by Olivia Ash
Kaiser crossed his arms. “I’m not leaving until you tell us what the hell you were doing in the south wing, Sadie.”
The other three stood their ground, waiting for an answer.
“Fine.” She sat down on her bed and motioned to the numerous chairs in her chamber. “Sit down, then.”
When the princes had made themselves comfortable, Sadie crossed her legs and began talking. “I’ve known about Hecate for a while now, and I didn’t tell you because I was only going to choose one ally.”
All their lips seemed to be uniformly set in a grim line.
She continued. “I have the mageblades now, and all I got to do is find Mara. I figured Hecate could help with that.”
Kaiser snorted. “Well, we found out how that went, didn’t we?”
“Yes, we did,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Now, you know what I was doing there. Happy?”
“And what are you planning to do if your plan worked and you found out where Mara is?” Damien asked.
“Then I guess I’ll set out and find her.”
“All by yourself?”
“Of course, it’s my fight,” she said, jutting her chin out a little bit.
Kaiser sighed. “We know and admit that you’re powerful, Sadie. But Mara is dangerous. She could legitimately kill you.”
“That’s a possibility. But I’m ready to do whatever it takes to kill Mara.” She looked each of them in the eye to show them that she meant it. “For my sister.”
The four of them sat or stood straighter, and they collectively growled at her, loudly declaring their protests over each other’s voices.
“You can’t just say that,” Damien said.
“You’re not going anywhere by yourself,” Kaiser said.
“I’ll just shift to shadow, find her, and kill her myself,” Mordecai said.
It became so obvious that they were all related. She groaned and stood up. “Stop it!”
To make sure they listened, she raised her arms to the side and let fire flare in her arms for a second before extinguishing it. They shut their mouths.
“Don’t you realize you’re all so… so…” She scrunched her nose. “Annoying!”
They didn’t answer, only simultaneously looked at each other and grumbled to themselves.
At last, Damien sighed. He was the first one to realize their berating wasn’t doing any good. “I guess she’s right,” he said, dropping his arms to his side. Maybe were just stressing her out a little bit.”
“A little bit?” she asked, placing her hands on her hips.
“Fine. A lot,” he said. He faced his brothers. “And I assume none of you want to leave this room, so why don’t we just come up with a plan. We can scold her all we want, but we all know we won’t win.”
Steele muttered under his breath, “Which is unfair.”
“I heard that,” she said.
Steele winked at her.
She just shook her head and faced Damien. “Thank you.”
Mordecai got up from her bed. He walked to a chair, flipped it around and sat, resting his arms on the backrest. “What’s the plan then, Captain?”
She shrugged. “I’m not really sure. I’m out of ideas.”
“Mara lives in the Vale,” Kaiser said. “How about we make a portal to get there?”
Steele placed an ankle over his knee and leaned back on the couch. “Well, has anyone ever been to the Vale?” He looked at his brothers, but they only gave him blank stares. “I see. So, no one’s really been there. But there are maps somewhere. I guess, we just have to learn the geography.”
“Right,” Damien said. “We’d definitely have the element of surprise on our side, assuming Mara isn’t expecting us. But how do we find her, exactly?”
Steele scratched the back of his head. “That’s—a big hole in the plan.”
“I can scout the area and find her,” Mordecai said in suggestion.
“That could work,” Kaiser said. “And if she finds us first, we could handle her. Especially with two mageblades.”
“Right. There’s that,” Mordecai said. “Now that you brought it up, we have two mageblades. Sadie gets the first one, of course, but who gets the second one?”
“I think Kaiser should hold it,” Damien said. “He’s the fastest among the four of us and would reach Sadie first if something did happen.”
Steele and Mordecai agreed.
Sadie listened to them with a fixed gaze, marveling at the way they strategized together. They all talked so amiably toward each other. She hoped it was always like this between them.
“That’s assuming Mara would be anywhere in the Vale,” Mordecai said. “What if she was near here? Or in the human world? We’ll only be wasting our time if we teleport to the Vale blindly.”
Kaiser shrugged. “Well, so far, it’s better than nothing.”
Damien rubbed his chin with his fingers. “That’s actually very possible. The night I met with a spy to procure for me the location of the mageblades, I saw shadows shifting in the forest. I thought it was just me, but the imp mentioned he had seen it too. It could be Mara or a scout she sent.”
Sadie piped up. “If that’s the case, I think I should be bait.”
“No,” Kaiser said. “Out of the question.”
She rolled her eyes. “What? It’s easy enough. And it makes sense.”
“You’re not doing it.”
“Well, you’re not the boss of me. Besides, Mara’s cunning. She definitely has a scout out there somewhere just observing the fortress if she’s not doing it herself. She would have eyes on me.”
“You’re probably right, Sadie.” Damien grimaced. “But let’s brainstorm some more. We’ll think of a better idea.”
Sadie shook her head. “Think about it. If, and I think it very likely, Mara has eyes on the fortress, or if she’s around here somewhere, she’s not going to come out unless she thinks she has the upper hand.”
Damien and Kaiser ran their fingers through their hair.
Steele crinkled his nose. “This is crazy. You could really get hurt, Sadie.”
She looked at Mordecai. His eyebrows were drawn downward, but he didn’t protest. He just sat there silently. She knew he was on the same page. When Mordecai caught her gaze, he nodded, albeit begrudgingly. “She’s right… as much as I hate the idea.”
Kaiser sighed. “Fine.”
“It’s a good plan,” Sadie said.
Steele winced. “Keep telling yourself that. Though, I’ll be there, don’t worry.”
Damien acquiesced, too. “It’s the best plan we have.” He looked at her. “But if we’re going to do this, you have to bring Pyra with you. And we’ll just be along the castle perimeter. I’ll be scouting from there, and the four of us will be ready to fight if it comes to it.”
She smiled at them, thankful for their help and support.
That wasn’t so bad.
She took a deep breath. Now, it was just a matter of her walking into the eye of the storm.
Chapter Forty-Four
Sadie
Sadie walked through the fog outside her fortress, beyond the boundary of her lands. Underneath her white, long-sleeved satin robe, she wore a leather corset to serve as lightweight armor. It was the more practical choice since it wouldn’t be as conspicuous as real armor. She also wore leather leggings, hoping the material would help make it harder for sharp weapons to get to her skin.
She had to walk carefully because the forest floor in this part of the woods was strewn with sharp rock fragments and the spiny surface roots of evergreen trees. Treading the forest was especially hard with sneakers on because the rock fragments grew bigger and sharper the deeper she went into the woods.
This part of the forest was connected to the place she and Damien had walked one time—the one with the golden and silver trees. It was hard to believe, because the forest she was walking through now felt like a different place.
Aside from the evergreens, there were also cherry t
rees and narrow hornbeams, and they were spread so far apart that the forest canopy was close to nonexistent. If she had visited this place under normal circumstances—perhaps in a time where she wasn’t purposefully serving as bait for a deadly demoness—she would have enjoyed how the pink cherry blossoms melded with the red-orange glow of the crystals that covered the ceiling of the underworld, and how the fog accentuated the glow.
Pyra trudged through the forest floor alongside her. Fallen twigs broke and rocks cracked under the massive dragon’s feet. Pyra snorted, causing a puff of smoke to billow out of her nostrils. She sensed her dragon was tense from the way her tail stood at attention, twitching at the slightest noises. One time, Pyra snapped her head back and almost roared out a stream of fire toward a green rabbit scurrying away to hide in the bushes. She did it again when a squirrel, that looked more like a bat, ran up a tree. Pyra was so tense that Sadie had to keep close and pet her every once in a while, just to calm her.
“Easy girl. I know what we’re doing.”
As Pyra remained attentive with her surroundings, Sadie looked through the fog as well, wary of any kind of movement. She focused to stay alert for any surprise attack.
The guys were nearby, hiding in the part of the forest that was still inside her fortress’s compound. She had specifically told them to stay where they were and that it was as far as they could get. They were not to cross the boundary until she had instructed them to. They would only go to her aid when she had said so. She and the princes had agreed beforehand that she would whisper her instructions to Damien.
A cold breeze flew past her, and Sadie hugged herself and rubbed her arms. She looked around, walking as ordinarily as possible, pretending to take a normal stroll through the forest with her dragon. But underneath the billowy sleeve of her robe, she clutched the mageblade’s handle tighter. She knew that even if the princes were nearby and, literally, one call away, ready with their powerful demon magic, they still might not get to her in time. So, she prepared herself for an ambush. Out here, she was pretty much alone.
Of course, there was a chance that Mara wouldn’t show up. After all, their mission for today just relied on the assumption that Mara was lying in wait. It was even possible that the demoness didn’t even set up spies or scouts along the fortress’s perimeter, but she doubted that was the case.
As she walked and waded through the fog, she felt Steele claw against her mental barrier. She knew it was Steele because of the way he scratched softly to get into her mental block, and it had become familiar to her. She heard Steele’s deep voice whisper in her mind at the same time Pyra stiffened and halted in her tracks beside her.
“Damien says someone’s there.”
Sadie stopped walking and peered through the fog. She clutched the mageblade so tightly her nails dug into her palm. Then, through the mist, she saw it—a silhouette.
Steele spoke inside her mind again. This time, instead of a mere warning, she heard a touch of pleading mixed in his voice. “Now’s probably a good time for us to step up, Sadie.”
But she didn’t think so.
“No,” she said in reply, muttering under her breath, knowing Damien was listening. Hell, he probably could smell her right now. “You’ll blow our cover. Wait for my signal.”
Sadie reconstructed her mental barrier, so she could keep Steele out of her thoughts. And based on the lack of handsome demons flying to her rescue, she concluded they listened to her instructions.
In front of her, the silhouette grew bigger, and as it got closer, she began to distinguish a pony-tailed figure limping toward her and Pyra. The woman seemed to notice them since the figure stopped and seemed to scrutinize Sadie and her dragon through the fog.
The woman called out. “Sadie?”
Sadie’s breath caught in her throat. She tried to speak but couldn’t find her voice. She took a steadying breath. “Blair?”
Beside her, Pyra let out a soft growl. Damien had suggested she bring the dragon because Pyra had sensed Mara’s pretense the last time the demoness had taken Blair’s form. The dragon’s reaction now meant that this woman was yet another impostor. Still, Sadie couldn’t be sure. The woman could still be Blair, and Pyra would still be a bit aggressive toward her because she was unfamiliar.
Sadie placed a hand on the dragon’s spiky neck and rubbed the rough hide. She reached out with her mind to plead with the dragon to keep calm and let things happen as they should. That Pyra should let Sadie handle the situation. She didn’t want their plan to fall to pieces. She breathed out a sigh of relief when the dragon seemed to understand and calmed down.
Blair walked closer, keeping her weight on one leg as she limped toward them. Her sister’s clothes looked different from the last time she saw her back at her apartment in Seattle. Now, Blair just wore a regular purple sweatshirt and jeans, although her clothes were filthy, and some parts of the fabric were tattered. Sadie’s heart twisted.
When Blair seemed to realize her guess was correct, that it was indeed Sadie that she saw, Blair’s lips opened in a wide-toothed grin.
“Sadie!” she said and bounded toward her. Blair hugged her tightly. “You’re alive. You’re all right.”
Sadie kept her arms to her sides and tried to gently extricate herself from Blair’s embrace. She wasn’t falling for this charade again. This woman looked exactly like her sister, and she sounded exactly like her. She even smelled like the Victoria’s Secret perfume her sister was obsessed with.
But Sadie couldn’t trust what she was seeing or hearing or smelling. She couldn’t even trust was she was feeling. It was hard, but she had to be objective. This was too much a coincidence for this person to be really her sister.
Blair stepped back from her and frowned. “What’s wrong with you?”
Even though she believed this wasn’t Blair, she still had to act friendly, that she believed she wasn’t Mara and was Blair after all. She had to trick her that she was being fooled.
She smiled. “Nothing. I—I just can’t believe you’re actually here.”
Blair didn’t look convinced. “Did you know what I had to endure to get here? It was lucky I still had an arsodite stone with me, so I could teleport myself to where you were supposed to be. But somehow, it didn’t work, and I got transported to Beijing. The residents took me to—” She shut her mouth, interrupted by what she must have seen in Sadie’s expression, whatever it was.
“Oh,” Blair said, wrapping her arms around herself. Her body seemed to droop. “You think I’m Mara.”
Sadie stepped closer. “No, Blair.”
Blair shook her head. “It’s okay, I understand. Demonesses are tricky, vile creatures.” She smiled, but her eyes looked sad. “Sadie, I’m so proud of you. You’re such a fast learner. You were always the smart one.”
Deep down, she knew it wasn’t Blair. But it was difficult giving up seeing her face, hearing her voice, even if it was a lie.
She pretended to let her guard down. “Is it really you, Blair?”
The impostor arched an eyebrow. “What do you think?”
Her tone and body language reminded her too much of Blair that Sadie’s act threatened to waver. She hugged Blair’s look-a-like instead.
“I can’t believe it,” she said, letting out fake laughter.
Blair tightened her arms around her that Sadie had difficulty swallowing.
“Look at you now, little sister,” Blair said as they embraced. “You’re royalty. I knew you could handle this power and assume the throne as the demon queen. That’s why I gave you the pendant.”
Sadie looked over Blair’s shoulder and admired how the shades of sunset cast the entire forest with bright orange light. It made the forest look like it was on fire. The fog added to the effect, giving the illusion of smoke. She took a deep breath, enjoying this moment even though she knew it wasn’t real.
“I miss you, Blair,” she said while gripping the mageblade’s handle tighter. She stealthily drew the artifact out of her sleeve.
“I hope you’re happy, wherever you are,” she whispered. A tear streaked down her cheek as she thrust the dagger into the impostor’s abdomen.
Blair screamed.
Sadie stepped back, for a second wondering if she had just killed her sister. But Blair clutched Sadie’s shoulders, gritting her teeth through the pain. Blair’s face dissolved, her features morphing into a paler complexion and sharper bone structure, revealing Mara’s face that twisted in an ugly snarl.
Blair’s figure grew taller, slowly shifting to the demoness’s original height.
The mageblade was already hilt-deep in the demoness’s abdomen, and dark blood seeped through the sweatshirt. The wound underneath hissed as if the dagger burned Mara’s skin. Sadie gripped the artifact tighter and buried it deeper into Mara’s body, resolving to end this bitch once and for all.
Chapter Forty-Five
Sadie
Mara’s face crumpled as her red, bat wings unfolded, and her thorny tail uncoiled from her back. She grunted and opened her mouth. Sadie saw a small, yellow orb form inside the demoness’s throat. Knowing she was about to get burned to a crisp, she removed the dagger from Mara’s abdomen and immediately climbed onto Pyra’s back.
The dragon leapt to the side, avoiding the stream of fire that erupted from Mara’s mouth. Pyra rose on her hind legs and attempted to crush the demoness under her feet and claws. But Mara unsheathed her sword and, with one hand on her abdomen, slashed Pyra’s thigh.
The dragon roared as her legs buckled. Sadie held on to one spike on Pyra’s neck, but the demoness sliced with her sword again, and the dragon leapt away. Sadie wasn’t able to keep her hold this time, and she fell to the ground. She tucked her arms and rolled to decrease the impact. She saw Pyra swipe her tail at Mara, but the demoness spread her wings and flew away from the thorn-covered attack.
The demoness held her sword high and soared toward her.
