Dancing With The Devil, Witches Anonymous Step 5

by Evans, Misty

  Luc and I were connected to each other and to the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, so although everything in me insisted I fight for my life, I reached out with my right hand and stroked his forehead.

  I trailed my fingers over his ridged jaw to calm him.

  Stroked his neck and opened my mind and my magic wide.

  Listen. Watch. Remember.

  He stopped fighting, stopped growling. Rested his massive forehead against my chest. His scales scratched my neck at the base of my throat and puffs of hot breath rolled down my arms, waist and hips.

  As the images came, Luc bore down harder as if trying to see them all.

  My magic sang, but my heart clenched and burned from the pain. Sticky warm blood trickled from the scratches on my neck. More pumped from the wound in my heart where the dragon’s horn nailed me to the Tree.

  A low-grade fever consuming my chest, burning in time with my heart and the ring of fire surrounding us.

  My hips ached. No strength left in my thighs. Knees, shot. The only thing holding me up was Luc.

  Vaguely I noticed shapes outside the ring of fire. Heard muffled voices. The singing had stopped and I missed it. Where had the angels gone?

  Images of Heaven, the War and my love affair with the Devil swept through my mind. I pushed them through to his. Minutes, hours, went by. Several times he tried to pull away. I sunk my nails into the scales of his neck, forcing him to stay where he was.

  He breathed faster, the exhalations wrapping me in a soft, warm blanket. My vision fuzzed at the edges, the flames around us doing little to keep the shadows at bay. I reached for my magic, hoping to jolt my body to keep from passing out, but everything felt sluggish. I wanted to give in and close my eyes. Sleep for a little while.

  The image of me stepping off the edge of Heaven and falling to Earth flashed from the Tree into my mind and then on to Luc’s. A shiver started in his massive shoulders and worked its way down his elongated spine. Then another and another, until he was shaking from horns to wingtips.

  The flames soared higher. I heard shouts. Overhead, a crack of lightning and rolling thunder, rising and falling, swooping low and dangerous over the valley, through the ruined forest and into my ears.

  Rain fell. Slowly at first, then picking up speed until a torrential barrage of it hammered against us.

  The mental picture in my mind switched to more recent memories. Human memories of me and Lucifer. His smile, his touch. Our latest round of lovemaking in my bedroom before Keisha’s party. Suddenly, I was there again, in the room. On the bed with him, but also floating above, watching us.

  There he was, all love and heat and desire, totally consumed with me. Me. Can you imagine? The sin that had condemned us and so many other angels was a tangible thing.

  A good thing.

  As evidenced by the hair-raising, top-of-my-lungs-screaming orgasm toward the end, it was an incredibly good thing.

  The dragon thought so too.

  I felt his mind push back. Push an image into mine. The view through Lucifer’s eyes as I came apart in his arms.

  Love, his voice whispered in my head. Amo.

  I smiled through the haze of tears. Yes. Love. You and me, Devil. You and me.

  In our shared mental reflection of our time together, a tiny light, as small as the end of a wand, appeared. It flitted and hovered above us as we slept, finally settling on my abdomen and disappearing where it landed on my skin.

  I sucked in a breath. Another hard shudder ran through Luc’s body. Rain sluiced down, washing away my blood.

  Physically, I was too weak to even keep my eyes open any longer, but my heart was full.

  I didn’t need to slay the dragon.

  I only needed to love him.

  Chapter Twenty-eight – The Sacred Union

  With a terrible howl of pain, the dragon stumbled back, jerking his horns from the Tree as well as my body.

  My weak legs couldn’t support me even as my magic locked onto Lucifer and refused to let go. I fell, lifeless, to the ground.

  The rain fell hard, creating a flood in the forest and rising around my body. My vision went black and I heard the sound of the angels’ voices singing to me once more. I sank into it, reveling in the peace it promised.

  And then rough hands gripped me, lifted me out of the rising water. “Oh, no, you don’t.” The hands shook me. “Wake up, dammit. You have to slay the dragon.”

  Zayfeer. How had he broken through the ring of fire?

  Didn’t really care. I was so tired. And too weak to fight off his manhandling. Even my magic was down for the count…I’d given all of it to Luc. “Leave me be,” I sputtered through the sheeting rain. “Let me die.”

  “You’re an angel, dummy. You can’t die.”

  Damn. “That’s too bad, cuz I’d really like to right now.”

  “Yeah, well, tough feathers. I wanted to die a million times in my purgatory and I’m still here, so pull on your big girl wings and do your job. If you don’t slay the flippin’ dragon, I’m stuck here with you. Those bastard archangels left us.”

  A fluttering sensation tickled my abdomen. At the same time, the ground—flood and all—trembled underneath me. I opened my eyes, craned my neck to see Luc.

  Several yards away, he was morphing from the dragon back into himself. All beautiful, sinful, complicated Lucifer. Heaven’s Light Bearer. The Devil. Archangel and love of my life.

  Love, in fact, of my entire existence. “I’ve already done my job.”

  Z glanced over his shoulder, turned back to frown at me. “The beast still lives in him. If you don’t slay it, and the fears it symbolizes, you’ll never gain redemption. Never see Heaven again. We’ll all be stuck here in this poor excuse for purgatory.”

  Poor Zayfeer. He would never understand. “No one can slay the dragon, traitor.” He flinched at the term. “But if you love it and accept it, rather than fighting against it, the beast will be soothed.”

  “Soothed? That’s the best you got? Soothed?” He released me and sat back on his heels. “God bless us all to Hell. I’m stuck in purgatory with a bleeding-heart witch.”

  “No redemption for either of us, I’m afraid, ‘cuz there’s no way I’m slaying the dragon and there’s no way you’re taking me to Heaven.”

  He smirked and shrugged. “Hey, you can’t blame a Fallen for trying.”

  Lucifer was in human form again. He lifted his head from the muddy water surrounding us and our eyes locked. The circle of fire flared high.

  Rising to hands and knees, he crawled to me. His pupils were their normal black and magic oozed out of his pores, rushing toward me faster than he could crawl.

  Shoving Zayfeer out of the way, Luc lifted me and helped me sit with my back to the Tree. His gaze never left mine as he covered the wound over my heart with his hand. Raw, undiluted power zapped my wound. My body arched and froze for a moment as his magic raced through me.

  The hole in my heart shrunk and disappeared. The torn tendons and muscles knitted themselves back together. Bones repaired and the ragged skin smoothed over.

  Luc started to say something, stopped. His eyes burned with sorrow. A hint of desperation.

  I patted his hand where it rested over my heart. “It’s okay.”

  He wiped water from his face, glanced at the sky and swore at God. “It is not okay.”

  I tested my magic…it was weak, but it was there. I touched the Tree.

  Shelter us.

  Dozens of leaves burst forth from the highest branches, forming a canopy and cutting off the rain. “You were under a spell, Luc. You didn’t know what you were doing.”

  “That’s just it.” He sighed heavily and sat so he faced me. “I knew exactly what my beast was doing. I just couldn’t stop him.”

  Under the shelter of the Tree, the rain ceased and the flood vanished.

  Everything was so clear to me, but neither male angel seemed to get it. “That’s why you have me. Because I can control him. I can he
lp you control him. He’s not a beast any more than you are, or the angels who followed us into battle, or the humans who sin and do terrible things to each other. Sin is not a dragon living inside us, separate from our essence. The dragon is simply part of our nature. The duality of good and evil, faith and doubt, love and fear.”

  As I spoke, the fire-scorched, rain-soaked earth sprouted green shoots of grass. New saplings sprang out of fallen trees. The Tree of Knowledge burgeoned with more leaves and ivy wound its way around the trunk, tickling my backside.

  The circle of fire quieted to a slow burn. In the distance I heard a song. Not angels…birdsong. I took Luc’s hand and squeezed. “One cannot exist without the other and we must embrace that. We must love ourselves, the good and the bad, if we’re ever to find true redemption. True peace.”

  Zayfeer sat a few feet away. He snorted. “Kill me now.”

  I snatched up his sword, lying next to me, and launched it at his heart. It struck home and he flew back and hit the dirt, finally speechless. “That,” I said, “can be arranged.”

  From his spot on the ground, he sputtered and raised a hand to the heavens. “She tried to kill me. Did you see that?”

  Pushing to my feet, I walked over, grabbed the sword and yanked it out. “You’re an angel, and as you just told me, you can’t die. Unfortunately.”

  He clapped his hands over his wound, which was already healing, and sat up. “Consider yourself excommunicated from my Christmas card list.”

  Bending down in front of him, I shoved the point of the sword under his chin. “I may not be able to kill you, but if you try to kidnap me again and take me to Heaven, I’ll cut off your balls. We clear?”

  “This is my new purgatory, isn’t it? To be stuck here with you and lover boy for eternity.”

  “Luc and I aren’t stuck here.” I jammed his sword in the ground. “Only you.”

  He glanced at Luc, who shrugged, and looked back at me. “What are you talking about?”

  “Luc has his magic back. And…” I rubbed my lower belly and smiled. “The sacred union has been achieved.”

  Luc and Zayfeer both looked confused.

  “The sacred union.” I pointed at Luc and the Tree. “You, me, the Tree of Knowledge. Good and evil and all knowledge of both, merged into one being.”

  Again, the men looked at me with blank faces.

  Rolling my eyes, I huffed a little. Then I walked over to Luc and put his hand on my stomach. “I’m pregnant. With your baby. And if this all goes according to plan, she’s going to bring Heaven to Earth.”

  Chapter Twenty-nine – God For A Day…At Least In Purgatory

  I’d never seen Lucifer speechless.

  His mouth opened, shut. Opened again. “You…I…” He wiggled a finger back and forth between us. “We, uh…huh. I see.”

  But apparently he didn’t. He shook his head. “How is that possible?”

  “Anything’s possible with love.” Yeesh, I sounded like Keisha. “The Tree showed me the truth about everything, Luc. I’m afraid Zayfeer was right about this one. Our baby is quite possibly the one entity in the entire universe that can reunite the Fallen with Heaven, if they wish to be redeemed.”

  Me, I was digging my life on Earth. I hoped Lucifer was digging it with me.

  He looked away, blinked a couple times. When his gaze returned to mine, it was filled with trepidation.

  My heart fell. I turned sharply and put my back to him so he wouldn’t see the tears welling in my eyes.

  This was a shock, obviously, but I’d been sure he’d be happy about it. I forced my voice to sound normal. “Hell will continue to exist, as will purgatory. Balance must be maintained, blah, blah, blah, so you’ll be free to stay where you are, if that’s what you want.”

  As the silence stretched, I looked toward the City of Lost Angels. The last of the clouds had left, revealing a beautiful full moon in purgatory. What once was sand separating the forest from the city, was now a lush meadow.

  In the distance, the church glowed. Moonlight illuminated the figurehead of Lucifer, the statue casting its arms wide over the trapped angels. Beyond the city, a sea rose and the faint smell of salt water carried on the air. The air held the faint color of pink.

  My heart hurt, my stomach hurt. My skin felt as rough and raw as my nerves. This was all on me, now. Saving the lost angels, bringing the child of Heaven and Hell into the world, restoring a new kind of balance.

  I could do it on my own. Would do it on my own. But it would have been so much better to do it with the man I loved.

  How old-fashioned of me, right?

  Underneath the hurt, a sliver of anger flared. In that moment, if I hadn’t loved Lucifer so damn much, I would have hated him.

  And then his arms encircled my waist. He pulled me back against his body, all heat and solid protection. “No matter what our child does or doesn’t do, he will be the luckiest kid on the planet…um, make that the entire universe…because he’ll have you for a mother.”

  The tension in my shoulders left. A slow slide down my body and out. Peace once again set up shop.

  I smiled into the night. “She.”

  “The Tree told you it was a girl?”

  The Tree hadn’t designated the baby’s sex. Only the intention of the baby’s soul to redeem those who were lost. “I think we should name her Arial, after my mother.”

  Luc’s chuckle at my obstinacy vibrated across my skin. He hugged me tight. “And should we raise her here in your purgatory or get out of here and back to Earth?”

  In a weird way, I hated to leave this place. “Earth, of course. But what about them?” I pointed at the city. “How am I going to free the lost angels trapped here?”

  Luc pressed his cheek against mine as we stood in silence for a moment, watching the deserted church and its grounds. “Maybe Arial will have the answer.”

  “Did you hear that?” Zayfeer said from behind us.

  Luc and I looked back at him. He was staring over his shoulder at a part of the forest where the trees were so thick, the moon’s light couldn’t touch the forest floor. “I swear I heard something.”

  “Time to go,” Luc murmured in my ear.

  Goosebumps ran down my spine as my ears strained to pick up the sounds of a horror monster. “Definitely.”

  Zayfeer hustled over. “About returning to Earth, Amo. You’re going to need help protecting your sister from that lousy vampire, Latimer, and hunting down those other demons that escaped from my purgatory.”

  “My sister? You mean Mikayla?”

  “I thought the Tree showed you everything.”

  I thought so too. Taking a deep breath, I poked around inside my brain.

  O-kay. There it was. The memory of Mikayla with her hair down, sitting next to Emilia at the party, and me thinking then, even before the IV hookup of knowledge, that we shared the same mother.

  It had been a simple inkling of the truth. One I hadn’t given my full attention to. Now it seemed so obvious, I almost smacked my forehead with my palm. “But Mikayla’s mother died on the steps of Immaculate Con..cep…tion... oh, my God.”

  Even as I said the words, one of the purgatory scenes played out in my mind. “The woman with the red cape, running up the stairs…”

  Z nodded. “That was your mother. Yours, Emilia’s and Mikayla’s.”

  “She was alive and living in Eden all these years and neither Emilia nor I knew it? Why didn’t she come for us? Why didn’t she…”

  One of Luc’s hands cupped my shoulder and squeezed. “She was protecting you. All of you. She made a pact with God before you were born, Amy. Because of her knowledge and her contact with Him, she wasn’t allowed to stay with you and Emilia once you were born. She stayed near you and started another family. When she realized Mikayla had powers, too, she tried to protect her, keep her powers from coming into their full potential and hide her from both Heaven and Hell. She knew it wasn’t going to work. That her plans were falling apart and you were g
oing to be exposed if they did, so she went to God, to ask His favor. She was killed on the steps of IC before she could do so.”

  “Why?”

  He shook his head, sad. “Michael was jealous. Jealous of the favoritism God had already shown her.”

  That familiar warm rushing sensation filled my mind. I turned wide eyes on Luc. “Michael was in love with her.”

  “And he hates you,” Zayfeer added.

  “His jealousy is legendary.” Luc’s eyes slid to the left, toward the forest, where a swishing noise erupted. Something large was sliding snake-like through the woods. “Perhaps we should continue this discussion in your apartment.”

  “Michael, you bastard!” I shook a fist at Heaven. “You had no right. She was just an innocent human.”

  The ground shook and I was thrown off balance, slamming into Lucifer. He grabbed me, helped me right myself. “Be careful, love. The baby and all.”

  Right. The baby. I pointed a finger at the sky. “This isn’t over, Michael. You and I have unfinished business. One of these days, I’ll be back.”

  A crashing noise came from the forest. Another creature out to scare me. The adrenaline pumping in my veins wouldn’t be tamed. I grabbed Zayfeer’s sword and stomped toward the noise. “Show me what you’ve got, Axeman, or whoever the hell you are.”

  “Amy,” Lucifer warned.

  I held up a hand to shush him. Raised the sword as the crashing grew nearer.

  I was done running from monsters. Done running from the past.

  A second later, Nikita burst from the trees, tongue lolling. She stopped short at the sight of the sword and my fighting stance. Her dark eyes darted around. “You’ve spruced things up while I was gone.”

  Cephiel emerged next, also looking over my purgatory with a critical eye. “Thought you said this place was a dump, Nikita.”

  “It was. Now it’s…healthier. No wonder the forest is such a bitch to get through. All that green.” She shivered. “Blech.”

  I lowered the sword. “What are you two doing here?”