Amma gasped, nothing she could do to stop the demon from sinking fangs into his neck or shredding him with her claws, but the succubus did neither. Instead, she dipped her face down to his chest and shifted to drag her body, breasts first, along his. Amma scrunched up her nose—somehow seeing that was much worse than watching him be sliced open.
The chaos of the rest of the room, the succubi screeching and clanging of weapons, fell away, but it all appeared lost on Damien, his grip on his attacker’s arms loosening from a rough hold to something closer to a caress. The succubus had lost her frightening visage, replaced again with the sultry woman who had initially appeared before them, and she skimmed her lips up the side of Damien’s face.
“Oh, gods, of course,” Amma grumbled, and she pulled a small stack of books off the nearest shelf. “Hey! Stop that!” She chucked a book across the room and nailed the succubus in the horn.
With a hiss, the creature’s head snapped up to Amma, eyes flashing yellow and piercing through her.
Amma swallowed nervously, but heaved another book, and it bounced off Damien’s still-slack face. “Don’t get distracted, those breasts are attached to a demon!”
Damien shook his head just as the succubus lunged off of him. Amma shrieked as the creature flew right at her, but the woman was stopped mid-flight with a tentacle of blackness that wrapped around her throat from behind and a second around her midsection. She flailed, screeching in that skull-piercing way, and then a crimson blade sliced up through her middle from behind. With a choking gasp, the succubus’s body melted around it into a pile of sizzling sludge that smelled of cinnamon and burnt hair.
Damien stood with a brand-new weapon held out, a sword of dark metal Amma had never seen him wield or even carry, covered in the demon’s oozy innards, but then it disappeared in a haze. He blinked twice, seeing Amma, then quickly looked away from her as the shadows that had strangled the succubus climbed back and disappeared around his form.
Pulling his dagger out once more, he sliced through his palm again, the first cut already healed, and threw bloody blades across the room and out onto the balcony nonchalantly, cutting through the green succubus as she was climbing atop the guard there. Another screech, and then another pile of sludge. Damien strode to the doorway, there was a crack followed by a wet squelch, and the guard whimpered from the hall as Damien strode back in with a huff. He wiped his dagger off on the bedding, sheathed it, and retrieved the broken idol from the ground.
The guards staggered back into the room, dazed and blinking, hanging off the wall to keep upright. One of them pressed a hand to claw marks that went through his leather armor at the shoulder, blood smeared there. “What in the Abyss?”
“The Wastes,” said Damien, holding the two pieces of the idol, one in each hand. “They came from the infernal plane by way of the Accursed Wastes. Here.” He tossed one half of the idol to the guard who juggled it between his hands before throwing it toward the other who simply let it pelt him in the gut and bounce to the floor. Damien turned up a lip. “Take that to one of your priests. They can confirm its origin.”
Morel was pulling himself up from the ground, just as dazed. He moved like his body was tender as he retrieved the half a relic. Instead of gazing at it lovingly as he had done before, he simply stared, bleak-eyed.
“That magic you did,” said the meeker guard, pointing his sword at Damien, the tip of it shaking. “That was…”
The blood mage looked up from the other half of the idol he still held, then pocketed the piece inside his cloak. He gestured to Amma and strode past the others, out of the chamber.
“Wait. That was bloodcraft you did, wasn’t it?” The guard appeared to suddenly be incensed. “Stop. Stop him!”
Amma could see the fear still on the man’s face and disgust creeping just behind it. “He just saved your life,” she insisted.
“Come along, Valeria,” Damien called from the hall.
Amma hurried after, scooping up Kaz as she went. Damien was continuing out the way they had been led despite the guards shouting for him to come back.
“Will that clear Morel’s name?” she asked, catching up.
“Does it matter?”
She paused on the top of the steps even as he went down them. “Of course it does.”
“Well, I don’t know if it will,” he said harshly, “but nothing will clear mine.”
She watched him continue on, the light from the front room falling on him as he turned for it. Even to someone untrained who had just heard stories, it was easy to put together what he was. But hehadsaved those guards lives, and they would be thankful, surely, with a little reasoning. “Damien, wait, I think—”
“Sanguinisui, come, now.”
Amma was propelled down the stairs, nearly tripping over herself to keep up with him, flooded with the urge to flee the estate. In the setting sun of the day, Amma glanced back only once, seeing the broken balcony door, the house otherwise dark. She shuddered, though whether it was from the spell urging her onward or the memory of the attack, she was unsure. The third, lanky guard was jogging up to meet them, asking after what caused the crash he’d heard, but Damien simply told him the others would need help and went for the gate.
“How did you know?” Amma asked when they passed out onto the street again.
“Could you not tell what those things were at first glance? I thought it was fairly obvious, and you’re much more clever than those men.”
“Oh, thanks.” She chuckled, placing Kaz on the ground and reaching out for her knoggelvi when they approached. She was pleased when it actually nuzzled into her hand.
“Infernal darkness, they were pathetic,” he muttered. “Falling under the succubi’s charm so easily.”
She clicked her tongue against her teeth. “And you didn’t?”
His brows arched inward, already leading the group away with fast steps. “You willnotspeak of that ever again.”
