“Martha?” I asked.
Speechless.
The sharp-eyed owner of my beloved diner back in Portland blinked and flashed me a smile as she crossed her arms over her chest. “You must be having a mighty hard time without bacon or coffee in these parts,” she drawled. Her voice changing to that of the woman I’d known for over a decade. My throat constricted.
“I left you everything,” I whispered, stumbling back. The form of the old woman disappeared in an instant and it was again the blonde…Saraphine standing before me. This time her eyes weren’t quite so striking as a softness formed in them.
“You’re a kind girl and you take care of your own,” she said. “Let it be known I never doubted you would make it this far. I knew from the very first day you walked into my diner.”
“Me neither,” Hela agreed, though the expression on her face made it clear she didn’t often agree with this woman about much of anything.
“She’s always been destined for greatness,” not-Mere concurred.
“She was destined for something, I’ll agree with you there,” the banshee said around a mouthful of grapes. I lifted an eyebrow and she grinned fiercely, her form shifting before my eyes into…Joe…
“You gotta be fucking kidding me,” I said, mostly to myself. The middle-aged cop with the receding hairline and beer gut smiled tepidly.
“Did you really think we would let our sister’s daughter grow up alone?” he asked, shaking his head the way he used to. In a blink, the banshee reappeared with a rueful grin. “You’re smarter than that, Morningstar,” she said, mockingly using my last name the way Joe had during our frequent encounters.
I looked around the room at each of the women that had been involved without me knowing it throughout the span of my life. “I don’t know what to say to this,” I said honestly.
“Thank you, perhaps?” the banshee suggested, making Saraphine—Greed—roll her eyes.
“She’s in shock,” said not-Sadie.
I turned to Laran, not sure if it was anger or just surprise riding me when I said,” Did you know?”
“Who they were?” he asked, looking around them in shock. I nodded. “No,” he shook his head. “Never.”
“Of course not,” the banshee said and yawned. “We had to keep it from the likes of Lilith. You four really had no chance.” She examined her nails, looking quite proud of herself and reminding me a little too much of a certain other banshee. I swiveled to glance at Moira who was watching the she-demon at the table with narrowed eyes.
“You lot have been following her this entire time?” Moira asked all the sudden. The Sins looked her way and nodded. Not-Sadie’s lips thinned as if she knew where this was going. “Then you either suck at your job more than the four fuckers who brought us here, or you purposely turned the other way all those years because not a single goddamn time that she’s needed someone have any of you been there.”
Hela looked like she swallowed something sour, but the banshee—not-Joe who’s name I didn’t know—just dropped her legs to the floor with a heavy thump and rose to her feet, arms crossed over her. “You really think that she kept herself out of trouble with the law all those years? Possession? Assault? Arson, really? No charges ever pressed against her and she never saw a judge? And yet you came and paid a bail. And she always dealt with me. That’s not how any of that works. Don’t be so obtuse,” she chastised Moira, rolling her eyes before my best friend could respond. “Turned the other way? Please. If she’d kept her nose clean it would have made my job all that easier. I could have been sitting on my ass all day eating donuts while I glamored myself doing shit, but no. I was constantly overriding the damn files to get her off with nothing more than a slap on the wrist,” she groaned and leaned back against the table. “It was exhausting. I’m fucking glad to be back here.”
Well, at the very least that answered who she was. Only sloth would bitch about me causing more work for her when she had the least hands-on role of them all.
“Lazy,” not-Mere griped.
“Jealous,” the banshee smiled.
“Can we get to the fucking point?” Moira asked bluntly.
“The point,” the Sin of Sloth said, “is that we’ve been in the background all these years. Raising you without you knowing it was us. We watched over you, keeping away the worst of the monsters so that you would live long enough to one day be able to do it yourself.”
“But who are you?” I asked, an anger beginning to form inside the more I thought about it. They seemed taken aback, but how could they not realize that this wasn’t just a shock. No…it was a betrayal. I needed to know who they were—who exactly I was dealing with all those years.
“We’re the same people we’ve always been, Blue—”
“Who are you really?” I interrupted.
Hela sighed. “You already know I am the Sin of Wrath.”
“And you?” I asked the banshee.
“Sloth,” she answered. “But you can call me Ahnika.”
I looked at the nightmare. “Greed?” I asked.
Sadness emanated from her as she took me in and nodded once. “Call me Saraphine.” Her lips were pressed to hide a frown and the pinched corners of her cheeks showed her strain.
“And you?” I asked not-Sadie.
“Lamia,” the sweet-faced woman said. “Sin of Revelry.” She stroked the dark blue sapphire that hung from her neck with an admiration.
“Not Gluttony?” Moira asked.
“I am a glutton by nature, but my taste is for the finer things in life,” Lamia said. “You would like my realm,” she added. “I throw the best parties.”
“Like Satan you do,” not-Mere griped.
“No need to be a jealous ninny, Merula—”
“Envy?” I asked, cutting Lamia off entirely without apology. I didn’t have time for their bickering.
“In the flesh,” the woman who had raised me in my formative years answered.
I mentally counted down the Sins…
“There’s only five of you,” I said. Six sins. Everything had been very specific about this before. Not seven. Not five. Six. “Who is missing?”
They all seemed to share a look with each other without moving an inch, and regardless of who these women were to me, I froze. More fucking secrets?
I opened my mouth to say as much when a voice spoke and ice spread through my veins.
“I see you all started the party without me.”
Standing behind me was one of the last people I ever wanted to see again. In the blink of an eye I reacted, turning on my heel to slam my palm into her temple. She sidestepped easily, blocking my rebound and the following three blows I let loose after that. It was only when the shiny metal crossbow materialized on my arm with the bolt already cocked that her hand came up to grab my wrist, stopping me from letting it fly.
I let out a growl, but it was Laran that said, “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“Great question,” she said offhandedly. I moved to punch her with my other hand and she was forced to let go of the crossbow to sidestep the swing. I wasn’t a bad fighter by any means but going up against a several thousand-year-old opponent wasn’t exactly a recipe for winning if you played fair. I concentrated on her with all I had and snapped my wrist to fire. The rest was left to chance.
The bolt flew true, striking her chest cavity with enough force to break the bone. Sin took a step back and glowered. “Feel better yet?”
“Hmm,” I drawled sarcastically. “Three of my mates are missing and my soul was ripped in half, so I’m going to go with a solid no.” She sighed, wrenching the bolt from her chest. The site of her blood cooled my own some.
“At least they’re not dead,” she scoffed.
“No thanks to you!” I roared.
My fingers twitched and I felt it again, the makings of something stirring within me. Like an ember of power that if only I could grasp it, it might grow to an all-out flame. I reached for it, but the ember evaded me.
“Guys?” She cleared her throat, looking over my shoulder. “Can I get a little help here?”
“You’re lucky she doesn’t have more Hela in her,” Merula replied. Sin gave her a flat look and snapped her fingers. The bloody clothes were instantly replaced with clean ones.
“What is she doing here?” I demanded angrily. A growing unease was beginning to fill me.
There were five...now there are six.
“Ruby,” Hela sighed. “Meet your mother’s replacement. Sinumpa—the Deadly Sin of Lust.”
Chapter 17
I opened my mouth and closed it three times, trying to find the right words to say. That’s the thing, though—there weren’t any.
“Replacement?” I said softly, but my voice sounded hollow. Cold. “You mean to tell me that you replaced her with the bitch who got me and Laran killed?”
Again, the Sins looked between each other, but Sinumpa—she just watched me. Her eyes were slightly narrowed as they skated over me from the top of my head to my bare, dirty feet. “They didn’t replace anything,” she said.
“Oh?” I lifted both eyebrows. “They didn’t?” I scoffed callously. Bandit wound himself around me tightly. “Please tell me who exactly made you the Sin of Lust, then?”
Sinumpa let out a sigh and her shoulders dropped a fraction. “Your mother.”
“Bullshit.”
“Is it?” she asked, daring me to contradict her. “You were just a little babe when I found you both in Atlanta. Your mother knew the score. She still begged for me to spare you. Not her. You.” I swallowed hard because I hadn’t wanted to hear about my mother days ago and I didn’t want to hear it now. “She passed on her title to me so that I had the power to keep you hidden until it was time for you to be found. Did you know that?” She unbuttoned the top four buttons on her blouse and pushed the material aside. “Did you know that she branded me before she ordered me to kill her and mutilate her body so that my mother would believe she had been thoroughly interrogated and died during torture while refusing to give up where she hid you?” There on her skin was a deep magenta brand made up of swirling lines that overlapped each other. “Did you know that, Ruby? Did you—”
“I get the point,” I spat, biting the inside of my cheek. Bandit braced himself on my shoulder, baring his teeth at the Fae woman.
“No,” Sin continued. “I don’t think you do. The only way you can become the Sin of anything is if the last Sin passes on her brand and title to you. Lola gave me hers when I found you in Atlanta. I was the one that hid you before the rest of Lilith’s children came looking. I was the one that hunted down every monster that got too close so that the other five could watch over you without blowing their glamor. I was the one that kept you alive for twenty-three years, so don’t tell me you get the point.” At the end of her little speech I wasn’t left with an immense gratitude I assumed she expected I should be feeling.
My entire life had been a lie, but that wasn’t enough. Raising me to never know the truth was not sufficient. They had to lie to me about who they were as well. It made the time on Earth and the experiences I cherished feel cheap.
Deceived was not a strong enough word.
More like the ultimate betrayal.
“Was any of it real?” I asked. This time my tone was not cold. Nor was it burning. It was empty. Like the hole in my chest where my mates had been carved out from. “Or was it all just preparation to keep the heir alive, only for me to fail because no one told me a fucking thing?”
“We didn’t want to keep you in the dark,” Saraphine said. I didn’t want to call her Martha. She wasn’t. She never had been in the first place. Saraphine was a stranger—just like the face that looked back at me—and I preferred it that way. “But we all had our roles to play. Roles that were agreed upon before Lola died. Not even Lucifer knew that we had left and gone to you.”
“Why though? Why bother being there at all when you could have just brought me back to Hell, or sent the Horsemen sooner, or any number of things that wouldn’t have ended the way today did.” I lowered my head.
“You didn’t fail,” Hela said. “Today went exactly the way we’d expected it to go—with the exception of War almost being killed.” My neck cracked with how fast my head lifted to look her in the eye.
“You knew that was going to happen to me?”
“We planned for a great many things,” the banshee—Ahnika—said. She lifted the grapes high over her head, dropping them into her mouth one by one. “If you’d all take a seat, we might even be able to start at the beginning,” she continued lazily. She quirked an eyebrow as another grape fell, her teeth clanked together as she bit it in half mid-fall, the other slice toppling to the ground. She didn’t seem to notice.
I took a deep breath, glancing at Moira and how she had her arms crossed over her chest. Beside her, Jax looked torn between remaining there and splitting. He’d done his job after all. He’d gotten me to Inferna alive. Past him, Morvaen idled by the door, watching everything around her with narrowed eyes. She didn’t trust this place, and she was right for that. I still hadn’t figured out what we were going to do with her, but at the moment getting some answers and getting my Horsemen back were the top priority.
Laran came up beside me and squeezed my side gently, placing a scratchy kiss on my temple. It steadied me for what was to come, and I went to sit at the opposite end of the table from Ahnika.
I crossed my legs as I leaned into the soft cushioning. My right arm rested on the arm of the chair, curling upwards so that I could brace my chin on my closed fist. The crossbow remained cocked, jutting just far enough out that if I were to fire, the bolt should miss me and still fly true. I didn’t expect to need it. Hell, I didn’t think it would do much more than anger whoever I hit. I was without power, though, and this metal contraption gave me a piece of that back. I clung to it even as my fingers grew so cold, they felt numb. “You wanted to talk, so talk. From the beginning.”
Ahnika’s eyebrows bunched together for a moment before her feet dropped away and she leaned forward on her elbows, steepling her fingers. I had her attention now. “Alright, Baby Morningstar. From the beginning.”
She nodded once, and the other Sins took their seats. A calm settled over me as I tilted my head. Inside there was a Ruby that hurt. A Ruby that bled. I couldn’t afford to be her right now. I couldn’t afford to lose my head. There was no beast to balance me anymore, and for that I had to balance myself. Right now, that meant putting aside all my feelings, because feelings wouldn’t save anyone.
But the truth might.
And so, I listened.
Chapter 18
“In the beginning when Eden was new, a primordial of great power came into being. Her name was Genesis,” Ahnika began.
“I’ve already heard this story,” I sighed.
“You’ve heard Lilith’s version of this story, but she was barely a babe when Eden came to an end and Hell was born,” Hela answered. I closed my mouth and inclined my head for them to continue.
“Genesis was the primordial of creation. She created us first, Lola included, as the original six. We each held an aspect of her, and that feature became what we were known for as she created others. She divided our world into provinces and gave us each a piece, tasking us to watch it while she watched over us all, and for a time it was good.” Ahnika leaned forward and dropped the empty grapevine on the plate in front of her.
“And then Lucifer came,” Merula said. She pushed her silky black hair over one shoulder, her cherry red lips twisting in a grimace. “In a blaze of fire, the primordial of the flames tore a rift in the boundaries between the worlds. Genesis was smitten the very moment she’d seen him because Lucifer was the first being she hadn’t created. The attraction only grew the longer he remained, until it reached the point of obsession.” She curled her fingers, showing the blood red shade of her nails. “After his falling out with God, Lucifer would not find himself tied to one woman—”
“Because he had already done so for God,” Ahnika answered. “He gave her everything. His heart. His soul. They’d been created as equals—him the primordial of fire and her the primordial of light. A perfect harmonious pair…”
“She wanted more,” Hela said, taking over. “God wasn’t fulfilled by Lucifer’s love alone and decided that she would no longer be bound to one. She would be worshipped by many. A being above him,” she said. “A God.”
“Lucifer would not be tied down again after that,” Merula said. “This drove Genesis mad, and in her madness, she revolted in one final act of creation. She’d wanted real children so desperately she split herself in two—creating the Fae—while dooming her world.” She shook her head of dark hair with disapproval.
“The world started to break apart at the seams because Genesis had bonded to it,” Merula explained. “Primordials do not have to bond with a world, but if they do it vastly increases their power. And that planet, that realm they’ve bonded to, becomes dependent on the primordial to sustain life. If that primordial dies, the only true way to stop it from imploding was for another primordial to now do the same. Lucifer was our only option, contrary to what Lilith might have told you. Without him, Hell as we came to know it never would have existed because Eden—the world—would have died. Us along with it.”
“That’s not to say that your father was a saint,” Lamia chimed in. “He quite enjoyed the indulgences that being bonded to Hell earned him and he grew to be known as King. Lilith was only a baby when he bonded to the planet and your father took it upon himself to raise her and Eve. She grew up a selfish little twat thinking that she deserved to rule simply because she and Eve were born out of Genesis’s death. Much like her creator, she focused on the wrong things. Obsessing over her lack of primordial power instead of the very people that Lucifer gave her by making her one of us. She abused it. Dabbling in dark magic at terrible costs, all the while he refused to see her as anything but the sweet little girl that looked just like Genesis.” She rolled her eyes to the crystalline chandeliers above us. Her lips pursed as she looked directly at me. “Then Ragnarök came. A banshee of such great power that he didn’t just herald the death of those around him, but the end of the world. He foretold of a future where Hell would burn like it never had before. The borders between this world and any other’s Lucifer bridged would be set aflame. Billions of humans, demons, and even angels would die.”
Brimstone Nightmares (Queen of the Damned Book 4) Page 16
