Her eyes roamed his chiseled features, his face perfect in repose. His arms, even after months asleep, still rippled with muscle. Despite his otherworldly beauty, the sight of him terrified her. Even unconscious and bound in iron chains, he exuded raw, dark power.
Clenching her jaw, she touched his hand, already feeling his dark magic flowing through her like waves of electricity. She slid the reaping pen into his enormous fingers, folding them around the pen until they loosely gripped it. She held the contract up to the pen’s nib, and in a haphazard scrawl, she scratched the letters B A E L. Bingo.
She had no idea if that counted as a legitimate signature, but it was at least worth a shot. He was immortal, so he shouldn’t care too much, but if he was pledged to Nyxobas, he’d surely want to reclaim his soul for his shadow god. And that meant he’d need to do what she wanted if he wanted to retrieve it.
Taking a steadying breath, she folded up the contract and shoved it into her pocket before drawing the kaiken dagger. Dread inched up her spine.
What she had to do next was even more horrifying than touching his hand.
According to the books, there was only one way to wake someone from Perrault’s Enchantment.
Tonight, Ursula would have to kiss the Sword of Nyxobas.
She clutched the dagger, her entire body rigid with tension, before exhaling slowly. I’ve got this. Surely demons like him were bestial creatures, and the scent of fear would only stoke his predatory instincts.
She leaned over him, somehow repelled and attracted at the same time to the shadowy tendrils of power coiling off his muscled body.
“Relax,” she reassured herself. “He’s bound in chains, and I’ve got his soul.” Still, she placed the tip of the dagger against the soft flesh between his ribs. If he attacked, it would take only one thrust to puncture his heart.
She leaned closer. He smelled of sandalwood, a scent both ancient and exotic. His eyelashes twitched. She almost jumped across the room, but then she realized it was her own nervous breath that had made them flutter. She eyed his lips. For a man made of pure muscle, they seemed oddly sensual.
Marshaling her resolve, she closed her eyes, leaning closer. Her heart threatened to gallop out of her chest as she pressed her lips against his warm, soft mouth.
Chapter 36
For a moment, nothing happened, then a powerful thrill rippled over her skin, and she jumped away from him.
Bael’s eyelids snapped open, and he surveyed her with glacial, pale eyes that sent raw fear snaking in her gut. Her pulse racing, Ursula’s grip tightened on the dagger.
His eyes flashed with ancient wrath; his voice rumbled through the room like thunder. “What did you do to me?”
She tried to stop herself from shaking. She couldn’t show him her fear or he’d find a way to rip through the chains and pulverize her. “We’ll get to that.”
“Who are you, little girl?” he barked. “Where is the other hound?”
“I’m Ursula. Henry is indisposed.” Probably best not to mention he’s been eviscerated just yet.
He narrowed his icy eyes, studying her. “Do you know with whom you speak?”
“Bael. Sword of Nyxobas.” Shit. Maybe he hates that name.
“Good. Now release me,” he growled.
“Sure. I can release you.”
When she didn’t move toward him he added, “Now.”
“I’ll release you after you tell me where I can find Nyxobas’s lair.”
The tendrils of dark magic swirled around him. “No.”
She raised the kaiken. “Abrax stole my friend’s soul, and I want it back. And he has another soul that belongs to me.”
His smile was a thing of terror. “Do you mean to threaten him with your little dagger, hound?”
“I have a sword.”
“Abrax is the Lord of Alnath, the eldest son of the Nyxobas. A little hound like you cannot stand against him.”
Holy hell. She’d felt pretty good with the sword tonight, but she was clearly way out of her depth. Still—she had no choice. Finding Abrax was the answer to every one of her problems.
“Henry was able to bind you pretty well.” She looked pointedly at the iron chains that wrapped round the demon. “For a mere mortal, he put you in quite the predicament.”
Bael yanked on his chains. “Fetch him for me.”
“That won’t be possible.” Her heart still thudded hard, but Bael at least seemed well contained by the chains. “He’s dead.”
“How?” Bael didn’t so much say the word as growl it.
“He was murdered.”
He closed his eyes, and took a long breath. For a moment, she almost thought he’d fallen back asleep—until he unleashed a roar that shook the entire building. It was a terrifying, bestial sound that threatened to tear her apart. She fought every instinct screaming at her to flee into the hall and down the elevator. When he glanced at her again, his eyes were black as night. “He was mine to kill. Who killed him?”
“I don’t know.”
“I will find the one who did it and rip his heart from his chest.”