The Lure of the Devil (The Demons' Muse #4) - Auryn Hadley Page 0,68

said a slave attacked his daughter in an attempt to get free. That's how we explained your sudden disappearance, so we kept your room the same, like most parents do when they lose a child. In truth, it was because we hoped that one day we could bring you back."

"How?" I asked. "I'd still be a Muse, and they would still want to destroy me."

She nodded. "I know, but I still hoped. It seems that even in Heaven we have foolish dreams."

Luke cleared his throat, pulling my attention back to what was happening in the next room. "Now, what's going on?" Uriel asked. "How are we extracting almost a hundred thousand slaves in a month?"

"Michael has ordered us to build a static gate to Earth," Eremiel said. "This will allow his assistant to move between the worlds and bring back the selected groups."

"Since it appears we won't be able to easily break through the veil on Vesdar," Chamuel added, "Michael wants to make sure that we have more than enough slaves to keep our society comfortable."

"Okay," Uriel said, dragging out the word in Angelic. "So humans, because there aren't enough fae left for a full-scale harvest. What do you need from me?"

"You are to shift slaves around so that we have more in the field making themselves useful, and the training and holding pens are all full. We know there won't be enough room, so you have to make at least one more facility, if not two."

"How big will these groups be?" Uriel asked.

"Large," Chamuel said. "Ideally, we would like to get them all at once."

And yet the way the angel said that made it clear even he thought it was unlikely. I might not understand the words, but once I heard Luke's translation, I looked at my friend. Our eyes met, and I knew he understood. Then Uriel said exactly what I was thinking.

"We cannot harvest a hundred thousand people from a single location!"

"It is not our place to make that decision," Chamuel told him. "It is also not our place to doubt his plans. For all we know, this could be nothing more than a distraction, just like the last one."

"And what was the last one supposed to accomplish?" Uriel wanted to know.

The other Angel chuckled at that. "Michael kidnapped the Muse. I saw him take her from the battlefield on Vesdar, but it seems he couldn't hold her."

"Or he is holding her," Chamuel countered. "You think he’d tell us that he had her? The power he could get from that creature would be unimaginable."

"Which," Eremiel said, "is why I don't think he has her. If he did, he would have no need for the slaves. He must be doing something a lot more worthwhile than destroying all the work we've put in so far." But the man ended that sentence a little too quickly, almost as if he regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth.

"Not that we doubt him," Chamuel told Uriel. "It's just that, in our experience, it tends to be easier to take small groups from many different locations rather than many from a single place."

"Well," Uriel said, starting to sound a little smug, "for me, it's easier if they come from one. That means one culture to deal with, one language to deal with, and one herd of them to go through. How you want to handle the situation on Earth doesn't really matter to me."

"How soon do you think a new facility could be ready?" Eremiel asked.

Uriel made another one of those thinking noises. "Definitely within the month. I'll need at least two weeks to do an inventory of the facilities we currently have. Probably another week to place the more recent intakes into plantations where they can be the most useful."

I couldn't help but shake my head at how easily Luke threw that word in the air. Now that I knew there was some disagreement about the word plantation, it stood out. So did the fact that Luke’s word was appropriate. In Earth history, plantations had been known for their slave labor. It was not a good thing, which proved that Luke hated slavery on this world just as much as I did, and he didn't have to actually say a thing.

"Then we will make sure you have at least that much time," Chamuel assured him. "I will tell Stieviel to have Michael make the necessary delays. Just know that if it is more than a month,