Page 131 of The Golden Rose Of Valenul

“Where is Lord Caldwell tonight?” asked one with a curious glint in their eye as soon as he’d entered the Dodd’s parlor.

A woman had leaned in not long after and said, “I had hoped to find your handsome cousin here.”

Still more had cornered him later in the evening as others danced to ask after him. Worst of them all was a man who followed up his question with, “I do hope he is safe. Too many dhemons about to be certain.”

“I can assure you,” he’d told each loose-tongued vampire, “he is perfectly safe. If he arrives, it’ll be because he’s finished the duties I’ve given to him.”

Between the questions, comments about the threat of dhemons, and his own lies, he’d nearly left to begin a hunt. If Ehrun had gotten ahold of Madan, his brother was as good as dead. The dhemon would string him up for the sun and then present his poisoned and rotting body in the most horrific way possible.

But Azriel had kept a straight face through it all. He kept his thoughts and concerns to himself as he spun Ariadne across the dance floor. Already he’d told her too much about the dhemons. The last thing he needed was for her to worry about Madan, too.

Closing his eyes for a long moment, he felt out with his mind. If Razer were close enough, he could ask his friend to search for Madan. He clawed through the void, grasping at the thin, telepathic lines connecting them, and came up short. Razer kept to the mountains, as instructed. Too far from Laeton to be noticed or contacted.

“Gods,” Ariadne breathed.

Azriel’s eyes snapped open to find her leaning to look out the carriage window. Her face drained of color. He sat forward. “What is it?”

“A dhemon.”

As though his own worries had summoned them.

He slammed a fist into the ceiling of the carriage twice, and the driver slowed to a stop. Azriel took up his sword from the seat beside him.

“Wait!” Ariadne grabbed his wrist, eyes wide. “No! Do not go out there.”

“Stay here.”

“Azriel, please—“

He couldn’t hear her anymore. If the dhemons lingered on the street to his own house, then they knew where he lived. They’d continue being a threat so long as he didn’t take care of them first.

“Please, no!”

The cry followed him as he leapt from the carriage and closed the door. He looked up at the driver. “If more arrive, take her to Laeton—not home. Don’t go home.”

“Yes, sir.”

Azriel stalked back down the road, scanning the darkness for the telltale signs of a dhemon. Their dark blue skin allowed them to blend into the shadows between trees despite their massive forms, but their glowing red eyes gave them away if they weren’t careful.

He didn’t need to search long. A dozen paces beyond the carriage, the dhemon stepped out to greet him, a wide grin on his face displaying the rows of sharp teeth. He held his arms out as though offering Azriel a hug.

“Dhomin!”

“Where is he?” Azriel demanded in the dhemon language, ignoring the jab. The rough syllables rolled off his tongue like gravel. “Where the fuck is my brother?”

The dhemon laughed. “You worry about him? What about her?”

Azriel didn’t look back at the carriage. The dhemon was trying to distract him—to tear his attention between the two people who mattered most to him. He wouldn’t let them. Not again.

“Tell me where he is, and I will make your death quick.”

The dhemon’s smirk only grew, and he pulled a pair of long, wickedly curved knives from his belt. “If you think I will tell you anything, you are more foolish than your father.”

“My father was ten times the man you’ll ever hope to be.” Azriel dropped the sword, and it clattered on the stone road. If the dhemon wanted to fight close-contact, he’d make that happen. In one fluid step, he pulled a long dagger from his boot.

The dhemon cracked his neck and stepped closer. “Ehrun will be pleased to have you back, dhomin. In pieces, of course.”

Azriel charged forward and hurled the dagger, hilt over tip, at the dhemon’s head. The beast laughed and side-stepped—right where he wanted him. Before the dhemon knew what he planned, Azriel gripped the dhemon’s closest arm, yanked him off balance, and back-kicked his foot out from under him.

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