Demon Sworn: A Reverse Harem Paranormal Romance (The Witch's Rebels Book 3)

by Sarah Piper

  Sebastian narrowed his eyes at Darius, but then he nodded. “Very well. You shall be escorted to the portal. The guards will wait for your return to escort the three of you back to me. I’m very much looking forward to introducing myself to Gray. It’s never too late to start paving the way for a good working relationship.”

  At that, I let out a laugh. “Yeah, I don’t think so.”

  Sebastian knew as well as I did that bringing Gray back through the hell portal was not an option. Darius and I could handle it, but her human soul could very easily be trapped in hell, especially since she was already sworn to him.

  He was so fucking transparent.

  “Darius and I will return through the portal,” I said. “Gray will be exiting by a different route.”

  He stared at me a long time, trying on his very best poker face. He’d been trampling me most of my life, but this was one thing I wouldn’t bend on, and he knew it.

  He drained the last of his bourbon and sighed. “Very well, demon. I’ll have my people draw up the papers for you to sign, and then you and your vampire will be on your way.”

  I nodded. Sebastian never made a deal without getting it in writing.

  “Signatures won’t be necessary,” Darius said to me. “Our generous host is offering us passage through the portal as a show of good faith that we will collect Gray and return her to the material plane, so that when she ultimately passes, her soul will be his to claim, per the terms of her contract.”

  Sebastian laughed his oily, car-salesman laugh. “Vampire influence has no effect here, but I applaud the effort.”

  “That is no influence, Prince. Merely a fact.” Darius offered an icy smile, then headed for the door.

  “Ronan?” Sebastian asked. “A word, if you don’t mind?”

  I looked to Darius, then nodded.

  “Don’t sign anything, hellspawn,” Darius warned as he opened the office door and stepped out into the hallway. “Come find me when you’re ready.”

  “Where you heading?”

  “Poker table.” Darius grinned. “Despite Sebastian’s claims to the contrary, I’m betting there are still some places where vampire influence is very effective.”

  Sebastian shut his office door and turned to me, malice glinting in his eyes. “You don’t even know if the witch will be able to find another exit, let alone where it will lead her.”

  “That’s a chance we’re all willing to take.”

  “If you fail, she’ll be trapped in misery. Or worse.”

  “I understand the risks.”

  “And you speak for her, too?”

  “I’m sure she’d agree with me on this.”

  His eyelid twitched—the only indication that this was getting under his skin. “If you change your mind, son—”

  “I know how to reach you. Are we done?” I reached for the door.

  “There’s one more thing, demon.”

  “There always is, isn’t there?” I blew out a tired breath, bracing myself for his usual diatribe about remembering my place.

  But instead, he said, “I’m going to need something from you, too. Consider it a show of good faith.”

  I turned to catch his grin, shining brighter than the city lights below.

  I probably should’ve seen it coming. Centuries doing his bidding, living under his thumb, and I still hadn’t learned the most basic lesson: it didn’t matter who was holding all the cards. In the end, in Vegas and in Hell, the house always fucking won.

  I saw myself out of Sebastian’s office, wishing I could shower off the greasy, unsettled feeling our conversations always left me with. But there wasn’t time for that. I collected Darius from the casino, and we took a cab out past the city limits. The portal entrance was buried in the desert; we had to walk the last two miles.

  Neither of us spoke. There wasn’t much else to say.

  The entrance was nondescript, no more than a manhole cover in the sand, hiding out in no-man’s land in plain sight.

  One of Sebastian’s underlings was already waiting for us. He smiled the same oily smile as his boss when we arrived, gesturing for us to climb down the ladder that would lead us underground, and eventually, to the portal itself. “One at a time, gentlemen. This way, if you please.”

  I looked at Darius. The desert wind blew across the sand and into my face, hot and rancid even at the late hour.

  It tasted like an omen.

  Sebastian’s words echoed.

  I’m going to need something from you, too…

  “Well, here we are, then.” Darius grabbed me for a quick hug, slapping me twice on the back. It was an affectionate gesture for the typically cool vampire, and I tried not to take it as a goodbye.

  “See you on the other side, brother,” I said.

  He met my eyes once more, offering a quick nod. “Let’s hope so.”

  Seventeen

  Gray

  The glass rainstorm lasted for days, leaving me trapped in the caves with nothing but my own thoughts for company. I was so desperate to feel the sun on my skin that on the first clear, silent morning, I bolted out of the cave mouth like a true bat out of hell.

  But instead of hitting the boulder field Liam and I had crossed to get here, I suddenly found myself in an orchard of bright green pathways lined with perfectly manicured trees. Their flowers fluttered in the breeze like paper, each bloom buzzing with honeybees.

  Passing under low-hanging branches, I realized they weren’t flowers at all, but tarot cards.

  One fell before me, riding a soft current down to my feet.

  I picked up the card and turned it over, revealing an image of a nude couple bathing in a river beneath the romantic glow of the moon. A fairy made of pure white light hovered above them.

  The man in the image reminded me of Ronan, and I smiled softly, letting the warm, loving energy of the Two of Cups wash over me. But soon the air around me chilled, and the peaceful, nurturing image on the card morphed into something else. It was still the Two of Cups, but this image was much more sinister, featuring a skeleton cornering an ebony woman in a dark, shadowy tower. Blood had been spilled on the floor between them.

  They shared a toast and drank from silver goblets, but unlike the couple in the river, this couple was not in love. Fear and malice crawled over my skin like a swarm of fire ants.

  Death and Midnight sitting ‘neath a tree

  Nothing is real but what you see

  Cups over swords, blood over minds

  Which will you trust—your heart or your eyes?

  The words echoed in my mind as the card vanished from my hand.

  On the path ahead, a man walked toward me. No more than a silhouette at first, he emerged from the center of the orchard with a determined stride.

  He lifted his head and met my gaze as he approached, his smile mischievous behind a thin beard, his eyes like leaves in the autumn.

  My breath caught, my feet carrying me to him of their own accord.

  “Ronan?” I gasped, falling into his arms, but he didn’t reply.

  He looked like Ronan. Smelled like him too, filling my senses with the cloves-and-campfire scent that always reminded me of home. Of our friendship. Of everything we’d become to each other.

  But when I reached up and touched his face, his smile died, and his eyes turned flat and empty in a way that sucked all the hope from my heart. I watched in mute horror as the hazel melted into solid black, then changed to a hazy gray. Slowly, wordlessly, agonizingly, the rest of his body turned to smoke in my arms and floated up into the trees.

  We’d finally been reunited, and Ronan… He’d been smoked out. Obliterated.

  A scream lodged itself in my throat, the pain in my chest driving me to my knees.

  I hadn’t even caught my breath yet with I felt the touch of another man’s hand on my shoulder.

  “There, there, love. No need for that.”

  I tilted my chin up to see my vampire, impeccably dressed in a charcoal suit, crisp white
shirt, and ivory tie.

  My heart was shattered. I’d just lost my best friend, the man I loved. But the sight of Darius soothed the endless ache, just long enough for me to take a breath.

  “Darius,” I whispered, reaching for the hand still resting on my shoulder. “He’s… he’s gone. Ronan is gone.”

  When Darius spoke again, his voice was heavy with something I didn’t quite recognize. “We’ve been searching for you a long time, Gray. This isn’t unexpected. Perhaps you shouldn’t have come to this realm.”

  “But… this was my choice. My fate. I never meant for you and Ronan to follow me here.”

  “Intention hardly matters,” he said, cool and logical as always. “We are, in fact, here.”

  Disappointment. That was the thing I’d heard in his voice, so unfamiliar to me.

  He pulled his hand away and took a step backward. “I should probably take my leave.”

  “Wait!” I shot to my feet, stumbling after him. It was hard to walk; suddenly I was wearing an ivory sheath dress the same shade as his tie and a pair of nude heels. “I’m coming with you. I think… we’re supposed to go somewhere?”

  “I don’t think so, love. We’ve been searching far too long, and there is still much ground to cover. I must leave.”

  “What are you talking about? I’m right here, Darius! You found me!” Was there something in the atmosphere affecting his perception? His mind?

  He shook his head, lowering his eyes to the ground. “I’m afraid it’s too late.”

  “It’s not!”

  He closed his eyes and stepped into the direct sunlight. Blackness seeped down from his head, running down his face like spilled ink.

  “Darius, no!” I reached for his hands, trying to pull him into the shade beneath the tree, but he wouldn’t budge.

  His black skin began to smoke.

  I tugged harder, yanking and jerking, begging him to move, but he was still as a statue, rooted as a tree. I gave him one last tug, but my hands slipped, and I fell to the ground at his feet.

  Blood poured from his lips, dripping onto my head, warm and sticky and terrible. Paralyzed with fear, I sat helplessly as Darius liquified before my eyes.

  Dark, wet blood stained my skin. My dress. It was all that I had left of him.

  Ronan and Darius were both dead.

  This time I did scream, a primal howl that tore through my throat and out my lips, ripping me apart on the way. It was so loud, so deep, it made the trees quake, the tarot-card leaves falling all around me.

  The Lovers card landed before me—another naked couple, this time on the beach, wrapped in an erotic embrace. A serpent had just sunk its fangs into the man’s leg.

  When I rose up from the ground and looked up the path, my gaze locked onto a pair of familiar ocean-blue eyes.

  “Tears? Seriously?” Asher’s cupid-bow lips stretched into a sexy grin. “I thought you’d be at least a little happy to see me.”

  “Ash!” I reached for him, but he held up a hand to stop me.

  “I can’t stay.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “I’m dying.”

  “But… how? Do you need to feed?”

  “Nah. Nothing you can do about that. It’s in my blood. It’s killing me.”

  “The devil’s trap? But I… I saved you. It’s gone.” I stretched up on my tiptoes and pressed my mouth to his, desperate to taste the cinnamon heat of his kiss. To remember what it felt like to be in his arms, falling apart at the seams in the best kind of way.

  His lips were cold and unyielding.

  “No, witch,” he said firmly, pushing me away.

  “Why are you doing this?” I whispered.

  Asher shook his head, turning his back on me. “Because you’re poison, Cupcake. And you’re killing us all.”

  I tried to go after him, but he disappeared beneath the archway of tree branches, and another tarot card fluttered down before me. It was the High Priestess this time, dressed in her sky-blue robes and standing on a crescent moon, wielding her crystal scepter.

  Remembering my mother, I reached out to touch the woman’s face, but the card transformed. Unlike the dreamy, peaceful Priestess I’d just seen, the one looking up at me now was fierce and wild-looking, with two interlocking crescent moons for a face and long, skeleton-white fingers. Her dark gray wings were studded with rivets, as if they were made of metal.

  The card vanished, and a woman with curly gray hair stepped out from behind the trees. She wore an amulet—a silver crescent moon beneath an eye made of opal, topaz, and black onyx.

  I’d know that amulet anywhere. She’d died wearing it. And the hunters who’d butchered her tore it from her neck.

  “Calla?” I breathed. It’d been ten years since I’d seen her, but she looked just as I remembered, with sharp eyes and that wild, curly hair.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. They were the first words that came to mind—ones I’d been wanting to say to her since her death.

  “I know you are,” Calla said with a small frown. She reached forward to fluff out my dress, which had transformed from the ivory sheath to a peach-colored sundress that just skimmed the tops of my thighs. “But sorry is just a word. It’s not enough. If only you’d been stronger, Rayanne.”

  “I survived, though. Just like you told me to.”

  “Still, a capable witch would’ve been able to save me, too.”

  “But I was just a kid!”

  “And yet you were already able to bring animals back from the dead.” She clucked her tongue. “I never should’ve adopted you. You’ve always been broken, child. There was a reason your real mother abandoned you.”

  I blinked in confusion, heart hammering in my chest. “But… you told me my mother died.”

  “Died, abandoned you, sold you to the highest bidder… What difference does it make? You turned out terrible anyway. She should’ve killed you as a baby. All of us would be better for it.”

  “You don’t mean that.” I reached for her, but it was too late. Flames licked her feet, twisting their way up her legs like vines.

  She glanced down, swatting absently as if shooing an annoying fly. “Now look what you’ve done.”

  I dropped to my knees and tried to tamp down the flames, but my action only seemed to aggravate them. They surged upward, brighter and stronger, crackling loudly.

  My mother turned black, burning away like paper in the span of a single heartbeat. In the dusty pile of ash and bone she’d left behind, another card materialized.

  Judgment.

  In it, gray bodies rose from a crypt, called forth by an angel’s trumpet.

  Panic made my hands tremble. I knew who was coming next.

  The bones of my mother reformed, the skeleton slowly filling in with flesh and hair. It wasn’t like Calla’s hair, though; it was dark and lanky, hanging in front of her face. She wore dirty jeans and a dark blue hoodie with a unicorn on the front.

  “Bean,” I gasped, the sight of her almost more than I could bear. She’d died in an alley protecting me, and I’d resurrected her by mistake, leaving her to suffer at the hands of Jonathan.

  I still hadn’t been able to deliver her soul to its proper resting place.

  She pointed a shaking finger at me, and my peach sundress turned into a mirror image of her outfit. “You did this to me, witch.”

  “I know, and I’m so, so sorry. If I could take it back, I would.”

  “You can’t, though. You can’t take anything back.”

  “Bean, wait. Let me help you. Let me free your soul.” I reached for her, but the moment my fingers brushed her sleeve, she disintegrated, blowing away on the breeze.

  In the grass where she’d stood, another card bloomed like a flower.

  I plucked it from its stem, looking at the beautiful ebony-skinned girl on the front, carrying a fish in a golden cup. The youthful, vibrant energy of the Page of Cups had always reminded me of Sophie, and I sighed in relief at the sight of it. Sophie would h
elp me through this. She’d been with me always, and I needed her now, more than ever.

  “Sophie?” I called out.

  She materialized before me, leaning against the trunk of a tree, casually inspecting her fingernails. They’d been painted white, with tiny pink dots. Her skin was painted with blue-green swirls, just like it’d been the last time I’d seen her alive.

  My jeans and hoodie transformed into a black linen dress and veil, like some kind of funeral attire.

  “It should’ve been you, you know,” she said with a shrug. “Your boyfriend killed me. You led him right to me, just like you led him to your mother.”

  “Sophie, no! I didn’t know.”

  “You should have, though. That’s the thing.” She shrugged, and the swirls painted on her chest transformed into runes carved brutally into her skin. They ignited one at time, glowing as bright as candle flame.

  “I would do anything to change it,” I said. “To save you.”

  “That’s what everyone says.” She rolled her eyes, then blew on her polka-dot fingernails. “Nice seeing you again, Gray. Take care of yourself, okay?”

  She turned to go, but I grabbed her from behind, tackling her down to the ground and pulling her into my lap like a baby. Everyone else got away from me, but she wouldn’t. Not like this. She struggled hard, bucking and kicking, but I locked my arms around her and held on tight, pressing my lips to her ear.

  “Shh. Listen to me,” I pleaded. “Just listen.”

  Sophie finally stilled. I tore the veil from my eyes and looked down at her again, but Sophie was gone. The warm body in my lap was now a newborn fawn, shivering and bloody. An arrow pierced his neck.

  “Oh no!” Gently, I reached for the arrow, trying to see if I could push it all the way through, but the poor creature howled in agony. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what to do.”

  “You’ve done enough,” the fawn sputtered, his blood dripping onto my bare thighs. Then he became a wolf.