Page 69 of I Accidentally Summoned a Demon Boyfriend

Yip! Yee! Yip!

The sound startled me, and I jumped from my seat next to Rayna. Had someone found us? This place was secure and had been for years. Had they captured my friend and forced him to reveal our secrets?

As I braced, preparing to do all I could to protect her, the sound grew near, and I heard the trumpeting sound of a demon dog’s fart. Before his little blue body appeared in the doorway, I smelled the sickly-sweet odor.

Piko.

He crossed the room, and in one leap, landed in my arms.

“Of course you found us.” I laughed and patted his head. “Easy boy. Settle down.”

He licked my face, and as soon as he saw her, he jumped onto the cot with Rayna. The mutt didn’t leave her side for the next two days.

Over the days, I made sure to give her water and kept talking to her as much as possible. Though I wasn’t sure if she could hear me, I told her all about my life, laughing at myself because these were things I would have to tell her again.

On the fourth day, something changed. Rayna’s body hummed with an energy I’d never felt from her. I stood from my seat as the light, golden like the elixir I gave her, shined beneath her flesh. Two steps into my approach, and that mental connection that was once a gentle frequency became a sharp sting in my mind. Needles punctured the surface of my brain, and my body seized.

My knees cracked against the ground, sending lightning strikes of pain up my thighs and into my gut. Rayna stirred. I fell to all fours, and her eyes opened. The box, Likosa’s gift. I crawled to it, fighting my seizing limbs. It took all my concentration to open the vial with my name written across it.

“Metice?” Her voice was dry as her eyes searched for me.

“I’m so sorry.” I closed my eyes and poured the fizzling gold liquid down my throat.

And the world went dark.

I didn’t get to look into her eyes.

18

And then comes Marriage.

Rayna

There’s a moment when you think your life is done, and you slowly accept it. Then, there’s the moment when you realize your life isn’t ending, and the pain of your recovery almost makes you wish it would. When my eyes opened to the dirty ceiling of the cave I lay in, all I wished for was anything to give me relief.

My body felt stiff, my bones ached, my throat burned, and every breath I took felt like it was fighting me back. What happened to me? The thought repeated in my mind as slow-moving snippets, memories of my past, returned like strokes of a paintbrush, filling in the gaps of an image.

The soft whining at my side drew my eyes to the warm body curled up with me. Piko. His eyes were closed, but he whimpered, and I wondered what he must have been dreaming of. I turned my head just enough to scan the space. This was a cave. Where, I didn’t know, but I didn’t think it was Earth. There was one small entrance, a fire pit in the center with a dying flame, and then I saw it.

Large feet in leather boots connected to a body on the ground. I carefully shifted to see who the owner of the feet was and panicked when my eyes reached his face.

“Metice?” I tried to get up, but it took much more strength than it should have. He wasn’t far, only about a foot from the bed. I could make it to him. I had to.

I rolled out of the bed, knocking Piko over as I did. Instead of crawling to the fallen demon, which would have made the most sense. I stood, took two steps, and then fell forward, right on top of the unconscious demon.

That was all the energy I had, burned up in half a step. I passed out the moment my head hit his chest. I woke to Piko’s tongue licking my face, his large, worried eyes darting between me and the one I fell on.

“Dammit.” I pushed myself off Metice and sat next to him. “What the hell happened to me?”

Metice groaned next to me, and all I could think to do was pull his head into my lap. It looked like he was sleeping, but I could tell something more was going on. I just didn’t know what it was.

“Please wake up.” I rubbed his face and felt the stubble along his jaw. “Metice, I don’t know what to do. I need you.”

His eyes fluttered opened, and he stared up at me, looking at me like he couldn’t believe I was real.

“Rayna?” he asked.

“Metice, are you okay? What happened?”

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