“You’re right about one thing,” Noah said, blowing out an exaggerated breath and stretching his arms over his head with a yawn. There were a lot of Demons watching them — if he wanted to sell his strength properly, he had to completely commit to the bit. “The only reason to kill you again would be to figure out if you get shorter the second time around — but I won’t deny that it’s a tempting experiment.”

“I will not return a second time,” Axil said. “My canvas has been painted. Lord Sievan’s brush has completed me, and I am nothing more than what I appear.”

Thank you for making absolutely no sense. I love it. I really do. You know what? I’ll retract my earlier complaint that everyone I run into is batshit insane. I don’t care if you’re insane. But couldn’t they at least be the kind of insane where they spill all their plans and reveal everything in a way where it actually makes fucking sense?

“Perhaps,” Noah said, going for the age old strategy developed through hours upon hours of school admin meetings of pretending he understood what was going on when he was completely lost. “But I’m afraid we’ve still got a problem.”

Axil’s porcelain features furrowed, the unnaturally smooth portions of her face crumpling in ways that a human’s body was never meant to do. “What problem could we have? I am no threat. Eliminating me would be the same as digging the dirt out from Lord Sievan’s toenail.”

I — what? Is she implying she’s worth no more than dirt beneath a toenail? If that’s the case, wouldn’t I literally be doing this guy a favor? Or is having dirt beneath your toenail somehow supposed to be a good thing in the Damned Plains?

“You made me waste my time,” Noah said flatly. He looked down to his corpse, which laid on the ground behind Axil. “That does not put me in a mood where I am particularly eager to bargain with you.”

She turned to follow his gaze, then looked back to him.

“I saved you time by killing four Rank 5 demons,” Axil countered. “That should set us even.”

“I wanted to kill those demons,” Noah snarled, striding up to Axil and looming over her. “I was looking forward to playing with them. You saved me no time. All you did was steal my entertainment and force me to waste a scrap of my hair.”

Axil turned to follow his gaze. Her eyes landed on the corpse lying on the ground. She turned back to look at Noah. For the first time, a flicker of unease passed over her features. Axil’s hands twitched at her sides and her weight shifted to her back foot.

Tension pulled the air taut.

The moment might have lasted a little longer if Lee hadn’t made her way over to the shadow of a building near Noah’s corpse and slowly reached out, snagging it by the wrist and slowly pulling it out of the light.

Noah and Axil both watched as Lee consumed the body whole, swallowing the entire thing without so much as taking a bite. She sank into the darkness and rose back up in Moxie’s shadow, averting her gaze and studying the wall as if she’d never moved.

Axil blinked heavily. She opened her mouth, closed it, and then opened it again. “Did your ally just eat—”

“Stylist,” Noah corrected. “That is my stylist. I do not enjoy leaving strands of my hair scattered around the ground like some animal. She is very good at her job.”

And Axil hardly has any room to talk. I saw her biting the faces off more than a few different people, and she did her best to do it to me. That automatically disqualifies her from being grossed out by Lee’s eating habits.

“You keep a demon around just to eat the bodies you leave behind?” Axil asked, and Noah couldn’t tell if there was awe, disbelief, or horror in her tone.

“Yes,” Noah replied. “Do you have an issue with that?”

“Does she eat other bodies?”

“Not yours,” Lee said. “You smell awful.”

“She keeps her diet refined,” Noah said, feeling like the conversation was starting to veer off the rails and head straight for a brick wall. “Only the highest quality meat.”

There’s got to be a special place in hell for people that refer to their own bodies as high quality meat. Good thing they won’t keep me around there for long.

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“Like squirrels,” Lee said.

Axil sniffed at her arm. Then she looked over to Lee. “What are—”

“Enough of this,” Noah snapped. The last thing he needed right now was for Lee and Axil to start getting into the specifics of Lee’s diet or why Axil smelled bad. “My patience is already thin. The only reason you aren’t dead a second time is because I have a degree of respect for…”

Shit. What was his name?

“Lord Seevan,” Lee provided.

“Right,” Noah said.

“Sievan,” Axil corrected.

“That’s what Lee meant. There was something stuck in her teeth,” Noah said.

Lee nodded empathetically. She reached into her mouth and yanked out a small fang, holding it up so Axil could see. “Yup. This.”

“That is a tooth,” Axil said. “One of your own teeth. It belongs in your mouth.”

“Does it?” Lee asked. She squinted at the tooth, then ate it. “I guess it does. Good point.”

Axil blinked heavily. Nobody said anything for several long seconds. That was definitely an improvement from all the yammer the demoness had been spouting about canvases and brushes. Maybe her former brain damage had been cured by dying — or split in half by Sunder. It was either that or Lee had confused Axil so thoroughly that her mind had actually managed to wrap back around into being almost normal.

“Just tell me what it is Sievan wants,” Noah said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “And then I will determine if I am willing to give it over — and what you will have to pay for it.”

Axil paused. “Pay?”

“Of course.” A slow smile spread across Noah’s lips. “You didn’t think I’d be giving it to him for free, did you?”

“He’s lord Sievan.” The tone of Axil’s answer might as well have changed her words to, of course I did.

“And I,” Noah replied, his smile growing wider, “am Spider.”

***

“The enforcers are dead, Lord Belkus.”

Lord Belkus shifted in his throne. The cold bone that made it up pressed into his back and loomed overhead, casting a shadow through the torchlit room. He’d had the throne built from the body of the last Lord of Treadon in a show of strength. The enormous chair was a display of power that cowed even the strongest demons that sought his audience — and there hadn’t been a day that Belkus hadn’t regretted making it. The damned thing was the most uncomfortable seat in the entirety of the Damned Plains.

A messenger knelt on the blood red rug leading up to him. The Rank 4 demon was barely as tall as the City Lord’s knee and he kept his head bowed low to avoid meeting Belkus’ gaze.

That was wise.

Anger, even more than what he was used to, swirled in Belkus’ chest. Old wounds throbbed all along his chest and back, reminders of battles long past that had never truly healed. They always hurt the worst when things weren’t going to plan.

As of late, that seemed to be more often than not.

“Why?” Belkus asked. His voice was flat and controlled, but his words echoed through the room like a thunderclap.

The demon kneeling far below him winced.

“They were killed, Lord Belkus. By an operative of Lord Sievan.”

A cold hand clenched around Belkus’ anger and snuffed it out like a candle in a winter storm. His back stiffened and his hands tightened around the armrests of his throne until the bone dug into his palm.

“What is Lord Sievan’s creature doing interfering with matters in my city? Has Sievan sided with the dissident that killed one that belonged to me?”

“I do not believe so, Lord Belkus.” The messenger shifted uncomfortably. “Spider killed Lord Sievan’s operative.”

Belkus blinked.

“He… killed them? Permanently?”

“They came back, but it seemed the fight was over. Sievan’s operative lost,” the messenger said. “The last I saw of them, they had gone into Spider’s tent to discuss terms of her defeat.”

The demon hesitated. There was something he wasn’t saying. Belkus’ eyes narrowed and he leaned forward in his throne.

“The rest of it. Tell me. Now.”

“Sievan’s woman… she was scared. I’ve never seen one of Death’s followers show fear,” Belkus’ messenger said, his voice shaking slightly. “She implied that Spider may be powerful enough to draw Sievan’s attention.”

Belkus stared in disbelief. A demon powerful enough to draw the eyes of the Eternal End was no mere thorn in his side. Igris had reported that he was cleansing the streets of some filth that was trying to steal the underground from him — not picking a fight with a roaming Demon Lord. Ice prickled against his back and curled down his arms.

Someone of that strength in my city… this is Yoku’s doing. She seeks to use my men like pawns, to turn this Demon Lord’s power against me and take the city for herself. I am not so easily tricked, wretched creature. I should have realized sooner.

“You will find Commander Zorin immediately,” Belkus ordered, his voice raising in volume and carving through the room like a blade. The situation had to be controlled before it grew any worse. Rumors spread like wildfire — and rumors drew those who sought power. They would make Yoku grow stronger still. He would not allow it. Belkus’ hand tightened into a fist. “Igris was a traitor working against me. Spider did me a favor in his execution of the worthless swine. Inform him that his earlier orders are canceled. I have new commands for him.”

“It will be done as you say, Lord Belkus.” The messenger’s body trembled and Belkus realized he was letting a minuscule amount of energy slip free of his body. He pulled his strength back and the messenger drew in a relieved breath. “What are your orders for Commander Zorin?”

“He is to find this Spider,” Belkus said, his jaw clenched as tight as wound steel. “And he is to invite him here. Zorin will inform Spider that he is called to an audience with me.”