Demon Bewitched

by Jenn Stark

  “I’ve got you,” he murmured into Cressida’s ear, but she was well past hearing him. He winked back into existence in the place she held strongest in her mind, an almost austerely decorated bedroom. These weren’t her opulent high-priestess quarters in New York City, Stefan realized immediately. In its duress, Cressida’s mind had retreated to the last place she’d felt safe. To where she considered home.

  He looked around, his lip curling at the simple furniture, the rough sheets of the bed on which he laid the high priestess. Cressida needed to redefine what a decent home was. Once she was his…

  The pain that cut across his mind was almost blinding, and it knocked Stefan completely off the bed, sending him sprawling to the stone floor. He roared with irritation as he came to, then leapt up.

  “I didn’t mean it,” he spat, stalking back to the bed as Cressida stirred.

  “Mean what?” she managed.

  But Stefan was burning with an unholy rage now. That Cressida had been injured was infuriating enough. But he was a demon of the Syx, and before that… Before that, he suspected—no, he knew—he’d wielded more power than any of the Fallen angels before him. Yes, his sin was pride, but it had been well earned. He would not be healing the high priestess of the Scepter Coven in a mean and small apartment, no better than a monk’s quarters. His glamour was not merely for his own purposes.

  With every step that he took approaching Cressida, the room around him changed. First the floor was covered with rich carpet. A fire was laid in the cold grate that had not been there before, and now it sprang to life. The walls were no longer bare brick but paneled over with inlaid rosewood and hung with gilded paintings, the oil paint thick and lush on the canvas.

  Around Cressida, the simple cot with its cotton blankets and thin coverlet was replaced with a king-sized bed piled high with pillows and fitted with silken sheets, Cressida nearly lost in the center of them. Enough of her wounds were still bleeding that she squeaked in alarm, apparently horrified at staining the sheets.

  “Don’t worry about that,” Stefan ordered, for in this place, at this moment, he could deliver such an order. She was a mortal, a broken child of God, and before he was consigned to the depths of infamy, it had been his task not only to heal, not only to raise up the children of God, but to inspire and delight them, to remind mortal souls of everything that awaited them, both above and below, if only they dared to believe.

  Now he brought his hands up as Cressida stared. “What are you doing?” she demanded, but she didn’t attempt to stop him or throw up any resistance as he stretched his palms over her.

  “You are a beloved creation of God,” Stefan said, his fury still raging within him at how much damage she’d suffered at the hands of his brethren. His brethren! He was as much to blame for her injuries as the meanest of demons that had slipped inside the coven’s circle. He was as much responsible for her care and healing. He would make her whole, not by his power alone, but by that which had been granted him millennia ago, that which he still could use by the grace of the Creator.

  He dropped his hands to Cressida’s burned and bloodied skin.

  The scream that tore from her barely registered in the maelstrom of his mind. Because it was working. From his hands extended a light so intense that Cressida’s remaining tattered clothes vanished in a puff of smoke, while her injured body was swiftly and gloriously transformed. First her skin was healed of the deep gashes from demon claws, then the burn marks were brushed away, then the bruises and scrapes were healed. She shuddered beneath his hands, surrendering to him, and he couldn’t keep his body from responding to that trust, either his glamour or his physical form. He gritted his teeth as temptation twisted and writhed within him. Now that she was healing, his fury was dissipating, but what was replacing it was a desire so maddening, he could hardly breathe.

  “Stefan,” Cressida whispered, and he stretched his hands farther, moving up her legs, her torso, skating the high swells of her breasts, until he paused, breathing heavily, his hands suspended above her face. She hadn’t sustained any wounds here, at least not the physical kind. But her eyes still held the haunted fear of any mortal when faced with the desecration of a demon.

  Stefan’s lips twisted, his own disgust surging once more to the fore. She was probably afraid of him. She should be.

  Distracted as he was by the stricken look in Cressida’s eyes, Stefan barely registered the movement of her hands until it was too late. She reached for him, closing her hands around his.

  “No!” he cried, but not before both of them were thrown into the maelstrom.

  For a long moment, Cressida couldn’t see, couldn’t feel anything but waves of agony pouring through her body. She stared, trying to pierce through to what lay beyond the fire, but her eyes were blinded with a light so bright, she might as well be standing on the surface of the sun. Stefan remained in front of her, his hands caught tight in her grasp, but his form was shaking uncontrollably, his head thrown back, his body racked in a paroxysm of pain.

  His head and body were shifting too. In one moment, Stefan was his glorious, beautiful self, the Stefan she’d now known for days, the powerful member of the Syx. In the next, he transformed into a hideous version of himself—the abomination of his original beauty that she’d seen once before. His ears and nose ripped clean away, his eyes scorched into dark and staring holes, his body riddled with a million scars. If anyone had ever met the beautiful demon before in his full glamour, they would know that this was the same creature. They would know and they would be horrified to the core. But that wasn’t the last transformation of the demon that she saw. There was a third evolution of his being, also linked to the first two. A new entity so magnificent, she couldn’t quite grasp it with her ordinary senses. He was a creature of light and magic and beauty—endless beauty. The gilding of the sunlight on the leaves in a sylvan forest. The trembling of a single drop of dew on the edge of a budding rose. The glow of distant magic surrounding a shooting star, everything he touched became more beautiful and stayed that way for an eternity after his passage.

  But that being didn’t last, just as the horrifyingly debased creature didn’t last. In the end, it was the glamour of the demon that took hold of Stefan’s body once more, his rage and pain and need coalescing beneath the surface of his beautiful face and gorgeous form.

  Cressida drew in a long, racking breath. “You’re not kidding around when it comes to this healing stuff, are you?”

  “Let…go,” Stefan managed, and she could tell by the strain in his voice that he was still battling a force unleashed within him. “Slowly.”

  She nodded, but his request wasn’t as easy as she wanted it to be. A strange, depraved part of her soul wanted to keep holding on to him, to claim him for her own, and never let him go. Was this the reaction he inspired in every human he touched, she wondered? The thought inspired both heart-wrenching compassion and a deep and twisted jealousy, twin flames raging on the same quivering wick.

  “Let go,” Stefan said again, his tone more pleading this time. “You must, Cressida. I don’t have the strength to leave you.”

  She felt the base and terrible urge within her flare up once more. The demand, the need to keep him for herself. Shocked at her own depravity, she opened her fingers wide and let go of Stefan’s hands.

  The burning fire within her winked out, and she flopped back on the bed. A bed that was surprisingly lusher than it really should be.

  “What’s up with—” She gestured to the sheets, then froze.

  Stefan hadn’t moved either. “Cressida,” he whispered.

  Her name on his lips was part warning, part entreaty, but Cressida didn’t know how to respond. Her fingers…were glowing, still heavy with the fire of his touch. She rotated her fingers, staring at them as red-and-purple fire jumped and sparked around them, her hands a blur of energy.

  “What’s happening?” she whispered.

  “I don’t know.” But the p
anic in Stefan’s voice made his words a lie. She turned her focus to his face and met his gaze—though not because he wanted her to, she knew immediately. Stefan was bathed in sweat, his jaw set, his eyes fierce. His entire body, in fact, was rigid, and…naked. How did he do that so quickly? She looked down the glorious length of him, her eyes going wide as she noticed something else. He was fully and completely ready for her.

  “Stefan?”

  “I’m not trying to seduce you,” he gritted out. “That wasn’t the point of this.”

  She chuckled. “Well, that’s a pity. Because I’m more than happy for you to seduce me.”

  With a touch of her glowing hand on his shoulder, she pushed him back, and he toppled to the side of the bed, breathing heavily. As she’d done before, she followed him over, straddling him as his eyes flared wide.

  “What are you doing?”

  “What does it look like?” She paused, the effort costing her more than she’d like. “Unless…you don’t want me to do anything with you? Are you hurt?”

  “Not—hurt,” Stefan gasped. He also didn’t respond directly to her question, though, so she hesitated above him, then placed her hands on his shoulders.

  Stefan convulsed, but the way his shaft leapt against her body, it didn’t seem like it was a bad thing. “What’s this?” she breathed.

  “A myth,” Stefan managed, his eyes going wide. “A lie, you could say. The Fallen who found human love spoke of it, but one by one, it was discounted. More likely, I’m being tested, reminded of my failures.”

  “Then I want it to be gone,” Cressida ordered. Instantly, the fire in her hands died away, and Stefan sagged against the bed. Relieved, yes, but also…something else. She wasn’t sure what, and a moment later, she didn’t have time to worry about it. Stefan opened his eyes and pinned her with his gaze.

  Gone was the doubt and confusion. Gone also was any hint of pain in his expression. Replacing it was a look of pure, unadulterated want, a desire so intense, it fairly radiated off him.

  Then he smiled.

  “You seem to be in a very precarious position, princess,” he said, and he settled his hands on her hips, edging her back until she could feel the touch of his shaft against her. Her body clenched, and his grin only widened. “But I think you like putting yourself in precarious positions.”

  “You…” Cressida gaped down at him. His change of mood was so immediate, she almost didn’t trust it, but every time he slid up against her body, almost to the point of entering her before retreating again, she found she really couldn’t focus on anything else but that. “Ah, are you feeling okay?”

  Stefan blinked, his smile faltering slightly. “What do you mean?”

  She didn’t like losing his smile. She wanted it back. She ground against his shaft, guiding it inside her, and Stefan’s expression eased. “What’s the last thing you remember before me climbing on top of you?” she asked.

  His grin returned. “I’d rather just focus on that,” he said, seating her more firmly on him. She hissed out a long breath as he filled her, and gave herself over to the sensation. He stroked her once, twice—long, mind-blowing passes that filled her up and made her feel like she could fly. Her fingers seemed to spark against his shoulders, and she quickly moved them away, curling her hands into fists that she ground into the sheets. She’d had only the barest lessons in working with the spectral fire that Stefan’s touch had awakened within her, and she didn’t want to hurt him with it. Then again, could you hurt a demon with fire?

  She sighed, allowing her own smile to tug at her lips. There was so much she didn’t know about Stefan yet…and so very much she wanted to learn.

  She shifted her body up, positioning her breasts higher, and Stefan took immediate advantage. He leaned up and drew a nipple into his mouth, making her gasp with the sudden circuit of energy that went from his mouth to her groin and back again.

  He growled as she ground into him, his hand snaking behind her back, positioning her against him. Then he pressed deep inside her.

  “Yesss,” he moaned against her breast.

  He reached up with his other hand and captured the back of her head. He bent her toward him, now moving his hips in a deep rhythmic movement that somehow seemed to touch her everywhere at once, inside and out, until she could feel her own reaction building. She managed a soft whimper, which he seemed to instantly understand, and she felt him swell within her, making everything more immediate, more intense, more—right.

  “Stefan,” she pleaded, but when she tried to pull her face away from him, to truly see him, he resisted. He held her in place, and the growl in his throat grew to a sharper, harsher tone. With her arms tight around him, her hands flat on his back, what her eyes couldn’t show her, her fingers truly felt. Stefan was changing beneath her, his glamour shimmering and writhing, straining to release the demon within. A demon who, in this case, retained the form of the man whose glamour she had become so accustomed to. A demon who, in this case, was not so far removed from the Fallen angel he had once been that his body didn’t still bear the remnants of that glorious raiment, no matter how burned and scarred it had become.

  “Stefan,” she begged again, and something shifted in her own voice, deepened. Not the compulsion of a witch bent on controlling her demon, but the cry of a woman whose heart could no longer bear not to see the truth of the demon who’d somehow claimed her.

  In her arms, Stefan went nearly still, barely continuing to rock into her, holding the tide of their shared passion at an ebb, all the energy around his body snapping and crackling, and Cressida drew in a shocked breath. Because she knew—she knew. She had pulled this demon to her in her hubris and fear, desperate to find a solution against Ahriman. She had thought she could rule him, force him to help her, tempt him into helping her reach the next level of her powers through the release of her virginity. He’d been part of a hastily contrived plan the moment she realized she had a demon of true power in their midst—a Syx. Surely, of all the demons in the world, a Syx would draw Ahriman out.

  But in this moment, all Cressida’s plans, all her preparations, all her ideas fell away, and there was nothing but this being whose arms were wrapped around her, his breath harsh against her skin, his heart pounding wildly beneath her own. His glamour, his skin and muscles and bone—whether smooth and perfect or warped and deformed, it didn’t matter anymore. Nothing mattered except that she was able to look him in his eyes, see him—truly see him.

  “Stefan,” she whispered for a third time.

  It was as if she’d spoken some fell incantation. Stefan pulled back from her shoulder, slowly, trembling, as if he was making every effort to keep himself hidden from her—and yet failing. When she could see him, her heart momentarily quailed in her chest.

  This was not the most beautiful demon of the Syx, the demon who had made six thousand years and more of human females swoon. This was the face of the damned, exactly as he’d described it—yet infinitely worse. Broken, scarred, burned, and mutilated, his mouth a bare gash of pain, his eyes nearly lost in sunken pits. Nearly, but not completely.

  “Stefan,” Cressida whispered, laying her hands on either side of Stefan’s face as she stared into those fathomless, fiery eyes, coal-black orbs shimmering with roiling red. It was almost as if she could see all the way to Stefan’s heart—and even to his soul—the fear, the self-loathing, the doubt…

  And something else.

  Stefan looked back at her desperately, mutely, unable to speak through the pain that clearly racked his mind and held his body in a vise of agony, but he couldn’t hide the truth from Cressida, not now that her eyes were open enough to see.

  He loved her.

  A demon condemned to eternal servitude, a demon whose sin had left him deformed and discarded, good for nothing other than blasting into nothingness creatures of the horde more twisted and heinous than himself—loved her.

  And what was more shocking, and frightening, and imposs
ibly real…

  She loved him back.

  The climax of their intertwined bodies struck Cressida with the suddenness of a thunderclap, quick and hard enough to make her gasp even as Stefan surged forward as well, both of them caught up in a tide of release that made her sight go blank for a long, perfect, precious moment, her mind letting go of everything she thought, everything she feared, everything she hoped for and simply, gloriously, was.

  Spectral fire erupted around them in an intense, purplish-red inferno.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Stefan collapsed beneath Cressida, her body slick on top of his, her hair tumbling over her shoulders, surrounding them both in a sea of deep red curls. She laughed, and the sound could as easily have been the crash of the ocean or the peal of bells, as loud as his heart was pounding. Once again, he was reacting in ways he’d never experienced before with a human woman, and, now that the haze of sex had left him, there was something she’d mentioned that he wanted to follow up on, some memory she’d triggered…

  “I really do like the way you heal a girl,” Cressida sighed, her body a warm, liquid weight on his, and he lost his entire train of thought. Instead, he circled her with his arms, holding her tight to him. She smelled of starlight, he realized dimly, though that couldn’t be right. It’d been so long that he shouldn’t even remember the scent.

  With Cressida sprawled against him, boneless and content, they drifted in and out of sleep for another few minutes, and he thought he could possibly stay in exactly that position for the rest of his immortal life. Cressida couldn’t, but he was a demon, and she was—

  He frowned. There it was again, that strange aroma wafting up from her hair. Starlight. Which couldn’t be possible, of course, and yet…

  “What are you thinking about?” she murmured, and he found himself considering the question as if he’d never heard it before. Arguably, not too many people wanted to know the thoughts of a demon, but what few humans understood was that a demon was bound to answer the questions that you put to it. It was simply that usually, you weren’t going to be happy with the answer. In this case, though, it seemed positive enough.