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Rasmus scrubbed his face again. “It hurts to talk about this.”

Conn spoke near my ear. “That’s a definite sign of compulsion. Only the strongest mind can fight it off.”

I nodded and pressed my lips together. “Would ya rather I knocked ya out, Rasmus? And I don’t mean like punch ya in the face. I mean, I would spell ya asleep. If ya dealt with a royal demoness and walked away, ya’ve suffered enough.”

“It’s more than that,” he mumbled, rubbing his forehead. “The she-demon who did this is carrying my child now. The last time I saw her she looked almost ready to deliver. She did something when I was captured to make me go along with her seduction. She came to visit me months later and showed me her pregnant state.”

The demon hunter had given me plenty of reasons to detest him, but my heart bled for what Rasmus incorrectly believed. It was a burden to carry misinformation in yer head and a torment to learn the truth after being wrong. Goddess knew, I was still learning that lesson with Jack’s ongoing betrayal. He was still surprising me with his conniving ways.

I talked through the bars of his cage. “That can’t be true, Rasmus. Humans and demons aren’t biologically compatible.”

“Actually,” Conn said, raising his finger. “Before The Dagdaconquereddemon kind, it was sometimes possible, but only with the royals. The offspring of such pairings were born either as evil humans or lame demons. They deemed the mix bad for both our species, so the gods put a magickal restriction on such pairings. From then on, when demons and humans came into contact, the demons only enslaved the humans for their entertainment value. Humans lack the ability to eradicate a demon completely. Their attempts, such as those used by demon hunters, only anger them. But demons still find humans hilarious.”

Rasmus made a sound I have no words to describe. It was obvious how distressed he was by the news. “Are you saying all the demons ever killed over the years are still alive?”

Conn lifted his hands in the air. “Alive is not a term those from the Underdark use. We say the person we know will begone for a while. Regeneration varies with how they were dispatched. Missing parts grow back. Severed heads and limbs find each other again. A burnt demon’s ashes incubate in total darkness until they replace the original form. The process takes time, whether a few hours or a few centuries. This truth is why the gods intervened between the two species.”

Rasmus walked to the cot Conn had thoughtfully provided him with and sank onto it. He put his face in his hands and shook it back and forth.

I sighed at his misery while Conn laughed. “It’s not funny,” I said.

Beside me, Conn kept laughing. “No, it’s hilarious. The man honestly thought he was killing demons. Do none of the hunters read? It’s all in the ancient texts.”

Ignoring the laughter of my own demon burden to carry, I walked to the cage. “I tried to tell Jack this when he became a demon hunter. Why do ya think I never hated him for doing that job? I knew he wasn’t doing what he thought he was, but ya can’t educate a man who refuses to listen to ya.”

Rasmus grunted. “You could have forced Jack to listen. You had the power.”

I let go of the bars. “Forcing my power on people is a new habit I’ve gained since my divorce. It was the only way I could get the two of ya to leave me alone.”

Rasmus raised his head. “They did the same thing to Jack that they did to me. It was the price he paid to get them to free me.”

I crossed my arms. “That’s not true, either.”

“I watched it happen,” he said.

I grunted. “No, ya watched a show, Rasmus. No demoness would risk touching my husband while our energy connection existed. They would have waited until after our divorce. Jack married a witch born from the lineage of Irish gods. Jack might not have respected what that meant, but ya can trust someone from the Underdark would honor it. My family’s reputation is well known there.”

“How do you know they would honor anything?”

I narrowed my eyes and leaned forward, so he’d know I was serious. “Because I’m the only creature walking this Earth with the power to make sure they don’t regenerate forthousands of years. When they return after that length of time, they don’t remember who they once were. It’s the closest thing to actual death that can happen to a demon. And yes, they know I’ve exercised that power before.”

“But why would Jack be working with them?”

I looked at the wall to keep from grinding my teeth. I swear with Goddess Danu as my witness, if I found a compulsion on Rasmus to defend Jack, I would neuter my ex-husband.

“Ya know, I’ve been asking myself many strange questions after seeing Jack again. The first thing I want to know is where he got all his money. He’s driving a car worth five years of his current salary as a demon hunter, even at Marshal level. Did he get money for locking me up? If so, who did he sell my extended absence to?”

“I can’t listen to any of this. You’re talking nonsense. Jack is not working with demons.”

Rasmus and his blind spot made me willing to bet he’d received two compulsions. But I needed to know for sure.

“Do ya think a royal demoness—princess or queen—is going to let the alleged father of her child simply waltz out of her life forever? If birthing a demon-hybrid was her goal, then she’s planning something big. Do ya think she’s going to let Conn come in and get ya like he did? No, she’d be watching ya night and day, Rasmus. If she truly is carrying yer child, she’s going to want more out of it than a one-time deposit of yer genetic material. She’s going to need yer presence to provide proof of parentage.”

Rasmus paced and rubbed his face. Finally, he came to the right decision. It gave me a little hope.

“Do what you have to do to me, then. I don’t know what to think anymore.”

Conn left the wall and came to stand beside me. He stared at Rasmus through the bars. “I need to be in my natural form to do this. Do you promise not to scream again? For your human ego’s sake, I will choose a stature shorter than your own six-feet-three height to appear less threatening.”