Page 104 of The Demon's Delight
The stout man reached out and snatched at her hair. She cried out, and I pushed forward, stopping him before he could get even a single step away from the cell my brothers had opened for him. I wrapped my tail wrapped around his ankle, and once Hailon had dislodged his fingers from her hair, I gave a tug, and he went face-first into the packed dirt floor with a satisfyingthud.
“Are you alright?” I asked.
She was rubbing her scalp with the heel of her hand, a scowl powerful enough to melt flesh from bone on her face. “I’m fine.” A clump of mixed dark and light strands floated toward the floor when she pulled her hand away.
My fury manifested in a growl, my scalp tingling as my horns burst out through my hair. My teeth grew even sharper in mymouth, and I fought my wings coming forth. There really wasn’t space for that down here. I heard my brothers muttering vaguely calming things, but nobody made any attempt to stop either of us.
He pushed himself up on his forearms, turned on his side, then sat up on his knees. He was out of shape and had enjoyed his bureaucratic position and good food for far too many years. “Please,” he raised his hands. His begging fueled my rage an unreasonable amount. “Please!”
“Please? Youdarebeg for mercy? After you touched her in such a way just now? After all you’ve done? There’snone of that here.” He focused on my eyes and reared back, clearly afraid of what he saw in the glowing red there. I flicked my wrist, sending my smallest blade into the man’s meaty midsection.
“Seir.” Hailon stepped between us as he howled, and I bowed to her authority, forcing my rage to stand down if only for a moment. She turned to the councilman. “What you did to me? That’s not where you started being a terrible person. You all were far too comfortable with what you were doing for that to be true. There’s a full complement of witnesses here. Perhaps you should confess your misdeeds so you can truly be held accountable.”
My chest puffed proudly. I’d never been more in love with her. “You heard the lady.” I gripped his collar, pulling him roughly to his feet only to fling him down into the straight-backed chair inside the cell. I yanked out my blade, and Hailon retrieved hers, not a single effort made to ease the pain or flow of blood.
This man wasn’t likely to survive the night, and he was going to suffer the entire time as he made his way out. I could see Rylan’s electricity around his hands, Calla’s green earth magic when she exhaled. Vassago’s teeth looked quite a lot like mine, and Magnus looked all too pleased to be a part of the goings-on,as did his daughters. Greta stood off to the side, frowning at the man as though thoroughly disappointed in him.
He would atone for grabbing at Hailon like that, for sitting by while she was abused, after ordering it done. This was her opportunity to make him pay, to make at least one of them die slower, as she’d said she wanted that night. He was going to arm us with everything we could possibly want to know about him, his merry little band of miscreants, and what they hoped to accomplish by taking pieces of my mate to experiment on.
“What do you say we start at the beginning?” Rylan suggested, stepping into the cell with us.
“I don’t have to tell you anything.” The councilman was putting up a good front, being stoic.
“That’s true enough,” my brother nodded.
Hailon pulled the little spell book from her pocket. “I suppose I should thank you for this.”
The councilman made a grab for it, but she held it out of his reach and gave it to Rylan. “So you’re a thief as well as a?—”
My fist flew out, a satisfying crunch under my knuckles as his nose gave way. He groaned, hands flying to the new injury.
“Tsk.” Vassago shook his head. “That’s just foolish.”
“Whose was this?” Hailon asked, holding up the obsidian dagger.
“Go to hell,” he grumbled.
“Do you really believe that to be a threat in a room with three demons?” I asked. “I was there earlier today.”
His eyes snapped up and he glanced between us. I could see the moment he fully understood who he was trapped in a cellar with.
“What were you planning to use a demon for, anyway?” I asked. He only scoffed, but after thinking it over all this time, I thought I’d finally figured it out. I started to laugh. “You thought you were going to summon a demon, and they would just takeup the task of making your stolen power potions because youcontrolledthem? Perhaps they’d be in charge of handing the vials out after you sold them and took the profit, all while lending you their magic to accomplish it in the first place?” My brothers also snorted at the idea, but the councilman’s eyes rounded like I’d guessed correctly. “They would have laughed in your face.”
Hailon leaned close, sinking the tip of the obsidian blade into his thigh as he tried to bat her away. “Whose blade was this?”
“Nobody’s,” he snarled. “It came out of the archives, the same as that useless little book.”
“You’re a disgrace,” Magnus growled. “How was it catalogued?”
“I’m not a fool. It wasn’t. The previous owner was unknown.”
Hailon seemed disappointed in that answer but removed the blade and stepped back. She seemed to have gone to that faraway place again. It worried me.
Rylan moved in to continue asking questions, and I pulled Hailon off to the side. “You alright, Moonflower?”
“I feel too calm,” she said. “I’m so angry, but I can’t really muster the energy anymore. He’s nothing. He held so much power over me before, but that’s done, isn’t it?”
I held her face between my hands, looking down into her eyes. “Yes. They won’t let him die without finding out every last detail. We can leave. Right now, if you want.”
