Chapter 6 #2
I had portaled away from the fortress at three in the afternoon, then returned for this banquet at seven.
As for how good a cook my grandfather was, he didn’t have much to work with.
Pickings were slim in the desert, mostly critters and bitter plants.
His occasional trips inland to the outer realm districts for supplies were few and far between, so the supplies had to stretch over months.
Those helped to keep food edible if not enjoyable, but I could safely say that I’d never have experimented so much in cooking if I’d had access to the bountiful food in the fortress.
I enjoyed figuring out how to make sand critter innards taste better.
Carmine leaned on his throne and sprawled his legs wide. I’d always liked him doing that, and the fucker knew it. Because I’d once told him. A hot king throne-sprawl was the demon equivalent of a woman bending over to show her ass, or leaning forward to show her cleavage.
“That explains why you ordered a servant to bring you a basket of food earlier,” Carmine said lazily.
I had. And dammit. Did the servant blab to him? I didn’t think anyone overheard my order. Only two people could have eluded my senses to do so. Carmine and…
Her shadow fell over me with all the warmth and comfort of an angry beehive. The woman didn’t need daggers when her voice could stab a person just as effectively, but she had them on her at all times anyway. Part of her look.
“Get out of my seat, human.”
Carmine’s mother.
She’d surprised me, and that wasn’t a good start.
I’d absorbed far more in my two years here than anyone knew, and I understood very well that unless I established dominance, it didn’t matter how many trainings I attended—the other crimsons would never respect me.
The queen must be more powerful than the king’s mother.
If I couldn’t earn their respect or their fear, then winning Tiers wouldn’t matter.
I kept my tone very bored. “Mother is home.”
“Yes,” she answered. “And Mother still keeps her daggers sharp.”
“However would Carmine get on without you?” I looked up at her then. I couldn’t turn my back on Athira as I could with her daughter.
Athira’s focus trailed over my toned arms and my face. “You have altered, but you have not earned the seat on Carmine’s right. Remove yourself and consider this your last warning.”
“Why don’t we put the question to your son, Athira? You really must stop fighting his battles for him. I wouldn’t dream of questioning him so.” I twisted to look at Carmine. “Would you like your mother to make decisions for you, great king of demons?”
His expression was carefully blank, and a curious amusement found me.
Some things in the demon realm were exactly as they were in the Earth realm, and a man caught between his mother and his significant other was one of them.
I could almost admire Carmine’s loyalty to his mother over my very public challenge.
He wasn’t picking sides. Which shocked me, too, because I’d expected him to dismiss me.
Fabric ripped, and a tugging sensation pulled at my shoulders and waist. Carmine’s eyes widened a fraction. I didn’t need that hint to know his mother just sliced through the bodice of my dress.
“I liked this dress,” I informed him, frowning. Luckily the dress was only cut and mostly stayed put.
His mother gripped a handful of my black hair, arching me back. “The next cut will be through your flesh, human,” she hissed for all to hear.
The thing about being called human… it genuinely offended me now.
My twin always had more time for them. Me?
They’d been like little dolls who always did anything I’d wanted.
Fun at the start, then so fucking boring.
I’d kept up the pretense of Queen Bee with them because Tempest wanted to work her weaving magic, but I’d never understand how Tempest had so much genuine time and care for them.
She’d even found the occasional one attractive.
I likened taking one to bed to screwing a blow-up doll.
If you couldn’t get a real-life partner, then go for it.
Not my cup of tea. Then again, Tempest got the chief of the magus power, and I’d received the chief of the demon power.
We had a little of the other power in us, but not enough to do much with.
I had my divination intuition, and she… well, I had no idea.
I’d only just figured out there was something different about me when Carmine killed them all.
Mother be, the craziness of that hit me all over again. I was sitting next to my family’s murderer, and that should repulse me, yet all I felt was a deep fear that I wouldn’t pull off everything I needed to.
Carmine’s hand had tensed on the arm of his throne at his mother’s words, and I made sure not to so much as hold my breath.
The ballroom was dead quiet when I released smoke from my scalp.
Masked by my black hair, I curled my power around Athira’s fingers, focusing with everything I had to keep wisps from floating up and alerting anyone but myself, Carmine, and his mother to what was going on.
“Find another seat, Athira,” I commanded.
My smoke had to be blistering her flesh.
His mother didn’t have many gaps in her scales left.
One of the gaps existed in the web of her thumb and forefinger.
I drove my smoke into that area, feeling skin peel back from my power.
I funneled into tendon and joint and cartilage.
Then I started for her circulatory system.
I may not be a better fighter than this woman, but—to my surprise, and likely hers—my power was stronger.
Her crimson smoke sizzled as it met mine, dying back as I neared her blood vessels.
Once I got there, poisoning her entire body would be easy.
At that point, she wouldn’t be able to mask her reaction, and if I decided to, I could kill her.
Athira released my hair, tucking her hand behind the other. “You may have this seat for now.”
I looked into her crimson eyes and couldn’t decipher a thing. I could have gloated, but she’d lost face big time. Saying nothing and dismissing her was the wisest course.
“You have learned much, enamai,” Carmine said as his mother sat on his other side, dislodging Gratia to the next chair. “Your grandfather could not have taught you these skills.”
My grandfather wasn’t powerful enough. “Not my grandfather, no.”
His hand gripped at the arm of his throne once more. “Then who? Those who are powerful enough to do so live in this fortress.”
Keep your enemies close, after all. The demon part of me understood that. But the reality of that was another issue. The idea that enemies had to be your only friends was so foreign to how I’d been raised. Or maybe friendship was foreign in general.
But Carmine wasn’t particularly worried about me hatching plans with a powerful enemy…
he was worried the powerful enemy was male.
I’d hidden from Carmine for years, and our mating made him a jealous sonofabitch.
He was the one to teach me all these tricks.
I’d seen Carmine do any number of things—such as controlling the trajectory of his smoke and only releasing from certain areas of his body.
Then I’d dedicated hours and hours of practice to mastery as I struggled to control my lust.
“He lives here,” I answered.
Cracks appeared in Carmine’s throne as he squeezed the armrest.
“Or maybe I taught myself,” I purred. “Which would you believe?”
“If you hold power, then you are capable of controlling it. Though many don’t strive to.”
“Lust has plagued us both. To cope, I spent time with my power, and you spent time with your obsession.”
“What is my obsession, Syera?” He released the throne. “You, perhaps?”
I snorted. “If you were anyone other than yourself, perhaps, but you were mated to someone else far before I arrived.”
He’d stilled. “There is no one else for me.”
I hadn’t meant a person. I’d referred to his mating with the realm.
I caught the flicker in his gray eyes when I faced him. “I worked on my power, and you spent time driving demon gates closer to the Earth territories of other supernaturals.”
His mother’s sharp gaze was upon me. She’d given far more away than Carmine.
“You are close, I take,” I murmured.
“Does the movement of the gates have something to do with you playing Tiers?” he asked, eyes glittering with ice.
“Would I have brought up the gates if so? You’ve killed everyone I loved on Earth. I would not choose to burn it, but I hold no illusions about who you are.”
“We must feed. To conquer more territory is to bring us strength, you stupid girl,” his mother chimed in.
I’d risen from human to stupid girl. Next thing we’d be baking Christmas cookies together.
Demons were well fed from their current territory.
There was no need for anything larger. “Obviously, demons should not starve, Athira,” I answered, watching one of the demons dancing for me.
He wore a loincloth in essence, but a fancy one that went all the way to the ground.
Was he implying that his cock extended to the ground too? I had a feeling so.
The crimson male shot a look to my left, and hastily retreated at what I could assume was a lethal look from Carmine. Plenty of women danced for Carmine, and I left them to it, only feeling a jolt of shame that the show used to make me so livid with jealousy.
“You should applaud your king’s efforts to keep us invincible,” his mother spoke again.