Chapter 25 #2
Runeak, always one to speak and listen in black and white, nodded. “I will let him know.”
Saer shook his head as he shut his eyes. “I...no. Runeak, don’t.” Once more rolling his head towards his sister, he met her gaze. “Don’t insert yourself into this. I’ll go back when I’m ready. That’s a truth you won’t be harmed for sharing.”
Observing Runeak and the way she sat with such impassivity, he pivoted away from their maker. “Where is Errshek?”
“I don’t know.”
Rage ignited through his body, tightening his chest with a ferocity that reignited the throbbing at his temples. Their fight. The blood and eviscerations and broken limbs…
Runeak’s nostrils flared, and he swore a glimmer of satisfaction shone in her fathomless eyes.
Damn her. She got exactly what she wanted. Would she give him nothing?
“When did you last see him?”
“Not long after you unmade our kin.”
So you wouldn’t suffer the same fate! An old, familiar pang dug at his insides which had nothing to do with their recent battle. He forced himself to sit a little straighter. Saer shoved the hollow feeling aside. “What did he want?”
“Protection.”
Saer made a derisive sound. “From me?”
The demoness nodded.
“Well, he’s not a complete idiot.”
Runeak didn’t respond.
“I gather since he’s not here, you declined his request,” Saer said.
“Correct.”
“Did he say where he was going next?”
Runeak leaned back in her chair, muscles tightening. Her lips thinned as she apparently attempted to hide any discomfort the movement brought. “He asked if I knew where the Twins were.”
Her answer prompted Saer’s subtle eye roll. “Of course. Did you tell him where to find them?”
“They prefer to be near water.”
“I don’t suppose you could be a little more specific?”
“No.”
“Great.”
Silence stretched between them while Runeak observed and Saer stared at the floor of the tent, contemplating. He had no better leads.
Astonishingly, she broke the quiet first. “You fought well.”
Saer smirked and lifted his gaze to Runeak. “Quite high praise, coming from you.”
“You should have done better.”
“Well, that ruined it.”
Her expression didn’t change, though a glint of laughter sparked in Runeak’s coal eyes.
Pride himself couldn’t leave it alone. “I almost had you.”
The edge of Runeak’s lips twitched again. “You did not, Eldest.”
Saer snarled, and his sister angled her head to the side in a fine tilt. “After you heal, train with my soldiers.”
“Why in the Hells would I waste my time with that?”
“I want a challenge at our rematch.”
In his days spent with Runeak’s encampment, Saer learned more about her blood drinkers, though they might as well be labeled the damned, in his opinion, for the price they’d pay in exchange for immortality. Others referred to them as vampires. Alive in some ways, dead in others.
They had been presented to her as a resource and gift, and represented a new creation from their maker who imbued them with their powers.
The non-humans were adept at stealth, making them perfect spies for Runeak’s position as a war leader.
As part of their connection to Lucifer, they remained immune to the burning properties of Daemoenica blood and—in fact—their blood equivocated to a drug for their kind, or perhaps a very fine and luxurious spirit.
The loyalty and balance Runeak achieved with her vampiric followers rose from an agreement to provide them with consensual tastes, straight from her arteries.
The blood drinkers could thin the ranks of her opponents with ease, but their true value lay in convincing humans on either side of the conflict to join their ranks—if they could be coerced to undergo the change. The more who took the oath, the more guaranteed souls Lucifer procured.
Saer had nearly recovered from his battle with Runeak, and the pair resumed a familiar routine they’d known prior to his years with Neyu—plotting alongside Wrath in her war room, strategizing for the greatest victory.
The itch to chase down Errshek persisted.
Runeak wanted him to train with her men, but he couldn’t be hampered.
The instant he came to full strength, he’d resume his quest to find the Twins. Another day. Perhaps two.
The knowledge Runeak already possessed of war and combat had only expanded. Runeak exhibited astounding cleverness in the arts of offense and defense. Maneuverability and security. Surprise and simplicity. She commanded without any doubt of her subordinates following orders.
He’d hate to find himself on the other side of her ministrations.
Angry footsteps thudded outside Runeak’s war tent. A rustled sound of struggling. The flap pulled back to reveal a pair of blood drinkers dragging a bound and gagged man.
The restrained enemy spy was thrust on the floor of the general’s tent. He couldn’t have been more than twenty human years.
The young man’s gaze held both terror and pleading, as though he knew his end neared. His gaze darted between Saer and Runeak, finding little solace in their impassive stares. Sweat dripped from his brow, dampening his dark hair and carving streaks into his dirt-coated cheeks.
Saer raised a brow and angled his gaze to Runeak. Her territory, her mission, and therefore her call. He wouldn’t aid in her harvests, but also didn’t intend to stand in her way.
She didn’t spare him a glance, addressing her blood drinkers while she fixed her predatory focus on the captured spy. “Can he be turned?”
Turned to their side of the fight, Saer assumed.
“He is willing to take the oath.”
Or...
Runeak offered a curt nod and waved her hand in dismissal. “Drain him.”
Drain him?
Before Saer could ask the question aloud, the vampires each dove for a side of the young man’s throat, and he screamed. The sound cut off after their fangs sank past skin, and blood flowed.
His shriek melted into a groan.
A rich, decadent rush of flavor slid over the back of Saer’s tongue from out of nowhere—unexpected. He growled and shook his head, taking a step from the scene.
What in all the Hells?
Saer cleared his throat, attempting to rid it of the taste, though he couldn’t say it was bothersome in truth. Unforeseen, certainly. Though not unpleasant.
Quite the opposite.
Pleasant.
Pleasure.
Desire.
His heart skipped.
Neyu...
It reminded him of when he’d first labeled Asheda’s pride, like a warm sunbeam on his skin.
He could feel pride.
In that instant, he tasted lust.
Runeak’s words when he first entered her encampment leapt into his mind. ‘I could smell you.’ Because the sin of wrath carried a scent for her. How did the other Daemoenica sense their respective sins?
It seemed he’d absorbed more from his beloved than her Hellsfire.
If he was right, it also meant the blood drinkers’ bite evoked a sensual euphoria, and that desire called to him.
Saer forced it down with a hard swallow and focused his efforts on quashing the sense. He didn’t want it, or the reminder of what he’d unwittingly stolen from his match. What else had he gained from her destruction?
An agonal gasp threw Pride out of his thoughts, and he jerked his eyes back to the young man. Runeak went on scouring her war maps without pause.
The vampires pulled away, revealing streams of leftover blood slipping down the sides of his neck. Their victim’s eyelids fluttered, and one of the blood drinkers curled herself over his body. “Invite him in,” she whispered.
A wave of uneasiness curled through Saer. Without taking his eyes off the pair, he aimed his question at Runeak. “Who?”
Saer knew before his sister brushed off the inquiry with a single head shake, but answered anyway. “Father.”
Saer moved back another step, and then Runeak lifted her attention to his face.
The spy cried out. His eyes flew open; the orbits bathed in endless black.
No.
Fear rooted Saer in place, lodged in his throat, choking him. He distantly noted Runeak tipping her head in vague fascination.
The drained man’s head snapped towards the First at an unnatural angle, neck cracking, and those onyx pools locked on Saer.
Saerkhanum. The hissing voice whispered in his head, desolate and enraged all at once. Under it all, a sense of delicate surprise.
No, no, no.
He wasn’t done. He hadn’t located Errshek. Had barely begun seeking his revenge.
And now Lucifer saw him. He’d be unmade for his disobedience.
Saer couldn’t voice any of it, stuck between begging and fighting in his terror. All he managed was a diminutive shake of his head.
The man’s eyes shut, then his entire body seized.
The instant Lucifer took Its eyes off him, the force holding Saer in place released, and he shoved past the vampires to flee the war tent.