The four demons who made up the Council sat on a dais at the end of the hall. The tapestry behind them depicted a human king kneeling before a Demon Council, poised to offer his crown. From the Council members, Korzha sensed caution as he and Claudia entered the hall. He was getting better and better at reading demons, and better yet at cloaking himself from them. If he had to, he could probably cloak Donovan, too, at least for a short time.
He let his senses expand. The demons were agitated, in part because of Donovan. A human felt so different from their usual experience, she unsettled them a good deal. More, she represented at one and the same time the enemy who had imprisoned them in Orcus and the savior who might break them free. As for him, they didn’t know what to make of him. He didn’t upset the demons the way Donovan did. Yet another presence undercut the room, too: a vivid darkness, a chthonic pulsing energy. Most of the demons, he realized, were far from calm. The darkness made them edgy, ill at ease. He turned his head, marking the exits. Every one of them was guarded or blocked. Up, then. If disaster struck, he would go upward to safety.
From the dais at the far end of the room, a female demon with grey hair beckoned them forward. To one side of the Council, a stout demon at a low table bent over a sheet of paper, a black stylus in his left hand. To his right sat a squat black bottle.
With his fingertips light against Donovan’s back, Korzha walked her into the Council hall. He made no effort to mask himself. Better the demons not know he could mask his presence from them. A few probed him, and he let them touch enough to satisfy their initial curiosity before he turned them away. It didn’t matter. Donovan interested them far more. As more and more demons took note of her, their level of sexual interest rose.
Behind the dais and along the perimeter walls, guards stood legs spread, arms crossed, faces blank. Each wore a sword at his hip, ceremonial no doubt, though he noted most had the centered balance of a warrior. He’d be foolish to think they didn’t know how to wield a sword, not with those wary eyes that scanned and assessed. These were soldiers; of this he had no doubt.
One of the Council members gestured to them to come closer. Korzha left his hand in the small of Donovan’s back as if he were her escort at a fancy ball and he was showing her off. The notion made him wonder what she’d look like in a dress. Damn good, he thought.
He and Donovan stopped before the dais, between two groups of demons who sat on rugs spread out for some ten feet around. A third demon knelt on the bare stones, head bowed, separate from the two groups. To the left, Jaise and Aslet sat at the head of perhaps ten demons. Supplicants. From Aslet, Korzha felt discontent. The pale-haired demon sat straight-backed, hands clenched at his sides in contrast to Jaise, who sat cross-legged and radiated mere caution. The demons to the right were something else again. From them emanated the darkness that permeated the chamber and had the others so jumpy.
A mere seven demons, and a squadron of demon guards was on edge? Granted, all seven were formidable and as tall or taller than Korzha himself. They were bare chested and sleek muscled and knelt with backs straight, hands on their thighs. Thin braids that began at their temples and tied at their napes fastened their waist-length hair away from their faces. Each had a narrow strip of metallic thread plaited in one of the braids. One of them, the most physically striking of the seven, had black hair and lilac eyes, and he watched Donovan like she was the only woman left in the world. He radiated desire. The demon wanted Donovan so fiercely it was a wonder he didn’t go up in flames. Hell, it was a wonder the whole damn room didn’t. Even Donovan herself felt it. The flush of blood to the surface of her skin roused Korzha’s hunger, but it was nothing he couldn’t control for now.
Korzha and she took their places between the two groups of demons and slightly behind the one sitting alone. She sat to Korzha’s right, away from Jaise, deliberately sitting so the Elismal demon could not really see her. A flutter of reaction went through the room. Demons shifted, stared, twitched; and a few made low sounds, purrs of anticipation. If any demons needed to be convinced of the necessity of opening the portal, the effect Donovan had on them put that to rest. As vampires were creatures of blood and the night, so demons were creatures of heat and emotion; they thrived in the presence of humans.
At the dais, the grey-haired female lifted a hand. All conversation in the room ceased. She had yellow eyes, the color of faded citrines. “Continue, en-Aslet. We listen,” she said.
“Nin-Siath,” Aslet replied. He bowed low, hand clenched over a fist. “We should go to the Kiverian.” He raised his voice. “The Kiverian remember how to fight. The Setonian, too. And the Nitah. We should not waste time with Overworld alliances. We should act as one. When Overworlders sealed the portal, they showed us no mercy, we owe them none in return.”
“En-Aslet speaks wisely,” said the demon Councilor on Siath’s right.
Siath lifted a hand. “Calmness, en-Tanith. Calmness.” She directed her attention to the lone demon. He lifted his head and made the fist-clasp obeisance. “Success?” Siath asked, leaning forward with fire in her yellow eyes.
“Nin-Siath, esteemed Council, we have not yet found the amulet. But—”
“If you do not have the amulet, then you have failed,” Siath said sharply.
“Nin. We will find it. We—”
Tanith leaned toward the other demon who trembled in his kneeling position. “Time grows short, and you have not yet kept your promise.”
“Amulet or not, we must act,” Siath said. “To delay courts disaster.” Her attention returned to Aslet. “Why not seek both?” she asked him. “Fight and negotiate.” Her eyes flicked between Donovan and the demons before the council. The long-haired demons put their heads close and began an urgent discussion. Jaise and his faction did the same.
One of those on the dais nodded to the guard nearest the dais. “General?” he asked.
The general dipped his head in a bow, then stood, arms crossed over his chest. “Council, I hear you. If the portal is opened,” he said, raising his voice to instant silence. He glanced at the long-haired demons. “If the Bak-Faru join us and if the portal is open, two months.”
Jaise bowed his head and was acknowledged. “All demons respect the Bak-Faru, but long ago they refused the authority of this Council. They have always acted for their interests first. The Council should not open negotiations with the Bak-Faru. It is not necessary. The Elismal will open the portal. With an alliance with vampires, and soon with werewolves, the Overworld is ours again.” He bowed to the dais. “We will fight when and if necessary.” The noise level rose.
“When we find the amulet—”
Siath’s raised hand cut off the lone demon. “Address the Council when you have come to tell us the amulet has been found. Until then we do not hear you.”
“Overworlders cannot be trusted,” Aslet said. “We must fight. We must crush them. Humans, vampires, werewolves. We must crush them all.”
“You underestimate them,” Jaise said in a voice sharp as a blade. “We fight, yes, but we must conquer from within, too. Make them weak inside and out, only then can we be sure they cannot close the portal ever again.”
The demon with lilac eyes spoke up. “The Bak-Faru intend to fight.”
Another of the Bak-Faru nodded. “We promise warriors,” he said.
Tanith smiled. “This is most excellent.” The other Council members nodded in approval, too, except the female, Siath.
“Warriors who fight for the Bak-Faru?” Siath asked, tapping her finger on the tabletop. “Or who seek to help all of Orcus?”
The demon with lilac eyes left off staring at Donovan. He clasped a hand over his fist and bowed in the direction of the dais. “Nin-Siath. Council. One hundred Bak-Faru will enter the Overworld.”
A murmur rose from the dais, from Jaise and his demons and from the guards. The stout demon, the scribe, dipped his stylus into the inkwell and began filling another page.
The councilor next to Tanith blanched. His pa
le eyes skimmed the seated Bak-Faru. “One hundred? Of what strength?”
The black-haired Bak-Faru indicated his companions. “One hundred warriors no less strong than the weakest among us here.”
“That is good,” Tanith said. His eyes were pure fire. “Very good.”
The scribe dipped his stylus in the bottle and wrote without looking up.
“All the same,” said Siath, glancing around the room with her citrine eyes, “we will hear what the human and vampire have to say.” She looked at them directly for the first time. “We hear you,” she said.
Donovan correctly interpreted the invitation to speak. She swallowed once, coughed, and began. She sounded confident, but Korzha felt emotion pour from her. He didn’t doubt for a moment the demons felt it, too. The tension in the room ratcheted up, particularly the sexual tension from the black-haired Bak-Faru. The intensity of the demon’s interest made Korzha’s skin prickle. And, to be honest, it made him feel a certain sense of angry possession. Donovan was with him. He’d fed from her, tasted her blood. She was, in a way, promised to him. Her life was his.
As for Donovan, though she could not in the multi-layered way he did sense the simmering emotions in the room, she felt enough. More than once her eyes darted to the lilac-eyed demon. But her nerves made her all the more convincing. The demons seemed to recognize the pattern of her feelings and listened on two planes, the verbal and the emotional. She set out her offer logically, the scribe’s pen flying across the page. She had, she said, convinced Korzha to make her vampire as Jaise desired, on two conditions. Her daughter must be returned safe, sound, and healthy to Crimson City and remain protected there. Korzha was to have his alliance in the Overworld. Once she saw for herself that her daughter was safe, then, and only then, she would allow Korzha to convert her. She would give the Council her direct and binding promise to open the portal for any demon under treaty with Korzha.
“Vampire?” Siath said to Korzha.
Korzha bowed. He lifted his eyes to her and found the demonness considering Donovan. “I would agree to these terms.”
Siath glanced at the other three demons on the dais. They put their heads together and conferred for several minutes. Jaise stared hard at Donovan, and Korzha reached out and took her hand. Her fingers curled around his, warm. The Council had more conditions and stipulations to accept or renegotiate. Aslet’s plan for direct and immediate conquest would be implemented if Jaise failed; they would then ally with the Bak-Faru. Until then, the Council accepted the promises of the human and vampire. Donovan stuck to her essential points. Korzha would have his alliance with the Elismal. Her conversion would take place in Crimson City when she saw Holly was safe. Only then would she aid the demons in opening the portal to allied demons as long and as often as she remained able.
“We agree,” Siath said at last, looking at Korzha. “Vampire, the Council approves your alliance.” She hesitated, consulting the document the scribe had handed over, and said, “The Council approves your alliance with the Elismal.”
He nodded and turned the motion into a bow, in part to hide a smile of satisfaction. Donovan’s negotiations impressed him. His alliance was now a sword with an even deadlier blade for vampires to wield if an inter-species war did break out. If Fleur Dumont chose not to support him, she’d be looking at a Bak-Faru invasion. “You will not regret your wisdom.”
After another conference, Siath turned her attention to Jaise. “You will return the child and the vampire to the Overworld under the permanent protection of the Elismal. Is this agreed, Nir-Jaise?”
He clasped a hand over his fist. “It is agreed, Nin.”
The scribe brought the document to Jaise who touched his finger to it. “Jaise of the Elismal.” The demoness bowed. “It is done.”
Tanith took the document from the scribe, spoke a word and touched his finger to the page. Pale mist rose from the sheet of paper. One by one the other council members did the same. “Claudia Donovan, Tiberiu Korzha,” The female said when she, too, had brushed her fingertip over the page. “It is done.”
Jaise straightened from his bow and rose. “Council. I will take them to the portal now.”
Donovan’s shoulders slumped. Her relief engulfed Korzha. Without thinking, he put a hand on her shoulder. He heard her whisper, “Holly. Sweetpea, we’re going home.”
The lilac-eyed demon stood. The air around him jumped and quivered. He stared past Korzha at Donovan. She caught her breath and flinched as if struck.
“I will not permit this,” the Bak-Faru said. Silence followed, thick as the quivering, burning air around the demon. Korzha scanned the exits again. There was still no fast way out except up. Out a window if need be. Donovan started to shake.
Several guards broke rank. The other six Bak-Faru also stood, taking up position behind the other. One of them said something indecipherable. A sharp and acrid smell floated on the air. Guards from either side of the room crouched and flowed toward the Bak-Faru. The scribe’s stylus shot off the dais and tika-tak, tika-tak rolled along the stone floor until it came to an abrupt stop at the edge of the rugs. Crimson ink sprayed outward in a fine mist. The stylus vanished and so did the nearest guards.
Jaise shouted. His Elismal came to their feet.
The black-haired demon’s eyes glowed red. He faced Jaise and uttered a single sound, a low syllable redolent of darkness, of the absence of life. The air closed in on everyone in the room, a vacuum of sensation. Like rings of water moving outward from the center of an impact, the Council chamber flooded with searing light. Korzha instinctively threw his arms around Donovan. Demons roared. The yellow-eyed demoness stood, both hands on the table. Every demon was on its feet. When the light faded, when the sound was a dark and maleficent whisper, Jaise remained on the ground and didn’t move. And then he was just gone.
The demon with lilac eyes walked unmolested toward the Council, a path that brought him nearer to Korzha and Donovan. Two more Bak-Faru followed behind him. Bodyguards. The hush was intense. No one moved but the three Bak-Faru. The one with the lilac eyes bowed to Aslet and then to the Council, hand over clenched fist. And when he straightened, he smiled. Dimples appeared in his cheeks, charming. Aslet stood his ground but looked wary. And no one, not even one of the guards, intervened.
“Council. Nir-Aslet,” the black-haired demon said. “The Bak-Faru will fight in the Overworld with or without the rest of you.” He turned to Donovan again. His dimples were gone, his smile now was a grimace. “The vishtau,” he whispered. The physical heat of his body felt alive, dancing around the demon. “I deny you, tes. I deny you, human.” Yet, he faced the room, sending a lilac glare over every demon present. “Let her die from the bond or by my own hand and no other. Interfere, demon or vampire, and you will find the Bak-Faru an implacable enemy.”
Korzha prepared to launch into the air with Donovan, but in the instant before his feet left the ground, the black-haired Bak-Faru focused glittering purple eyes on them and let loose with a concussion of energy that tossed him and Donovan to the floor in a tangle of bodies. The purple-eyed one flowed toward them and gripped Donovan’s arm hard enough to pull her to her feet. Korzha lunged for her but the Bak-Faru clamped an arm around her neck and levered his arm up so that one good twitch would break her neck. The demon smiled and said, “I will kill her, Overworlder.”
Donovan braced herself against the demon’s body, trying to relieve the awkward pressure of his grip. “Don’t be an idiot, fang.” Their eyes met. “One vampire against a few hundred demons?” The Bak-Faru shifted his weight, and Donovan went up on tip toe. “Go,” she said in a choked voice.
Another of the Bak-Faru flicked a wrist, and Korzha shot toward the ceiling.
Chapter Seventeen
Claudia watched the moon. Crimson-tinged and hanging low in the sky, it filled the window where she stood. One thing was certain: moonrise in Orcus was spectacular. Her head ached, her mouth felt dry. It had been four days since Holly had been taken. Her daughter
had been within her grasp, had been moments away from being back in her arms, but now…
She had a new and bitter understanding of demons. Jaise’s promises had died with him and Aslet had no interest in seeing Claudia made a vampire. He agreed with the other Bak-Faru that she should open the portal once more to send through the Elismal, the Bak-Faru and as many demons as agreed to join them in a direct assault. After that, she should be allowed to die. In the Overworld, with help of the Bak-Faru, the Elismal would bond as many humans as necessary in order to keep the portal open. Dead, that’s what they wanted of her. They were going to keep her daughter, turn her into one of them.
The only one who’d come off well in the entire debacle was Korzha, if well wasn’t an overstatement. He still had his alliance with the Elismal because the agreement had been with Jaise as Nir. Aslet, and all the Elismal, were bound to see that promise kept. If Korzha was still alive, he had managed to keep his demon alliance. That was if he was still alive. She wasn’t sure what happened to him after Jaise was killed. She knew the Bak-Faru had tried to kill him too. The flash of light in the room had blinded her.
Sighing, she pressed her head to the window pane and wondered if she would ever see her daughter again. And though her heart chilled to think of it, she wondered if Holly was even alive.
It was four stories to the ground. Not much chance of escaping out the window, and the door lock had defeated any pick she managed to fashion. She would never survive a jump, and there wasn’t any ledge. She’d already tried several times to reach the roof, but she might as well try to fly for all the good it did her. Flying was about the only way she’d leave this place without a demon.
As she looked out the window, a shadow crossed the expanse of courtyard below and vanished into the blackness. Somewhere out there was her daughter. She pressed her fingers against her eyes. Was Holly crying? Had they hurt her? Her chest tightened with unbearable, unfathomable pain.
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