Demon Revealed (High Demon Series #2) (4 page)

Spawn dust hit the cliff face like a sandstorm, causing
Aurelius to hunch down and cover his head to keep blasting particles from his
eyes. He hoped the mass dusting wasn't blinding Reah—she'd come to protect him.
There wasn't any way he might have lived through this, otherwise.

* * *

"Reah my love, are you going to change back now?" Aurelius
patted one of my huge, gold-scaled arms. I'd sat down wearily against the cliff
face after the last of the spawn had been killed. The piles of spawn dust surrounding
us were several hands high. I'd learned, too, after changing this time, that I truly
could burn what I chose and hold back the burning if someone I trusted wished
to touch me while I was Thifilatha. Aurelius was touching me now.

"Four feet," Aurelius read my thoughts and nodded at
my estimation of how deep the spawn dust was that lay about us. "And I am
grateful you can hold back that talent you seem to have," he added with a
tired smile.

"Auri, please teach me your measurements sometime,"
I sighed. I wanted to hold my head in my hands—it hurt. Karzac was going to
have a fit when we got back—he hadn't released me yet, but there wasn't any way
I would leave Aurelius to die. I loved him. I knew that for certain, now—my
heart had squeezed horribly when I'd seen him fighting off hundreds of spawn,
trapped against the cliff face as he was. "Are there any more spawn?"
I asked after a moment, when Aurelius hadn't answered me.

"No, love. You killed them all."

"You got your share."

"I got what I could. Now, change back, please. I can't
hold you when you're like this." He looked up at me.

"She doesn't know how." Someone else was there with
us, suddenly. Someone I didn't recognize. "I have seen you, young one, but
each time you were asleep or unconscious."

I blinked at him; he was beautiful to look upon. I could also see
the aura and power surrounding him. Struggling into a kneeling position, I
placed my forehead on the ground at his feet. Somehow, I knew what he was, even
if I couldn't put a name or words to it.

"Few know to bow to me nowadays," he said, smiling a
wondrous smile. "My fault, I'm sure. Young one, rise up. I will teach you
to come back to yourself."

"I am Kifirin, Lord of the Dark Realm," the god told
me later, after he'd shown me how to regain my normal shape. Aurelius had
watched both of us carefully as Kifirin had worked with me. It only took
concentration on my part—visualizing what I wanted—and it happened. Kifirin was
more than handsome as a man—he was the most beautiful creature I'd ever seen.

"Little one, you were foretold long ago," Kifirin
said as I searched for something to cover myself. Turning Thifilatha destroys
whatever I am wearing, and coming back to my humanoid form leaves me quite
naked. Aurelius and Kifirin appeared to be coolly indifferent to that reality.

"That sounds like a child's tale," I muttered at
Kifirin's statement as I attempted to slip behind Aurelius. Aurelius smiled
slightly and moved forward so I could hide behind his muscular frame.

"But this foretelling only came to me." Kifirin's
smile might stop many a heart, I think, even if he were smiling at my
embarrassment. "It is not time, yet, to explain that tale," he went
on. "Spawn Hunter, there is no Ra'Ak here. I would know if there were. You
may use your folding ability to take this one home." Kifirin disappeared
as quickly as he'd arrived.

"What did that mean—about the foretelling?" Aurelius
slipped his shirt off and wrapped me in it. It bore rips and tears but it
covered most of me—likely because I could wrap it around myself twice.

"Auri, I don't know and my head hurts," I rubbed my
forehead.

"I'll fold us back, then, since I know there's no Ra'Ak."
Aurelius' breath was warm against my temple as he kissed me gently and lifted
me in his arms.

* * *

"Aurelius, I'm sorry—we didn't know how bad it was and
there wasn't anybody we could have sent that quickly." Someone named
Kiarra paced in front of Aurelius and me. Her hair wasn't as white as mine, but
it was close.

"It doesn't matter now—my Reah came to get me,"
Aurelius was smiling down at me. I sat beside him inside Lissa's office—it was
the second time I'd been inside it within a day.

"Young woman, if this had been for any other reason, I
would be chewing you out, right now." Karzac flung the door open so hard
it bounced against the doorstop and almost hit him in the shoulder. He glared
at it and it stopped just short of his body. That look could quell anyone or
anything into submission, I think.

"Karzac, I'm sorry and I have a headache. Can we still be
friends?" I asked in a small voice.

"You saved one of ours. Even so, I would have been your
friend anyway," Karzac placed a warm hand against my forehead. The
pounding headache subsided, then disappeared. "Little one, if I yell at
you at any time, it is only because I care about you and you have frightened me.
There will be no other reason. Do you understand?" He had my face in both
his hands, his green-gold eyes staring into mine.

"Yes," I nodded. He still held my face in his hands,
after all.

"Aurelius, did she injure her Thifilatha in any way? Are
her wings intact?" Karzac turned to Aurelius.

"She was whole," Aurelius assured my healer. "As
am I. I would not have been, however." Aurelius gripped one of my hands in
his.

Kiarra left us after a while, leaving Karzac with us. Tory walked
in and together he and Karzac explained the events on Tulgalan to Aurelius. They
also informed him of what had occurred since then. Aurelius growled when he
heard that Nods had shot me, and then growled again over Tory's claiming. Tory
flushed, embarrassed to give Aurelius the truth. I know I was embarrassed, too,
although Karzac insisted that none of it was my doing. Then we went over what
had happened with Norian Keef and Lendill Schaff.

"The ASD has some answers to give me," Aurelius'
voice was nearly unintelligible and his eyes were red.

"Master vampire, you need to hold that back—they still
have a tight grip on our young one, here." Karzac jerked his head in my
direction. "I do not wish to cause her more grief than she has experienced
already."

"If they allow their argument with me to interfere with
their fair treatment of Reah, then they aren't much in the way of men." Aurelius
rose from his seat, dropping my hand. He was angry—dangerously so. Karzac had
insinuated that the Director and the Vice-Director might treat me worse if
Aurelius voiced his concerns. Was that what would happen? It made me want to
cry.

"Baby, hush." Tory gathered me tightly against his
side. "They haven't treated Ry or me badly."

"You are sons of a queen, and the sons of Director Keef's
mate," Karzac grumbled. "Of course you will not be treated as any
conscript might be treated. Reah is a rare treasure and they intend to use her
any way they can."

"Is that what you think?" Norian Keef slammed the
door so hard against the wall it crushed the doorstop and split the fine wood
of the door.

"Yes, that's exactly what I think, Director," Karzac
spat. "Tell me what you did when you forced that child to walk through the
entire palace and then down two flights of steps to the dungeon, when she
shouldn't have been on her feet at all. Tell me what that second of yours was
thinking when he dug his fingers into a ranos pistol wound. Tell me what you
were both thinking when you stood there for minutes, watching our little one go
into convulsions and nearly die. Were you hoping that your prisoner would
confess something right then? As I hear it, he was shouting at you to help
her!"

Norian's face held guilt. There wasn't any other way to
describe it. I was wiping tears away—only now was I hearing the incident
described. I hadn't been lucid enough at the time to say exactly what had
happened. And Karzac had been warning Aurelius about voicing his opinions to
Norian Keef. Well, Karzac's temper had just gotten the better of him.

"We will not be treating agent Nilvas worse, now." Norian
ran fingers through his brown hair. He was slightly shorter than Karzac, and
there was still something dangerous about Director Keef. I wouldn't want to be
on the opposite side of Karzac's anger, however. Who knew what the physician
might be capable of doing?

"You've already done that. How can the worst become more
so?" Aurelius' eyes were so dark a red they were nearly black.

"Vampire, it was not my intention to cause that much harm.
Neither Lendill nor I knew how bad off she was. We thought the healer, here, and
the Larentii had taken care of things. We were wrong."

"And you did not ask." Karzac was still furious. Nothing
Norian Keef had to say would make up for what Karzac might consider gross
negligence and outright endangerment. I'm not sure how I knew that, but the
information filtered into my mind somehow. Director Keef—he was angry as well. Angry
with Karzac, angry with Aurelius, angry with Lendill and angry with himself. Surprisingly,
I didn't detect anger with me and that caused me to wonder. I was still pressed
tightly against Tory's side. I shivered in his embrace.

"Norian, are you destroying my study?" Queen Lissa
walked through the door.

"I am surrounded by people who wish to destroy me,"
Norian grumbled.

"And I might be convinced to help them if you are
frightening Reah," Lissa pointed a finger at her mate. It made me wonder
how they'd become mated to begin with. Director Keef's actions so far hadn't
spelled out an ideal mate for the Queen of Le-Ath Veronis. Not in my eyes,
anyway.

"He's a lion snake shapeshifter, and he wasn't always
this awful." Lissa turned her gaze to me.

"Lissa, the fact that you gave away that secret would see
you imprisoned, if you were one of my conscripts," Norian snapped. "And
thank you for calling me awful in front of my employees."

"She already thought that, don't you think? Norian, this
isn't your normal conscript. You know that." Lissa flung a hand in my
direction. "She's nineteen, for fuck's sake. She didn't tell anyone while
she was growing up that her brother, who is actually her father, was doing his
best to beat the life out of her. I think she can keep your secret, Norian
Keef, as well as keeping her own." Lissa's eyes were now just as deep a
red as Aurelius' were. And what had she said about Edan?

"Oh, no," my vision went dark.

"Reah, don't pass out, baby," Tory was patting my
cheek while Karzac rushed over, placing fingers against my forehead.

* * *

Vice-Director Schaff was standing next to the sofa when I woke.
I blinked up at him, wanting to cry. Was he going to hurt me again? That's what
Edan had done. If I passed out after he hit me, he'd hit me again when I woke,
just for fainting in the first place.

"She thinks you will harm her. State your business and
leave." Karzac was still there and handing out orders. Tory was there,
too, as was Aurelius. My head was in Auri's lap while Tory paced and blew clouds
of smoke from his nostrils.

"Reah, we wanted to tell you soon," Lendill began. "About
Edan Desh. Addah had the DNA tests run shortly after your birth. He suspected
even then. We figure it was the reason he sent you to Edan. His mistake was
never telling either of you what he'd found—that Edan was your father. We
suspect foul play, not only in that but also in your mother's death. We are
currently investigating Edan, Marzi Desh and the physician who attended your
mother. We are very close to bringing charges against them—for rape, murder and
child abuse. You no longer have to level abuse charges—if other, more serious
crimes are committed, the abuse victim doesn't have to be involved. The state
will prosecute." Lendill nodded curtly to Karzac and strode swiftly from
the room.

"I was born of rape." That fact settled into my
brain—it was so much like Edan to do something like that and so much like his
mother Marzi to convince him it was a good idea in order to get rid of another,
whom she saw as a rival.

"Reah, you can't let that upset you," Aurelius now held
me on his lap. "None of this was your doing, love."

I saw the wisdom and reason in his words—it did nothing to
keep my heart beating at a more steady rhythm or my mind from going in circles.
They'd killed my mother. She hadn't wanted to leave me, perhaps. Her death was
something that had plagued me over the years and Marzi's whispered "You
should never have been born," when I was six now made more sense.

"Marzi probably wanted to tell Addah that my mother had
gone to bed with Edan," I mumbled, while Aurelius kissed my temple and
held me tightly against him. "But when my mother became pregnant, I guess
other things prevented it."

"Reah, stop thinking about it, baby." Tory went to
his knees in front of Aurelius and me. "We're trying to get you back from
the other things. This shouldn't have been dumped in your lap just now."

"No time would have been a good time, my love." Aurelius
stroked hair away from my face. I suppose my hair was finally growing out a
little.

"Reah, I don't want to place you in a healing sleep but I
will if this overwhelms you," Karzac sighed.

"I just feel cold," I muttered. I did feel cold.

"It would help if you'd drink some hot tea with Tory and
me." Aurelius rose easily, even with me still in his arms. He was vampire—he
was strong.

"I want to come." Gavril poked his head in the door.
"Master Morwin wouldn't let me leave my lessons early. I got here as fast
as I could." His dark eyes held a silent apology for me.

"Chash, don't worry about it." Aurelius set me down
and Gavril and I were hugging each other tightly.

"I heard all that stuff; my hearing's really good,"
Gavril said. "Reah, it doesn't matter how you got here. Where would
Aurelius and I be if you hadn't been born? I'd have taken that shot instead of
you—you shoved me out of the way. Believe me, anybody brave enough to pound on
a High Demon in his smaller Thifilathi to keep him from killing a witness gets
the highest marks in my book."