The Warrior God (The Ares Trials #1) - Eliza Raine Page 0,30

my enthusiasm.

“Why do you seek this demon? Are you are here on Hades’ bidding?”

“Why we are here is none of your business. Tell me where the demon went,” Ares said.

“Was he alone?” I added quickly.

“You assume this demon is a he?” Pain smiled at me, and an uneasy feeling rippled down my spine. That smile held a malice that I didn’t possess. I was filled with anger and energy and a desire to physically feel the world around me, but I did not yearn for pain, nor to inflict it. This man however... It oozed from him.

“Answer the damned question!” shouted Ares, and Pain whirled to him.

“You are in my domain now, holy one, and your little show of power only served to confirm that you are indeed weak,” he hissed, the tower darkening around us. “My brothers will be here momentarily, and we shall decide together what to do with our once mighty leader. Until then I suggest you take a seat.” I felt movement behind me and glanced back to see two large wooden chairs appearing out of nowhere. I had my knife in my hand, though I had no recollection of taking it from my pocket, and my racing pulse was causing blood to pound in my ears.

“Bella, listen to me.” Zeeva’s voice in my head almost startled me into dropping my weapon. “This is Ares’ fight. It is Ares’ realm, his subjects, and his pride you face. If you want to find your friend, you must let him lead this.”

Every instinct in my body ached to throw myself at creepy, hot Aladdin. But her words rang so clear in my head they drowned out my other thoughts.

This was Ares’ fight.

I looked at the two men, Ares refusing to sit down and an epic stare-off in progress. She was right. I would be pissed if someone stole an important fight from me.

I slowly put my knife back in my pocket. I wanted to ask Zeeva where she was, but I couldn’t mind-speak like she could. I remembered her saying that I had to project my thoughts to her and folded my arms across my chest. With a pointed sigh, I sat down hard on the seat behind me. Both men broke eye-contact with each other to flick glances at me. I gave them a sarcastic smile.

“Don’t mind me,” I said. “Please, continue eye-fucking one another.” Ares bared his teeth, but they went back to staring at each other.

“Where are you?” I thought the question as hard as I could whilst holding an image of my stuck-up cat in my head.

“By the closest palm,” came a reply a moment later. Giving myself a mental high-five for managing to make contact, I scanned the pool fast, and saw a tiny flicker of a tail behind the nearest tropical tree.

“How’d you get in here?”

“I followed you. People do not notice small cats here. Listen to me. The Lords of War are powerful, each able to inflict the power they embody with so much as a look or a word. Do not goad Ares whilst in the presence of the Lords. It is extremely important that they do not realize his volatility. Do you understand me?”

“Gods, you sound like my old teachers,” I answered, rolling my eyes.

“Bella, do you understand me?” she repeated, her mental voice hard.

“Yes!”

“Good.”

The air before me began to shimmer, interrupting us, and with a flash of red two more men appeared. Two men who could not have looked more different from one another.

One was a similar stature to Pain, tall and slender, but instead of being dressed like an Arabian sultan, this guy was dressed like Robin Hood. He was wearing leafy green breeches, had a white linen shirt on that was also open to his navel, and tall leather boots. Sandy colored hair curled over his ears, and when he looked at me his green eyes shone with something just as dark and unsettling as I saw in Pain’s eyes. The third man... The third man was so striking that once I started looking at him, I couldn’t stop. He had no features at all. He was a humanoid mass of something solid; smooth and hard and mesmerizing. Whatever he was made of was covered in a marbling effect, black and white swirling and moving and blending over what I guessed was his skin. His blank face fixed first on me, then on Ares.

“My Lord,” a hissing voice issued from him, like nails dragged down a