Page 13 of Wine and Gods

She ran her hands through her hair, finding and then pulling out pine needles and lichen. Lovely. The animals had left her alone, yet she’d dug herself into the mossy bedding in her sleep. Her damp shirt stuck to her back, the effects of sleeping too far into the day mixing with the rising temperatures in the relative solitude of the forest. Erin sat stupefied, dazed at the sudden change of her circumstances.

A pinecone landed on her head, followed by a chittering rant. Erin scrambled to her feet, easily locating the offending chipmunk in the limbs above her head.

“Hey! That was completely uncalled for! Get outta here before I throw one of those right back at cha.”

The chipmunk stared at her raptly throughout her speech and then scurried down the tree and off into the woods. Well, at least she’d scared it off. She loved her time in the forest, but those chipmunks with their morning antics and cries for territorial dominance could drive a woman to the brink.

Standing, Erin stretched again, testing out her ability to move, and discovered only minor sore spots. Nothing to hold her back. Grateful for however it happened, she dug her shoes out of her backpack and put them back on her feet. She gathered the rest of her things, leaving the walking sticks behind, and shouldered the backpack. Checking the sun’s position and the forest for recognizable landmarks, she settled on a north-western path, which she reasoned should rejoin the main trail and get her back to her car.

Although she walked hesitantly at first, both fearing another encounter with the local wildlife and afraid of pushing her foot too hard, her confidence soon returned. Despite the bear and her subsequent fall from the cliff, the forest remained her refuge. The sighing of the wind through the trees was a solace to her heart. The sunlight filtered through the air, dappling the pine-needle littered earth and warming her back, a hug shining upon her very soul.

The essence of the forest filled her. Completed her.

Erin didn’t want to leave. The moment she spied the abandoned trailhead and her dilapidated Dodge sedan, she heard the call of pan pipes echoing through the hills behind her. She spun around, searching for the source of the sound, while her heart beat in time with the haunting melody. No one—or perhaps more accurately,nothing—was there.

Something in the forest waited for her. Beckoned for her to return.

Shaking it off, Erin stumbled back to her car, flung her backpack in the passenger seat, and then climbed behind the wheel. Her head ached. Today was Sunday, and in a few hours, she’d be expected to serve drinks at her second job late into the evening, on her feet, before getting a scant few hours of sleep and heading back into her corporate job on Monday. She had responsibilities. Commitments.

It promised to be a very long week.

CHAPTER11

NADIR

“Wrathkin. Athazagorath. Rakshasa.”

The smell of the greed daemon, Athazagorath, hit her first, the sound of his swift footsteps coming a moment before he materialized right in front of her. He was an enormous creature with blackened skin, ragged clothes, and long, thick fingers. Before she had time to react, the daemon was on her, crushing her body back against the others with his substantial bulk. He reeked of greed, desperation, and a hundred other unsavory things. His hands gripped Nadir’s throat and forced her head back. She struggled under him, skewering him with one blade after another, but she wasn’t able to free herself from his grip even with all of her strength enhanced by daemonic powers.

The sound of steel on steel filled her ears as the others faced Wrathkin and Rakshasa, but Nadir’s focus was completely upon the immovable daemon with his hands around her throat. Her lungs burned for air as one of her daggers fell uselessly from her fingers, sinking into the floor at their feet.

Azimuth appeared out of nowhere behind Athazagorath, driving his sword through the daemon’s back. Nadir gasped for air as Azimuth withdrew his sword from the daemon, who slumped forward onto the floor between them with a mighty, gurgling exhale.

“Thanks!” she coughed out. “I almost had him.”

“Of course you did.” Azimuth winked at her, and then pulled her close, spinning them around just in time as Kobol suddenly came flying across the room. He hit a wall with such force it shook the entire structure, and then he fell motionless to the floor. Orias moved quickly past them toward Kobol, enveloping them both within the void of his shadows. Although Nadir had seen him do it countless times, the sense that they’d ceased to exist always nagged at the back of her mind.

Nadir shook off the sensation and shifted her attention, sizing up the other two daemons, Wrathkin and Rakshasa. The former was a large, imposing figure, blue-skinned and gaunt, with a pair of horns curling from his forehead. The latter was a human-like female figure with a slender frame and golden eyes that seemed to burn with a deep, inner fire. Rakshasa might have appeared to be the less dangerous one of the two, but Nadir knew, since the daemon was a flesh-eater, that she likely also had an ability to incapacitate her victims.

“Hey, Rakshasa. Wrathkin. How about we don’t choose violence?” she asked. “Tell us where the others are, and we can all part amicably.”

It was a lie, and by the dubious flash in the daemon Wrathkin’s yellow-lined eyes, he knew it.

Rakshasa seemed to sense the tension in the air and was starting to move. She took one step back and then another, her eyes flashing between Nadir and Azimuth and Wrathkin. Suddenly, as if she couldn’t control herself any longer, she rushed toward the shadows wrapped around the fallen Kobol with a ravenous look on her face.

Nadir reacted without thinking, launching forward before Rakshasa could reach her fallen brother. A host to a flesh-eater daemon herself, Nadir understood the sometimes near-undeniable compulsion to feed, especially when the victim was already incapacitated. With a twist of her body, Nadir drove one of her blades through the daemon’s heart, killing her instantly. The sound of the impact reverberated in Nadir’s ears as Rakshasa fell to the ground in a lifeless heap. There was a moment of tense silence, followed by a sorrow-filled howl from Wrathkin.

Nadir turned to face Wrathkin, who was now the only daemon left standing. He’d moved closer to her, body shaking with overwhelming grief at the loss of Rakshasa. Nadir could see the torment etched on his face, even as he eyed his companion’s blackened blood dripping from her upraised blades.

She didn’t fear the remaining daemon, trusting that he was no match for Azimuth and herself. “I’m sorry for your loss,” Nadir said, her voice filled with genuine empathy. “But you must understand, you left us no choice. You’ve been feeding on the humans here, drawing undue attention.”

Wrathkin looked up at her, his eyes filled with tears. “She was my mate. My everything. And now she’s gone.”

Nadir felt a pang of sadness for the daemon, despite the fact he had just tried to kill them. She had seen enough death to know the pain of losing someone you loved. As she met the gaze of Wrathkin, Nadir didn’t react as Azimuth raised his sword to the daemon’s throat. As the icy steel touched his flesh, hatred bubbled up in Wrathkin’s gaze.

“What’s the location of your nest?” Azimuth demanded. When Wrathkin didn’t answer, he went on. “Give us what we want, now,” Azimuth said, his voice low and menacing. “Or suffer the same fate.”

Wrathkin stood still for a moment, his gaze shifting between Nadir and Azimuth. Nadir watched him with barely concealed contempt as he thought through his options. She kept her blades at the ready, knowing that she would have to act in an instant if Wrathkin chose wrongly.

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