Of course, clear by the pack of wargs prowling around their table. Hadeon stood nearby like a sentinel of muscle. Calla had wicked blades strapped to her thighs, more likely hidden else on her. Motion above their heads drew Alora’s eyes upward to a shadow in the rafters where Deimos had perched, coiled like a serpent on a ledge, tail flicking.
Watching. Listening. Waiting.
For what?
Rune’s dark voice curled in her mind.The damned.
Chills coursed down her spine and Alora’s heartbeat climbed with dread.
She didn’t need to wait long.
Calla’s nails clicked on the table twice. A warning, Alora realized, as the onyx doors groaned open.
CHAPTER 31
Alora
Aprocession of horned nightmares and regal rot strode into the hall.
Each one more terrible than the last.
First came a female demon with vivid red tresses hissing with living snakes, heralded by sweet incense and laughter. Ribbons of transparent black silk clung to her pale body like sin. Dainty horns crowned her head. Small wings fanned at her back, a slender tail tracing her seductive steps. Behind her came her court of succubi and incubi. Demons who used beauty like a weapon, eyes bright with lust and seduction.
Rune whispered her name into Alora’s mind,Lady Morvenna of Lust.
Another female glided in next, a creature both divine and dreadful.
Her slick gray skin shimmered like wet pearl as she swam through the air as though on invisible tides, sirens tail catching the light like wet gemstones. Her hair streamed behind herin long, liquid strands, a cascade of sea-silk blues and silvers, threaded with faint glimmers like light refracting through deep water. Strips of translucent cloth and scales formed her attire clinging to her breasts and hips. Pearls and gold chains dripped from her arms and neck, pairing with the gold trident held elegantly in her webbed hand. And when she smiled, too many sharp teeth gleamed like shards of opals from her black lips.
Lady Nexia of Greed,Rune introduced, nodding in greeting.
Then came a towering male demon. He stood like a living embodiment of war given form, his presence bending the air around him. Antler horns arced from his skull, wreathed in fire that burned without smoke, casting harsh light over leathery wings at his back. His skin tinted a faint red bore the scars of countless battles, muscled abdomen marked and hardened, as though violence itself had shaped him. Plates of sharp armor clung to his broad shoulders and arms, forged with bone and iron. A tattered battle skirt of charred leather and darkened hide hung from his hips, weighted with chains and fragments of bone, every tear and scorch mark stained with blood. He radiated the terrible calm of something that knew it would win, whether by strength, endurance, or sheer inevitability.
The demons of his court pounded their chests in greeting, a sound like rolling thunder.
Alora swallowed.
Rune’s mouth hitched at one end.Lord Ira of Wrath. Warlord and first commander of my legions.
Then came the next Dominium, and Alora knew his name.
Rune’s claws flexed on her hip, gaze cold.Lord Sal’vathar of Envy.
His armor gleamed like a beetle’s shell, six spider limbs unfolding behind him. His face was ashen, lips thin, eyes glowing sickly green. Around him scuttled his faction, arachniddemons with too many eyes and limbs, their movements like a chorus of skitters that set her teeth on edge.
Then followed a demon that made her stomach turn.
He was a grotesque mass of hunger given flesh, towering and misshapen, body swollen with layered muscle. Jagged spines and hooked protrusions erupted from its shoulders and back, while thick, sinewy tentacles coiled and uncoiled behind it like restless fingers searching for a meal. A wide, brutal mouth split his face, lined with tusks and vicious teeth made for rending rather than speech. Pockets of more fanged mouths lined. Him from shoulder to shoulder, the stench of decay rolled off him in waves.
She blinked at Rune.Gluttony?
He nodded.Lord Balgor.
The last of the Dominions drifted at the end of the procession and the room fell quiet as all eyes fell on her.
Though much smaller than the others, she carried a presence that demanded quiet, as if the air itself held its breath. A headdress of blackened bone and antler horns framed her face, a skull worked into its center like a mark of death worn openly. Her hair fell in a silver cascade beneath a black hood, skin ashen and streaked with dark glyphs that crawled like veins of shadow. She moved leisurely, the air shimmering with motes of sand and falling embers around her bare feet, burning and vanishing before they touched the floor.
And a tattered sash covered the top of her face.
