House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1) by Sarah J. Maas

She said tightly, “Do you know, though? Or know who summoned it?”

His golden lashes shimmered as he blinked. “You believe I dispatched it?”

“You would not be standing there if I did.”

Aidas laughed softly. “No tears from you this time.”

Bryce smiled slightly. “You told me not to let them see me cry. I took the advice to heart.”

What the Hel had gone on during that meeting twelve years ago?

“Information is not free.”

“What is your price?” A bluish tint crept over her lips. They’d have to cut the connection soon.

Hunt kept perfectly still as Aidas studied her. Then his eyes registered Hunt.

He blinked—once. As if he had not really marked his presence until this moment. As if he hadn’t cared to notice, with Bryce before him. Hunt tucked away that fact, just as Aidas murmured, “Who are you.”

A command.

“He’s eye candy,” Bryce said, looping her arm through Hunt’s and pressing close. For warmth or steadiness, he didn’t know. She was shaking. “And he is not for sale.” She pointed to the halo across Hunt’s brow.

“My pets like to rip out feathers—it would be a good trade.”

Hunt leveled a stare at the prince. Bryce threw Hunt a sidelong glare, the effect of which was negated by her chattering teeth.

Aidas smiled, looking him over again. “A Fallen warrior with the power of …” Aidas’s groomed brows lifted in surprise. His blue opal eyes narrowed to slits—then simmered like the hottest flame. “What are you doing with a black crown around your brow?”

Hunt didn’t dare let his surprise at the question show. He’d never heard it called that before—a black crown. Halo, witch-ink, mark-of-shame, but never that.

Aidas looked between them now. Carefully. He didn’t bother to let Hunt answer his question before that awful smile returned. “The seven princes dwell in darkness and do not stir. We have no interest in your realm.”

“I’d believe it if you and your brethren hadn’t been rattling the Northern Rift for the past two decades,” Hunt said. “And if I hadn’t been cleaning up after it.”

Aidas sucked in a breath, as if tasting the air on which Hunt’s words had been delivered to him. “You do realize that it might not be my people? The Northern Rift opens to other places—other realms, yes, but other planets as well. What is Hel but a distant planet bound to yours by a ripple in space and time?”

“Hel is a planet?” Hunt’s brows lowered. Most of the demons he’d killed and dealt with hadn’t been able to or inclined to speak.

Aidas shrugged with one shoulder. “It is as real a place as Midgard, though most of us would have you believe it wasn’t.” The prince pointed to him. “Your kind, Fallen, were made in Midgard by the Asteri. But the Fae, the shifters, and many others came from their own worlds. The universe is massive. Some believe it has no end. Or that our universe might be one in a multitude, as bountiful as the stars in the sky or the sand on a beach.”

Bryce threw Hunt a look that told him she, too, was wondering what the Hel the demon prince was smoking in the Chasm. “You’re trying to distract us,” Bryce said, arms crossing. Hoarfrost crept across the floors. “You’re not rattling the Northern Rift?”

“The lesser princes do that—levels one through four,” Aidas said, head angling again. “Those of us in the true dark have no need or interest in sunshine. But even they did not send the kristallos. Our plans do not involve such things.”

Hunt growled, “Your kind wanted to live here, once upon a time. Why would that change?”

Aidas chuckled. “It is dreadfully amusing to hear the stories the Asteri have spun for you.” He smiled at Bryce. “What blinds an Oracle?”

All color leached from Bryce’s face at the mention of her visit to the Oracle. How Aidas knew about it, Hunt could only guess, but she countered, “What sort of cat visits an Oracle?”

“Winning first words.” Aidas slid his hands into his pockets again. “I did not know what you might prefer now that you are grown.” A smirk at Hunt. “But I may appear more like that, if it pleases you, Bryce Quinlan.”

“Better yet: don’t appear again at all,” Hunt said to the demon prince.

Bryce squeezed his arm. He stepped on her foot hard enough to get her to cut it out.

But Aidas chuckled. “Your temperature drops. I shall depart.”

“Please,” Bryce said. “Just tell me if you know what killed Danika. Please.”

A soft laugh. “Run the tests again. Find what is in-between.”

He began to fade, as if a phone call were indeed breaking up.

“Aidas,” she blurted, stepping right to the edge of their circle. Hunt fought the urge to tuck her to his side. Especially as darkness frayed the edges of Aidas’s body. “Thank you. For that day.”

The Prince of the Chasm paused, as if clinging to this world. “Make the Drop, Bryce Quinlan.” He flickered. “And find me when you are done.”

Aidas had nearly vanished into nothing when he added, the words a ghost slithering through the room, “The Oracle did not see. But I did.”

Silence pulsed in his wake as the room thawed, frost vanishing.