Hunting Fiends for the Ill-Equipped (The Guild Codex Demonized #3) - Annette Marie
Chapter One
Adrenaline fired in my veins, intensifying my senses. My pulse throbbed in my ears, jumping nervously, and air rushed through my nose with each deliberately deep breath. Tension infused my muscles as I held my stare on my opponent.
Lounging on the opposite side of the coffee table, the demon watched me with softly glowing red eyes. The living room lamp bathed his warm skin, toffee brown with a reddish undertone, and his long, thin tail coiled across the carpet, the barbed end twitching.
On the table between us were two stacks of playing cards—and the prize. The plastic container held four fat cinnamon buns from a nearby bakery, the tops drizzled with white icing.
I shifted my attention to my cards: the two of hearts and the queen of spades. To win, I had to play both before my opponent could empty his hand.
Zylas flicked his two cards as he studied me.
Entertaining a demon wasn’t easy. He hated anything that involved a screen, and convincing him to try board or card games had been a losing battle—until I realized the missing ingredient. He didn’t want to play games. He wanted to win games, and winning wasn’t any fun without a prize to claim.
“It’s your turn,” I pointed out.
A corner of his mouth lifted, flashing a sharp canine. He brushed a finger across the top of his cards, then plucked one out and set it on the discard pile. The jack of hearts. He’d skipped my turn.
I gritted my teeth as he tossed down his last card, emptying his hand.
“Vh’renith,” he declared smugly. “I win.”
Clenching my jaw even tighter, I swept up the stock and discard piles. “That makes two wins for you, and two for me. The fifth will be the tiebreaker.”
“The next winner gets the food,” he agreed.
I shuffled the cards more thoroughly than necessary, just in case he’d come up with ways to cheat. He was a demon, so I couldn’t rule out the possibility.
“I did not cheat, drādah.”
“Stop reading my mind.”
“Stop yelling your thoughts at me.”
I froze in mid-shuffle. “Wait. You—” I gasped. “You are cheating! You can read my mind, so you know my cards and what I’m planning to do!”
He snorted. “I do not know your cards.”
“But you can read my mind, so that means—”
“I do not know your cards.”
At the hint of a growl in his voice, I snapped my mouth shut. Demons didn’t lie—and could detect lies when others spoke them—and he hated it when I suggested he was being untruthful.
I dealt the cards. “If you can hear my thoughts, why don’t you know my cards?”
He slid his off the coffee table and fanned them out. “If I heard every ka’an thing in your head, I would not be able to think.”
“What does ka’an mean?”
“Turn the first card.”
I flipped the top card off the stock to start the discard pile. “You know what I’m thinking all the time. You always notice when I …”
Trailing off with a blush, I cleared my throat and grabbed my cards.
“When you insult me in your head, na?” he asked slyly.
“See? You do know what I’m thinking.”
He dropped the two of diamonds on the discard pile. “Only what you want me to know.”
I plucked a pair of cards off the stock and organized my bulky hand, annoyed by his early advantage. “What do you mean, you only know what I want you to know?”
“Take your turn.”
I played the jack of diamonds—skipping his turn—then the ace of diamonds and ace of hearts. With that, we had an equal number of cards again. Much better.
He scanned his hand. “Why do you think I know everything in your head?”
Frowning over his question, I almost missed him play a card. His ability to read my mind was something I tried not to think about too hard, but I had noticed he didn’t react to my every thought. I’d assumed he was tuning me out so my inner dialogue wouldn’t drive him crazy.
I discarded a card onto the pile. “You always seem to know what I’m thinking.”
“Because I can hear you, or because I can guess?”
Guess? He couldn’t be guessing what I was thinking. “You respond to my thoughts as if I’m talking to you.”
“When you are thinking at me. Sometimes I hear other things, but I do not hear what you do not want me to know.”
My mouth dropped open.
“Take two cards, drādah.”
I looked down at the pile. A jack of hearts peeked out from behind a two of hearts. He had only three