Page 3 of Demon Sworn
I brokenly laugh. “Of course you did.”
Zolroth stops kissing my fingertips and instead puts our linked hands up on the side of his cheek, drawing my gaze to his now serious expression. “I was his hero that day, Katrina. Hero. I’ve never been that before.” His throat closes as he experiences a strong emotion, and his arms tighten around me.
I untangle our fingers so that I can hug him hard around the middle, and we both dissolve into tears together, our chests ripped open, tears bleeding out onto one another’s skin.
“We’ll find him,” I say, because I have to believe it.
“I vow to you, Katrina Colt, love of my existence, that we’ll find him.” We wipe our tears and hold each other close, and for a few minutes, we just sniffle and possibly doze off, the exhaustion of these emotions and everything that’s happened finally catching up to us.
After my eyes flutter open from a brief nap and I release a yawn—probably resembling a monkey getting anal probed—Zolroth rubs a hand up and down my back. “Are you awake, my love? There’s something else I want to discuss with you.”
I tense automatically, my muscles locking together, and I don’t relax, not even when he begins to rub soothing circles across the bare skin of my legs, where my shorts have ridden up.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I whisper, my voice a hushed murmur.
“Kastros loves you,” Zolroth reminds me gently, and if it were anyone else saying that, I would’ve punched him, but I know Zolroth is saying it because he cares about both Kastros and me. “As much as he’s a bellend for what he did—and right pissed as I am about it—he didn’t know back then.”
But how can Kastros possibly love me after what he did to me?
And worst of all, how can I still love him?
“Zolroth, please.” I tremble all over. “I don’t want to talk about it. He… Fuck! He tried to kill me. He killed my nanny, who was completely innocent in all of this. How can I look him in the face anymore? How can I forgive him?” Large, heaping sobs shake my body as I curl myself even further into his chest, wishing I could disappear inside of him. Kastros’s betrayal combined with Adam’s disappearance have nearly broken me. I’m pretty sure I’m not as whole as I was a mere hour ago. My insides are made up of jagged, brittle pieces, and I’m afraid it’s only a matter of time until those pieces crumble entirely, leaving behind nothing but dust.
It stings.
It fuckinghurts.
“We don’t need to talk about it if you don’t want to,” Zolroth assures me, peppering kisses across my scalp and then to the side of my head, just above my ear. His lips linger there, the warmth they emit seeping through my skin and bones and taking up residence in my very soul. “But I just want you to know…we’re a family. All of us. I can’t speak for the others, but I can speak for myself. You come first. You and Adam. Always. I’ll support you with whatever you decide to do about Kastros.”
Whatever I decide…
If I decide to leave him, Zolroth means.
But how can I leave someone who’s an intrinsic part of me? Someone who is a part of my very soul? I don’t think it’s possible for me to exist without all five of them. And at the same time, how can I love someone who once tried to hurt me? How can I love a monster?
I suppose I shouldn’t be too surprised that I do.
After all, I am in love with five of them.
My beautiful, psychotic demons.
And the only men truly capable of breaking my heart.
2
Akor
“I actually wrote a song about pain,”I tell Kastros conversationally as we enter the spacious lobby of Katrina’s parents’ law firm, where the two of us have come to find information so we can reclaim Katrina’s little brother, hopefully before she even wakes up. Last thing I saw, she was sleeping on Zolroth’s chest while Van brewed some tea for whenever she did wake. As if my cherry wants tea more than blood or Adam back. I chose to leave and do something useful. Bonus—it comes with a side of pain.
I glance around the stupid human lobby that’s furnished with a collection of black leather armchairs that look too stiff to be comfortable and a wooden desk used by a receptionist, all vacated at this time of night. The marble floors have been polished so meticulously that I swear I can see my reflection in the glimmery tiles. I give said reflection a wave and then shoot a couple of finger-gun bullets at it. Wait, what was I talking about again? Oh, right. My pain song. “You remember, right? In the bowels of Hell? In the Forest of Pain?”
Ah. Home sweet home. Even now, I can still hear the anguished screams and terror filled cries of the lost souls in the torture caves, wide expanses of black clouds that have been hollowed out like swiss cheese over the millennia for all kinds of brutal experiments. It was my home, once upon a time, a place where demons and souls experimented on one another, all their minds just as warped as mine. Music to my fucking ears.
Kastros grunts, the morose bastard still pouting, but I continue on, unperturbed by his growly exterior. Besides, if he considers my ramblings torture, then I’m just gonna talk some fucking more. Torture is my specialty, after all, and he deserves all of this and more for what he did to my sweet cherry.
“Remember the first verse?” I clear my throat dramatically as he leads us to an elevator. Oh. Perfect.
We’re alone.
