Chapter 16 #2
“Only me?” Neyu’s fingertip ran soft trails along his forearm at her waist.
“Yes.” Saer tilted his neck forward to kiss the crown of her head.
“You, calming me. You, reversing my mindset. You, convincing me I can’t be without you, after all.
You…” He squeezed his arm around her middle, nuzzling her hair, and she all but purred against him.
“I fought so hard to not need you, and only you could have broken through every defense I’d fortified like they were built of straw. Within minutes.”
“Perhaps you should just listen to me next time.”
He chuckled despite himself, and Neyu wiggled to flip around until they faced one another.
This close, the contented glint shimmered in her beautiful eyes. Words came to his mind, but he stopped them just before they left his throat.
She was too perceptive for her own good. Something in his body language or expression must have given him away, because she said, “I wish you’d speak your mind.”
The sin he’d been molded from didn’t want him to say it, yet he desired more than what made him. With Neyu. Saer lifted his hand and cupped the side of her face. “Thank you,” he whispered.
The corners of her eyes tightened, like she knew what it took for Pride himself to utter the words. Neyu leaned forward to brush her lips against his, a feather-light kiss. “Don’t thank me yet, we still have to get you out of your mess with Ahraan.”
He frowned and gave a bare shake of his head—not a subject he wished to discuss, but if they had to, better to do so while he held her this close. “I’d collected half the villagers’ vows when Ahraan showed up.”
Neyu pulled back enough to see his eyes. “What did you promise the humans?”
Saer’s lower jaw jutted forward, some of his aforementioned relaxation forgotten. “That they’ll ascend into godhood when they die.”
Neyu gave him a considering raise of her eyebrows. “You pulled on their pride to make them believe it.”
“Then Ahraan arrived and healed one of them with some sort of…” Saer made a vague gesture with one hand, unable to elucidate further. “The guard would have died otherwise.”
“Ah.”
He smirked. “Yes. Ah.”
She smacked the front of Saer’s chest with her knuckles, and he couldn’t help his amused grin as he swept her hand in his. He bowed his head to kiss her fingertips. “Careful with these, or I’ll pin them down.”
Her breath caught, precisely as he’d hoped, and he grazed his mouth on Neyu’s knuckles. “Since then, he and I’ve been at odds with one another. I just need to find the right tactic to convince the other half of the settlement to come back to me.”
His demoness laced her fingers through his. “You could take half of the village and move on.”
Saer made a point to look as unamused as possible.
Neyu scoffed. “Pride himself won’t settle for anything less than the entire village, will he?”
“I’m better than him.”
She rolled her eyes, but with placating humor. “Be that as it may, sometimes one must take what one can get—”
“Neyu.”
“Saer.”
The way she threw his name back at him surprised a laugh out of his throat, and he snapped his arms around her, pulling her into him quick enough to elicit a quiet squeak from her lips. Her heart slammed behind her breastbone, so hard he could feel it against his chest.
We’ll take the entire village, he wanted to say. Instead, staring into her fathomless blue eyes, he found himself whispering, “I love you.”
An exhale filled with relief and adoration left her.
“I love you too. Impossible as you are.” She trailed a finger along his jaw, her clever gaze locked with his.
A pause stretched before Neyu took a deep breath and made her offer.
“I could try to find out more about Ahraan. Talk to him. See what he’ll say. ”
Saer frowned.
“It could be to our advantage.”
She was right, much as the words burned like acid in his stomach. “I trust you. But he…” Saer growled and let his judgment fill the silence.
His love nodded, patient as always. She leaned forward to press a kiss to his lips, which he surrendered to with another quiet sound in his throat. Forehead pressed to his, she whispered, “Information-gathering only, Saer. Nothing more.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about,” he murmured, and was surprised to note it was true.
Neyu smiled, nudging his nose with hers. “Are you worried about me?”
“Yes. No. Not like that. I—” Saer cut himself off with a huff, gathering his thoughts.
Now that Neyu was back in his life, he didn’t relish being away from her.
He couldn’t be present when she gathered information from Ahraan, and he didn’t trust the man.
Then again, she was the fiercest amongst them in the quietest way.
If anyone could do it, it was his beloved, and he would give her anything she asked for. “I can’t not worry about you.”
She seemed to understand he meant so much more than their small time in the village. “In this, we’re alike. I’ll be fine.” Neyu brought her lips to his, then whispered against his mouth as though reading his mind from earlier, “We’ll take the whole village. Together.”
Neyu paced in the hut while Saer sat in the room’s only chair and watched her.
Outside, a desert storm broke on the horizon and thunder echoed from afar.
The evening sky sparkled with ill-intended lightning.
She rounded to resume her back and forth pattern, muttering, “If not tonight, I don’t know when.
Why has nothing happened yet? Were we not thorough?
” The demoness dragged her fingers through her hair, pulling her veil away and back in the process.
Over the weeks, tensions rose to the boiling point. Despite Neyu’s close proximity to Ahraan, even going so far as laughing and joking with the man, she’d not uncovered anything to help sway the townsfolk. Families pitted against one another, Saer’s followers versus Ahraan’s.
At the risk of violence breaking out, they heard final arguments from Ahraan versus Saer and Neyu—while Kalia observed. Then the villagers demanded to be left alone to debate a final solution.
The deliberation lasted all day, seeping into the night.
“Neyu,” Saer said.
“I had them, I felt their dedication,” she went on, switching to pace the other way.
“Neyu.”
She snapped to face him. “What?”
Saer stood and went to her. Raising a hand, he brushed her hair back into place, letting the side of his thumb trail along her cheek.
Neyu released a shuddering breath and shut her eyes.
“Kalia will be back soon.” They’d remained careful through the weeks to keep the intensity of their relationship a secret from her, lest she take any extra information to Lucifer.
“Shhh.” Saer leaned forward and whispered across Neyu’s mouth, “You need to calm yourself. You’ll give us away.”
Neyu nodded, a stilted and anxiety-ridden motion. “I know.” She dug her fingers into his shirt. “It will happen tonight, yes? We have them.”
“That’s what Kaliaspher has stayed behind to find out.”
“What if—”
Saer cut Neyu off with another kiss, gentle but firm. The demoness resisted, but then leaned into the comfort of it, allowing the moment of much-needed peace. Upon breaking away, she sighed against his mouth. “What if they don’t choose us?”
Saer leaned back to tap the bottom of her chin with a fingertip. “Needing reassurance does not become the first lady of the Hells.”
Neyu swatted his hand away. Whatever retort she had at the ready died on her lips when Kalia burst into the shelter with a gust of the approaching storm.
“They’re coming.” Breathless, Kalia leaned half over, clutching her side.
Saer jerked his head towards the shelter’s door at the sound of the first angry shout, still far away, but audible. Several others lifted up with the storm’s wind—a rallying cry.
“What’s wrong?” Neyu crossed the room and took hold of Kalia’s arm.
She gasped for more breaths and shook her head.
“Talk to me,” Neyu pressed.
Ahraan rushed through the open doorway and stood just inside the frame, glancing at the women, then locking on Saer.
He dressed in linens as the rest of them, but the hood fell back from his face, leaving metallic-hued eyes and golden-tinted skin clear to see.
Tension rose from waist-deep to choking.
“Saer.”
“Ahraan,” Saer replied, his tone gravelly with contempt.
The man took the acknowledgement as an invitation and stepped towards Neyu and Kalia. Baring his teeth, Saer stepped in Ahraan’s path.
“They are...coming to kill you…Neyu,” Kalia said, still breathless.
“What?” Neyu addressed Sloth first, then turned to the two men in the room. “What?”
“Neyu,” Ahraan said.
Saer growled at the other man and Ahraan held up his hands, entreating, “We don’t have much time.
Neyu, they come for you by mutual consent between the two factions of this settlement.
Saer’s followers believe you’ll live regardless of what they do to you.
Mine trust you’ll die without blood to sustain you. ”
“Without blood to sustain me,” Neyu repeated blandly, blinking.
Hands balled into fists, Saer glared at Ahraan. “Why Neyu?”
A flash of discomfort crossed the silent man’s face. Saer snapped his attention to Kalia. “Why her?” If he could get them to focus their attention on him…
Kalia shifted on her feet, just as uncomfortable. “They’ve seen her with both of you…” Her voice faded as she drew her bottom lip between her teeth, gaze darting between Saer and Ahraan.
Both of us. Saer’s mind whirred, jealousy threatening, yet he knew what they’d seen. Neyu on his arm, Neyu on Ahraan’s arm, her charm and her laughter, her swaying hips and her demure glances under thick eyelashes. I can’t help what I am—my components, my sin—any more than you.
Saer lowered his voice. “Kaliaspher.”
His threatening tone spurred her to let the rest escape in a rush, “They think Neyu is the key, that she holds influence over both of you, and this decision will bring the truth to light, one way or another.”