They lunged at each other, a blur of speed almost too fast to follow, their heavy bodies meeting in the air and rolling to the ground a few yards away, shaking the earth beneath me with the impact of their combined weight. Claws slashed and blood ran. Kadeen howled with rage and threw Halcyon off him. The Demon Prince rolled to his feet with fluid grace, at peculiar odds with his beastly appearance, and sprang and tackled Kadeen in a haze of motion. They roiled on the ground, further away from me, each trying to get atop the other, Kadeen slashing with his claws, snarling and cursing, Halcyon fighting in a cold, freezing silence that was somehow scarier than Kadeen's hot rage.
"Enough," Halcyon said suddenly, as if he was tired of playing.
All I caught was a swift sharp movement that abruptly shut Kadeen up mid-snarl. There was a stunned, uncomprehending look on the smaller demon's face for a long, stretched-out moment. Then Kadeen's head fell off and rolled to the ground. Blood, the color of dark burgundy under Hell's twilight sky, seeped out beneath it. I gave a muffled shriek, unable to tear my gaze from that head, from those eyes. Those red, burning eyes that, dear merciful God, still held awareness and watched as Halcyon proceeded to slice off Kadeen's arms and legs with swift, lethal precision. Watched as the severed limbs fell in bloody, chunky pieces to the ground. Watched with fear-wide eyes as Halcyon walked over to him and drove both talons into his skull with one forceful, piercing thrust. Those eyes finally closed as Halcyon cracked open the thick bone of Kadeen's skull several inches to reveal soft, wet brain and oozing cerebral fluid. Just as I was breathing out a sigh of relief, those terrible eyes flashed open once more in awful awareness.
Halcyon tipped back his head and released a blood-curdling howl. Fierce, joyous baying answered in the distance unearthly cries that made my skin want to detach itself from off my flesh and crawl away just to escape whatever was coming.
"Feed him to the Hell hounds," Halcyon ordered. His rough, gravelly voice, a hoarse parody of his usual smooth, cultured tone, made me flinch. And that one involuntary ripple of movement from me tore away Halcyon's cool facade and revealed the seething emotions within. Hot, burning rage poured out from Halcyon in roiling waves until the very air quivered. His flaming eyes burned so hotly it seemed as if they would surely sear flesh. The other demons seemed to think so as well. They faded away, all but two males who quickly gathered up all of Kadeen's many parts and hurriedly took them off into the woods, as if they too could not wait to escape their prince's wrath.
Halcyon walked to me and knelt down, so close and so big that I felt like a small, fragile doll beside him. The chains that I had not been able to free myself from looked ridiculously tiny in his hands. Hands that spanned more than three times the length of mine.
With one yank, Halcyon snapped the chains easily and removed the manacles, his big hands accomplishing the task with unexpected gentleness. I was free, but couldn't seem to move. His red eyes, set deep in that beastly face, touched upon my torn and swollen neck, my bruised and bloodied breast, moving slowly down my body, reminding me vividly aware once more of my nakedness.
I closed my eyes, unable to do anything else. A moment later, I felt silk touch my skin. I opened my eyes to find Halcyon's shirt covering me.
I sat up and flung myself against Halcyon, hot tears roiling down my face. "I am sick of men stripping away my clothes and chaining me up," I said fiercely, my face buried against the hard ridges of his abdomen.
Halcyon took a deep breath and shuddered. Energy prickled my skin. As Halcyon changed back, shrinking once more to normal size, I found myself held against his chest, my eyes level with his throat now. I gazed up into black midnight eyes, into Halcyon's dear familiar face. He lifted me into his arms and I was never so aware of man's greater strength.
He carried me out of the courtyard and I had a brief impression of entering an ancient dark fortress that seemed to reach for the sky. I glimpsed a few startled, tanned faces. His servants, no doubt.
Wrapping my arms around Halcyon's neck, I pressed into him, needing the contact, the security, unable to stop my body's tremors.
Ascending a flight of stairs, Halcyon brought me to a rich, comfortable chamber and lay me down on cool linen, disappearing for a moment. When he returned, he wore clean clothing. The blood that had covered him was gone. He held two wet washcloths in his hands. One he gently pressed against the torn flesh on my neck. With the other, he slowly and methodically cleaned my face, wiping off Amber's blood. He carefully washed my raw wrists and ankles, even my breasts, as efficiently as any nurse. When Halcyon was finished, he slid me into a clean silk shirt that smelled faintly of him.
"Where are we?" I asked.
"In my private chambers," Halcyon said, sitting on the edge of the bed.
"He staked me out in front of your own house." I snorted. "He certainly had balls."
"No longer," Halcyon said coldly.
I shivered, remembering the unearthly baying of the Hell hounds.
"I am sorry you had to see that," Halcyon said quietly.
"No. I know you had to set an example. To let others see what they risked if they challenged you. And it's not as if I haven't cut parts off of men myself." My smile cracked and disappeared. "Just not quite to your thorough degree."
"I meant that I was sorry you had to see me in my other form." Halcyon kept his gaze averted. "You fear me now."
Monsters were we all, I thought, and so terribly fragile.
"It would be foolish not to fear demons," I replied softly.
"You did not fear me before."
"I was foolish. I did not know how incredibly strong and dangerous you were." I remembered Gryphon's trembling fear and anger when I had returned from the forest in Halcyon's company. Gryphon had known.
Halcyon's face was a carved golden mask, devoid of any living expression.
"But I trust you still not to harm me." I took Halcyon's unresisting hand, laid it against my face, and drew his long lethal nails gently down my skin.
Halcyon drew in a convulsive breath. His hand tightened against my face for a brief moment, an involuntary spasm, then relaxed.
Something changed. The room suddenly shimmered with sensuality. Halcyon's lips softened in a seductive smile, drawing my attention to them like an irresistible siren call. His lips were pure red carnality. His nails slid down the smooth uninjured side of my neck in a sensuous caress that seemed to touch more than just skin, going deeper, much deeper inside to secret places. Unbelievable pleasure slithered down my spine and loosened my knees.
I shuddered and drew carefully away from his touch. "I don't, however, trust you not to try and seduce me."
"And well you should not," Halcyon murmured, his voice a deep sensuous velvet that stroked all my senses. He bent over me, lowering those erotic red lips down.
"No," I said softly. The small hand I put up to his chest was no match against his greater strength, but he stopped.
"Why not?" he asked just as softly.
"I've given my heart already."
"To Gryphon."
"And Amber," I said in a low voice.
Halcyon's lips twisted. "Then why not me too?"
"I… just can't. I'd feel as if I were betraying them."
Halcyon lowered those tempting lips closer and whispered against my mouth, "I could make you not care."
I did not doubt that he had the ability to make true his words.