Beautiful Salvation by Jennifer Blackstream Read Free Book Online Page A

Aiyana from her sleep and save his kingdom.
     
    “There was a time the people thought sacrificing a virgin was a good way to curry favor with an incubus.”
     
    Saamal paused. It took him a moment to shift his thoughts and follow Adonis’ new line of conversation. “Indeed?”
     
    Adonis rolled his eyes. “Ridiculous, right? Why on earth would an incubus be pleased to see a perfectly good virgin—”
     
    “Get to the point, Adonis.” Etienne crossed his arms.
     
    “We can talk about sacrifice later,” Adonis finished. “But we will talk about it later?”
     
    “Is it your intention to tell me how to run my kingdom, Adonis?” Saamal kept his voice calm. The demon knew nothing about this kingdom, nothing about what it took, what it had taken… There’d been a time he would have killed Adonis for questioning him. Fortunately for the demon, a century of forced humility had taught Saamal restraint.
     
    “You know me better than to think I want to tell you how to run your kingdom.” Adonis’ face hardened. “But if you’re talking about human sacrifice…” He stopped, pursed his lips. “Some things are not acceptable. If Kirill is right, and whatever Eurydice has planned is going to keep us in each other’s lives, then I need to know what sort of person you are before we go on.” He glanced at the castle for a long moment. “I’m willing to put the conversation off until we can make sure Aiyana is safe. But after that…”
     
    The image of Aiyana lying in her bed, still as death even after a century, moved Saamal to incline his head, his eyes still locked on Adonis’. “We will talk later.”
     
    Etienne furrowed his eyebrows. “If a sacrifice is needed to keep the land healthy, and the king is no longer able to lead the sacrifice, then why don’t you perform them yourself?”
     
    Saamal stiffened, then reminded himself that though Etienne was perhaps a little more familiar with the flesh and blood aspect of existence, he was painfully unfamiliar with the divine. “A sacrifice is offered to gods, not by gods. If gods were to sacrifice to themselves, the sacrifice would have no meaning, no power. It would be murder, not sacrifice.”
     
    Adonis opened his mouth, then closed it as if thinking better of what he’d been about to say. Etienne remained silent, appearing to be mulling over Saamal’s words. Saamal took advantage of the silence. He left his companions to their thoughts as he closed his eyes and opened his senses, listening without his ears to the wheeze of the wind. Though the air no longer answered to him as it once did, he could still hear its voice, gather information from its swells. The breeze ran invisible fingers through his hair, swirled around his head, breathing words into his ears in a language that had him aching for a simpler time. He clenched his teeth, forcing his mind to the present. There was nothing new to learn, nothing that had happened in his absence. Everything was silent.
     
    A sudden growl from behind him prompted Saamal to open his eyes. He found Etienne staring off into the beginning of the maze of briars that surrounded the palace. His eyes had bled to the golden amber of his wolf and the sound trickling out of his throat had the hair on the back of Saamal’s neck standing up. The werewolf hunched over, the muscles of his arms and back swelling, stopping short of growing fur and moving him from human to half beast. He took a step in the direction of the brush and bared glistening canines at the darkness.
     
    Adonis crouched slightly, rising onto the balls of his feet and scanning the environment with eyes that had bled to hellish crimson though he remained solidly in human form. “What is it?”
     
    “Predator.” Etienne’s voice was thick, a low, gravelly sound that was more animal than human.
     
    Familiar spirits danced in Saamal’s awareness, so familiar they were more an extension of his own consciousness. He held up a placating hand to his