Page 7 of Demons Treasure Warlocks

“I have no idea what’s going on. We need to plan shit and not do anything stupid. Obviously. I also want to relax a bit. Find my centre. Not sure how I’m going to do that,” Darius said the words, and they seemed right. He felt good. He wanted to…just be happy.

“Planning shit is always a good thing. What is involved in this?” Bale asked.

“Restoring trust, I think.” Darius gave Bale a side-eyed glance and was surprised when he nodded agreeably. “It seems fractured among everyone.”

“It does. How do you propose we do that?”

“I don’t know, Bale. I’m just throwing ideas out there, okay? Do you deserve my ffaith in you again? Or am I going to get burned? Because honestly, I’m kinda done with that,” Darius snapped.

“Darius.”

“Oh my God. No one is allowed to say my name anymore. God, you’re all so fucking annoying. Why can’t I—” Darius shuffled away from Bale on the deck. He didn’t want to feel the heat coming off Bale or listen to the sad way Bale said his name. He was allowed to be angry at Bale. It was his right after being betrayed by his goddamned lover twice for the same fucking asshole demon. “How about we tell everyone why Has—the King is here in this bloody dimension and how I fucked up?”

Bale opened his mouth to speak and closed it. Smoke steamed out of his nose as he glared at Darius. “Do not do anything that will hurt you. I will not allow you to cast yourself as a villain.”

“Why not, Bale? Why not? It’s my fault that these fucking portals are here! It’s my fault that he managed to step through. I was fucking weak. He—he used my grief against me. And you let it happen. You stood by and let him—” The remembered shock and pain of seeing the demon-red sky through an open portal still burned in Darius’s memory. The gut punch as Hastur stood by with a smirk on his face and Bale with his arms around Trey. The two different memories melded into one, and each time, it tore a tiny bit of Darius away.

“Is that why you went off to your la-la land? Because you couldn’t deal with the King taking the win from us? You left us behind, Dare,” Bale hissed. Pain bled out of him as he spoke. “How the fuck could I protect your friends when you weren’t there? I had to keep an eye on him, so you’d be safe.”

“You’re blaming me? Fuck you, Balor. You fucking betrayed me twice. You left me to the mercies of that asshole twice. He stole my innocence,” Darius shouted, goaded to tell the truth. His chest hurt, and his head swam after the outburst. This wasn’t how this was supposed to happen. Darius didn’t want Bale to see him like this. Bale wasn’t even supposed to be around. Why couldn’t he have just stayed the fuck away? Why couldn’t he leave well enough alone? Darius was so tired of constantly fighting and explaining.

Dead silence echoed through the yard. Darius wiped a hand across his eyes. The cold air made them sting and water—not his overwhelming emotional baggage. Inhaling deeply and releasing it, Darius spoke calmly, hiding his pain behind flat words. “He offered you something, and you stepped aside, leaving me unprotected and vulnerable to him.”

Bale worked his mouth as he glared at Darius. There was no rebuttal, no denying what happened. Darius sniffed once more as he returned Bale’s look.

“He was going to kill you if I didn’t let you go.”

“I would have rather died than what he did,” Darius said quietly. Telling Bale the truth hadn’t been on his radar. Having this explosion feelings was unexpected. But it was always Bale who managed to pick at Darius’s shell and discovered the real reasons, the truth behind his casualness. The headache Darius had hoped to keep at bay, throbbed painfully. The whole day was a gut punch, and he was so tired. “But now we have him here in my dimension, and I have to figure out a way to destroy him. Thanks for the sandwiches, Bale. Please leave.”

ChapterFour

Bale sat on the deck chair and glowered. This evening had not ended up the way he’d hoped. He glanced back at the house and saw that the upstairs lights were on. Darius was going to bed.

Darius was excellent at hiding his true feelings and keeping a brave face on for the world. The argument they just had only proved how much pain Darius was holding back. Bale was only a bit comforted by the fact Darius opened up for him. Though he hadn’t realized how much Darius blamed himself for Hastur coming through.

Bale wanted to be there for Darius. He ached to provide support for him and be a shelter for when things went south. It was terribly hard when Darius cast himself as the villain. Bale couldn’t take that pain away. He hoped that sharing even that tiny bit would help Darius.

They were going to have to tell their friends the truth about what originally happened. Bale knew it was time for that, but he worried a lot about what Darius would confess and what he would hide.

Darius would keep a lot of what happened locked up and only give his friends the bare-bones version. Darius understood his friends’ feelings and would never deliberately cause them pain. He felt guilty enough.

Bale blew out air and shuddered. Even the mere thought of remembering those awful moments made his stomach curdle. Nighttime was not for those memories.

“Bale, get the fuck off my property. I don’t need you to stand guard,” Darius’s cranky voice shouted from the second storey. Darius was tuned into Bale’s presence as much as Bale was with Darius. It was sweet and comforting. Somehow, Bale would find a way back to Darius’s heart. Someday, he’d be up there in Darius’s room, doing nightly ablutions beside him, listening to him bitch and moan about everything under the sun. Bale had to figure out how to do it that would make them both happy. Trying to mend the rift between him and Darius was a challenge because Bale knew what he had done and why he had chosen to be by Hastur’s side.

“Sorry, Dare. I have to finish my dinner,” Bale called back deliberately. He settled himself more comfortably in the chair and proceeded to watch over his heart’s home. Protecting it from the evil that still lurked outside the boundaries and in the shadows was a never-ending task. Hastur was watching. He always was.

* * *

Both Bale and Darius’s attempts to tell their friends about the initial meeting with Hastur fell through. Isaac and Caspian had been asked to join in a festival celebrating an important cryptid god, and Isaac didn’t want to offend anyone.

The next time they attempted to bring the group together, Trey ate something he shouldn’t have and spent the whole evening in pain. Adam suggested it was a plant or mushroom.

Every time Darius prepared an evening, it was cancelled. Adam and Trey officially moving to Caspian’s old apartment, Darius getting pissy with someone and refusing to let anyone in. Bale even had to say no once.

“This is fucking ridiculous. Why can we not get together for one fucking dinner?” Darius paced the length of his kitchen. He crackled with energy, and Bale worried for the lightbulbs in the rooms he paced. “Last year, I swear we had dinner together almost every other night. It was fucking annoying. But it happened. Why isn’t it working now? Balor?”

“Why are you looking at me?” Bale asked from his post by the back door. He hadn’t dared to step foot into the kitchen. Darius had growled every time he tried to help. In the interest of peace, he watched the shadows for movement. Something about them bothered him.

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