Epilogue
Alekter was pleased.
No, he was beyond pleased. He was absolutely ecstatic. His plans were finally—finally—after so many millennia of hoping a searching, finally coming to fruition. When first his plan had come upon him, he had begun with simply magic. Centuries upon centuries of toying with spells, tweaking them here and there, only to have them explode (sometimes, quite literally) in his face. Years of research, of tracking down experts in the field of magic, only to have nothing come of it but the useless wasting of his time. It wasn’t until man, of all creatures, began working with and creating machinery that he finally realized what had been missing.
To think, humans had given him the only useful thing.
Even that fool Fontaine had been useless, though what he’d learned about controlling the shades was something he was able to incorporate into his plan.
What most people—supernaturals included—didn’t know, was that sorcerers weren’t just born from any old demon, oh no. A sorcerer was only born between the mating of a human and an upper level demon. And every so often, that sorcerer would inherit some of the abilities of said demon.
And as it turned out—his upper level demon mother was called the Mother of Shades. She was the source of all shades—very own little demon slave pets—and it was only by a stroke of sheer luck that he managed to inherit a portion of her ability to control them.
Granted, the constant effort required to control them was exhausting, and every so often one of them would break free from his control to wreak a little havoc on the shifters down below.
But that wouldn’t be a problem much longer. Not now that he’d found his precious phoenix shifter.
His skin tingled in delight as he imagined how quickly they would bring the world to its knees, his lovely little phoenix and him. He could almost feel the power of her fires, and his mind filled with images of her phoenix filling the machine, and all the wonderful, mindless shifter slaves it would produce.
He was downright giddy with joy.
Skipping a few steps, he made his way down the empty corridors of the castle he owned in the north of France. He’d gone to great lengths to hide it from any and all eyes, making it seem abandoned. Little did they know, he had filled it to the brim with supernaturals of all species for years. There was nothing much of it—after all, between himself and a bunch of shades, how much did they really need?—save for a few pieces of furniture and long table that served as his work station in what he called his lab.
He began to whistle as he approached the locked room at the end of a particularly long hallway, and, reaching out with his empty hand, he placed a single finger on the hole of the round lock holding the door in place.
A sharp prick bit into his finger before the lock released.
Another little trick he’d picked up from man—using DNA mixed with machines and a dab of magic. It was genius, if he did say so himself.
Which he did.
Pushing the door open, he continued whistling as he waved a hand, magically commanding the unlit torches to burst into flame.
Okay, yes, he was all about machinery these days, but he was also a sucker for tradition, and nothing screamed traditional world-conqueror like torches in a castle.
He smiled brightly at the limp form curled up in black vines on the floor at the far wall. Striding across the room, he leaned over the dark head of ragged hair.
“My, my. You don’t look so good, teacher.”
Dark eyes peered up at him through the shaggy hair, filled with hatred and loathing.
“Well that’s not way to look at your student, and future ruler. If I choose to let you live, which, as of yet, I remained undecided on.”
“Former.” The man on the floor rasped out of a tightening throat as the thorns along the black vines dug into his skin, creating little rivulets of blood that streamed down his neck.
“What was that?”
The man coughed harshly. “I said…former. You’re my former student.”
Alekter’s eye twitched. Reaching back as far as he could, he flung his hand forward, slapping the man so hard he flew back into the wall behind him. The sound of flesh hitting flesh, and then flesh hitting stone, was endlessly gratifying.
He would be lying if he said he didn’t get off on it.
“Now, Daromir. That was rude, opening up an old wound like that. You know how much your abandonment hurt me.”
“There was never anything to hurt. You’ve always been empty.”
Alekter rolled his eyes to the ceiling, very much like a parent trying to figure out how to deal with a wayward child. “You really shouldn’t be so cruel. Did you ever think that maybe it was you who made me this way? Maybe if you were more emotionally available, I’d have been different. Did you ever think of that?”
“No.”
Sighing heavily, Alekter crouched down in front of Daromir. “Of course not. Typical, selfish Daromir. Always thinking of yourself.”
Daromir remained silent.
“Doesn’t matter. Nothing you can say will bring me down from the pure joy I’m riding on. You see, I’ve finally found it. The missing piece to my most vexing puzzle. And to think, you had her hidden this whole time.”
Daromir’s shoulders stiffened, and he looked at Alekter for the first time with real fear.
“Ah, yes, that’s right. I found your little phoenix. Now, the real fun can begin. And you get to have a front row seat for the entire show.”
The End
Keep reading for the first chapter of Angel Eyes by D.S. O’Neill available now.