But she had to try—for Sabrine.
She had to try for Sabrine.
One of the squad cars raced after the sedan, but she knew they would never make it in time—just as Loren would never make it.
Still, she hurtled along the dark street, dodging piles of trash, feet ripping open on stones and fragments of glass. No matter how fast she ran, the sedan only got farther away.
Loren would never forget the sight of her.
Of Sabrine—thrashing against the hellseher’s hold, staring helplessly through the back window as the sedan disappeared around a corner up ahead. Sabrine’s gaze was utterly broken and full of anguish.
Just like Loren’s heart.
2
The wild cheering that barreled down the damp hallway that led to the Pit was music to Darien Cassel’s ears. The excitement of the rowdy audience encircling the sunken fighting ring in the distance told him his opponent tonight would be worthy. If he was lucky, whatever manner of creature he would soon be facing might even make him sweat a little.
Darien kept his eyes shut as he rolled his muscled shoulders and shifted his weight. This idle fidgeting was for the benefit of the half-human bouncers waiting near the latticed grille at the end of the hallway; he had a habit of standing so still, it unsettled anyone in his vicinity, even here in Angelthene—a place where most of its inhabitants could live without sleep and preferred the blood of a freshly killed corpse to the burger joints found on most city blocks.
But as a pure-blooded hellseher and the leader of the Seven Devils, he supposed he could understand their apprehension. If only a little.
Down the hall, the ring announcer was declaring his reputation. As the undefeated champion of the Pit, he was a favorite of the lowlifes and career criminals who clawed out a living making bets on those who entered the ring. Pathetic wastes of life, but it wasn’t his business. He came here, sometimes seven nights a week, strictly to take the edge off his temper and combat his Surges—though tonight it wasn’t just his temper or his Surges that needed reining in.
Eight years ago, his mother had died. And while fighting served as a useful channel for his rage, it also provided him with a way to forget, even for a few hours.
And tonight, he needed nothing more than to forget.
Darien ran a tattooed hand through his hair, pushing the black strands of his undercut back flat, entirely aware of the bouncers assessing him with caution as they awaited the ring announcer’s signal. Even from this distance away, he could smell fear emanating from them like cologne. He supposed he should take it as a compliment that they were still so afraid of him—of the man who’d replaced the heartbroken fifteen-year-old boy who’d stomped in here eight years ago in search of an outlet.
What he could scent more than their fear, however, was the demon—the flesh-hungry beast prowling the Pit on all fours. The oily reek of its hairless, mottled skin snaked down the hallway, burning his airways.
A creature of the storm drains that hated the light. They left their dens only during the darkest hours of the night, which was why the Head of State had recently proposed the idea of a dusk-to-dawn curfew for the city, keeping the citizens safe while giving Pest and Disease Control a chance to scale back the capital’s rising numbers of ravenous vermin. No one would face more than a small fine for breaking the said curfew—but might very well pay for their lack of intelligence with their life, and their body dragged into the sewers to be chewed into ribbons.
The thing was agitated, a sign that it had been caught only minutes ago. Judging from the sound of its flesh-shredding claws gouging lines into the cement walls of the Pit, it didn’t like being caged. Nor did it like the glaring LED lights mounted above the audience.
One of the bouncers whistled the signal, and Darien opened his eyes. The crowd’s cheering rattled the exposed rafters of the vaulted ceiling and set the floor beneath his combat boots rumbling. He let the familiar sounds wash over him, electrifying his blood.
His mouth curved into a lethal smile as he stalked forward, toward the Pit. Toward the creature that had a population of eight million people hiding inside after dark.
It was time. Time to lose himself to blood and gore for a while.
Violence was his drug. His own personal demon.
He only hoped the one waiting in the Pit would put up enough of a fight that he might not feel the need to return here tomorrow.
—
Darien dragged out the fight for longer than he usually cared to. He was beginning to tire of this, but not from exhaustion. He could easily keep going for far longer than the sixteen minutes and thirty-four seconds the timer hanging above the Pit displayed.
He was simply getting bored.
The demon reared back on hind legs, releasing a wet roar that rattled his eardrums and set the crowd foaming at the mouth with excitement.
The feral thing had a maw of serrated teeth, black as obsidian. The curved horns on either side of its near-translucent head were evidence of how long it had been alive. This was one of the stronger ones, yet it bored the hell out of him. He needed to find better opponents—a challenger that was actually worth his precious time.
Sensing that he was being watched by a gaze unclouded by liquor and opioids, Darien tipped his head back to observe the screaming audience. Hundreds of piss-smelling drunkards were packed from the stands to the rafters, shouting out bets and exchanging gestures to communicate as they waved fistfuls of mynet in the smoky air. There were no ropes around the perimeter of the Pit; if anyone fell in, they were fair game. In the years in which Darien had fought in this ring, several people had done exactly that.
Not one of them had lived to tell of it.
