One of the symbols on his arm began to glow and tingle. An alert. Someone had tripped his perimeter wards. A trespasser in my sanctuary.
He pictured Josephine—small and helpless in his bed. The demon in him commanded protect. Fangs bared, he unslung his bow, then traced to the observatory. His scowl deepened. He had a guest.
Sian was drinking from a flask, gazing down at an orgy, his customary war ax sheathed at his side.
By way of greeting, Rune said, “How did you find this place? And trace past my ward?” He shouldered his bow once more.
Sian cleared his throat. “You concealed your knowledge of this location, but when I read your mind, I uncovered enough.” The demon’s striking face was stamped with fatigue, his intense green eyes bloodshot.
How long did he have before his appearance started changing? With his twin’s death, Sian had become the King of Pandemonia and all Hells—which meant he would transform from one of the most physically faultless males in the worlds into his own most monstrous state.
Sian offered his flask. “Brew?” The favored libation of demons.
Rune found the taste harsh, but as a lad, he’d drunk it just to have more in common with demons. The habit had stuck. From his pocket, he retrieved his own flask.
He raised it and took a generous swig. “What are you doing here?” Would Sian scent Josephine on him? How would Rune explain that he smelled of only one female? “You could have contacted me.” His wrist tattoo was dark. “Now is not a good time.”
“You must have a thousand nymphs in need.”
Rune corrected him: “A thousand and one.” Soon. He’d gone two nights without release, holding vigil for a female who didn’t want him. Two nights abstaining! That was why he was conflicted. Rune wasn’t the only one. “You look like hell, demon.”
“Soon to be literally,” Sian said in a bitter tone. “I’m now the king of it and must fit the part.”
Rune had nothing but sympathy for Sian. He loathed change, had been altered so many times during his life, he refused to be ever again. “How long do you have?”
Sian didn’t respond to that, his focus on a racy scene below—a demoness with three males inside her. “Gods, I will miss the attentions of desirable females. They flock to me now. Anon, they will gaze upon me with horror.”
There was only one cure for a demon like him, and it was so implausible, Rune had little hope for his friend. “Will you resemble Goürlav?” Sian’s twin had been a giant with green skin and slitted yellow eyes, considered repulsive by most.
Curt shake of his head. “Already I sense different changes. I’ll be my own brand of monster.” He drank again. “I asked around about my brother, couldn’t understand why he would enter a contest for a kingdom. He already had the demonarchy of Pandemonia.”
The source world of all demons. “Then why’d he do it?”
“Also up for grabs was a queen, a sorceress who’d volunteered to be won.” Sian met Rune’s gaze. “Don’t you see? He craved a willing wife and could see no other way to get one.” Sian took a long swig from his flask, then stared down at it. “The spectators of that contest considered him a monster, when all he wanted was a companion. Soon, I’ll be the one who’s hideous and yearning. How amused she would be about this.”
“The fey girl? With different colored eyes.”
Sian glanced up. “We have so few mysteries among all of us.”
“Was she your mate?”
“I never attempted her, so I can’t know for certain,” he answered. “But I had a strong sense she was mine.”
“You once said she was treacherous.”
“As duplicitous as she was lovely.” Sian rubbed his head, a gesture he often did—a telling one. A full-blood hell demon like him should sport sleek black horns, but his had been shorn when he was too young to regenerate them. Even after so long, he felt their absence. Like phantom limbs.
A predatory and defensive feature, horns were also sexual organs, sensitive to the touch. Amputation would be a nightmare.
“I would give anything for vengeance.” Sian turned up his flask, draining it, then swiped his sleeve over his mouth. “Let’s think not on the past. I’ve come to call you to battle.”
Even better than a covey visit! “Against?”
“The Ice Demonarchy. They’ve been making sacrifices to old deities, attempting to wake them.”
Idiots. They had no idea what they were doing. The Møriør ran into this sometimes, were old enough to have personally encountered most of those gods before they’d slept. The ice demons played with powers more evil than the Møriør could dream of being.