by Cole, Tillie
With each rhythmic boot-step on the tunnel’s old stone floor, Noa thought back to Diel. The crazed fight he’d had within himself before her. She had watched with fascination as he switched personalities like a light being turned on and off at a rapid speed. One second the beast inside triumphed; the next, then did Diel.
Her thoughts lightened when she thought of Diel’s monster. The way it watched her, softened under her touch, like a tamed beast simply needing a moment of rest. Then she recalled Diel fighting back to the surface. The man with the glacial eyes. He acted in total opposition to the monster, recoiling from her touch as though it were a naked flame. Her chest pulled tight. Not in anger, but in deep sorrow.
As if hearing her thoughts, every single scar on her body began to sting; every bone in her body ached as if she been strapped to the rack and yanked apart. But there had always been more that came with the rack, as punishment for her perceived innate sin, for being the devil’s whore on earth.
More than the agonized pain and the muscular tears. More than the dislocations and the burning welts from red-hot pokers singeing her skin while she was bound to the wooden contraption. And if she was correct, the Fallen had been taken sexually by the priests too, just as she and her sisters were. An exorcism of the flesh wasn’t complete without the cleansing of the internal flesh too.
It was relentless. And not one of the Brethren’s “sinners” came away from their respective hells unaffected.
Nausea built in Noa’s throat as she remembered Diel rolling off the bed after lying underneath her. After the monster had pinned her down and wanted to touch her, gain her affection. She pictured Diel writhing on the floor, his voice lethal and dark, but the fear in his eyes shining so brightly it could have blotted out the midday sun.
Fear of her. Not of what she might do to hurt him, but of what she might do to soothe him. For someone who had been so cruelly and wickedly treated for too many years to count, the act of kindness and the simplicity of an embrace could be as destructive as a sword plunged directly into the heart.
And Noa knew its root cause was the collar.
She remembered the collar’s dagger-like electricity striking him down, wrecking his body as if he deserved it. She remembered the tight jaw, the taut muscles and the tormented roar as the volts burned his every cell from the inside out.
With the force of a migraine attack, Noa remembered the face of the boy from a few years ago. He had been tied up in a metal collar and chains, rabid and feral like a junkyard dog, hanging on for dear life, but fighting so hard to be freed that he’d used the last of his depleted energy to snarl and try to attack her even as she arrived to set him free. Even after being locked up like an animal and abused to within an inch of his life—skin and bone, and gray in pallor—he still fought. Because he had a monster inside him too. A beast, Noa knew, who protected him from feeling the harm that was inflicted upon him daily. His feral nature wasn’t immoral or evil—it was his salvation, the only way his mind knew to protect the purity in his spirit from being crushed.
Just like Diel. As if the past and present were colliding, Noa saw the boy and Diel mold into one damaged soul as clearly as she saw the stars in the sky each night. And as she’d stroked her finger down Diel’s monster’s cheeks and ran her hand through his hair last night, Noa had seen a glimpse of a young boy in Diel’s deathly frightened stare too. Frightened of any kind of non-threatening touch.
To kill was his protection. To seek revenge was the only way he could get out of bed each morning and live something that resembled a life.
And Noa knew this, because that used to be her life too.
She remembered the burning, molten anger taking hold and controlling her. She surrendered herself to it freely. Like it was a soft cloud catching her in freefall. Like it was her trusted sword against an invading enemy army, boldly slashing them down in cold blood so she could never be hurt again.
“Noa?”
Noa shook her head and blinked in the tunnel’s semi-darkness.
Dinah was facing her, eyebrows furrowed. “You okay?”
Noa nodded, but the echoing chills of her thoughts remained. “Yes.”
Dinah stepped even closer. “Is it him? Are you worried about seeing him this morning after last night?”
Noa smiled. “No. Not at all.” It was the truth. If anything, Noa was desperate to lay eyes on Diel again. He had become like a dream she couldn’t shake; her gut told her to seek him out, to be near him, to guide him. It had been that way from her first sight of him in the priest’s home, feeling his strong hand wrap around her throat as he slammed her against the wall, then watching him savagely destroy the priest on the bed. Blood and death didn’t faze her. When you were raised in the dark, pitch-blackness felt as comforting as a soft, warm blanket. That included the demons that lurked within it.
The minute she had looked into his eyes, and seen that collar around his neck, something flared inside her. A magnet, pulling her to the tall and imposing black-haired man with the oceanic eyes—like called to like.
Noa could still feel the phantom sensation of her on top of him last night, him hard beneath her. His body broad and muscled, and his cock so solid between her legs. The monster craved her; the man fought it. Diel refused to yield and instead wanted her dead.
So, she’d offered him tonight.
In the folly he expected a fight. And a fight he would get. No, not a fight, an apocalyptic war. Just not the kind that he anticipated. Her heart skipped a beat. Her plan had to work. She would make sure it worked. Because she understood the beast inside him better than he could ever know. She understood why it existed. What Diel wasn’t aware of was that the monster wasn’t a separate part of him, some evil entity that had come to possess him.
The monster was Diel and Diel was the monster. They were one, and that fucking collar was keeping them apart. He needed to face his inner demon. He needed to embrace its darkness into his hidden light.
“What happened last night?” Candace asked, confusion written on her face.
“Nothing,” Noa said, still glaring at Dinah to make sure she didn’t speak of it.
Dinah sighed, but then looked at Candace and Jo. “Noa had a bad dream. She woke up screaming.”
Jo looked at them suspiciously, but then shrugged. “Fine. If that’s how you want to play it. Let’s get to this friggin’ breakfast.”
Dinah knocked on the manor’s door, then let herself in. “Hello?” she shouted.
A real-life fucking butler came to greet them—black and white suit, a bow tie and everything. “This way, ladies.” Dinah looked back at her sisters and raised her eyebrows. The Coven weren’t used to pomp and ceremony; they were used to leaking tunnels and cold so frigid it rattled their bones.
Noa followed the butler and her sisters into the dining room. The second the butler opened the door, Gabriel got to his feet at the head of the table. He was dressed in his priest’s outfit again, his soft blond curls making him look like a living, breathing saint. Noa wanted to snarl at the sight; shitty memories of the most ungodly men in those black suits cut too deep for her to see him as anything but an enemy.
But Noa’s attention quickly fell from Gabriel, and she roved her gaze over the busy table. It didn’t take her long to seek out Diel. He sat next to the one who had been waiting for him last night—Sela. Father Auguste’s brother and doppelganger. Just the sight of Sela’s face sent shudders through her body, and she had to breathe slowly to calm herself down.
He wasn’t Auguste. He wasn’t the Witch Finder General. In fact, from what she could gather, he was as far from Father Auguste as he could possibly get. He was a Fallen. He had been deemed a sinner and an enemy of the faith.
Diel was already watching her. Bright blue eyes were fixed on her every move. His body vibrated where he sat, and his head ticked from one side to the other, his eyes blinking dramatically. She was once again witnessing the fight for dominance between monster and man. His collar crackled, pulli
ng Gabriel’s attention to him.
“Diel?” Gabriel said. “Are you okay?”
Diel closed his eyes and breathed. Gabriel watched him closely, but the other brothers talked among themselves like it was something they’d seen a million times before—they probably had. When Diel’s eyes opened again, he seemed calmer, but by the excessive ticking, Noa knew that not to be true. “I’m fine,” Diel growled.
Sela’s gaze slipped to Noa’s. It narrowed, as if he suspected she was the evil heretic she had been raised to believe she was.
“We seem to be missing some of your sisters,” Gabriel said, a hint of a question in his voice.
“Beth’s feeling unwell. Naomi is staying to watch over her,” Dinah explained.
“Do you need a doctor?” Gabriel asked.
“No need,” Dinah said, protecting Beth as fiercely as she always had.
“It wasn’t something we said, was it?” the redhead, Bara, asked, a cold grin on his lips.
“Not at all,” Dinah said.
“Then please, sit down,” Gabriel said, and the Coven pulled out chairs. Noa made a casual beeline for the seat opposite Diel. She sat down and met his harsh stare head on. The air between them seemed to thicken, crackling with tension. Jo shifted beside Noa, darting worried eyes between her and Diel. Noa slipped her hand under the table and squeezed Jo’s, silently telling her not to draw attention to them.
“So,” Gabriel said, as a middle-aged woman began bringing out plates of food. Noa’s stomach growled. “How’s the house?”
“Perfect.” Dinah cast a subtle glance at Diel. The ire on her face was plain and clear, but she refocused her attention on Gabriel before he could suspect anything.
The door to the dining room opened, and Maria, the woman with the abnormally long hair, slipped through. Raphael, her Fallen partner, entered behind her. Raphael’s shirt was half-open, exposing his chest—a chest that was coated in a light sheen of sweat. Maria was combing through her hair with her fingers, smoothing some flyaway strands. Her cheeks were pink and her eyes were bright. Noa smirked to herself, completely aware of why they were late.
“I’m so sorry,” Maria said, flustered, and took her place beside Gabriel. Raphael slipped beside her, his hand reaching out to run through Maria’s hair. His golden eyes never moved off the woman, as if she were a living goddess. Noa frowned when she caught a line of red around Maria’s neck. Strangely, no one but her seemed disturbed by the sight.
“Raphe,” Bara said, shaking his head. “Don’t you know how uncouth it is to fuck your woman so long you almost miss breakfast?” Michael, Gabriel’s vampiric brother, sat next to Raphael, sipping on his blood and staring at the tabletop once again, apparently not even paying attention to anything happening around him. Even as Uriel and Sela began stacking their plates with pancakes and bacon, he just sipped on his glass of blood like it was OJ.
Noa thought of the glaring irony. Michael was contentedly consuming blood as his morning sustenance, while Beth was back in the housekeeper’s home voluntarily expelling it from her body.
Raphael smiled, and even Noa could see the glaring attraction of the man. He was like a Renaissance oil painting—golden eyes, dark hair and complete facial perfection. “I’ll never apologize for being with my little rose, Bara. I’d fuck her on the table right now if she wanted me to.”
Bara rolled his eyes as Uriel scowled beside him, his piercings glinting in the sun that shone through the vast bay window overlooking the expansive gardens. Bara turned back to the sisters. “You see, ladies. We’re very free with our affection around here.”
“It wouldn’t be welcome,” Dinah said with a curt laugh.
“Ouch,” Bara said, hand over his chest. “You wound me, head witch.”
“Don’t be offended.” Dinah shrugged. “I’m on the ace spectrum. I don’t find anyone attractive enough to want to fuck them.”
“Ace?” Uriel questioned, eyebrows drawn down in confusion.
“I’m both asexual and aromantic,” Dinah explained. “I have no inclination toward people either sexually or romantically. No desire at all.” Dinah pointed at Noa, Jo and Candace. “I have my sisters. Our purpose to bring the Brethren fuckers down. That completes my life, before you ask if I’m missing out or some other asinine question like that, which, frankly, is nothing but fucking offensive. I’m not.”
“And just for the record,” Candace said, firmly clutching Jo’s hand, “we like pussy. Each other’s, specifically.”
“Now, that,’” Bara said, “is something we have in common. I’ll take pussy all fucking day long too.”
“Bara, please,” Gabriel said, clearly exasperated, and somewhat uncomfortable, judging by the quick tightening of his lips.
“We have a brother who drinks blood, one who strangles his woman with her own hair while he fucks her, and one who wears a metal collar to keep himself under some kind of control,” Uriel said, and Noa could see that he was just as perfect-looking as Raphael, though it was obvious he tried to lessen that attractiveness with his many piercings and tattoos. He was losing the battle though. In Noa’s eyes, it only made him more interesting. “I’m not sure any kind of existing spectrum could show what we fuckers are into.”
“You only covered some of your family’s sexual preferences,” Jo said. “What about the rest of you?”
Uriel smiled widely. “Let’s just say we’ve only mentioned the very tip of that iceberg.”
“Speaking of,” Bara said. “How’s the little mute fire witch doing?”
Noa whipped her head to look at Bara. Naomi. He was talking about Naomi. “You don’t need to fucking think of her at all,” Noa said coldly. The redhead turned his disturbing green eyes on her. In that moment, he looked just like a panther sizing up his prey.
“Is that so, pink witch?” he said, voice lowering an octave. He remained staring at her, and a shard of ice trickled down her spine under his glacial attention. But Noa stared right back. He didn’t intimidate her. None of these fuckers did. She’d dealt with worse …
A quiet voice in her head told her that maybe she was worse.
The sudden electrical snap of Diel’s collar cut through the room like a thunderclap, pulling everyone’s focus his way. He was shaking, fists clenched on the table. His neck was corded, and his eyes were bloodshot with the strain of trying to keep himself reeled in.
“Diel?” Gabriel said cautiously, but Diel’s eyes were on Noa. Then they slowly traveled to Bara, who frowned in confusion at his brother. When Bara glanced at Noa, a look of stark understanding flashed across his face.
Bara held up his hands, wearing a cocky grin. “Message received, brother.”
Noa’s heart fired into a sprint. Sela placed down his fork and said, “Breathe, Diel.”
Diel stared at Noa a second longer, the look in his eyes switching between the monster’s softness and Diel’s potent anger. But he eventually shut his eyes and inhaled a steady breath. In less than a minute, the collar lost its serpentine hiss, and the charged metal seemed to calm to a low-grade hum.
Diel opened his eyes, but his focus was on the wooden table, gaze averted from Noa. Noa fought to keep her own breathing under control. Heat rushed over her body, and every part of her was primed, in a confused cocktail of being braced to either fight or defend Diel.
Tonight in the folly couldn’t come soon enough.
“You’re a fucking interesting bunch, that’s for sure,” Dinah said, shaking her head. “Never thought we’d find anyone more fucked up than us. But I think we’ve hit the goddamn lottery with you guys.”
“You flatter,” Bara said, the darkness he’d just exposed quelled and his usual dry humor rising to the surface.
Dinah faced Gabriel. “As much as I’m loving the fucked-up blended-family bonding, we need to start planning. Our rescued children need moving. And we need to start talking about how we’re going to take out the Brethren.”
Gabriel nodded. He was about to speak when Noa asked, �
�I’m assuming you can all fight.”
Gabriel seemed taken aback by that. Uriel leaned forward, elbows on the table. “We’re serial killers. What do you think?”
Noa cracked her neck. “Being able to kill, individually, doesn’t mean you can fight collectively.” She scanned the Fallen men. “You have just turned your focus to fighting the Brethren and were only your run-of-the-mill, everyday murderers before that. We have been facing these pricks for years.” She tapped her nails on the table. “They can fight. They train together constantly—a well-oiled cohesive unit. You have no idea what awaits you. We have barely scratched the surface.”
“We set Purgatory fucking alight,” Sela said. Diel’s head remained bowed as he tried to keep himself calm. “We went in and killed them all.”
Noa huffed a laugh. “A few old priests who you caught unawares in the back of some secluded kids’ home.” Noa looked at her sisters, who were nodding in agreement with her. She leaned forward, and as she did, she saw Diel stiffen. His musky scent hit her nose, causing shivers to spread all over her skin.
She lost a breath before she schooled her features and carried on. “The Witch Finders, and the Brethren soldiers, await a holy war against all enemies. Their very own Armageddon. It’s been prophesized. They talked about it nonstop when my sisters and I were their captives.”
Noa remembered overhearing those conversations with crystal clarity. “They live and breathe solely for their mission to rid the world of evil. Of people like us.” Noa laughed, only because she could scarcely deal with the enormity of the influence and power their mutual enemy had. “You have no idea …” She shook her head, not in disrespect to the Fallen and their lack of knowledge of just how powerful the Brethren was, but at the seemingly impossible battle that was before them all. Thirteen of them versus an entire fleet of cult-whipped, zealot priests.
