Esher (Guardians of Hades Romance Series Book 3)
Page 1
Esher
Felicity Heaton
Esher
Prince of the Underworld and Lord of Water, Esher was banished from his home by his father, Hades, two centuries ago and given a new duty and purpose—to keep our world and his from colliding in a calamity foreseen by the Moirai.
Together with his six brothers, he fights to defend the gates to the Underworld from daemons bent on breaching them and gaining entrance to that forbidden land, striving to protect his home from their dark influence. Tormented by his past, Esher burns with hatred towards mortals and bears a grudge against Hades for forcing him into their world, condemning him to a life of battling to keep a fragile hold on his darker side—a side that wants to kill every human in the name of revenge.
Until he finds himself stepping in to save a female—a beautiful mortal filled with light and laughter who draws him to her as fiercely as the pull of the moon, stirring conflict in his heart and rousing dangerous needs long forgotten.
Aiko knows from the moment she sets eyes on the black-haired warrior that he is no ordinary man, just as she’s no ordinary woman. Blessed with a gift, she can see through his stormy façade to the powerful god beneath, and the pain and darkness that beats inside him—pain she grows determined to heal as she falls deeper under his spell and into his world.
When the daemon bent on turning Esher against his brothers makes her move, will Esher find the strength to overcome his past and fulfil his duty, or will the lure of revenge allow the darkness in his heart to seize control, transforming him into a god intent on destroying the world?
OTHER PARANORMAL ROMANCE BOOKS BY FELICITY HEATON
Stories in the Eternal Mates romance series
Book 1: Kissed by a Dark Prince
Book 2: Claimed by a Demon King
Book 3: Tempted by a Rogue Prince
Book 4: Hunted by a Jaguar
Book 5: Craved by an Alpha
Book 6: Bitten by a Hellcat
Book 7: Taken by a Dragon
Book 8: Marked by an Assassin
Book 9: Possessed by a Dark Warrior
Book 10: Awakened by a Demoness
Book 11: Haunted by the King of Death
Book 12: Turned by a Tiger
Book 13: Tamed by a Tiger
Book 14: Treasured by a Tiger
Book 15: Unchained by a Forbidden Love
Stories in the Guardians of Hades romance series
Book 1: Ares
Book 2: Valen
Book 3: Esher
Book 4: Marek - Coming in 2018
Stories in the Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series
Book 1: Covet
Book 2: Crave
Book 3: Seduce
Book 4: Enslave
Book 5: Bewitch
Book 6: Unleash
Stories in the Her Angel romance series
Book 1: Her Dark Angel
Book 2: Her Fallen Angel
Book 3: Her Warrior Angel
Book 4: Her Guardian Angel
Book 5: Her Demonic Angel
Book 6: Her Wicked Angel
Book 7: Her Avenging Angel
Book 8: Her Sinful Angel
Stories in the Vampires Realm romance series
Book 1: Prophecy: Child of Light
Book 2: Prophecy: Caelestis & Aurorea
Book 3: Prophecy: Dark Moon Rising
Book 3.1: Spellbound
Book 3.5: Reunion
Book 4: Seventh Circle
Book 5: Winter's Kiss
Book 6: Hunter's Moon
Book 7: Masquerade
Book 8: Hunger
Books 1-3 are also available in one anthology ebook: Prophecy Trilogy
Stories in the In Heat romance series
Book 1: In Heat
Book 2: In Heat: Mating Call
Discover more available paranormal romance books at: http://www.felicityheaton.co.uk
Or sign up to Felicity's mailing list to learn about new titles, be eligible for special subscriber-only giveaways, and read exclusive content: http://www.felicityheaton.co.uk/newsletter.php
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
About the Author
Paranormal Romance Books by Felicity Heaton
Copyright
CHAPTER 1
Rain hammered the pavement around him, scoured the walls of the towering buildings that hemmed him in and stole the clouds from view with their bright neon signs, and saturated the two daemons gathering their wits around fifty feet from him in the narrow Tokyo alley. It mingled with the black blood that turned the air rank and coppery, a stench he wanted to erase from this world.
And he would.
Esher moved forwards, through the heavy droplets that began to gather and condense, responding to the hunger mounting inside him—a desire to eradicate the foul creatures stumbling onto their feet now.
At the far end of the narrow street beyond them, a mortal male tucked beneath a clear convenience store umbrella paused and glanced their way.
Big mistake.
The darkness was swift to rise, to pound in Esher’s blood like a tide that battered him, powerful waves that rolled over him and washed all the light away.
On a black snarl, he pressed the toe of his right boot into the wet pavement and launched forwards, little more than a blur as he closed the distance between him and his prey.
The male daemon swiftly turned his way and stepped in front of his comrade—a female. Protecting her? Valen had reported the daemons in Rome had done something similar.
As if the creatures were capable of feeling anything tender or sweet.
They were as devoid of softer emotions as he was.
But still the male reached behind him and shoved her in the hip, forcing her to stumble out of the firing line just as Esher threw his right hand forwards. The rain that had been gathering around him exploded towards the male, whipping into a spiralling spear as it zoomed away from Esher. It hit the male with the force of a tidal wave, sending him flying through the air. The wretched daemon hit the pavement near the far end of the alley and rolled to a halt next to the mortal.
Esher growled and spat on the pavement, the gnawing hunger growing stronger as he stared at the wretched human.
It would pay in blood for daring to remain near him, for daring to gaze upon him.
It would pay in its own blood.
His lips stretched into a cold grin, the lower one stinging as the cut on it pulled, filling his mouth with the metallic tang of his own blood.
He twitched as memories surged, wrapped around him and felt as if they were pulling him down into them with claws that shredded his insides—tore his heart to pieces.
Blood.
So much red.
He had never seen so much of it, had emptied his stomach more than once when they had been butchering the male in front of him, spilling crimson and fles
h on the hay and dirt. Their sick laughter had prodded at him, ripping at his strength and dragging him down. He had been weak. Stripped of his powers. Left vulnerable. He had been an easy target for their fear, their rage. They had beaten him. Tore more of his strength from him. He had been weaker. Wounded. Bound and broken.
But fucking gods, he had shown them the error of their ways when his power had returned.
Just as he would show this human.
Esher reached his left hand out and focused on the mortal male. It took only a brief thought. One moment the male was standing, the next he was prone on the floor, blood leaking from his eyes, nose, mouth and ears. Weak. Humans were weak. Pathetic. Unworthy of the protection of the gods.
Thunder rolled overhead, golden lightning striking a split-second later, snapping at the buildings that loomed over him and tearing a fearful gasp from the daemons.
A warning from the king of gods.
His uncle could go fuck himself.
The mortals deserved death.
He wasn’t on this plane to protect them. He was here to protect one realm—the Underworld. His home.
This entire world could burn and he wouldn’t give a shit as long as his home was safe.
The male daemon picked himself up, pausing to look at the dead human, his dark eyes wide and a flicker of fear emerging in them as he turned them on Esher.
And the female.
The blonde staggered onto her feet, clutching her stomach, her limbs visibly trembling beneath her long black raincoat that matched the one the male wore. They had come prepared for the turn in the weather. It was almost a shame they hadn’t come prepared to win. It had been a long time since he had fought a worthy adversary.
Keras’s words rang in his ears.
An adversary was coming for him, one of the group bent on destroying the gates to the Underworld that he and his brothers protected, all in an effort to merge the worlds and claim dominion over both.
Esher just hoped they were worthy.
He wanted a good fight, one that would test him to his limit.
Fire tore through his right arm and he grunted and snapped back to the alley. The blonde bitch leaped away from him, her silver knife stained crimson.
With his blood.
It rolled down his forearm to his wrist beneath the sleeve of his long black coat and he raised his hand before him and watched it drip to the ground to dissipate in the water beneath his leather boots.
Water that began to vibrate, tiny droplets of it bouncing higher and higher into the air as he stared at the blood flowing along the side of his hand to bead at the tip of his little finger and fall.
Typical of inferior creatures to use weapons in a battle.
He had never understood why some of his brothers relied on them too, one or two of them even favouring mortal-made guns, when they were gods and wielded powers strong enough to defeat any adversary they might face.
Personally, he never used weapons.
His powers were more than enough.
Without even taking his eyes off the blood, he flicked his left hand towards the female as she launched at him again, her blade flashing in the neon lights and a battle cry on her lips.
It turned to a scream.
She dropped from the air, landing in a shaking heap on the wet pavement, her convulsions growing more and more violent as he slowly turned his gaze on her. Hatred seethed inside him as he looked at her, as he commanded every molecule of her vile blood to dance to his song. He despised using his power over water to end his prey in such a way, because it was just too easy, but she had brought it upon herself.
“No!” the male barked and sprinted towards her.
He sank to his knees at her side and grabbed her arm, pulling her onto her back.
Too late.
Black blood rolled from her eyes and her mouth, streamed from her nose and her ears.
Esher closed his right hand into a fist.
Her body lurched upwards as her heart exploded.
“Bastard.” The male daemon shoved to his feet.
Esher slowly smiled. Crooked a bloodstained finger.
Flames licked over his left side and he grunted as he clutched it through his coat and grey-blue shirt. Waves of heat rolled through him, each stronger than the last. He gritted his teeth as his vision wobbled, shadows dancing across the alley before him, swirling around the corpses and drifting towards him.
No.
He wasn’t sick now. He was safe. Healed. The intense burning in his side mocked him, screamed that he wasn’t healed, was far from it. The wraith’s blade had done more damage than anyone had suspected, and more than Ares’s female could mend. He could feel it. It had been weeks since the attack, and his body could heal even the most vicious of injuries in less than a day. He should have healed by now, but the pain lingered, came in sharp bursts from time to time to remind him that he had let his guard down and paid the ultimate price.
Or he would have, if a mortal hadn’t saved him.
He chuckled through his gritted teeth at that.
“You won’t be laughing in a minute.” The male voice came from behind him and Esher heard other words, in another male’s deep voice.
Give your sister my regards.
Fiery agony streaked across his side, just as it had that night in that heart-stopping moment before everything had gone black, but this time the flames licked at his right side, just below his ribs.
He grunted as the pain combined with the lingering effect of the wraith’s blade, stripping more of his strength from him. The shadows scattered as he growled and focused on the male behind him now, not the one who had been there on that rooftop almost two months ago.
Esher raised his right arm and slammed his elbow into the male’s cheek, and grunted in time with him as the daemon was knocked sideways and his blade scraped over bone before sucking free of Esher’s flesh. Heat spread down Esher’s side, and he clamped his left hand down over the wound, spun on his heel and grabbed the male by his throat.
He kicked hard, shoving the male into the concrete wall of one of the buildings with enough force to break bone. The male screamed as several of them shattered and choked on blood that burst from his lips, coating them. Water streamed over his face as the rain fell harder, so thick and fast that it created a wall around them, shutting out the world.
Esher reined in his hunger, breathing hard as he wrestled with the need to butcher the male and then turn his sights on anyone else in the vicinity. He focused on each breath, his hand shaking against the daemon’s throat with a need to reach into the breast pocket of his grey-blue shirt and pull out the noise-cancelling earbuds. He needed the quiet, the solitude. He needed to let the strings wash over him and sweep the world away.
He could have it, but first he had to ease back on the daemon’s throat and do what he had promised to do.
“Who sent you?” Information.
He and his brothers had all agreed to get information out of any daemon that dared attempt to reach their gate, but Esher had forgotten all about it when the female daemon had clawed and bitten him when he had caught them near it, drawing blood and pissing him off.
Toying with the bitch had become priority one, shortly followed by killing her.
Getting information hadn’t even ranked.
It was a miracle he wasn’t bursting the male daemon like the pustule he was and was instead attempting to get something out of him.
Although, it seemed he had failed to rein his temper in quickly enough.
The male sagged in his grip, his weight tugging Esher’s arm down and sending a fresh wave of pain rolling up it from the cut on his forearm.
Esher huffed and discarded the dead male.
The rain eased enough that he could see the female.
His brothers wouldn’t be pleased that he had killed them both, but they would understand when he told them he had done his best. He wasn’t the only brother with a habit of forgetting to get information. So far, Dai
mon was in the lead. His younger brother had killed almost fifty percent of the daemons who had attempted to get through the Hong Kong gate, only remembering after they were frozen popsicles or shattered into meaty pieces that he was meant to beat information out of them before killing them.
Esher drew his hand away from his right side and frowned at the blood coating his palm. It caught the light of the narrow signs that jutted out from each building, running their entire height to mark what was on each floor, and reflected white, red and yellow back at him.
The wound would heal rapidly, not like the wraith wound, but he would have to conserve his strength until it had knitted back together, which meant he couldn’t teleport home. Stepping, as he and his brothers called it, would drain him, and it was only just gone one in the morning, meaning there were still another four or five hours of darkness in which another daemon could attempt to find the gate.
Or a Hellspawn, one of the accepted species in his father’s eyes and one allowed to enter the Underworld via the gates, could call on him to open it.
So, he would have to do the unthinkable.
Public transport.
He ground his molars and reached into the breast pocket of his shirt, tugged the tiny headphones out and jammed them into his ears. Instantly, the soothing melody of Bach filled him, swamping the song of the rain and the grating noise of Tokyo.
Esher took a few deep breaths, giving the beautiful classical piece time to do its work, and then trudged forwards, past the two dead daemons. He didn’t look at the dead mortal as he passed the male, kept moving onwards on auto-pilot, slowly constructing a wall of calm inside himself, a barrier that would shut the world out and allow him to venture down into the train station and tolerate the presence of the mortals as they surrounded him.
Crowded him.
As the strings rose, he spotted the airplane-wing canopy that stretched above the central entrance of Tokyo station, extending from the glass skyscraper to its right. Clouds swirled around the top of the towering structure, glowing yellow from the city lights. The rain continued to pour, soothing Esher as much as the music, but as he approached the entrance and the number of mortals rose, hurrying to catch the last trains, his grip on calm began to weaken.