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So far, anyway…
All of the sudden, I feel so tired, which surprises me because I haven’t felt tired in days. Not since Abaddon healed me. Which just reminds me of how complicated the knot I’m caught in really is. Especially when it’s followed by the question: am I tired now because of the pregnancy? When will I start to feel symptoms?
And what the hell can I expect with a hybrid monster-human baby pregnancy? Where’s the What to Expect When You’re Expecting demon-monster baby edition?
“See?” Remus chimes in. “She doesn’t like you, but maybe she’ll like me.”
My mouth drops open. Is he kidding? “You’re a sociopath,” I say to him.
“I don’t know what that means,” Remus says with a charming grin, “but I’m very good at what I do, and I always get what I want.”
I roll my eyes at that. “What do you do?” I ask, while Abaddon starts making the angry throat-growl noises again. Thing is again standing between me and him, or rather him and Remus more likely, in this case. Thing, my unofficial bodyguard.
Remus’s grin sharpens again. “Why, I make War, my dear. Don’t tell me brother dearest didn’t tell you. You didn’t stumble into the lair of just any old monsters.” He holds out his arms. “We’re famous. I’m War, that’s Death,” he points at Thing. “Our other brother Famine died the day we killed our father, and the one whose kit is in your belly is—”
“Don’t!” Abaddon roars.
“Who?” I ask, my gaze ping-ponging between Abaddon and Remus. “Who is he?”
Remus just grins wider, showing all his sharp, white teeth. “Why, he’s Pestilence, of course. We’re the Four Horseman. So apt because he really is a pest. He’s been up my ass for about a millennium, but I gotta say, locking me up in a dungeon for the last two hundred years. New low. Even for you.”
Abaddon roars his full lion’s roar in response, and Thing is using all six of his arms to hold him back now.
“Pestilence,” I whisper, and again my hands go to my belly. I blink rapidly but I just can’t take in what I’ve just heard. This is officially too much.
“Try not to tear each other’s heads off,” I whisper to the room at large, then turn and walk out, leaving them all behind.
I need a fucking bath.
Chapter Forty
ABADDON
I stare after my consort. I am not to be walked away from. I should tie her to the bed again and make her shiver and tremble. Then not allow her to gush until she speaks to me and promises she will never leave.
But what good is a promise when I have heard her just now say that she will leave, no matter our deal? Especially now that Remus has told her what I am.
Fury flares in my chest. She will not find leaving so easy. I will hunt her to the ends of the earth anyway, and that was before she had my kit in her belly.
Yet even just now she has just walked away from me.
I want to charge after her, but as if sensing my impulse, Thing blocks the doorway.
“Let her go, brother,” he cautions.
The fire in my belly burns brighter. “You are a mad beast for millennia, and now you decide to speak like a civilized person?”
Thing huffs at me, his shoulders hulking even larger as tension gathers. “You treat me as a beast, you will get a beast.”
“You slaughtered whole armies. Entire cities. You are a beast!” I roar in his face.
Thing straightens, all his arms going out in attack mode. “I was instrument of slaughter.”
“And if anyone’s gonna go on about taking out whole cities,” Remus chimes in with a dark laugh, “I mean, that’s rich coming from you, brother.” He stares me down. “All fear the mighty Pest if he but passes by the threshold of your door.”
I bare my teeth at him. “You killed more than any of us, inciting war in their puny hearts. Father just had us there to pluck at the carcasses and finish carrying them off. Or don’t you remember the Battle of Borodino?”
But foolish of me to forget, Remus feels no shame. He smiles warmly as his eyes go to the ceiling in remembrance. “Ah, the bloodiest day of all of Napoleon’s wars. How could I ever forget? The sky was ablaze with cannon fire and the ground six feet deep with bodies and entrails.” His eyes glisten. “That was a good day for all of us.”
Thing turns away in disgust, and my stomach sours. Father always thought his Horseman—for that’s truly what he thought of us as—just calvary to be brought out to win his secret wars, would never fail him. That we would go on fighting for him for eternity as his loyal soldiers, even though he treated us—
