“They didn’t claim me, you did. As in, you can never touch another living creature for pleasure, or we both die. We’re now mated in the ways of the Gods.”
“Fuck,” I uttered breathlessly as the pain continued, my body bathed in sweat from earlier and anew as something inside of me reached for him. As if we were fusing into one being, able to sense the other without trying.
“Fuck is right,” he snapped as he started moving. “Scream for me,” he demanded as he leaned down, kissing my neck as he sucked the quick beating pulse between his teeth as I exploded around him, my body clenching against his.
Chapter 37
Fires bathed the mountains as we slowly approached the house, the night a mixture of flames and chaos as demons converged to the location of their dark master. We remained in the shadows, watching, observing as they danced naked, screaming and celebrating the coming arrival of the antichrist as they referred to the innocent life of my niece.
As if the birth of his child would signify the ending of this world, while bringing in a new one, and hell, maybe they were right. Perhaps if we failed, we didn’t deserve to be here. Life was precious, her tiny little life was precious, and yet the archangels who paced alongside the demons seemed to be uncaring that she, a tiny little being, was being celebrated as bringing about the end of days.
“Kendra,” I whispered, sending it through the bond with everything I had in me, all the strength from ignoring it since I’d come back from my death. I felt her stir, her mind grasping onto the fact that I was here, with her. I’d never leave her alone, ever. “Fight him,” I instructed. “I’m coming for you.”
“You won’t make it; you need to stay away from here. It’s a trap.” Her voice was filled with emotion, pain etching and pushing through the bond even though she tried to hide it from me.
Her contractions were fast, violent as her body arched and then sagged as each one hit harder than the last. She was tied to one of the beds from inside the house that they’d brought out for her. Her mouth was filled with cloth, preventing her from screaming too loudly as the demon peered down, dragging the sharp edge of a knife over her cheekbone, yet it didn’t pierce her flesh.
“You’re going to die, whore,” it crooned gently, pushing a hand against her swollen middle as if it could force the babe from her body. She screeched as pain erupted and I winced as it slithered through the bond, threatening to take me to the ground as I struggled to remain with her.
“Ignore it,” I uttered as sweat beaded against my brow. “It fears hurting you, which means Lucifer is near.”
“He knows I will die when I give birth,” she informed tensely, her tone a mixture of resignation for her situation and pain for what her child would surely endure at the hands of her father. “You need to go, get as far away from here as you can. He doesn’t want her or me, he wants you. He wants to punish you for what you did to him. He showed you his true self, his insecurities, and you hurt him for it.”
“Kendra, we are coming, just hold on. Please? Please hold on for me,” I begged and then she did the last thing I expected; she whispered a goodbye.
“I love you, and I’ll always love you, Lena. I know you were afraid of hurting me, I felt it. I let you have your space, and I wish I hadn’t. I wish I’d hugged you one last time, held you and told you how much losing you hurt me. I know what you are about to go through and you need to know that you’re not alone. You’ve never been alone. You’re my sister, my soul. My womb mate and my best friend. Life wasn’t supposed to be like this, but you will survive this. It’s going to hurt, and it’s going to tear you apart for a while, but you will get back up. You were always the strong one. You will raise my daughter, and you’ll tell her about me, won’t you? You will be a good mom, Lena. You can’t let him keep my daughter. She will need help that you can provide. You’ll teach her how to love, how to live. I can go if I know that she will be loved. I’m okay with dying to bring her life, but I need to know you will save her, that you will fight for her. You think you’re darkness, but you’re not. You’re the light that shines in this dark world, a bright star that refuses to dim your light for anyone or anything. Teach Makenna that, teach her how to be good. I love you; I love you both so much that it hurts.”
“Don’t you fucking give up on me.”
I waited, searching the bond and then withdrawing from my mind as I stared into midnight eyes.
“We’re out of time,” I announced as I stepped from the shadows, staring out over the chaos that was ensuing. “She’s giving up.”
“We need more time, Erie is finding us a way into the wards,” Lucian uttered as he watched me. “Tell her to hold on.”
“She pushed me out,” I admitted. I exhaled as I stared at Joshua, knowing he felt it too. Our bloodline was dying out, becoming a thing of the past. I swallowed hard as I turned, searching the faces of those who had come to help, and then sucked my lip between my teeth as I considered our next move.
Lucifer wouldn’t allow anyone else into the warded area, except me. He also had acquired a dagger which could end my life, for real. But if everyone here fought, they could die as well. Wouldn’t it be better to give him what he wanted, what he craved?
“Don’t you even think it,” Spyder snapped, his eyes holding mine as I struggled to figure out how to save everyone. “He will kill you for what you did.”
“And if I die, and she survives, it would be worth it.”
“She doesn’t have to die,” Vlad acknowledged.
“She won’t accept immortality, neither will my grandmother. That’s my people out there! They’re dying, the witches are already feeding off the weaker of the coven they took, and the moment they’re strong enough, my grandmother will become nothing more than a vessel to them! Give me another option, anything,” I growled as the hopelessness swelled through me.
“They can’t,” Hades crooned as he stepped into the shadows, staring at us. “We can’t fight him because we’re bound by rules and laws that prevent us from intervening. Unless Lucifer touches someone who isn’t meant to die, we can’t intervene in his affairs. Not without giving something in return for meddling.”
“What the hell does that mean? You’re a God?” I asked, directing my question to Lucian who shook his head, his eyes watching mine before he replied.
“No, I’m not. Neither are my men, but we are bound by similar laws to not intervene in the affairs of mortals.”
“So then we go in, and we save our family alone,” I argued as I stared at Joshua who nodded.
“I’m okay with that,” he acknowledged.
“I’m not bound by their laws, no Fae is,” Zahruk announced softly, his lip twisting into a dark smile.
“So who do we have then?” I asked.
“I can help, but I cannot intervene against mortals,” Synthia said, and Ryder shook his head. “I can help her, and I will without being the one to end a life or change the outcome to one. Those are the rules I have to abide by.”
“Synthia, the laws aren’t swayed, and by going in with Lena, you will be changing the outcome.”
“No, no she won’t be. Kendra will die, that much we know. How she dies is different,” I mused as I stared at her. “It’s not changing the outcome of a life if we are taking one away from the father. I’m going in there to save my niece, not from death, but from becoming evil.”
“And you’re so sure she isn’t evil?” Hades questioned.
“Children are not born evil or wrong, they’re turned into that somewhere in life. If we can get her out, protect her from him, we can sway which side she chooses to be on.” Joshua nodded, his matching blue eyes sharp as grief filtered through.
I wasn’t an idiot; I knew Kendra was dying. I could feel her slipping further away from the bond as time moved, passing as the demons continued their endless chanting. I didn’t need these creatures or Gods to fight Lucifer fo
r me; I just needed them to get me close enough so I could fight him.
“You mentioned glamour; can you make yourself look like me?” I asked and watched her platinum head move up and down before a smile played across her lips. As I watched, she changed, becoming the mirror image of my reflection. “Good, now give me your face.”
Once we’d switched looks, I stepped next to Lucian and touched him, leaning in close enough that he inhaled and then frowned.
“You smell like a Goddess,” he mused as his brow line creased and he lifted his eyes to Ryder’s, who smirked. “It’s almost foolproof, and yet he may note the way you talk or walk. It’s not worth the fucking chance.”
“It’s not your choice to make,” I pointed out. “It’s mine, and that’s my family in there, Lucian. I won’t let them die for nothing. You can’t ask me to stand here and watch it play out. Not after everything I’ve been through.”
“That doesn’t mean I have to fucking like it.”
“No, but it means you will help me. You can’t fuck with what is happening, but you can kill demons that had their time here. You can take them out because, in the grand scheme of things, they don’t belong here. Correct?”
“And Synthia, what is she supposed to do?” he asked as he watched me with worry in his inky depths, something I’d never seen in his eyes before.
“She’s going to make sure that when that dagger is used, it isn’t used on me. Lucifer can attack her, and she’ll be immune to it. Get it from him, and then destroy it.”
“You make it sound so simple,” he growled as he pulled me in close and kissed me until my world teetered around me and I hung onto him as worry flooded my senses. This had to work because there was no backup plan. This was it, this Hail Mary we were throwing up as we went in to save my niece and maybe my grandmother, and then, then I’d hold my sister until she took her last breath on this earth and left me to pass onto the next.
Chapter 38
I stepped up to Synthia as we pushed through the horde of demons, the men fighting their way through them until we toed the wards that separated us from my family. Erie continued working, her hair slick with sweat as she followed us as the men protected her.
Kendra’s pain-filled scream tore through the night, shaking the confidence I held as I stared at her, tied to a bed with her legs apart as her body jackknifed. Blood covered the sheets she had been laid upon, and Lucifer stood beside the bed, watching us as we ripped the demons around the warded circle apart.
The barrier itself was shaped in a circle, and on the ground was painted the symbol of the pentagram. Added protection against us getting inside? Probably. I turned my head, taking in the coven members who had been tied to chairs, some staring at the ground with vacant eyes as the death haze coated them, and others seemed mindless as they waited for death.
Four of the highest ranking coven members had been stood up, their hands tied to an ancient tree that sat in the middle of the yard, strung up with tiny slits cut into their flesh, draining pools of their blood into the earth they stood on.
Power erupted, and I turned my head, watching as Spyder’s body disappeared, becoming a shadow as he moved around it, pushing through the demons which seemed to drop their human host suit the moment his darkness touched them. Lucian watched us, his eyes blue liquid as souls slithered around his armor.
I didn’t dare reach for the bond to my sister, not when I felt her slipping further and further away. She alone could give away that I wasn’t Synthia. I watched Lucifer as he moved towards Synthia, who tilted her head and spoke with my voice.
“Let her go, you don’t need her,” she urged, and he snorted.
“You had a chance to join me,” he rebuked.
The wards slithered as he pulled her into them, his magic blasting her to the ground as she sagged, and I winced. If she could disturb the ground, we could get inside. I could get to my sister. Her hand dragged over it, and I pushed into them, forcing my magic to meet his head-on until I felt my wings starting to uncoil from my spine.
Not yet. I pushed them back, using every lesson Lucian had taught as I struggled to remain under the glamour Synthia continued to throw over me. He pulled out a dagger, tossing it into the air as he stared down at her, uncaring that I was trying to push through the wards because he didn’t think she could intervene. Only it wasn’t her who was about to burst through them. I added more power as he watched her.
“You should have taken me up on my offer, Lena. You could have been in her life; all you had to do was give in to what you wanted, what you craved when I touched you. Yet you played me. Now you’ve lost your chance to be in her life, to watch as she brings down the gates of heaven to Hell, and unseats the old God to become the new one.”
“And let me guess, you’ll rule this world with her? Through her? Didn’t you try this before?” Synthia scoffed as she eyed me, taking in the progress I made as I fought the magic to reach Kendra, who was screaming as she cradled her stomach.
“She can’t help you,” he chuckled. “She can’t even intervene to save you. Gods are fickle fuckers, and yet they stick to the rules because they tend to attach themselves to creatures, and if they break them, they lose what they love most. So no, she won’t help you.”
I burst through the wards and sagged as the magic hit me, hard. It was spelled inside the circle? I coughed up bile, and blood exploded from my lungs as I threw it up. Lucifer tilted his head as if it was wrong, and then stared down at Synthia who still wore my face.
“Interesting, since it isn’t spelled against Gods, only…”
Synthia lunged, ripping the knife from his hands before she spun, throwing it to Lucian, who caught it and the moment he did, it vanished from his hands, and only a thick cloud of dust remained. I was up, moving towards Lucifer, who smiled.
“You didn’t think I wouldn’t plan to lose, did you, Lena?” he smirked as I lunged, catching nothing but air. I looked around at the demon’s that covered the ground, finding no sign of Lucifer as I turned in a full circle. “I knew you’d come, and I knew you wouldn’t be stupid enough to rush right in. Though, I did leave you a parting gift.”
I stared at him as his body misted and then reappeared across the grass, next to Lucian who reached out, his hand going through the image Lucifer projected. I swallowed hard as I moved to the bed, finding Kendra watching me with a sadness that wrecked me.
Her hair was slick with sweat, her body lying in a pool of blood that seemed to continue flowing from her. I sat beside her, cutting her free as I shook my head.
“Stay with me, please, please stay with me,” I begged as I pulled her to me. Her hands clung to me, her body shivering as it went into shock. I felt the wards being lowered as Erie cried out, even as demons tried to attack her, only for a large male to step out at the last minute, sending power rippling through the area. “Stay with me, stay with me,” I chanted as I rocked her in my arms as she held onto me.
“You have to find him, you have to save her,” she pleaded as I shook my head. “He has my daughter, Lena. Promise me, promise me you’ll find her and keep her safe.”
“We will find her, you and I will find her,” I promised.
“Not us, you. I’m dying,” she cried as her strength flowed from her as surely as the blood that left her system.
I watched Vlad as he sat beside her, slowly opening his wrist and then before she could protest, he pushed her mouth against it. I watched, knowing she’d hate me for forcing this choice, for forcing her to stay with me and yet she shook her head as she smiled.
“My soul is leaving,” she uttered. “It’s protected. You have to let me go.”
“Bullshit, you need to stay with me and fight,” I pleaded softly as black tears trailed from my eyes. “I need you. I need you to fight this.”
“I can’t, he promised to make the pain end if I agreed to his terms. He warned me that you woul
d fight him.”
“Who?” I demanded.
“Death, he told me you’d find her, but that I had to go. He told me my time is finished, and I would know peace. I’m okay with dying, Lena. Because I know you will continue living, you’ll protect my daughter for the monster who sired her.”
“But you’re a momma,” I argued. “Kendra, let us save you so you can be her mother!”
“She has a mother,” she said gently as she touched my cheek. “You will be her mother. You’ll teach her everything. You have a second chance to be a mom, Lena. I’d have died, either way, even if I’d chosen to stay with her, he’d have figured out a way to have taken me. So I made a deal, my soul is safe from anything trying to turn me. My daughter is immortal, she’s like you. Like you and Joshua, which means you can find her and save her, and you can tell her about me. Tell her how much I loved her, how much I gave to be sure she could live.”
“Dammit, Kendra, you can’t do this to me!” I snapped as I watched her flesh grow pale, the blood continually flowing from her.
“I love you, Lena. You’re going to get through this. You’re the strongest person I know. Find her, find them and make him pay for what he has done to us.”
“That’s sweet,” Lucifer’s voice sounded from beside me. I turned, staring up at where he watched with a squirming baby in his arms.
“Give her back before you ruin her!” I demanded, unwilling to let Kendra go from where I held her, cradled in my arms.
“Lena, she isn’t healing.” Vlad’s words forced my eyes to his silver ones and then down at Kendra, who stared up at Lucifer.
“I’m going to find you, and I’m going to destroy you. I don’t care if it ends the fucking world, so long as you can never hurt another living soul!” I snapped, and the squirming baby began to mewl.
“She looks like you, you know,” he said, ignoring my words. “She has her mother’s eyes, and nose. She’s beautiful.”
Becoming his Monster Page 28
