“Or maybe it is.” He winked and descended to his pet in question, giving her a loving stroke against her hair as he glanced up at me.
She growled in response, causing him to chuckle.
I didn’t quite understand the dynamic there or why she’d ended up with him, but it was obviously all linked to whatever Ashmedai suspected about the Nephilim being involved.
He was right about them being ideal pawns.
The question was, who would use them?
The Nephilim would have to be strong enough to handle Kristina’s power as well, something very few beings would ever be capable of doing.
Unless they shared the power somehow.
I frowned, considering the possibilities of how that could be facilitated. Someone with a higher-level ability would have to be at the helm.
Or multiple someones.
Maybe it wasn’t just a group of Nephilim, but angels or demons, too.
Which Ashmedai had already implied.
“What proof are you waiting for?” I asked as I joined him on the floor.
He stood right beside Trudy, his wing wrapping around her in a suggestive manner. But his feathers weren’t touching her.
Actually, she seemed rather oblivious to his nearness.
Or perhaps she was used to it.
“If I told you that, it would give away the endgame. And I’m not ready for that particular move yet.” He spoke with the ease of an uncaring man, but I sensed the concern in his gaze. “That’s the purpose of this.” He pointed to the master map.
“We’ve drawn out every possible outcome and theory based on what we know for sure, and we’ve altered some of them with speculations regarding the future.” Trudy studied the contents as she spoke, drawing Ashmedai’s gaze to her.
Admiration touched his features for a brief second before he nodded, his expression morphing back into one of perpetual amusement. It was a mask of sorts, one he used to hide his true feelings on current events.
It prompted others to doubt his position, thus giving him the upper hand in certain situations.
By allowing others to assume his preference for fucking around, he could hide his true intentions.
The question became, were those intentions good or bad? Or were they simply gray?
If anyone could be orchestrating this whole disaster, it was Ashmedai with his penchant for riddles and carefree maneuvering. He would be the perfect one to engage in this game of imbalance.
And by pretending to be on this side, to be working through all these scenarios, would be the best way to fuck everyone over.
The power rolling off of him confirmed he was very much benefiting from the imbalance, as was Zebulon—a Demonic Lord under Ashmedai’s command.
Ashmedai was also the one who’d given that device to Kayla, thus setting all of this in motion for Kristina to be taken.
“You see it now,” he mused, his lips twisting into a wry grin. “You see how everything points to me.”
“Yes.”Just as your comment proves what I’ve always suspected about you—you can read minds.Not that he would ever admit it.
Now was no different.
He didn’t even blink at my mental comment.
But that didn’t fool me.
