing here?”

He peered over the water, gauging how fast
it was moving, how deep it was, and how far something would travel
if tossed in. “If I’m right, this is where I threw out your phone,”
he told her. “And now I’m going to get it back for you.”

Chapter Thirty-Six

“
She
is the fated queen. It was never Lenore,” said the demon who
had been servant to Apollyon for centuries.

“
I know,” said Apollyon
softly. His words moved like black satin through the
chamber.

Derotimus took a step back. His master’s
power was fluctuating, pulsing like a massive lung breathing in and
out, in and out. The terrifying man with the very blue eyes touched
his chin thoughtfully and then lowered his hand to the arm rest of
his chair.

“
Your plan to flush her out
worked, my lord. Everything is proceeding as planned.”

“
So it did,” said Apollyon.
The man who would have been king glanced at his servant, and
Derotimus felt the terrible weight of that gaze even though it
lasted but a moment. “And so it is.”

The servant swallowed hard. “What now?”

“
Now we wait.”

“
For what?”

“
For Astaroth’s half human
son to falter and use his magic. Then we destroy him and claim his
lovely bride.” Apollyon smiled, and it was beautiful, and it
chilled Derotimus to his demonic core.

“
But he knows not to his
magic,” said Derotimus. “Bael warned him.”

Apollyon chuckled. “Lazaroth has lived in
the mortal world his entire life, Derotimus. He will not be able to
keep from using his powers for long. His human morals and ideals
will interfere with logic… as they are wont to do.”

This was probably true. Derotimus had known
a few humans in his time. Emotion, especially fear, almost always
overrode reason. Entire belief systems were founded on that fear.
Lazaroth would most definitely mess up, and probably it would be
sooner rather than later.

“
She was stunning,” said
Apollyon softly, and Derotimus could tell that his master was
really only speaking to himself, voicing his thoughts out loud.
“And her magic is already changing.”

Derotimus knew what he was talking about.
Dahlia Kellen had arrived on the scene of the summoning in the
warehouse just as Apollyon had said she would. She’d come in
without a care for her own safety, drawn to the danger and needs of
the demon Apollyon had illegally called. Most likely, Kellen
thought she had been there because of the Akyri who’d been drawn
into the circle along with the demon. But it was the demon – the
beast the Akyri claimed as an animal companion – that was the true
target and the true bait.

Dahlia felt its fear and
reacted to it instinctively because she was the Demon Queen, and
she hadn’t even known it. Even her magic, a Tuathan warlock’s magic
rare enough in its own right, was shifting. As Apollyon had stated,
it was becoming demonic. That purple fire was a sure sign if ever
there was one. Only demon royalty could use dark fire. As a matter
of fact… only
female
demon royalty could use it.

Dark Angels. That’s what they were called,
any woman who wielded the dark fire. Dahlia Kellen was heating up
to be the most powerful Dark Angel the realms had ever seen.

Derotimus had watched the proceedings in the
warehouse through a scry in Apollyon’s chambers. He’d been
delighted to see that everything had gone exactly as his master had
planned. Apollyon had “recruited” human magic user pawns, performed
the ritual, trapped the demon – and a young Akyri girl right along
with him – and Dahlia Kellen had come. Right on cue.

Now there was no doubt in either of their
minds that the gorgeous black haired Tuathan fae was everything
they could have hoped for and more.

“
With the Dark Angel at my
side, the realm will kneel before us,” Apollyon stated, again as if
he were merely speaking to himself. “And with her in my bed…” he
whispered, his smile broadening, fangs gleaming. He didn’t finish
the thought aloud. There was no need.

*****

“
I see you’ve run afoul of
something.” The Entity’s voice rolled through the all-white room
like the rumblings of a god machine. It was deep, it was powerful,
and it held magic like a thunder cloud held electricity. The
creepiest thing about it was that it came from nothing. The Entity
was formless, without shape or substance, and had been since the
Winter King had defeated him in the land of the Norse.

The traitor looked down at his left arm
where it rested uselessly against his chest. He’d had to bind it.
The old woman’s dying spell had injured him in a way that would not
heal. Neither his own inherent healing abilities nor magic had put
a dent in the pain or repaired a single stitch of the torn flesh,
muscle, and cracked bone. What was worse was that he’d even tried
human means of dealing with the injury, and no matter how many pain
killers he ingested, nothing worked. The arm was broken and it was
bleeding and it hurt like hell.

“
It was the witch’s passing
gift,” the traitor said. “A small price to pay for her
destruction.”

“
Indeed,” agreed the
Entity. “But how pray tell do you intend to hide such an injury
from your brethren at the Table of the Thirteen?” The Entity asked
the question with an edge of laughter to his taunting tone. He
didn’t care of the traitor were found out. The deed was done and it
was all the same to him. This was simply an amusement.

“
They are not my brethren,”
said the traitor simply. “And I do not intend to hide.”

“
Oh?” The Entity seemed
even more amused than before. “Then you intend to confront them at
last?”

At last? What did he mean by that? Something
about the Entity’s words really pissed him off. He spoke before
thinking his words through. “That would be stupid,” he said
plainly. “I’m not a fool. I’m outnumbered.” And that was an
understatement.

“
Yes, you are,” said the
Entity.

The traitor’s brow furrowed at the statement
and the silence that followed it. What exactly was the Entity
agreeing with?

“
But your job is far from
over, my young friend.”

Young?
Now that was actually funny. The traitor nearly laughed, but
the pain in his arm was putting him in too bad a mood.

“
The Demon King will soon
claim his throne. He is changing as we speak, becoming what he was
fated to become. As he does, his bride too changes. But in her
case, she is becoming what she has always been; a true queen. She
will be a ruler of not one world, but two.”

“
You think she’s strong
enough to awaken the
One
.” The traitor had known it would
come to this. His master wanted a queen powerful enough to bring
him fully into this world and unleash his magic so that he could
awaken someone very special to him. Dahlia Kellen could certainly
fit that bill. She was a legend in their worlds. She was the
Tuathan warlock who’d become a traitor, then a vampire and was now
to be queen. She would be queen not only of the Akyri realm, but of
the Demon Realm as well.