Page 120 of Hell Bound

“Yes?”

“Be quiet.”

She fell silent, trotting alongside us as we headed for the showers.

I’d just rinsed the soap out of my eyes when I realized she was still watching us, waiting for something. “Go. At first light, you and Deasley are training together.”

Some of the tension went out of her shoulders, and I realized that was the subject she’d been waiting on me to address. “Commander.”

She spun on her heel and left. I’d paused under the flow of water, wondering if Pypentha had grown genuinelyfondof Deasley. She’d always tolerated him before, like, as Deasley put it, he was ‘a wad of gum stuck to her shoe.’

Whatever the hell “gum” is.

It was beginning to feel like we were becoming a real pack.

She’d gotten up every day since before the crack of dawn, dragging Deasley out of bed to train with her. The days of making fun of each other were over.

Every time I walked out into the ring, they were there, sparring with silent fury as Jovran offered pointers and corrected their forms.

Pypentha didn’t tease; Deasley didn’t whine.

I sighed, rubbing the bridge of my nose as I watched. All it had taken to get Deasley to take the fighting arts seriously was a looming death sentence.

“Commander.”

I turned at the sound of a new voice and found Crussian, one of Asmodeus’s favorite courtier pets, waiting by the door to the courtyard, his dark eyes on Pypentha as she slashed at Deasley.

He took a deliberate step away from them, cringing a little.

“What?” I asked shortly. Crussian was no better than the worst boot-licker. He seemed to sense my disdain, his emerald cheeks growing darker.

“Several delegations have arrived. The King demands your presence in making them feel welcome.”

A chill snaked down my spine. “Which delegations?”

On your knees, Lucifer…A husky voice slipped through my memories. If Tainted had arrived already…

“The Spectral Court.” Crussian laced his webbed fingers together in front of him as relief welled in me. “King Asmodeus wishes for his pack to look presentable for the arrivals, and then to patrol the forest.”

He waited expectantly, blinking, as though I would acknowledge him for giving the orders.

I turned my back on him. “We will resume this later. Get showered and we’ll meet thehonoredguests.” I let a hint of sarcasm slip through, and Crussian made a small noise of disdain behind me.

By the time I turned around again, he’d scuttled off. Probably off to shove his tongue back into Asmodeus’s ass.

We washed quickly, and we all donned dark, clean garments; there was no point in wearing formal clothes if we were going to be bursting out of them shortly after our welcoming duties.

Finding the Spectral delegation was easy enough; the palace foyer was filled with trunks carried by servants, and the nobles were easily identifiable: all of them were tall, wearing dark veils over their faces that gave only a hint as to who lay beneath them.

A male demon at their head, wearing billowing robes that the veil blended into like smoke, gestured to one of his cohorts. “Prince Morningstar.”

His voice was a reedy whisper. Striding closer to him, I caught a hint of his green-eyed gaze beneath the veil, dark tears running down his cheeks in an endless flood. He carefully dabbed with a handkerchief.

I shrugged off the title, as much as it irked me now, and inclined my head. “Baron Cthurhain.”

He was far from my favorite demon, but of all the delegated nobles, he alone had never taken enjoyment from Lilith’s plight.

He was also despised by Duchess Eldrid, ruler of the Spectral Court, so she sent him in her place. Even she could not refuse an invitation from Asmodeus—not if she wished to avoid war, and the Spectral Court was the most neutral of them all.

---