Page 37 of Psycho Devils: Aran's Story 2

Dick put his hands on his hips. “Would you like to throw something else? Perhaps break off a chunk of the wall and chuck it at me.”

I walked over to the wall, punched a circle with my fist, ripped out the wood paneling, then flung it at Dick with all my might. He waved his arm lazily, and wood slammed against the floor.

He rolled his eyes. “Feel better?”

“Never.”

Dick stared at me for a long moment, then dropped into his fancy leather chair that was curved at the back to allow room for his wings. He sat at his desk like this was an ordinary meeting and said, “If you’re done acting like a petulant child, I have a matter I want to discuss with you.”

Manic laughter exploded from my throat, and I almost fell to my knees from the weight of emotions coursing through me. “A matter to discuss? You enslaved my daughter with that tattoo, and now she can’t leave the kings without pain.”

Dick waved his hand like he wasn’t listening. “That has nothing to do with the tattoo.”

How quickly he dismissed everything as trivial.

He’d ruined my daughter’s life with his games, in so many different ways. She was going to be devastated when she discovered how far his deceit reached.

I already was.

Would the lies ever stop?

Dick leaned back in his ostentatious leather chair and placed his hands behind his head. He put his boots on his desk and stared at me impassively.

He was so sure I’d just keep playing his games.

Not this time.

He’d gone too far.

I smiled. “I’m done. Turn me over to the sun god, I don’t care what you do. I’m finished being your pawn.”

Silence stretched between us.

“Perfect. I’ll alert the entire High Court network that Arabella Alis Egan is enemy number one and should be exterminated immediately.”

My fangs dug deeper into my gums. “You made a vow.”

Dick’s pale skin glowed under the bright lights of his office, like he was a god addressing a subject. “I vowed to leave your child alone once they took on the mantle of ruling the fae realm and sided with the sun god. Your child has not yet done so. There is no vow binding me.”

My jaw trembled. “Stop with the games. You know what she is. Why would you want her to rule?”

“Because that is her destiny.” His lips thinned. “Because I’ve decided that is her fate and she will fulfill her role.”

My fangs dug deeper into my gums as I spat, “I hate you.”

“I know.” Dick spun a fountain pen between his fingers and said calmly, “Emotions aside, the matter to discuss is important. At the direction of the gods, the High Court is instituting the Legionnaire Games at Elite Academy.”

My temples throbbed with pain.

Dick said casually, “We’ve both known for decades that war is coming. Now it’s here. It is crucial to the war effort that the gods establish this generation’s legion leadership structure. They’ve already identified the six strongest groups in all the realms. All that’s left is to test them and evaluate how they interact with one another. The gods need to see how they suffer.”

I’d been monitoring the ungodly for years, and I’d seen firsthand how dire the situation was becoming. How they were spreading.

There was an infection in the galaxy.

But some things were more important than the threats to civilization, so I shook my head and said, “I don’t care.”

Dick continued like I hadn’t spoken, “Your current training group is among the strongest we have. So the gods have evaluated that they have enough ties among them to make up a single legion.”

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