“You die now,” he snarled, his eyes glowing reddish brown as he spun the throwing star in the air, snatching it back to press against my jugular.
“I’m immortal,” I gasped, my right hand trying to finish the ward.
“You can die,” he answered. A moment later, the door burst open…but it wasn’t help that swarmed into the room in a violent yellow wave.
“Oh, god, it’s the imps,” I moaned, wondering which of them—the red dragon or the imps—would finish me off first.
As soon as that morbid thought formed in my head, self-preservation kicked in and I slammed another bolt of fire into the red dragon, sending him flying back onto the mass of imps. Imps being what they are, they stopped to attack the dragon rather than continue past him for me. I’ll always be grateful for that fact, because it gave me time to scramble over the desk, using another chair to break the window that led to a small service alley behind the gallery.
The dragon was screaming out curses as he beat the imps off him, but more were pouring in through the door. I didn’t wait around to see what happened. Careful of the sword still jutting from my belly, I got out the window and dropped to the ground. The impact sent me to my knees, but it took me only a couple of seconds before I was racing down the alley, praying Rene would still be out in front of the building. I hurled myself around the corner into the mass of people streaming out of the tube station, ignoring the cries of surprise around me as people noticed the sword. Ahead of me sat a black taxi with an open door. I lunged to it, half falling inside it with a sob of gratitude on my lips.
“Oh, thank god. You have no idea how grateful I am to see you. A red dragon tried to kill me, and the imps found me, and I have a sword sticking out of me!”
I allowed helpful hands to pull me off the floor of the taxi to the seat, turning as the taxi shot forward.
The eyes I met as I pushed my hair out of my face were not the ones I was expecting.
“Who are you?” I asked the blond woman who sat next to me.
“My name is Obedama. I am servant of the lord Ariton. You are summoned before him, Guardian.”
“Ariton? The demon lord Ariton?” I ripped the bottom of my shirt to carefully wad around where the sword protruded. Part of my mind was still coping with the fact that I’d been skewered (and survived), but the rest of it had moved on without anything but a passing thought that it was odd I wasn’t feeling more pain. The wound bled, but not copiously so. It hurt, but not to the exclusion of thought.
“Aye. We will go there now.”
“Wait a second.” I waved a hand around vaguely as the woman nodded to the taxi driver. “You’ll have to forgive me, but I’m a bit woozy from loss of blood, not to mention having just barely survived an attack by a warring dragon and homicidal imps. Why on earth does a demon lord want to see me?”
The female demon—for that’s what the woman had to be—looked at me for the count of three, then turned its head.
I was reminded that demons don’t have to answer questions asked by anyone but those to whom they owed allegiance or who summoned them. I toyed with the idea of summoning this one but discarded that plan for two reasons—first, I didn’t have the tools on me to call up a demon, and second, I had a vague memory of Jim telling me it couldn’t nark on its demon lord to anyone.
Jim! Why hadn’t I thought of my furry little demon? “Effrijim, I summon thee.”
Obedama’s head snapped around to face me as Jim’s black shape took form at my feet.
“Wow. Do you know you’ve got a herkin’ big sword sticking out your front?” Jim asked, peering around me to look behind.
Obedama hissed something under its breath.
Jim turned to look at the other demon. “Oh. Hi there, Obi-Wan. Long time no see. I see you’re going for a female form now. Nice.”
“My name,” the demon snarled back at Jim with deliberate pronunciation, “is Obedama. You will remember that, Effrijim!”
“Man, no sense of humor!” Jim dismissed Obedama and turned back to me.
I gave it a look I thought it well deserved. “Do you honestly think I haven’t noticed this sword?”
The demon shrugged. “I never know with humans. So…is it the newest in fashion accessories? Or do you just enjoy the skewered look?”
“God in heaven,” I swore to myself. “I can’t reach the handle to take it out, you boob!”
“OK. Lean forward and I’ll get a grip on it with my teeth…”
“No!” I shoved the demon back onto the floor. “You’ll do more damage yanking it out! I need medical attention! It’s not bleeding much now, and so long as I’m careful how I move, it doesn’t seem to be getting worse.”
Jim rolled its eyes. “You’re immortal, Ash. A little sword through your gut isn’t going to do any permanent damage.”
“I’m not taking any chances. So, Obedama,” I said, turning back to the demon who was studiously ignoring us. “What exactly does your demon lord wish to see me about?”
It didn’t even look at me. “You are summoned before him. Anything else you will have to learn from Ariton himself.”
“Fair enough. The problem is that I’m a bit busy at the moment, what with the impalement and all, so I think I’ll take a rain check on visiting with your boss.” I leaned for ward to talk to the taxi driver. “If you could let me out at the nearest available stopping point, I’d be grateful.”
The driver didn’t answer.
“Um…sir?”
“It will do you no good. You have been summoned,” Obedama told me. “The driver will not assist you to escape.”
“Look, I appreciate that you’ve been sent to bring me to your boss, but right now is not convenient. So I’ll just be leaving, with or without your permission.” I had noticed we were coming up to a stoplight. By the time I had finished my statement, we were stopped.
“Uh…Ash…that may not be a good idea…”
Jim’s concerned face was the last thing I saw. The instant my hand touched the door handle, Obedama raised her hands. A brilliant white light burst behind my eyeballs, sending me spiraling down into oblivion.
A cold, moist, soft something pressed against my cheek. “Aisling? You there?”
I cracked open one eye to find myself staring up Jim’s nose. “Maybe. It depends. Am I still alive?”
“Yep. All in one piece, two if you include the sword.”
Gingerly, I pushed myself up from the soft surface that rubbed against my face, blinking to clear my vision. I had been lying on my side on an old-fashioned dark maroon velvet fainting couch, tucked away in a dark corner of a room that seemed to my bemused eyes to be something taken directly from the set of the movie Gaslight. Flames flickered in art deco gas jets that bedecked heavily flocked gold-and-black wallpaper. Big rubber plants sat in the four corners of the room. A huge marble fireplace bearing ornate brass figures twisted in torment squatted across from me, but my attention skimmed past all that to settle on the man sitting behind a massive ebony desk.
“You are awake? Excellent. You have my apologies for the methods my minion was forced to employ in order to ensure your attendance at this most important meeting, but I assure you such extreme methods were necessary.”
The man who rose from the desk and walked toward me could have doubled for Charles Boyer in Gaslight. He was of medium height, had slicked-back black hair and a pleasant face, and wore a black satin smoking jacket that would have looked silly on anyone else but seemed to fit this room to a T.
“Um…you have to forgive my stupidity, but this has been a heck of an afternoon. I assume you are Ariton, the demon lord?” Carefully, so as not to jostle the sword, I got to my feet. I was rumpled and dirty, dripped blood, and had a sword poking out of me, but by god, I was a professional.
“I am,” the man said, stopping before me. He hesitated for a moment, his eyes on the sword. “And you are Aisling Grey, demon lord and wyvern’s mate.”
“Yes. You’ll have to excuse my appeara
nce.” I waved a nonchalant hand toward my middle. “A dragon from another sept attempted to kill me earlier, and I haven’t yet had time to have the sword removed.”
“Ah,” he said, considering it for a moment. “Then this is not part of your normal appearance?”
I shuddered to think about the sort of people he must deal with on a daily basis. “No, it isn’t.”
“Would you care for me to remove it?”
I was about to accept when some wild wiggling of Jim’s eyebrows warned me to think carefully. The polite, well-dressed, and well-spoken man in front of me might appear perfectly normal, but he was in fact a demon lord, one of the eight princes of Hell, and commander of legions of demons…not the sort of person I wanted removing a sharp, potentially lethal if mishandled, object from my body.
“You know, it’s not really hurting that bad, so I think I’ll just leave it where it is for now.” I offered the demon lord a bright, cheerful smile.
He gave me a bland “you’re quite, quite insane” look. Indeed. Well, shall we get to business?”
I headed toward the elegant Victorian armchair covered in petit point that he indicated, pausing as I considered best how to sit without moving the sword.
“Ah. You are having difficulties? Allow me.”
Ariton took ahold of the chair by the back. I assumed he was going to remove the chair and give me a footstool or something to sit on but stared in surprise as he simply ripped the back off the antique chair, tossing the ruined part into the fireplace before returning to his own seat. I stared openmouthed for a moment at the now-backless chair, boggling just a little at how easily he had destroyed it, then snapped my mouth shut and took my seat without comment.
“As a fellow demon lord, you are no doubt aware of the lamentable recent events in Abaddon,” Ariton said, playing with a polished bone letter opener. I wondered whose bone it was.
“Well…”
Jim sent me a pregnant glance.
“I am to the best of my ability, naturally. But you know, given the circumstances, I really don’t consider myself much of an expert in the whole demon lord business.”
Ariton frowned as he set down the letter opener. “Circumstances? Of what circumstances are you speaking?”
I crossed my legs and tried to look as if it was a perfectly natural thing for me to be sitting in the den of a demon lord, a sword piercing my midsection.
“Well, I have only the one demon.”
We both looked at Jim, who was, come to think of it, being unusually quiet. Jim looked back at me, its eyes wary. “The number and…er…quality of your minions is not of importance at this moment. You are a demon lord. You are a wyvern’s mate. Although I have heard a rumor you have been seen in the company of a Guardian, I’m sure there is a reasonable explanation for that. The fact remains that you will naturally be interested in the recent happenings, and weighing the evidence of which prince you wish to rule Abaddon.”
Jim coughed.
“I am never hasty in my decisions,” I said firmly, ignoring the fact that I hadn’t been exactly truthful. “I need lots and lots of evidence before I make such an important decision.”
“As I suspected.” Ariton leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepled. “The reason I have brought you here is to seek an agreement between us.”
I badly wanted to ask what the hell he was talking about, but Jim had sent me enough warning looks to keep me bluffing my way through the situation. I couldn’t imagine what a demon lord wanted from me, but I knew that without a doubt, it wasn’t going to be anything good. “What sort of an agreement did you have in mind?”
“A simple one by which we both benefit.” His eyelids dropped until he was giving me a veiled glance that sent shivers of uneasiness down my back and arms. “You support me against Asmodeus’s attempt for the throne of Abaddon, and I will rid you of any and all enemies.”
“I don’t have any enemies,” I protested, then glanced at the sword. “Well, none that deserve being rid of by a demon lord!”
Jim stepped on my foot. Ariton’s eyelids drooped even more. “Do you not? I was under the impression that the imp kingdom has sworn to have your head in exchange for the murder of their monarch.”
“That was a mistake, and…oh, it doesn’t matter.” I stood up carefully, wondering where I was, praying it wasn’t too far from London. “I appreciate your offer, but it’s just not going to work for me.”
“Do you mind telling me why you so abruptly spurn my offer of friendship?” Ariton asked, his voice rich with menace. Jim scooted over until its body was leaning against mine.
“I haven’t spurned anything, and I’m sorry if it seems to you that I have,” I said slowly, trying to pick my way through a path that seemed to be fraught with nothing but potential peril. “The truth is, I’ve got one little demon. I’m not a big, powerful demon lord. My support can’t mean squat when compared to all the other demon lords you could be rallying.”
“The six other princes have their own interests at heart,” Ariton answered. “The seventh, Bael, will be leaving his throne. So you see, you are important.”
There was an undertone that raised goose bumps on my arms. I badly wanted out of there, not just so I could have the blasted sword removed, but to get away from Ariton himself. There was a subtle, almost intangible miasma of evil around him, like darkness gathered, little snaky tendrils of it reaching out to tease me.
“I’m not talking about you guys. I mean all the other demon lords like me.”
“Like you?” One eyebrow rose.
“Kind of part-time demon lords, if you get my meaning.”
He was silent for a moment, then stood up and walked to a curtained window. “There is no other like you, Aisling Grey.”
A little skitter of pain shot through me at the invocation of my name. I took hold of Jim’s leash and wrapped one arm around myself, wondering if I made a break for the door, whether I’d make it out alive. “Surely there must be other demon lords—”
“No. There are the eight princes of Abaddon, of which I am one, and then there is you.”
“Wait a minute…” I shook my head, hoping it would clear my confusion. “Are you saying that other than you guys, the big demon lords, the ones who rule Abaddon, I’m the only other demon lord around?”
“Your pretense bores me,” Ariton drawled. “Your disrespect and insults I find less acceptable, but given the serious times in which we find ourselves, I will overlook them both. You have the cycle of one day to come to your senses and acquiesce to my generous offer.”
He turned his back on me, as if dismissing me. Jim hurried for the door next to the fainting couch. “And if I don’t acquiesce?” I asked, dreading the response but unable to keep from asking the question.
“Asmodeus poses the only serious threat to the throne. If you refuse me, I will assume you desire him in power and will treat you accordingly.”
My blood curdled at the unspoken intent behind his words. I walked slowly out the door, down a wood-paneled hallway to what I assumed was a front door, wondering how my life had gone so wrong in such a short amount of time.
Ariton followed me to the door.
“Be warned. Aisling Grey.” Ariton’s voice stopped me as I reached for the doorknob. I fought the unspoken command he had issued me but decided after a brief battle that it would do me more damage to fight his compulsion. “I intend to rule Abaddon. Heed my warning if you wish to survive.”
“Good luck with that,” was all I said as I opened to the door and walked out…until I got a good look around me. The line of white stone houses, the black wrought-iron fences, the intersection were horribly familiar—goose bumps marched up and down my arms as I spun around to face the demon lord.
“You know, you might get a little more cooperation from people if you didn’t try to shoot them first!”
Ariton’s eyes narrowed. “You try my patience, human. You have been warned.”
The black lacquered door shut w
ith a solid click, leaving me to stare at the house and wonder whether my eyes had been deceiving me. I was willing to swear that the expression that flashed in the demon lord’s eyes was blank confusion.
Was he working with the red dragons? He had to be…because if neither of them was responsible for shooting at me, who was?
13
“Hi. Do you think you can pay off the taxi guy? He seems to be a bit leery of me getting too close to him.”
Pál, who answered the bell to Drake’s house, stared in wordless horror at the sword that still stuck out of my stomach.
I stumbled past him into the hall, relief at being safe again causing my muscles to go all rubbery. “Thank god.”
“Aisling? Is that you? What happened to you—oh, merciful heaven!”
“Mon dieu!” Rene appeared behind Nora, the two of them frozen in identical expressions of horror.
“Yeah, it’s us. You wouldn’t believe where we’ve been,” Jim said, sauntering around me. “I stubbed a toe. Did we miss dinner?”
“What…” Nora took one step forward, stopping to gawk at the sword. It took her a couple of seconds to pull herself together. “Dear heaven. I’ll call a paramedic.”
“That won’t be necessary,” a familiar deep voice rumbled down the staircase. Drake stood at the top, his face impassive as I turned toward him. A shadow emerged from behind him and resolved itself into the hotheaded Dmitri.
I had been about to run screaming for comfort to Drake, but the sight of the other dragon had me stiffening my back instead. I might be willing to appear weak and needy in front of Drake and my friends, but a troublesome sept member was another matter.
“Hello, Dmitri. Hi, Drake. It would seem the red dragons are quite serious about war.”
“Indeed.” Drake sauntered down the stairs just as if the sword gutting me was nothing out of the ordinary. “István?”
The bodyguard nodded and headed for the phone. Nora hurried over next to me, carefully putting an arm around my shoulders. “You should sit. Or lie down. Or…” She stopped and looked at Drake. “Aren’t you going to do anything?”