Beauty and the Beast (Demon Tales 1) Read Free Page B

her bruised wrists, as a ridiculously ill-timed bout of
shame washed over her body.
    “What do you want with a pathetic human,
Helki?” Brigg asked in a deep voice, so gravelly that Cally felt it
vibrate all the way to her very bones.
    Wait. Pathetic?
    “Wouldn’t you like to know,” her captor
taunted, laughing like an impertinent child.
    The hairy one—Brigg—stepped more fully into
the room. His eyes rooted on Cally. She felt like a mouse trapped
in a corner by a cat. He was paying little to no attention to
Helki, and for some strange reason, Cally was scared and excited by
this fact.
    Helki placed himself in the way of the
advancing beast, his dirty hand pressing hard on the Brigg’s
shirt-covered chest. But Brigg ignored Helki as if he were nothing.
Eyes the colour of chocolate pinned her, held her captive. Thought
fled her brain and her heart throbbed madly. Cally swallowed the
hard lump of fear lodged in her throat and considered what she
should do. The hilt of the knife turned warm in her fist. Cally was
wracked with indecision. Run? Or attack? Neither option seemed very
good.
    If she slashed out at Helki, as she had
planned, would the hairy one stop her? But if she didn’t react,
would she get this chance again—a weapon in hand and her legs free
to run? She doubted it.
    The hairy demon dropped his chocolate eyes
to her hands, a frown crossed his face.
    Had he seen the knife? A whiplash of oh
shit cracked in her mind, and Cally almost sagged with fear.
Then he gave a gentle, almost unseen, shake of his head—clearly
telling her no . Cally trembled with fright, but she knew she
had no option. A week she had been here, on the floor, weakened by
hunger and pain. She had been kept a prisoner too long to
successfully fight two demons. She must make a choice. Cally nodded
shakily in reply to the demon’s silent no .
    I won’t attack him. But the other…
    I have to. Adrenaline surged like a
raging bull through her insides. Desperation filled her body, and
tears burned her eyes. She surged forward and sunk the knife into
her stinking captor’s back. She cringed at the gruesome sound of
tearing skin and the sickening grinding feeling the bones made
against the blade. She had never, never done anything so abhorrent,
but she couldn’t bring herself to care about hurting the vile
demon.
    Roaring with animalistic pain, he spun, his
hands coming down around her throat faster that it took for her to
snatch in a breath. The horror of the situation fell against
Cally’s chest. Her captor’s teeth had grown—elongated—and his eyes
glowed bright red.
    Oh, God!
    His hands were too tight, throttling her
until her head pounded. Cally dropped the small knife, reached up
and gripped his wrists, but his arms were too strong for her to
budge. She tried to twist, to kick out, but nothing released the
pressure on her throat.
    “Helki, release her.” The big demon’s deep,
baritone voice sounded calm. Urgency flooded Cally’s heart, when
Helki didn’t respond to the calmly delivered order. Cally’s vision
began to swim, her chest burned to suck in some air.
    “Back the fuck off, Brigg!” No longer the
strange gnomish thing that the demon had been for the last few
days. No, now his face had stretched and changed. Bones jutted out
within his cheeks, making him look gaunt, giving the word sinister
a whole new meaning. “She’s mine, and I’ll do what the fuck I want
with her.”
    Black winked at the side of her vision, her
throat burned as if she had swallowed fire. Coupled with the
pressure, it was just too much to bear. Cally could literally feel
her life slip away. Her pulse-beats slowed under the attack, and
breathing became a thing of the past. She could no longer muster
the strength to fight, and her body hung heavy.
    Shifting her eyes away from her would-be
murderer, Cally sent a pleading look towards the hairy demon. Brown
eyes, like the darkest coffee, stared back. But unlike the hot
drink she saw nothing but