Even if Saetth had dicked her over, she could find someone else for herself. Anyone else.
A male who was normal. Who knew what a phone app was. Who didn't accessorize with a battle-ax. Who wouldn't cringe to picture the kids they'd have together.
Abyssian squared his shoulders. "For as long as you are my wife, I vow to the Lore that the inhabitants of Sylvan are safe from my alliance. None will fall by a Morior's hand."
She drew back her head in disbelief. A vow to the Lore was unbreakable, yet she knew how badly he wanted to punish her kingdom. "Ah, I see, the master of trickery is playing with me. You'll figure some way out of your vow, and make me a victim of your games yet again. You're illustrating why I could never trust you!"
"The time for games has passed."
"You're . . . serious? Then this is coercion."
He shook his head. "A mutually beneficial arrangement."
If she was bound to Abyssian, Rune would have to back off.
Was she actually considering this marriage? How could she not when it would save her people and herself? "You'd vow to keep me safe from any threat to my life? Any at all?"
"Yes. I easily make that pledge."
Eventually he'd find out she was Magh's descendant. His vow would force him to protect her--even from Rune! "Maybe if you didn't demand sex--"
"Not an option," he said, tone unyielding.
"We aren't physically compatible. I'm too small compared to you." When he'd loomed over her in that glen . . . "You're well over a foot taller than I am. With your wings, you must have three times my weight, and you've got to be ten thousand times stronger."
He'd begun shaking his head before she'd even finished. "I promise you, we will be compatible."
Sex. With Abyssian Infernas. She ignored the spike in her pulse. "You said you wouldn't hurt me. Losing my virginity with you will hurt." Despite her new immortality.
And he'd need to bite her during the claiming. She recalled his reaction at dinner when she'd said she would accept a mate's bite. Abyssian had looked like he'd forgotten how to blink.
Perhaps in that past life, she--or Kari--had rejected the possibility. Lila had been truthful, though. If she were mated to a male she loved--and trusted--she would bare her neck, taking her medicine.
Loving and trusting Abyssian weren't in her future.
"I would be as gentle with you as possible."
Her lifelong aspiration to be Sylvan's queen faded from distant hope toward wistful memory. But if she kept the Morior from attacking her people, she could do more for them than any other ruler before.
Isn't sacrifice what queens do?
When she imagined Abyssian's ax raised against the Sylvan army . . . or one of Rune's arrows piercing her heart . . .
Dear gods, she was going to have to surrender to the king of hell.
Dear. Gods.
She'd wondered whether fate had some kind of cosmic plan in store for her. Lila's mind flashed to a memory of playing with her dolls, pretending they were her subjects in need of protection. Maybe she'd been reborn to sacrifice herself--damning herself to hell--for Sylvan.
"I will have your answer now," Abyssian said. "I understand you'll be giving up certain . . . things to live here. But through your actions, Sylvan will be spared for an eternity of eternities."
The exact phrase Nix had used.
Realization struck. This had all played out according to the Valkyrie's plan. That bitch.
I was a pawn to save Sylvan, in ways I never even suspected.
Had Saetth been in on the plan? She'd questioned why her fiance wouldn't simply order her assassination; maybe because he'd known she needed to be alive for this sacrifice? "Fine. I'll do it."
Abyssian exhaled, as if he'd been holding his breath. "Very good. Just so we understand each other: as my wife, you'll serve me in every way, doing my bidding."
Frustrations that had compounded all her life boiled to the surface. She met Abyssian's gaze. "I hate you."
In a lover's voice, he said, "And I you. That's why our marriage will work. Neither of us will expect anything more than pleasure between us."
Expediency was key.
Fearing Calliope would back out from their agreement, Sian hadn't even given her a chance to change her clothing for the wedding. He'd hastily teleported her into his empty court, appearing in front of the throne dais for the simple hand-fasting ceremony.
Her pupils had dilated to the size of coins.
Part of him was just as shocked. She agreed to wed me? Her decision made him grudgingly respect her more. Like Kari, Calliope was nothing if not loyal.
The marriage rite was straightforward. He would wrap a sacred tie of leather made from the hide of the last Lotan around their clasped hands as they repeated vows.
He asked her, "Are you ready?" He'd told her what she would say, a basic pledge of self.
She hesitated, then nodded.
Curling his finger under her chin, he lifted her face. Brows drawn, she bit her bottom lip.
What he wouldn't give to know her thoughts now. As he gazed down at her, the millennia faded away until he felt as if he'd held her in his arms just yesterday at a dance in Sylvan.
"What are you contemplating, Calliope?" he asked, though he suspected she'd never answer.
She surprised him by saying, "How I will live without everything I'm giving up."
The idea of her pining for her fiance sent Sian's jealousy skyrocketing. "You'll simply have to find other things to satisfy you." He would make her forget that prick if it killed him.
"I won't hold my breath." Gesturing at her filthy dress, she said, "Not exactly how I imagined my wedding. But this is just how I would imagine yours."
He supposed young females cared about such things. "Perhaps if you please me as a wife, I will grant you a more formal coronation."
"Be still, my beating heart. You're really sweeping me off my feet, demon."
Undaunted, he conjured the Lotan tie, then took her hand. As he wrapped the binding around his wrist, then hers, Calliope's gaze rested on his long claws. Their hands looked as mismatched as the rest of their bodies.
Yet fate said she was the only female with whom he could feel complete.
When he retracted his claws, her attention shifted to his wings, then to his fangs, then his horns. His mate was sizing him up, no doubt wondering how they would be together sexually.
Her behavior struck him as heartening. The real problem would be if she refused to look at him at all.
He'd asked himself what Gourlav had been thinking to imagine a future with a beauty. Wouldn't Gourlav ask him the same?
Sian didn't care. For lifetimes, he'd dreamed about what could have been with this female. For better or for worse, he had to know.
TWENTY-NINE
Deja vu hit Lila the second they'd appeared in this throne room. Had she seen this place in a dream? How could she have? She'd never been here before.
Shaking off that odd sense, she focused on getting through this wedding. Her wedding.
She had yearned for control over her life--yet she was about to have less of it than ever before. She would be under the thumb of a dominant demon.
Who was an enemy.
She doubted an immortal as old as Abyssian held modern marriage views. Talk about a male set in his ways.
But she'd secured a measure of protection for her people. She needed to take comfort in that.
She wondered what Saetth would do when he found out she'd married Abyssian. Nix would no doubt tell him--especially if they'd been in league for that portion of the plot. . . .
Abyssian began his vows. In his deep, accented voice, he promised to treasure and protect her.
She tensed when a marble throne started to materialize on the dais beside his. Was the castle providing it for her?
Once the demon concluded, he gave her hand a squeeze.
Oh. My turn.
She delicately cleared her throat and recited her vows. As she finished--"This I promise until the end of time"--her throne appeared fully.
Engravings marked the back of it. She skimmed some of the Demonish words: Mistress of this castle, lady of flames, dark queen of this land.
Fate had always wanted her to be a queen.
Memories of hard-won political lessons from her childhood surfaced. Here she would be hated by a united populace--just because of her species. She'd probably have more than Rune to worry about.
"I'm to kiss you now," Abyssian said, leaning down.
She averted her face.
He didn't complain, just pulled her against his body and grazed his lips over her cheek.
There. They'd done it.
Her ears twitched when hounds howled from the brush. Lightning flared outside, and volcanoes rumbled.
The dimension seemed to go askew. Her skin grew even more hypersensitive; chills raced over it.
In those lightning bursts, Abyssian's features appeared more demonic. Something was happening here--much more than a wedding.
Yet he didn't behave as if anything was different.
Lila sensed that hell was happy about the marriage. She felt as if this realm was . . . welcoming her.
Crazy, right?
She'd been so busy concentrating on her new groom that she hadn't given much thought to the other aspects of this union. She would be making her home in a land that was as fierce as it was mystical.
For an eternity of eternities.
He drew back. "You are now Queen Calliope the first, of Pandemonia and All Hells." Thunder boomed, and the castle quaked.
Too much to process. I turned immortal. I got off with a demon. Did I really just get hitched to a Morior? How could someone like me be the queen of hell? Don't have anyone I can talk to about this.