Chained to the Devil’s Daughter (Mating the Elements #1)

20

Ash’ren

M y fingers smelled like Searra’s sweet nectar. For the twelfth time, I brought them to my nostrils and inhaled the pleasant scent, more stimulating than pyro sap.

Searra would be busy for a while. Royalty always had something to attend to, or settle, or whatever. Though she’d called me her king in jest, I wasn’t sure I wanted that role. It could be nice to have a little say over what happened in Hell, I guess. Especially knowing how it felt to be on the outskirts of society.

Speaking of the outskirts, people were awaiting my help. I had to admit it was fulfilling deep in my blackened fucking soul to have a purpose other than sick entertainment for fucked-up overlords.

When the next carriage pulled up, the driver holding the gryffions’ reins crinkled his charcoal face into a look of utter disgust under a flashy top hat.

“Ash Render,” he spat by way of greeting. “Why should I give you a ride anywhere?”

“For the queen’s coin.” I twirled a coin between my knuckles.

“That spoiled heiress ain’t no queen yet.”

“Yet.”

The sour demon grunted and jerked his head toward the back. I flipped the coin with my thumb, sending it sailing through the air to land on the grouchy man’s hat.

It seemed like forever before the gryffion’s strides slowed from their breakneck pace. I’d counted and lost count and counted their steps again by the time the driver ordered me to get out. I nodded at the scowling demon as I brushed past, trying not to stumble too much. Traveling by gryffion was not my fucking favorite, but without a wing, I had no choice.

I managed to reach the ladder built into the side of the bridge without giving away my dizziness. The carriage driver spat on the ground before departing.

Unlike my last trip to Ring Seven, I saw a few smiles. Even heard someone whistling a tune in the distance.

When I walked up to the tented shelters that’d been built for the refugees of Ring Eight while their soil was cleared of Firefolk, the Faith Keeper beamed at my arrival. I acknowledged him with a nod and took the final five strides to the man’s side. Others in the tent—which I saw now was doubling as a makeshift medical facility—eyed me warily, some downright hostile.

The kind of hate spewing from some of the laborers was not your run-of-the-mill discontent. Faces, bloody and unblinking, flashed through my imagination, a zoetrope of all the lives I’d taken. My personal demons itched for attention.

“Ash Render,” Markel’s mother spoke my unfortunate nickname with a twinge of surprise. “You’ve really come to train us?”

I nodded. The woman motioned to the discarded shovels littering the cliffside. “With these?”

“We must be subtle. In the inner rings, revolution is not quite so. . . necessary.”

She sighed but nodded and stuck out her hand. "Maisa.”

“Ash’ren.” I took her hand and gave it a firm shake, speaking my name with conviction. Perhaps this would be my first chance to shed the misnomer.

“We know who you are!” a shrill voice called. “Ash Render, the Demon of Darkness, Thief of Men!”

Fuck. Well, that wishful thinking lasted all of two fucking seconds. I faced my reckoning, which took the form of a plain, thin woman with a patch of scalp so burnt that hair no longer grew upon it.

Ice invaded my veins at the cold reminder of the sins lurking in my shadow. “Who was it?”

“My husband, you piece of trash!”

“What is this?” the old man croaked as loudly as his throat could probably allow. “This man is on our side—”

“This man is a murderer, Keeper. You can’t truly expect us to trust him.”

“You don’t need to trust me,” I said. “Only to train with me.”

The woman took four angry strides closer, not even wincing at the hard impacts each stride had on her busted-up feet. She spat directly into my face. “No.”

I grimaced and wiped my face with the back of my hand, keeping the grieving woman’s eye contact. I couldn’t fault her righteous anger, but if any of these people were to take my lessons seriously, I’d have to come clean.

“The guards used us as a cure-all for their boredom,” I spoke loudly enough for the small crowd and the Faith Keeper’s aged ears. Rubbing my hands free of the blood that stained them underneath the surface, I forged on. “I tried to hide my true strength, but I could not forever.”

“Then you should have stayed down!”

“Perhaps I should have, and I’m sorry for the pain my life has caused. Truly. I can’t take it back.” She stepped back, as though afraid I’d take my bloodlust out on a defenseless, grieving woman. My jaw worked around the words damming my throat, begging me not to speak their truth. Let it lie, man, let it fucking lie. “And I wouldn’t, anyway. Because I’m here.”

“And they are not.” The woman shook her head, deadly hatred aflame in her pinched gaze.

I gave a sharp nod. My heart was too black, my soul too far gone. I couldn’t regret surviving, not with everything I’d done, the amount of blood on my hands. Not with Searra back in my life.

The whole makeshift town was encapsulated by sticky tension. My life hung in the balance as the people I’d caused so much harm quietly decided my fate, a threadbare string pulled taut. Even my strange ally leaned pensively on his long wooden staff, inked words on his forehead indecipherable in the creases.

A scuffle of sandals. A young human man approached. He drew the woman into his arms and whispered in her ear. When he faced me, the breath left my lungs in a powerful whoosh. Those emerald eyes, they were. . .

The man walked seven steps to the wall of the cliff, choosing a shovel with a broken tip that was sharp enough to impale.

“My name is Kien.” A sob broke from the woman behind him, who had sunk to her knees. “My father would have fought bravely to return to us. I don’t forgive you. Will you train me?”

Of fucking course Samothy’s son would be the first to extend a hand. I almost fucking choked but managed to hold my breakfast down and nod.

∞∞∞

The sun was only a whisper of yellow over the western cliff when I called training to an end. Most of the trainees were tired, drooping, and sickly, especially the humans.

Briefly, I considered forgoing the carriage to try out a technique I was hoping to master soon but grimaced at the thought of more attention thrown my way. I’d spent all day as the Ash Render, training exhausted workers how to be ruthless and cutting. I didn’t need more glares to remind me of the terror that name wrought.

At least it was a different carriage driver. This one, a squat demon shaped like a perfect square, grunted once in acknowledgment of the destination, and once again when dropping me off in front of the palace, swaying on my feet.

Searra would already be in the dining hall with the nightly gathering of rich fuckers. I sniffed my armpit and winced. It wasn’t as though a little guppy in her pond like me would sit close enough for her to get a whiff, and I didn’t give six well-rounded fucks what the rest of them thought. Let my rancorous scent ward off anyone who attempted to sit close enough for their snobby looks to affect my jolly fucking mood.

Five, six, seven steps. The noise of the dining hall reached me before two guards opened the heavy doors. Eight, nine, ten—

My ears popped with the sudden rush of noise, immediately waving over me like dark magic weaving a spell to draw me deeper into the room. Fucking flames below, I’d never get used to this.

Searra stood from her fancy table for two at the dais and waved me over. An uneasiness slicked my palms. Every single platter was untouched, bearing the silver topper that hid important meals. Even Searra’s placemat, and the one beside her on the raised table.

“Sir,” Fara hissed, sounding a little out of sorts. She took my elbow and guided me to the front of the long table, motioning to the seat nearest the dais. Closest to Searra. Which was the exact seat I’d been headed towards anyway, but fucking whatever. Blood pumping uncomfortably, I shot a glance to the wide-eyed courtly woman across from me. Her nose wrinkled as I sat.

Fara offered a strained smile before scurrying away. On the dais, Searra stood in front of her table and raised a hand for silence. A snake-like demon that I recognized as a member of Devil’s asshole adviser team approached the dais mere feet from my chair.

“Princess Searra,” the man drawled after rising from a mediocre bow. His reptilian mouth curled in a half-smile, half-scowl that appeared well-lived-in. “An announcement over a special feast, two plates set upon the dais. One might believe your courtship was a success.”

The room hummed with delight, accepting his assumption without question. Small whoops and light claps rang out until Searra silenced everyone again. She was a ravishing queen, controlling these rich assholes with the slightest gesture of a hand that looked so dainty wrapped around my cock.

“My courtship with Filaris is over,” she said, her tone light. “Filaris was a special woman and one whom I will never forget. She is not why we are here.”

“I see.” The adviser hid his hands from Searra, but I could see them behind his back, tap-tap-tapping his forefinger and thumb in growing ire. “Then why the Hell are we here, princess?”

“Attendants, please.”

A flutter of movement and tings of metal, and the meal was revealed. Fried canyon goose rounds, to symbolize fertility. Lemongrass bonbons for longevity. Orange thunder cakes, for a love as passionate as a volcanic storm. The hors d'oeuvres served every time a new suitor was named.

I stared at the lavish meal, the uproar fading into background noise. Dragging my gaze to the dais, I gaped at the woman I loved so desperately that I’d trashed any sense of moral code I might’ve once had, all to be by her side. Inside my chest, my heart burned and burned and burned, fire leaking from every orifice of my body. Searra returned my heated stare with a queenly one, her bright gods-given light leaking out for my eyes only.

Searra raised her hand, but this time, it went unheeded.

“Guys! Guys, please!” Searra grumbled, then banged her palm on the table set for two, rattling the silver. The room slowly grew quiet.

“Most of you have been in your stations since I was a little girl,” she began. Her voice was steady, the voice of a queen sure of her decision to upend the fucking laws. “Most of you were part of court when Devil banished a demon for asking my hand in marriage.”

“You can’t fucking be serious,” the adviser grumbled under his breath.

“The story Devil spread, claiming that I was a pawn in a game for the crown, played by a—ahem— pussy-hungry con artist, ” Searra was forced to pause for the titters and whoops at her rare curt language, “was not true. I loved my station-less demon then, as I love him now.”

Another uproar, though it was silenced more quickly by the demon lord from earlier, who took three steps closer and bowed at the bottom of the dais, then straightened. His tone dripped with venom.

“Princess,” he all but snapped, “the matter of your courtship is not for you to decide. Let us take this up with Devil when he returns from Fyre. Surely, he will give your puppy—erm, I mean your criminal fuck boy—another chance, now that you are grown.”

My chair clattered to the floor. The snake jumped back a step, but it was Searra’s calm glance that kept my feet rooted. Bravely, the adviser met my glare. My warning was clear: speak to her like that again and burn.

“About that,” Searra said with a chirpy laugh. “Devil’s return to Fyre has been delayed.”

The demon’s eyes widened. “For how long?”

“Indefinitely.”

The room descended into madness. Through it all, Searra held my gaze captive. When she spoke next, she didn’t bother to raise her voice. Her quiet tone hushed the whole hall of richies.

“In light of my father’s abandonment of his realm, such decisions fall to me. Devil’s rejection is repealed. Ash’ren is owed one year at my side, per his legitimate request nine years ago.” She reached out for me, and I did not hesitate to close the five broad stairsteps between us. “And I accept.”