Page 40 of Savage Blood (Den of Shadows #6)

Chapter

Twenty-Six

Shrieks and shouts of terror erupted through Wrath & Ruin, shooting arctic water through my veins and dousing the haze of lust in the private VIP room. We bolted off the broken couch, and I grabbed Fane’s t-shirt to shield my body before darting to the balcony.

Instead of bothering to cover up, the demon shifter just stood there, stark naked. No one paid him any attention, though.

They were all attacking, being attacked, or trying to run.

My heart shot into my throat at the chaos unfolding across the club.

Demons—an eerie, almost robotic jerk to their movements—assaulted humans and other nightworlders.

Snarls and screams pierced the thudding music, and the dancing lights bounced over the scales, sharp teeth, and unnatural shades of flesh of the demons as their glamours vanished.

Vampires and shifters attempted to fight back while the few fae and witches hurled magic. The metallic tinge of blood perfumed the air.

“What the hell is going on?” I screeched .

“I have no fucking idea.”

This wasn’t like the time those dux demons dropped their glamours and fed on human souls out in the open. The demons knew what they were doing then.

These demons had lost all sense—like they’d consumed an unstable batch of Soulvation.

Logan wouldn’t…

“Wrath is coming,” Fane said, pivoting and storming across the room to grab his jeans.

Oh hell. I was totally naked.

By the time Wrath busted through the door, I’d slipped on my underwear. And that was it.

I squealed and jerked Fane’s t-shirt up to cover my bare breasts. A smirk pulled at the high demon’s mouth when he surveyed the two of us and the broken couch.

He shook his head, though, and moved past us to the balcony. “This is total fucking bedlam. We’ll have to compel every human in the place before they leave. Some have already made it out the doors.”

“What happened?” Fane asked, yanking on his jeans and buttoning them. “What’s causing this?”

Wrath gripped the railing as power throbbed from him, his muscles tensed beneath his sky-blue t-shirt. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

I finally fastened my bra and then hurried into my jeans. “They’re kind of acting like the demons who tried Ruin’s Soulvation.”

Fane met my gaze. “You think Logan is experimenting on them?”

I winced. Logan would never do that. He wasn’t Ruin.

“Logan hasn’t gotten that far in his research,” Wrath said. “Besides, he wouldn’t be able to dose every demon in the club. ”

“Here.” I tossed Fane his shirt and grabbed mine, slipping it over my head. “But it’s not every demon.”

Fane peered over the balcony as he pulled on his shirt, covering that beautiful torso. “She’s right. You’re fine. Logan’s fine. Perry’s fine.”

“It’s only the dux demons.” Even so, there were still a good number of them.

Wrath cursed and tightened his grip on the balcony, the metal railing vibrating in his grasp as another wave of power washed over him. “Stop!”

But the demons weren’t listening. They continued to attack.

“I’m not getting through to them.” Wrath slapped the balcony. “It’s like they’re hypnotized.”

Fane cursed and jammed his hand through his messy locks. “I’ll be right back.”

“Where are you going?” I asked.

He hooked a finger into the waistband of my jeans and jerked me into him. “Stay here, Tate. I mean it.”

His lips fell on mine in a quick, heated kiss. And then he vanished out the door and down the stairs.

Why did Fane bother telling me what to do? He knew I wouldn’t listen.

I shoved my feet into my boots and laced them up before leaning over the balcony. Demons weren’t outright slaughtering humans. Yet. They toyed and tormented them and then sipped their souls. The blood in the air came from the ravens and other nightworlders who were battling the demons.

“Something is controlling them,” Wrath hissed, his eyes no longer blue but pools of ebony as he pulled on more of his power to break the hold on his kind. “I don’t sense an enchantment in the air, so what the hell could it be? ”

A feminine scream made my shifter senses perk up, and my head yanked to the left as five giant dux demons with scales, slick horns, and smoldering neon irises circled Charla. Ice trickled over my back at the look of panic crossing her face.

After she was abducted and kept in the lab, Charla had started training with other wolves at Silver Ridge, but she couldn’t take on five massive dux demons alone. Across the dance floor, Alicia was attempting to pry two female dux demons off a group of girls huddled beneath a booth.

Where the hell was Saint?

My jaw clenched as fire once again infiltrated my bloodstream, but this time, lust didn’t fuel it. Rage did.

I stormed toward the door as Wrath yelled after me.

“Fane told you to stay put!”

“He knows me better than that,” I called. “He probably expects me to leave.”

I took the stairs two at a time, ignoring any anxiety caused by the tight space, my thoughts focused on Charla. The inhuman growls and the screams, louder in the thick of it, rattled my eardrums. Fear and sweat choked the air.

Without a transformative weapon, I’d have to rely on my teeth and claws.

A screech erupted from the left, and I spun in time to stop a demon’s claws from slicing into a pixie.

“Snap out of it.” I punched the female dux demon, and she stumbled back, crashing into a table.

A collection of frozen cocktails spilled onto her long yellow hair and ran down her gray flesh. Her thin lips curled back, unveiling rows of serrated teeth and a forked tongue.

“Don’t even think of coming after me.” I cracked my knuckles. “I don’t want to kill you, but I will. ”

“I’ll kill you first,” she muttered before pushing off the table and lunging for me.

My demon shifter side rushed forward, thinning my pupils and pushing onyx talons out of my fingertips.

Sensing the danger throbbing out of me, the yellow-haired demon stopped in her tracks. And then she slithered through the crowd to find an easier target.

I should have knocked her out.

“Th-Thanks,” the pixie said, her gossamer wings fluttering behind her while the lights cast shimmers over her cotton candy pink hair.

I nodded and dashed through the melee to search for Charla.

Her scent was familiar enough that I could follow it, but too many bodies and other scents filled the air.

My pulse spiked as I shoved others out of my way, slipping on puddles of black and crimson blood.

If I had the Infernal Sol, I could make them all stop…

Air caught sharply in my lungs. Could this violence be the work of the demon amulet?

My scalp prickled and sweat beaded over my forehead as I stopped and searched for any sign of the amulet. But I’d be able to feel its power, wouldn’t I?

“Back off!”

Charla’s voice caught my attention, and I pushed through the chaos toward her. I slammed my boot into a demon’s leg and then yanked away from her. He swiped his claws through the air, just missing my chest, and I crushed my fist into his nose.

“Tate!” Charla yelled and reached for me.

I stuck my own talons into the demon’s gut and shoved him off. The wound wouldn’t kill him, but it would definitely hurt .

Charla’s hand wrapped around mine, and we clung together, bulldozing toward the left and off the dance floor. Her dress was torn, and cuts dug into her arms and her neck, but she was otherwise fine.

“We need to get out of here,” she yelled, pushing her blond locks out of her face. Her ponytail was destroyed, and her glasses were missing, not that she needed them to see.

Saint emerged from the crowd, black blood speckling him. “Tate!”

The alpha reached us in seconds, and I practically shoved Charla at him. “Get her to safety.”

His mouth dropped open. “What about you?”

Power suddenly rippled through the air, and the hair on my nape rose. Saint and Charla didn’t react, so it had to be Wrath exerting his influence as the demon lord—or at least trying. I could feel it only because I was half demon.

“Enough! Stand down,” he commanded.

But when I looked at the balcony, my own mouth parted. Wrath and Ruin stood there, their eyes black holes, complexions like bleached bone, and hair drifting in a phantom wind created by their sheer power.

Goose bumps erupted over my flesh as the brothers pooled their power to break the mysterious hold on their kind.

Some of the heavy tension in the air finally cracked.

It was working.

“I’ll be fine,” I told Saint, jerking my chin toward the brothers. “They’re getting to them. I can feel it.”

Saint and Charla looked less than convinced, their wary glances heavy on me, but I waved them off.

“I just want to find Alicia,” I shouted over the music, the growls, and now Wrath and Ruin’s commands .

“Be careful,” Saint finally said and pulled Charla through the calming crowd.

As I moved across the club and the Bacchus twins continued to push their power at the dux demons, an invisible fist gripped my chest.

With a gasp, I halted and hunched over, grabbing the sun tattoo below my ribs.

The moisture zapped from my mouth, and my heart tapped out a frantic beat as I felt that wicked presence curling over my heated skin and wrapping around me like a soft velvet blanket.

The Infernal Sol called to me, and I couldn’t stop my feet from moving, heeding its command. Sweat slicked my spine, and my every hastened inhale tasted like sweet, seductive surrender.

The amulet was so close. So damn close.

My common sense screamed for me to stop, to find Fane or anyone, but I couldn’t make my body listen to reason. That craving for the amulet seared my bloodstream, inundated my veins, and clouded my mind.

Barric was here, with the gleaming blood-red stone around his neck. He—the amulet—was the reason for this madness.

Why cause this? Was it a way to get to me, or was this part of another ritual he needed to perform before the Admordum Nexia Covenant?

The bright pulsing of the amulet emerged through the shadows first, like a beacon of light drawing me safely to the shore.

Not exactly.

More like the call of a siren leading me to treacherous cliffs and a watery grave.

Barric finally materialized, and frost crystallized through my veins at his sinister smile. It should have halted me in my tracks.

But it didn’t.

I kept going, hypnotized by the dark power.

Another figure coalesced behind Barric, approaching him with a stealth only a skilled hunter possessed.

No fucking way.

My mouth opened as Coltrane, dressed in all black with her usual slicked-back ponytail, cut a path toward the former head alpha. Did she plan on stealing the amulet? Could she?

“I never knew how pliable demon minds were.” Barric stroked the amulet, his brown eyes nearly black.

Coltrane’s unexpected appearance lessened some of the amulet’s control on me. Need ceased to consume me fully, and the fog cleared from my mind.

“I’m pretty sure it has something to do with the incredibly powerful stone around your neck.” I jerked my chin toward it, keeping my hands by my sides as temptation brewed through my veins. “From this over-the-top display, I’m sure all of Nightworld will know you have it soon.”

My father gave a lazy shrug. “So what? It’s mine .”

A possessive edge curled around that word, almost like a threat to anyone who dared take the Infernal Sol from him. Little did he know someone was about to attempt that very thing.

I kept my focus on Barric instead of Coltrane, so he didn’t suspect someone sneaking up on him. “You’re not invincible.”

His chuckle had ice skating down my nape. “Are you sure about that?”

I sure as hell hoped not.

But before I could say or do anything else, Coltrane jumped on Barric’s back .

“What the hell!” Having been caught off guard, he stumbled back, snarling. “Get off me.”

As he fought with the former raven captain, the influence of the Infernal Sol on the dux demons finally shattered. Barric couldn’t fight Coltrane and maintain the power.

I scoffed, knowing I could have.

Not important now, Tate.

“You shouldn’t have the amulet, Barric,” Coltrane gritted out. “It doesn’t belong to you.”

He tried to buck her off, but she held on, wrapping her legs around his waist.

“Because it belongs to you?” His bitter laughter erupted. “You’re as psychotic as I am.”

Not quite.

As I rushed forward, Barric’s jaws snapping and claws raking through the air, Coltrane reached around and grabbed the amulet.

“No!” I yelled.

Her reaction was instantaneous, and the scream she expelled nearly busted my eardrums. The stone glowed like scarlet fire around Barric’s neck as Coltrane released it, her palm sizzling and burning.

My stomach heaved as the scent of burned flesh choked the air. But Coltrane still distracted Barric as he tried to shake her off, so I took my chance and darted forward.

I gripped the sun-shaped stone and yanked as hard as I could.

The amulet didn’t burn me like it did Coltrane, but it also didn’t budge.

The chain wouldn’t break, and I couldn’t lift the stone from my father’s neck.

What the fuck ?

A sly smile curved Barric’s mouth, and he finally tossed Coltrane off. She slid across the floor and vanished into the shadows behind a giant geode.

I dropped the Infernal Sol and took one step back, but Barric’s hand jutted out and wrapped around my wrist. Panic exploded through my chest, and the air catapulted from my lungs. Barric had me right where he wanted me.

Again.