Eisha laughs as she recovers, wiping dark blood off her hand onto her leather pants. “You mean you don’t know? You’re Amato’s kid.”
29
MAVEN
I stare at the demoness.
“You’re the whole reason he started the movement in the first place—and now I fucking get why! Quite the scent on her, huh? Told you so, shitface,” Eisha adds as Melchom and the twins sniff the air around us.
Melchom looks baffled. “Devils and dicks! I swear on your cheating little sluthole that she didn’t smell likethisthe last time I was around her.”
He inhales deeply again.
“Stop sniffing my mate,” Baelfire snaps, baring his teeth.
I ignore their weird tangent about my smell, still focused on Eisha’s words. “You’re mistaken. My parents were killed slowly and brutally in the surge before the liches took me away.”
The demoness snorts and motions for us to follow them to the tables, scooting them around until we can sit. At least, some of us sit. There aren’t enough chairs in this little restaurant, so Bael and Crypt stand behind us, and Everett and Silas sit on either side of me. Eisha takes the seat opposite the table. The other demons go to order food from the very distractedemployee who apparently hasn’t noticed anything odd going on here.
Eisha examines me, shaking her head. “Infernal hells, I can’t believe that man was telling the truth. Told him he was a horny fucking dreamer, but here you are.”
“Your vague answers test my patience. Once again, both my parents died.”
She smirks. “Nah. Sure as sin, you’re Pietro Amato’s daughter, kid. You would’ve been only two years old when they dragged you away, so you can’t remember your parents—let alone them dying. Meaning all you know is what the chumps in the Nether told you, isn’t that right?”
That’s…true.
I frown, considering the possibility that my parents somehow survived the surge Dagon told me about. “What makes you so sure that I’m his kid?”
The other demons return to the table with multiple heaping plates of chicken, some kind of meat wrapped in bread, other steaming dishes, and sodas.
Eisha pushes a plate toward me.
I push it back.
“It’s not from your personality, I can tell you that much! Bet you got that shit from your mother.” She laughs and shakes her head, taking a whopping bite of chicken and nodding at my quintet, careful not to look at them again. “Do they want some?”
“I mean, if you’re offering—” Bael starts.
Crypt elbows him hard.
“No. We buy our own roadkill,” Everett says, watching with obvious disgust as the twins chow down like they’ve been starved for decades.
Eisha shrugs and smiles at me. “Listen,telum. Your dad was one hell of a guy.”
Hang on a second. “If you’re about to tell me you fucked him, I’ll vomit on your food.”
She bursts into riotous laughter, as do the other three demons.
“Oh, fuck, no,” Eisha wipes away a tear finally, shaking her head. “Amato was pussy-whipped by your mom like none other. If you ask me, that’s partly why he was so obsessed with getting you back from the Nether—he said you were the spitting image of her. Poor guy was determined to be the best dad in the whole damned world. Wanted to bring you up like a fucking princess all on his own.”
That answers that question.
No mother. Dead, or left us before I was taken.
“And somehow, he got along with your type?” I check, glancing at the demons. I’m not sure the twins can speak. Some demons don’t get the hang of human tongues very well.
“He was much more open-minded than most humans,” Eisha nods.
