Page 18 of Queen of the Wicked
“Itisa choice,” the lord snapped. “I don’t have to accept it. Have no desire to.” Erebos sent him a look Alessia couldn’t see, but it shut the burly man up immediately.
Taking that as an opportunity, Alessia sauntered to both of them, squeezing her way between the unbearably muscular men. “Why are people dressed like they’re from Little House on the Prairie?”
“Little House on thewhat?” Erebos asked. The burly man chuckled and slapped him on the back.
“You need to spend more time up on Earth,” he told him. “To answer your question, Alessia, Hell didn’t exactly get thememoto update their fashion taste. This is how it’s always been and how it will remain.”
“Erebos isn’t dressed like them,” Alessia pointed out, waving up and down his outfit.
“Because he had to go to Earth,” he replied. “Earth has a different dress code.”
“And did he go to Earth to kill me?”
Erebos grunted and stalked further ahead toward the gates to the castle. “Tell her nothing,Eryx,”he ordered.
“You certainly know how to get on his nerves,” Eryx observed. “Alas, I can’t go against his orders.”
“And what is it you do for him?”
A sly smile spread across Eryx’s face, and Alessia was relieved to have a joyful conversation for the first time in days. She needed the humor. “I’m instructed totell you nothing, and I, unfortunately, can only take orders from him and whoever his mate will be, of course, whenever he or she decides to claim that title. Then I’ll havetwopeople to answer to, and most of the time, their desires will trump his.”
Alessia’s eyebrows lifted. “Hismate?”
Eryx nodded, his chiseled jawline working as he replied, “The person he is fated to be with. It’s the connection all of us desire to find in our lifetime. One we can only dream of.”
Alessia laughed, and at the sound of it, Erebos whipped his head around, lingering by the gates and guards surrounding it. “Well, I feel truly sorry for whoever hismatewill be. What a task they have ahead of them.”
Eryx chuckled as Izara elbowed him in the ribs. “Indeed.”
When the guardsopened the twenty-foot doors to breach the castle walls, what lay before her took Alessia’s breath away. Two grand staircases flanked the sides of the foyer, their banisters wrapped in gold, with towering ceilings that seemed to extend to the top of the mountain on which it resided.
A red, three-tiered chandelier cascaded from the ceiling with black gemstone teardrops equivalent to the size of her fist. It had Alessia questioning if those gemstones were real when a circular stone table in the center of the room stole her attention. Different varietiesof black flowers were sprawled on top; she’d never seen anything like them. They were like sunflowers, but without their vibrant color. Shimmering specs of white danced across the petals as if made of stars. She stepped closer and brushed her fingertips against them, smiling to herself.
“Corathins,” Eryx supplied, noticing her infatuation. “They only grow here in Hell.”
“Good evening, My Lady, do you have a coat for me to take?”
Alessia spun around at the voice in her ear, and when she saw the floating skeleton before her, she crashed back against the table, sending the vase of flowers shattering against the pretty black and white checkered floors. She almost screamed, but she couldn’t find the breath to do it.
Thiswas what she expected Hell to be like.
At least somepart of it was true.
“Ambroz, this is Alessia Eastwood. She will be staying with us for the time being,” Erebos explained. “Please show her to her chambers on the west side of the castle, and have Isla see to it that her needs are met.”
“Of course, Your Majesty,” he obeyed. “Right this way.”
Wait. That was it? She just got here, and Erebos was going to leave her alone with a skeletal servant? Could hebeany more selfish? She hadn’t even gotten a tour of the castle. She didn’t know where to get food, water, or even where the bathroom was, for crying out loud!
Alessia was a grown woman, but Erebos acted like an insolent child on their journey, so she felt like throwing atantrum of her own by stomping up the staircase. With her arms crossed, she huffed after Ambroz with a flourish, hearing Eryx release another chuckle.
“She’s not staying onyourside of the castle?” he asked Erebos in a teasing manner.
“Over my dead body,” Erebos hissed. “I’ll see you both at dinner.”
Alessia heard the snarky remark, but it didn’t bother her one bit. She’d rather pluck her eyeballs out than stay onhisside of the castle, where she would run into him. That arrogant son of a bitch wouldn’t know manners if it hit him in the face, and you’d thinkhe’d encompass just asmidgeof them since he lived in a swanky castle where everyone seemed to be stuck in medieval times. All he was missing was a moat and a crown.
She thought they were going to find the Seeker and make plans to find her mother. When the hell did he plan on doing that? Maybe he needed time, but she wanted to be involvedwith those plans. What did he expect her to do? Sit in the castle and look pretty while he paraded around without his powers?
