Текст книги "Prince of Demons"
Автор книги: Nora Ash
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Prince of Demons
Demon’s Mark II
Nora Ash
Copyright © 2025 by Nora Ash
All rights reserved.
Cover art by Cherie fox
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Any and all likeness to trademarks, corporations or persons, dead or alive, is purely coincidental.
About Nora Ash
I write romance that Hurts So Good.
Visit my website to learn more about my upcoming books.
WWW.NORA-ASH.COM
Content Advisory
This is a dark fantasy romance. It contains graphic violence, including scenes of skull-crushing, brain consumption, and general demonic brutality.
There is also (non-penetrative) assault not perpetrated by the hero. While Kesh is violently protective and never harms the heroine, the world she’s trapped in before he finds her is not kind—and parts of her journey are disturbing and traumatic.
Summary
She came to sell her soul.
He wants to ruin her body first.
Georgia has spent her life running from demons. But when her brother is dying and no cure can save him, she has no choice but to strike a deal with the monster all others fear.
The bargain was meant to be simple: her soul in exchange for her brother's life.
But Demon Prince Kesh has other plans.
She will be marked.
She will be trained.
She will be bred.
Sentenced to a future as a Breeder, Georgia is meant for another demon's bed. Kesh is only meant to prepare her—subdue her, awaken her body, make her submission absolute—then auction her off and return to his war.
But Fate has other plans.
One taste of her, and hard-won discipline unravels. She is warmth. She is hunger. She is everything he was never meant to have.
And if he can't give her up, he won't just lose his throne...
He'll bring Hell itself to their door.
An intense dark paranormal romance with a touch-hungry demon prince, high fantasy stakes, and a heroine who refuses to break. For fans of steamy power-play, emotional ruin, and fate-marked mates.
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Contents
About Nora Ash
Summary
Get in touch
1. Georgia
2. Georgia
3. Georgia
4. Georgia
5. Georgia
6. Kesh
7. Georgia
8. Kesh
9. Georgia
10. Kesh
11. Kesh
12. Georgia
13. Kesh
14. Georgia
15. Kesh
16. Kesh
17. Georgia
18. Georgia
19. Kesh
20. Georgia
21. Kesh
22. Georgia
23. Kesh
24. Georgia
25. Kesh
26. Georgia
27. Kesh
28. Kirigan
29. Georgia
30. Kirigan
31. Georgia
32. Kesh
33. Kesh
34. Georgia
35. Kesh
36. Kesh
37. Kesh
38. Georgia
39. Georgia
40. Georgia
41. Georgia
42. Georgia
43. Kesh
44. Kesh
45. Georgia
46. Kirigan
47. Georgia
48. Georgia
49. Kesh
50. Georgia
51. Kesh
Epilogue
Kirigan
Thoughts? Feelings? Horny devastation?
Also by Nora Ash
1
Georgia
“Your brother is dying.”
Those were the words that ended Georgia’s world.
She stared at her mom’s drawn face, the pale skin taut on her too-prominent features. She'd hardly slept, hardly eaten in the month since Larry’s hospitalization. Georgia had done her best to care for her mom while she coped with the news of Larry’s aggressive cancer, but there was only so much she could do to ease her mother’s life while her youngest child went through chemo with a less than five percent chance of survival.
And now, even that small ray of light had been extinguished.
Georgia clutched her hands in her lap as her mother sank down on the waiting-room chair next to her and buried her face in her palms. She didn’t cry—she hadn’t since the diagnosis—but Georgia knew she was quietly breaking apart from the inside.
She knew, because she was, too.
He was only nineteen years old. Nineteen, and so full of life and light. How could something so horrible as cancer take away the kindest, brightest person in a hundred mile radius?
How was that fair? How was that right?
“How long?” she asked, voice soft despite the urge to scream until she blacked out.
“They think maybe two weeks, if we’re lucky,” her mom said, voice muffled by her hands. “I need to call Mike. I just…”
“I’ll do it,” Georgia said, mostly because if she didn’t do something, she would give in to the rage and grief, and her mom didn’t need that.
Her mother's voice was a hoarse whisper of exhaustion. "Thank you."
The sunset was cruelly beautiful. It lit up the autumn sky in a tapestry of golden orange, reds and purples while Georgia walked back and forth across the small strip of grass outside the hospital’s western wing, listening to Larry’s dad go through all the stages of grief on the other end of her cellphone.
“Larry asked us not to tell you, Mike,” she said as gently as she could as he cussed and roared. “He didn’t want you to worry. He was sure he would beat it.” Her brother, an optimist until the end. Even when the doctors had given him his diagnosis and the grim chances for survival, he’d smiled at her and told her he’d beat the odds and not to worry.
“Fuck!” Mike groaned on the other end. “This is my fault. He didn’t think he could reach out to me because I’ve been so busy with Jeanette and the twins…”
“It’s no one’s fault,” she said, because despite Mike’s shortcomings as a father, he loved her brother. And right now, loving Larry hurt something fierce. “You know how he is—always expects the best outcome of everything.”
Mike coughed a broken sob. “Fuck. This can’t be happening, Georgia.”
“I know,” she whispered. “But it is, and I think you should come see him.”
“Of course. I… I’ll be there within two hours.”
The silence after he hung up echoed through the hollow place inside of her, the one that’d been empty since Larry’s first diagnosis. She’d known, from that first day, despite her brother’s complete belief he’d be all right… she’d known he wouldn’t.
Numb, Georgia stared into the sun, stung by it’s final flare as it sank below the horizon. The golden reflections on the city’s skyscrapers dimmed and vanished, as if sucked away, leaving her alone in the creeping twilight.
“Got a light?”
Georgia jolted at the unexpected voice—she’d been too lost in her own misery to hear anyone approach. When she turned toward the speaker, another shock jerked through her chest, and she automatically took a half-step back before she caught herself.
“Sorry. Don’t smoke,” she muttered, trying to keep her eyes from the horns growing out of the stranger’s pimply forehead.
“S’ok,” he said, turning back toward the hospital. “Nasty habit anyway.”
Georgia stared blindly at his tail swaying as he walked back toward the large building lit up brightly against the darkening sky. He was wearing scrubs, and she numbly wondered if he had to cut a hole in the pants for the tail to fit through. They didn’t all have tails. She knew because it wasn’t uncommon to find demons in places like hospitals or care homes. Any place with vulnerable people, really.
They’d always scared her. She’d called them trolls as a little girl as she’d screamed and pointed, but that’d only made them take notice of her. They’d stared at her, and even though she’d been young, she’d never forget that greedy look in their eyes as they watched her sob. As if her tears, her fear, excited them. It hadn’t taken long before she learned to pretend she didn’t see their horns or scales or claws.
She’d been in her late teens before she’d learned the adult word for what they were. And what they did.
“Hey!” the shout was out of her throat and past her lips before she could think to stop herself.
The demon turned to look at her over his shoulder. “Yeah?”
“I…” Her mouth was dry as she stared at him. Never in a million years had she thought she’d do this. But Larry was sick now, and in her gut she knew there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do to try to stop her family from crumbling apart.
If he died, there wouldn’t be anything left to live for anyway.
“I want to make a deal with you.”
The horned man arched an eyebrow, slowly turning all the way back around to face her. His fully black eyes crept over her face. “A deal?”
Georgia quickly bobbed her head in a nod, before she could change her mind. Every instinct in her screamed to run at the calculating look in his slightly narrowed gaze. “That’s what your kind does, isn’t it? Make deals?”
A small smile with no warmth tugged on his lip. He crossed his arms over his chest and walked back toward her, every step slow and measured. “I suppose that depends. What kind am I?”
“Demon,” she croaked, her throat tight as he stopped in front of her. “You’re a demon. And I want to make a deal with you.”
His eyes turned laser sharp then, head tilted back as he took her in from head to toe. “Well, well. And what do you have to trade?”
“My… my soul?” she whispered. “Isn’t that your price?”
He cracked a grin then, wide and unpleasant, but thoroughly amused. “Not exactly the kind of business I’m in, darling.”
“Oh.” Georgia frowned, taken aback by this twist in the conversation. It wasn’t that she was an expert on the subject, but all the religious scripture she’d found said demons fed on mortal souls. “I thought—isn’t that why you hang around the hospital? To trade the souls of grieving relatives in exchange for their loved ones’ lives?”
The demon snorted. “Nope. That’s a few steps above my pay grade, I’m afraid.”
“Then why do you work here?” she asked, confusion winning out over fear.
“Easy access to organs,” he said with a shrug. “And juices. Eyeballs. That sorta thing. Plus, the benefits aren’t bad.”
Georgia blinked, every small hair on her body standing on end as horror crept back through the confusion. “O-oh. Okay. Nevermind.” She made to push past him, but he brought a hand up to her arm, stopping her before she could.
“Don’t flee, little mouse. Just because I don’t want your soul doesn’t mean we can’t find another bargain.”
She suppressed a shudder at his touch and forced herself to look up into his eyes. “What do you have in mind?”
“Well,” he drawled, letting his gaze rest on her throat for a beat. “I like blood. And bile.”
“You work in a hospital,” she said. “Surely there’s plenty of supply?”
“You’d think,” he said with a grimace, finally letting go of her arm. She immediately took a step back, putting a foot’s distance between them. “But as lax as they are with checking everyone gets buried with their liver, getting to the blood bank’s a right nightmare. Every ounce is accounted for.”
“Oh… right,” she said, somewhat off kilter by his relaxed mention of harvesting organs from corpses. “So you want… to bite me?”
“I could,” he said, flashing her that disturbing smile again. “But if I do, you ain’t getting back up again, and that would put an end to my blood supply, now wouldn’t it?”
“Uh…?”
The demon tossed his head in the direction of the hospital for her to follow, then began walking back toward the building again. “From what you were saying before, it sounds like someone you love is sick, and you want a bit of magic to make them all better, hmm?”
Georgia stumbled after him, her legs taking a millisecond to obey. “Yes. My brother.”
“Well, darling, that sort of power doesn’t come easy. Or cheap.” He shot her a meaningful look as they passed through the sliding doors, and the noises from the busy hospital intruded on the surreal conversation, surrounding them in an obscene cocoon of normality. “Tell me what room your brother is in and I’ll bring a contract with me after my shift tonight. But a fair warning—once you sign it, there’s no going back.”
2
Georgia
Both her mother and Mike were asleep when the demon entered Larry’s hospital room, sometime in the early hours of the morning. They sat by his bed, in the hospital's uncomfortable chairs, heads twisted uncomfortably to the side and their features drawn in troubled lines even after exhaustion had claimed them.
The night gave no respite when the person she loved the most in the world was drawing his last breaths.
Georgia forced her gaze from Larry’s pale face as the door cracked open, revealing the demon. His black eyes immediately flicked to her brother, hunger evident in their depths.
“Don’t even think about it,” Georgia hissed, getting up and out of the chair as quietly as she could. They’d all earned their rest—and she didn’t particularly want anyone to see whatever was about to happen.
The demon sighed impatiently, rolling his eyes as he dragged them from Larry to her. “Fine. Guess you’ll have to do. Tastes so much better from the sick, though.”
She grimaced, not willing to think too hard on the implications of what he’d said. “Be quiet—I don’t want them waking up. Let’s go into the hall.”
The demon waved his hand, and dark… something left his fingertips, floating toward the sleeping trio. It swept around them like a thick fog, tendrils slipping into their nostrils, mouths and ears before it finally evaporated.
“There,” the demon said, sending her horrified grimace a smirk. “They’ll have a headache in the morning, but you and I can discuss our business undisturbed.” He pulled up a piece of paper and presented it to her. “The contract.”
She reached out and gingerly took the single sheet. The lettering was handwritten, with swoops and swirls that could have made any calligrapher green with envy. Georgia raised her eyebrows as she scanned over the words. The greasy demon didn’t look like the kind of guy to care much for penmanship, but apparently he was.
“It says in exchange for my brother getting brought back to health, I will give ownership of my body, including but not limited to, my blood and vaginal secretions, to the demon Lewin?” she read from the page, grimacing at the mental pictures that painted.
“That would be me,” the demon—Lewin—said, bowing his head in mock civility.
“I thought you just wanted my blood?” she said. “Why does it say you get ownership of my body?” And vaginal secretions. Ugh.
“Because, when you eventually die, I’m going to suck all that delicious bile straight from your gall bladder, rip open your stomach and lick the juices from your intestines,” he said, slurping for emphasis. “Mmm-mh! Plus, nothing’s quite as delicious as menstrual blood straight from the source. I do hope yours is chunky. Wait—don’t tell me. It’ll be a nice surprise.”
Georgia choked back the nausea rising rapidly in her throat. “Ew, maybe learn to sugarcoat things. Jesus Christ.”
“I would,” he hummed, “but you’re going to sign that piece of paper no matter what I tell ya. No human desperate enough to come to me offering her soul as the first bargaining chip has any other options left.” He produced a pen and handed it to her. “You can sign on the dotted line.”
He was right. If this had been for anything other than Larry’s life, she’d have never talked to any of them, let alone revealed that she saw them for what they were. It didn’t matter what he wanted to do to her—even if he decided to murder her the moment she signed, to drink the bile he was so enraptured by. Not so long as Larry lived.
Numbly, Georgia took the pen from his outstretched hand. It was an old-fashioned fountain pen, the kind you dip in ink. Only there wasn’t any.
One glance at Lewin, and a particular aspect of the research she’d done on demons as a teenager, back when she finally realized she wasn’t crazy, sprung to the forefront of her mind. A contract with a demon was always signed in blood.
Georgia poked the pointed tip of the fountain pen to her fingertip, breaking through the skin with a quick jab. Crimson blood pooled from the wound in a single droplet, only to be funneled up into the metal tip of the pen.
Breathing out quietly, she turned the now red tip to the paper.
Don’t.
The word rang in her ears as clearly, as if someone had spoken it directly by her side. She startled, dropping the pen as she whipped around to see who’d snuck into the room without her noticing. But there was no one conscious but her and the demon.
Warily, Georgia bent to pick up the pen from the floor as she kept an eye on the demon. He was watching her intently, with bated breath, and she knew…
That voice, she’d heard that before. Warning her as a kid when she was about to scream at the horned creatures no one else seemed to be worried about.
Always it said the same: Don’t.
Don’t draw their attention.
Don’t go near them.
Don’t look them in the eye.
Don’t.
Don’t.
Don’t.
When she’d listened, she had avoided their attention.
But this time, she couldn’t obey the voice. Even if she knew the creature staring at her as if she were lunch had undoubtedly planned even worse things for her than what he’d admitted to.
Georgia shot a last, lingering look at Larry’s pale, still figure before she scribbled her signature across the dotted line, finalizing the contract.
Lewin smiled slow and wide when she handed the piece of paper back to him. Before she could pull her hand back, he snatched her by the wrist and pulled her arm up, closing his lips around her wounded finger. His mouth was hot and dry, and her finger stung when he swiped his tongue over the pen-prick with a visible shudder of pleasure.
“My, you taste delicious, my dear,” he rumbled when she managed to yank her finger from his mouth.
“Yeah, well, you don’t get to taste before you uphold your end of the deal, remember?” she hissed, cradling her hand against her chest. Shivers of revulsion still prickled across her skin from the feel of his tongue.
“Sure,” he said, giving her a nasty smile before he turned to the bed. “One cancer-free brother, coming right up. And then… then you and I are going to enjoy ourselves, little girl.”
The dark fog from before gathered around his hands, sweeping over Larry’s still figure. Nothing but the demon’s panting breath and the slow beeping of the machines her brother was hooked up to disturbed the quiet of the hospital room for several minutes.
Finally, Lewin sagged against the bed with a curse, the dark fog vanishing. “Shit.” He rubbed a hand against his forehead and turned to look at her. “It’s too strong.”
“No!” Georgia hissed, tears blurring her vision as impotent anger fizzled in her veins. “No! I signed your stupid contract! You heal him! Now!”
She didn’t realize she’d gotten to her feet, nor that she’d charged at the monster, until his hand connected with her chest and he shoved her to the floor by the side of the bed.
“You really have a death wish, don’t you?” he snarled, and though it wasn’t the fog from before, something dark and sinister gathered around him, emphasizing the shadows under his eyes and the otherworldliness of his horns. “You know what? Fine. I was going to let you out of the contract, but if you insist…”
She frowned, unease creeping along her spine at the threatening tone. “You’ll… you can save him after all?”
Lewin’s thin lips turned up in a nasty smirk. “For you, I’ll find a way.”
3
Georgia
“Where are you taking me?”
She’d managed to keep her mounting fear under control as the sleazy demon drove her out of the city’s center, all the way into the depths of the industrial quarter. But when he pulled the car to a stop deep in the midst of stacked shipping containers, by the side of a large, run-down warehouse with a broken neon-sign spelling out ‘HELL’, Georgia’s bravery started to fade.
“What’s eating your brother from the inside, we need more power than I’ve got,” Lewin said, flicking two fingers at her to follow him as he got out of the car and began walking to a door on the side of the warehouse. “Jimmy will be able to source that. For a price.”
Georgia bit her lip, every instinct in her body telling her not to trust the demon—but if Larry’s salvation lay beyond the dingy metal walls of that warehouse… well, that’s where she was going.
Lewin led her to the door and yanked it open, clamping a hand around her shoulder when a broken sob from within met them.
Georgia hesitated, frowning at the dimly lit room inside. It wasn’t more than a small space walled off by flimsy plasterboards, but another demon sat behind a reception desk. He was about as sleazy-looking as her companion, with small horns poking out through the greasy strands barely covering his scalp.
Lewin shoved her through the door and slammed it shut behind them, never releasing his grip on her shoulder.
“You again?” the receptionist said, his lips flattening into a disapproving line. “You know Jimmy doesn’t wanna see you here before you pay him back for the merchandise you damaged.”
“Oh, he’s gonna want to see me this time.” Lewin flicked his eyes to Georgia for a brief moment before he lifted his chin at the other demon. “I’m here to pay my debt. In kind.”
The receptionist turned his gaze to Georgia, acknowledging her presence for the first time with a quirk of his eyebrows. “Got a contract on her?”
“Yup. Ironclad.”
The new demon sighed. “Fine. Go on through.”
“Come along, darling,” Lewin purred, but the sense of foreboding in Georgia’s stomach tightened to the point of pain.
More sobbing rang through the warehouse from multiple directions, along with unmistakably rhythmic slaps of flesh against flesh. The smell assaulting her nostrils was a mixture of blood, decay, and sex.
“What is this place?” she asked, even as that neon sign flashed in her memory. Hell. She had a sinking feeling that perhaps that was intended a bit more literally than she’d initially thought.
“Does it matter? You wanted your brother healed—this is where you’ll find the cure to save him.” There was nothing soothing about the look Lewin gave her, but… Larry.
Her heart gave an achy spasm as a flash of memories of his easy laugh flickered for her mind’s eye. When Lewin pulled her along by his tight grip on her shoulder, she didn’t resist.
They headed down a narrow, makeshift corridor flanked by five-by-eight cubicles on both sides. Each opening was covered with rough-spun fabric, but the sobs, grunts, and fleshy smacks from within ruined any semblance of privacy. About midway down the corridor, one of the curtains was only half-pulled, and what transpired inside confirmed, with all too much clarity, what the sounds and smells had already revealed.
A human woman was strapped to the wall of the tiny cubicle, her wrists secured over her head and her knees pulled up and out to the sides, leaving her spread open and unable to escape the monster in there with her.
He was big—much bigger than Lewin, with many more demonic features, his skin scaly and black, leathery wings flexing from his muscled back as he drove into the helpless woman, ignoring her babbling pleas for mercy.
Georgia dug her nails into her palms and forced herself to keep walking. Her stomach clenched with empathy as the woman’s tormented voice was lost in the cacophony of human cries echoing from every cubicle they passed. Gross as Lewin’s payment for her contract was, at least it wasn’t that.
Perhaps… Perhaps when Larry was okay again, she could try to save them. Somehow. Alert the police. Even if they didn’t see the demonic features of the males brutalizing the women trapped here, they would do something. They would have to.
They reached the end of the corridor and stopped in front of a closed door. Lewin drew in a deep breath, as if steadying himself, before he rapped his knuckles against it with his free hand.
It swung open two seconds later, and someone snarled, “What?” from within. A huge, burly demon, with features not unlike the one they’d just passed in that cubicle, took up most of the doorframe, his bumpy forehead locked in a glower. His eyes narrowed further when they landed on Lewin. “You again? You’ve gotta be shitting me.”
Georgia let out an involuntary squeak at the monster’s sudden closeness and made to scramble backwards, but Lewin’s hold on her shoulder kept her in place.
“I’m here to see Jimmy. Got a trade for him,” Lewin said. His Adam’s apple bobbed under the newcomer’s glare, but he raised his chin. “He’s gonna want to take this meeting, Irral.”
The bigger demon arched an eye-ridge before he took a half-step back. “It’s your funeral.”
Lewin crept sideways through the door, dragging Georgia along.
“Now, now. What do we have here?” a drawling, nasal voice sounded from inside the moment they stepped through. “Lewin the Grave-robber. I thought I made it perfectly clear what would happen if I saw you in my establishment again.”
Georgia darted her gaze from the huge demon in the door toward the speaker—and clenched her jaw. There were two more monsters in the room. One was the approximate size and shape of Irral and stood casually, leaning against a closed door on the opposite side of the room. Another demon, more rotund than the others, sat behind a large mahogany desk far too opulent for the grimy warehouse. A pinstriped suit clung tightly to his body, the jacket gaping open between straining buttons as he leaned forward, his small, beady eyes fixed on Lewin. A thick gold chain completed the impression of a low-budget movie mafioso. Only the redness of his gaze and yellowed claws on his fingers gave away his true nature, but that cool, calculating look in his eyes made him no less terrifying than his two burlier companions.
“I know, I know. But I can pay this time, I swear,” Lewin said. He forced Georgia forward with him, stopping only a few feet from the large desk. “I’ve got a contract you’re gonna want a bite of, Jimmy.”
“What?” Georgia turned to the demon by her side, that sense of foreboding that had pounded in her blood since she saw where he brought her turning to a dull throb low in her gut. “My contract is with you. You can’t share me.”
Jimmy’s cold eyes finally moved to her, flicking over her for less than two seconds. “You bring me an untrained cunt? You broke one of my most prized girls, and you think I’ll just, what, swap her out for whatever street whore you’ve picked up and we’ll call it a day? Do you know how much money I’ve lost out on while she’s been unable to fuck? How long it takes to break in a new girl?”
“This one’s worth it,” Lewin said. His fingers digging deeper into her arm were the only indication that he’d heard her protest. “She can see us. What we really are.”
Jimmy froze, gaze whipping back to meet Georgia’s. Excitement bloomed in it, along with unmistakable greed. “She can what?”
“It’s true—she clocked me, no probs.” Lewin seemed a bit less panicked, since the big brute who’d been advancing on him had also turned to stare at Georgia. “Ask her.”
Jimmy raised up from his chair, surprisingly nimble for his size, and waddled around the desk to them, those red eyes never leaving hers. When he stopped in front of her, he held out a hand and offered her a smile that held no warmth. “Come to me, my dear. Don’t be afraid.”
Georgia didn’t move so much as an inch toward him. A shrill scream broke through the underlying cries and moans drifting into the makeshift office from the warehouse beyond, making her heart thump unevenly in her chest. Don’t be afraid—said the creep who had God knew how many women tied down like sacrificial offerings for horny demons. Yeah, hard pass on getting any closer.
“This is not our deal,” she said as evenly as she could muster, turning her attention back to the demon who still had his claws in her. “You said you only wanted my… fluids, and you’d heal Larry in return. I only signed your contract to save my brother—and it doesn’t say shit about selling me.”
“Don’t tell me you signed a contract for nothing more than her fluids,” Jimmy said, annoyance tainting his voice. He snapped his fingers. “Show me the paperwork.”
“How dumb do you think I am?” Lewin muttered. He reached into his jacket with his free hand and produced the now slightly crumbled piece of paper she’d signed.
One of the large goons snatched it from him and took it to his boss—but his eyes stayed glued to Georgia.
Jimmy unfolded the contract, tsking as he smoothed the paper with his hand before skimming his red gaze over it. An unpleasant smile hiked up the corner of his mouth.
Georgia’s stomach tightened.
“Unfortunately, my dear girl, it would seem good old Lewin tricked you. You’ll find some of our kind have that nasty habit. You did indeed sell him your body. It’s his to do with as he pleases,” Jimmy said.
The tightening in her gut climbed up to her throat, squeezing her windpipe. “No. That’s… That’s only supposed to be after I die! You can’t make me do this.”
“Now now,” Jimmy tooted. “It’s not so bad. You like sex, don’t you? Humans are usually so obsessed with it anyway, and if you are what he says you are… We’ll treat you like a princess. Don’t you want your brother healthy, hmm? Just look at Loyt here and tell me what you see.” He gestured to the big demon, the one who hadn’t opened the door for them.
Georgia hesitated, eyes flicking from Jimmy to Loyt. She’d sold herself in exchange for Larry’s life without hesitating. But she’d thought… She’d thought it’d be a gross, monthly transaction with a creepy but not too terrifying demon. Not forced prostitution to an endless horde of nightmarish creatures.
Did it matter?
If she did this, Larry would live. If she didn’t… He would die.
Since the day he’d been born, she’d known she’d protect her baby brother. No matter the cost.
She dug her nails into her palms and opened her mouth to describe the thick scales and brutish horns on the burly demon, but the same voice that had echoed in her head before she signed Lewin’s contract rang through her like someone had struck a gong.
Don’t. Don’tdon’tdon’t. Georgina. Notthis. Don’t.
Georgia blinked. Through the years, she’d come to think of that voice as her sixth sense. But it had only ever said the one word; don’t. Never more. Never her name.
And never with such panicked urgency.
“I… Don’t know what you mean,” she whispered. “I see a man.”
Jimmy sighed irritably. “Oh, you do, do you? Fine, if you don’t want to cooperate, you certainly don’t have to.” He snapped his fingers, and darkness rose from his yellow claws in a slowly twisting plume.
Georgia gasped and shrank back on instinct, but Lewin still held onto her shoulder, keeping her in place.
Jimmy gave her a nasty smile, and then the plume of dark energy began to float toward her like a thick trail of smoke.
