Devil May Care (17 page)

Something cool and smooth eased around my ankle. I glanced down, but of course I couldn’t see the element entwining around my leg. At first, I assumed it was just the touch of Carol-Anne’s element. It felt like cool water on hot flesh, but Carol-Anne’s touch had been sharper. This was something else. My gaze seemed to be drawn behind me into the crowd. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled as I scanned the anonymous faces. The demons felt it too. The crowd stirred, and the music cut so suddenly the silence throbbed in my ears.

I stepped closer to Akil. I opened my mouth to ask what was happening. He shoved off Carol-Anne with a muttered curse and corralled me against the bar. “Don’t talk. Don’t move.” I had the sense he wanted to say more, but he turned his back on me and blocked my field of vision. I peeked around his arm and caught sight of a tall figure moving through the crowd. The demons stumbled against one another to move out of the way. Some ducked out the main doorway, making their escape.

When I finally laid eyes on the woman the crowd appeared to revere, a bolt of energy danced up my legs, funneled into my spine, and damn near wrenched a cry from my lips as it pierced my skull. My legs wobbled. I clung onto the bar and tried to ride out the pain without drawing attention to my sudden weakness.

Akil’s hand found my hip, but he didn’t turn. He settled his hand against my waist, holding it there to steady me. His warmth seeped through my clothes and into my skin. It helped clear my head enough that I could focus on the woman who stopped a few strides from Akil.

I’d never seen anything like her before. She wore a combination of leather and steel plates. She had a short sword strapped to one leather-clad thigh, and a dagger hooked through the thick leather belt riding her hips. Her auburn hair had been pulled back into a tight braid, yanking her features back so that her eyes, cheekbones, and chin all seemed perfectly aligned and symmetrical. Perversely perfect.

I closed my eyes. An ache throbbed through my skull and down my neck. When I opened my eyes again, the figure hadn’t been a woman at all. How had I mistaken him for a woman? He still had the braided red hair, the same oddly feminine face, but he was heavier. His broad muscular arms looked like the sort to wield a sword with deadly accuracy. Armor clung to him like a second skin. He tossed a glance left and right. The crowd shrank away. He fixed his liquescent green eyes on Akil.

My head buzzed. My vision blurred. My own element tried to rush my skin. I held it back, shoving my demon back into her box before she could make herself known. Like Carol-Anne moments before, I didn’t want to appear to lose control so easily.

Carol-Anne had slipped off the bar and regained some of her composure, although her hair was mussed and her dress was askew. She dropped to a knee just ahead of Akil and bowed at the feet of the armored man. She didn’t speak. Nobody had said a word.

The armored man tilted his head, the gesture akin to a satisfied wolf admiring its prey, marking future hunts. He pointed a gauntleted finger at me as I peeked from behind Akil. “That… is quite the plaything, Mammon.” His voice carried to every soul in the club, his tone one not used to being argued with. Clearly, he was the sort who gave orders.

That!
I knew better than to growl, and besides the pain in my head dashed my anger.

I did, however, manage to hold his emerald gaze for all of three seconds before the pounding headache forced me to avert my eyes.

“Levi...” Akil’s purr resonated to a depth my mortal hearing could barely detect, setting my teeth on edge. I’d not heard him purr before, not quite like that. I’d’ve called it a nervous purr, but nervous and Akil were two words that should never be present in the same sentence. “May I have the pleasure of introducing you to Muse?”

Akil stepped aside and left me exposed, slumped over the bar, head drooping, struggling to stand and barely able to focus. I don’t know what Levi saw when his green eyes drank me in: a twenty-something woman dressed in ill-fitting clothes with wild eyes and a harassed expression. But he didn’t waste time assessing my physical appearance. He went straight for my demon. I almost caught sight of the wave of power rising behind him. My mortal sight captured the quiver in the air, right before he plunged his element into me.

I should have screamed, but the overbearing thrust of energy wrenched my voice away. This was no curious exploration. Levi threw enough ethereal power into my human skin to render me useless.

Akil dropped his gaze. I saw him to my right, head hung low, turned away from me, and then Levi’s power rode over me so completely that I no longer saw anything but the whirling torrent of water which had swallowed me whole. Swept up in the whirlpool, I recognized the drowning sensation, having nearly drowned twice before. It didn’t matter that I was dry as a bone or that my own element spun in chaos around me, unable to find direction in my terrified thoughts. I couldn’t remember my own name, let alone draw from the veil and direct my power at Levi. He could have torn me apart on the elemental level, and I had no defense against him.

When he finally let me go, I fell to my hands and knees, coughing up non-existent water from my lungs. My skin and clothes were clammy with perspiration, but the rush of water I’d experienced hadn’t been real, at least not on a physical level.

“A curious thing.” Levi flung out a hand, twisted it palm up, and then beckoned me with his fingers.

My arms and legs worked as though they possessed minds of their own. I rose off the floor like a wooden puppet, dancing on the end of Levi’s strings. His half-smile quirked one sided. His lips parted, and he peered at me through wet lashes. He controlled my human body, and those emerald eyes made wicked promises.

I snapped my head up and summoned my demon. She came willingly, spilling into every cell, planting her strength and power into my limbs. Looking through demon eyes, I saw what Levi really was. Behind the armored-man, towered the ghost of a vast sea-serpent. His scales glistened beneath the writhing lights. His elongated snout bristled with whiskers jutting from his chin. One long barbed fin rode down his back, probably all the way to the end of his tail somewhere far back in the crowd. He had wings bunched against its sides. Levi’s demon form eyed me curiously.

“Levi...” Akil spoke up, but stalled under Levi’s glare.

I stood my ground, pulling back against his summons, leaning away from him, as he held a coil of power around me.

Whatever Akil was going to say, he’d better hurry. Left any longer, and I was opening the veil and throwing every damn molecule of fire I could find at Levi.

Akil moistened his lips and took a step closer to Levi, holding out a hand. “Wait.”

Levi’s smile was too broad for his face. Too many teeth gleamed behind his thin lips. The demon image behind him chuffed a laugh. “Mammon. Did you think you could keep this little morsel for yourself?” As Levi spoke, his voice fractured in two, human and demon, an echo over an echo that bounced around my fragile skull.

“Just...” Akil struggled to find the correct words. A rigid expression of concern cut into his face. Akil didn’t know what to say.

Holy hell, I was on my own.

I fixed my heated glare on Levi. “Akil introduced me, but I don’t know you.” My words felt gritty and abrasive against my tongue. I was suddenly thirsty. My throat was parched, lips dry. Water, I needed water.

Levi visibly shivered, and immediately the suffocating weight of power in the room began to ebb away. “You will.” He took a few strides forward. His human guise shimmered and contorted. On his last step, I found myself looking at a warrior woman once more. Man and woman, both and neither. It messed with my already fragile mind.

I lifted my blackened hands, claws glinting. “I don’t know why you want me, but I can guess. Can we perhaps, do this another time? I mean... you’re immortal, yes?” The female Levi didn’t answer me, just smiled an empty smile, like a queen smiling at her subjects. “Time means nothing to you, but I’m asking you for time. Surely you can forgo a little time before we do this again... whatever this is.” I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t know the correct way to address other Princes, which, by now I’d assumed Levi was, by the fact he/she made Akil quake in his shoes.

The she-Levi flicked her green eyes to Akil, who flinched under the weight of her glare. He hadn’t dropped to a knee like Carol-Anne, but he wasn’t far from it.

“Very well.” Levi’s voice alone cleansed my mind and satisfied my thirst. How was that possible? “Mammon, I am obliged not to interfere in your undertakings, but a creature as powerful as Muse should not rest with you, Prince of Greed.”

Akil glowered back at her, hands clenched at his sides. “And you believe you have the right to her?”

She snorted, as though offended. “No. You misunderstand me. I am not here for my own desires. I’m here for Asmodeus, her father by blood. Not even you can dispute his claim over her. Muse shall return to her father as it should be.”

Akil smiled. “He was content to throw her away as a child, but now she’s come into power, he wants her back.” He grunted a demonic curse. “Does he know she’s
infused with another
?”

Levi’s face paled. Her image shimmered before she regained it again. “Easily undone.” She dismissed.

“Just so.” Akil’s reply sounded equally blasé.

Levi and Akil exchanged wary glances, and I felt like a pawn in a game of chess. “Well Levi,” I snapped, words and their implications buzzing through my head. I could filter it all later. Right now, I needed breathing space. “Another time, perhaps?”

Levi bowed her head. “Another time, half-blood.”

Carol-Anne jerked her head up. “Wait, don’t leave me with Mammon.” I couldn’t see her face, but I didn’t need to. The tremor in her voice said enough. “We have a deal. You promised to protect me.”

Levi gave Akil what amounted to an eye-rolling glance. She gestured absently at Akil for Carol-Anne’s benefit. “Mammon will not harm you. He is weak. He would not dare interfere with one of my subjects. Give Muse what she wants, and let them leave. She is not to be harmed. Do you understand?”

Carol-Anne’s head bobbed in agreement, and with that, we watched Levi turn, take a few steps into the crowd, and dissolve into fine droplets of mist that swirled and drifted beneath the multicolored lights.

The presence of Levi’s power lingered long after she’d gone. For a few moments, nobody spoke. The seconds ticked on, and then the music burst across the dance floor. The crowd began to move, stirring back into life. Carol-Anne climbed to her feet and turned on the spot. She adjusted her hair and brushed down her dress.

Akil joined me at the bar. His shoulders slumped, and his eyes had dulled. He hitched himself onto a bar stool and ran a hand through his hair, ruffling the dark locks with his fingers before slouching forward. Eyes closed, he dragged his hand down his face and growled low in his throat.

I shook off my demon, packing her neatly away inside of me. Carol-Anne gave me a curt nod of acknowledgement, which I took to mean she’d be back, and then she disappeared in the crowd. Glancing askance at Akil, I wasn’t sure where to start with my questions. The one I settled on surprised even me.

“Are you okay?”

He dragged his gaze up to meet mine and mustered an insignificant smile. “Of course.”

“Is it the wound? Are you hurt?” He looked away, but he wasn’t escaping so easily. I leaned back against the bar so I could look into his face. I reached out a hand, hesitated, and then rested it lightly on his arm. The warmth of his element soaked through his shirt, into my hand, and wound up my arm. “No lies. Tell me the truth.”

His face softened. His gaze dropped to my hand on his arm and then flicked back to my face. “The Princes are difficult. Levi knows how weak I am. He won’t hesitate to take my title from me, should it benefit him. Likewise, the others, should they discover I’m wounded...”

I eased my hand off his arm and undid a few buttons on his soiled shirt. Akil made no attempt to stop me. He watched my face.

I peeled his shirt back. The fabric clung to a ragged puncture wound on his right side of his chest. The puckered flesh wept blood. A mottling of bruises bloomed across his muscles.“Akil...” I hissed. “Stefan did this?”

He tugged his shirt from my grip and buttoned it up. “It’s healing. There’s nothing to be done.”

I scowled at him. “Why didn’t you say?”

“When?” He smiled. “It’s not important. It will heal in a few days. Stefan needs your attention more than I do.”

“That’s very noble of you, but I need you to get Damien out of me. You’re no good to me unconscious.” He looked offended that I’d suggest such a thing could happen. “Levi is bad news, isn’t he... she... whatever it is?” I grimaced and shook the eerie commanding touch of him from my body. “He controlled me...”

Akil closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath. “He has physical control of human flesh. Leviathan is one of the First. He wields authority the way most demons wield weapons. I cannot protect you from Levi. Or from your father, Asmodeus, for that matter.”

I fell quiet and watched Akil watching me. He looked as exhausted as I felt. “He controls human flesh… So if I’m demon around him, he can’t control me?”

“Levi has many ways of controlling those around him. I suggest you do not defy him.”

“You mean, do as he says?”

He inclined his head. “If you want to survive with your mind intact.”

“I’m done bowing to others.” A growl tried to claw up my throat.

A tiny smile skimmed his lips. “Defiance will get you killed.”

“What’s the alternative? A lifetime groveling at their feet? Asmodeus, Levi, you?”

“I would never— “

“Control me? What were you doing for ten years, Akil? Huh?”

The weariness on his face tempered to steel. “I think you’ll find your time with me was a fucking fairytale compared to the alternative.” Splinters of fire blazed in his eyes.

My heart quickened. There was a time I’d have feared that look. It wasn’t fear amping up my heart rate. Goddamn demon desires. “Until you tried to kill me. What kind of fairytale ends with the Prince trying to flay the Princess?”