Page 25 of Devil's Doom

With a jolt of gut-melting fury, I recognize the rust-colored rapist from before. But my anger dissipates, replaced by confusion when I notice what they carry.

Each dragon handles a heavy metal cage, and inside—a child. I narrow me eyes, trying to make out details through the metal mesh. One is a boy, the other a girl, both around three years old. They smile with delight, showing off cute dimples in their round cheeks. The children are so pretty, I don’t understand for a moment why someone locked them up in cages.

But then I remember another cute, dimply child that I met in the woods.

“Don’t be deceived by those adorable looks,” Lech murmurs in my ear when the crowd settles. “These sweet creatures are not what they seem.”

“I know what a poroniec is. But I don’t understand what they are doing here.”

“You’ll see.”

The dragons set the cages down on either side of the fenced-in area and stand guard. The crowd goes quiet, intense anticipation filling the air. Low murmurs mix with urgent whispers. To my right, I notice a trembling woman with a smattering of feathers in her hair, her face birdlike with a small beak. Her brown skin under the feathers on her arms looks ashen.

Her fingers are tipped with short talons, and she grips the hand of a similar-looking man standing next to her. They look tense and terrified.

When another dragon comes out, pushing before him a young man with a small beak and downy brown skin, I finally understand what’s happening. The boy isn’t even a fully grown adult yet, and his birdlike eyes are wet with tears as he shakes. His hands are bound with heavy chains, and he stumbles under their weight, crying out when his legs almost buckle under him.

His palms are bloody, fingers swollen. I realize most of them are broken.

When a cold hand settles around my waist, I gasp, looking at Lech with wide eyes. His expression is pleasant, but his eyes are hard. He leans in until his cool breath envelopes my ear.

“Don’t try to stop it or you’ll be next,” he murmurs, his chilly lips brushing my skin. “This is what happens to people stupid enough to defy the dragons and the gods. It’s a lesson, Alina. Learn it well.”

I shiver when he pulls away, though his arm stays firmly around my waist. As more dragons pour out of the building, leading three more prisoners, I have to admit Lech is right. I cannot fight so many beasts, all equipped with talons and sharp teeth set in huge, bone-crushing maws.

I can only watch.

“He didn’t do anything! Let him fucking go!” someone screams in the crowd behind me, raw and desperate.

A dozen dragons in their half-human form now surround the large cage. Two of them exchange quick nods, and a green-hued dragon marches off into the crowd, coming out with a scruffy girl in tattered clothes. She’s beautiful in the ephemeral wila way, but her cheekbones and bare arms are marked with scales—rust-colored scales.

The green dragon throws her on the ground in front of the rust-colored one, who spits on the girl.

“Bastard scum,” he hisses. “This is your last warning. Shut your mouth.”

The girl is on the ground at his feet, but she doesn’t cower. The look she gives him is one of pure, deadly hate.

“Fuck you,” she mouths, completely silent, but I bet everyone understands the words from the exaggerated movement of her lips.

The dragon huffs, tendrils of smoke exploding out of his nostrils, and picks her up by the hair. She cries out in pain, and he backhands her hard. Her cheek splits, gushing blood.

Lech’s arm around me tightens. “Don’t fucking move. Don’t speak. She got off lightly. See? He let her go. Don’t make it worse now.”

I haven’t even noticed the way my body tensed, bracing to charge in defense of the girl. But Lech is right. It’s over, and nothing I do right now will help anyone.

The girl scurries off to the cover of the crowd. I crane my head to check on her, but she’s gone, her frame so small, she easily vanishes in the fray.

“Is she his daughter?” I murmur, leaning toward Lech.

“Mhm. He’s the captain’s second in command, you know. Men in power are so virile.”

When I glance at the upir, his grin seems forced, the skin around his eyes revealing tension. His frown spoils his effort to look amused, so I press my fingertip to the tense line between his eyebrows.

He nods, smoothing his face, and we turn back to the spectacle. Lech’s fingers dig into my waist, but I’m grateful for his touch. Seeing the extent of the dragons’ cruelty finally makes me realize they aren’t like the opponents I’ve fought until now.

The werewolf and the poludnica I managed to slay were stupid and mindless, driven by beastly instincts. The dragons are different. They are monsters, too—but thinking, plotting monsters who apparently have a strict hierarchy and follow orders.

A red-scaled dragon that’s visibly bigger and somehow even more menacing than the others steps forward. The murmuring crowd goes quiet. In the tense silence, his sonorous voice carries easily into every corner of the square.

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