City of Thorns by C.N. Crawford

Chapter 3

We were sitting at the marble bar, with the night-dark sea glittering before us. I didn’t want to ruin the evening, and so I waved a hand. “Never mind. I want to hear more about your daily life. What’s it like?”

I could feel the tension leave the air again. “Fucking amazing,” Shai said. “I might do another year. Any chance you can get the tuition for next year?”

“I’m working on a few ideas for getting in.” Wildly illegal ideas at this point. “What’s your dorm like?”

“There’s a balcony and servants. Even the ocean is more beautiful there. It’s not like the Atlantic—it’s like this gorgeous tropical ocean made with magic. Okay, so the city has seven wards, each one associated with a demon. And the university buildings are organized the same way. I’m in Lucifer Hall, and it’s this enormous stone castle-like place.”

Even putting my vengeance plans aside, my jealousy was crippling. “How are your classes?”

“Amazing. They’re held in lecture halls that must be four hundred years old, with seats curved all around a stage.” She sighed. “I know, it’s a huge expense. But I wanted to learn magical arts, and you can’t exactly do that at Osborn State. Belial is the finest witchcraft institution for mortals. I’m desperate to stay another year.”

“What are the demons like?”

She ran her fingertip over the rim of her mojito. “Well, my classes are mostly with aspiring mortal witches, but there are a few demons, and the professors, obviously. They’re beautiful and intimidating as shit. Some of them have horns, but not all. I haven’t met anyone who seems particularly evil. At least, no one worse than Jack.” She turned and lifted her empty glass, motioning for the bartender to bring us another round, then swiveled back to me. “I’ve heard the king is evil—him and the Lord of Chaos. They’re both terrifying, but I’ve only seen them from a distance.”

My eyebrows shot up. “Okay, start with the king. What’s his deal?”

She leaned in conspiratorially. “King Cambriel only recently became king. He slaughtered his father, King Nergal, who’d ruled for hundreds of years. Cambriel cut off his dad’s head and stuck it on the gate to his palace.”

I shuddered. “That’s fucked up.”

“The only way a demon king can die is if his heir slaughters him, and Cambriel did just that. Now he’s apparently looking for a demon queen, and there’s all kinds of gossip about which female he might choose.”

As I finished my first mojito, the bartender brought over two more.

“And the women want to marry this guy with his dad’s head over his front gate?” I asked. “Sounds like quite a catch.”

“To the female demons, he is.” She slid one of the mojitos over to me. “And the Lord of Chaos is the other eligible bachelor in the city. He’s an outsider—a duke from the City of Serpents in England, so he was leader of a demon ward there. No one knows why he left, but obviously, it was a scandal. Dukes don’t normally leave their cities. But the most important thing is that he seems to be filthy rich.”

“If it was such a big scandal, how come no one knows the details?”

She stirred her drink with her little black straw. “There’s no communication between demon cities. Demons can arrive in a new city, but they can never speak about the old one. It was one of the conditions of surrender in the great demon wars years ago, sealed by magic. The Puritans thought that if demons spoke to each other, they could grow strong and rise up against the mortals again, so he can’t say a thing about the English demon city.”

“Wow.”

“So.” She leaned closer. “No one really knows anything about him. But here’s the scariest thing: on the rare occasion that a demon comes into a different city, they have to pass an initiation called the Infernal Trial. It’s supposed to prove that the demon gods have blessed the new arrival. I don’t want to say it’s barbaric because that sounds judgmental, but it is barbaric. In the City of Thorns, the way the Trial goes is that the demons have to run through the forest and try to kill the newcomer. Only those who survive can remain. Most of them die before they can be initiated, but the Lord of Chaos slaughtered fifty other demons. Obviously, all the women want to fuck him because he’s terrifying.”

I stared at her. “This is all legal?”

She shrugged. “Their city, their laws. They can’t kill humans without starting a war, but demons are fair game.”

This was fascinating.“What does the Lord of Chaos look like?”

“I’ve only seen him from a distance, but he’s shockingly beautiful. Like, fall-to-your-knees-before-him beautiful. He has silver hair, but not from age. It’s sort of otherworldly. And he has these stunning blue eyes, devastating cheekbones. He’s huge. I have a crush on him, and on a wrath demon named Legion. He has long black hair and these sexy-as-hell tattoos. Both of them are, like…stunning. Legion looked at me once—a smoldering look. Not even joking, I forgot to breathe.”

I leaned closer. “What about a star? Have you seen a five-pointed star on anyone’s head?”

A line formed between her brows. “What are you talking about?”

And there I was, back to my obsession—my mom’s murder.

I shook my head. “Never mind. I just heard a rumor about marks on demons’ foreheads. Might be bullshit.”

As the pizza arrived, I pulled off a slice for myself and slid it onto a small plate. It looked surprisingly good, even though it was vegan.

Shai drummed her fingernails on the counter. “Why do I get the feeling you’re always hiding things?”

“Some things are meant to be hidden.” My mouth was watering for the squash and garlic. I took a bite, and while the vegan cheese burned my mouth, it still tasted glorious. I wasn’t sure even the magically inspired food of the demon world could compete.

When I swallowed the hot bite, I asked, “Are you going to show me any of the healing magic you’ve been learning? If I have a headache, can you fix it?”

She wiped the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “I’m not ready yet. And anyway, I’m a veterinary student. I can’t treat humans.”

I pointed at her, feeling a bit tipsy now. “But if someone shot me in the shoulder, could you fix it with magic, or would you turn me into a cat or something?”

She shuddered. “Probably half-cat, half-human. It would be horrible.”

We went quiet for a while as we ate the rest of the pizza.

When we finished, I turned to look behind me and found that the club was starting to fill up.

“Are we going to dance?” asked Shai.

I was now two mojitos and a Guinness into the evening, and so I shouted something about it being my birthday as I took to the dance floor.

They were playing my favorite, Apashe. As the beat boomed over the club, I found myself losing myself in the music. I forgot my college loans, my disastrous presentation, the spiders that crawled over me when I slept. I forgot about Jack and the five-pointed star. I let go of my lust for revenge.

At least, I did so until the music went quiet and tension thickened the air.

Sometimes, you can sense danger before you feel it, and this was one of those moments. Darkness rippled through the bar, floating on a hot, dry breeze. I went still, disturbed to find that everyone was staring in the same direction with an expression of horror. Goosebumps rose on my arms. The warmth felt unnatural, disturbing. I didn’t want to turn around.

When I finally did, my stomach swooped. There, in the doorway, was a demon with otherworldly silver hair and eyes like flecks of ice. The Lord of Chaos? His size and breathtaking beauty almost made me dizzy. He looked like a freaking god.

Maybe it was the mojitos, maybe it was his stunning physical perfection, but I felt magnetically drawn to him. I wanted to slide up closer to him and press myself against his muscular body. As I stared at him, my heart started to pound faster.

Divine.His silver hair hung down to heartbreakingly sharp cheekbones. He sported a high-collared black coat that hung open. Under his jacket, he wore a thin gray sweater that showed off a muscular body. It looked soft, but I could tell the abs beneath it were rock hard. I found my pulse racing as I thought of running my fingers over the material and feeling his muscles twitch.

I’d never enjoyed sex—not once in my life. But as I looked at him, I thought there was a man who could actually satisfy me.

I clamped my eyes shut. Wait, what the fuck was wrong with me? He wasn’t even human. He was another species, one that used to eat humans.

But when I opened my eyes again, I felt like I was melting. In contrast to his pale blue eyes, his eyebrows were dark as night. The effect seemed shocking, mesmerizing.

But when he slid those pale eyes to me, an icy tendril of fear curled through me. His fingers tightened into fists, and he lowered his chin like he was about to charge at me.

I froze. My heart started beating faster now for an entirely different reason. I had his attention, but not in a good way.

This was a look of pure, unadulterated loathing, a look of palpable hatred that sent alarm bells ringing in my mind. He hated me.

Holy hell.

What did he think I’d done to him?