“Sorry about . . . the other night,” I said.
“A King beating a scrapper?” Oanu’s tail lashed the air. “Disrespectful cub. Would have done the same.” He hesitated. “Well . . . might have killed him, eaten his brains.”
“The boys get hungry for brains,” I said. “Generally speaking, it’s been a life of deprivation with me.”
Oanu glanced at my tattoos and gave me a toothy grin. “Life isn’t worth living without eating your enemies.”
“Glad we’re not enemies.”
“But to fight a true Queen,” he murmured, looking at me like I was delicious, “that would be glorious.”
My smile warmed—but that lasted only as long as it took me to look past Oanu at the Yorana who had gathered beneath the trees.
They watched my husband with thinly veiled disgust. Tall, lean, humanoid, with skin the color of cherries: a dark, bleeding red. Long black hair swooped high off their scalps in tumbling Mohawks; and small jewels were embedded in their concave chests. Their demon lord had been seductive, magnetic. His people shared the same dark charm.
I glanced back at Grant, his body still teeming with Shurik—undulating over him with a distinctly ecstatic energy, like he was some kind of drug. I’d never seen them so worked up. I’d deliberately stayed away from most bonding sessions, but the few I’d witnessed—early on—had been as energetic as dirt. Things had changed since then.
A low hum rolled from Grant’s throat, more vibration than melody. A shimmering wave of energy passed over my skin, making the boys tug on me, restless.
The Yorana flinched, as though hit. Oanu shivered.
“Lightbringer,” he rumbled in his deep voice. “Never thought to see one again.”
“You’re familiar with his kind?”
“Collected history when I was not killing. Soothed me. But then, later, Aetar used enslaved Lightbringers as weapons.” The demon lord slapped a huge paw against the ground. “Strong then, protected by the bonds of our Kings. We ate them.” He gave me a sidelong look. “Not protected now.”
No, none of them were protected. And this demon lord might be dead by the end of the week if Jack was to be believed.
Grant’s voice trailed away into silence. The woods were so quiet, except for soft, Shurik hissing sounds and my own heartbeat. I wouldn’t have known that Oanu was beside me if I hadn’t been looking at him.
“Power,” said Oanu, with admiration in his soft, rasping voice. “Stole the bonds that kept the Shurik and Yorana alive. Bound them to his heart. Did this with his voice, killed with a word.”
“He’s just a man,” I said. “A man with a particular skill.”
“Just as you are skilled?” Oanu’s toothy grin seemed a little more challenging this time. “Power accepted means power controlled. Worry me more, you deny yourself. Makes you . . . unpredictable.”
Given the bargain I’d made, I didn’t think denial was going to be a problem for much longer. I gestured toward my husband. “He’s getting sick because of what he did.”
“Yorana,” Osul murmured, glancing at them with disdain. “Selfish Yorana. Hate that he is human. Taking power, returning nothing.”
Which echoed Jack’s assessment of the problem. “Can they be forced to change?”
“Must fear him or love him. Shurik love him. Yorana do not fear him.” Oanu tilted up his massive shoulder in a shrug. “I think there is more to fear than love, but the Yorana . . . maybe they are not wise.”
I would have been happy if the problem rested with the ugly little slugs. But no, the big handsome red demons were the assholes. Of course.
“Grant,” I called. My husband twisted to look at me, and his mouth softened into the faintest of smiles. He looked a little less tired, his skin not as pale.
He didn’t manage to disentangle himself from the Shurik. Quite a few came along with him, clinging to his body and draped over his shoulders. Some had burrowed beneath his flannel shirt. I swallowed hard. Oanu made a small, grunting sound like he was gagging deep in his throat.
“You told the Shurik about the illness?” I asked Grant, trying to ignore one of the little demons wriggling happily on his shoulder. I couldn’t imagine what he’d done to make it react that way, but it was making a hissing sound that could have been a good stand-in for a girlish giggle.
“Everything.” Grant raked his gaze over the Yorana with a cold scrutiny that was another sign of changing times. He had been a priest, once—his kindness radiant. But now he was growing harder. Sometimes I thought I was getting softer. It wasn’t, I thought, supposed to be that way.