Page 98 of Sugar Rush

The magic buzzed fiercer, making my whole body shake, and ringing filled my ears. Then, people were screaming. Ten, twenty, a hundred roars of agony overlapping. Dull, visceral thuds shook the ground all around me, making my body flash hot and cold. Or maybe that was blood loss.

Eidolon loosed a battle cry, but I didn't dare lift my head to see what was happening; magic cloyed thick in the air, spiky and deadly, and I was already on the verge of passing out.

I only dared to investigate what had happened when a throb of pain ached through X's soul like a bruise. I lifted my head slowly, warily looking around at—oh, there was a sea of corpses. Of course there was.

Each demon soldier had blood leaking from their eyes, ears, and noses. Presumably dark armour hid the blood where X had exploded their dicks and pussies.

Jesus, he was strong. He’d taken out Eidolon’s entire army,

The orb's power …Xhad it. He must have. He'd been powerful before but nothing on this scale, nothing big enough to wipe out two hundred demons. That was … that was moremystyle.

And I needed to gobackto that insanity. Seeing Christian Lachesi's face had thrown me, but the same resolution I'd made earlier throbbed in my blood.Kill everyone, unleash myself, end this.

"—think you can kill them? I'm the devil," the maniac himself was laughing at X as my mate threw another wave of murderous lust at him, to no effect. "I control death; Iamdeath."

I waited for X to scoff and roll his eyes, but his face was bleached of colour and he'd frozen there, staring as my bastard abuser stormed closer.Shit.This was the man who’d tortured him for days on end, who broke him apart, and whose monstrous treatment X wasn't even remotely healed from.

I didn't think; I saw X's terror and I blasted through my pain barrier and into a whole new level of Big, Scary Demon Bitch.

I vaulted off the ground and slammed into Eidolon's back, sending him crashing to the grass hard enough that his human skin flickered and turned green and slimy. I probably should have thought before I acted, but why change the habit of a lifetime?

With a guttural growl, I sank my sharp demon teeth into his neck, right where I'd already gored his skin and insides on my claws.

It took little effort to rip out the back of his throat. Blood spurted dangerously, a life threatening injury on anyone else.

Ugh. I had a chunk of his neck in my mouth. Gross. I spat out the skin and slime into the grass—and belatedly remembered his paralysing venom.

I was a fucking idiot. But on the plus side, it didn't stop me growing, "If you lay another finger on my mate, I'll make your murder slow and agonising. You'll beg for death—and I'll make you scream for days, months,years."

Eidolon hissed and bucked so suddenly, I was thrown back. I landed hard enough to shock me back to my human form, suddenly small and vulnerable before his taller lizard form.

I lumbered to my feet as he did, circling him, one eye on X to make sure Eidolon went nowhere fucking near him.

"What do you hope to gain?" Eidolon asked, more curious than anything, his fury masked. For now.

"Your head cut off your body. Your corpse hacked into so many pieces that you can never come back."

Eidolon shook his head, as if I was being silly. He didn’t seem to care that the back of his neck was missing or his blood ran down my chin.

"Av," X breathed, horrified, and for a moment I thought it was just his trauma and fear, but my adrenaline-fuelled brain finally realised he was looking behind me.

"Move!Avie!"

I jerked aside automatically, but I wasn’t nearly fast enough.

Gnarled hands wrenched me back, and I slammed into something solid. Withered but deceptively strong fingers locked around my arms—and more bound my shoulders, my waist, and my hands.

How many of them were there? Cruel hands tangled in my hair when I tried to see who held me, and a small, helpless sound clawed up my throat.

"I warned you," Eidolon sighed, brushing dirt off his green scales. "I'm the devil; I have ultimate power over death. You can't kill my army."

Oh, god. The hands trapping me, the bodies surrounding me…

They were the soldiers X killed.

I was going to be sick.

It was typical that my limbs grew heavy and my face turned slack right as the undead army trapped me. Guess that answered my question about Eidolon's venom.

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