“How did you know the gate would keep you out?”
“I’m a demon. I can tell.”
“How?”
She rolled her eyes.
“Why are you here? What do you want? Why did you wait so long to come back to the place that exiled you?”
“Do you really think I’m going to answer those questions? Like some spineless human criminal in an interrogation room?” She leaned in, and I felt the hot and bitter edge of her magic. “I’m here because you let me in,” she said, each word an indictment of me. And I felt the truth of it in my gut.
Mechanical thunder rumbled. “But I’m afraid I don’t have time to talk right now. The weather has taken a turn.”
With apingof steel, I unsheathed my sword, extended it. “You’ll be going nowhere but a cage.”
She laughed, the sound hoarse and smoky. “You’re fighting alone, and we’re surrounded by humans I’m sure you don’t want damaged in the onslaught. What risk could you possibly present to me?”
It was my turn to feel that spark of concern. Not because I wasalone; this wasn’t the first time my sword would be the only one swinging. But because I didn’t know the full extent of her power, and that made me nervous.
Of course, my fear didn’t really matter. She was here, and it was my job to stop her—while injuring as few people as possible.
I flicked the tip of my blade, snagged one of the feathers around her face. Her gaze followed as it floated through the air. “Would you like to see what I can do?” I asked. I figured my best bet was keeping her contained—or keeping her from doing any more damage—until backup arrived.
“I have seen it,” she reminded me. “You served your purpose, but it wasn’t especially impressive.”
She cocked her head, stared at me with focus so sharp it felt she might incise my very soul. She took a step toward me, each moment sending a wave of perfume in my direction. It was strong—rich and musky. But beneath it, ashes—dark and bitter. She sniffed delicately, as if scenting the air.
It wasn’t the first time I’d seen a Sup wrinkle their nose and lift it to the wind. I’d done it myself, and I was dating a wolf. Magic had scent, undeniably. But this didn’t look like mere curiosity, more a searching of her own. She was looking for something. Trying to find something.
And then joy blossomed on her face, and her smile widened.
“You’re the one. The vampire who popped out of her mother like Venus from the foam. You are chaos,” she said, narrowing her gaze as she looked into my eyes.
Monster skittered backward. I also wanted to shrink back from her intrusive stare but refused to move.
“The first vampire to be born,” she continued. “The most unique. The change. The mutation.” She smiled thinly. “The cataclysm. Vampires will never be the same. Not now.”
She was right that I was different; I was the only vampire born, not made from another human by biting and blood.
“I didn’t choose how I came into this world.”
“Perhaps not.” She watched me again, and I wondered how much of monster she would see. “I bet the Masters hate you, don’t they? You interrupt their order, their understanding.”
“None of that matters here,” I said. But, oh, how right she was.
“Of course it does. I want to see what happens when I throw chaos your way. When everything is taken away from you, as it was for me. For I see you, girl. You like your rules. Your boundaries. Your space. You try to inflict order. But you can’t order chaos. And I don’t even need to move mountains or drown the sun. I only need to let humans do human things.”
The scents of smoke and sulfur rose. Demon scents, which meant she was doing something again.
“Put down that fucking sword!” a human yelled, and I looked back.
Two guys, both bulky gym types, were barreling down the street toward us. The one on the left pushed a man out of his way, sending him sprawling over a park bench.
I’d have thought they were demons, given the self-centeredness, if I hadn’t smelled the human on them immediately, at least behind the pulsing of demonic magic.
“Help,” Rose said weakly when they reached us, using the same voice she’d used in the SUV. Fury curled my lip.
“The fuck is this?” one human asked, gesturing to my sword.