CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Drak
The agony that consumed my body while Omaera was “busy” with the mage and bear was almost more than I could take. I ended up falling asleep on the bathroom floor after vomiting every ounce of my dinner. The Fates wouldn’t allow forced mating, and yet, they had a very sadistic way of “encouraging” me to mate.
Tell her the truth.
I ignored that voice in my head. Omaera needed to want to mate me because she wanted to mate me, not for any other reason. Otherwise, I’d forever wonder if she somehow “forced” herself to acquiesce in order to save me the pain. She was a powerful demon whose powers we still didn’t fully understand. If anybody could bend the Fates and the centuries-old magic, it was the new queen.
I woke the next morning with an unbridled headache surging through my brain. I thought for sure that meant Omaera and her bonded mates were back at it, but when I finally opened my eyes, I found my mate standing over me with her hands on her hips and a deep glare in her green eyes.
“Get up, Fangs. We have work to do.”
I blinked up at her a few times and she sent a sharp jab into the front of my mind making me cry out in pain and wince .
“Why are you on the bathroom floor?” she asked, irritation still in her voice.
“I … I was ill.” I hedged a one-eyed glance at her and her expression softened instantly.
“You were ill?” she dropped down to a crouch and pressed the back of her hand against my forehead. “You don’t have a fever.”
“Vampires don’t get fevers,” I said with a groan before rolling over onto my back.
She remained crouched, frowning down at me. Now, she was upside down. Even upside down she was beautiful. “Shoy and Kenvin have intel from last night and want to debrief with us. You can sit out and rest if you need to though.”
I shook my head. “I’ll be out in a moment.”
Her brows hiked like she didn’t believe I could be upright without vomiting. “You’re sure?”
Nodding, I cleared my throat, pushing myself to sit. Her proximity allowed for a clearer head than normal, and I wasn’t feeling poorly at all. She also pulled back the assault on my brain. With a grunt, I gracelessly stood up, catching a glimpse of my sickly and disheveled appearance in the mirror.
I hated how weak and helpless I continued to look and be around her. I wasn’t normally like this. There was a time I was one of the strongest vampires alive. The most decorated and admired. Now, I was less than a shell of my formal self and it was humiliating.
Would I regain my strength when we mated? Or was this my forever fate?
I didn’t even have Howar to turn to for advice anymore.
I had no one.
“I’ll let them know you’re on your way,” Omaera said from the bathroom doorway. “Take your time.” Then she left and that constant hint of nausea that I seemed to live with now returned the moment she was out of the room.
I showered and dressed quickly, then joined the others in the courtyard. Even though it was tough to tell with Hell, based on the location of the sun, it appeared to be nearly high noon. Why did they let me sleep so late?
“About time you woke up,” Shoy said with a chuckle as he sat in a metal chair sipping something steaming from a mug.
Omaera brought me a plate of food, but I held up my hand and shook my head. “Thank you very much, but I’m going to decline for the moment.”
She nodded. “Tea then?”
Tea sounded wonderful. “Please.”
With a small, but pleased smile, she returned to the kitchen, bringing out a steaming mug similar to Shoy’s a moment later. Zandren and Maxar arrived, taking seats opposite me. Kenvin was last to join our little trust circle.
Omaera handed me the mug, then took a seat next to me. “All right, gang’s all here. Let’s hear what you guys found out last night.”
Shoy and Kenvin exchanged glances.
“Well, the good news is, nobody in Hell likes Lerris. He kept a very low profile when he was here. The general consensus that we got was that he would have been beheaded if anybody saw him since nobody believes for a second that King Donovar’s death was an accident. I think it would be safe to assume that Lerris has headed back to Earth. It’s tough to confirm it, but from what intel we could grab, very few people saw him. Once he realized how unloved he was, he stopped yapping it up and adopted a disguise.” Shoy sipped his tea, then sighed deeply as he swallowed.
“There’s bad news though,” Omaera said, a humorless smirk tugging at her lips. “That sigh wasn’t of contentment.”
Shoy’s eyes turned sad, as did Kenvin’s.
“The idea of a half-human, half-demon queen sits about as well as Lerris as the new king,” Kenvin said, offering Omaera a regretful frown. “Humans are pretty widely hated down here. Humans are pretty much the only reason anybody chooses to live in Hell in the first place. They hate humans.”
Omaera made a slight growly sound beside me.
“Humans were incredibly cruel to each other for a very long time,” Shoy said softly. “Not trying to insult you, Your Majesty, but they are a remarkably unevolved species. The ways in which they not only treat each other, but animals and the environment, is revolting. The Earth is not an endless bounty. Her resources are finite. ”
Omaera exhaled and her shoulders rounded. “I can’t argue with any of that, I’m afraid. When you put it like that, I kind of hate humans now too.”
That made Zandren and Maxar snort.
“So what does this all mean?” Omaera asked. “They don’t want me, they don’t want Lerris. Who is the next obvious choice?”
“There isn’t one,” I said quietly. “It would come down to a challenge. Anybody can challenge. But most likely, one of the existing Realm leaders.”
“Well, my dad’s not going to challenge,” Zandren said, leaning back in his seat and crossing his ankle over his knee. He glanced at Maxar. “What about Queen Anysa?”
Maxar gave him a confused look. “I keep telling you, not all of us have our monarch on speed dial. I have no idea if Anysa wants the crown or not. I’m not in her court.”
Zandren’s brows furrowed, and he crossed his arms over his chest, pouting a little. “Don’t have speed dial. Don’t even have a phone,” he murmured.
“And it’s a power challenge, not a democratic challenge? Like they can’t vote me out. I would have to be vanquished in a ring of some sort?” Omaera asked. “But that could happen, right? Any ol’ demon could waltz in off the street and challenge me to a battle? And they could kill me, right?”
Reluctantly, we all nodded.
“Fucking great,” she murmured. “I didn’t even want this job to begin with, and now I’m the only option? And if someone else wants it, I literally have to fight to the death to keep it.” Her eyes widened and she sat up straighter in her seat. “What if I let the person win? What if they’re not some schmuck who is determined to turn the Realm FUBAR, but actually a decent dude, or dudette, and I just say ‘Uncle—’” She blanched and rolled her eyes. “Wrong word choice. I knew it the moment it came out of my mouth. Sorry.”
Everyone but me snorted.
She continued. “What if I wave the proverbial white flag? Why does it have to end in death?”
“It doesn’t have to end in death,” I said. “But it can .”
“The plan Drak came up with last night will help sus out your alliances,” Kenvin said. “Particularly Anysa. She’s the wildcard. We know Ryden will be with you, and Howar is with Lerris—”
“Or, he has an agenda all his own and Lerris is no more than a pawn,” I cut in, the betrayal of my cousin still a burning coal in my gut.
“Or that,” Kenvin agreed. “Either way, we know his allegiance is not with the Queen. So we need to figure out who Anysa sides with, and we need to neutralize Lerris once and for all.”
“Do you think there could be a coup here in Hell? Or in the entire demon world, if we neutralize Lerris—and Howar?” she asked. “Is my immortality going to be spent always sleeping with one eye open because somebody out there is gunning for my crown?”
“Kind of the way it goes being the monarch, baby girl,” Maxar said with an apologetic shoulder lift.
She was thoroughly unimpressed. “Fantastic.” She cracked her neck side to side. “Well, then I guess we better get training and practicing some more, huh?”
Shoy and Kenvin shifted uncomfortably in their seats.
“What now?” Omaera asked.
“Lerris went to Quintella for something. We don’t know what. Either way, he’s taking that back to Earth—back to Howar. You need to set the trap now.”
Omaera seemed to be the only one surprised at that. Zandren, Maxar, and I had all seen war of some variation, and we knew that you could only train and strategize for so long before you had to eventually take those skills, however minimally honed they might be, and go on the offense. It was better for us to trap Lerris than to wind up in another one of his traps. We needed to be proactive.
I also needed to get to the bottom of Howar’s plan and neutralize it.
“B-but,” Omaera sputtered, “I’m not ready.”
Kenvin nodded. “While I agree, I will also say that your level of improvement in the very short span of time since you’ve come here is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. You are an impressive and powerful demon, Omaera. I’m not sure how much more I can teach you. All you need now is practice, and you can do that anywhere. ”
Her face fell and she sulked. “Just when I was beginning to not completely hate Hell, you’re kicking me out.”
That made the old demon chuckle. “You’re always welcome back.”
Shoy’s brows nearly met his salt-and-pepper hairline. “Wow, Your Majesty. You must have really made an impression on Kenvin here. This old goat normally hates everyone.” He playfully slapped Kenvin on the back, though the older demon didn’t seem too impressed.
“So … do we leave tomorrow morning at first light, or is this like a ‘pack your bags and get gone right this minute’ kind of thing?” Omaera asked, shifting her worried gaze between all of us. Sometimes, given the level of confidence and power she’d so quickly assumed, I forgot that she was just a twenty-two-year-old woman who only just discovered she was part of our realm. Her wide-eyed innocence hit me hard in the solar plexus.
But before I could comfort her, Zandren was out of his chair, picking her up, and plunking her into his lap as he sat down in her seat. “Little One,” he said softly, nuzzling her. Jealousy licked through me hot, sticky, and uncomfortable. He rubbed her back, knocking me with his bulky elbow in the process.
“First light tomorrow is fine,” Kenvin said, his gaze softer than I’d ever seen it as he nearly broke a smile for her. “That way you have all day to find the portal. No need to risk the desert with nighttime encroaching.”
Only a glimmer of relief flickered in the deep-green of Omaera’s eyes. She swallowed and studied Maxar, then me, asking us each a thousand questions without saying a word.
I nodded solemnly. “First light. The sooner we get back, the sooner we can lay the trap. Kenvin and Shoy are right, we don’t know what Lerris or Howar are planning. We need to play offense.”
“And while you’re taking care of the plague that is Lerris, we’ll do what we can here to curry your favor among the demons of Hell.” Shoy gave an affirmative nod. “Shouldn’t be too hard.”
Even I scoffed at that, along with Kenvin, Maxar, Zandren, and even Omaera.
“I guess all we can do about it at this point is laugh,” Omaera said from her nest in Zandren’s enormous lap. “Laugh, plot, plan, practice, and hope that we all arrive back on Earth in one piece.”
Zandren whimpered a little where he sat beside me. “I’m not looking forward to that trip again.” He squirmed and covered part of his lap with one hand. “I quite like certain parts of me.”
Omaera’s lip twitched, and she kissed his jaw. “I quite like certain parts of you too, Pooh Bear.”
Even though I said I was fine, my “illness” of last night made Omaera once again obstinate. She refused to practice on me again, and instead sparred with Zandren and Maxar. Then she had all of us lie to her, changing our tone, pitch, and latency to throw her off.
It was my turn to lie to her, and when we sat across from each other on the floor in the training room, unease crawled across me with spider-like legs, making me itch.
“What aren’t you telling me, Drak?” she finally asked.
I knew this was coming. I wasn’t stupid. Of course she would take this opportunity in her training to work out what I was keeping from her.
“Nothing,” I said flatly, keeping eye contact.
“Bullshit.”
My brows lifted only slightly, but I didn’t say anything.
The key to not breaking during an interrogation was to go against all the normal behaviors and mannerisms that a typical deceitful person would do. Normally, if you were evading the truth, you would break eye contact, stammer, perhaps even talk too much to overcompensate.
I needed to keep eye contact, say as little as possible, and articulate like I was back in boarding school and if I didn’t say the words correctly, I’d be beaten to within an inch of my life by the instructors .
A pinprick of pain wedged its way into my brain. “What secret are you keeping from me, Drak? Your Queen … your mate demands the truth.”
“I am keeping nothing from you, My Queen.”
Her nostrils flared along with the brighter-green swirls in her eyes. “Perhaps I need to reword things for you to understand. Drak, tell me what secret you are keeping, or I will not mate-bond with you. I will drag you around with me for eternity, unbonded, while you listen to Maxar, Zandren, and I have sex.”
Heat raced up my neck and into my face before I could stop it—not that I could have.
Triumph flashed in her eyes. “Ah, now we’re getting somewhere.”
Another pinprick of pain in my brain had me wincing, then she shoved an image so carnal, so erotic and filthy, into my mind that it was impossible not to get aroused. It was of her, Maxar, and Zandren all writhing in pleasure together. She was pinned between them, her face in the throes of ecstasy as one man penetrated her from the front, and the other from behind.
My cock stiffened in my slacks and Omaera’s gaze drifted down to my lap, a smug smile curling her mouth. She pulled back on the pinprick, but kept the erotic film rolling. I pinched my eyes closed to try to banish it, but that wasn’t how these things worked.
The Omaera in my mind looked up at me as I stood like a voyeur, watching them. Her gaze was hooded, her nipples peaked and crimson before Zandren dipped his head and latched onto one with his mouth. She rode him while Maxar filled her up from behind. “Drak,” she beckoned from the pile of flesh, “come join us. I’m not full enough.”
I was so fixated on the vision in front of me that I was barely aware of her tiptoeing through my mind to where I kept my secrets. She nearly reached the door where I kept the ultimate secret before I pushed back, shoving her out of my mind and away from uncovering what I refused to tell her.
I pushed hard enough that the sensual image of her and the other two vanished, and we were back in the training room, just the two of us. She glared at me, steam practically erupting from her ears and nose. “You’re a fucking idiot,” she said, shaking her head. “A damned fool. ”
I didn’t say anything.
She wasn’t done though. “When you first showed up on my door, you were so insistent that we mate. That it was for the good of the Realm and all this shit. And now … now, I’m … I don’t exactly hate you anymore, and would be more open to the idea than I was that first night, but you just keep pushing me away. You know that I’ll never agree to mate you unless you tell me what you’re keeping from me, right? You’re your own worst enemy.”
My molars scraped back and forth against each other.
The pinprick in my brain turned into many and a lot more painful. While I was focused on the pain, I couldn’t focus on anything else, and that allowed my brilliant demon mate to forgo tiptoeing and basically do the flamenco into my mind and right for the door that held all my secrets. She heaved it open with a flourish as terror and pain ran through me.
I closed my eyes to deal with the agony so I wasn’t able to see her face, but the audible gasp told me she uncovered the truth.
I opened my eyes.
And just like that, as intense as it came on, the pain was gone.
So was my mate.