Revealed in Fire (Demon Days & Vampire Nights #9)(72)

“Yeah. I do.”

“Right, yeah, I forgot. You know the deal. Another day in paradise. Not sure I’d want to do this for a year, though.”

“I didn’t have it as bad as this. Not all at once.” He couldn’t help his breath hitching. “Not even close.”

“Nice. I win. Where’s my prize?”

“Here’s what we’re going to do…”

“Crack everything back in place so I can heal it up—eventually—and then run me out of here, I hope?”

“Yes. It’s going to hurt like hell.”

“Nah. It’ll hurt worse than that.” Her bleary eye came to rest on him. “I am really, really glad to see you. Did you know that the elves can dampen a vampire bond?” He grabbed hold of her pinky. It was as good a place to start as any. Crack. “Elephant dongs in a singalong! Damn it, I sound like Penny.” Crack. “Holy fuck tarts!” She breathed through the pain. “Anyway, turns out they can dampen a bond. He’s there, I feel him, but he’s so muffled that I can’t feel any emotion from him. Don’t worry, I will kill the king and queen for that. Mess with my limbs? Not good, but we all have our issues. Mess with my bond to Darius? I will rip your head from those bony shoulders and shove it up your ass.” She paused as he tackled the rest of her fingers. “Just as soon as I can work my limbs, obviously.”

“At least you’re in good spirits.”

“Yeah. I was singing bottles of beer on the wall through the last session. They really hate that song, it turns out.”

The ground beneath them rumbled. The walls groaned. A push of air disturbed the stuffy silence.

Cahal paused, her shoulder in his hands, listening.

Somewhere in the castle, a large load of power was sinking into the very foundation, tremoring through the stone.

…how would she learn?

He turned back to Reagan in a rush. “We need to go for ‘good enough’ and get you out of here.”

“Why, what is it?”

“Someone you’re in no shape to meet.”





Lucifer blew off the front face of the castle, sending stone and brick raining down. His subjects erected a ceiling of air so he could pass through the debris without being struck. His subjects hurried out in front of him, all different forms, ghastly creations that had been forbidden to show their faces in this poor excuse for a castle.

Elves rushed toward him from the front hall, only to fall back again.

His black, feathery wings snapped out behind him, filling the hall, the edges raking down the walls. Fire pulsed around him, burrowing into anything wood, flames roaring in his wake. The ground shook as his subjects joined their power with his, their magic tearing off doors, pulling down chandeliers, scraping up the floors.

“In the dungeons, sir,” Victoria said, flying in her demon form in front of him, half his size and adept at handling tight spaces and ghastly surprises.

He tore the next door from its hinges and threw it aside. With an extra little boost of magic, it tore through glass, brick, and mortar. Through the archway, which he’d left intact for his subjects to rip down, he let surprise hinder his step for a brief moment.

The large room, two stories with a viewing balcony, had been utterly destroyed. Huge, gaping holes punched through the left wall and the ceiling, clumps of destroyed stone littering the floor. Columns lay in ruin, and half the balcony had been torn down.

“Your daughter, sir,” Victoria said.

Pride welled within him, and he laughed. “Finish the job,” he said, turning.

At the narrow steps to descend into the dungeons, he felt the unmistakable power of the king and queen. He turned to the right, waiting to see if they would present themselves. His subjects crowded around him, ripping and tearing, making clear what he thought of this insult.

The king’s voice reverberated through the chamber. “She has committed grievous infractions within our kingdom. She should be hanged. She was spared solely because she is your heir. Your actions today, however…”

The threat lingered, though the king did not step through the doors. He did not intend to confront Lucifer face to face.

A smile stretched across Lucifer’s face.

“My actions today serve as a hint of what is to come. Brace yourself, you sniveling coward. You have no idea what your actions will unleash.” He glanced at Victoria and thought, Tell them to cover me, and then follow me down. Leave the rest up here.

He descended, closing his wings with a snap, letting the fire follow him down. A body littered the ground, the neck having been ripped out. A vampire had visited, then, and clearly not one under the employ of the elves. Vlad?

A man in a cell looked up as fire crowded the room, his eyes wide but glazed, responding to the light. There was nothing behind those eyes, his mind utterly gone. He would never come back from this. Only the primal part of him still remained, and that part wasn’t enough for any sort of action. This man was waiting for death.

Lucifer stabbed him through the forehead with air, a merciful killing. “Find out who he is and deliver him to his people. Inform them of what the elves did.”

He stepped over another guard, killed the same as the last. He moved down the hall, passing closed doors. Only one of them, the last on the right, was open. He slowly walked toward it, anger burning within him. If the vampires had taken his daughter with anything other than the intention of delivering her…