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T HIRTY -F IVE X ANDER

The following day, my council gathers at the house. We meet in the dining room, and just as I’m about to close the oak double doors, Harper pushes inside.

“I hope you didn’t start the meeting without me.”

I blink at her. She hasn’t officially accepted the council position, so her presence is a bit surprising, especially considering we discussed keeping her away from any meetings unless absolutely necessary. But here she is, dressed in hunter attire, all the way down to the obsidian dagger strapped to her thigh—which likely won’t go over well with our present company.

“You couldn’t have left the dagger upstairs?” I say under my breath. “While we’re at it, what are you doing ?”

“You wanted a hunter, did you not?” she throws back at me.

I arch a brow. “I thought we talked about this.”

“Have you even graduated yet?” Blake taunts behind me before Harper can respond. “Maybe your skills aren’t up to par.”

Her eyes narrow, no longer focused on me but on the blue-haired demon at the table across the room. “Why not come here and find out?”

With a sigh, I interject, “All right, that’s enough.” I snare Harper’s gaze. “You’re sure you want to be here?”

She nods. “I decided the others should know who I am, because if shit goes sideways, I want more than just you to back me up. And I wasn’t about to bring it up earlier and give you the opportunity to keep me out of the meeting.”

A laugh slips out of me, and I shake my head. “Might I remind you these demons are loyal to me ?”

Harper moves past me into the room, patting my chest. “We’ll see about that, brother .” The challenge in her voice is unmistakable. She thinks she can win over my council. Make them like her more than me, as if this is some kind of game.

We’re more alike than she cares to admit.

I stare after her, somehow caught up in the ‘brother’ comment despite it sounding nothing like a term of endearment. Shaking it off, I follow Harper across the room. “Let’s get started.”

I take my seat at the head of the table, while Harper drops into the chair next to Greer and across from Francesca, who sits beside Blake. Rain hits the windows on the other side of the room. Despite it being midday, the sky is dark and gray, only adding to the lethargy clinging to me.

“Would you like to introduce yourself?” I ask Harper, leaving it up to her how much she wants shared with the others. I trust them with our arrangement, but I understand she likely doesn’t at this point.

Harper’s false bravado slips a little, and there’s a faint tinge of pink in her cheeks when she says, “Uh, okay.” Glancing around the table, she gives an awkward wave. “I’m Harper. If you’re wondering why I’m here, don’t worry, I keep asking myself the same thing. Anyway, Xander and I recently discovered that we’re half-siblings, and he decided his council of demons wasn’t dramatic enough—hard to believe when Blake is here, I know—so he wanted to add a hunter to the mix.”

Blake rolls his eyes, while the others snicker, and I just shake my head.

“That’s not exactly how I’d explain it,” I point out.

Harper shrugs. “Close enough.”

Francesca grins at her. “I like you already.”

Jude and Roman exchange a glance before turning their gazes to me.

“Problem?” I ask.

Jude wets her lips. “Not necessarily. However, you just took the throne. Is this, bringing a human—a skilled hunter, no less—onto your council, the first move you really want to make as king?”

“That’s a backhanded compliment if I ever heard one,” Harper mutters, crossing her arms over her chest as her heart beats faster.

Jude grants her a thin smile. “I mean no offense. I simply want to make sure our king is setting himself up for success.”

“I think that ship sailed when he brought Blake on, but whatever.”

I press my lips together to hide my amusement at Harper’s quip. She and Blake seem to have adopted a rivalry I don’t quite understand, but I can’t deny its entertainment value.

Blake smirks, his eyes locked on her. “You know being mean to me gets me hot, and that’s super unprofessional in this setting.”

She rolls her eyes. “Bite me.”

Hunger darkens his gaze. “That’s twice now. Careful, little hunter. Next time you ask, I fucking will.” He snaps his teeth at her.

I glance down at the table as they continue bickering, figuring Harper is comfortable enough to put Blake in his place. She doesn’t need me stepping in—in fact, she’d probably put me in my place if I tried.

Instead, I focus my hearing on the level above us where I can hear Camille humming to herself and the sound of pencil strokes on paper. I wasn’t sure she’d use the sketchbook I left for her, but I’m glad she is. Anything to keep her distracted from the circumstances triggering her anxiety, and there are many. I can’t fix them for her immediately, as much as I wish I could, but at least I can help her manage her thoughts when they start to spiral.

“Xander,” Blake’s voice cuts into my focus, and I look at him, lifting my brows.

“You just completely zoned out,” Greer says.

“Apologies,” I say, waiting for whomever to repeat whatever I missed.

“Where’s your head at?” Roman asks.

“Probably the human upstairs,” Francesca says before I can respond. “Is she clouding your ability to focus on the matter at hand?”

Unless Blake and Harper quit their verbal ping pong and I missed when the real conversation started, I’m not sure my focus was truly required here.

“Not at all,” I say in a level tone despite the irritation prickling along my skin at being questioned. I push my chair back and stand. “While dealing with Marrick is important, there’s something else I need to attend to in the meantime.” My gaze sweeps over my council members. “I trust you. I need you to prove yourselves to me now. Prove I made the right decision bringing you onto my council and giving you my trust.”

“Of course,” Greer says in a solemn voice, then asks, “What do you need from us?”

“By the time we return topside, I want to know exactly how Marrick is turning humans into demons. Also, where and when it has potentially been done before. Anything that will help us stop Marrick from continuing to do it now.”

Roman nods, though he’s frowning. “What will you be doing?”

“I’m taking a trip home. Camille’s sister was taken to hell by the demon who took her life years ago, and she’s been trapped there since. We’re going to bring her back.”

Those words burn my tongue, coating my throat with acidic bile at the thought of Camille being in the wretched place I grew up. I know what it did to me, and considering just for a moment what it could do to her makes me desperate for another way to bring Danielle back. But even now, I don’t have the strength to refuse Camille. The power she holds over me is irrefutable. I can’t let her down—not ever again. So the thing she wants from me now puts her in the most danger she’s experienced since I waltzed into her life, and the frigid, thorny vines of fear wrapping themselves around me because of it feel like a punishment I most certainly deserve for loving her as I am.

Francesca scowls, her tone unimpressed when she says, “You’re leaving us to help your human plaything?”

A vicious growl rumbles in my chest and tears from my throat. “Watch yourself. Camille is my mate, soul or not. She is mine and I am hers. I will do anything for her, and if anyone in this room doesn’t approve, you are not welcome here.”

No one speaks up as I look around the table, and when my eyes land on Blake, I find him grinning. “Go help your girl, mate. The rest of us will hold down the fort here, put our detective caps on, and find something that’ll help us take that bastard down when you’re back.”

I nod. “I was hoping you’d actually head home before we travel there. Camille won’t want her sister spending another holiday alone.”

Camille already took care of my sister’s plans for the time we’ll be gone, convincing Harper to go to the all-inclusive resort she’d initially booked for the two of them.

Blake drums his fingers on the table, flicking a glance toward Harper for a brief, almost non-existent moment before his gaze returns to me. “Of course.”

I give him a look that expresses my gratitude without words before I walk out of the dining room, my heart beating faster in my chest as I head for the stairs. I never thought the very thing my mother loathed about me would help me rule, but it was my human heart that led me to choose my council. To fight for a relationship with my sister. To fall in love with Camille. It seems I need to listen to it more and recognize that caring isn’t a weakness as Lucia led me to believe for years.

I care more about the demons than the power ruling over them grants me, which is something the queens and kings before me would never be able to grasp.

Perhaps that is my real power .

While that might work for me topside, embracing my humanity—or what’s left of it—is a dangerous gamble and something I absolutely cannot do in hell, especially not as the demon king.

Which is going to make this trip the hardest thing I’ve ever done.