Astaroth shifted in his chair, trying to push the image of a nude Calladia out of his mind. “We had a bit of fun, that’s all.”
She scoffed. “That’s what you call hooking up with two of history’s most notorious schemers and murderers? Come on, drama queen. Give me the dirty details. Was it separately? Or like . . . at the same time?”
Astaroth might not know much these days, but he had a suspicion Calladia’s moral scruples wouldn’t stretch far enough to condone incestuous threesomes. “A gentleman doesn’t shag and tell,” he said in a dignified tone.
Calladia clapped a hand to her mouth. She was making a stuttering, high-pitched sound it took Astaroth a moment to identify as laughter. Her shoulders shook, and her eyes were bright with hilarity.
Astaroth was torn between fascination and annoyance. She laughed so infrequently, and never in these bubbly giggles, as light and intoxicating as champagne. But what was there to laugh about? His life was in shambles, and he’d just been clobbered upside the head—metaphorically this time—with details of his existence he didn’t know how to process.
“This isn’t funny,” he snapped.
“Oh, come on,” she said through her fingers. “You had a threesome with the Borgias!”
All right, maybe her morals did stretch that far. A good thing if she was going to spend more time around him, since more memories of hedonism would certainly follow.
Not that she was going to spend more time with him. This was a brief quest she had reluctantly embarked on due to some foolish notion of responsibility. Once her duty was carried out, she’d return to her life and leave him behind.
His chest ached at the thought. He rubbed his sternum, wondering if he’d cracked a rib somehow.
“Sorry,” Calladia said when Astaroth didn’t reply. She took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “I shouldn’t have laughed. I just can’t believe I’m hanging out with the sixteenth century’s most gutsy lothario.”
He scowled. “How did I not remember being a hybrid?” he blurted out. “Or being a member of the high council? I craved that bloody position for centuries, and now I can’t remember getting it?” His temple throbbed again, and he stabbed his plate with the fork, eliciting a loud metallic screech. “Lucifer, this is a disaster.”
“How is it a disaster? You’re remembering more and more every day.”
Astaroth made a frustrated sound and jabbed the plate again. “There aren’t many demon hybrids, and feelings about them have always been . . . complicated. Some of the most influential demons don’t consider them true demons at all, and there’s never been one in power before.”
“Until you,” Calladia said. “That has to be gratifying.”
It should be, but it wasn’t. “How, when I can’t remember gaining power? When I have no idea how or why I lost it? When I know if my secret gets out, I’ll never hold a position of influence again?” A thought seized him, accompanied by tendrils of icy dread that wrapped around his ribs. “What if they did find out, and that’s why I’m here?”
Saying half demons were controversial was just the start. While there were those who lived and thrived in the demon plane, albeit without much institutional support, others had been sent to live off-plane or disowned entirely. The ones who did remain tended to have more demonic traits, such as horns and immortality.
Hybrid minds are weak, someone had once told him, the sneering words echoing through history. How can we allow human frailty to shape demon society? Only the strong can lead the strong.
Who had said that? Moloch? Another demon?
Astaroth scraped his fork over the plate again, then jabbed the tines into the salmon repeatedly, wishing he had a sword and could murder something for real. Curse his rumbling stomach and his aching head. Curse his feeble brain, curse his human heritage and whatever weakness it had imparted to him, curse Moloch and the demon high council and the great, yawning expanse of the past that no doubt hid countless other nasty surprises. Curse the whole bloody universe!
“If they booted you out for that,” Calladia said, “then the high council needs to get with the times. They’re begging for a wrongful termination lawsuit on the basis of discrimination.”
“Americans and your lawsuits,” Astaroth groused. “Swords are more effective at conflict resolution.”
“Oh, yes, let’s promote a new era of tolerance by skewering people. Excellent choice.”