Page 47 of The Demon Crown

How did he know?

Greed felt his heart stop and then suddenly thud harder than ever in his chest. “So what do you want me to do about this, then?”

“Let him lie low here while I fix things. Don’t let him touch anyone. And try to knock some sense into his head while you’re at it.”

“I’m not staying with Greed,” Gluttony said, squawking at the idea. “That’s ridiculous!”

Wrath turned on him again, every bit the embodiment of his name. “You will do exactly what I say, and you will shut up about it!”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then I will drag you down to my kingdom and bury you in a hole until I know what to do with you. You won’t die. Both of us know that. So unless you want your mouth filled with dirt for months on end, you will keep it closed.”

That made Gluttony stop talking.

Wrath shook with anger as he rounded on Greed. “Any complaints from you?”

He held up his hands in peace. “Absolutely not. Keep an eye on Gluttony. I understand my place.”

“Good,” Wrath snarled. “At least one of you does.”

ChapterSixteen

Her head hurt. Bad. The headache that seared behind her eyes and nose was one that came from blunt force trauma, not because she’d drank too much the night before.

Varya had broken her nose once. She’d hit the ground too hard as a child, fell off a building or something like that, she couldn’t quite remember. But she’d hit her face on the dirt so hard that she’d snapped the fine bone and twisted it to the side. She’d never forgotten how her neighbor had come out of his yard and seen her. The old man had laughed, then grabbed onto the mangled bone and forced it back into place.

That kind of pain never left a person’s memory. How could she ever forget the blinding ache?

Sighing, she tried to open her eyes, but they were stuck together. She wasn’t sure how that had happened, but she was certain to find out soon enough.

Rolling onto her side also proved impossible. Her hands were tied behind her back and her legs bound. A bad sign, really. She was more concerned with how to get herself out of this situation than with figuring out where she was.

It didn’t matter who had kidnapped her. There were plenty of people in this kingdom that wanted her dead. She’d stolen things her entire life from a lot of powerful people. And even if those items were used to make her own little town better, that still meant she had taken from another town who had been using it.

She’d had a bounty on her head most of her life. Varya was used to it by now.

Wiggling her fingers, trying to get some feeling back into the numb digits, she tried to pull her lashes apart by sheer grit and will. Unfortunately, that wasn’t working at all. And her arms must have been tied behind her back for a while because even moving her fingers felt impossible.

“Ah, you’re awake.”

She stilled at the sound of the voice. Familiar in a way, although she couldn’t quite place it. Tilting her head toward the sound, she tried to act like she was fine. “Thanks for welcoming me into your home.”

“You won’t be saying that for long.”

Hands curled in her hair at the base of her head, dragging her face upward to look at what she expected was a man. The hand was big against the back of her head. Covered in callouses too, as his palm ripped her hair from her skull.

Who? Who was this? She should have been able to at least guess...

Then she smelled it.

Whiskey, rum, vodka, all the alcohols combined into a breath that made her nauseous. Only one group of people drank like that and it was the last group she wanted to catch her.

Memories filtered in. She’d been unlucky enough to be caught by the Horde. Greed had gotten away, though. She was certain of that. His guards wouldn’t let anyone near him, and they’d all rushed after her, anyway.

Maybe she’d left a lasting impression on the demon. If she’d done that, at least, maybe she’d finally succeeded in making this place a little better for all those who lived in this cursed desert.

It didn’t matter what they did to her.

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