Page 19 of Hellish Witch (Playing with Demons #3)

Chapter 18

“ S hhh.” Killian held up a hand, stopping along the grassy riverbank and cocking his pale horns aside.

I immediately swallowed the inane small talk I’d been making for the last hour as we’d trekked along the river. It hadn’t done a thing to ease the tense awareness between us since last night’s fiery dream and all the mind-blowing revelations that had come before it.

This morning, I’d blushed just looking in his direction, and that was before we’d bathed in the river and I’d reapplied salve to his wounds. Though, they’d mostly healed from the energy we’d shared in my dream.

He’d not said a peep about it, and I sure as hell-fires were hot wasn’t going to bring it up first. I still couldn’t process that for years he’d been beating up any exes who’d hurt me. Pretty much everyone in our kingdom had a rejection complex from being born an unwanted hybrid, so most break-ups ended up as vicious things.

Did that mean they deserved to be beaten bloody for insulting me? Probably not.

Now that I thought about it, it was only the handful who’d been truly cruel, or physical, that had actually disappeared.

Which I now knew meant Killian had murdered them.

My brother clearly knew about it too and hadn’t interfered.

It was enough to make any sane demoness start hissing and clawing the faces off such psychotic, overprotective males.

I scanned the forest for whatever had triggered the incubus, struggling to stomp my inner turmoil into submission.

I might not have the senses of a full-blooded demon, but lately, other senses had been sharpening. Ones I didn’t quite know how to define. Like the odd awareness of creatures around me when I couldn’t see, hear, or scent them.

I shuddered, stuffing the feeling away with the hungry wisps of darkness lingering inside me, even though it seemed tamed this morning. Possibly because of the things Killian had done in my sleep.

Alpha stilled beside the incubus, lifting his nose to the air. Like a summoned demon, the hellcat slunk from the tree-line, winding silently closer to us as she, too, scanned the river and the trees.

Anticipation sang through me. That was the danger of following the river; life needed to drink to survive, and we were right in their way.

We’d already spotted several animals sipping from the riverbank as we’d passed by, most baring their fangs in threat or stomping hooves aggressively. Some I could feel waited in hiding for us to pass before they revealed themselves. My weird senses latched on to them to deliver odd instinctual knowings—like that one of the delicate vine dragons was pregnant, and a hornless deer was looking for a mate. A phoenix had even swooped through the sky like a comet, blazing past as it scooped a mouthful of pink river water on the fly.

I heard it then. The rustle of bushes and crack of twigs. The squeak of a wheel.

The chatter of voices.

Killian planted himself between me and the sound. “Whatever happens this time, if I tell you to run, you’d better listen.” His voice was quiet, but the command rang clear.

Too bad for him, I was absolutely going to ignore it.

Glimpses of green and grey demons preceded a dark wooden cart pulled along by a scarred unicorn. The magnificent creature should have shone with a brilliant silvery glow in the patches of dappled sunlight. Instead, angry red lines cut through its once white coat, now tinted a filthy yellow and smeared with mud.

To see a unicorn mistreated was a crime against nature.

My heart squeezed as the procession drew closer through the trees. A small travelling band of merchants from the looks of the laden carts.

In the cities, demons used mechanical vehicles that were basically monster trucks. Out here in the wilderness between kingdoms, though, the landscape wasn’t kind to such tech. Using beasts was still the best way to travel, especially when transporting goods.

The travelling party slowed to a halt as they spotted us. We were in a weird standoff, the river at our backs as we faced the demons emerging from the forest, half blocking our way forward along the bank.

Killian’s eyes narrowed on the unicorn, and he stalked towards the merchants. My brows shot up at his recklessness, but I hurried along behind him, heart pounding with each step closer.

Maybe we could have slipped past them without incident, but the sight of the abused creature wouldn’t have let me either. I reached out with my magic, a foreign stretching sensation jumbling my mind. It brushed over the unicorn, and the old male tossed his head, tugging at the chains restraining his face. The thin golden links wrapped around his muzzle so he couldn’t open his mouth to bare his dagger-sharp teeth.

I traced the length of his restraints, which tied him to the front of the convey of three heavy carts.

Killian halted a few feet from the waiting demons—all pure-bred orcs, by the looks of it.

They sized him up, with his countless scars, half-healed wounds slathered with cracked paste, and most prominent of all, his mixed heritage.

Thin lips curled in contempt. Brows lowered. Eyes tightened. Hands strayed to weapon hilts.

“Unhitch the unicorn, and be on your way,” Killian said, voice deadly neutral.

Silence answered before a rasping chuckle broke from the largest orc of the group.

The towering male puffed out his chest, a sneer carving his heavy features. “Why? You going to take its place, beast?”

Sniggering rippled the group of orcs at his back. The males focused their mocking stares on us, filtering closer. Tension hummed through the air, the oncoming bloodshed contrasting the sunny morning scene beside the pretty pink river.

Killian joined in with the orcs, his laughter harsh enough for theirs to die on their lips. “Actually, I was going to set him free and give you quick, clean deaths because we’ve got places to be. But now I think I’ll take my time. Let him gorge on your bloated carcasses instead.”

The lead orc scoffed, snorting like a shadow boar. “A battered mutt like you? Your frail body would give out before I even raised a fist.”

I winced at his assessment. Layers of damage etched Killian’s chest, despite the salve I’d packed into his cuts.

Voices murmured from within the carts.

The six visible demons already outnumbered us. I frowned, easing a few steps aside to glimpse the others.

A blood-smeared arm poked through the bars of a cage. Thin and scarred.

Horror choked me.

My gaze raked across the orcs bristling around the cart.

They were all purebloods, and I knew that shouldn’t make me jump to conclusions, but life had taught me too many lessons for me to assume they were transporting prisoners for bounty.

Killian caught sight of the arm hanging limply from the cart. His eyes cut to the demon at the front. “What’s back there?”

The hulking orc took a menacing step closer. “Nothing that concerns you. But if you want, you can join the rest of your worthless kind in there. Even a weakling like you can fetch a good price in certain kingdoms.”

Killian chuckled, and the sound scraped like the edge of a blade. “Be careful, this slave isn’t collared anymore.”

The orc ran his gaze more fully over Killian, then moved onto me. His dull green skin rippled with disgust, and I saw the exact moment he realised what I must be, his face puckering like a dried berry.

My insides pinched as his judgement washed over me.

I had been born in one of the more purist succubus kingdoms. Sneers and mocking were nothing new, from strangers or my own kin. It shouldn’t bother me anymore.

But something about this orc was a little too familiar.

After I’d failed to save my mother, her two sisters raised me. They’d got bored after a few years of beating me, and so the cruel succubae pushed me towards one of the pleasure houses to “earn my keep.”

I’d been fourteen.

Other demon breeds flocked to my old kingdom for a good time, despite the drain on their energy that came with seeking pleasure.

I barely remembered killing my first customer: an orc just like this male sneering at me. All I knew was that I’d run for days, clutching a bloodstained knife in my hand, until I collapsed in this very forest. Rex had found me, half-clothed and coated in dried blood that wasn’t mine.

He’d brought me home and nursed me back to health like I was a baby phoenix with a broken wing.

Seeing this demon brought back a surge of toxic memories. Ones I’d blocked out long ago for my own sanity.

A sharp smile stretched Killian’s lips. Shadow bled through his feathers.

“Hybrid scum.” The orc spat on the floor at his boots. “We’re going to take you and your human whore abomination.” His sneer turned on me as he jabbed a dull claw towards my face.

Killian blurred, sword flashing in a gleam of obsidian.

The orc screamed, black blood spurting from the stump of his arm.

Killian had sliced off his hand.

But he didn’t stop there.

The psycho speared his weapon into the grass and launched himself at the squealing male, slashing chunks of flesh off with his bare claws. An unhinged laugh spilled from Killian’s lips, soaked in darkness.

He kicked the orc’s knee out, sending him screaming to the floor, and pounced.

I couldn’t breathe. Killian straddled the giant male and punched his hand through the orc’s heaving chest, reaching in and scrambling organs until the thick scent of gore perfumed the air.

The unicorn beside them whinnied in excitement, stomping his pointy hooves like he wanted the orc beneath them.

Killian bared his fangs at his victim. “You’re not fit to be in her presence, let alone speak about her.”

Violence danced in his glowing eyes. He removed his dripping hands from the chest cavity he’d cracked open like a crab shell. He pried open the orc’s mouth, reaching his fist in and yanking at something.

I gagged the second Killian ripped the forked tongue free, cackling like a madman. “Now you can never address her again. She’s above you. My fucking princess.”

The light dimmed from the orc’s eyes, their yellow glow dying to a putrid pus colour.

Silence blanketed the forest.

None of the orc’s comrades dared move. Not a leaf dared rustle, nor an insect dared chirp.

“Ohhhhkaayyyy…” I drew out the word, struggling to process the brutality I’d just witnessed.

I mean, I knew Killian was a little unhinged. He was a lead enforcer for a brutal kingdom constantly under threat. The things he did to protect us involved bloody fangs and stringy flesh under his claws.

But this was a whole new level of crazy.

Killian had the gall to look up at me, raise the slippery grey tongue in offering, and smirk . “A gift, sweetness.”

My birthday wasn’t until tomorrow, but I doubted he knew that.

He’d just dismembered a demon and cackled while doing it. And then was trying to give me a piece of his victim.

Like a complete psychopath.

I couldn’t help the snort of disbelief that escaped me. “No wonder people avoid our kingdom.”

He grinned manically. “It’s called a show of excessive force.”

I coughed. “Isn’t it just.”

One slaver at the back of the group gagged, a fine leather-gloved hand coming up to cover his tusks, and the shocked stupor holding the others broke.

“Throw them in with the rest!” A wrinkled orc beside the carts stamped a crooked staff with a booming thud.

The orcs moved as one, a surge of violence bristling towards us.

Killian leaped to his feet and threw his black wings wide, intimidating enough to make a few hesitate. The rest plunged towards us.

I wouldn’t be caged. Not ever again.

My magic surged. A desperate dark thing. It clasped me by the throat and tore from its cage.

Everyone flinched, and time stilled.

Bones snapped, and screams answered. Cuts and bruises ruptured through the crowd.

Green skin. Purple. Black fur. White hide. All began to split and gush blood.

Only the hellcat seemed unaffected.

Power writhed through me in a torrent, choking me.

Killian was the first to react, grunting as he swiped up his sword and began chopping off heads like a macabre logger, the black blood of his kills wetting his skin along with the red of his own.

And I couldn’t do a thing except stand there and wage an internal war against the evil I carried.

I really was an abomination.

The moans of the dying filled me with horror. And a strange bubbly energy that made me want to vomit.

I groaned along with my victims, dropping forward. A thud reverberated up my knees, quaking my thigh bones.

My purpose was to heal people. Not…not this.

“Eve…,” Killian spluttered, coughing up blood as he reached for me. Black wings drooped at his sides, coated in wetness.

The horrifying sight burned into my retinas, and I willed something to stop me.

Anything.

I’d rather die than hurt Killian like this.

Cookie leaped for me, clawless paws looming large in my vision.

They slammed into my face.

And the black void caught me.