9. Trust me
CHAPTER 9
TRUST ME
BILLIE
I don’t trust easily. I rarely trust at all. But there are times when I’ve been thrown in a situation where I have no choice. It’s kind of like trauma-bonding in a way, and after a full day of travel… I decide I have to trust Glaine for now otherwise I’ll lose it.
I have to trust him to show me the right spot to squat and pee that won’t end up with fire up my vagina or something. I have to trust him that the berry-looking things he digs out of the ash are edible; at the very least, they’re sweet enough to eat, and juicy enough to quench my thirst. When my legs go wobbly, I have to trust him to pick me up, and when I fall asleep against his chest, I trust him to keep on marching toward Nuit.
He doesn’t need the sleep, he assures me. We don’t need to hunker down because both of us must rest. He’ll sleep when we reach the mage’s village. Until then, he will do what he promised and get me there.
We’re not as alone out here in the shadows as I first thought. The way I see it, the sooner we’re in a village the better, and if he wants to keep on trucking… well, I’m not going to stop him.
Not even when it becomes obvious that we’re being followed…
“What was that?”
I know what I just saw. I’ve been noticing creatures like that skittering by us before, with the same white eyes, only they’re a lot smaller. He told me about the prey beasts that lurk closer to the edge of the shadows where we are because, if they venture too much deeper into the blackness that surrounds us, there are even more dangerous monsters to deal with.
The arkoda is one. The hitchul is another. The ungez are the smaller ones that scamper like squirrels, and when I heard a long, drawn out squawk that broke up the heavy silence at one point, he simply said, “Firebird.”
That’s not a bird tracking us. The shadowy figure has horns and two long arms. It’s a similar size and shape as Glaine, and it reminds me of the shadow form that Sombra demons at the palace wore.
Its shoulders are hunched a little, almost as though it’s preparing itself to fall forward on all fours and run if it has to, but based on the few times I’ve caught its silhouette and those eyes staring at us… it— he can match our pace easily.
And he’s following us.
The second I spoke, the creature pauses. Then he growls. Stepping out of the shadows in the distance, the glow from the reddish moon above us illuminates him.
It’s a demon alright. And though most of his features melt together in his shadows, I can make out details. His hands are flexed, shadowy claws on display. His nose is shorer than Glaine’s, his hair longer, and because he is in his shadows, he’s not covering anything up.
How do I know? Because unless he’s got a baseball bat or something swinging between his legs, that’s his cock.
I yip, and as I watch, that part of his shadowy anatomy jolts and starts to lift.
Fuck . He sees me and that’s how his body reacts? What is it with these demons? Do they all have a human fetish, or is it just because I’m the only female I’ve seen in Sombra so far?
I don’t know, but I start to retreat.
Glaine holds out his hand. “Billie. Don’t move.”
Okay. There are times when I’ll cross my arms over my chest and refuse to be ordered around. There are times when I’ll pretend not to hear a command so that I’m not necessarily disobeying. And there are times when I know when to keep my mouth shut and do what I’m told.
In the shadows of Sombra, with the creepy white-eyed demon moving like he’s some kind of beast as he stalks us as his prey… this is one of those times.
Don’t move? I’ll try. I mean, the length of chain separating me and Glaine is about as much distance as I can keep from him. If he moves, I’ll have to follow?—
The white-eyed demon takes a deep breath in. His exhale is a sudden roar that has my knees turning to jelly. I wobble, about to drop because my other instinct is to turn and run as far as I can in the opposite direction, and that’s when Glaine—grumpy, scowling, terse and uptight Glaine when he’s not attempting to ‘flirt’—throws his head back, shakes it roughly, and howls with more emotion than I’ve seen him give off since I first rejected him.
Something happens. The big, red-skinned demon seems to grow impossibly bigger before he explodes; at least, that’s what it seems like from my vantage point behind his big, bulky back. The golden chains gleam, the glow so bright I squint against it, and when I recover my sight, Glaine is gone.
No. Not gone. He’s reverted to that mass of shadows, the silhouette of the horned demon who walked out of my kitchen before he abducted me.
I don’t know what shocks me more: that after almost three days stuck together, he’s broken out of the chains—or that, once he’s free, the first thing he does is charge toward the demon who’s been stalking us.
They’re shadows. It doesn’t matter that he was able to grab my arm when he pulled me into the portal that brought me here. When Glaine is red-skinned with the ridges over his nose and on his brow, I can think of him as at least human ish . As a mass of black shadows with a pair of glowing green stop lights for eyes? My mind just can’t comprehend that he’s anything but a grumpy storm cloud.
I expect them to meet and become one big shadow. Not even close. They collide, the ground shaking with the force of their hit. Their shoulders hit first, using brute force to knock into their opponent. When that doesn’t work, they lower their heads and ram their horns into each other repeatedly while snarling at each other in Sombran—and what might not be Sombran but pure animalistic sounds.
It goes on like that for a few fierce moments before Glaine scores a hit. Something cracks, a piece of horn going flying, and the howl of rage from the white-eyed demon is deafening.
Glaine retreats for a moment, then glances around. His eyes land on me, and he bobs his in-tact horns. He’s making sure I’m safe, but just as I want to shout at him not to be distracted, he waves his hand. It darkens with even more shadows, and when they clear, he’s holding a gleaming silver sword about two-feet long.
What the— where did that come from?
I don’t know, but I’m glad to see it. They two demons seemed evenly matched when they were ramming horns with each other, but now my demon soldier has the edge?—
Seeing the sword, the other demon gnashes his fangs and, slashing out with his claws, goes for Glaine’s wrist.
The sword falls to the ash.
Damn it!
He was distracted after all, wasn’t he? All because he was looking for me.
Barely taking his eyes off of the challenger for a moment, Glaine searches for me for a second time and, just as the demon tackles him hard , he rears back his foot and punts the hilt of the sword, sending it flying in my direction.
Glaine is on his back, the rogue demon snarling in Sombran on top of him, digging his claws into Glaine’s shadows.
The big demon howls, throwing the other one off, but the white-eyed demon launches himself at Glaine right away.
“Stab him,” bellows Glaine—in English. “He will take you for his own if he guts me first.”
I drop down, grabbing the sword from the ash. Glaine grabs the rogue demon’s remaining horn, twisting his head so that he has the leverage to rise up. I don’t know if he’s been hurt or not. Can a shadow be hurt? This sword suggests that it can.
And Glaine wants me to stab this other demon?
I… I don’t know. Can I?
I hesitate, and the rogue demon senses weakness. Twisting out of Glaine’s hold, he butts the soldier in the middle with his horn, then plants his foot in his side, kicking my demon at least ten feet through the air.
Glaine lands on the ash with a thump and a roar, but the rogue demon is already on the move. He spins on his heel once Glaine is down again, tearing through the ash right toward me.
“Billie!”
I tighten my grip on the sword.
I can’t let this demon get me. I also can’t let him hurt Glaine anymore. He’s immortal, so he shouldn’t be able to die, but the duke mentioned that he could easily end his existence if he chose to. With a sword like this? Or being gored to death my claws?
No. I can’t let anything like that happen. Glaine… he’s my ticket out of here. His only mistake was getting it in his head that I was his mate after he went searching for that spell book he was talking about. And, okay. He wants me to believe that he followed the book to our apartment because Sierra has a mate of her own. It’s not Glaine, though.
And if the pit of my stomach did a little flip-flop in inexplicable relief to hear that, for once, someone would rather be with me than Sierra? I’m sure I haven’t noticed at all...
The demon has slowed, circling me now. Taunting me. He sees the sword and doesn’t give a shit. Because he doesn’t think I’ll use it? Or because he’s just toying with both of us?
My arms shake, but I don’t drop the sword.
“Don’t hesitate if given the chance,” commands Glaine. “He is lost. Better my sword end his existence than the fate Duke Haures would have in store for him.”
In answer, the demon spits something at me in Sombran, then jerks on what has to be his dick to make sure I get the message despite having no idea what he’s saying.
That does it.
I hold up the sword, and Glaine calls out, “You can do this Billie. I trust you.”
He does?
I firm my grip on the hilt. “Bring it,” I dare the rogue.
He has no idea what I’m saying. It doesn’t matter. His eyes glow so brightly, they light up his face. It’s misshapen. I suddenly understand what the word ‘demonic’ means. His fangs are overgrown, his cheeks stretched tight, and there is a promise in his blank gaze that he will hurt me—and he will enjoy it.
No.
At the same time as a burst of adrenaline has me dashing forward, the rogue demon runs full-speed at me. I don’t even have to move the sword or do anything but angle it up before it’s slicing right through the shadows, getting lodged in the meat of the solid chest beneath.
He gasps, and I can’t help but wonder if this was some sort of demon suicide before I realize that I’m still holding the sword and he’s skewered on it like a shish kebob.
I yell and drop the sword. For a second, he’s still standing. In the next? He crumples to the ash.
I dash away. Without the chains, I could keep running, but I stop when I’ve put a good distance between me and the rogue demon. Glaine, meanwhile, has gotten up. Limping for a few steps before shaking it off and striding the rest of the way toward the fallen demon, he crouches down at his side. He murmurs something in SOmbra, then, with a yank, pulls his sword out.
He does something else to the demon with the blade. A little late to be squeamish, but I cover my eyes with my fingers for a moment. He grunts, and when he’s done, he’s hovering there in his shadows while that other demon is… gone.
No. He’s not gone. Unless I’m imagining it, there’s a massive mound of ash laying in just the right size and shape as the fallen demon. As I watch, it disintegrates further and joins the piles of ash beneath it.
My head shoots up to Glaine. He’s brushing his hands together as he moves away from the ash.
“There,” he says. “I’ve returned my sword to my shadows until we have need of it again.”
Holy crap. I don’t know what he did or where he pulled that sword from, but if it’s an immortal demon killer, we should keep it out. Not because I have any intention to use it on Glaine next—I’m pissed at him, but that was pure self-defense that had me stabbing the demon, not revenge—but because I like the idea of being able to protect myself without relying on him.
“What? No. I think?—”
It doesn’t matter what I think because, before I can say another word, something else happens.