The Demon's Song - By Kendra Leigh Castle Page 0,45

glanced back at her. “Trust me, that’s nothing.” Then he turned the knob and pulled the door open, revealing stairs that descended into darkness. Sofia felt the panic she’d been holding at bay beginning to rise, but Phenex didn’t seem concerned. She tried to think of that as a sign that she had nothing to worry about. Down there. In the deep, deep dark.

Oh, God. I’m doomed.

“Come on. Just stay right behind me. We keep it dark to discourage any nosy humans who might manage to find a way in.”

Sofia raised her eyebrows as she forced herself to accept the hand he offered, hoping he didn’t see how she hesitated. “You have humans who know how to bibbidi-bobbidi-boo the door open?”

“Not so far. But your kind is great at getting into things you shouldn’t.”

“Like me,” Sofia muttered, forcing herself to walk through the door and pull it shut behind her, plunging her into a blackness so deep that she couldn’t even see a hand waved an inch in front of her face. Phenex was unnervingly silent. Especially because his feet never seemed to make a sound. She couldn’t even hear his breathing. It was almost like being alone, except that she could feel him near her.

“Where does this go?” Sofia asked, her voice dropping to a whisper as they descended. It seemed like it would be a mistake to speak too loudly in this place.

“Basement.”

“Great,” she said flatly. In a place like this, who knew what might be in the basement?

He actually chuckled, a small thing, but reassuring. Sofia concentrated on his touch, on the strength of his presence. She had forgotten, probably because it had been years since she’d even had to deal with it, just how much she hated the dark. She’d spent a lot of time as a child hoping that her blankets served as both camouflage and armor, hiding her head beneath them to protect herself from whatever bogeyman was surely lurking in her closet. Or under her bed.

After what seemed like a long time, they got to the bottom of the stairs and another door. Phenex repeated the odd ritual with the handprint and the words, and when this door opened, Sofia was relieved that there was at least a faint light illuminating what was beyond.

Phenex led her quickly through the cavernous basement, which seemed to be full of things that might be used upstairs—spare furniture, boxes labeled “glassware,” speakers and linens, and other things covered in sheets. Nothing weird. And there was nothing that would seem to merit the security.

“Do the vampires sleep down here?” she asked, starting to look for the shapes of long boxes or coffins. Or maybe it worked like the book Dracula, and there was just a room with a dirt floor where the vampires would be mostly dead all day. Picturing it gave her the creeps. The vampires she’d met had seemed very much alive, but she had no idea how it worked.

“Nope.”

When he said nothing more, Sofia glared at his back.

“You’re a font of information, Phenex.”

“I know.”

She sighed heavily, but her irritation vanished quickly when she saw what looked like nothing more or less than a large hole, or maybe the entrance to a cave, in one wall of the basement. Stationed on either side of it was a pair of dangerous-looking vampires—in this case, the glowing red eyes were a dead giveaway. One was male, one was female, both were dressed in leather, and neither looked friendly. As she and Phenex approached, a group of five people strolled out of the hole, chattering as though there was nothing unusual about the way they’d arrived. Sofia noticed that they gave Phenex a wide berth once they spotted him. The female guard, on the other hand, grinned as soon as she recognized him. Her fangs glinted in the light.

“Hey. We were wondering where you’d gotten off to lately.”

She was pretty, Sofia noted. Actually, she was drop-dead gorgeous. And the way she was looking at Phenex was awfully…friendly. Sofia supposed it should be reassuring that, despite the fact that she’d nearly been killed by a demon less than an hour ago, she was still capable of petty jealousy. And knowing that it was stupid didn’t stop her stomach from twisting into knots, especially when Phenex was uncharacteristically friendly right back.

“Hey, Tania. Yeah, work’s keeping me busy. You know how it is.”

“Hell yeah.” Tania looked at Sofia, and her reddish eyes gave her a far cooler look. “Uh, you know that’s