Becoming his Monster (Playing with Monsters Book 3)

by Amelia Hutchins

  “Vlad,” Synthia whispered as she pushed the doors open as humans pushed and forced their way past us into the safety of the club.

  Inside the coppery tang of blood was thick in the air, and rancid. I pushed my elbow up against my nose as we entered it, finding bodies of immortals and humans in pieces littered on the floor. Silver eyes flashed in my mind; the gentle being that had always encouraged me and pushed me to be stronger, better, was lying on the bar with an iron rod protruding from his chest.

  “No,” I uttered brokenly. “No, it can’t be.”

  Chapter 28

  Ryder’s approach to the bar was unnervingly slow, as if his feet dragged to the gruesome task of discovering Vlad’s corpse laid out on the bar, with an iron bar pierced through his heart. I swallowed one, then twice as bile pushed heavily against the back of my throat as tears threatened to fall from my eyes. One foot in front of the other, he passed through the mutilated corpses that had been scattered onto the floor, left in tattered pieces by those who had desecrated the one place immortals and mortals had been safe to mingle. His hands gripped, turning the corpse over to reveal the face and then expelled a shuddered breath as his shoulders slumped and the body was set back down. His voice was thick as he plucked the note from the corpse, and read it before letting it drifted to the bloodied floor.

  My eyes stared down at the bloodied note which read two words. You Lose.

  “It’s not him, thank the Goddess it isn’t Vlad,” he said thickly, his voice filled with the same emotion we’d felt seconds ago when we’d believed it was Vlad’s corpse on display.

  I started to collapse in relief, but Lucian caught me as Synthia released the soft cry of relief that splintered through her. I watched her in disbelief as she began to search for someone else among the littered bodies of immortals that covered the floor, face down in the river of blood that seemed endless inside the club.

  It took hours of sorting through them to discover who had died, and who had been able to get away before this place had fallen to Lucifer. Hours passed as we helped her, piecing body after body together as the Fae began sifting corpses in and out of the club and back to Faery for their final burial. Fae sifted in and out, one after another until the bar was empty of death and then we began slowly cleaning it, as if for our own benefit it would help our mental state.

  Hours later, humans began lining up at the doors, demanding entrance into the one place they could be assured safety from the new world, and one by one, they were sifted to the Guild where we were sure they’d be safe. It stung, knowing that this place had been a beacon of hope in a world rife with chaos and debauchery, and yet they flooded to it, even though it had fallen. Instead of running to the Guild as they should have, they came here.

  “I didn’t think he’d be in danger. The club has always been protected, always safe,” Synthia whispered as she dusted off her hands on her pants. Her top was covered in blood, as the rest of her was, the rest of us. Blood smeared her sharp cheekbones, and then all at once, as if I’d imagined it, she was clean. “It’s always been warded against anyone seeking to cause harm entering it. How the hell could they bring it down?” she demanded as Ryder pulled her close, kissing the top of her head as he comforted her.

  “I’m guessing the wards we crossed outside removed the ones inside. Someone turned the new ones that Erie placed against us. They countered it, meaning Lucifer has a powerful fucking Mage or being on his side, working to undo what we did,” Ryder answered, and I shook my head.

  “Witches,” I corrected. “He used witches. They’re not strong wards, they’re smart wards. They used wards that turned your wards into a weapon against those inside the club. So once the ones inside the club became entangled with the others, they nulled the beings in the club, rendering them all but mortal. It worked long enough to allow those in the club to be slaughtered, and then his wards once again became the dominant ones. Witches are taught to outthink our enemies, to not work harder, but to work smarter. This was a smart move, for them, not for us. It’s not something those in here would have seen coming, and the moment they tried to fight back, the wards saw them as the threat to the club. They used your wards to kill your people. It’s smart, and yet fits the monsters we are fighting. It was dark witches, judging by the taint of dark magic still heavy in the air.”

  “They were placed by Fae and a very talented druid. They wouldn’t fall to mere witches, it had to be something stronger, much stronger,” Zahruk snapped, his sapphire gaze alight with rage brewing in their endless depths.

  “I didn’t say any witch, Zahruk. They’re dark ancient witches. Meaning they’ve sustained life for a very long time to gain an unbalanced footing of knowledge. If I’m right, they’ve spent a large portion of that time learning your people. The scent is old, musky and mixed with death. They’re over a thousand years old if my senses are correct. They are searching for chaos and souls. That means they’ve found a use for them, some way to devour them…” I paused, inhaling deeply as the grimoires inside me reacted to the magic in the air, the decay that the witch’s magic had left lingering. Admitting magic to these creatures still felt wrong, like a part of me still lingered in the past. “I can feel their darkness, which is the same as the magic in my head.”

  “The grimoires…they’re still alive inside of you?” Synthia asked as her hands fisted at her sides. “They’re old, but not that old. The Guild wasn’t built that many years ago, and the elders have not lived that long. Even the older ones, the ancient Guild didn’t have magic that old.”

  “No, but the grimoires were compiled of witches and bloodlines, meaning they kept their magic throughout the years, and the taint of it is in them. The spells that linger inside of me are very old, some light and some dark,” I admitted softly as I explained what I felt in my own head from the grimoires that remained closed in my mind. “Spells are passed down through generations. These wards that took down the clubs are old, ancient ones shared through blood that calls to the grimoires inside of me. I’m guessing whoever Lucifer is using; it’s from one of the bloodlines Katarina was born into. As with light magic, dark magic is also passed down through lines, only it is hidden between the pages where only those who sought out darkness would dare to look. In our coven, yarn was used to find the darkness in a line, to search their grimoires for the spells. If found, the purity ceremony would be used to bind any temptation to use it,” I elaborated as they listened, their eyes narrowing as I laid it out for them. “I house both dark and light magic, even though I no longer house a soul. The magic of the grimoires is still inside of me, as is the seal.”

  “Who is it?” Lucian asked, his dark gaze demanding I answer him and yet he already knew.

  “You know who did this,” I said softly, staring at him.

  “That’s impossible; they’d be dust by now.” His tone damned my words and yet his eyes seemed to sadden.

  “Unless they found a way to feed off of souls of immortals?” I offered, and he frowned deeper as he stared at me.

  “Who the fuck is it?” Synthia demanded.

  “If she’s right, it’s an entire coven of dark witches. Dark, immortal witches now. They’re evil, almost as evil as Lucifer himself, hungry for a power that they can’t contain because they lack the vessel to use it. They’d crave blood, and souls to retain their immortality if they do still exist. I cursed them to contain the souls of the damned eons ago for trying to take something from me. Magdalena is right, though, this is something they could do, and they’d be powerful enough to turn our own wards against us.”

  “And they have Vlad now? Adrian?” she demanded crossly.

  “Pray to your Gods that they don’t, or they are already dead.”

  “Vlad isn’t that easy to kill, he could be a vessel,” I offered. “He’d fight against them, he’s strong.”

  “He’d fight them, but they would win. They wield
iron claws and teeth to weaken their Fae prey. They drain their strength and then feed on them for however long they can. They suck them dry, leaving a husk of their victims in their wake.”

  “They are what were released from Hell today, aren’t they?” I asked, utterly horrified.

  “They and countless other monsters that have not fed in centuries and are starving,” he nodded as I swallowed hard. “Unless they were already here, helping him; it would explain how he hid Katarina’s soul in two vessels. I had wondered how he had done it, but if he had their help to remove and create a perfect replica, it would make sense how you are alive, and how you came to be a clone.”

  Ouch. I’d been a clone, not even a real person.

  “Where would they go? Where would they take them to finish feeding off of them?” Ryder asked, his eyes glowing as he feared for Vlad and what would become of him.

  “I don’t know, if I did we’d already be there retrieving him,” he supplied crossly as he stared at the empty side of the bar.

  “That is my family they took!” Ryder snarled as his wings and beast exploded in front of us.

  “Calm your tits,” a silken voice groaned as people moved through the halls. Weapons were brandished as we stared down the hallway. The hair on my neck rose as they emerged. I uttered groan as dark shadows began slowly exiting the hall, to enter the club.

  I expelled a soft cry as I watched Vlad, Adrian and countless others pour from the hallway to where we stood. “I wouldn’t be that easy to catch. Give me some credit,” he said in a guttural tone as he hugged Synthia and limped towards the bar.

  I slowly walked to the bar and stared at the bloody mess of his body, noting he’d given them a fight before he’d retreated. He turned as he poured himself and countless other cups with top shelf bourbon before his eyes lifted, and the bottle crashed to the floor.

  “Lena?” he whispered thickly before he was over the bar examining me. His hands cupped my cheeks as he stared into my eyes. “Gods, tell me it’s really you?”

  “It’s me.”

  “How? I fed you my blood, and yet I felt nothing from you. You are…different. You smell different.” His eyes smiled and yet it faded as he took in the tattered state of his club.

  “It wasn’t your blood or from lack of trying,” I whispered hoarsely. “I came back because Nyx brought me back as a Fury,” I admitted, and his forehead rested against mine as he chuckled.

  “Of course you did,” he said as he pulled back and stared openly at me. “I don’t care how it happened, but I’m glad you’re alive. I’m glad you survived. I’m not even sure why I am surprised anymore when you females come back from the grave. You crazy bitches pop right back up like daisies.”

  “What happened here?” Ryder asked as he downed a glass of the expensive liquor and then another.

  “Lucifer fucking happened,” Adrian injected, straddling a seat on the bar as he pushed guts off another to allow Synthia a clean spot to sit. “Lucifer and a group of haggled witches, who were surprisingly powerful considering they looked old, sickly and stunk of death and decay,” he shrugged as if he didn’t know what else to say or how to explain it.

  “Fucking Lucifer used the world trembling as a diversion to bring down the wards. He brought in a group of witches, old ones. They looked young at first, but I could see past the glamour and the veil of magic they wielded. They were husks of flesh and magic, as if they hadn’t fed in centuries, and then they opened their fucking mouths and began feeding on the partygoers inside the club, immortals and human alike were consumed like they were nothing. Child’s play to the likes of them,” Vlad growled as a shiver shook his large, muscular frame. “I barely got Adrian before I felt the tug on my magic. I felt it pulling me towards them, but a Fae got a shot of magic off, killing one of the witches, and then all hell broke loose. We had just enough time to get to the hidden rooms before the screaming started in earnest,” he said as he pushed his hands through his midnight hair and frowned. “I saved who I could, but it wasn’t much. It wasn’t enough.”

  “You did what you could, cousin,” Ryder stated, and I frowned as I took them all in.

  They were a family, one who was smack dab in a war they hadn’t signed up for. I turned my eyes to Lucian, wondering if my life could end this. I’d done it once, and even if it did open the gates to the other realms, wouldn’t these beings be able to prevent those monsters from entering it? They were the legends of the Fae realm, all wrapped into one family who’d go to war to protect each other. They could work together to save this world after I’d unleashed the seal to slaughter Lucifer.

  “No, they can’t,” Lucian snapped as he watched me. “We are not sacrificing your life, period.”

  “Lena?” Vlad asked, his silver eyes swirling as he read my emotions. “No, no sweetheart. Your life is precious to us, and you’re a part of this family now. You all are whether you want to be or not. Releasing one monster to kill another one isn’t the answer. We can face Lucifer together, all of us or none of us at all. There is no I in team, nor is there one of us that would allow you to die to save any one of us. We stand together, now drink. Because I’m assuming shit is about to hit the fan and all we have is right now, together.”

  “We can’t beat him if we don’t know where or what he is planning. We almost lost you tonight, and we didn’t even sense you were in danger because he killed angels!”

  “He tried,” a deep voice snarled behind us, and we turned as one to watch the same archangels swagger into the club. “It’s personal now,” he snapped as his cerulean gaze met mine.

  “The gloves are off, now pour a few rounds, because it’s about to get apocalyptic really fast. Heaven just fell,” he uttered thickly.

  “Heaven cannot fall,” I whispered in a horrified tone.

  “Earth wasn’t his goal, it never has been. He wanted the seal to open heaven to the world so that he could waltz right in and destroy it. Earth had to fall before he could bring heaven to its knees.”

  “So heaven and Hell are now in this world?” I asked.

  “They always have been, but the gates were closed to mankind,” he elaborated slowly, as if I wouldn’t understand him. “You can’t see them unless you’re heading into one. That’s why every once in a while, a soul will sneak back into this world. What you call spirits or ghost are just souls who slipped back out of the gates and came back, drawn to loved ones. The ones who wreak horror on humans are the ones who escaped Hell. They just have to catch the gate open or a crack in the walls to come back to what they know. Either way, no walls separate this realm from heaven or Hell, or more walls are cracking as we speak. Now, about that drink?” he asked as the shadow of wings stretched behind his back.

  “An angel, a demon, a Fae, and a few monsters walked into a bar…” a feminine voice purred behind us.

  “And?” Synthia asked as she turned to stare at Erie.

  “And my fucking fantasies came true,” she chuckled. “Bitches, have you seen outside? It’s a fucking shithole. I just got accosted by demons trying to give me mouth to mouth. I need something to sanitize the taste and wash their blood off my hands. Oh, and I blew up a few Paladin to make this night even funnier.”

  “You killed Callaghan again?” Ristan asked as he tapped Vlad on the shoulder and helped him pour more drinks to the people piling into the bar.

  “Just a little,” she chuckled with a smirk that told me she’d enjoyed it.

  “Who is Callaghan?” I asked.

  “The male who thinks I’m his salvation. I’m his doom; he just hasn’t figured that out yet.” I stared at her with my mouth open as I tried to form a question and failed. “He thinks my vagina is going to save our races, but it won’t. I mean, the entire world just literally went to hell, and he’s still chasing me.”

  “You’re a female druid,” the archangel pointed ou
t.

  “And you are?” she countered.

  “Raphael,” he said as lightning lit the room and the shadow of wings covered the wall behind him.

  “Uh, fucking hell,” she smiled as she slapped him on the back and downed her drink in one swallow. “An archangel, we’re so fucking fucked right now.”

  And that was the Gods’ honest truth.

  “Female, watch your language,” he urged, and she shook her head.

  “Oh hell, you ain’t heard anything yet,” she snorted as she tapped the bar for another drink and then peered around the room at the walls and the bodies strewn around the floor. “Jesus, did someone forget to clean up their dinner?” she asked.

  “Lucifer was here,” Synthia said softly as her hand rested on Vlad’s.

  “So these…these were your friends,” she said in a whispered voice that spoke of understanding. “I’m sorry, Vlad. I didn’t notice them in the excitement.”

  “The wards came down.” Vlad looked at her pointedly.

  “No, no they wouldn’t come down,” she said as she turned to focus on the walls. “They were voided out by something powerful. Or many powerful things,” she amended. “The wards outside, they’re not yours?” she queried.

  “No, they were placed mere seconds before the bar fell to Lucifer.”

  “Dark witches?” she asked, and then whistled as turned back around. “The Guild,” she whispered. “Bloody hell, the Guild has the same wards as we have here!”

  People began sifting, and Lucian grabbed my arm, yanking me with him. I didn’t fight it, didn’t struggle as my stomach dropped and tears burned my eyes. My family was there, unprotected while we’d sat here, drinking…

  Chapter 29