Page 428 of Blood and Ruin: The Complete Series

“If you need an outlet for your rage, all you have to do is ask.” We turn to find Soren walking toward us. “Back so soon?”

Jax smirks at him. “What can I say, we missed your ugly face.”

Soren gives him a deadpan look. “Stop, you’re making me blush.”

I cut Jax off before the two of them start again. “Did you get it sorted?”

“Straight to business.” I give him a look that tells him now is not the time to mess around. I want to do this right, but I also want to get back to my mate. The look she gave us when she found out King was still alive nearly fucking broke me. I don’t regret what we’ve been doing the last couple of days, but we should’ve handled it better and told her.

Soren’s eyes widen. “With the little time you gave me?”

I raise a brow and he rolls his eyes. The fucker has been around Jax too long. “Of course, I got it sorted, it’smewe're talking about.”

Jax chuckles, walking over to him and slapping him on the back like they’re old buddies. “Good man.”

Great, now there are two of them.

“Lead the way.” I glance over at Rion and on his shoulder where King is bagged and tagged with just enough air to keep him alive before turning back to Soren and giving him a look to hurry the fuck up.

We turn and head through the jagged rocks. Each time we come here it’s changed, the entire landscape flipped, shifting shapes or sizes. The only consistent thing is the dark sky above as it snuffs out most of the light.

We continue past dozens of prisons when a couple of Ivor’s men walk past us, bowing on their way.

Axel frowns as they scurry away, avoiding eye contact. “That’s still so fucking weird.”

He’s right. Ever since we came back with Kiarra to drain the extra power, all higher-level demons have been treating us like we’re their superiors, bowing in respect and making sure anything we need is on hand.

Soren smirks at Axel. “The Lords haven’t been replaced yet. Even though Rielle has taken over most of their duties, it’s only a quick fix. The five of you and your mate are the most powerful beings we know of. The Underworld would thrive under that kind of power.”

I open my mouth to straight out decline his offer when it hits me. Having the Underworld at our disposal could be useful.

I never want something like King’s war to happen again but should another foolish being decide to push his or her luck, I’d want a plan in place well before it.

But taking over full-time is not something I’d agree to. None of us ever want something like that to take over our lives, when family should be the priority.

I give the boys a look, and from that one look they know what I want to know. If they will trust me with this.

They nod without question, giving me my answer.

I look back to Soren. “We’re not taking over as your Lords, but we’ll help out where we can.” Once we have an in, that’s all we really need.

Soren smirks at me like it was his plan all along but I know exactly what I’m doing. I’m protecting my family in the best way I know how and making sure they never have to go through something like this again.

“I’ll let Rielle know.”

I nod as we move past the jagged rock prisons. More and more of them appear surrounding us like a maze.

Jax’s eyes widen. “What the—”

“Keep moving and try to avoid touching the prisons. Some of these prisoners are extremely temperamental.” The jagged rocks shift and move making us react quickly to avoid them. Soren easily avoids every one of them as if he knows the exact path to follow.

I narrow my eyes on him, about to call him out on it when darkness quickly descends around us. Pushing my hounds to the surface, I watch the darkness crawl outward making everything disappear. Everything but us and the ground is gone. Just a vast darkness that looks like it spans out infinitely.

“What the fuck?” Axel grunts walking into the back of Luka.

Jax shakes a hand in front of himself. “Not again. I feel fucking blind.”

Rion nods over at me, his basilisk eyes glowing back at me.

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