Becoming His Monster by Hutchins, Amelia, Hutchins, Amelia (2)

Chapter 11

I stewed at his words, hating that no matter how much I ignored them, it replayed in my head on repeat. Was he the reason we remained here, stuck to this place unwillingly? I’d assumed it was our family, which it could be, but the others who served Joshua seemed unwilling to leave it either.

It ruffled my feathers, and as I marched into the huge conference room, it didn’t help that his smug ass was there to greet me. As if he hadn’t just floored me with words or knocked me on my ass with them, only to walk out and leave me with my mouth doing a fish out of water impression. Asshole.

Taking the seat beside him, I turned, staring at my mother and Kendra, who eyed me warily. I shut down the emotion and turmoil that stewed inside of me and allowed the darkness and its calming effect it had on me to slowly rise. It wasn’t until Joshua joined us that I stiffened. I glared at him, wondering what the hell he was doing here as well.

My grandmother stared at me, her matching blue eyes trying to see past the shield I’d slipped into place. Lucian being so close had butterflies I’d thought I’d ripped the wings off of soaring inside of me. Joshua sitting on the other side had a hurricane of anger mixed with pain that we had come to this place and time, and now had to explain how we’d gotten to it.

“Benjamin,” my grandmother whispered thickly, choking on emotions.

“I am not Benjamin,” he declared gently as he folded his scarred hands in front of him. “I’m Joshua, you buried Benjamin.”

“Impossible, we did the spell to be sure of who we’d buried,” she argued as power rippled through the room, a warning of her own turbulent emotions flaring.

“We were exactly the same. The spell used to create us, and the soul we shared, was Katarina’s first attempt to close a twin with a fractured soul in it.”

“Then she’d have died when you separated and it fractured,” she said pointedly.

“Had it been her own soul she had used, yes. She hadn’t talked Drake into it yet and had to be sure it worked first. She was able to pierce the veil and met him long ago, and once she’d sunk her claws into him with the promise of untold power, he did whatever she asked of him, including murdering the seer in the woods. Or more to the point, the woman you thought was a seer. He’d set up everything, done all the legwork and spells as she’d told him to, and the results of it were Benjamin and me being born from one soul, split into two.

“When he found me, I was in Afghanistan. My unit was assigned to join with another on a mission outside a town. Imagine my surprise when he was the leader of the second unit I was to find and help. He explained where he was from, who he was, and what you had done. He told me we were meant to be one person, and that the only way to manage it was for me to die. The next day we were supposed to be in the center of Kandahar, so I used runes to paint my flesh before we set out. I was prepared to die, but not ready to allow it to happen. So when he lured me to the bomb someone had set in the middle of town in the heavily visited shopping area, I murdered him. Unlike Lena, I do not have a fractured soul because I was the light. The spell they used to create us was to balance Yin and Yang, to eventually become one. My soul was stronger than his, so when I left my tour, or his tour, after they’d sent you back his body instead of mine, I became him. I reported back to my father that it had worked, that all his effort and time hadn’t been for nothing. When he’d gone to tell the soul of his lover the truth, I waited. When Drake returned, I murdered him and for all intent became Benjamin. You had already buried me by the time I’d returned. Lena had left town, and even though I watched her, I had to wait to see what would happen. Drake had told me his plans, how Lena and Kendra were carrying the dormant soul. The moment I returned, it began to unravel.”

“You met him?” my mother whispered through eyes shining with unshed tears. “Was he, was he evil?”

“No, misled, but not evil. He did what he had been told to do, and while I don’t think he would have hesitated to end my life to finish his goals, he wasn’t evil. He told me about his father, and I told him about his mother. I told him of the sisters he’d never meet, and how much the coven needed him but Drake had beaten him, snuffed out any humanity he could have had. I am dark, mother. I was the moment his soul met and dissolved into mine. His magic became my magic, and his secrets became my truths. I knew his past, his horrors, and everything he’d been told. It was how I knew that if Lena ended her life, she would come back.

“The plan was to break the spell Katarina had placed on Lucian by making him fall for the darkness in Magdalena. Making him care for her before the solar eclipse was crucial. Lucifer had used his abilities to ensure she was fertile, that her womb would take his seed. They planned everything, right down to you sending her to that club outside of Portland. That was where he allowed his barbs to plant the potion into her womb. Then he allowed them to escape, to rush back here where he knew Lucian would be waiting. The only thing they didn’t plan on was how far a mother would go to protect her own child. I’d told Lena what to use to ward her womb, to protect her child. I told her what she held inside of her and what it could do to her son if it lived. How it wouldn’t ever be a child but rather a monster, the true Harbinger of Doom. They’d wanted to force Lucian to murder his own child, and the only way he could save this world would have been to do just that. They wanted to hurt him, for what I’m not sure. That part was never told to Benjamin. But Lena would have lived under the control of the monster inside of her, had she lived. Once she gave birth, she would have ceased to exist. Just an empty, soulless corpse, but the man who came to me promised she’d live if she did as he instructed us to.”

“Who was the man?” Lucian growled thickly with his question.

“I don’t know who or what he was, only that he promised me Lenny wouldn’t die for having ended up in the middle of a game she hadn’t agreed to play in. The others were with him, the soulless as we call them, informed me of his truths, and I asked him to show me. To show me what she would become. And so he did, and I became first. Everything he said would happen played out, and no matter what we did, it didn’t change the path Lena dove headfirst into. So I told her the truth. I told her if she was strong enough to do it, I’d save her.”

“You knew you wouldn’t die?” Kendra snapped heatedly.

“No, we didn’t know for sure,” I answered harshly. “I knew you would live. When I met Lucifer at the house, I knew I would die, and that you would go on. I knew one of us had to die to fracture the soul. My son was cursed; he held pure evil within him. My first and only decision as his mother was to take his life with mine. To free him from the monster they’d intended him to be, and to give his soul back to Hecate so that he may be reborn again. By taking my life, I saved yours. One of us was not living through that night, and you weren’t the one with the cracked skull. You ended up in Hell because of me, because of my choices and who I had been with. You didn’t deserve it, nor can I ever make up for it, but I could sacrifice myself to save you. To protect the world from what my son would become. I knew I’d come back; I’m not sure how or why I trusted the word of a man who wouldn’t even show us his face, but I did. I felt it. So I took my life, ending my mortal one for whatever I have become. I do not regret it. This world doesn’t need more heroes; it needs monsters that can do what is needed when needed without having to worry about the hindrance of a soul that stands in the way.

“You see, I knew dying wasn’t the end because, without a soul, heaven wouldn’t take me and Hell couldn’t hold me. I just existed now. I don’t run based off what my heart tells me to do, something else controls me now. I don’t know what it is, or why we are drawn to this place where you and these creatures dwell, but neither do I care as long as I can kill. I’m not your daughter, I’m so much more. I think I love you still, but I no longer care if I do or if I don’t. That should scare you because it also means that I do not care if you live or die, but I think I should, so I protect you. I am not bound to the coven, nor do I use your magic. I use something greater, stronger than your coven could ever offer me or us. We are evolving into what remains a mystery to even us. The man who created us, he has not returned, nor does he beckon us to him.”

“And if he told you to kill us?” Kendra asked.

“You’d die,” I said without hesitation.

Chapter 12

Time held no meaning, and since we’d left the meeting where they’d drilled us for hours, I’d stewed. I’d ran my answers through my mind a thousand times since I’d walked out, leaving them to determine if they’d ask us to leave or stay. If I were them, I’d tell us to go or fight us. We were dark, deadly, called by the night and the endless blackness that bathed the skies above the Guild. We were an unknown threat no matter how you chose to look at it.

“You shouldn’t have told her that,” Joshua said from where he stood beside me.

“It’s the truth,” I argued. “Should I have pretended otherwise? I do not want them dead. I fear him coming back and using us for whatever purpose he created us for. Do you not?”

“I don’t think he created us to kill our coven, nor those we love, Lenny. I think he created us to protect something, maybe even Lucian. You said he felt a thread; I felt it in that room with him. We need to figure out what he is so that we can figure out why the fuck you grew wings and what we are,” he muttered as he scrubbed his palm over his face and shook his head.

I shrugged. “What does it matter what we are? We’re not dead, and that’s exactly what I would be if he hadn’t told you how to save me. Everyone here has sacrificed something to be here, even you. You had to give your life to be sure mine wouldn’t end. You trusted him enough to do that, so who cares who he is?”

“You’re not seeing the bigger picture. What if he made us kill this world?”

“Don’t go there,” I frowned, rubbing the crease between my eyes. “I have yet to feel a pull to anything but this place, and yeah, maybe Lucian but that could be because I’d thought I loved him.”

“And now?” he scoffed as the question came out guarded.

“Loving him ended my life; it ended my son’s life. I cannot go back there, or ever be the girl I was before this happened. Life isn’t black and white; it’s muted in the undertone colors of what forges you into what you become after it’s fucked you. I was filled with color, hope. I thought if I loved enough, if I sacrificed enough, I’d save the coven and everyone. I was wrong. I don’t know about you, Josh, but this second chance is more than I expected when I slit my fucking throat. I’m with you, the brother I buried, and yeah, there’s a huge piece of me in that coffin with Benjamin. Or the old me. I don’t feel the weight I used to carry on my shoulders. We’re stronger now, able to protect the coven more than we ever could have managed before.”

“But we don’t care if they live, and there lies the problem.”

“I’m still me,” I muttered. “I’m still one of them, and I know you feel it too. I don’t carry the obligation, but I love them enough to know I’d die for them still. Dying didn’t change that for me. It didn’t change it for you either, we just don’t love them the same. It’s like an echo in my mind, telling me that I do, even as the darkness says to let them go. You?”

“I wouldn’t watch them fucking die, I’d fight for them. You just told them otherwise.”

“I told them the truth, and yeah, the truth fucking sucks, but if the man who created us told us to, we could very well slaughter them. That scares the fuck out of me, so yes; I wanted them to fear us. If they fear us, they will take precaution around us, and they will ward themselves against us. Better they let go and fear us than cling to the hope that we are what they lost because let’s face it: we’re not fluffy fucking bunnies anymore. We’re created to kill, whatever we are, we aren’t something they should want to hold close. Fearing us might just keep them alive.”

“I’m going to go on patrol,” he mumbled as he stepped out of line and another fell into it beside me.

My head ached from the endless questions along with Lucian’s touch. Mid-explanation his hand had gripped my leg, slowly pushing the skirt I’d chosen to wear up until he’d grazed my sex. It had taken everything I had not to moan or rip his clothes off and ride him until I fucked that man out of my system. That man was the bane of my existence, and now we had forever to play cat and mouse, which just pissed me off.

“I’ll patrol the back of the Guild, see if we can find any fuckers willing to dance,” he informed me before nodding at something over my shoulder. “He isn’t going to let you stay out here. He’s about to come fetch you, Lenny,” he laughed, and I growled.

I turned to look over my shoulder, frowning as anger shot through me. Fetch me, would he? I felt a ripple of power that shot through me without warning. Feathers exploded into the air, slowly floating down as I turned left, and then right…slowly. A frown tugged at my lips as I winced at what I’d done.

“Jesus H. Christ, Lenny,” Joshua groaned.

I’d impaled both soulless beings on either side of me, right through the temple. I swallowed hard as I started to turn, dragging bodies on my wings. “Oops, my bad,” I winced as I shook my wings, hearing the dull thump as the bodies slid from the razor-sharp bones of my wings. “Those are lethal.”

“You need to figure out how to control that,” he warned, and I eyed Lucian who stood on the stairs amidst the others who’d all sat on them, watching our silent vigil into the midnight sky. Synthia covered her mouth, but the way her eyes shone and crinkled told me she was laughing. Ryder beside her was shaking his head and chuckling at me openly and Ristan, the silver-eyed demon, well, he just wiggled his brows and muttered something to Olivia who he had finally brought out of hiding.

Probably not a smart move considering we were hanging around unwillingly. I pointed to my spot line, and another person moved in, taking my place with a worried glance as the others had yet to fill the vacant spots beside me for fear I’d impale them as well.

Like I’d tried to do it…

I had zero control over what these fucking wings did and no idea of how to even begin to control them. I felt them ripple at my back as the wind ruffled the feathers. I strode towards Lucian, wondering if my wings would work on him, but they vanished on the trek to him.

“You control them,” Ryder laughed, and I tossed an irritated glare in his direction. “They do as you want them to, or react to your mood.”

“I have no idea how I even did that, let alone how to control what they do. I just thought of how I’d like to impale Lucian and ended up sticking them into Lar and Kaden’s fucking skulls. Yay me. We need to talk,” I said pointedly at Lucian.

“Talking isn’t what I want to do to you, little witch.”

“I’m not a witch anymore, asshole. Inside, please,” I said impatiently, tapping my foot on the pavement.

“Fine, we’ll go inside where we can speak in…private,” he mused, his eyes flashing liquid flames as if he no longer cared if anyone knew what he was.

“If you think it means something else, you’re wrong. I need to pick your brain, and either we can do it here in front of everyone, or alone. You tend to like to keep your secrets. The choice is entirely yours to make, Lucian.”

“Inside,” he growled, his hand snaking out and slipping his fingers through mine, and my body jerked in reaction. My wings unfurled as my eyes slowly rose to hold his. “They don’t scare me, little witch.”

I turned back to the others, nodding before I winced at the two dead bodies I’d accidentally created and then back to Lucian, only for the air to thicken with danger around us. Everyone braced to fight as shadows swirled around us, bathing the Guild in a thick, dark mist.

“Hello, Lucian,” a deep, disembodied voice said silkily. “I see you found my gift.”

Chapter 13

Every soulless being present except me dropped to their knees. The crunching sent a chill racing down my spine as I turned my gaze back to the bodiless voice. I knew that voice, on a physical level. I swallowed hard, as my heart erupted as chaos slithered through my mind, racing down my spine. From the midst that surrounded us outside the Guild stepped a man with black hair and violet eyes that smiled as he held his arm out, extending it to a small, petite midnight-haired beauty. I stared into the purple-blue depths and expelled a shaky breath because I knew those eyes, knew them with carnal knowledge. Full lips tipped into a beautiful smile, telling me he knew me as well; memories flowed between us and I trembled as images flashed in my mind.

I’d watched those eyes lock with mine as his wicked tongue had tasted me, forcing orgasm after orgasm to shake me to the core. He was in that room, the one I thought had been no more than a dream. It felt like a lifetime ago, but it hadn’t been.

He’d done things to me, bad things. But he’d also been the one to save me. Hades had removed Lucifer from the fight, giving me time to finish the job. If he hadn’t been there that day, I’d be a lifeless vessel, carrying the Harbinger until he was ready to be born to destroy the world. The silence passed between us, him reading my face as I replayed his part in the epic finale of my life. And had he just said I was a gift? My eyes dropped from his, turning to the others who still bowed before him as if he was some sort of God to them.

“Hades,” Lucian said in a clipped tone, pulling my horrified eyes back to him. “Persephone,” his tone gentled, and I glared at the dark-haired female who stepped from the safety to Lucian’s side, swishing her hips as she strode towards him.

The hair on my nape rose as my power unfurled, rage growing with every step her dainty feet took her closer to Lucian. I moved, getting closer as I closed the distance between Lucian and me. Once I was close enough, I turned, drawing my blades as I stared at her, blocking her path to Lucian. The warning was there, shining from within my black eyes. If she stepped closer, I’d end her.

“Stand down, Magdalena,” Hades ordered, and my fingers released the blades which clattered to the pavement deafeningly. I brought my empty hands up as I stared at them, swallowing hard as my gaze darted to his in shock.

“How did you do this?” Lucian demanded, his tone carrying a silent warning.

“You were about to lose them both, so I saved the one I could,” he said with a shrug, as if it mattered little to him. “You’d lost enough, and given enough to a cause you never asked to protect. It was the least I could do.”

“What the fuck is she?” Lucian growled, his nostrils flaring as his hands tucked beneath his arms, which almost looked as if he’d relaxed. His thumbs were up, which he only did if he was trying to appear unthreatening.

“Special,” he chuckled as his eyes slowly roved over me before settling on the scar on my throat. “Figuring out what she is should be half the fun, friend.”

“Explain what the fuck you did to bring her back as she is. She’s fucking heartless, literally,” he warned with his tone barely above a whisper that carried on the wind.

I swallowed hard, my traitorous useless heart thundering in my chest as the Goddess of the Underworld and her husband stared at me. Persephone moved towards me, tucking in a stray strand of hair that had fallen into my face. Her mouth lowered to hover over mine, and heat singed my flesh as she inhaled deeply, touching my cheek with the tips of her fingers. After what felt like hours, she pulled away and stared into my eyes with something dark and familiar in her ice-colored depths.

“Beautiful,” she murmured as she kissed my cheek and then turned, sidling next to Hades where she stood, keeping the barest hint of distance from him.

“I asked for help, something you couldn’t be bothered to fucking do. You think you have to do everything alone, but you don’t. So I did what you fucking couldn’t do.” Violet eyes clashed with midnight ones, glowing as his hair rose as power thrummed in the air, biting my flesh as if I was being shocked a multitude of times. The mist darkened until I felt smothered by it, which terrified me since I literally didn’t need air to live. “I had no idea what he would do to her, but I did know she would die. That she would die as you watched it unfold. I did what I had to do to prevent an all-out fucking war, and that is exactly what is coming. Her little stunt, and taking away your ex set Lucifer off; he’s started something we cannot stop.”

I couldn’t move, couldn’t blink. The others had remained on their knees, heads bowed as he spoke. I could feel the power in the area growing out of control. Sweat trickled down my spine, between my breasts, and the entire time, Persephone watched me with inhuman eyes that noted the discomfort. There was something gentle in the way she looked at me, an understanding that I wasn’t sure I wanted to see. I was Hades’s bitch! My body trembled as panic started to take hold, and then something comforted me, soothing magic that eased my nerves and bathed my body in a chilled embrace. I thanked her without saying a word, moving my lips as she continued to calm my response.

“I didn’t ask you to save her!”

“You’d have let her fucking die?” Hades shouted right back at him. The earth trembled around us, lightning rocked through the sky followed by loud claps of thunder.

“She’d have come back!” Lucian raged, and the wind picked up, whipping my hair against my face. His hands exploded into blue flames as souls danced and slithered around him, forming armor as he continued to scream. It was getting fucking freaky. My senses were overwhelmed, my nerves fried to the point that even Persephone and her magic couldn’t soothe the panic building inside of me. “Now when she dies, there’s nothing to save!”

“She never existed outside of magic,” Hades said softly as his magic seemed to dissipate from the air around us. “She would have been gone forever had I not fed her the sliver of a soul from the River Styx. Had Nyx not added the night into her and brought her back at my request, she’d have simply ceased to exist or became a mindless body controlled by the seal she carried within her. Lena was created of no more than magic mixed with a sliver of Katarina’s soul. Everything that you admired or loved of Katarina was eradicated to become her, to lure you to your death. Once Katarina had melded her soul together, Lena would have been a vacant creature who had no mind of her own. She wouldn’t have even known who you were anymore, Lucian. They intended to keep her that way until your child was born. Unleashing it upon the world, which by the way, she fucking prevented by no small miracle. I had no idea they were aware of my part, and if she hadn’t had the strength she did, she’d have died in vain. Nyx was watching that night, aware of the favor I’d asked of her and found your little witchling worthy. So she stands before you on her own merit. She earned the respect of a Goddess who respects no one, on her own. That is a feat unheard of in this day and age, all things considered.”

“If you’d broken the wards, she wouldn’t have had to die in the first place.”

“Yes, she did. Your son was the Harbinger. I let you see her death echo, the one she is cursed to relive every full moon, the price she pays to come back to you. She said his name correctly. He’d have been that and worse if he’d been born to her. He wouldn’t have stood a chance. You think Lucifer hadn’t told half of Hell what he was planning to do with your unborn son? He made sure you’d have to kill him or watch him die. One of the twins wasn’t leaving that circle alive, he’d thrown that around enough that I knew which one he’d take out to hurt you the most. Once I knew Katarina was part of his plan, the one you’d bred with seemed more like the one destined to die. I told you to find something soulless to love so that we didn’t have to watch you hurt again and again, and so I took it upon myself to make it so. Now Lena has an army at her back, one she will control and fight with beside you, unlike Katarina who was always against you. I have Cerberus at my gates, and now you have Lena and her army guarding yours.”

“How did you create her?” he demanded, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides.

“I tasted her, pushing a sliver of a lost soul into hers. Not enough to be controlled by the evil she houses, not unless she decides to let it. Your woman is stronger than most, brother. She is fierce, even though she be little. Nyx did the rest. There’s something else you should know. Lucifer is aware she is alive, and he is free now. He will be hunting her as soon as he is back on his feet and able to do so, which brings us to this next pickle. There’s a way to bring her back, but she’d have to choose to do it freely, she’d have to want it enough to follow through with it, and it would bind her to him as much as she is now bound to you.”

“How?” he asked, the one word a thunderous boom in the night as everyone else held their breath.

“She would have to take the soul her sister grows inside her womb. She’d have to kill it the moment it took its first breath, murdering it for its life source. She’d be human again, whole. But she would be part of him until she took her dying breath.”

“No, never,” I uttered as anger bubbled up. “I’d rather die than be attached to that monster.”

“And you’re not one now?” Lucian seethed.

I flinched and recovered before I laughed softly. “Afraid of me, Lucian, or are you afraid that I am immune to you now, like this?”

“I’m not afraid of you, but darkness only grows. Eventually, you will not be Lena; you’ll be whatever the fuck they created you to be.”

“I created her to be yours,” a soothing voice whispered through the night, as inky and beautiful as the woman who seemed to appear out of thin air. “She will always know you, and what she once was. She is revenge, chaos, and beautiful disaster. The night in her veins is pure, and yes, it occasionally comes out of her eyes as memories. She is not evil, but she is not of the light as she once was, either. Does that bother you, Lucian?”

“Nyx,” he uttered as he took a step closer towards her and then stopped. “You did this to her.”

“I did, and I am not sorry for it. She is a warrior and the rage she felt was beautiful and intoxicating. Her sacrifice was heartfelt and pure. Who else would be better to guard you than someone willing to end her own existence to save you from pain?” She stopped in front of me, touching my cheek with her hand, and emotion stirred to life vividly, as if the world had been bathed in a kaleidoscope of beautifully-woven colors that started and ended with her.

“Mother,” I whispered even though I hadn’t wanted to. I felt her in my bones, in the darkened mist within me, I felt her. As if she was a part of me, my creator.

“Ignore him; he gets pissy when he hasn’t eaten enough souls, love. You’re utterly perfect in your imperfect way as he once said you were before. She is, isn’t she, Luc?” she laughed, and the hair on my nape rose as the name slipped out. “Oh, calm your tits. He was Luc first, before Lucy’s dad ever even lay on that whore of a mother he sinned with,” she said with a frown as my mouth dropped into an even deeper frown. “Don’t look at me like that; your God was a sinner before he was a saint, but then aren’t we all? Did you really think angels just came to be? He lay down in that Garden of Eden and created life with a serpent. Imperfect life, and then grew bored of them and created humans.” She shrugged. “And so your world was created. And now you know how the humans were created and in whose image. No, sweetling, we are not his. You’re giving it away here,” she said as she tapped her head. “We’re connected so that I know if you are ever in trouble.”

“Get the fuck outta my head!” I shouted, scaring even me as my mouth worked to speak, finally.

“You’ll get used to it,” she retorted. “Anywho, you’re welcome,” her words were pointed at Lucian. “Hades was correct, I did find her worthy. The war is brewing ever so closely, and we needed what Lena would become on our side, what with your unwillingness to join us in it. Now that she will be forced to wage it beside me, so too will you. Those who kneel are hers now, her army. One created with an iron will for revenge and hatred. If she chooses to take the unborn soul of Lucifer’s child into her body, she can choose to free them of her control. If not, she will lead them. She is your gift from me, for what you have sacrificed to prevent this war, but it is coming. The only hope we have to win is keeping the last gate from opening. Enjoy, brother mine.”

“You’re a God?” I asked, turning to stare at Lucian.

“No, I’m not.”

“Then what are you?” I snapped. “What am I?”

“You, my dear, are a primordial being now,” she chirped as she strolled towards Synthia and sniffed. “You’re new, newly born.”

“I am daughter of Danu,” she said stiffly. “And not for dinner, but I do love the brands you wear.”

“They’re not brands; they are strands of the night woven into my soul. Much like Lena has, but where I can control mine, she has yet to learn and so it shows from where her soul used to shine. She will master it quickly, as she has learned to harness her powers and sprout her wings.”

“She’s a harpy,” Synthia countered.

“I am Nyx; I do not create Harpies. I am Destiny’s mother. I am the mother of darkness and death, not women who resemble nightmarish chickens. Now, have fun my little Furies and don’t kill too many creatures.”

“Furies?” I uttered through clenched teeth.

“You’re created for revenge, chaos, and that is what it will take to close the gates that have opened. Unless, of course, you prefer the chaos of this new world?”

“I’m a Fury, like the mythical creature?”

“You are,” she chuckled as the night enveloped her and she vanished. “And you’re his now, forever. Be gentle to him, for he has been through hell without you.”

“I’m not his,” I growled, but the mist cleared, and the midnight sky hovered above once more. I stared up at the multitude of stars that blinked and burned out, sailing across the sky in a vibrant display as they fell. Her throaty laughter was the only indication she’d even heard my refusal.

Chapter 14

A Fury!

I was created from chaos and darkness. Just what I never wanted to be, and yet it felt right. It felt good, and I was the leader of an army? I felt like I should be miffed or upset, but I wasn’t. Instead, I felt as if I was where I was supposed to be.

“Follow me,” Lucian ordered, and I turned on him with a mocking grin marring my lips. I put my tongue in my cheek as I watched his eyes narrow on mine. “You’re not that fucking badass, little girl. You want to go toe-to-toe with me? I fucking dare you to try it.”

“You think I wouldn’t?” I asked, and I tried to attack him. Nothing fucking happened. I was literally unable to do anything. Before, I’d been able to hurt him, but I hadn’t felt the burning need to obliterate him, either. Just to make him feel my pain.

“Bound to me means you cannot hurt me,” he laughed coldly.

“The fuck! What the fuck, Hades?” I demanded, swinging my eyes to his.

“Sorry, but he’s right. You cannot hurt him, not with the intent to really harm him. Other things, though…I didn’t take away everything, sweet one. Just the inability to actually hurt or harm him,” he chuckled as he watched me.

I frowned, and stared down at my hand and then back towards Lucian who watched me with a burning need bathed in his midnight depths. This was crap! I wanted to fucking murder him, and yet I couldn’t touch him as the anger radiated through me.

“Don’t encourage him, husband,” Persephone warned. “She has suffered enough at the hands of others; she should at least be able to hurt him back. She lost a child, something we have to know the loss of,” she uttered as her hand slipped to her slim belly.

“You’d have to fuck me to have a child, wife,” he snapped coldly.

“Oomph,” I snorted. “I’m sorry.”

“For what, dear?” she asked. “I chose not to have a child with him who would be stuck in that miserable Underworld for eternity. The Gods would never have let him come with me when I left for the time I’m allowed. I wouldn’t leave my child there so he could corrupt it.”

“You think I’d corrupt him any more than you and your family would?” Hades asked, his eyes glowing with his anger.

“Okay…we’re going now,” I said, turning to grab Lucian’s hand as I rushed us towards the Guild, pulling him with me. That wasn’t something I intended to process, let alone get in the middle of.

“Now you’re in a hurry to get me alone?” he chuckled.

“Fuck off,” I retorted as I continued to move us towards the entrance of the Guild. I wanted away from the arguing Gods, away from their massive power that sent chills racing through my body.

“How about we do this?” he asked. One minute I’d been pulling him behind me, and the next I was in the room with him alone.

“How did you do that?” I asked as I swayed on my feet as I struggled to maintain an upright position. My body thrummed with his power, unable to catch up with the way he’d moved us through the Guild.

“Magic,” he replied as he tilted his head, staring at me with a hungry gaze. He stepped closer, stalking me until my back skimmed the wall, and his hands trapped me there. I stared up as his mouth touched my cheek and then pulled away to smile down at me with a predatory, hungry gaze.

“Stop it,” I ordered as his mouth lowered, brushing against mine without kissing me.

“Stop what?”

“Stop looking at me like I’m a freak! I heard you, you know. I get that you don’t like me like this, but I won’t bind myself to that monster. I won’t do what he said just to get out of this.”

“You mean take the life of a child,” he amended. “I’m willing to do it for you.”

“Just because she’s his daughter doesn’t mean she’s evil,” I answered as my forehead creased and my eyes closed. “Lucian, what the hell is going on? What the hell are you that Gods intervened and saved me from death?”

“You aren’t ready for that, even after everything you’ve been through, you’re not ready to accept what I am yet,” he disclosed as he lifted his hand, and I ended up flying through the air without warning, only for him to reappear in front of me, shoving me to the bed as if I was weak. “When you’re ready to accept me, I’ll tell you what I am and why they chose to save you.”

“But you don’t trust them or why they did this to me, do you?” I asked as I stared up, cupping his cheek with my palm as I watched him. His heat undid me, sending a shock that registered in my core, unraveling me without warning.

“Gods do nothing for free, Lena, ever.” His mouth lowered to mine, brushing the flesh as heat rippled through them. I rolled away, noting he’d let me create distance between us. I couldn’t think with his mouth that close to mine, and his body, that fucking body still did things to me that the simplest of touches sent fireworks exploding through my system.

“It’s not going to be that easy,” I muttered as I pulled my legs to my chest and leaned against the wide, cloth-covered headboard of the bed. “You got me killed.”

“I warned you plenty of times to stay away from me. You should have listened. Not that it would have saved you from me.”

“I tried to stay away from you, I couldn’t,” I argued as I stared into the turbulent storm brewing in his nighttime depths. “I was like a moth to the flame and I ended up charred, didn’t I? You thought you could protect me, silly boy, but you’re the one who ended my life as surely as if you’d wielded that blade. I was dead the moment you kissed me and just too stupid to realize it.”

“You were put in this game by Katarina and Lucifer, never by me. I’ve never used an innocent life to lure her to me. You were as much a surprise to me as I was to you. You were something I couldn’t stay away from, and even when I tried, I couldn’t stay away from you. If you think I’m letting you go again, I assure you, I will not. Losing you once was enough, Lena.”

“You chose her! I remember it, you calling her to you. You didn’t want me, you wanted her.” Tears slipped free, running down my cheeks as I scrubbed my face, hiding the memories.

“I called out to her to protect you and the child you carried, yes! I’d have told her anything she wanted to hear. I’d have left with her too if it meant for one fucking second that you would have lived. I begged her to come to me, to save you. I had no idea you would go to them, nor could I break through the wards to get to you. I didn’t even know I had a son because you decided to keep him from me. And why didn’t you tell me? Afraid I wouldn’t accept him, or were you just planning to hide him from me?”

“So you wouldn’t hurt as I had to,” I answered as I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the softness of the bed frame. I swallowed hard as I felt his eyes burning my flesh. “I knew he was doomed, and that my only choice as his mother would be to end his life. You didn’t deserve to know of him. I asked if you wanted children, and you said you couldn’t have them and dismissed me. I told you I loved you and what did you do? Do you remember?”

“I left, because loving me is a death sentence and look at how well that worked out for you.” He grabbed my legs, pulling me to him until I was forced to fight or curl into the heat of his body. “I pushed you away because it was the only fucking way I knew to protect you from this happening. I didn’t want this for you, even if I had to let you go to prevent it. You should have come to me, told me what was happening. I’d have destroyed worlds to save you. To save him,” he uttered thickly.

“And I would have lost my sister, and you’d have been forced to kill our son to protect me and everyone else from the monster he would have become,” I whispered tightly. “I was going to lose the fight and I knew it, but I wasn’t letting her have you either.”

“Kiss me, Lena, kiss me right now before I do something we will both regret,” he urged, and I turned over, staring up at him.

“No, no, you want me? Earn it.”

His mouth crushed against mine and I moaned against his sinfully delicious mouth. I felt too many emotions as he held me there, kissing me softly until he slowly pulled away from my mouth to stare down at me. I rolled him over, straddling him as I stared into his endless eyes. My hand lifted, and I slapped him, hard, tears streaming down my cheeks as I watched him take it. Over and over, I hit him until a sob ripped from my lips.

“I know,” he growled as he rolled us, pinning my arms against the softness of the bed. “I failed you, I know. You shouldn’t have been the one to die, but then you seemed hell-bent on ending your own life. You were reckless and had you come to me, we could be in a very different place right now. I would have done whatever it took to protect you from this. Whatever it took,” he uttered as he stared into my eyes, his meaning crisp and clear. “We’d be together, all three of us.”

“In a world you destroyed? Do you think I could have lived in it? My family is safe because I had the balls to do what I had to do to save them. You think he wouldn’t have come after them? I was the bait to his trap; he’d have killed us all to get to you. You and I both know that once you’d unleashed whatever the hell you’re hiding from us, this world wouldn’t exist anymore. You may have gone on, and you may have saved me, but what about everyone else? What about my family and my friends.”

The tick in his jaw moved, and I didn’t need him to tell me or answer me. It didn’t take a soul to know he’d have wiped out a world to protect someone he cared about. Whatever he was, he was powerful enough that Gods had brought me back to keep him happy. Not that I wasn’t thankful, but I had a feeling they weren’t done messing with my life.

“I should go,” I informed him softly, hesitantly, but he didn’t let me move or get up. Instead, he just hovered there, close enough that he was inhaling my scent, and I wondered if he was relearning me. Learning how to track me by scent alone? I lifted up, claiming his mouth without warning. My arms wrapped around him as I took from him. My tongue pushed deeper, finding his and dueling against until he growled thickly. The need was brutal, sending a wavering ache deep in my belly. I moaned against his heated kiss as I slowly pulled back, staring into the liquid pools of desire that watched me.

“You kiss me like that again, and I swear to everything within me, I won’t let you leave this room unscathed.”

“I’m sure it’s hard for you,” I mused as he rolled from me and sat up, placing his head in his hands as he rubbed his temples in frustration. “Discovering your ex is back from the grave. We’ve gone through too much together,” I mumbled as I stood, fixing my clothes. “But I meant it, Lucian. You want me; you have to prove you deserve me. I went to hell and back, and I sacrificed our child. So no, I’m not ready for this, for whatever it is. Whether you just want to fuck me or fuck with me, I’m not ready to go there. I can’t,” I said as I moved to the door.

“It was never like that and you fucking know it,” he snapped, moving to the door to slam it shut. “You…”

“I what, Lucian? I poured out my fucking feelings and gave you everything I had, and you threw it away? You made me feel as if I didn’t matter. Like what I said to you had no fucking meaning, and then you left me in that room to cry alone. Tell me I’m wrong,” I whispered thickly as emotions swirled to life inside of me. His fiery glare made my stomach ache; my body tightened, and yet it wouldn’t be that easy this time. I had shit I was trying to deal with, and his issues weren’t my problem.

Chapter 15

I surveyed Synthia, watching her endlessly as she ran the Guild with quick, efficient tasks that had people milling about as they set up perimeters and checkpoints around the city. Alden listened and offered advice when she stumbled, as if they’d done this a million times before. Creatures walked about, accepting orders and rushing to do as she bid them to. She was a natural-born leader, one crafted to rule this Guild. I hoped that one day, when the world wasn’t collapsing around me, I could be as she was now: strong, fierce, and a total badass. These creatures worked together towards one goal: to protect those who weren’t strong enough to protect themselves. As I sighed, Ristan turned from where he stood across the room and slowly made his way to the stairs, sitting beside me.

“You think you don’t fit in here, but you do,” he stated offhandedly as I turned my heavy stare towards him. “You see the girl with red hair? The one who placed the wards against you in the dome? That is Erie; she’s not here of her own free will, more here to hide from the thing which is hunting her. She’s forced to choose between hiding here or being used to save an entire race.”

“And yet she chooses to be here, why?” I countered as I took in the warrior who turned her bright blue eyes in my direction and then tossed red curls over her shoulder, dismissing me.

“Choices are tricky. Her race and the one that depends on her did that to her face, a warning to any who thought to love her or mate with her. Druids do not birth females, and yet she is one. Magic is what created her. Same as you,” he said softly as he smiled, and Olivia blushed across from us as she placed a hand on her swollen belly.

“She is close to her time,” I said sadly. I took in the couples that worked together like one well-oiled machine. Ciara and Blane bent over a map as Synthia pointed out things to them. Ryder stood behind her, his eyes surveying as he listened. They’d been through hell, and yet they’d come out stronger for it, because of it. I’d listened to Synthia as she gave me a quick rundown of what had happened to her and it only made me respect her more.

Maybe there was hope for me after all? Maybe.

“You’re lost inside that head of yours again,” Ristan said as his silver eyes held mine with sadness. “Change is hard; changing who you are is a lot harder. It doesn’t mean you’re not you, though, Lena. It just means you evolved, and that makes you stronger. Most people would have given into the darkness, welcoming it to take away that pain. You didn’t, and Nyx is right: there’s a war coming to this world, and we can use someone like you on our side. You were given a second chance, it’s more than a lot of people get. Don’t throw it away. Use that pain to harness it, to redirect it after those who think to hurt you or anyone you care about.”

“I’m like this because of what he is,” I said with a subtle nod in Lucian’s direction. “I’m here because he is something big, something deadly. They brought me back to keep him from destroying this world, doesn’t that bother you?”

“If he wanted this world destroyed, it would be. If he wanted us dead, he’d be against us, not helping us track down those who opened the gates. He’s trying to undo what has begun. We can’t push everything that escaped them back through. All we can do is close the gates and hunt down those that are here, feeding off the human race.”

“That’s pretty optimistic, all things considered,” I scoffed angrily. I’d seen the monsters that had crawled out of those open gates, and they weren’t feeding on the humans, they were slaughtering them.

“The sky is always falling around here, and yet the world continues to turn. The sun continues to rise. I learned long ago that we make our own choices, and most of the time they’re fucking wrong. Some so wrong that you end up scarred for life because of it. How you decide to wear those scars, though, that is up to you. My own father brutalized me for what I was, for a choice he’d made. He claimed my mother as a concubine and then hated what they created together. He spent my entire life trying to destroy what he’d created: me. My sister, she was tortured as well. He cut and broke her ribs until she learned to take his torture in complete silence. When he took her ribs, bending them from her chest, she didn’t utter one single cry from her lips. Yet in our own way, we loved him. We killed him, but yet his scars didn’t define who we would become. He didn’t shape us into what we are. You lost something, and you’re still trying to learn how to live without it. It’s your scar, Lena. Wear it proudly; know that you cared enough to shield others from carrying your burden. You’re a fucking badass in your own right. You got a nod from a Goddess for your valor. Most creatures never even know they still exist and you had two willing to move mountains to bring you back from the grave before you’d even placed one foot into it.”

“Isn’t Synthia a Goddess?” I asked as she lifted turbulent blue eyes to mine, smiling before she bent her head back over the map she was studying.

“She doesn’t count, she’s new,” he chuckled. “My point is, death wasn’t your fucking end; it’s your beginning. You decide what happens from here on out. Don’t waste it pining away on what could have been, and if you shove people away enough, they’ll eventually stay away.”

“They’re safer without me,” I acknowledged, holding up a hand to staunch off any retort he may have had. “If the Gods told me to murder them, I would. Hades had full control over me, Ristan. He could have told me to take my own head, and I would have. It wouldn’t be something I could ignore if he ordered me to do it. He told me to drop my weapons, and even though I didn’t want to, I did. I know you’re trying to help and that you mean well, but that’s my family. They’re my bloodline. They’re safer from me if they fear what I have become. If they die, then what am I fighting to protect? No, Ristan, fear keeps people sharp, it keeps them alive; it forces them to prepare, to take steps against what can happen. They’ve warded against me, which makes them safer than before, when they thought I was just the girl they’d lost. Now they know I’m not her, and they’re safer for believing that. Let them fear what I have become. They won’t make a mistake and think I’m the girl they buried in that empty grave.”

“You’re trying to scare everyone with what you’ve become, but Spyder seems unaffected by it,” he snorted, and my eyes followed his to where Spyder had bent down, whispering in Lucian’s ear. I tilted my head, watching him as he stood erect, moving directly towards my location with a stereo carried at his side. My eyes dropped to his waist, noting the sack that had dried, black from my blood. My heart continued to beat inside the sack, and I frowned.

“He is off his fucking rocker,” I muttered as I stood, watching him approach, wondering why my heart, the old one, was in the sack he’d tied to his waistband. Which he continually carried around like a trophy.

My gaze followed him as he sat the stereo down and smiled at up at me as I narrowed my eyes on him. “I see you, Lena. I see you.”

“What the hell does that even mean?” I snapped as I crossed my arms to give him a blank look.

“I see you, Kitty, and this little façade you’re playing, showing everyone the dark side of you, it ends now.” His tone was hard, but the seriousness in his eyes played with my heartstrings. Was my mash that cracked? His finger pushed against the play button and I stared at the old boom box he’d pilfered from somewhere as Rick Springfield’s Jessie’s Girl started to play. He stood to his impressive height and wiggled his brows as he watched my face contort into utter horror.

The look in his eyes made my hackles rise as everything said to run away, quickly. My eyes slowly took in the people who now all stared in our direction, fully aware of the spectacle he was making of this. The music was loud, grating against my inhuman senses as I watched him.

“Are we fighting?” I asked, doing my best to ignore the fact that everyone was watching us. His lips started moving as he sang with the vocals. Loudly and off-tune in a deep baritone that sounded out of place. My eyes grew large, rounded as his body started moving, his hands clapping as he found the beat and just went with it. It was like a train wreck that I couldn’t look away from. Spyder dancing was almost as scary as Spyder fighting back in that sex club in Portland. His feet moved, his hips rocked as he stared at me, serenading me in front of the entire Guild with no fear of being laughed at. He actually looked…hot…

“Oh, we’re dancing.” My tone was filled with awkwardness as I watched his massive body moving, hips gyrating as his neck moved to the beat.

He got closer, mouthing the words as his body continued and he started moving around me in a circle. I looked between him and Lucian, and then back to the dancing maniac who was watching me like I was about to be eaten whole. His eyes darkened as he got to the part about it being mute. I swallowed hard as he near-shouted the words, holding deathly still until that part of the song had passed. Then once again, as if he hadn’t just professed his love through the lyrics, he started dancing faster as if he couldn’t help it.

Spyder grabbed my hand, pulling me closer before he threw up his hands as he found the beat again. I lost the fight. I threw my head back and laughed, the sound foreign to my ears. I couldn’t stop laughing. I laughed so hard that I held my stomach as it hurt from laughing so hard as I landed on my knees on the floor, continuing to laugh uncontrollably.

Tears streamed down my face, unchecked as the laughter rippled through me. He dropped down in front of me, settling on his knees as his dark eyes held mine.

“There she is,” he uttered breathlessly. “There’s my pretty kitty. I see you. You’re in there, still you. I want you back.”

“You’re insane.”

“If dancing like a fucking idiot to a song that makes total sense to me about you gets you to laugh, I’ll do it a thousand times a day just to see you smile.”

“Fine, but you have to get rid of that,” I said, pointing at the bag still tied to his jeans.

“No fucking way. I’ve been fighting Ristan off tooth and nail because he eats hearts. This one is mine; it’s the only piece of you I can get away with having.”

I turned, staring at all the eyes that watched us, and groaned the moment I caught the heavy, heated narrow midnight gaze across the room. I leaned over, kissing Spyder gently against his lips chastely. “You and I will always have Portland,” I murmured before I pulled away from him, standing back up to my feet.

“What happened in Portland?” Ristan asked as he popped another kernel of popcorn into his mouth and crunched it. “Oh, come on, this is better than Demon-On-Demand and Fae-Per-View together! It’s like an actual drama without the commercials or waiting for the next episode!”

“Ristan,” Spyder growled.

“Good job, big guy. You made her smile. I almost like you now. I’d like you a lot more if you gave me that heart,” he chuckled, and I rolled my eyes as I headed towards the door, dismissing them both for their crazy antics.

Chapter 16

Grueling pain mingled with aches as hour after hour of testing our skills went by. The sun had risen and was just beginning to set as the twinge of being watched sent a shiver up my spine. They’d poured out of the Guild to watch as we’d honed and tested our skills. We’d done this vigorously as we’d trained without knowing what we were, and while we knew what we were now, it still didn’t let us know our limits. Sweat dripped and pooled between my breasts until I slipped the jacket from my shoulders.

I fought to forget. To endlessly hone my skills while forgetting the pain even for a few moments. It felt as if it weighed me down, a vise grip around my throat that never released, never lessened its hold. It felt as if I was slowly drowning and no matter how much I fought, I sunk deeper into the watery depths.

Music started, Imagine Dragons’s Natural erupted, filling the evening in the beat and I turned, staring at Spyder who smirked back, the stereo held high above his head as if he’d stepped out of the screen from Say Anything. It was official; he was my favorite monster, but clinically insane or high on acid. It was really fifty-fifty there. I stood there, dumbfounded as I watched his smirk turn into a smile that sorta scared and excited me. He wasn’t right in the head; that much was clear. I shook off the laughter that threatened to bubble up and looked back to Joshua who glared over my shoulder, at Spyder.

Today my heart beat; it beat endlessly as my arms burned with each massive swing of the blades I wielded. My body ached with a need only one man or being could fix; which was an entirely different problem I had no desire to settle anytime soon. Not until that fucker earned it, not after what his actions and plans had done to me. That wasn’t something I could just forget or sweep under the rug. Not when our child had paid for it with his tiny life.

Our child.

The innocent being who I’d sacrificed to protect from evil that he’d housed. That burned me the most; the need for revenge was a constant thing on my mind. It was almost like it fueled the hatred inside of me. I knew one creature that would pay for what had been done to us, one who would be ripped apart the moment I had the chance.

“Damn you, Lenny. Focus!” Joshua snarled as I drew blood with my blade. I paused, watching the black droplets that leaked from the wound.

“I am!”

“No, you’re not, or I wouldn’t be bleeding, now would I? You’re lost inside your fucking head again,” he accused as he dropped the tip of the blade to the street and started at me.

“So what if I am? I’m still kicking your ass,” I pointed out flippantly.

My sword cut through the air, swiping and defending as he brought his up to counter each blow easily. Blow after blow crashed against metal, but my arms were weakening, and every swing grew harder as the burn ate through me. I ended it, sending his blades crashing to the ground, and watched as he lifted his hands in surrender.

“Are you tiring?” he asked and shook his head as his eyes rounded with surprise.

“I don’t tire,” I lied, and he puckered his lips and then whistled low as his eyes adjusted from black to blue, staring at me with worry.

“What up, Lenny?” he demanded.

“Nothing,” I lied, rolling my shoulders. “They’re getting better,” I acknowledged and stared up at the blistering sun. It was fall, and hot as hell. The weather was wonky. But then the whole world was in the shitter. “You’re keeping the new ones on track?”

“They’re still adjusting, but worth keeping.”

“I’m not sure we can send them away,” I frowned as I rolled my left shoulder, noting the strange pain in it.

“What the hell is going on, Lenny?”

“I don’t know,” I replied honestly. “I ache like my body needs nutrients, and yet we don’t hunger. I’m afraid to even ask if we eat and what the hell it would be. We have not eaten in months and we’re fine, so why would I feel like this?”

I listened around us as the weapons stopped meeting and turned around to find the others staring at me. I swallowed as my eyes narrowed on them, zeroing in on the weapons they still held. I watched Catalina move, her eyes never leaving mine.

“Get back in line and train,” I demanded.

“Make me,” she hissed as she watched me closely, as if she planned to attack. My hackles rose as I stared at her.

It wasn’t her who approached, closing the gap between us. It was Philip. He drew his swords, approaching with swift, precise moves that forced me to lift mine to defend or be decapitated. His lips curled into a sneer as his eyes turned as black as the sky that turned to midnight above our heads. My brow creased as I stared at him, watching as he lifted his swords and leered coldly.

“You want to lead us? Prove you are worthy. Prove to us you’re strong enough to lead,” he challenged, and I swallowed hard as our swords slammed together. “Your pain is a weakness, one that holds you down. You’re weak, Magdalena. So fucking weak, pathetic, and broken that you’re not fit to lead us into battle,” he snarled as he continued sending blow after blow against the weapons I held.

“What is your fucking problem?” I demanded.

“You will never lead us,” Catalina quipped, her own weapons flying in my direction as I cried out as the others started towards me as well. “Fight us!”

“Rules?” I offered as sweat dripped down my neck; my arms burned, a fire rushing through me as the adrenaline spiked, and I waited for them to state their rules. Typically, it was nothing fatal. Adrenaline was seductive, like Lucian’s cock when it was pounding into my body. I couldn’t get enough, and I never wanted it to stop once he’d started.

“To the death,” she snickered.

“Then die, bitch,” I snapped as my swords crisscrossed, sending her head sailing across the vacant street we stood on. I spun around as Philip’s blades cut through the air, whistling a warning as they rushed for my neck. Seconds, seconds are what it took for my blades to block his, sending one blade into tiny pieces as the metal exploded as power ignited into mine.

My swords hummed with it, lighting to an iridescent blue as I moved in a blur of speed and feathers. Blood splattered against my face as I severed his arms, and then cut his body into two pieces as I bent sideways to escape another attack.

“Next,” I uttered through clenched teeth as I turned to face the others, sensing the array of magic as it was directed at me. They swarmed me, encircling the space I stood in, and I smiled coldly, wondering if I should point out the stupidity of that idea. No, I’d let them learn it the hard way.

I sent my swords in a wide circle, pushing magic through me into the weapons as I took the first few who’d been stupid enough to stand that close to my blades. I stepped over the remains, moving towards the larger males who slowly backed up, thinking to lure me towards the largest to become victim to the others who stood back, hoping I fell for the ploy. I didn’t, I’d had a damn good teacher. I watched as one moved, sending his blade out, towards my midsection. I flipped mid-run, twirling through the air with my blades like a boat propeller, landing in front of the largest as I tossed one blade into the air, using my wings to pin him into place before I brought my blade down hard, cutting him into two separate pieces. My left hand reached, grasping the other sword as it came back down, and sent my blades between my arms, backwards. Grunts erupted, and I turned, peering over my shoulder with a saucy smile curving my lips.

It was endless; they came against me in pairs or more until their bodies littered the street like discarded trash. Blood ran from the street in a river, following it down until it hit the sewer drain. A coppery tang filled my mouth from taking a few elbows to the face, and yet no blade had touched me. I exhaled as I took in the carnage, hating that it was my people that lay in severed, bloody pieces on the street.

I turned to face the last one, and my sword tips skidded to the ground, scraping across the road as I stared into midnight eyes that had filled with hatred. I watched as he bent to retrieve the blades he’d lost earlier in practice before everything had gone to hell.

“No, Joshua,” I snapped, but he didn’t listen, as if something else was controlling him. My chest ached as I watched him slowly approach me. My gaze swung to the Guild, and the people who watched us in silence. “Don’t make me do this, I beg of you!” I pleaded. Lucian was arguing with Synthia, his hands fisted at his sides while the others watched us, silently taking in our moves, studying us. Nobody was planning on intervening and stopping this from happening. No help was coming to prevent this fight that I would give anything not to be a part of. “Please!”

“Fight me, Lenny,” he chuckled, the sound eerie and causing my hair to rise with the wrongness of it. His blades crashed down, and I brought mine up, but not fast enough to defend the blow that cut through my arm. I screamed as I swung out, sending his blades away from my body. I didn’t want to do this; I’d had to watch his death echo, which to me, was the worst one.

I had watched it for the first two full moons, and then I’d been unable to stomach seeing it again. I’d observed him standing in an open field with a dark shadow; that shadow had explained his deal, explained what would happen to him upon accepting it. I’d stood there, frozen as he’d explained that it was for me, because of me, but Joshua hadn’t blinked, hadn’t hesitated. I’d had no idea it was Hades, or that he was trying to help us, to help me, which now made sense, but the pain of watching it was unbearable. Joshua had died to save me, to be sure I’d come back; he’d gone first. He’d died and become this monster because Hades had found him and explained what would happen once he entered our world again. It was why Joshua had never come home after he’d killed Benjamin. Because he’d lived. He’d survived until my life had been placed on the line. And now I was fighting him, my hero. My world.

“I’ll drop them,” I warned, knowing if it were Joshua in control, he’d yield to me. He didn’t, and I fought the tears that rolled down my cheeks as my eyes burned with anger. “Fuck you! Fuck you to Hell!” I screamed as anger thrummed through me, making my hair rise with the power that exploded from my pores. I brought my arms up and fought with vigor, watching as his blades clattered to the ground as I landed blow after blow against his body. Once he was teetering on his feet, his body a sliced up mess, I expelled the scream that had built in my lungs. “Enough! It’s enough! Please…”

It wasn’t. He reached down, his body a mangled mess as he retrieved the swords and turned around, slowly, his balance as much of a mess as the tattered remains of his torso. Blood oozed from his wounds and yet he continued to come at me. Over and over, he swung his blades, and I easily deflected them with his clumsy movements. Anger rippled red-hot through me, and I knew, I knew it wouldn’t be enough until he lay in pieces with the others. My wings unfurled, and I stared at him, waiting for him to swing once more, and then I lunged, severing my brother in half.

“I can’t do this!” I screamed until I was hoarse, my voice little more than a rasp that escaped my dry throat. I shouted at whoever had forced this fight, forced my hand. I dropped to my knees and waited there, waiting for them to come back. To be put back together again, whole. They didn’t, and after hours passed, people on the stairs departed as night fell on the macabre scene. The sun came and went, flies swarmed the bodies as the blood dried and the stench of death lingered in the sun’s heat.

I put them back together, finding the part to the body and placing it close to it. Panic began to swallow me whole as the knowledge of them being really gone started to eat at my mind. Hopelessness began to consumed me, the never-ending dread that I’d slaughtered them all, along with my brother, raged inside of me. I screamed, I shouted, I begged, boy, did I fucking beg them to bring them back to me. I cursed the Gods, and in the next breath, I begged them to just give them back to me whole.

I stood, staring at Lucian as I dropped an arm next to a body. I was covered in dried blood that felt like it would never wash off. It was sticky, coating my flesh and clothing as I inhaled the sharp, nasty scent of decaying corpses. They were bloating, disintegrating around me where I stood, lost without them. I’d done this to them. I’d killed my army and my own brother. Panic began to choke me, and then the music started to play softly.

That song.

My eyes rose to the sunlit sky, feeling the heat of it against my flesh as I stared into the beauty of it. There was no full moon tonight, no phase that should bring about my echo of death. I dropped my eyes to the gore and heard it.

My son’s beautiful wail; his cries that haunted my every wakeful moment. My throat tightened and my hands fisted against my sides. It wasn’t real. I exhaled deeply, lifting my eyes to the stairs, and frowning as I found Lucian watching something behind me.

He started forward as if he was haunted, and then his actions slowed and uncertainty played across his rugged features. Then Nyx was there, appearing beside him as she pushed him back as she shook her head. They argued, and he pushed her away, and I watched as she landed on the ground, lifting her dark eyes up at him before she was rising, moving towards him with a warning in her eyes.

“It’s her fight, not yours or mine. Only she can decide what happens here, Lucian. You cannot choose for her, and neither can I. It’s her pain, her weakness to overcome, and she alone has to choose which she is willing to sacrifice to remain strong, to remain here with you.”

“She already did! This is fucking torture, Nyx. You know it, and I know it. Do you have no fucking heart, woman?” he demanded coldly.

“No, I don’t. I’ve never pretended to have one either. I refuse to be weak,” she hissed. “That loss is holding her back from what she must become. Furies are born of rage, vengeance, and anger. Lena is dying because there’s so much fucking pain that she cannot grow into what she must to survive. She has to find a balance and quickly. Right now the only thing keeping her alive is the pain, but every moment she feeds from it, it takes more and more of her until it will consume her. This isn’t something you can choose for her, or take away from her. One option holds the future, the other is certain death. She knows what she will choose because she can feel it. She deserves so much more than you or what she has been given. To find a woman like her with so much strength is rare these days, but to find one who does as she has, well, you are aware of how rare a breed she is. This place seems to be a beckon for them, though…” She paused, eyeing the women who stood shoulder to shoulder, staring at her through narrowed gazes. “I would enjoy finding my Furies here, would I not?”

“They’re not interested, Nyx. Let it go,” he snarled as he placed his hands at his sides in balled-up fists. I watched them flex as if he was fighting to hold what I knew was behind me. His son, the unborn child we’d created together. I’d thought I was releasing an unborn child, but he hadn’t come out as a fetus. Instead, he’d been fully formed and aware of what I’d done. They’d pulled him fully formed from my womb, and I’d felt it. I’d known it the moment they’d removed him that he was aware.

I turned, staring at the woman who held him covered in a blanket. His little arms stretched, jerking as if he sensed I was near. I wanted to scream at her to hold him tighter, to stop his struggles and fears, but I couldn’t. I walked towards them, my heart filling my throat as I started past the endless body parts that rotted at my feet. I paused as I reached out for him, watching as she lifted my son to me.

Everything inside of me screamed to take him; to hold him one fucking time before I released him. Tears slid down my cheeks, and I wailed; something inside of me broke to pieces, and I screamed in frustration because I knew, I knew I wouldn’t ever touch my son. I would never know the feel of him against my arms, or cradle and soothe him. My outstretched hands turned into fists as I dropped them at my sides. I swayed on my feet, emotions warring with my need to touch him once, but once would kill us both. His cries lessened, and he stilled, and his fist went to his mouth as a tiny noise started. The blanket fell away, and I stared into midnight eyes, as he sucked his tiny fingers as he stared at me.

“I love you.” A sob escaped my throat to bubble up as I shook my head. “I love you so much, but I can’t choose you.” It escaped as a broken sob, and pain lanced through me, shattering what little heart I had left. “I’ll always love you, my little Harbinger. Always and always, until I am no more; until I turn to night, and I’m given to the earth,” I reassured him as he watched me through innocent eyes. I turned away from him, staring at Joshua’s corpse. He still hadn’t risen, nor had the others. My head swung back to where my child had been, finding the spot vacant and empty. He’d had midnight curls of hair, and matching eyes just like his father’s. Endless depths of midnight darkness had watched me. His flesh had held the runes which matched mine, placed there to protect him and mark my sacrifice. Runes to protect him in his next life, to show the world that he would rule it. He would have been beautiful, had he not been cursed to be born as my child.

“Get up!” I demanded as something inside of me slipped into place. I screamed at them, baring my loss of the son I’d lost all over again. Everything inside of me turned to rage, abandoning the pain that had once eaten at me. The buildings around me trembled as my power shook them, threatening to level the entire place if my warriors didn’t heed my call. I screamed again, letting my newly found rage ride through me to reach them. I screamed until my voice cracked like thunder through the sky as I released the last of my anguish and embraced the growing rage. It bubbled up like a shaken can of soda, shooting through me until the ground vibrated and whined against the pressure I released. I dropped to my knees in the middle of the corpses and slammed my hands flat on the ground as I sent my power searching for them. Power rippled around me, and I felt its deadly cold as the day turned to night and thunder snapped and rumbled above us. “Rise!” Lightning flashed across the sky, followed directly by thunder.

“Shit, that’s unfortunate,” Nyx exclaimed as my eyes lifted to hers over the dead that littered the streets. In the next instant, she was beside me, placing a calming hand on my shoulder. “Pull it back, little one. Lucian, she needs to be trained. She’s more powerful than I imagined she would be,” she hissed as her hand tightened against my shoulder. “I suggest you use your normal methods on her. If you choose not to, Styx will be my next choice. You and I both know he’d love her unblemished flesh.”

“Train her how?” he demanded.

“She has to learn to control the rage, or she will level more than a few city blocks. I’ve underestimated her. She is not a Fury, she is the Furies. She is three in one, Lucian. It’s unheard of, but she took all three into her body when I created her. I’d assumed others would take pieces of them from her, but she prevailed and seems to have contained them all. To me, it doesn’t matter if she learns to control them, but to her, it does. If she cannot control them, she will end up killing others, and I’m certain she still cares for the weak mortals she loved. They’re weak, useless, but she cares for them.” She flicked an invisible piece of lint from her dress as she rose to tower above me. “Styx is waiting, salivating for a chance to teach her if you’re unwilling.”

“You’re a fucking sadist,” he snapped.

“You are one too, and I know she enjoyed the pain you inflicted on her. Did you think we wouldn’t watch to see who won this last game? We were always watching you. That little shack didn’t have thick enough walls, and you knew it. You enjoyed us watching you fuck her flesh, claiming her so that we all knew she was marked. There’s also the fact that bringing her back meant I had to sit through every fucking boring and not so boring parts of her life. I had to relive them all, every fucking mundane emotion she’d ever experienced. Do you have any idea how tedious it is to go through them with them unaware that you’re beside them, reliving their life?” she frowned as she eyed me. “It’s why I have not created new Furies in centuries. But then it wasn’t really my choice, either. Choose.”

“I’ll do it,” he growled. “If Lena agrees,” he hissed as his midnight eyes dropped to hold mine with a warning in their seductive depths.

“Lena, it wasn’t a question that takes thought. Styx is a fucking monster, he enjoys taking pretty things apart,” she hissed as she knelt down, staring into my eyes. Her platinum eyes stared into mine, glimpsing the indecision playing in them. Her smile turned dark, her lips pulled back, exposing serrated teeth that looked like lethal blades. “Torture or pleasure, pick your poison. One will only break you, the other will fucking devour you. You will not enjoy Styx’s brand of pleasure; that much I promise you.”

“Lucian,” I uttered through clenched teeth. “I choose Lucian.”

“I thought you would, smart girl. Have fun, and pay attention to what he shows you. I can’t have you focusing on pain if you murder what little of your family members remain. Your army is now yours to lead; the pain is no more standing between you and them. The cries that torture you will cease now, and he will be reborn. Had you chosen him, he would have killed you. He was your death. He is not of this world, nor will he ever be. When he is reborn, this world will tremble with fear. He’s been chosen for a reason. If he wants to, he will find you again when he chooses to. If we survive the war that is coming,” she uttered softly, her eyes gentling as she watched me.

“How do you know that?”

“Because death is never the end to our kind, only the beginning,” she frowned and then dropped her eyes with a faraway, haunted look in them. “Unlike you and the others I brought back, of course. Your deaths meant something, something bigger than you will ever understand. How you can hold three Furies inside of you is impressive, which makes you one of a kind, Lena. Don’t fuck it up. None who held them before you ever retained their memories of who they were, and yet you do it beautifully. You’re one of a kind, rare, very rare indeed. Don’t break her, Lucian. I have big plans for this one. Big plans indeed,” she chuckled right before she vanished.

I stared into midnight eyes who watched me with a heat banked in their depths, and anticipation etched on his face.

“I may enjoy this a lot more than you will,” he growled with blue flames burning in his eyes.

“It doesn’t mean I’m going to continue after we’ve finished training, Lucian. I told you before, earn it. You didn’t just fuck me over or screw me. You placed my life in the middle of a fucking war with your crazy ex, and she was only crazy because you continually fucking murdered her over and over again. I can almost understand her trust issues and her motives. You’re enough to drive any sane woman insane.”

“I told you a million times before, Lena. I’m not your fucking prince charming, I’m your nightmare. Now follow me.”

I glared at his back and then I winked at Spyder, who watched us. I knew he hurt, and I knew he out of everyone here knew I was still me, but I refused to let them see it. He saw me, inside of me; through the darkness and ugly bits, he saw that I was still me, just that I’d buried myself so fucking deep into the darkness I wasn’t sure I’d ever come back out.

Chapter 17

I followed Lucian’s stiff back as we made our way down the vacant hallway towards his suite. Synthia had offered us a more private location and neutral ground for what was sure to be a mind-fuck of a lay. I’d almost agreed, but something in Lucian’s demeanor had stopped me cold. His dark, sinful gaze had warned me to remain silent, and so I had. Not because I’d felt threatened, but because I wanted to use his bathtub to wash off the filth of the battle that had just gone down outside.

“Bathe; the only blood I want to see upon your flesh is the blood I put there,” he growled as he shook out of his suit jacket, folding it before he carefully set it on top of the large dresser. My eyes remained locked on his large hands, so adept and skilled. He loosened the tie he wore, placing it atop the jacket. Next, he rolled the sleeves up past his elbow and then paused, staring back at me. 

“Do you plan to torture me, then?” I asked, locking gazes as I waited for his answer.

“Nothing you can’t handle, witch.”

“I’m no longer a witch, Lucian. That part of me died with my soul. I am no longer human, nor do I crave anything. Including you,” I warned as my lips drooped into a frown that marred my mouth. I expelled a shaky breath, knowing it wasn’t true.

I craved him more than I craved anything. As if he was an extension of my soul and through him, I held onto some form of myself. It was why I’d wanted to let him go, to not feel that urge or tug of humanity that had once held me down.

“Bathe, use the salt in the cabinet,” he uttered. “It’s going to be a long night for you.”

“They didn’t say sex, they said you needed to train me. To teach me control,” I offered, extending a way out of this.

“Do you know what the body’s most basic need is?” he asked, as he watched me through cold, detached eyes.

“No.”

“Pleasure, and the need to succumb to it,” he explained. “When you first experience it, it feels wrong because it’s new. It’s exciting, and everything in this world tells you how wrong it is. Once you’ve tasted it, once you’ve admitted that it’s normal, it becomes the one thing you need. The hardest thing you can do after that is deny it when it’s right there, offered so freely. I’m going to bring you to the edge of pleasure, and you’re going to deny the urge to jump off that cliff. You won’t come unless I allow it, because once you can force pleasure away, you can control everything else easily. Your wings are under your control, ruled by emotions. When you’re pissed, they extend, right?” he waited for me to nod and then continued. “Yet you can’t prevent them from unfurling. Once you can control your most basic need, they will easily be controlled. So yes, Lena, I’m going to fuck you. We’re going to have sex because there’s no fucking way in hell I can do this without being with you. I’m going to teach you to control your basic needs, to be in control of how you react, and that means fucking you. I could do it without entering your body, but I’ve yet to touch another woman since you entered my life, and I’m positive that no matter who I fucked, she’d be lacking and she sure as fuck wouldn’t be you.”

“Tell me how it works, how you teach me to control my body’s response.” I lifted the blood-soaked shirt over my head, tossing it aside as I slipped out of the shoes that had pruned my feet, sloshing blood onto the floor. His eyes lowered, taking in the splatter of if it where I walked towards the tub. “Well?”

“I’m going to dominate you.”

“And you think you can?” I chuckled, the taunt lying heavily between us. I smell it then, the atavistically acute scent that is exclusively his. It’s something ancient, something forgotten, and yet it unravels me to my baser needs, the most basic thing inside of me that is unquestionably woman.

Lucian is a temptation; one that doesn’t just sneak up on you and slowly removes your inhibition. No, there’s no subtlety about him. He weighs on you, the scent, the midnight eyes that consume and devour. He stares at me like I’m some precious fucking gift, and yet he fucks me like a savage. Lucian is everything dark, and yet the moment he touches me, it’s not the darkness I fear, but rather the flame that threatens to destroy and consume me. He’s a fucking monster, and I’m about to show him his match. The tit to his tat, his motherfucking downfall, I’m about to show him the monster within.

I slipped out of the jeans, tossing them aside as I turned to throw an angry glare in his direction, but I didn’t make it that far. I was slammed against the wall on my stomach, his touch burning me as pain shot up through me. I growled low in my chest, letting the noise build up and then escape from between my lips.

Lips touched the back of my neck, softly before his teeth grazed the delicate flesh as his naked, smooth chest pushed against my spine. He wasn’t afraid of the deadly wings that had razor-sharp edges, but then I was sure not much terrified this man. His mouth sent heat pooling low in my belly, my sex tightened with anticipation as his hot breath fanned my ear.

“I think you want to be dominated by me,” he uttered as his nose ran down the flesh behind my ear. “I think that one man and one man alone can dominate you. Not because you’re weak, but because I’m the only man you’d ever allow to dominate you. You’re fierce, Lena, a fucking beautiful, chaotic storm that cannot be contained, and shouldn’t. This world underestimated you, hell, even I did. I won’t do it twice.” He pushed away from me, his heat still sliding against my flesh as I turned to glare up at him. “Now bathe, because I’m about to show you what real control looks like.”

“Are you planning to watch me bathe?” I murmured as I reached for the bath salts, knowing his eyes watched the curvature of my spine as my hips flared. I knew he scented the arousal he’d created, but the thing was, he thought he could so easily dominate me. That I was going to bend to his will, but it wouldn’t be that easy.

“I’ll give you some privacy,” he said softly, and yet he remained there, staring at me as I set the scented salt aside and stepped into the tub, turning on the water to rinse the first coat of blood off my flesh. Once it wasn’t as thick, I used the soap, purposely covering my body in a thick lather before I rinsed that off as well.

After I’d ensured the bathwater wouldn’t be blood red, I dropped some of the salt into the freshly-run bathwater and slowly sat down, feeling the heated weight of his gaze.

“If you’re going to stand there, you can help me wash,” I offered, unable to stop the smirk that lifted my lips as he growled, warning me he wasn’t enjoying having to wait for me to finish my bath. He deserved it.

Once I finished, I towel-dried my hair and then braided it neatly before wrapping the towel around my body and moving to lean against the doorframe, staring into the dark room beyond. Lucian’s shadow was there, lit only from a single candle whose flame danced in the room.

“Setting the mood, are we? The mood is pissed off, and slightly over this shit,” I informed as I stepped deeper in the abyss, hating that my body grew heated, ready for this creature. I hated it for betraying me; I mean, couldn’t it understand what had happened? The events that made it into what it was were huge, cataclysmic shit that had literally left me without a soul. Okay, so I had a fucking sliver of one. Wasn’t that what Hades had mentioned? Someone else’s soul resided inside my body to retain some semblance of my mind.

“Is that so?” he chuckled; his deep baritone voice slithering over my heated flesh, unfurling need to the pit of my being. “Kneel,” he ordered.

“I’m not a sub, and you’re not a Dom,” I growled as I stood clothed only in a towel in the middle of the bedroom. “I will not kneel to you,” I warned.

“You’ll kneel,” he replied huskily as he stepped out of the shadows wearing only a pair of faded jeans that hung loosely from his hips. I swallowed hard, hating the fire that burned from deep in my belly as every nerve ending came alive with the sheer magnitude of perfection that was Lucian Blackstone. “Not because I demand it, but because in order to train you to contain what you are, I have to tear you down to nothing but a blank canvas. You will yield so that I don’t have to murder Styx after I’ve just managed to forgive him for his last trespass.”

“He may be safer for this, you know, self-preservation and all that jazz,” I argued beneath my breath.

“He enjoys breaking pretty things,” he warned as his hand snaked out, stealing the towel I’d used as a shield against him. I swallowed the scream that threatened to bubble up and escape the pout I wore on my lips. “He’d ruin you, and I assure you, sweet girl, you wouldn’t enjoy his touch. You know you enjoy mine, no matter how much you want it to be otherwise.”

“Still not kneeling to you,” I warned. “I will never bow before you.”

“Is that a challenge?” he laughed huskily as he knelt on the floor, staring up at me with his midnight, heated gaze. His lips moved, hovering against the inside of my thigh as his tongue snaked out, licking before his teeth grazed the flesh. My body almost buckled from the subtle motion alone, threatening to not support my weight.

“If I challenged you, you’d know it,” I admitted as I threaded my fingers through his silken hair, grabbing a handful before I pulled his head back as I lowered to my knees in front of him. He allowed it, watching me as I let my mouth hover just inches from his. “You want control, fucking take it from me. That is a direct challenge…” I was pushed down with my hands held in a viselike grip above my head; my wings unfurled, and yet he slammed me hard against the floor, rendering them useless. I grunted as his knees trapped my legs as his other hand circled my throat, closing it off to the useless oxygen I no longer needed.

“No matter what you’ve become, I’m still stronger,” he growled against my ear as his teeth pulled the delicate flesh, nipping at it until it released it. His hungry lips moved to my shoulder, kissing the scar from his claim that had forged a bond that had followed me, even in death. “You’re mine, you’ve always been mine, and you will always be mine. Not even death could take you from me, Lena. I’m glad you’re stronger, harder to break now. It means I no longer have to hold back. I don’t have to fear breaking this pretty little neck of yours. You will kneel, and you’ll beg me to fuck you. Those things are certain, because I know what your body craves, and I enjoy watching you struggle.”

I couldn’t speak, not because I lacked the oxygen to do so; more because he was crushing my throat. I bucked my hips as his teeth sank into my flesh, mirroring the exact scar he’d given me on my inner thigh. My body responded in a blaze of fire that ignited in my belly and unfurled until I was dripping with sweat and the anticipation of what it promised.

His hand left my throat, sliding between our bodies until they danced on my pussy, gliding through the sleek mess that his touch created. They trailed through it, his thumb stalling against the peaked flesh to roll over it as my hips lifted, the moan exploding from my lips before I could prevent it from escaping.

“That’s right,” he laughed huskily against my ear. “You feel me; your body needs what I can give it. So you will kneel, and I’ll fuck this tight flesh so you can reach your most basic fucking need.” He rolled from the floor, standing up to stare down at the mess he’d left laying on it. I trembled from the loss of his touch, but I didn’t beg. Instead, I replaced his hand with my own as his darkened gaze watched me.

I felt nothing. Nada. My fingers pushed through my flesh, and I swallowed hard as I sat up, peering up at him as worry sank into my mind. “The fuck,” I exclaimed as I tried again as the panic turned into a vise around my newly regrown heart.

I rose from the floor, moving towards him and grabbing his hand, pushing against my sex and moaning as the sensation came rushing back.

“Motherfucker!” I seethed as I backed away from him as if he was the vilest, uncouth fucking creature I’d ever encountered. “What did you do to me?”

“Lena, what is happening?” he demanded.

“I can’t feel it,” I admitted as I reached for his dress shirt, pushing my arms through the sleeves as he stared at me in confusion.

“Can’t feel what?” he asked carefully, his eyes darkening as they slowly lowered to where my hand was stroking my flesh as my heart raced against my chest. Slowly, they lifted to hold mine as I raged.

“My fucking hand! It’s like it doesn’t even register that I’m touching me!” I moved to the door, throwing it open as I raced down the hallway, ignoring the sound of his bare feet as they followed me. I rushed into the main room of the Guild, sliding on the smooth floor as I searched through the heads that turned at my sudden entrance. “Motherfucking bitch,” I fumed as I didn’t see Spyder, but then he was there, moving across the floor as he took in my disheveled appearance.

“Problem?” he asked, and I swallowed hard as I took in his heated gaze that slowly traveled down my body to where the shirt covered me past my thighs. “Kitty, you seem to be in a compromising position here. Something we can help you with?” he asked.

“Touch me,” I demanded and his eyes lifted to mine, then briefly moved to Lucian who stood directly behind me. “Spyder, I’m not asking!” I hissed when he continued to stand mere feet away from me.

I felt Lucian’s nod more than I saw it and watched as Spyder stepped closer, his hands slowly moving to my waist, holding me. I gripped one, peeling it off my hip to press it against my breast, feeling the heat of his palm but nothing else. A terrified groan left my lips as I stepped on tiptoes, pulling his mouth down to mine. My tongue darted in, claiming his and then tears begin to fall in earnest. I was fucking broken.

I released him and watched the heat pool in his glacier stare that could have melted the icebergs in the Bering Sea. I shook my head, confusion marring my mind and face as I turned to stare at Lucian as it hit me.

“Motherfucker, Hades!” I seethed, the scream turning into a growl as it exploded from my lungs. “This is fucked up, even for you!”

“Is there a problem?” Synthia asked as she and Ryder started across the floor to stand close to us.

“A problem? Yes, a huge fucking problem,” I seethed as it exploded from my lips, dripping in sarcasm. “I can’t feel pleasure unless Lucian is giving it to me. I’d call that a huge fucking problem!” I swung around, glaring at Lucian, whose eyes seemed to burn with the newly found knowledge that we’d just learned.

“Awkward,” she uttered with a frown tipping her lips as she stared at me, helpless to offer anything that would take away the panic growing inside of me. “I mean, you liked being with him before, so this isn’t so bad, right? You can still…”

“Not the fucking point!” I argued. “I can’t orgasm unless he is touching me; it’s a massive fucking problem. I can’t even get myself off! I’m broken.”

“You’re not broken, Lena. You’re adjusting. Maybe it’s something that just needs time,” she offered.

“No, she was his gift. There’s only a few men she can touch and feel, the others didn’t need to be able to give her pleasure,” Hades said as he appeared from thin air and leaned against the stone column. He shrugged when I gave him a seething glare. “You have a sliver of a soul, Magdalena. Beggars can’t be choosy. I did what I could, and I put everything I could into retaining who you were, and your mind. You had enough left for three lovers. You can choose me, Lucian, or Lucifer, but I’m hoping you don’t go for the latter one. I didn’t bring you back to leave him, or to run to the arms of your enemy. You can, however, feel others if he is touching you, or he allows it.” He shrugged again as if he didn’t care which I choose.

“I get Lucian being on the list, but why are you on it?”

“I tasted that pussy once,” he smirked as his violet eyes glowed and power erupted around us, slithering over my flesh. “My wife doesn’t respond to my touch, but you did. If things don’t work out, I left you only one option.”

“Because you don’t think I’d go to Lucifer?”

“He did bash your fucking head in, and I protected you. Don’t get me wrong, Lena, we wouldn’t be in it for love. We’d fuck. But that’s only if Lucian relinquishes you. I don’t think he is quite ready to do that yet.”

“You’ll never have her, Hades. She is mine.”

“She always has been, even before you knew it. She was, after all, created to lure you in and distract you. Now that the bitch is out of play, thanks to this one,” he said hiking a thumb in my direction, “you can have her. I’m leaving, but you should know that Lucifer is closing in on her, drawn by her scent. He’s aware of what she is and who she is with.”

“He can come, I’m ready for him.”

“The next time you shout my name, you better be fighting something you can’t handle, or need me for other…things.”

Chapter 18

The world was chaotic, a broken place that teetered on the edge of a massive overhaul it hadn’t asked for. My world, on the other hand, was fucked. I was fucked. Lucian didn’t seem to mind or be bothered at the news that I’d been brought back and my body only responded to his. Or maybe he did care but preferred it this way. Back inside the room, I hesitated in stripping myself bare, unable and unwilling to face what was now my new reality.

“Strip,” he ordered and produced a cane as he paced around me. His eyes flashed with darkness, the promise of pleasure lacing every word that dripped off his tongue in a silken caress.

When I continued to just stare at him with a glare that bordered on murder and loathing, he smirked. It tugged up at the corners of his generous mouth, dripping off that tongue like a silken caress. The cane shot through the air, slapping my naked ass, and I growled.

“I’m going to take that from you and shove it so far up your ass that you’ll need twenty-four nurses, thirteen doctors, and a fucking midget to get it out!” I snapped, the warning reverberating through the room.

“You feel pain, but not pleasure.”

I rubbed my ass as I stared daggers at him. “I felt it.”

I watched him set the cane down as he turned to stare at me where I stood on pins and needles from the new discovery of my limitations. Of course, I could feel pain and not pleasure, why not? Everything else was turning into a shit show, why not add this to the mix?

Muscles rippled as he stared at me; dark, muscled, sleek utter perfection is what Lucian Blackstone was. His runes and tattoos danced in his flesh, even in the candlelight, they beckoned me to touch them. To drag my fingertips over the sinewy hard flesh that would send a ripple of electrical current through me, aimed right at the broken vagina I’d been reborn with.

I ripped his shirt off of my frame, letting the clean cotton dress shirt pool to the floor at my feet. I was sleek, hard-muscled, and jagged edges. I was no longer the soft girl I’d been when he’d first fucked me. I had no confusion on what he would do to me. He’d wreck me, it was a given. Fact. Fact: Lucian Blackstone wrecked things, bent your will, destroyed any sense of self-preservation you may have thought you had, and he did it fucking well.

I could have been an asshole, I could have attacked him and went to war with his body, but I was curious to know how it felt to be controlled by something like him. To bend the will that wanted to rip his hair back and devour his mouth. I wanted to hurt him as I hurt now, but I also wanted what he could achieve: Mindless, leg-shaking, earth-shattering pleasure that would take away the pain.

I kicked his shirt away and knelt before him, my hands folded in my lap as I lowered my eyes in a demure strangeness that forced me to give up control. His hiss was enticing, the air escaping between his teeth as he took in my fake surrender, because I wasn’t stupid and neither was he. I’d make the world’s worse submissive.

“You kneel now?” he questioned and my eyes lifted to his, the rage I felt at giving myself to him without him earning it burning bright in my stare. I opened my mouth to speak and yet slammed it shut as my teeth snapped together loudly. “Get on the bed,” he ordered, and I stood, doing as he said.

Once there, I watched him as he collected a few things from the dresser, moving to stand at the side of where I now lay, awaiting his next command. He bent over, kneeling beside me as his mouth lowered to the needy flesh between my legs. His tongue snaked out, trailing from my wet flesh to my inner thigh. He pushed something against my clit, and then he laughed gutturally as he pumped it.

My hips shot off the bed as pleasure shot through me. I lifted my head, staring down at the pump he’d placed on my clitoris. “What the hell are you doing?” I asked, and then my back arched as he pushed his finger inside as he added yet another pump to the thing attached to my pussy.

“It’s a clitoris pump,” he chuckled as he rubbed his fingers around it. My back arched into his touch and my body flooded with a multitude of heat and sensations as he watched me. “It’s going to make it harder for you to ignore your body’s needs.” I stared into his dark, hypnotic gaze as goosebumps covered my flesh. He squeezed it again, and I moaned, unable to suppress it. I could feel the flesh swelling beneath the contraption he’d connected to it. His eyes slowly took in what he’d done, and I lifted, staring down where the tube had sucked my clit, making the pink flesh red as it swelled into the tube. “In order to control your power, you have to gain focus and control of it. You can control your response to the anger like you would your pleasure. You decide when to let it out. Once you can control your own orgasms, you can master your response to anything,” he explained, his fingers drifting to run his scarred knuckles over the wet flesh between my legs. “Your body runs off your emotions now, once you cease to control it, it controls you.

“I’m going to teach you to be in control of how you respond to it. Anger is much akin to pleasure, both can control you easily. You crave the emotions they bring as they ebb and flow through you. You’ll be your own Dom, Lena. You will control it as if your powers are the submissive, and you the master of them. For now, I’m the Dom, and you’re my submissive. You only come when I allow it, or you will be punished for it.”

“Are you high?” I asked as I sucked my bottom lip between my teeth before releasing it. “I don’t have a submissive bone in my entire body. I don’t like to be told what to do, or did you forget that part?”

“You think I’d forget anything about you?” he snorted as he moved from the bed, shucking his pants as his cock bounced free from the jeans he’d worn. My eyes feasted on the flesh, staring at the massive cock that stood proudly against his navel. I swallowed hard as he settled back on the bed, staring down at me as if I was his favorite meal, one he intended to savor slowly. “You are not a submissive, and you wouldn’t be one normally. This isn’t a normal situation, and if it weren’t a matter of life and death, we wouldn’t be here naked, together. You’d still be holding me at arm’s length, but you and I both know what is at stake here, who is at stake. If it weren’t important, you’d have ignored Nyx. You can still try to do this yourself, or you can let me help you. You decide your own fate, my little Fury.”

“Fine, tell me what to do, and I’ll do it,” I uttered.

“Scoot to the edge of the bed,” he ordered huskily.

Once I had done it, his mouth found my flesh as he pushed my legs up against my chest. A scream built inside of me, bubbling in my lungs as it slowly built up until I was shaking, trembling, coming undone.

“Lucian,” I cried out as the orgasm teetered on the verge of the precipice. Dark eyes held mine as he continued to stop until I was almost too close to prevent it from unraveling and exploding from inside of me. I needed to come, and the bastard knew it. He enjoyed torturing me. That much was certain.

“Green means you’re safe, not close to coming. Yellow means you’re close and on the verge, and red, red means you’re coming for me. Remember that because I’ll ask it often in the coming days.”

“Days?” I asked, sitting up on my elbows to stare at him from between my legs.

“This isn’t going to be a quick fix,” he offered. “You’re a new creature, something you and I both have no idea how to control. I’m not going to lie and say it doesn’t excite me that I get to bring you into my world, Lena. Because the idea of teaching you control is a fucking turn-on, but knowing that I’m one of three you can actually fuck? That makes the primitive being inside this flesh hungry to devour you.”

“I can still fuck, Lucian. I just can’t get off, but that doesn’t mean I won’t try,” I warned and before I knew his intentions, I was slammed against the bed with his nose pressed against mine. His smile was wicked and deadly as those silken midnight eyes stared into mine.

“I will destroy anyone who thinks to touch you.”

“Jealous?” I taunted as I stared into his eyes. He smiled, and it wasn’t friendly. It was all teeth, the warning there in the pits of his midnight gaze as he remained unmoving, watching me for any sign of weakness. Once he was sure I wouldn’t smart off, he moved.

My tongue licked over my lips as I watched his cock bounce with every step he took, moving around the room until he was once again before me. His legs spread wide apart as he stared down at my naked, swollen flesh.

“You’re wet,” he mused as his fingers pushed into my needy flesh and I moaned as he slowly began working my flesh. His other hand moved to the side of my hip, pulling one nipple clamp up as he easily maneuvered it onto my nipple. His mouth lowered, clamping down hard as his teeth grazed the peaked flesh. He followed it to the other, placing the second one before he pulled it into his heated mouth, suckling the flesh before he lifted his hard head. His fingers continued to work magic into my aching core, and I purred for him. “Good girl,” he urged as he withdrew his fingers to the tip, only to surge it into my body harder. “So fucking wet. You’re the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen, Magdalena. Fire and ice, whiskey and flames,” he growled through a thick tone, laced with desire.

“Red,” I replied huskily as I rode his fingers, needing the release they dangled right out of reach.

His hand moved to the pump, squeezing it as a scream rose from my lungs, and I gyrated against him, uncaring if this was training or not. I wanted him, I wanted him to throw caution to the wind and fuck me like our lives depended on it.

“I won’t fuck you if you don’t want me to,” he uttered, and the pain in his eyes burned my insides. “I’ll make you come, and leave you untouched. I’ll earn it,” he offered even though I could see the pain it took to offer me such a thing. As I decided on what to do, he pushed something into my body, and I swallowed hard.

“Lucian,” I uttered as I stared at the ceiling. “It isn’t about fucking, it’s about what happened. It’s not that I don’t want to; it’s that you have to earn me back. You want me; you have to show me you do. You have to show me that my sacrifice wasn’t for nothing. I’m not saying I did it just for you, but I wouldn’t have to have chosen what I did if I didn’t feel the way I did.”

His hand slid up the inside of my thigh, and the bullet ignited, right on my pleasure spot, directly on the fucking G-spot. Why couldn’t he be like other men who wouldn’t know what it was if it came with a map? I moaned, rocking my hips as he watched it unfold from between my legs.

His hand lowered and the sound of flesh being rubbed only sent my body spiraling towards the edge faster. “Yellow!” I screamed as I gritted my teeth as he watched me. The bullet turned off, and he removed his hand and my body instantly stalled out.

“Bloody hell,” he groaned as he stared at the wet mess he’d made between my legs. He swallowed hard as he rubbed his hand down his face and covered his mouth. His hand touched my leg as he added another squeeze and the device sucked on my clit, pulling it further into the pump. I whimpered and lifted my head, staring down at it and then up at him. “Almost there,” he groaned as he pulled the bullet out and stared down at me. “Tell me to use a toy, tell me you don’t want me, and I’ll do it.”

“I don’t want a toy,” I whispered through dry lips. “I want you. But I need you to know that it’s not a thing we can just keep doing. I don’t care if I can’t find pleasure without you. I’m not ready to forgive you.”

He swallowed and nodded and pushed his cock against my opening. His cock was life. I screamed as he stretched my flesh, my muscles clenching against his intrusion. It burned and ached, but I fucking liked it. I rocked my hips, adjusting to take him and then I was screaming. “Red!” I trembled as the orgasm teetered on the edge.

He withdrew and stared down at me with sweat dripping from his forehead. “You’re a fucking virgin.”

“Is that going to stop you now?” I asked as I ground my teeth together as I stared at him in disbelief.

“I’m your first,” he smirked as he leaned over, sucking the tip of a nipple before nipping it between his teeth, letting them scrape across the flesh.

“Lucian, you were always my first even if I did it with someone else. No one else ever made me feel anything like you did.”

He slid in, and there was no waiting, no training. Bare fucking bones. I screamed as he stretched my body and I struggled to adapt to his sheer size. He knew it and slowed, holding still as I whimpered as pain mingled with a hint of promised pleasure. His mouth lifted, finding mine and claiming it as his hand released the device’s hold on my clitoris and he removed it.

I moaned as it was released, only to be replaced with his fingers. My legs wrapped around him as he lifted and I slid down further on his cock.

“Jesus,” I hissed as I rolled my eyes to the back of my head and just felt the sheer magnitude that was Lucian Blackstone. His hands gripped my hips as he sat me on the edge of the bed.

“Don’t come yet,” he ordered as he pulled out and slammed back into my body that clamped down hard around him, as if it wanted more. “Bloody hell, you feel so fucking alive,” he whispered as he kissed my forehead and the soft column of my neck before his mouth trailed over my collarbone. His mouth was searing my flesh, undoing the walls I’d placed around myself as he slowly rocked his hips, giving me time to accept him again. “I dreamt of this every fucking night since you died. Every moment I begged the Gods to return you and every day you were still buried in that cold fucking ground. Only you weren’t there, were you?” he growled, and his body started to move harder, faster. Every thrust took me closer to the end, and I mumbled red, warning him as he shoved me down, staring at me. “You could have fucking made it known you were alive.”

“This isn’t the time,” I muttered as my body trembled around him. “Red,” I warned, and he pulled out, stalking away from me as I watched his naked ass move. It was a really nice ass, but it was tense. His shoulders strained as he walked away from me. “I wasn’t ready for you.”

“I don’t give a fuck if you were ready! I fucking lost you, and you let me think you were gone. I sat beside your fucking corpse! Were you alive then? Did you think it fucking hilarious that I sat with you and you were what…sleeping?”

“Dead, Lucian. It takes almost a month to come back. You sat beside my corpse as I lost our son. You want to be mad? Too fucking bad. You don’t get to be mad at me.” I sat up, hating the itch that indicated my wings were about to make themselves known. “I died; fact! I lost my life and what little bit of my world I’d created. I lost everything for you! Protecting you and everyone else, and you think you’re pissed? I’m fucking furious!” My wings exploded from my back, and I was marching on him, intending to rip him apart, but the moment I lunged, I was thrown backwards. “Ahh! I hate this. I hate that I can’t hurt you and yet you can hurt me. I hate you!”

“Good, because it will make this so much fucking easier,” he snarled as he walked towards me with purpose and I smiled. Bring it, big boy. The moment he got close enough I slapped him hard, not intending harm, but intending to get his attention. He slapped me back, but it wasn’t hard. I turned my face back towards him and jumped into his arms, grabbing his hair as he used my hips to push my body down onto his.

I exploded without warning, and then he sank his teeth into my shoulder, and I howled, screaming as the orgasm ripped me apart. My wings flapped, as if they were as turned on as I was and then my eyes closed, and I let him take us soaring past the clouds as his hips rocked with every thrust of his cock until it shattered me again. His mouth was hard when it found mine, pouring all his frustration and pain into the kiss. My toes curled as my body reacted to his, taking everything he gave back tenfold.

It wasn’t until he hissed and captured my face between his hands as he moaned and found his release inside of me that I opened my eyes and stared at the floor behind his head.

“Lena, don’t…” We fell to the floor, and I screamed as we landed hard without anything to break our fall.

“The hell! Why didn’t you tell me you could levitate?” I demanded.

“That wasn’t me,” he laughed, and I turned to give him a scathing look. “You can fly.”

“Awesome.” Not. Like I needed another thing to learn how to control. With my luck, I’d probably end up in the engine of a plane and splattered across the entire country. I struggled to gather my wits, which I was pretty sure he’d just fucked out of me.

“I’ll earn you back, Lena,” he said as he leaned up and rolled onto his stomach, slowly removing the clamps before kissing each nipple. “I’ll teach you to control your body and powers too. But you’re mine, you’re something I cannot fucking walk away from. I need you to understand that, because I’d kill whatever stands in my way of getting to you, anything and anyone. I lost you once, but I won’t again. I will destroy the Gods if they fucking try to hurt or do anything to you.”

“Nyx is more than a God,” I murmured as I traced my hand over his shoulder before I turned and reached for his shirt. I needed a shower and somewhere to think. I ended up in the chair, slipping into his shirt as I watched him dress. 

“I will do as I said, Lena. I assure you, I can destroy her and Hades, or at least send them somewhere they won’t be found. You sleep with me tonight.”

“You’re not going to start that caveman bullshit already,” I argued.

“One fucking night,” he growled. “One night to hold you and know you’re alive. And don’t worry, I don’t sleep either.”

“Bullshit, I have slept with you before,” I frowned. “You snored.”

“I learned to adapt, but I assure you that I was never asleep when you were in my bed.”

“Really? Because I’m pretty sure you did…” Hadn’t he? “Either way, I’m not repeating what we just did again anytime tonight.” 

“Careful, you’ve been gone for months, and I’ve been celibate.” He watched me absorb that tidbit, and I nodded. “I’ll get you clothes so you can tell the others where you will sleep tonight.”

“Fine, but don’t think I’m letting you fuck me again.”

“Fine.”

“Jerk,” I mumbled as I waited for clothes he’d promised to let the others know what the plan was. I still didn’t know what he was, but what I did know was this, Lucifer was coming, I could feel it.

Chapter 19

The putrid scent of death clung to the world. The noxious odor of brimstone, mingled with newly lit fires that danced like living things. The flames leapt around, orange and blue as they burned hot and out of control. Flames licked buildings, logs, and anything else they could reach as it oozed from the depths of Hell, pooling smoke into the air that choked those not strong enough to survive its acrid poisonous scent. I eyed one of the patches of fire, the flames licking the air, warming the area I stood in. Pushing through the thick smoke, I eyed the decaying corpses who’d fallen to the cadaverous new world order which twisted and rose from the ground, taking form as I slowly approached its ruler.

Lucifer watched me, smoke billowing around his form like steam as he stared back with an intensity that shook through my core, my body. This creature was bathed in sin, created to lure the pure into impurity. Sex oozed from his pores as he pulled the lit cigar from his lips and smirked as small circles of smoke escaped from his lungs, filling the sky as he exhaled. His bare arms were covered in tattoos; fine sinewy muscle clenched and unclenched as he tossed the lit cigar onto the ground, uncaring that it lit yet another fire into this world.

Power radiated from him, leaking from his body to tingle and graze my flesh as I made my way towards him, lazily, uncaring that he watched the sway of my hips or the fullness of my breasts as I did so. His eyes were reflecting the fires and my image as I stopped inches from where he stood. His tempting lips opened, the smile all sensual and alluring as I watched him through my lashes, unwilling to let him see the effect he had on me or my senses.

“Do you like what I did with the place?” he asked, his blue depths pooling into liquid heat as he lifted them, holding my stare. His arms stretched as he indicated the new world, the chaos he’d brought to it, and the death that clung to it.

His hair was shorter, cut and styled, which was alluring on him. It framed the sharp lines of his jaw, defining them and the utter perfection he’d been carved into. His power shook the world as he released it, letting me feel the magnitude of it as he watched my reaction and smiled coldly as a tremor slid through me. His wings unfurled, significantly increased in size now that he’d been freed from his prison.

“I think you could do better,” I said aloofly as I watched him bend down as he picked up a human skull, lifting it in his hands as he placed it on the wall of skulls behind him. It stretched out as far as my eye could see—a never-ending wall of human skulls from the victims he’d sacrificed as he forged his new empire. It was impressive, the lengths he’d gone to just to show me his strength, his unworldliness. He smirked wolfishly at my words as he sat on the wall, crossing his tattooed arms over his chest as he stared. “You do know that you will fail, you always do. We will stop this from happening.”

“You and what army, my sweet little hellcat?” he scoffed as he rose, slowly approaching me as his hand trailed over the curve of my hip. I didn’t take my eyes from his as he continued to touch me, to tease me with the pleasure he so freely offered. “You want this. I can feel your need, so fucking dark and delicious that it makes my cock ache to fill you. To show you what a creature such as you’ve become can feel with something like me, Lena. Tell me you didn’t enjoy my touch, my sex fucking that sweet pussy. It clenched around my cock so fucking tightly. You’re so much more…appealing than your sister. You didn’t fear me; instead, you welcomed me. You welcomed the horde of the damned watching your body being ravished, just as you did when Lucian finger-fucked you in front of his club. You wanted me, even if you thought I was Lucian, you still wanted me when you figured out that I wasn’t him. I felt it, and if I’d contained the extension of myself, you’d have let me finish in that tight pussy. Tell me you wouldn’t have?” His eyes devoured mine, demanding I answer him, and when I didn’t, he laughed huskily. “Keep your secrets if it helps you sleep at night, but I am the prince of darkness, and you will be my queen. He can’t keep you, nor does he see the evil churning inside of you. I see you, my queen, all of you. You’re beautiful chaos, mixed with the throes of sin and delight who begs to be taken, fucked in ways that man cannot even begin to comprehend. You were never meant to be mortal or to be held down by their laws. Let me have you. Let me show you what you can become with the right man beside you. Help me set the world on fire, and dance with me as it burns to nothing but the ashes of these insignificant humans.”

“Why would I help you?” I asked, not moving from his touch as he stroked my flesh, his fingers dancing over my cheek as he slowly, seductively caressed me. I let the darkness I’d been holding in come out, watching as his eyes slowly studied the change in my features, the sharpness of the Fury as I let it out for him to gaze upon. 

His lips skimmed over mine, unafraid of the darkness that filled my vision as it oozed out from where I’d held it in. His mouth sent a ripple of exquisite pleasure racing through me, rushing towards my apex, which caused his nostrils to flare as he scented my arousal.

“Help me end this world, or I will come for her. I’ll come for your sister, and take what is rightfully mine. That child is mine, Lena. She holds the purest blood in her tiny form, the darkest evil in her precious mind. She is my daughter by right. I will come for her, but I am willing to settle for you in her place.”

“And if I don’t want to be yours?” I uttered as his tongue snaked out, tracing my bottom lip before he sucked it between his teeth and I moaned loudly as his teeth pulled, teasing the fatty tissue before he released it and studied my face.

“You want honesty?” he whispered before he pulled me closer, ripping the shirt from my body as he stared down at my breasts. Heat licked my flesh, creating an ache in my nipples that hummed and begged to be touched. His hands cupped them, testing their weight as his thumbs brushed over the pebbled peaks. “I want you, I’ve wanted you since the moment I tasted the chaos and fire that blossomed and burns inside of you. Help me take over the world, Lena. Become my queen, and I’ll show you what real love is. Do you know why I was kicked out of heaven? I wanted to know what made mortals so weak, and yet they were special. I questioned why they could love and yet it was forbidden to us. Why they got to taste sin and we were forbidden for touching, fucking. I wanted to be them, to know what it was that made Eve lie down in that garden and ride Adam’s cock. And she did, she fucking took him with vigor, riding him until she glowed with pleasure and I fucking wanted that too. So I was cast from heaven into Hell for wanting what he allowed them to taste. How fucking fair is that? Could you imagine never knowing what it felt like? Never feeling pleasure as someone experienced these perfect lips.” His finger traced my mouth, pushing between them until I closed them, sucking his thumb deeper as his eyes darkened with lust. He hissed as his eyes heated with need, raw, palpable need that shot through me. He withdrew his thumb and pressed his mouth against mine, pushing his tongue deep into my depths as a groan escaped his lungs. He was skilled, created for luring women to their doom. His tongue dueled against mine, fucking me with nothing more than it as he made my knees grow weak, and yet he held me as if I was the most precious thing in this world. He pulled away, raining kisses down my neck as his fingers pinched my nipples, stealing a moan of pleasure that rushed from my lungs as my head rolled back. I inhaled the brimstone and death, sucking it deep into my lungs as I let his lips devour my will, my body a tool for his pleasure, to be used as he wanted. I cried out as his mouth touched my breast, sucking one nipple between his lips before his teeth scraped over the sensitive flesh. He rose, cradling the back of my head as his mouth devoured mine.

“Rule with me, darkness. I can feel it pooling inside of you, begging to be freed from that tight hold you have on it. It wants what I can offer it, what you crave, I can give you. You think I’m evil, that my intent is to destroy, but it isn’t. I want freedom, I want to be here with you and the other immortals that walk these streets and feast in the flesh, in the open freely. I’m sick of punishing souls, exhausted from being punished for wanting to taste the pleasure others took so freely. I’m not the bad guy here, have I hurt you? Yes, but only because you were his and I craved you. Imagine my surprise when I learned you survived, that you had come back stronger, darker than any woman before you had. Katarina was beautiful, but you, you are so much more than she could have ever hoped to be. He took from me, he took everything. He took the one woman I loved and murdered her, and I was supposed to just accept it. I’m not a weak prince; I’m the fucking prince of the Underworld, the fucking devil. And you? You’re the queen of darkness, the one female who could rule at my side and devour anyone who stood in our way. Rule with me, at my side. You can make him feel what he forced you to endure; you can show him what it feels like to lose everything as you have. Help me show him what it is like to lose everything he loves. Show him what it feels like to be betrayed as he has done to both of us.”

“And what do I get in return? You think I care about revenge?” I scoffed as my fingers threaded through his newly shortened hair as I leaned in, claiming his lips, letting him feel what I had to offer. It cut off his words, forcing him to taste the pleasure I had to give, the fire he so wanted that burned from within. I felt the growl as it rose from deep in his chest as I pulled from the kiss, scraping my teeth over his full bottom lip. “What can you offer me that he cannot?”

The world burned around us as we stood amidst the fire, the inferno that raged as the desire that burned through us. His face glowed from the eerie light of the dancing flames as he peered into my eyes, searching my face for the answer he thought I wanted. His mouth crushed against mine, his intent to take me to the ground and fuck me explicit, but I wasn’t that naïve or easy to obtain. My hands threaded through his hair, yanking his mouth away from mine as I demanded he answer me.

“The world,” he smirked as he framed my face with his hands. His voice was a silken caress that slithered over my flesh and consumed my mind as I stared into his beautiful blue eyes that danced with possession, as if he thought he already had me. My body tightened as my spine arched, spreading in invitation. “They’ve had their time. They’re destroying this world, a gift from the Gods and yet they spit on it. They murder each other, tearing this world apart as if it belongs to them alone. We can take it back, we can bathe in their blood as it boils, Lena. He will never destroy a world for you, but I will. I will tear down the walls that hold the other monsters at bay and let them in, to join us. I will rip this place apart, piece by fucking piece for you, and you will reign at my side. Say yes, say yes, and I will come for you. I will walk right up the steps of that Guild, and I will claim my queen where the world can see it unfold.” Lucifer’s eyes watched me, studying me as I considered his words. His heady stare caressed me as if it was fingers stroking chords inside my body, his fingers slowly touching my cheeks as he watched me, waiting, letting me decide my fate.

“If I do agree, you will leave my sister and her child alone,” I stipulated. “I will not share you, and you will prove to me that you want me more than them. I’m a selfish bitch, and I’m a starving one. I will never share you with another, nor will you seek another’s pleasure. You will be mine, and I will be yours. Do you understand me?”

“Deal, but only if you let me fuck you in front of him to prove to him that you are mine,” he smirked as his arms wrapped around me, tightening against me as he pulled me into the warmth of his body. “I want him to hurt, and I will use you as he watches us together. I want him to know what betrayal feels like, what it tastes like.”

“Deal,” I said, smiling against his lips before he sealed it with a heated kiss.

“Deals with the devil aren’t that bad, now are they, my sweet queen?”

“We will see if you hold up your end of the bargain. They’ll be expecting you, Luc,” I uttered as I slid my lips across his, enjoying the taste of him before I stepped back, staring at his chest which led into an impressive V that disappeared into his jeans. “Don’t keep me waiting, I get bored easily.” He stepped back into the fires that burned among the rotting corpses of the victims he’d taken pleasure in slaughtering.

The world was already hell, what would it matter if we added more corpses to it? I pushed from the dream, righting my body as I peered up into angry midnight eyes. He inhaled, his nostrils flaring as he scented Luc upon my flesh.

“You smell like Lucifer,” he snapped.

“And?” I asked softly as I leaned over, kissing him with Lucifer’s taste still on my lips. I pushed my tongue deep into his mouth, forcing his tongue to play with mine before I slid over him, staring down into his eyes as I devoured his mouth like it was my own playground. I let the darkness behind my eyes glow, bathing him in its alluring scent as he growled against my kiss. The need to do as Lucifer had said was seductive, exhilarating as it exploded inside my mind. The queen of the new world sounded pretty fucking good to me.

Chapter 20

“You’re playing with fire,” Lucian warned as he gazed up at me, rolling me beneath him as his body dwarfed mine, his scent a heady mix of wood and spices. He was all male, right down to wherever the fuck he was. He pushed his heavy cock against my naked sex and watched me, studying or memorizing every fine detail of my face. “You’ll get burned if you try to fuck me over, and I won’t have mercy.”

“You think I care? I like pissing you off, the angry sex, the fucking like we’re going to war? And you must think I’m afraid of the flames that dance in those endless depths. No, Lucian, I’m not afraid of being burned, and I think the odds are in my favor,” I murmured as he dropped his mouth, kissing me until I groaned and uttered his name against them.

“Tell me what he did when you went under, when you went to him,” he demanded as he pulled back, gazing down at me.

“Jealousy doesn’t suit you, Lucian. Afraid I’ll switch sides on you? I muttered as I peered up into his burning stare. He’d known I’d met up with Lucifer, but then even I smelled Luc’s scent on my flesh. His eyes burned with anger as he watched me, curious to see what I’d do next, or maybe deciding if he should strangle me? I didn’t care either way. He had no idea of the betrayal coming, no indication that of what I was planning, which was fine since he tended to leave me in the dark more often than not. He didn’t even trust me with his secrets, so tit for fucking tat. He deserved to feel betrayal, to know what it felt like, the sting that sucker-punched you in the gut without warning. He also had some cosmic karma coming for what he’d allowed to happen to me. I was waking up, and the devil was in the fine print.

I rolled us again, staring down into his inky heat-filled gaze as we silently warred with each other. My head bowed as I brushed my lips over his, letting him feel the molten heat that built in me that he created. My body rubbed against his, and I felt his growing erection as he growled from deep in his chest, letting it built as he watched me slowly rubbing my heat against it. My teeth scraped over his lip, capturing it between my teeth and drawing blood as I sucked it into my mouth. His growl turned guttural, dangerous before he slammed me backwards, knocking the air from my lungs as his hand wrapped around my throat tightly before his mouth crushed against mine.

He entered my body hard, no mercy given as he violently took me to the throes only he could send me sailing to. The man was built to fuck; it was as simple as that. Pain mingled with pleasure, sending my senses dancing on the line as he forced me to accept what he gave. He stared into my eyes, watching as the orgasm tore through me, sending me into a trembling mess as I whispered his name like he was my fucking salvation. I rode the storm of emotions, the endless orgasms as he rocked his hips, noting every fucking time I cried out or grew closer until he gained control of me, my pleasure, gauging my needs as no other could. He didn’t care if it hurt and neither did I, he was a storm, and I danced in him until we went over the edge together. The only thing that mattered was him, climbing that motherfucking cliff together over and over until we both were a tangle of limbs and sweat.

“He’ll never fucking touch you again. He’ll never have you, Lena. I would raze the world and be damned for eternity gladly before I let him have you,” he growled thickly as if his mouth had become swollen. His penetrating gaze consumed mine as I stared into his darkened depths.

The building rumbled, and Lucian’s dark head lifted, searching the wall as if he could sense what was currently setting off the wards. I swallowed hard as I rolled away from him, leaving his cock sleek and hard with my arousal as I left him. I smiled as I swayed to the bathroom, putting on the black sundress and thin black panties.

It was a new day, a new dawn, and I’d be damned if I was planning on being on the wrong side when shit went sideways. I hadn’t chosen this life, but I sure as fuck wasn’t letting myself end up dead again, if it was even possible.

Lucian dressed as I waited, leaning against the wall as I gazed at his utter masculine perfection. Footsteps sounded outside the door, rushing towards our room. I lifted my head, listening before I peered back at the man who’d made me into this monster and took a long, leisurely look before I stepped from the wall, swallowing hard as the person outside began pounding. Lucian gazed at me as if he perceived exactly what awaited us outside. The warning in his eyes was deadly, and just that, a warning to not fuck him over. As if he sensed I was about to.

I slowly followed him from the room, a skip to my step as we walked to the main room of the Guild, staring at the utter chaos that was unfolding. The walls cracked as energy bombs exploded against them from Lucifer, who was doing exactly as he said he would: knocking on the door.

“It’s Lucifer.” Ryder’s tone was tense, angry and a hint of disbelief flickered in his golden eyes. I smirked as I considered my next move, my decision unwavering as I followed them to the glass that held Lucifer outside.

Smoke billowed around the buildings on the far side of the block, fire bathing his image as he stared directly at me. I smiled back at him, turning to watch Lucian from my peripheral view before I stepped back.

“Let’s go fucking welcome him, shall we?” Lucian growled, the hatred burning so deep that his voice made me tremble.

Too little, way too late.

I followed them out of the doors, smirking when the song began to play loudly around us. It was that song, the one he’d played as I’d fallen prey to him in his club. Marilyn Manson’s rendition of Sweet Dreams filled the night. I watched them all, staring at him as they realized the Furies had placed stones around the stairs, along with added runes and wards to hold them here, to keep them prisoner.

I exploded past them, materializing outside the wards, safely away from them. I turned, staring back at Lucian who glared at me, his eyes screaming murder as he slowly put it together. I’d summoned Luc here. I’d called him to us from his bed. I tilted my head, staring at him before I slowly moved to stand mere feet away from Lucifer, where his demons converged around him, protecting his back as he let that hypnotic gaze slowly take in my new form.

His hair was darker here than it had been in the dream walk we’d shared earlier, his tattoos hidden by the leather jacket he wore. His eyes though, they swirled with an inner fire that pulled me in, calling to me. He was the epitome of a fallen angel. He lured souls to their doom, his beauty pulling them in without warning, the monster within stealing what they treasured most before they had any clue it had been taken. He was the perfect thief, the ideal creature to reign in Hell. As I gazed upon him, I realized why God had forced his fall, forced him to Hell where he could do what God himself hadn’t wanted to do: Punish us for our sins. He was his perfect warrior, all beauty but lethal, deadly, and created to reign. His eyes danced with victory as I held my hands out, palms up in surrender as I took the last few steps to him.

“You’re even more beautiful than I thought possible, Magdalena,” he uttered as he pulled out his own blades, dropping them to the side as he stepped forward, pulling me against his body as his mouth touched, skimming against mine. He pulled me closer, turning me in his embrace as he faced Lucian. I leaned against his heat, allowing him to spread my arms wide and then place them behind me until it looked as if I was on display. I held his neck as I stared up at Lucian, feeling his rage and anger as he watched me through a murderous glare. Lucifer’s mouth lowered to my ear, sucking the lobe between his lips before he slowly kissed his way down my throat, nipping where my shoulder met my neck. His hands ripped open the dress, shredding it easily as he exposed me to their angry stares that watched us in disbelief and horror.

“You fucking traitorous bitch,” Lucian growled thickly as Lucifer laughed huskily, sending a shiver down my spine as it vibrated against me. “You were always a part of this, a part of his fucking game. And I fell right into it, didn’t I?” he demanded.

“Of course she was, she’s my queen,” Luc sneered as he turned me around, kissing me until I was moaning against him, holding on to his neck for life as he drove me over the edge with lust. I was unable to deny the pleasure I felt as he rubbed my body with his hands. He stirred to life an inferno to match the one that blazed around us; the one which consumed the world as we created our own.

He lifted me, ripping the panties from my body as he settled me above him. His cock still hidden within the jeans he wore, but then I didn’t need it out to come. I groaned against his mouth as he smiled his victory right there for the taking. All he had to do was push that throbbing cock into my core, and our deal would be locked, sealed. I opened my mouth to his kiss, the blistering heat of it making my air hitch in my lungs as I pulled away, drawing my hooded stare to Lucian’s. Lucian watched us, his own stare a murderous threat as he paced in front of the wards.

The music hit a crescendo, and my fingers trailed through Luc’s hair, holding him down as my mouth fucked his. He lowered our bodies to the ground, his wings expanding as we lowered until I was above him, rocking my body against his with need. I held his head down, fucking him with my mouth as he struggled to free his thick cock, sensing the moment he released it. I stared down as it pushed against my sex, the electrical sensation of lust shooting through me.

He pushed against my opening, and my hands lifted his head as my mouth lowered, and then I slammed him down, hard. Once, twice, pop. The sound echoed around us as I smiled down at the murderous prick who’d taken motherhood away from me. Blood exploded into my eyes, bathing my face and my mouth as I continued to pound his head against the unforgiving concrete. I stared down with a smirk that was all serial killer and no pretty as I admired the bloody heap that had been utter perfection seconds ago. Too bad it wouldn’t end his miserable fucking life.

I stood, naked, bathed only in his blood that coated my body as if it was paint. I wiped my face, licking my fingers clean as I peered down at the prince of darkness. He gurgled, already healing from what I’d done to him. The mangled mess seized, making grotesque noises as his demons gawked, unsure what to do as they stared at the mess he’d become. He turned to his side, stumbling to his feet before he turned his ruined face towards me. His wings began to move, and I turned my head to the side, studying him and every weakness he had. My own wings expanded, and I spun as he charged, severing his head, which bounced and then stopped right on the stairs, right at Lucian’s feet.

“That was for my son,” I uttered thickly, reveling in the revenge that slithered through me, the intoxicating taste of it so strong that my eyes closed and I stood there, basking in it. I rolled my head, letting loose the muscles as the magic and power rushed through me as I opened my eyes to stare at the demons who were now comprehending what had played out.

Lighting crashed close by, and then it struck everywhere. The entire night turned into day as bolt after lethal bold crashed down, slaughtering the demons who’d come to protect their prince. The night was scented in electrical current as I stood there in all my naked glory, watching as they perished, sent back to whatever dark pit they’d crawled out of. The Furies slipped into the wards, into the protection it offered, chancing the anger of those they’d earlier trapped inside them.

Once they were within, I let my Fury out. Every bit of anger, loss, and hatred let loose at once. The smell of burned flesh permuted into the night as bodies that had held the demons melted under the bolts of lightning.

Everything came out.

Everything I’d kept inside of me, power, anger, rage, and the pain. Oh, the pain was intense as it exploded from me, and punished those outside the protective barrier. I let it all go so that I didn’t have to feel it, live with it.

The world trembled as the scream ripped through my lungs, echoing with the power I unleashed. It rode the bolts down with the demons, slamming into them with the force of my emotions as I held nothing back. My hair rose as my flesh glowed with the runes painted upon my flesh. One after another, the demons popped, sizzled and then melted into nothing. The bodies of the humans they’d stolen turned to ashes, floating in the air around me. It looked like a blizzard, ashes rained around me, floating with the wind and breeze as I turned, staring at Lucian. Once the last demon had popped and exploded as my mortal head had done that fateful day I walked towards the wards.

And Lucifer thought I’d be his fucking queen? Please. I was the fucking reigning queen. The queen of the dead, the undead, and the pissed the fuck off.

Once I was inches from him, I lifted a dainty brow and glared at him. “Bitch?” I snapped.

“You…” he stopped, letting his gaze drift down my naked body which was painted in our enemy’s blood. “I was wrong.”

“You’re damn right you were,” I growled back. “If you think I’d so easily slip and land on his dick after what he did to our child, you’re not ready for me. He killed my son, so I did what I had to do to get revenge. He may not be dead, but he knows I’m willing to fight him to get to that point of our relationship.”

“He cannot be killed, not without offsetting the balance.”

“Fuck the balance. Everything can be killed. And I don’t really want him dead; I want him to suffer for the rest of his miserable fucking life.”

“And you didn’t tell me your plan, why?” he demanded. 

“Now you know how I felt when you begged Katarina to let you in. Betrayal stings and you now know exactly how I felt before I slit my fucking throat. I thought you wanted her, and yet I sacrificed my life to protect you and everyone else. So the next time you think you’re doing me a favor? Don’t. Or I’ll make you feel it tenfold.”

“You’re fucking hot when you’re evil,” Spyder drawled from beside Lucian. “She’s like your evil fucking twin, but with a nice rack.”

Synthia snorted and then I was dressed, even though the blood was still crusted against my flesh. I stared at Lucian pointedly, watching as his eyes crinkled in the corners as a smile played across his lips.

“Lesson learned,” he agreed. “Let’s get inside; you have Lucifer in your hair still.”

“I may not shower for a week,” I muttered. “I enjoyed being covered in him.”

He growled, and I wiggled my eyebrows, sauntering past him as I followed the others into the Guild.

“You’ll shower, because I won’t smell him as I fuck you, Lena. Next time, warn me so that I don’t have to punish you.”

“Punish me?” I smirked, watching him as he stopped me, pulling me back as the others moved inside.

“I almost took those wards down tonight. If I had, everyone else would have died. I can get through your wards, the runes? They won’t fucking hold me now. Not being able to get you before? I made fucking sure I’d never have to go through it again, but the cost is anyone else in the general vicinity will die. Don’t do it again. You get me? Because I won’t lose you, not even if you switch sides. I’ll hunt you down and tie that tight ass up to my bed for eternity just to keep you. I can’t and won’t lose you again. Whatever the fuck you make me feel? I want to keep feeling it. So careful, because I don’t play by rules that you understand, and I don’t care who I take out if it ends with you living, or staying with me.”

“You know, they have a word for that, it’s called sociopath,” I muttered as I lifted up on my tiptoes and tried to kiss him. His hand came up to block it.

“You are not kissing me with Luc on your lips, and he is. He’s everywhere,” he growled as he indicated my entire face and then smirked. “You were a fucking sight to behold tonight, but I mean it. No more secrets where he is concerned.” He pushed me towards the Guild’s door, and I allowed it, even as I smelled the brimstone as Lucifer healed. He’d be back, and pissed.