Jeaniene Frost - The Beautiful Ashes

“Hondalte,” a commanding voice ordered.

Adrian paused. I did, too, schooling my features into a blank mask despite the hairs standing up on the back of my neck. When I turned around, I saw that my demon radar hadn’t been malfunctioning. The lanky, blond-haired man approaching us had two tall, dark arcs rising out of his back.

Not arcs, I realized when he drew nearer. Pitch-black wings. Then he spoke, causing my stomach to flip-flop in fear.

“If she is a new pet for me,” the winged stranger said in English, “tell me, why are you leaving with her?”

“My lord Mayhemium,” Adrian said, bowing formally. “I have discovered that this one is too flawed for you.”

The blond demon came closer. I tried not to stare, but he had wings . Were they real or a type of illusion, like Demetrius’s ability to transform into shadows and other people?

“What is so flawed about her?” Mayhemium asked, and my skin felt like it was trying to crawl away as his gaze slid over me.

“I have crabs,” I blurted out, saying the first gross thing that came to mind.

The single glare Adrian shot my way said that I wasn’t helping. “She’s mentally defective,” he replied, his tone implying that it should be obvious. “I’m taking her to Ryse’s realm. He doesn’t mind less-than-superior pets.”

Mayhemium’s gaze swept me again. From his expression, Zach had glamoured me into looking as gorgeous as Adrian’s disguise was plain. Then the demon waved an imperious hand.

“I’ll take her anyway.”

Adrian let go of my arm and stepped away. I tried to conceal my shock, but I wasn’t that good of an actress. Yes, we were deep in enemy territory and outnumbered by a thousand to one, but was he really going to let Mayhemium take me?

The demon thought so. My breath sucked in at the gleam that appeared in those inhuman eyes. Now I knew what death looked like when you stared it in the face. Then Adrian straightened, abandoning his subservient posture.

“I never liked you, Mayhemium,” he said in a tone so flat, he sounded bored. “At least you’re so arrogant, you came alone.”

Before the last word left him, he hit the demon, moving so fast all I saw was his usual blur. Mayhemium stared at him, something inky leaking out from the side of his mouth.

“Adrian?” he asked in disbelief.

“Ivy, leave,” Adrian ordered, urgency now replacing the flatness in his tone.

Mayhemium’s head whipped around, and he stared at me with understanding that turned into unbridled savageness. “The last Davidian,” he hissed.

Adrian punched him so hard, I expected a dent to appear in the demon’s face. It didn’t, but more incredibly, Mayhemium shattered, his body transforming into dozens of large crows that flew straight up before diving in a furious arc toward me.

My arms rose to shield myself, but Adrian was suddenly blocking them, his large body absorbing the stabs from beaks sharpened into knifelike points. With lightning-strike quickness, Adrian snatched the largest crow out of the air and then crushed it in his fist. Mayhemium materialized at once, howling in apparent agony, his long black wings now broken.

“Think I didn’t remember how to neutralize your trick?” Adrian’s purr dripped viciousness as he punched the demon hard enough to knock him over again. “What’s wrong? Can’t fight without your wings?”

Mayhemium snarled something in Demonish that turned Adrian’s face into a mask of rage.

“No,” he spat. “I’ll never do it.”

“You will,” Mayhemium roared. “It’s your destiny!”

“Not today.” With that, Adrian landed a kick that snapped the demon’s leg when he got up again. When Mayhemium bent low and staggered, Adrian smashed a knee into his face, crunching bones with an audible sound. Then Adrian’s fist drove through the demon’s neck, briefly disappearing up to his wrist before he yanked it and a handful of something pulpy out.

Yesterday, the sight would’ve made me gag, but after touring the pyramid, all I wanted to do was cheer, especially when Mayhemium fell and didn’t get back up.

Adrian strode over, yanking my arm with a hand now coated in what looked like motor oil.

“What part of ‘leave’ did you not understand?” he snapped.

“The part where I left you alone with a pissed-off demon,” I replied, feeling dazed. “Is he dead?”

“Of course not.” Adrian propelled me into the darkness, running so fast I had trouble keeping up. “For the tenth time, humans can only kill demons with the weapon we don’t have yet.”

“You’re not human,” I panted, my strides no match for his.

“I’m as human as you are,” he said, shocking me. “And you need to run faster. He’ll wake up soon and send every minion in this realm after us.”

“I can’t...run faster.” I could barely talk, I was huffing and puffing so much from our frantic pace.

“Yes, you can.” He hauled me closer, his body a guide in the stygian darkness. “We’re the last of the two most powerful lines in history, and our ancestors passed down all their supernatural abilities to us. If you try, you can do everything I can do, except sense demon gateways. It’s in your blood, so use it.”

The source of his incredible abilities was also in my blood? Impossible. I wasn’t superwoman; I was the girl who’d hated gym class because of all the times I’d gotten picked last for teams.

“I’m running as fast...as I can,” I gasped out.

He only yanked harder on my arm. “Not yet, and you need to. I can protect you from a few demons, but not all of them. Do you know what will happen if they catch you? Death will be the best part. Before that, they’ll hurt you worse than they’ve hurt anyone else. Rape won’t be enough. Torture won’t be enough—”

“Stop!”

“—and they’ll make you watch as they do the same to your sister,” he continued ruthlessly. “You’ll die knowing that everything she suffered was your fault, so run, Ivy!”

Something snapped in me. I’d already failed Jasmine by leaving her in that B and B when I should have stayed until I found a way to get her. The last time I’d seen my sister, I’d been running away, and she had no way to know that I was coming back for her—

“That’s it,” Adrian yelled, his grip on me loosening. “Faster, Ivy, you can do it!”

I didn’t feel any change in my body. My legs didn’t work harder, my lungs didn’t suck in more air, but I was somehow ahead of Adrian, running flat out into the impenetrable darkness. Once again, I flashed to that day at the B and B. Mrs. Paulson had attacked me, and I’d made it into my Cherokee without knowing how. Right now, I did. I must’ve run just like this, with a speed no human should have, but I somehow did.

Was Adrian right? Had ancient legacies and inherited abilities been simmering in me this whole time?

He drew even with me, his hand a brand on my chilled flesh, guiding me in directions I couldn’t see. At some point, I’d dropped the ski gear, but I was glad I didn’t have it. All that padding would’ve hindered me, and the cold spurred me on. In my mind, it was now tied to this place, so I hated it. I ached to be back in the sunshine where it was warm and demon-free, and all I had to do to accomplish that was to run faster.

So I did, my legs pumping with the same velocity as Adrian’s. When he grabbed me and I felt the body-bending force of hurtling through one realm into another, then found myself facedown with a mouthful of hot sand, I smiled.

We were back in the Zone of Silence.

Adrian didn’t give me time to celebrate by kissing the ground, which I wanted to do. He also didn’t pull me back through the gateway so we could search another demon realm through the vortex’s version of a revolving door. Not with Costa and Tomas waiting here like sitting ducks. Instead, Adrian hauled me up into the Jeep, barking something to Tomas in Spanish that had the brawny Mexican and the handsome Greek scrambling for their machine guns.