He was right. I straightened my shoulders, lifting my chin as I sniffled my last sniffle. Drake wasn’t excluding me because he wanted to—he’d always been proud of me as his mate, demanding I be at his side for everything. I was just giving in to my hormones, and that wasn’t going to help anyone. If I wanted things to change, I’d have to see to it myself. “You’re absolutely right. Dammit, I am a Guardian. I am a wyvern’s mate—we won’t go into whose right now because that’s all screwed up—but I am still a wyvern’s mate, and that’s important.”

Righteous indignation filled me, but it was a cleansing, energizing emotion.

“That’s better,” Uncle Damian nodded as I stormed over to the window and flung back the curtain.

“And I am a demon lord, one of the seven princes of Abaddon!” I yelled, spinning around to face him, shaking my fist to the ceiling. “As god is my witness, I’ll never go hungry again!”

“Eh…” Uncle Damian pursed his lips.

“Sorry. Got carried away with the moment. Jim, Traci! I summon thee!”

Both demons appeared before me just as Rene cracked open the door and peered in.

“Is everything all right? We heard yelling.”

“Come in and join the fun,” I said as he slowly came into the room, Nora on his heels. “Everything’s crap right now, but it’s about to get a whole lot better. I’m tired of the world spitting in my face! If people, dragons, demons, whatever else want to mess with me, if they think they have me cowed, they have another thing coming.”

Jim whistled, eyeing my uncle with obvious admiration. “I don’t know what you said to her, but you win my uncle-of-the-year vote. Look out, world, Aisling is back!”

“We’re going to start at the top and work down the list,” I said loudly, slamming my hand flat on the table. “Bastian will get my help when he needs it. Next up is the homage to Bael, and the proscription. I think two birds with one stone will suit us there. Traci, take an e-mail!”

“Take a what?” the demon asked, looking startled.

“E-mail.”

“My lord? If you wish to send a message, tradition dictates it be done via written document, sealed with blood, and sent by hand.”

“Yeah, well, I’m the demon lord who owns a software company, remember? We’ll use e-mail to contact every single one of my minions, all the demons in every legion. And the other demon lords—Bael excepted.”

“But that’s…that’s over a hundred thousand demons in your legions alone,” Traci said, gasping slightly.

“You can copy and paste,” I said kindly. “Tell my minions to wrap up the business concerns of the software company and to prepare for banishment to the Akasha.”

“What?” shrieked Traci.

Jim’s eyes widened. Rene looked as surprised as Nora. Uncle Damian almost cracked a smile.

“Then I want you to e-mail the other five demon lord princes—but not Bael—and tell them I want to meet with them to discuss the future of Abaddon.”

“The future…” Traci’s hand clutched its chest, as if it was having trouble breathing. It cleared its throat a couple of times before it continued. “What exactly do you wish me to tell the other lords?”

I smiled at my uncle. He nodded curtly. “Tell them I intend to overthrow Bael and take control of Abaddon myself.”

A loud whump! echoed around the room as Traci fainted dead away.

18

“This is insane, you know that, right? I think the dark power has warped your sense of what’s smart and what’s incredibly stupid.”

“On the contrary, I’m being proactive and taking charge of things, dammit. You like it when I do that,” I told Jim.

“I don’t like it when you go stomping off to prove something, and we end up in seriously hot water.”

“I always get you out before you actually boil.”

“Not always,” it answered, looking pointedly at its feet.

“Will you stop with the toes? You have enough of them left.”

“I am just surprised that Drake let you go,” Nora said as we approached our goal. “He has certainly changed since I have seen him last if he’s allowing you to meet with other dragons without him.”

“Oh, he hasn’t changed. He’s worse if anything, because of the baby. But he knows I’m protected.”

Her eyes shone brightly behind her glasses.

I grinned at her. “And there’s the fact that he is making me check in every half hour, in case something goes wrong.”

“A half hour? I’m amazed he let you get away with that long,” she answered.

“It started out at five minutes. We negotiated down to half an hour, but I only got that concession because he knows I won’t be alone.”

“I just hope you know what you’re doing coming here,” Jim warned.

“I think we’ll be all right. Fiat isn’t stupid—he has to know Drake is keeping a close eye on me, and besides, I’ve got a Guardian extraordinaire with me,” I answered, patting it on its head before pointing down the block to where a sign hung announcing a pub named Wyvern’s Nest. “There it is.”

Nora smiled. “Technically I’m only supposed to be helping you with the proscription situation, but in this case, what the Guild doesn’t know won’t hurt it. Although…Aisling, I have to say, I’m not certain that your plan in regard to Abaddon will go as you hope.”

“There’s no other option as far as I can see—I’ve got to make Bael realize that I’m going to be far more trouble than I’m worth without him actually wiping me off the face of the earth. So. What do we think?” I asked, as we stopped outside the pub. I tried to peer into the windows to see what was inside, but the interior was too dark.

“The word ‘doomed’ comes to mind,” Jim said, pouting just a little. “Also ‘scary’ and ‘feed the demon before it ruins this magnificent form.’ And lastly, ‘what are you thinking walking into such an obvious setup?’ but I expect you’re going to ignore that last bit.”

“Wrong. I’m going to ignore all of it.”

Jim sighed heavily as it shuffled forward to the door. “I’m gonna lose more toes, I just know it.”