Page 19 of The River of Fire
Kevin however lets out a low, closed-mouthed noise, unhappy, but ultimately he must know my choice was the only correct one.
“Weapons?” Maalik asks next.
I shake my head. “Just a couple of knives. If it comes to a fight, we’ll be overwhelmed by sheer numbers anyway, and there’s no point in dragging large weapons through small tunnels.”
“That’s what she said,” Nick snickers, and Darla smacks him. Her hand must hurt all the time.
“Read the room!” she hisses at him.
“Your ankle is fine?” Maalik checks with me, ignoring the idiot behind us.
“Yup,” I reply. “Perfectly capable of running like a scared little girl when being chased by a hundred imps determined to make Lana kabobs,” I finish while mock-saluting him.
Maalik, more than used to my antics by now, just scoffs.
The demon who had the most to say is now suspiciously quiet. I look at the figure whose burning gaze I feel on my cheek. Lightning is still crackling angrily above us, showing his displeasure over my choices. Well, tough luck. I’m a soldier and if nothing else, the last few years have indoctrinated me into believing that it’s my duty to shield innocent people. Like Mike.
Just because the demon lord got his teeth in me – both literally and figuratively once – doesn’t mean he has a say in the decisions of Abaddon.
“Go get ready.” Maalik nods at Akira and me. “This will take a couple of days,” he says to the figures still choking us with their oppressive aura.
I turn in the direction of the armory, Kevin and Daniel leavingwith me.
“Lana…” Kevin says plaintively.
“I’ll be fine,” I tell him. And myself. And perhaps even the demon glaring at my back.
“Which one?” I quietly ask Daniel as we move across the field.
He knows what I’m asking and replies even quieter, “Ashtaroth.”
“Ashtaroth,” I repeat, and feel every hair on my body stand at attention. As if he heard me invoke his name, despite my quiet voice, despite the distance now between us.
As I step into the fortress, I glance behind one last time. Some of the cloaked figures are still conversing with the mentors who remain on the field. Some of them have turned and vanished. But one figure stands still, the darkness under the hood of his cloak turned in my direction.
Chapter 14 – Ashtaroth
Ipush the heavy reinforced double doors to my throne room with both hands and with force, making each panel slam into the walls. I march inside, my steel-plated boots echoing with each step that pounds against the mosaic leading toward my throne. The depictions of human souls burning in the Pits of Hell flicker in the light cast by the standing black candelabra.
Sariel looks up at my noisy entrance and stops mid-sentence in his conversation with his friend Armaros. His black-feathered wings are out and they twitch as he meets me halfway, then follows me to my seat.
“How’d it go?” he asks.
Though his charming words have melted uncountable numbers of females and males intopuddles of lust, the abbreviated manner in which he speaks vexes me even more than usual today.
“It is done,” I clip, and sit back, my heavy armor now feeling like it’s compressing my lungs.
“Then why’re you ticked off?” my son asks, quirking a black eyebrow, confusion clear on his face.
“You know, brother,” Armaros says, a depraved smile firmly in place, “he came home smelling of pussy the other day. Mostly human pussy,” he finishes, his grin now looking unnaturally large on his narrow face. “Maybe he accidentally decapitated her before he got off.”
Sariel uncharacteristically ignores the gruesome and lewd suggestion and turns his face back towards me, his charcoal black eyes wide in surprise.
“One of the soldiers?” he asks and then adds, as if this new information added up with today’s events to draw a clear picture of the situation, “I see.”
“Leave,” I growl at them.
They turn at once. Not even Armaros is idiot enough to test me in this mood.
