Lore inhaled deeply, and his hand trembled a little as he raised the beer bottle to his lips and took another swig. “Revenant and Reaver estimate that half of the Resurrected from Sheoul-gra were killed in Azagoth’s war. The rest…” He smiled at his son, who was hightailing it toward the waves, Idess in close pursuit. That kid was like Forrest Gump. Always running. “Most of them are likely enjoying their second chance at life and aren’t focused on revenge.”
Revenant probably knew what he was talking about when it came to the numbers of Resurrected destroyed in Hell, given he was the king of the place. King until Satan was released from his prison, anyway.
But if Revenant or Lore really thought that demons who’d died horribly and then rotted in Sheoul-gra would forget their deaths and hellish afterlife, they were delusional.
That said, Tavin wouldn’t mind being in that same delusional boat. Instead, he found himself half-hoping and half-dreading the possibility that one particular formerly deceased female would come for him.
After learning that all souls in Sheoul-gra were re-embodied when it was destroyed, he’d searched for her himself, but so far, he’d come up empty-handed. He’d called in a couple of favors too, past associates who could get into Neethul society and dig around a little. But no one had found evidence that Gristlen was alive, let alone back with her psycho family.
Not that he’d expected anything different. She’d feared and despised her family, and there was no way she’d want to be part of it again. If she’d survived the big battle Azagoth had sent her into, she’d likely be laying low. She’d have spent the last couple of years doing everything she could to stay away from other Neethuls. Her kind and gentle nature was everything the species hated, and she’d been miserable with them.
Would she want revenge for what Tavin did to her? Was she even capable of it?
Of course, there was also a chance that she had been reincarnated into another species of demon before the day Azagoth went mad and released all demon souls into the bodies they’d died in. If that were the case, Gristlen was a young demon somewhere with no memories of her past lives. She could be any species, but probably, hopefully, one that matched her soul’s moral alignment.
He’d been convinced almost from the moment he’d met her that she’d been a good soul wrongly placed in the body of an extremely evil species, and he hoped she was finally in the right body and at peace.
He hoped that was the case because he was sure that peace wasn’t something he would ever find.
He didn’t deserve it.
Chapter 2
“Okay, ladies! It’s time to celebraaaate!”
Music blared, lights strobed and flashed, and male strippers exploded out from behind a curtain on the stage in front of Deja.
“Man, I love ladies’ night!” Deja’s Sora demon classmate and friend, Ronnie, raised her glass of bubbly, her crimson fingers and black-painted nails wrapped around the stem. “And graduation night. Let’s party, girls!”
A chorus of cheers rose as the twelve graduates of Underworld General Hospital’s nursing school, Class 7.04, downed their celebratory champagne.
Ronnie finished first. With a flourish, she stuck the flute onto her right horn and then used her tail to snare another from the nearby tray of full glasses. “One more of these suckers, and I’m going to join that guy right there.” She pointed to a totally ripped vampire kneeling at the edge of the stage and thrusting his hips at another classmate, Tonya. “Imma climb right into his thong.”
That was the difference between human and demon strip clubs. At demon clubs, you could touch. Lick. Suck. Whatever you wanted. Right there on stage.
“Don’t overdo it,” Tonya warned. “You don’t want to be hungover on our first day of work tomorrow.”
No, definitely not. The Seminus demons who ran Underworld General made it clear that, in exchange for free medical schooling, you were expected to show up for work on time and in good condition. And since getting close to one particular UG employee was key to her future plans, Deja wasn’t going to screw up by going in late or sick on her very first day.
Too much was riding on this job.
Chelanne, a svelte redhead with the lispy accent of her reptilian Gnarll demon people, came up behind Deja and wrapped her arms around her in a brief hug. “I’m ssso excited about work tomorrow. Did you get your assssignment?”
Deja nodded. “I drew second shift in the Emergency Department.”
“Ssseriously?” Chelanne squealed in delight. “It’sss what you wanted! I told you they gave the top graduate in the classss their pick of duty ssstationsss.”
Heat skimmed across Deja’s cheeks at the compliment. She’d worked hard to be at the top of her class, and not just because the ED was the choicest assignment. It was also where she’d most likely run into first responders. Paramedics.
Like Tavin.
“Where will you be working?”
Chelanne grinned. “I drew maternity. My sssecond choice after ED.”
“Ooh, that’s a good one. I think I’ll request maternity for my second rotation.” All new nurses were required to work in five different departments or disciplines before settling on a specialty and/or further schooling. They could also decide against a specialty and work on a rotating basis wherever the hospital or its London clinic needed their general skills.
Originally, Deja hadn’t thought much about choosing a career path. Her goal after being returned to a physical body following a decade in literal Hell had been to get a job at UG in order to seduce the bastard who had killed her and return the favor. She hadn’t thought about much beyond that.
But attending nursing school had altered her trajectory. First of all, she’d liked it. She’d truly enjoyed learning about medicine. And as she’d worked toward graduation, she’d grown to love her friends. She’d never really had any in her previous life.
As a Neethul living among her people, she’d been an outcast. A weirdo. The cowardly wuss who tried to save lives instead of taking them in the most painful and lingering ways possible.
No one had wanted to hang out with her, which had worked out fine since she couldn’t stomach any of them, either. She’d kept to herself as much as possible, going out into public only when forced by her parents or her duties. They’d constantly shoved her at suitable males, hoping one of them would take her off their hands. She’d been an embarrassment, and on days like this, she could almost think that Tavin had done her a favor by putting her out of that misery and giving her a second chance to be happy in another life.
Then she remembered that she’d loved him with all her heart, and he’d betrayed her in the worst way.
With her gray skin and silver hair, she might no longer look like a Neethul, but deep inside, the Neethul desire for violent revenge flowed like a swollen river.
She would kill Tavin. And she would also keep her job and her friends when it was over. That was The Plan, and she would stick to it.
“Come on,” Ronnie shouted over the roar of the music. “Let’s get on stage. Everyone is up there already!”
Yup, most of her graduating class was on the stage, gyrating against the half-dozen hard-bodied dancers, one of whom was female. Rowen and Eileen were all over that one.