I was already in hot water with Dolion. He was already going to make an example of me by killing me in front of Nyfain. What did I have to lose? This was the next step in freeing us.
“How about you get ready to go, and we’ll get this party started?”
NINETEEN
FINLEY
I pushed Calia out of the way and walked directly toward the sex demon. He stopped, and his magic hit me, oozing over me like slime. My stomach churned. Bile rose in my throat. I barely kept myself from stopping and retching.
I plowed into him, grabbing his shoulders and walking him backward until I neared the others, and then I sliced into his middle with my magic and threw him. He smashed into the group of naked people.
Bodies flew to the sides in a tangle of limbs, some trying to get out of the way of the suddenly dead demon and some getting hit by the debris. The other sex demon was the next to go as power pulsed and pumped around me, throbbing into the room.
“Do not shift,” I called out, throwing the second sex demon, quickly lifeless, out of the way.
The demon huddled on the floor, looking up at me with wide orange eyes in his brown-scaled face. “Guards!” he shouted, cowering as I stood over him. “Guards!”
I bent to take him out, then thought better of it. Why should I steal the others’ opportunity for revenge?
“Anyone want my collar to strangle him?” I asked, removing it so the guards I’d eventually be confronted with didn’t get any ideas.
“I don’t need a collar.” A lady shifter pounced on him, wrapping her fingers tightly around his neck. His hands flailed, caught by a faerie and held out of the way.
“I can feel…” A shifter pressed his hand to his chest. “I can feel—”
“Do not act on it,” I barked, magic riding the command, shocking into him.
He jerked as though slapped, and he wasn’t the only one. The rest were shedding the effects of the demon’s sex and suppression magic, turning on their captors and brutally tearing them down.
A side door opened, and I realized I’d forgotten about Mr. Pee-body.
“Help,” he yelled through the door. “Help!”
Guards streamed into the room, pushing him out of the way. Before I could get to him, I was surrounded, my power still pumping out.
Get all you can from Nyfain, quickly, I told my dragon.
On it.
Power surged into me, and it kept coming. As guards swarmed me, grabbing me and attempting to throw me to the floor, I blasted out a hard thrust of power at Calia, still standing in the corner. I didn’t know if I could direct it like that, but it was worth a shot.
My chest hit the ground and someone put their hand on my head. My hands were wrenched behind me and secured with cuffs before I was yanked up and marshaled out of the room. As they turned to get me out of the door, I caught the rest of the shifters descending on Mr. Pee-body. The guards were so preoccupied with the dragon that they didn’t seem to notice. Mr. Pee-body wouldn’t be getting out alive either.
Govam’s voice rang out. “Let’s go, let’s go.”
They hustled me down the wide and luxurious corridor, then took a small arched door into what looked like the servants’ halls.
“I’ve got her.” Govam pushed his way through the others and took my shoulders.
“Just a tiny bit of trouble,” I told him, out of breath. “They deserved it, though. Seriously. There is no way you’d fault me if you knew what they were getting up to. It was not my scene.”
“I tried to warn them that you could not be controlled. I was ignored. That’s why we were waiting outside of the room instead of inside. Part of staying alive around dragons is knowing when to get out of their way.”
Smart guy.
“His highness blames you for the…change in…party dynamics,” Govam said softly as they ushered me down a few flights of narrow stone steps.
“I know. He told me.”
“He was correct, of course, just not in the way he supposed.”
I tensed.
“Easy, dragon,” Govam said. “My job is not to instruct his highness regarding his affairs. My job is to escort dragons. I am nothing but a minion in this castle, regardless of my title. No one listens to guards or officers. Not about anything important. We have our duties, and that is where our usefulness ends.”
He walked me through the dungeon. Officers wandered about, smiling at me as I passed.
“She’s back early again, hmm, Govam?” the first officer called. “I think soon I’ll be given leave to use her as I see fit. There is yet more power I can wring from her.”
“He’s not wrong about getting free license with you soon,” Govam whispered as we walked to the next set of stairs. “The demon king does not like acknowledging the incubi and succubi as beings that exist naturally among us. He values their ability to control and twist minds, but he’d prefer to have nothing to do with them. That’s why they are used to taunt and torture kingdoms under his control. He likes to think they are the only demons who enjoy less-than-standard sex, even though he himself has some…peculiar tastes. The party tonight exposed a nerve. He will not let it stand.”
“I know. As I said, he told me.”
“He’ll give them time to wring the last shreds of power from you, and then he will throw you at the golden prince’s feet and kill you for good. The officers are only kind to those deemed useful. They can also be cruel.”
“Whipping us is their version of kind?”
“You were deemed useful, so they were not actively trying to break you. Sometime soon, the demon king will want you broken. He will do it to hurt the golden prince—and you.”
He slowly led me down the last flight of stairs, Denski and the other guards lingering behind.
“Soon, you will lose all traces of yourself, and when you die, that prince will die with you. At least the parts of him that matter.”
His tone was so matter-of-fact. He didn’t sound like he was warning me, or deriving any pleasure from our conversation. He was just giving me the current state of affairs.
“Why are you telling me this?”
He didn’t answer, just sped up again and walked me through the rows of cells, all of them empty except for Hannon’s and mine. Jedrek lay curled up in the corner, his clothes torn and stained with blood. They’d clearly beaten him for the part they thought he’d played in the most recent party.
Fear choked me as Govam shoved me into the cell and I backed up to get my cuffs removed.
Soon they would realize it wasn’t Jedrek who’d made things so spicy. They would put together that everything had changed after the arrival of the two new additions from Nyfain’s castle.
Hadriel and Leala were in danger. So was Hannon, given he was my brother and could be used to torment me. I was in danger. Jedrek, too, though it was a little harder to care about that.
We had to get out of here. Now.
I just hoped to hell the boost of power I’d given Calia would be enough for her to get moving. Otherwise we’d just have to force our way out through the officers and make sure we crossed the waters before the rest of the castle found out about it.