Page 4 of Hell's Queen

“They have my son? You let them have my son?!” the king shouts at me from the end of the bridge.

“I didn’t let them do anything!” I snap, feeling pain in my ribs. “But I’m getting him back today. Get your healer.”

He stares at me, knights crowding around him.

“Now!” I shout, fire blazing. “We need to be healed to get him back.”

He growls at me, turning away. “Afterwards, you all are gone.”

My anger doesn’t hold back, and I flip him off behind his back. With that, I pull out my phone. I’ve been desperately ignoring this thing. Amos has texted me a million times, and so did the council members to check in on me. I dial one number, and when she picks up, I say, “I need your help.”

“Are you ready to control The Flames, finally?” Her old voice sends shivers down my spine.

I look down. In a flash, my whole life flipped upside down again. These last few weeks, I haven’t truly felt like myself, parts of me were missing, and now with three of my men gone, that feeling is there again. I am missing parts of myself again and tired of losing the people I love. “Yes. I’m ready to do whatever I need to do to control this. I need to get my men back.”

“Give me an hour.” She hangs up, and I look down at the phone melting in my hands.

Ledger takes the phone from me. “It’s almost weird for you to admit that you finally need help.”

“Fuck off.”

He smiles, limping with me toward the others. The fae have already come to help with the rubble and to heal my men. Hollister, a fae that Hazen met, is kneeling next to Jigsaw, healing his wounds. He’s barely conscious.

Jigsaw looks up at me. “Asura, I’m so—”

I hold up a hand. “Are you okay?”

Jigsaw is almost taken aback, probably expecting me to explode. I want to, but not at him. What’s happening isn’t his fault. “I’m okay… Khazon was right about me.”

Before Khazon left the last time, he said some rude things. He told me my hellhounds couldn’t protect anyone, let alone me. “You are an amazing hellhound, Jigsaw. Don’t listen to someone who can’t even control his own demon.”

He nodded. “So… you.”

I giggle, shaking my head and moving to Ozias. I kneel before him. “Are you okay, Oz?”

“Just… shocked, really. How did a vampire find the land that no one can find?”

“Someone is a rat,” Hollister mutters, flipping her chocolate curls from her face as she heals Hazen.

“No. It was me.” I stand before the remaining four men and Khazon and Ryker’s Hellhounds. Alexis, Ryker’s Earth hellhound, looks like he wants to eat me in one bite… and I don’t doubt he can.

“You’re the rat?” Hazen asks as a joke. He knows I would never give away our position and endanger the others.

“No. Hollister, check his damn head.” I straighten my shoulder. “When I was on Earth, a Soul Reaper and his hellhounds attacked me. They fucked me up and weren’t going to stop there.” I avoid eye contact with Ledger. I know he might understand what I mean, especially since he beat up a group the week we met. “Draco and his men made it worse, and Thorne saved me.”

“So, Thorne is a real motherfucker?” Ledger asks.

Eames, one of Khazon’s hellhounds, hits his bare chest. “The white-haired dude from the waffle house.”

Ledger nods. “Oh, that fuck. I’m confused. You said you guys slept together in the dungeon when we got to Faelands.”

I hold up my hand. “Let me explain!” When he stays silent, I continue. “Thorne saved me, but he blood-bonded himself to me.”

“And that means?” Hazen asks, holding ice to his head.

“It means I drank his blood to stay alive and because of who I am”—Human—“I was bonded to him. Emotionally. Physically.”

“How didn’t we notice or anything?”

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