The Lure of the Devil (The Demons' Muse #4) - Auryn Hadley Page 0,29

demons have been able to do what you want without worrying about who was watching. At worst, you fought each other, but that was mostly a case of who could do what first, right? Like, demons wanted to grow a population where angels wanted to harvest it, and maybe you fought over that, but you didn't have anyone saying to leave the midworlds the fuck alone, right?"

"Right..." Sam said.

"And now you fucking do!" I used both hands to point at myself. "Me. I'm Ayala. My mother named me that, and I am that thing. I mean, it's pretty much what I've been doing: saving the midworlds. I kicked the angels out of Vesdar. We're doing everything we can to help Tyrnigg. We left Earth so angels would too. Never mind that we just became the third side in this war. There's angels, demons, and us, right? So, maybe that's what I'm doing? I'm punishing the angels for getting out of hand, and the demons for being dicks - because I've done both."

"She kinda has," Bel agreed.

Nick casually leaned against the arm of his chair. "I thought you didn't want to be a weapon."

"I don't," I assured him. "I will if I have to, though. I'd much rather be the repercussion. Like a defense system. I mean, that's pretty much what we've been doing. They attack something, we defend it. We go in and lay the smack down so they can learn how to stop fucking up - or at least be prevented from hurting anyone else with their screw-ups."

Nick was just nodding. "Ok. And if that's the case, don't you think we should treat your power as something important?"

"Fine!" I groaned. "I'll wait a week before I do anything serious."

The look on his face softened. "And we'll spend the time planning how to rescue the slaves on Angelis, ok? I know this is important to you, and it doesn't matter what name anyone gives you or your abilities. You are still our Muse, and all I want is to take care of you."

"Nick, I can take care of myself."

He just shook his head. "No, dove. No one can take care of themselves. We all need a little help. That is what a legion is. It's the people you trust, who you know have your back. These guys pick me up when I need it, and I will pick them up when they do. Now, you're a part of that, so let us be protective? Let us worry. Let us spoil you so we don't worry."

I could only nod at him, because he had a point. "Ok. I'll try."

"Good." He smiled at me. "So, we need to figure out in what order this will have to happen. With the Angelis veil locked, that means most of us can't help on Angelis, so we'll need to crack those wards first."

"No," I said. "Nick, the first thing we need to do is figure out what we're going to do with the slaves, because there's no way I'm locking them in with the angels. That wouldn't really be punishment for the angels. The slaves would simply be forced to breed more, breed faster, and if they die in the process, they'd feed more trees. We have to get the slaves out or the whole thing is pointless."

"And where would we put them?" he asked.

I leaned back into Sam's chest. "Here, on Tyrnigg. There has to be an island somewhere that's isolated and uninhabited, right?"

Luke groaned. "Yeah. Fire Island. It's about the size of Hawaii, so could hold a few hundred thousand people easily."

"And then," I said, "we can sort them out. Pretty sure Phanuel owes us a favor, right? Think the Unaffiliated Angels of Vesdar would help do some mind-fucking? If the satyrs and humans can't remember where they were..."

"Only works for the ones not born on Angelis," Nick pointed out.

I pointed at myself. "Worked for me. Going to be a lot of cases of amnesia, though. Which means we'd need a way to explain it. Possibly even a pathogen, like some flu that would be easily treated and wiped out? I'm not sure about this since science isn't my best subject, but there has to be a way."

"You know," Ron said, "there's no reason that a new pathogen needs to cause amnesia. If it's only seen in patients with it, the scientists on Earth would assume it was a symptom, and yet no one else would suffer from it. We can make something