Demon’s Test (Demon Mates #4)

Prologue

Sometime around 900 A.D.

“Thy be banished from these holy grounds henceforth, foul fiend! The serpent hath no place in the House of God!”

An entire bucket of Holy Water hit Quirion square in the chest. Which he didn’t mind in itself, because the only remotely godly thing about that water was the rather unholy amount of bacteria living in it. Bacteria that could kill a human—which was probably the reason people thought Holy Water was effective against evil beings like vampires and witches, when in reality it simply weeded out the weak—but were no match for a demon’s system and definitely showed Mother Nature’s ingenuity impressively. What he did mind were the droplets splashing all over the pages of the book he was in the process of correcting, smearing the ink and rendering his hard work naught.

“And I was almost done,” he groaned. Looking around for something to absorb the liquid from the pages in the hope of saving his work, Quirion reached for a promising-looking dry cloth.

Another bucket of water hit him.

“I said be gone, foul fiend!” The monk, a rather unpleasant man with the name Edwy, who claimed to be the abbot of this monastery somewhere on an island on Earth—Quirion never bothered learning countries’ names, they changed too quickly—was starting to sound hysterical. Next would come the frothing around the mouth, from which it always went downhill and fast. If his father hadn’t been so adamant about humans not being harmed by demons—even indirectly through a coronary, not that people already knew about coronaries, oh no! Dark Age, how aptly named indeed—he would have simply waited till the annoying idiot was shut up by his own body. As it was, Quirion sighed deeply.

“For the last time, I’m not a foul fiend, the devil as a concept does not exist and you should be grateful. I’m doing you a huge favor here. You wouldn’t want books with so many mistakes out in the world.”

Edwy blinked. He looked like the giant toad that lived in Quirion’s moat, guarding his library against unwanted guests. Not that anybody ever found their way to his little haven, but if they did, his toad was there. Technically it wasn’t his toad either. She had been there when he first encountered the small universe consisting of one huge ocean battering endlessly against a rock island atop which Quirion had built his library. The constant dampness wasn’t ideal for preserving paper books or scrolls made of animal skins, but a few well-placed spells had taken care of that problem. The toad hadn’t minded, as far as Quirion could tell, and just kept on sitting there. Once he had completed the moat, she had moved in. If there were others of her kind, Quirion had yet to meet them, and he wasn’t in a hurry to do so. He was rather fond of their living arrangement. He had someone to come home to who never uttered a word or disrupted his days and she kept to the moat. A perfect situation as far as he was concerned.

“… foul fiend, serpent!”

Aaand he had gotten distracted again. Edwy, the Abott of the Toad Eyes, was indeed frothing now, which put the books in his library at an even greater risk. Human saliva did not go well with sensitive parchment. Not to mention what would happen if the man did die and spilled all kinds of other nasty fluids. Quirion decided that enough was enough. He was trying to do good, helping fellow scholars—well, not scholars in the strict sense of the word, not compared to him, more like novices, no, lowly peasants who dreamed of becoming novices, yes, that was accurate—to make their writings as flawless as possible even though said writings had even more flaws in their logic than in the actual spelling. Peasants, dreaming of being novices. And all he got was anger.

Wouldn’t a bit of gratitude be so difficult to show? No, most certainly not, yet he was called a serpent, even though he had his scales hidden at the moment, which couldn’t be compared to those of reptilians anyway. They were made of completely different material to begin with, otherwise they wouldn’t be able to fuse with magic.

Anyway, Quirion had had enough. He stretched to his full height of over seven feet, let his wings and scales show and started grabbing books, throwing them into several large sacks that were lying around quite handily while Edwy was now on his knees reciting prayers in Latin instead of defending the books. This monastery clearly didn’t deserve to keep them. They would be much better off in Quirion’s library, where he could correct them in peace. It was all so tiresome. Quirion shook his head. He simply couldn’t understand why people didn’t appreciate his efforts.

* * * *

The recent past

The sound of a thunderclap alerted Quirion that one of his family members had entered the library. Assigning the different wards protecting his sanctuary different tones was a stroke of genius, even though he had to give humans credit for it. Cell phones might be inferior pieces of crap, but individual ringtones — that he could appreciate. The door to his study was shoved open with enough force it bounced back from the wall.

“Dre, how nice of you to drop by. I hope you left the menace at home.”

“A good day to you, too, brother. Sammy is fine. Thanks for asking.” Dre was, as always, either immune or oblivious to Quirion’s sarcasm. “He says ‘hi’, by the way.”

“I can imagine,” Quirion grumbled. “He can say that all he wants, as long as he stays away from my books. The heathen.”

It took him some effort to contain the fondness in his tone and to suppress the smile tugging at his lips. No need to encourage Dre in the worship of his mate.

“You love him, and we all know it.”

Apparently, that was futile anyway. Quirion sighed from the very depths of his soul. “Why are you here?”

“If I said it was to see how you’re doing, would you believe me?” Dre grinned, showing his fangs.

“We both know the answer to that. Don’t insult my intelligence by pretending otherwise and don’t waste my precious time with your games.”

“Geez, you’re a real ray of sunshine.” Dre threw himself on the chaise at the left wall of Quirion’s study, stretching his long legs. “I need your help.”

“I assumed as much.”

Dre mumbled something along the lines of ‘arrogant asshole’ but not loud enough for Quirion to clearly understand, which told him that whatever his brother wanted from him was more important than his nagging. Interesting.

“Are you going to tell me or am I supposed to guess?”

“Ass.” This time Dre didn’t hold back. “Anyway, what do you think about taking on an assistant for your library? I’m sure you could use the help.”

Quirion understood the words his moronic brother had just uttered, he just couldn’t make sense of them. No matter in which succession he brought them, they remained ridiculous. One look at Dre’s hopeful expression told him his brother wanted to hear an affirmative. “No.”

Dre’s face fell, but only for a moment.

“Yes, you do need somebody. Sammy thinks so as well.”

Quirion snorted. “Sammy also thinks that organizing books by field first and author second is an appropriate and meaningful way to store them. His opinion cannot be trusted.”

Dre made a face which was pretty impressive, what with the rows of needle-sharp teeth and the dramatic eyeroll. “If he wants to do it that way, then it is right.”

Quirion knew better than to argue with a lovesick fool. In time Dre would learn to see his mate’s many flaws and accept them as inevitable in somebody who was born human. It might take a few hundred years though. Perhaps longer.

To speed things along and get blissful silence back—because Dre would neither leave nor shut up before he got what he’d come for—Quirion asked, “Who would I need as an assistant?”

“I’m so glad you asked.” Dre was beaming as if Quirion had offered anything, and voluntarily at that. “You remember Milo? The young man working for Sammy?”

“The one who tried sacrificing Sammy to you?”

“Yep. That one.”

“Why would I want him as my assistant?” Quirion was still puzzled why Sammy had taken the boy under his wing. It was just further proof that Dre’s mate was short a few books on the shelf.

“Because he needs money, but he can’t accept it as a gift, and when he works for you, it’s definitely hard-earned.”

That was insulting. Quirion looked down his nose on Dre. “I have you know it would be a great honor for him, from which he’d profit greatly.”

“My words exactly,” Dre murmured. “So it’s a deal? I’ll bring him here tomorrow, so you can hash out a schedule.”

Quirion furrowed his brow. He wasn’t sure how they had gotten from this being a preposterous and ridiculous idea to Milo coming over.

“Great. You’re a lifesaver, big brother. See you tomorrow.” Dre got up and had both opened and vanished through a portal before Quirion could even start formulating a proper response to this utter nonsense. Well, steamrolling had never worked on him and if Dre thought he could start with it now, he was sorely mistaken.

* * * *

“Well, I guess having an assistant wouldn’t be such a bad idea,” Quirion heard himself say. His common sense was screaming at him to shut his stupid mouth, while his heart had taken over control to turn the hopeful smile on Sammy’s face into one of pure happiness. There was no way Quirion would dash the spark in Sammy’s eyes and not just because he knew their father, Alerion, King of all Demons, would then come barreling in. No. It didn’t matter that Sammy’s views on the correct listing of books were warped at best and technically an abomination. All that mattered was the pleading look in those heterochromatic eyes. Quirion should have known his devious younger brother would bring in the heavy artillery. Sly bastard.

And the boy, Milo—although boy was probably wrong, according to Dre he would reach the age of eighteen in a few weeks and therefore be considered an adult in human society’s eyes—clearly was an apprentice of Sammy when it came to pleading looks. Quirion knew when a battle was lost, though he refused to go down without one last jibe. “Perhaps I can save him from your bad influence, Sammy. I’m sure you’ve been trying to corrupt his poor, innocent soul. But fear not, Milo! I shall teach you the proper way of organizing books.”

“Oooh, Quirion, you are the best!” Sammy hugged him, ignoring the scathing comment. Quirion had to concentrate to keep his expression grumpy, when his brother’s mate subjected him to the full force of his cuteness.

Judging from the knowing glint in Dre’s eyes, his endeavors were in vain. Quirion shot his brother a scalding look over Sammy’s head, which prompted Dre to mime zipping his lips.

“Thank you,” Milo said, blinding Quirion with a smile that rivaled Sammy’s. Quirion was so dazed, it took him some time to come up with an answer. Dre, being the predator that he was, injected himself smoothly into Quirion’s and Milo’s delicate first interaction.

“Perfect. Now let’s talk wages.” He rubbed his hands with a positively gleeful expression. “Milo has quite the way to work, so he’s definitely entitled to mileage as well as hazard pay, of course, what with the gigantic toad in your moat. Hey, that kinda rhymes. Toad—moat!” Dre grinned happily.

“No, it doesn’t.” Quirion furrowed his brows. Clearly his brother didn’t have the slightest clue about word building, rhymes and patterns. The barbarian probably wouldn’t recognize a sonnet when it hit him in the face. Though his brother’s poor literary knowledge wasn’t the point here. “Hazard pay? The toad is perfectly peaceful, as long as you treat her with respect…”

“Her? How do you know it’s a she?” Sammy leaned back from their hug, his fascinating two-colored eyes narrowed. “On Earth, the easiest way to determine a toad’s gender is their size—females are way bigger than males, but you need a male for comparison…” Sammy tapped his right forefinger against his lower lip, a habit of his when he was deep in thought. “Have you seen any male toads around here? If not, we have to lift her up. If she starts chirping or if the underside of her mouth is darker than her belly, then she’s actually a he.” Sammy frowned. “Though I guess she’s too big for lifting her up. And she probably wouldn’t appreciate it.”

Two observations that were very true. As well as so far from the topic as they could probably get.

“I think the toad’s gender is irrelevant to what we were discussing.” Quirion let go of Sammy to stare at Dre. “I don’t see how mileage and hazard pay are an issue. Though I could offer health insurance.”

Dre glared at him, making strange faces. “Mileage, because this is a different universe and hazard pay because of the toad.”

Quirion opened his mouth to contradict these ridiculous statements. After all, Milo would travel by demon, which was a lot faster and safer than any transportation Earth had to offer normal human beings. A particularly violent grimace made him rethink his answer, though. “Yes, of course, hazard pay, health insurance, mileage, let’s not forget holiday pay, because this universe doesn’t have weeks or months or hours.”

The happy glint in Dre’s eyes told him that his brother was completely immune to sarcasm, and that he was on the right path. Inwardly sighing about this charade, Quirion continued. “Which would amount to an hourly wage of thir—”

Dre’s brows furrowed.

“Four—”

Now his brother was flashing fang.

“Fifty dollars. Is that acceptable, Milo?”

The boy stared at him with wide eyes. He looked as steamrolled as Quirion felt. “That’s a lot of money—” Milo started.

Quirion nodded. “You are right, I think.”

Behind Milo’s back, Dre was moving his hand in a slitting motion over his throat. Sammy had dialed the pleading in his eyes up by a thousand, causing Quirion again to change what he had been about to say. “Come to think of it, fifty dollars seems not enough considering the high standards you’ll have to live up to. Let’s say sixty?”

Now Milo looked as if he’d been hit by a rockslide. A not-so-subtle nudge from Sammy’s elbow had the boy nodding.

“Yes. Yes, thank you, Quirion.” Milo lowered his gaze, shuffling his feet. “Uhm, when do you want me to start?”

This time Quirion took the direct route instead of engaging in the pantomime game from before. He stared at Dre, who mouthed, “Tomorrow”.

Inwardly, Quirion sighed. He had one day to come up with a work plan for Milo that wouldn’t disrupt his own routines. Great. He smiled at his new assistant. “Would tomorrow be acceptable, Milo? I could really use the help.”

Milo cleared his throat. “Yes, totally. I can come right after school.” He glanced at Dre. “That is, if you have time to bring me?”

Dre smiled broadly. “Of course I have time.”

To Quirion’s ears, the words sounded like the bells of doom.

* * * *

The even more recent past

Quirion stepped through the rip in space and time into Sammy’s bookstore, where he was welcomed by the familiar scent of loads of books and an unfamiliar faint whimpering that had his demon coming out the second he realized it was Milo crying. Quirion hated to admit it—but admit it he did, because he was the son of the demon king and not a sniveling coward who couldn’t face reality—but Milo had grown on him. Very much so. In the four months since Milo had started working for him, Quirion’s life had changed from being that of a hermit who treasured his solitude to someone who actually looked forward to company. Well, not any company. He could still do without his brothers. No. He looked forward to seeing Milo. And now Milo was crying. And that simply wouldn’t do.

Quirion started stalking in the direction of the crying, where he could also hear muted voices discussing who to call. If Quirion wasn’t completely mistaken—which he never was, thank you very much—those were the voices of Declan and Troy, his father’s mates. How his father had managed to end up with two gorgeous uber alphas was anyone’s guess, but the old demon was happy and too occupied with fucking to bother Quirion about the incident in that library in Egypt. If he’d even heard about it yet. Alerion was very busy shooting videos for Barion’s and Jon’s video game launch or something along those lines. The only reason Quirion was even mildly interested in the whole endeavor was because they were using the Demon Wars as inspiration for the game and Quirion had written an extensive treatise about this part of demonic history. So far what he had seen and what Milo had told him—the boy was totally hyped when it came to the videos—was, in parts, accurate. Of course, Barion and Jon had switched out places and dates, as well as participants, to keep things obstruse. Nobody needed anybody taking the Demon Wars as an inspiration for actual war. As for that library, Quirion had tried to keep everything low profile, but when he’d heard about the government’s plans to destroy some of the oldest writings they had because they didn’t conform with their current system of beliefs, he had had to act. And it wasn’t his fault that he’d lost his patience when those idiots had tried to stop him from taking the scrolls. Anybody would have slipped into their demonic form. Plus, it had tickled some primal instinct to see them running through the cellar system like panicked rabbits trying to escape the hungry snake. Then he had had to destroy the video evidence, and maybe, just maybe, he’d gone a little overboard and that library would never be the same. It would be brand new, should they decide to re-build, for one thing. But the scrolls and important books were safe in his own library, which was all that mattered.

Another loud hiccuping sound brought Quirion back to the problem at hand. Milo was crying, his demon wanted to reduce anybody responsible for the boy’s tears to a red smear on the ground—or the walls, he wasn’t particular—and he knew his father’s mates were present. Stomping down the narrow hall to the back of Sammy’s shop was easier once he’d tucked his wings in and, when he reached the small room where Sammy stored everything he couldn’t or wouldn’t sell out front, the constant sniffling had his demon ready to go on a rampage.

The door turned out to be his greatest adversary because it was simply not wide enough to let his bulk through. For a moment all he could do was watch as the two uber alphas tried to soothe Milo one moment and turned around with glittering eyes promising death and destruction the next. His demon wasn’t sure if he should be pleased about their readiness to defend Milo—they wouldn’t have much of a chance against him, but anybody else trying to harm the boy would be toast—or annoyed because they were there to defend Milo.

That’s my job.

Wait a moment. Where did that come from?

Quirion stared at the two werewolves and the boy who had yet to realize that another apex predator had just entered the room. Or would enter, as soon as he figured out how to do it without blasting the frame with his shoulders.

“Why isch Milo crying?” The words, a bit distorted because of his fangs, sprang from his lips and finally alerted his assistant to Quirion’s presence.

“Quirion?” Milo lifted his head. To say he cried beautifully would have been a stretch. His cheeks were mottled with red spots, there was a hint of snot under his nose, and his eyes were red-rimmed, which made him look as if he were seriously ill. In his long life, Quirion had always done his best to avoid humans precisely for this reason—they were messy and wet and sticky and about as appealing as the rat dimension. Which still had the bonus of no humans being there. But when it came to Milo, Quirion had by now realized that he didn’t mind what would have driven him crazy with anybody else. He attributed it to Milo having gone through the Sammy school of dealing with paranormals—bringing them to heel with a cuteness that should be outlawed.

“I’m here, Milo.” Quirion retracted his teeth and shot Declan and Troy a dark look. The two alphas didn’t even flinch.

“You good here, or should we call Sammy?” one of them, Quirion thought it was Troy, asked.

“We’re fine, thank you.” He stared at the two werewolves. The two werewolves stared back, their eyebrows raised. “Why aren’t you leaving? I said we’re fine.” Until now, Quirion hadn’t been under the impression that his two stepfathers— shudder —were somehow slow but he could always reassess.

“Dude, we can’t leave. You’re blocking the way.” This had to be Declan. He was trying very hard not to grin.

Quirion huffed. “I knew that.” He turned his body sideways to allow the two alphas to pass. Once they had squeezed past him through the door, grinning like mad men, he retracted his wings and shrunk his body a bit before he stepped inside the room.

“If you need us, call Sammy! Bye, Milo!” With that, Declan and Troy stomped through the hall back into the shop then outside to the street. Once the chimes made it known they were gone, Quirion turned his full attention on Milo. His young assistant stared at the tabletop.

“Now, what seems to be the matter, Milo?” Quirion adopted the softer tone he had developed just for Milo. It was even gentler than the one he used for Sammy, because he had quickly found out how willingly Milo reacted to it. This time was no different.

“I’m sorry, Quirion. It’s just too much. Everything’s too much.”

“Nah, I doubt that. Let’s assess.”

He briefly thought about planting his ass on the table but decided against it after a quick peek at the rickety legs. It was a miracle that thing was still standing and Quirion didn’t want to be the one to deal the coup de grace . So he hunkered down in front of the table until he was at eye-height with Milo. His knees weren’t too happy about their half-bent state, which he ignored.

Milo inhaled deeply and his gaze became focused. He lifted the index finger of his right hand.

“Firstly, my mom’s surgery will be soon. She’s taking it all pretty well, which is probably the reason I’m such a wreck.”

Quirion nodded in encouragement. He was proud to have fostered such a pragmatic streak in Milo, which allowed him to maybe not always keep a cool head but to regain it quickly.

“Secondly, because of all the worrying, I can’t seem to concentrate on my studies. The tests for MIT are in a few weeks and I’m behind.” His shoulders sagged.

Quirion extended his hands and took Milo’s in his. “Firstly, there isn’t much you can do about your feelings regarding the surgery. This is something that defies logic, a matter of feelings.” He gave a dramatic shudder which made Milo giggle. “But the surgery will soon be done and afterwards, you can concentrate on your studies. Don’t worry about losing a week or two, because you’ve got the best teacher there is to help you.” He winked and pointed at himself, shortly losing his contact with Milo’s hands.

“You’re helping me?” Milo sounded so adorably surprised, Quirion wanted to hug him.

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I? You’re my assistant and it’s a matter of pride for me to see you shine no matter what you do.”

“Even if I sort books by field first?” The glint in Milo’s eyes told Quirion that the young man was already feeling better.

“I just pretend I didn’t hear that. By field.” Quirion made a face, even showing a hint of fang. This was no joking matter. “How much longer do you have to mind the shop?”

Milo looked at his wristwatch. “Sammy should be back in about twenty minutes.”

“Excellent. I’ll keep you company till he’s back and then you can come with me. We take a look at your study schedule and see where we can tweak things.” He looked directly into Milo’s eyes, getting lost for a moment in the pale blue depths. “You will succeed, Milo. That I can guarantee.”

The smile he got in return warmed his heart. It was a strange sensation he didn’t want to examine too closely. He was here to help Milo, not to make his life even more complicated than it already was. Still, having the young man look at him with such pure adoration did things to his ego. He puffed up. “Perhaps you can make me one of those lattes the werewolves always rave about.”

“Gladly. Though mine aren’t as good as Sammy’s.” Milo winked and leaned closer. His earlier breakdown seemed to be forgotten. “I think he is in league with the coffeemaker. Or there’s a deity nobody else knows about who has blessed him to make the perfect beverages.”

“You know what, with Sammy, everything is possible.” Quirion helped Milo up and followed him to the front of the shop.

The latte Milo made was, of course, the best.