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I didn’t fall asleep until Omaera’s final cry of ecstasy echoed off my wall. She deserved the pleasure the bear gave her. I would never deny her that. I just wished that it was me giving her that pleasure.

Morning came with an obnoxious alarm blasting through the door, loud enough to wake the dead. Was there a tornado coming? A tsunami? Enemy aircraft carrying an atomic bomb? The only times I’d ever heard a noise like that was just before disaster struck.

So, of course, I sprang out of bed, naked as the day I was born, and swung open the front door, green flames in each hand, ready to defend my queen.

Drak, apparently, had the same idea—though he was dressed in black pants—and Zandren came out, hair a disaster, hard cock poking straight at us and murder in his eyes.

We stood there, ready to fight—and protect—only to blink like surprised idiots at Kenvin Jol standing in the courtyard, hand cranking an old-school war siren. “Get up, idiots. It’s training day.”

All three of us groaned.

I snuffed out my flames.

Zandren growled.

Drak … he looked the same as always, unimpressed and pale.

Omaera appeared in the doorway, wrapped up in a bedsheet. Her tight curly hair wilder than normal, and her eyes bright, even though they had dark smudges beneath them. The woman looked thoroughly fucked. Even Drak saw it, and a hint of color crept up his neck.

“Breakfast in five, training in twenty,” Kenvin hollered over the siren before letting go of the hand crank.

Omaera blinked, then knuckled sleep out of her eyes. “What time is it?”

“Training time,” Kenvin said. “You want to trap and defeat Lerris? You want to earn the trust and loyalty of the Realm? Then we need to get cracking.” He grunted, nodded curtly, then spun on his heel and headed off across the courtyard.

It felt like I’d just fallen asleep, only to be brutally slapped back into the land of the awake with a cold, wet washcloth.

I knew my fellow explorers were suffering in this heat, but I didn’t mind it. Sure, the sulfur smell of the water wasn’t great. Neither was the red hue to everything, nor the dryness. But all-in-all, I would easily take Hell over Antarctica. Penguins were cute, but they were idiots for choosing to live where they did.

Ducking back into my room, I tossed on some clothes after giving them a sniff, washed my face, and slapped on some deodorant. I tamed my dark-red hair as best I could, though it generally had a mind of its own since I had like forty cowlicks or some nonsense.

Omaera emerged from the bedroom at the same time I did, and I fell in beside her, wrapping my arm around her slender frame and pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Did the bear let you getanysleep, My Queen?”

Instantly, she flushed with color and glanced away from me.

I chuckled and tugged her closer. “I mean, if I got to share a bed with you, I’d probably keep you up all night too. However, we do need to have your brain functioning on all cylinders for training.”

She nodded and yawned. “Yeah, I know. I got a little sleep.”

We entered the kitchen where various foods were spread out on the island. I didn’t recognize a damned thing. This did not bode well.

“Since we’re here, are you planning to go see your parents?” she asked, picking up something thatlookedlike a scone or biscuit, giving it a sniff, then making a face and putting it back.

“I’m not sure,” I replied, dropping my voice just above a whisper. “I feel like Ishould. But at the same time, why? They’re terrible people and I doubt they’ve changed. It’ll also just put me on the radar for the Mage Council even more than I already am.”

“Mage Council?” she asked, just as Zandren and Drak walked into thekitchen as well.

I shook my head to get her to drop the subject. I wasn’t ready to discuss my parents with the bear or vampire. Though, honestly, they both had connections to their regencies, and both King Howar and King Ryden knew of my parents and their wrongdoings. Whether they’d passed that information on to Zandren and Drak was another question.

Zandren went to a cupboard and pulled out four glass bottles of water, handing us each one. I unscrewed the cap and took a long sip, taking stock of the space and how similar it was to a dated kitchen on Earth—besides the lack of a refrigerator.

Kenvin Jol really seemed to like the color blue. All the cabinets and tiles—floor, counter, and backsplash—were all complimenting shades of blue. Perhaps he missed the shade from Earth, since nearly everything in Hell was various shades of red.

“Eat up,” Kenvin said, strolling into the kitchen.

“What is all of this?” I asked, frowning at the grayish goo in a bowl. Was it oatmeal? Yogurt? Pureed brains? It was anybody’s guess.

He pointed to the goo. “That’s Hell Cricket porridge.”