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Chapter 37
I swallowed bile as I eyed the hellhound. And the motionless Velokel, who all but thrummed with lethal power. I found myself absurdly comforted by a single thought, an instinctive weighing of every erg of Power this being possessed. He isn’t as strong as Japhrimel. The comfort was short-lived. He can still kill me. He can still easily kill me.
“Relax, Valentine,” Lucas said from behind me, pushing me none too gently. “I was contracted to keep your skin whole.”
She wore a loose blue cable-knit turtleneck, khakis with a sharp crease, and a pair of expensive black Verano heels. Her breasts moved slightly underneath the sweater. Velokel didn’t move. If he wanted to kill me, he’d had more than enough time. He’d had more than enough time as soon as I opened the door.
My hand dropped away from the swordhilt. Lucas closed the door behind us, leaned against it with his head cocked. “You’re too old,” I whispered. I sounded choked. My cheek burned, my emerald answering the green gem that flashed on her forehead. “Too old.” She should still be a child.
She looked just like Doreen. Just like my sedayeen lover, dead on the floor of a warehouse while Santino giggled and snuffled happily to himself, collecting his “samples.” My beautiful, gentle, wonderful Doreen, the lover who had given me my soul back. Who had given me myself back.
Eve smiled, one corner of her mouth quirking up. It was a familiar smile, but I couldn’t quite place it. Doreen hadn’t ever smiled like that. “A year in Hell isn’t the same as a year on earth. Far from. Please, come in, sit down. It’s good to see you.”
I eased across the room, staring at her. Velokel might as well have been a statue. My skin crawled. “You… I… you—”
“I hired Lucas to find you as soon as I left Hell. It was difficult, but I wanted you to have the benefit of some protection. Someone you could trust. It took him a while to find you; the Eldest had you hidden well.” She paused. “We could not locate you for a long time, and when we did, we could not approach. He was too… watchful.”
Japhrimel, listening to a sound I couldn’t hear. Taut and ready, perhaps sensing someone looking for me. Aware that I was in danger, knowing Lucifer was calling for me. That look on his face, that sense of him listening, hadn’t been because he was dissatisfied with me. It had been vigilance, the type of protective attention I’d sometimes practiced while doing bodyguard duty but had never, ever thought I would be the subject of. So living in Toscano had been to hide me.
To keep me safe.
“You’re in a dangerous game, Dante.” She moved slowly, like oil, over to the chair that stood with its back to the hellhound. She sank down gracefully, crossed her legs. “Lucifer has contracted you to kill four demons.”
I found myself lowering into the other chair, the katana across my knees. My heart beat thinly in my wrists, my ankles, my throat. In my temples. I swallowed, hearing my throat click. “Yes,” I said cautiously. One of them’s standing right over there, pretending to be a block of marble. I cast a quick nervous glance at him, wished I hadn’t. His eyes were fixed on her, he hadn’t shifted or moved a muscle but his entire being seemed to yearn toward her. I can bet you’re one of them too. No wonder Lucifer… gods. Oh, gods. Did Japhrimel know? Did he?
She smiled again, that same half-quirk of her lips that seemed so familiar. “I suppose I’m one of them too, then. The Twins, Kel, and I have all escaped Hell.” She leaned back into the chair, looked away from me. Doreen’s eyes in her face, staring into the fire. “The fault is mine. I am… unique, it seems.”
Then her eyes returned to me. Her gaze was so like Doreen’s I was having trouble breathing. The demon and the hellhound were utterly still, Lucas just as still. As if the only two people in the room were Eve and me.
I was almost begi
Memory slammed into me, swallowed me whole.
“Game over,” he giggled, and the awful tearing in my side turned to a burning numbness as he slashed, I threw myself backward, not fast enough, not fast enough.
“Da
“Get out!” I screamed, but she was coming back, hands glowing blue-white, still trying to heal.
Trying to reach me, to heal me, the link between us resonating with my pain and her burning hands—
Made it to my feet, screaming at her to get the fuck out, Santino’s claws whooshing again as he tore into me, one claw sticking on a rib, my sword ringing as I slashed at him, too slow. I was too slow.
Falling again. Something rising in me, a cold agonizing chill. Doreen’s hands clamped against my arm. Warm exploding wetness. So much blood. So much.
Her Power roared through me, and I felt the spark of life in her dim. She held on, grimly, as Santino made little snuffling, chortling sounds of glee. The whine of a lasecutter as he took part of her femur, the slight pumping sound of the bloodvac. Blood dripped in my eyes, splattered against my cheek. Sirens howling in the distance—Doreen’s death would register on her datband, and aid hovers would be dispatched. Too late, though. Too late for both of us.
I passed out, hearing the wet smacking sounds as Santino took what he wanted, giggling that high-pitched strange chortle of his. His face burned itself into my memory—black teardrops painted over the eyes, pointed ears, the sharp ivory fangs. Not human, I thought, he can’t be human, Doreen, Doreen, get away, run, run—
Her soul, carried like a candle down a long dark hall, guttering. Guttering. Spark shrinking into infinity. I am a Necromance, but I couldn’t stop her rushing into Death’s arms…
I stared at her, my nape prickling and my mouth full of copper. It could be true. We’d certainly both bled enough when he killed her. But wouldn’t Santino have known? A demon geneticist was perfectly capable of telling a contaminated sample from a pure one. There was no reason for him to even keep a contaminated sample.
Unless he’d guessed he might find a use for it.
She looked back at me. Her mouth curled up in that little half-smile again. “Vardimal may or may not have known. In any case, it was immaterial once he realized the value of what he had—a viable sample. A viable fetus.” Now her mouth pulled down into a soft grimace, Doreen’s little moue of distaste. It was damn hard to think with the smell of her filling the air. I shivered galvanically on the hard seat, my eyes flicking past her to the dozing hellhound and returning, compelled, to meet hers.
Doreen’s eyes. My dead lover’s eyes.
In someone else’s face—a face that held an echo of Lucifer. I was responding to her, unfamiliar desire rising to swamp me. A thin trickle of heat purred through my belly. Doreen. Oh, gods, Doreen.
My heart slammed against my ribs. The mark on my shoulder was alive with heat, burrowing into my skin. “Why are you telling me this?” I still sounded choked. I’m in a room with two demons, a hellhound, and Lucas Villalobos. Anubis protect me.
“I’m explaining.” Her voice was soft, soothing. “Vardimal failed to keep me away from him. The call the Prince is capable of exerting on an Androgyne is… immense. We are of his kind and he is the oldest, the Prime. I had very little chance of denying him access to my mind when I was a child. However… the Prince, whenever he creates an Androgyne, also implants several commands before the Androgyne is hatched. One of them is obedience. I wasn’t implanted until I was five human years old. The implant held until very recently.” The half-smile was back. I realized with a deep chill that I recognized it because I’d seen it in the mirror. It was my own expression. “It seems I have inherited your stubbor