Demon Forged

scheduled to meet at the nearby Piazza Fiume shouldn’t have been here. Not in Rome. Less than a year ago, the nephilim had slaughtered every vampire within the city. The demons might still be here, hidden within the bodies of their human hosts and shielding their psychic scents.
    The nephilim still might be here . . . but they weren’t just demons, Irena reminded herself, and her amusement leached from her thoughts, leaving them sour and dark. The nephilim had come from Hell, but they hadn’t been created when Lucifer and his angel comrades had rebelled against Heaven and been transformed into demons. No, the nephilim were the offspring of Anaria and Zakril, two demon-spawned grigori who’d once called themselves Guardians.
    There were still other grigori who called themselves Guardians. Until a few weeks ago, Irena would have fought to the death for one of them: Michael—the first Guardian, and their leader.
    She would not die for him now.
    Michael hadn’t explained why he’d lied about his parentage for millennia, or why he’d written in the Scrolls that he’d been human before slaying the Chaos dragon. Not that an explanation was necessary. As the son of Belial and a human woman, Michael was half demon—and lies were as natural to demons as their scales and horns.
    Since she’d learned the truth, Irena couldn’t make herself trust or believe in him. Not while Belial’s blood ran through his veins.
    But although she’d lost faith in the Doyen, she was still a Guardian. Still believed that every demon and nosferatu needed killing, that humans—and some vampires—needed protecting. And she would have met with Deacon even if the vampire hadn’t been a friend.
    A friend, but not close enough to know what this part of Rome had meant to her. She’d never told Deacon that she remembered the walls when they hadn’t been ruins, and the gate that had opened Rome to the Via Salaria. This meeting and location had nothing to do with her past. And she could have avoided this road and the memories associated with it by flying directly to the piazza, but she’d wanted to be reminded of the changes in the city. She wanted the stink of exhaust burning her nostrils, rather than the stink of bodies, animals, and waste.
    And she’d wanted to see the metal. So much metal.
    Yes, she liked what had risen—and who had risen. Whether they lived here or were tourists fascinated by the past, humans experienced the same emotions they always had, but they governed those emotions differently. There were still too few with too much power, but despite the corruption at its foundation, the civilization that humanity had built was impressive.
    Impressive, but not perfect. There were always exceptions, large and small.
    On the sidewalk ahead of her, beside the entrance to a wine bar, a small exception slouched at a wrought iron table. His jacket and shirt were unbuttoned despite the crisp autumn evening, and a medallion winked from a bed of dark hair. Empty wine bottles stood next to an overflowing ashtray.
    His bleary eyes sharpened as they fixed on Irena. “Mi sento come un buon pompino. Quanto, puttana?”
    How much? She studied his face as she drew nearer, and dug into his emotions—arrogance, overblown machismo, a need to humiliate, a sharp loneliness—but she was unable to summon either pity or disgust.
    And she felt no surprise at his suggestion. No matter the century, there were always men like this. Men who would see the brief top she wore, the cling of the soft suede from her hips to her upper thighs beneath the belt and straps of her leather stockings, the face that had aroused a Roman senator before she’d reached her ninth summer and assume rights they didn’t have.
    At least this one offered to pay—and she’d known too many whores to be insulted when mistaken for one. She dismissed him, and her gaze moved on. Ahead, a fenced monument marked the Piazza Fiume.
    The human’s derisive command returned her attention to him.
    “Venite a succhiare il mio cazzo.” He cupped his crotch, jiggling his hand as if Irena were a horse and his balls a bag of oats. His mouth slid into a leer. “E si inghiottire troppo.”
    At that, Irena smiled. She would swallow—but only if she bit off a chunk first.
    She didn’t need to tell him so; her expression served as a reply. He dropped his gaze to his table.
    Cowed, but not quieted. Even if she hadn’t heard the word he muttered as she reached him, its shape was