Demon’s Test (Demon Mates #4)

Chapter Fourteen

The invitation for the soiree with SBW came a few days after Milo had passed their test and had recuperated from the mating party Sammy had organized for them. It had been a wonderful, intimate thing with close family and the book club, in a gorgeous mansion in France which belonged to Emilia, the vampire. The food had been excellent, the weather perfect, and the company simply great. He and Quirion had gotten back to the library sometime around four in the morning, drunk on happiness and the perfect selection of wines Emilia had taken out of the gigantic wine cellar underneath her lovely little holiday retreat, as she called it.

The letter from SBW was delivered to his lab at MIT, probably because it was now all nailed down. The dean certainly had gotten a highly official letter stating that Milo Abber was on the official funding list of the SBW, which had let to a lot of congratulations and bragging from MIT on their website, in the press, and on social media because apparently Milo was their first scientist to receive this honor. Of course, no apologies were given for cutting him off from their own funding in the first place. Also, nobody talked about his research being a dead end anymore. It was funny how even the minds of highly intelligent people could be swayed like flags in the wind when enough money was involved.

Milo wasn’t bitter, no, in the end, everything had worked out perfectly for him. He simply allowed himself some accurate and maybe, perhaps, seen from a specific angle, slightly sarcastic observations of the scientific microcosmos which wasn’t that different from any other microcosmos in human society, even though scientists always claimed the contrary. Money and prestige dictated life, something Milo had learned early on in school, where he’d been bullied because he had neither. It was only thanks to Sammy and Quirion that Milo had found a way through this jungle.

He read the invitation, written in gorgeous calligraphy with more loops to every letter than Milo had ever thought possible, on thick, expensive paper and of course a wax seal he’d had to break before opening. The soiree would be held in a private mansion on Martha’s Vineyard close to Edgartown, and Milo was asked to report if he would be bringing a plus one. He grinned. Quirion would love that. He was just about to put the letter down when the door to his lab was ripped open and smashed against the wall with so much force it made the glass window rattle. Milo looked up to see Devon Merrybone standing in the doorframe, his broad chest heaving, his eyes glinting in anger.

“Abber!” He stalked into the lab, a mix of frustration and rage twisting his features.

For a moment Milo felt a stab of fear. Even though he had never harmed him physically, the way Devon was approaching him reminded him of the bullies in his past. Then he lifted his chin and met Devon’s gaze head-on. He was now the mate of a demon. There was nothing for him to fear.

“Merrybone. How can I help you?” To his own surprise, Milo realized the calmness in his voice was real.

“How can you help me? Help me? You weren’t supposed to get that funding! How did you do it?”

Devon’s voice had a frantic quality, almost hysterical. For the first time, Milo really looked at his nemesis. He went past the superficial, past the muscular build and the alpha posturing, past the perpetual anger and blustering, past the scorn and disgust Devon seemed to have for him. At the core he found a little boy who’d never had to grow up, never had to fight for a single thing in his life, never had to take responsibility for his actions. He recognized himself in that boy, from the time when he was desperate enough to try to sacrifice Sammy just to get what he wanted most back then—the acceptance of his peers. He also realized he was no longer that boy. He had grown up, had fought for all the good things in his life, had accepted help when he needed it but had also kept his pride intact, and he had taken responsibility for his actions. It was time he finally did what Sammy had told him all along. Milo forgave himself.

It was like a huge rock tumbling down from his shoulders, a weight he hadn’t even realized he was carrying all this time.

He was free.

“I worked for it. Hard, I may add. I deserve that funding because my research is absolutely worth it and because I spent my entire life bettering myself and I’m determined to keep doing it. This funding will help me broach new spheres and maybe find ways to make life better for humankind. And no, you don’t get a say in it because you have no part in my life or my work. Be happy about your own funding and use it the way it is intended.”

Devon looked very much like one of the reef fish he was supposed to be studying, if said fish had been thrown on land. His mouth opened and closed several times, his eyes almost popping out of their sockets while his arms flailed wildly. “How dare you… You can’t… You have no idea… You…”

Milo waited patiently for Devon to find either his words or composure. It didn’t happen and after a few more moments of spluttering, Devon made a strangled sound in the back of his throat, turned on his heel and left the lab the same way he had entered, only this time the door smashed back into the frame. The glass rattled and a fine crack appeared in one corner before it all settled again. Milo’s ears were still ringing from all the noise when he felt large arms snaking around his torso. He leaned back into his mate’s broad chest with a happy sigh.

“Hi.”

“Hi, Milo. Everything okay?”

“Yes. I just had a visit from Devon, which brought an epiphany.”

“I have trouble believing how Devon and the word ‘epiphany’ fit in one sentence.”

“Mmm, I can see your point, but I assure you, it’s possible. He came stomping in, screaming about how I shouldn’t have gotten the funding from SBW and all of a sudden, I was able to see to his core. The boy there—that was me, emphasis on was. I realized how far I’ve come, how much I’ve grown—and that being young and scared is an excuse when you’re indeed young and scared, but no longer when you’re old enough to know different.” He turned his head to snuggle his cheek against Quirion’s chest. Well, more against the end of his breastbone, because his demon had come in his full size. It didn’t matter. The close contact was what counted.

“I’m happy you’re finally seeing what we’ve all been telling you for so long.”

“Yeah, yeah, rub it in.” He grinned.

Quirion grabbed his shoulders and held him away from his body to look into his eyes. “I’m not rubbing it in. I’m well aware how personal growth and insights have their own pace. I’ve read enough psychological books and essays to know this is something that can’t be forced. I’m genuinely happy you made the step and are now free of the shackles of your past.”

“You really are the best. I don’t know how I deserve you.” Milo’s heart overflowed with love for his grumpy, scholarly demon.

“Well, the same way I deserve you and before you ask, I don’t know either.” Quirion winked before he lowered his head to kiss Milo.

“Then let’s be clueless together,” Milo panted after the kiss ended. “Even if being clueless goes against our very nature. I also got the invitation for the soiree today. They’re asking me if I’m bringing a plus one.”

Quirion grinned, showing all his teeth. “I guess we have to go tux shopping for you.”

“Just for me?”

“Just for you. I know exactly what I’m going to wear.” The evil gleam in Quirion’s eyes made Milo wonder if the SBW could take away his funding before they had paid a single cent. “Oh, and we need to go home. I think Mildred’s babies are hatching.”

The words jolted Milo out of his worries like a bucket of cold water over his head. “Why didn’t you lead with that?”

“Because, strange as it sounds, there were more important things to talk about first.”

“The babies are coming, Qui. I think that takes priority.”

“We can discuss our differing list of what’s important later. Now we have to go.”

“So, all of a sudden we’re in a hurry.” Milo winked.

“Yes. Don’t you want to see all those little tadpoles?”

“I want.”

“Then let’s go.”

Quirion sliced time and space.

* * * *

“There’s so many of them.” Milo sounded absolutely awed.

Quirion was awed as well, and a tiny bit worried. There were indeed very many tadpoles, so many that the water in the moat seemed to solidify. And they had no idea how many more were to come. Mildred had dug the moat deep enough for her to completely vanish, which was not a promising sign. Quirion tried to recall if she had, at any point during the mating with that no-good male toad who’d come out of nowhere, dove under water to lay part of her eggs farther down, but all he could remember was the kiss that had brought him his mate. Toads on Earth laid their eggs in shallow water so perhaps there was hope—

“I think there are too many, Qui.” The worry in Milo’s voice was a perfect mirror to his own feelings.

Mildred seemed to have come to the same conclusion because she awkwardly swam and hopped around the teeming mass of her offspring to where the moat was closest to the ocean and started digging again. They watched her for a few moments.

“She’s never going to make it in time.” Milo was choked up. There were now so many tadpoles, some of them were already pressed against the steep walls of the moat, their bodies only partly immersed in water. “We need to help her.”

“And we need help to do it. Get Sammy. I’ll try to come up with a viable plan.” Quirion pressed a kiss to Milo’s forehead. His gorgeous mate nodded. Quirion opened a rift through which Milo ran at full speed.

Quirion still wasn’t entirely sure how to proceed when, only a few minutes later, Dre, Sammy and Jon came back with Milo. His brother clapped him on the back.

“Hi, Quirion. Barion is getting the others. We thought it would be better to come immediately.”

Quirion nodded. “Good thinking, brother.” He gestured to the moat and the tadpoles. Some of them were now out of the water, writhing like crazy, clearly fighting for their lives.

“Oh no, we must help them!” Sammy stared in horror at the scene. “Is there a way to get more water in there?”

Quirion had already thought about it and wasn’t sure if this was the right idea. “The ocean is right there. We can use hoses to pump water into the moat, but I don’t know if that’s the best thing to do. We don’t know if all of the eggs have hatched, and the ocean water is different from the water in the moat. I know, because I have made tests. It’s a bit like on Earth with saltwater and freshwater, just with different components.”

“Oooh, really? You have to tell me everything about it!” For a moment, Sammy got that gleam in his eyes before he focused back on the problem at hand. “After we’ve saved all those poor babies. I think we need to risk the ocean water, unless you have another huge source of moat water somewhere? And Mildred is digging toward the ocean. Shouldn’t she know what’s best for her babies? Also, can we help her?”

Quirion sighed. “She probably knows what’s best for the babies that have already hatched. I’m not so sure about the eggs. There has to be a reason why she laid them here and not on the shores of the ocean. But I guess we have to risk it. Dre, can you help me with the hoses? I know just the place where to get them. Then we need magic, and start digging.”

“Do not fear, help has arrived!” The booming voice could only belong to one person.

“We don’t know yet if we can be of help, Uncle.” Alerion sounded amused.

“Of course we can help! We’re demons and witch queens and werewolves and vampires and a banshee! Help has arrived!” Corrywin obviously had no intention of letting Alerion dampen his mood. “Hello, Quirion. What seems to be the problem?”

“They’re dying and we need to help them! Dad, please, we can’t let them die! Mildred is counting on us!” Sammy threw himself at Alerion, who caught him and immediately started soothing him.

“It’s fine, Sammy. As my uncle has pointed out, we’re all here now.”

And they were. Quirion couldn’t remember ever having so many people on his peaceful island. It was a strange sensation, one he would contemplate later, when lives were no longer on the line. “Dre, we need to get those hoses. Milo, explain the situation.”

With that, he ripped time and space and dragged his brother with him. The hoses he was seeking were actually plants from one of the more interesting—aka dangerous—dimensions with huge, hollowed out vines and a tendency to suck in everything through the openings at the end.

“I think it would be best to make one rift directly at the shore to put as many of the ends into the water. Then another above the moat to get the water there.”

“Good idea, brother.” Dre batted one of the vines aside when it tried to suck onto his left thigh. Where do you want to go?”

“The moat.”

“Fine, I’ll take the ocean then.” Dre grabbed four of the thrashing vines—they had realized prey was nearby and were getting agitated—made a rift and dunked the openings into the ocean of Quirion’s dimension. It was a bit of a gamble, mixing the inhabitants and resources of different dimensions, but it was all they had at the moment. Quirion was counting on the viciousness and adaptive powers of the vines, which were the dominant species in this dimension, and resembled dandelions in their sturdiness. They started sucking the ocean water without a hitch. Dre came back to grab more of them. The good thing about the Sucker-Vines—Quirion had never gone to the trouble of finding a better name for them—was, that once they started sucking, they didn’t stop until they were either full or the source drained. And they wouldn’t get full, because Quirion found the opposite ends, sliced them open with his claws, shoved them through another rift, and rained the ocean water down on the moat. And not a second too late. Some of the tadpoles were only moving feebly. As soon as the water hit them though, they were almost instantly revived.

Farther down the moat, Quirion watched Mildred digging with stoic determination. Quirion leaned through the rift to see ahead of her, where the rest of the family plus the members of the book club were digging from the ocean toward the moat. Grann, Mavis and Maribel were leading the attack, so to speak, directing five giant shovels to move the loam and five pickaxes to carve the stone. Alerion, Barion and Corrywin were channeling their considerable magic into the witches, while Declan, Troy, Amber and Emilia were moving boulders out of the way to grant a straight line to where Mildred was digging. Milo, Jon and Sammy were standing at the sides of the moat, pushing tadpoles back into the middle before they got swept over the rim and onto dry land. Considering most of these babies were almost as big as the three mates, they had their work cut out for them. Quirion ducked back into the vine dimension to grab the next bundle. They could do this. No lives would be lost on his watch.

As more and more water poured into the moat, the situation relaxed a tiny bit. Mildred had now almost reached where the witches were digging. Emilia was high in the air, overseeing the last few feet to the meeting point. Holding the writhing vines in place to keep all the tadpoles nice and moist, Quirion watched the ancient vampire give her orders.

“Almost there. A little more to the left, Mildred had to veer off course, now, forward, lose the pickaxes, we’re too close, very good, Mildred is coming from above so perhaps you can breach from the bottom, yes, yes, I can see water. Careful, the barrier is crumbling, get back, we did it! We did it!”

A cheer rose from everybody when Mildred broke the last of the loam down and water from the moat started flowing around her and down toward the ocean. The moat was now draining, luckily taking the tadpoles with it, but they weren’t in the clear yet.

“Dre, more vines!”

“On it.”

Quirion watched which vines his brother grabbed and directed their opposing ends toward the moat, where the tadpoles were no longer being lifted over the rim but were facing rapidly thickening mud while the water flowed toward the ocean. Mildred had left the moat to make more room for her offspring to get flushed out. Quirion directed the vines to a spot behind the tadpoles, or so he hoped—because of all the mud, it was getting difficult to see a damn thing. His father appeared next to him with another bundle of vines.

“Barion is helping Dre. We need more water.”

They spent the next minutes literally hosing out the moat until they were sure all the tadpoles were gone. Mildred was sitting next to the breach, observing the proceedings with lazily blinking eyes. It was hard to see emotion on a toad’s face, but Quirion wanted to tell himself she was grateful. The low croak she made when the last tadpole vanished in the ocean definitely sounded like appreciation.

“Okay, what do you want to do now, son? Do we leave it like this? Then the moat is gone.” Alerion elbowed him. “And we can’t leave the rifts open for much longer. The fabric between is already suffering.”

Quirion leaned through the rift. “Grann, Mavis, Maribel? Can you close the moat off?”

The three witches gave a thumbs-up. Alerion made another rift to land next to them, then he and Corrywin poured magic into them again while they used the shovels to close the moat. After that it was a waiting game until the moat was filled again. Mildred hopped in, ducking under until only her eyes peeked over the water. Quirion and Dre shoved the vines back into their own dimension, where they immediately started to attack them, the ends Quirion had ripped open already healing, for which he was grateful. He’d known they were sturdy and killing a few of them wouldn’t have had an impact on the dimension, but he was glad they didn’t suffer.

“Damn suckers. Let’s get out of here.” Dre kicked another vine that had tried to sneak up on him. “Barion was blabbering the whole time how this would make a great new level for the next installment of Demon Wars . To be honest, I don’t see the appeal.”

“That’s because you’re a realist, not a gamer. You’re right, let’s leave.”

They stepped back into Quirion’s dimension where Dre was immediately assaulted by Sammy, and Quirion found his arms full of Milo. His mate was muddy all over and reeked of stale water.

“We did it! We saved all of Mildred’s babies!” Milo was so happy.

“Yes! Dre, my beloved mate, you were soooo brave, battling those vines! You are my hero!”

Dre puffed up like an idiot rooster in front of his hens. Then Sammy turned in his arms, looking at the others. “You all were the best! I’m so, so happy. Grann, Mavis, Maribel, I’m sure you’re the greatest witches to ever walk the Earth. Giant shovels and pickaxes? You’re so smart. Dad, Barion, Uncle Corrywin, lending your power was so badass. Declan, Troy, Emilia, Amber, how you handled those boulders. I knew you were strong, but that was epic! Milo, Jon, you were so brave, shoving the tadpoles back in even though the rim was so slippery. I’m so happy and proud to know all of you.” Sammy was crying now, at the same time smiling so broadly it seemed as if he had an inner sun shining on them all.

Quirion looked around at his family and…friends, he guessed. Yeah, it seemed as if he’d gotten friends without noticing it. They were the most powerful their respective species had to offer, and here they stood, gathered around a former human, after they had taken part in a rescue mission for a bunch of tadpoles, smiling and puffing up and assuring Sammy how much they loved him as well. In that moment, Quirion had an inkling that fate might be more than just the fickle conglomeration of chances he had always thought it to be. Right here on his island stood peace between all species, and Quirion knew with sudden clarity that hope was more than just wishful thinking. It was real.

“Yeah, what Sammy said.” He cleared his throat. “Thank you for coming to the rescue. Milo and I would have never been able to do this alone.”

“Always, son, always.” Alerion slapped him on the back.

“So, what are you going to do to prepare for the next bunch of tadpoles?” Amber cut through Quirion’s happiness like her scream cut through a hero’s hope to survive their adventure.

“What do you mean, the next?”

“I think what Amber wants to hint at is that if Mildred has reached the reproductive stage of her lifespan, this will be a regular occurrence.” The amusement in Emilia’s voice was completely uncalled for, Quirion thought.

“Regular?” Milo whimpered. “I reek of moat. I don’t want to do this regularly.”

“Shh, min Liechtbrunn , you won’t have to. Don’t forget, we’re smart men, we’ll figure something out.”

“If you say so, Qui.”

“I say so.” Quirion kissed Milo’s forehead. At the sudden awed silence, he lifted his head. “What?”

“It’s just…we’ve never seen you so, so…soft.” Declan winked. “It suits you well, son.”

Quirion shot him a dark look, because the werewolf knew perfectly well how much he hated it when he called him son. Although, after what Declan and Troy had just done, maybe ‘hate’ was too strong a word. Dislike. Yes, he disliked it. Or found it mildly annoying. It was inappropriate, because he was so much older than the two werewolves.

“Concerning your moat, you have to build some kind of dam you can open at will to let the tadpoles out, and you’ll probably need a pump to supply fresh water when they’re hatching. Those vines were a good idea, but I don’t think they are a long-term solution.” Corrywin spoke with the air of somebody who had a lifetime of experience on the subject, which he had not. “Of course, we’re here to help you.”

Quirion wasn’t sure if he should be glad or afraid. After all, Corrywin was the demon who had given humans the ability to prank call demons. For fun. And now he had a witch queen for a mate whose ideas of a good time were nearly as twisted as his.

“This is going to be the best moat dam thing ever built! I just know it!” With that, Sammy had sealed Quirion’s fate. Looking down into the sparkling eyes of Milo, Quirion couldn’t bring himself to regret it.