Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 109033 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 545(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109033 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 545(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
“What are you getting at?”
“Presumably you’ve met Naomi’s demon?” Tobe probed, though it wasn’t really a question.
“Of course,” Luka confirmed.
“I’ll bet it’s made brief appearances here and there to warn you to behave but hasn’t really involved itself in anything happening around it,” Tobe hedged.
“Sounds about right.”
“It doesn’t give a shit about anything except its own survival and that of the person with whom it shares its soul. Naomi’s demon will protect her to the death, but it won’t do that cleanly or carefully. It won’t be subtle, won’t show an ounce of mercy, won’t be leery of attracting human attention. Because, in truth, there’s nothing low-key about that demon.”
Luka narrowed his eyes, his own entities locked on the male imp, sensing there was more.
“She and her demon have a deal,” Tobe added. “Unless she’s in the gravest danger, unless her life is truly at risk, it won’t interfere; it will let her handle it. But if the threat is too big, if she’s outnumbered, the entity gets to take charge and eliminate the danger. Naomi has to take a back seat.”
Luka felt his brow furrow. She’d told him nothing of this. “And if the demon gets to take the wheel?”
“We’d better hope she’s somewhere isolated. Somewhere no humans will stumble upon anything they shouldn’t. Somewhere no random demons might witness what she can do and just how much power she carries. Because if they do—human, demon, child, adult, innocent, guilty—the entity will kill them all. It allows no witnesses to live.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Just hold . . . baby . . . coming, said Luka, his psyche bumping hers.
Naomi gently cricked her neck, trying to ease the ache there—an ache that had been caused by her head being slumped forward while she was out cold. Waking to find that she was bound to a chair by ropes of magick hadn’t pleased her in the slightest.
Her little nap had been enough to make the dizziness pass, though. More, the pain in her head was subsiding now, enabling her to think. But she was still a little off, her psychic strength having taken a hard hit—hence why her demon hadn’t yet struck at their enemies.
Whispers came from the clerics surrounding her. She ignored them as she scanned the temple yet again on the off chance that she’d missed a clue as to her precise location.
Among the religious symbols on the walls was the Lemures’ emblem, so she had to be at the monastery. That was all she knew.
She mentally crossed her fingers that Konstantin was all right. She tried thinking back to what had happened. She remembered the rush attack, remembered blasts of hellfire, remembered sensing more such blasts, as if other demons had arrived—likely alerted by how the unnatural darkness had fallen. She’d heard cries of sheer agony, and she hoped like hell that none had come from Konstantin.
She was pissed that she’d passed out. More, she was pissed that these bastards had managed to take her off guard—as was her entity. That anger seemed to feed the warped fiery power within her. It was already heating and rising in response to the danger.
The crowd stirred, and then the clerics directly in front of her started shuffling aside, making way for a tall figure. He had a real Jesus vibe going on with his beard, shoulder-length hair, and full-body aura of light.
The clerics bowed, but he paid them no attention. He took purposeful, elegant strides toward Naomi, his pale-blue eyes fixed on her intently.
Reaching her chair, he loomed over her in a clear attempt to intimidate her—his chin high, his back straight, his chest puffed out. There was an air of serenity to him. It was fake as fuck, of course, but very good.
“You must be the one who calls himself Kushiel,” she said. Her demon was very still, watching him carefully; observing its target, biding its time as the heat of her inner fire built and built.
He gave her a placid smile. “I am Kushiel,” he lied, so convincingly that it was almost impressive.
“Now that’s not exactly true, is it?” she challenged with a chastising smirk.
He flapped a hand. “I do not expect you to recognize me. My kind do not consort with yours, after all. Feel free to telepathically call out to whoever you want, by the way,” he added. “They won’t understand much of what you say.”
Yeah, she’d figured that much, considering she’d struggled to understand both Luka and Tobe when they’d telepathed her. It wouldn’t have mattered if she did have a clear mind-to-mind connection to them—there was absolutely nothing around her that would clue her in as to where they could find her. Not that she needed saving, but still.
“It was quite arrogant of you to have only one bodyguard when you knew a divine force would come for you,” he reprimanded condescendingly. “His soul will be in hell now, along with those of the other two demons.”