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promised them another village to raze, but there was no need to rush. There were many villages between tonight's camp and their final destination, and the destruction of all those villages would take place at the hands of his legion. In time.
    Soon the moon would rise. On the mountain which was now days behind him, Anwyn and Caradon alike would transform, as would those he had called to him who were no longer the creatures they had once been. He had been tempted to summon some of the mutated creatures to him for his army, but he was marching to Arthes, and in the capital city the creatures would be too far away from the mountains to be affected by their magic. No, they had their work there in the mountains, and he had his in Arthes. Another would lead them; that was as it should be, the demon told him.
    Ciro thought ahead to his return to Arthes. His father would be surprised to see him, he imagined. Surprised, and then dead. Once that was done, Ciro would be emperor. Taking the throne would not be the end of this journey. No, it would be the beginning. A wonderful, terrible beginning.
    Diella sauntered over to him with her hips swaying. She was proud of her new body but still annoyed with him for the scar he'd left on her new face. The scratch he'd left with his teeth—before the body had become hers—had become infected, and the scar would only grow worse as days passed. He was already tired of the former empress's demands and her complaints, but she had a purpose to serve still, and he could not dispatch her just yet, much as he wished to do so.
    "A few of the idiots who call themselves your Own have gone to fetch your supper from a nearby farmhouse."
    "I know." Ciro knew everything that happened with his army. He knew their thoughts, their fears, their desires. The Isen Demon had taken his soul first, and then he" had drawn in the souls of his Own. Those lost souls mingled with his and became something stronger than he had ever imagined possible. They became one with the Isen Demon, and Ciro's body housed the demon and all the power it possessed.
    "Why can't they bring me a man as well?" Diella complained.
    "You are surrounded by men."
    "I am surrounded by drooling idiots who don't care much for bathing or cleaning their teeth," she retorted.
    Diella's soul had been lost in Level Thirteen for many years, and now that she had a body to call her own, she was trying to sate more than forty years of need in a matter of days. Ciro was already tired of her attentions, and besides ... he was saving his seed for his beloved Rayne. The Isen Demon had promised Ciro that he and the woman of pure soul would produce a remarkable son.
    First he would take the throne, and then he would collect his beloved and they would make their special son. Some would call his son a monster, he knew, but Ciro didn't worry about such. His child's powers would be remarkable. Dark, malevolent, and remarkable. The very idea made him almost giddy with anticipation.
    He fondly remembered Rayne as he'd last seen her, chained to the wall of the basement of her father's house, begging to be released. If he took the drug Panwyr into his body, he could pretend Diella was Rayne, but he'd done so a few times, and while the physical release was real, it was not the same as having his beloved beneath him. What he felt under the influence of the drug was an illusion, a trick of his mind. No, he would prefer to save himself for his betrothed. He would wait for her. He would wait. She would make a fine empress, a fine mother to his child. Monster or not, she would love her child as a mother should.
    Two of his men approached, dragging a reluctant young woman between them. The girl was pretty enough, in spite of the tears on her cheeks, but Ciro studied her soul, not her face or her body. Even from this distance he could see that it was tarnished. He was not yet strong enough to take a pure soul, but he had only recently progressed to the point where he could take a