Forfeit Souls (The Ennead Book 1) Read Free Page B

She needs her rest.”
    Demetrius bowed to Father and began to lead me away.
    “I want you to stay with her Demetrius. I trust that you will not harm her, but there are others here who are not as disciplined.” He glanced to his left and right before quickly returning his gaze to us.
    “It will be done.” Demetrius took my hand and whisked me from the large room.
    When we were in the hallway again, he loosened his grip on my hand, but did not let go until I looked down at it.
    “Why does Father think I need protection?” I asked. Demetrius seemed to be the only one that was willing to speak to me about anything important. Moreover, he was the only one, it seemed, that I would spend any time with.
    “I thought that he had spoken to you. I’m sorry that I was rude earlier.” He did not look at me during his apology, he kept face forward, his jaw set, looking down the hallway, but I could see the pained expression that covered it. “The people in that room are his… children, for lack of a better word.” His voice was very quiet, as though the walls had ears. Perhaps they did. This place was extremely loud. “They are unerringly loyal to him, but the way that he treats you is different. You are not one of his children so he should not express the same care for you as he does for them.”
    “He thinks one of them would want to harm me?” I asked, searching through the faces that I remembered vividly now. None had been happy about my presence, but I had not sensed any outright hostility.
    “At least one of them wants to be rid of you this second. The rest are simply untrusting. You scare them.” His answer was flat, emotionless. He stated fact, not opinion.
    “They are scared? Of me?” I laughed at the thought, it was once again that beautifully menacing laugh that was completely foreign to me.
    “You’re not one of them.” His tone was apologetic again. “Carla, at least, will never truly accept you – as she has never accepted me – but in time the others might.”
    “If you are not one of Father’s children, why are you here?”
    A small smile came to his lips then as though a fond memory had returned to him. “Father and I have simply been… friends, for lack of a better term… for a very long time.”
    “Why do you call him Father then?” I realized that my inquisitiveness was probably verging on rude, but, at the moment, I was more concerned with answers than I was with propriety.
    “It is the name he had given himself when I met him. Only Lilith calls him by his Christian name.” He said the word Christian with a derisive laugh.
    I didn’t say anything for a long moment. It was too easy to come up with questions, but I didn’t want to ask the wrong ones, and before I knew it, Demetrius was holding a door open in front of me.
    I stepped in assuming that it was the same room I had been in, and stopped when I saw the rows of books that were stacked on shelves that disappeared above my head into the darkness.
    “Are we in a library?” I asked without thinking. The enormous bed on the far wall told me that it was not.
    “No. This is my room.” Demetrius said curtly. “It will be safer for you here – easier for me to protect you.”
    “Oh.” I said as I looked at the massive space around me.
    It was easily three times the size of the room I had first been in, and was divided into four distinct sections. The area to my left appeared to be a study; the massive bookshelves were a backdrop to a large desk that was piled high with papers and notebooks. The bed was directly in front of me, designating the sleeping area, and the area to my right held a large seating area, a grouping of comfortable looking chairs and a sofa were arranged around a hearth that was ablaze. In the far corner, next to the fireplace was a massive black grand piano.
    “Father had anticipated that you would need somewhere safe to remain until you recover your full strength. That is why he decided that you should stay