Page 18

Chapter 18

Andy

S ometimes I forgot that I was technically surrounded by creatures that many would call monsters.

Not all of my lovers were terrifying, of course. But given the right context… well, I could see any one of them starring as the predator in a human horror novel, is all I’m saying.

The poor cultist. He probably thought we were sparing him. Goddess was he ever wrong.

I stood back against the wall by the door, my face clearly showing what I thought of torture. We had dragged the cultist guy out to the center of the courtyard, on the grass, where blood and bodily fluids wouldn’t be an issue. Outside, where the lingering energetic echoes of pain and suffering would be easier to cleanse.

And Bella made sure to explain these reasons to the jerk who had chosen the wrong side of this little conflict for world domination. I think he might have wet himself a little.

Dyre busied himself sharpening his athame, which was soaked with obvious dark energy. He positioned it carefully next to a bunch of other weird implements on a metal tray he’d found in the basement. And no, I didn’t want to think about how it fit his purposes so well or what my family had used it for, once upon a time.

Niamh was busy expertly tying the man’s arms and legs to a chair. He didn’t struggle, didn’t cry out or beg for mercy—because Aahil was currently possessing him, making him sit still like a nice, helpful little victim.

“This is so fucked up,” I muttered.

Elijah came to stand beside me and wrap an around my shoulder, tucking me in against his side. “You don’t have to watch,” he said gently.

I huffed, glancing up into his troubled blue eyes. “You don’t either,” I reminded him. If anyone was going to hate this, it was the guy who could sense soul energy.

But Elijah just shook his head. “No, I need to bear witness.”

And I felt the same way. If I was going to be an accomplice to something as awful as torture, then I was damned well going to stand here and suffer the consequences of my moral failings. I wasn’t going to hide inside behind the mansion walls while terror was acted out in my name, the way my family had loved to do.

Zhong took up position behind the captive, shirtless and rippling with muscle in a clear reminder that there would be no escape, no running away, even if the witch somehow found a way to outsmart the magic users around him. Bella and the others circled the chair, forming a ring of security and judgement.

“All set,” Dyre announced, running a finger lovingly over the sharp implements one last time.

“Aahil,” Ambrose said with a congenial smile as he stepped up next to the metal tray and picked up a pair of pliers. “You may come out now. We’re ready to begin.”

Aahil appeared on Dyre’s other side, releasing the cultist from his possession. “This is going to be so much fun,” he said in a breathy voice that almost sounded lustful. He lifted a hand, and flames danced along his fingers. “Brand, please.”

I watched with a churning stomach as Dyre easily handed Aahil a swirling piece of metal attached to a handle… like a stamp.

The cultist came back to life, now that he had control of his own body. He blinked blearily a time or two. Then the yammering started.

First it was threats. How we wouldn’t get away with this. How he had been spelled not to recall pertinent information anyway. How we would all regret our actions when the cultists took over, yadda, yadda.

Ambrose just ignored him and stepped closer, head tilted as he inspected the point of his dagger, pressing it against the gloved finger of his opposite hand. “You have a beautiful voice,” he purred, finally looking at the man. “I’ll enjoy hearing more of it.”

He leaned in and set the tip of the dagger against the man’s chest, parting the fabric with a careful downward swipe, then slowly, carefully dragging the tip of the dagger in a circle round his stomach. He didn’t draw blood, but the threat was implicit.

“Please,” the man began to beg. “I don’t know anything. I swear. Please don’t do this.”

Witch magic flared as the man tried to prepare a spell, but Bella already had a suppression spell on him, and it wouldn’t have done any good anyway. He was way overpowered by the beings around him.

Ambrose’s dark aura swelled as his grinned widened. “Yes,” he purred in his dark velvet voice, leaning closer to the witch, so he could murmur in his ear. “Sing for me, darling.”

Tendrils of blackness curled around the boogeyman, and reached outward, sliding up the witch’s legs. His eyes widened and he began to squirm, trying desperately to escape the creature before him. “No. What the fuck are you? Ah!”

The knife pressed to his belly, a shroud of blackness began to swirl around the circle of tormentors, and I looked away.

Then the screaming started.

The man screamed and cried until his voice as broken and hoarse, begging us to stop. And eventually begging us to kill him. Promising us anything we wanted if we would just make the pain end.

His screams grew weaker as he tired, as he was drained of life force and of the will to live. Eventually he was reduced to broken whispers and gasps, little sobs between moments of babbling insanity. And all the while, Ambrose whispered questions. Kept a running commentary on how much fun they were having together.

Bella stepped in a time or two to whisper in Ambrose’s ear, and the boogeyman changed his inquiries accordingly, until he told us everything. All we needed to hear and more.

“Fucking finally,” I said on a heavy sigh, rubbing my temples as the harsh breathing and pleading stopped. “Goddess, I have a headache.”

Elijah patted my back. “That was rough. But, better than the alternative, I suppose.”

We both looked on as Ambrose drew back his darkness, leaving the cultist tied to a chair in the sunshine in the middle of the courtyard. Bella was still standing next to Ambrose, but everyone else had taken a seat at some point in the proceedings. River was in jaguar form, curled up under a shrub taking a nap.

I shook my head at the guy’s ability to sleep through all that racket.

Ambrose straightened his jacket and held out an arm to me as I went to join him. He pressed a soft kiss to the side of my head and gave me a sideways hug. “Will that suffice, lovely witch?”

I nodded. “I suppose. But I’m not entirely sure he wouldn’t have preferred real torture.”

I glanced at the cultist who sat there crying in the afternoon sun, completely unharmed.

“Oh, it certainly seemed real enough to him, at the time,” Ambrose assured me with a shark-toothed grin.

I shuddered, recalling the time we had all been caught up in one of Ambrose’s nightmares when he was first freed from the bestiary. It had absolutely felt real. And it had almost killed a couple of us…

But this I could live with, much better than knowing that my lovers had just sliced up some guy for funzies.

Bella shook her head in awe. “That was insanely effective,” she marveled. “And not a drop of blood wasted.”

I didn’t exactly love the little spark of greed I saw in her eyes when she looked at Ambrose, but I didn’t comment.

The cultist finally caught his breath and lifted his head, blinking stupidly at the circle of people around him. Some of whom were only just now rousing themselves from their seats in the grass. “What…” He muttered, his voice still hoarse from all that screaming. “How…” he looked down at himself, his eyes widening. “I was bleeding. There was so much pain. I… how?”

Ambrose winked at him. “Contrary to your beliefs, little boy, witches are not the supreme race, and they never will be. You might think yourselves mighty. But you are mere children compared to some of the other beings around you. Remember that.”

“Did we get everything we need?” I asked Bella tiredly.

She nodded. Then she cut a look toward the captive. “We’ll talk more once we get rid of that.”

“What are you going to do with me?” the cultist asked, confusion creasing his brow. He was probably wondering why we’d go to the trouble of avoiding physical torture, only to go ahead and kill him afterward.

Aahil popped out of existence for a little trip to the Lovell vault. Then he returned in a shower of sparks that was a bit excessive compared to his usual flare. The strap of a messenger bag was draped across his chest, the bag concealing the amplifying artifact resting at his hip.

“Okay,” he said with a grin, “Off we go.”

He grabbed hold of the cultist’s still bound arm and they both disappeared with a wash of heat and magic.

I shook out my hands, trying to get rid of the full body tingles that wave of amplified magic had caused. “I will never get used to that.”

Bella tilted her head at me. Clearly, she had felt the backlash of amplified magic, but I didn’t think it was as intense for her. I wasn’t about to explain to her all about my bonds with the people around me. I wasn’t entirely sure I trusted her with the information.

Aahil returned in seconds, but this time, the wash of magic wasn’t as intense. The messenger bag was gone, restored to its place in the vault.

“All done,” he said smugly. “Our new friend is currently trying to work his way out of his restraints… somewhere in the far reaches of the Magean jungle, on the eastern side of the globe, as far away from the heart as possible.

I chuckled. If the guy was currently there, he was about as far away from the heart—the center of the Magean city of Hearthfire, where the Lovell mansion had once stood, and the main hub of magical government—as he could possibly be. Even if he managed to get himself untied before something ate him, he wouldn’t be rejoining his cult friends until it was far too late for him to be of any help.

But my amusement was short lived. He had spilled everything he knew. And Bella was right. The cult had amassed enough power and knocked down or infiltrated enough of the SA. They planned to attack the heart and take over the government and the Alliance’s police force. Soon.

Wars in the magical world were different than those in the human world; they weren’t won with numbers, they were won with power. And the cult had enough magical tricks up their sleeves now to win this war. The moment the Alliance was eliminated or completely taken over from the inside, the cult would be the ones with all the power, and there would be no organized force strong enough to stop them. It would snowball from there, with the strong magic users who chose to fight back lacking the organization—and the ruthlessness—it would take to be effective.

As Bella led the group back inside to discuss what the hell we were supposed to do with this knowledge, I reached down and ran my hand over River’s soft black jaguar head. He nudged me gently and I took his cue, moving to a bench off the side of the main path.

“Shift back,” I demanded.

He gave me a little rumbly noise somewhere between a purr and a whine, but I just gave him an impatient stare. Now wasn’t the time to enjoy playing with the overgrown cat. And I was pretty sure he was just hiding in this form to avoid having to interact with Bella anyway.

He sighed and transformed back into a human shape. I raked my eyes up the length of his beautiful, lithe, copper-skinned form, and forced myself to focus on more important things than licking him. “What happened?” I bit out, crossing my arms over my chest to avoid the temptation to touch. “Earlier. When she first got here. I know you used your magic.”

He gave me a wry little smile that told me he knew what I was thinking about his looks. But he did me the favor of retrieving his pants from under a bush and tugging them on, so we could focus on my question.

He didn’t pretend not to know what I was talking about or try to shield my feelings. He simply told me the truth. “She made her demands and her threat. You, in your infinite and usually adorable, stubborn way, refused to be told what to do. She ripped down the wards using your blood connection and essentially killed us all.”

I stared at him in silence for a few seconds, processing. I had suspected something like that, of course. Otherwise, why would River have had to alter time? But still, the confirmation hurt.

“We can’t trust her,” I said flatly.

I had held onto my suspicions, told myself not to trust too easily just because she was my sister. But damn it, I had really hoped I was wrong. I had really hoped that being a Lovell didn’t automatically make us all evil bitches.

He sighed and ran a hand over his face. “Should you trust her blindly? No.” He lifted his citrine gaze to mine. “I’ve known Belladonna longer than you have. As an adult, at least. I’ve worked with her and the rebels for quite a long time, while you’ve hardly had any time to get to know her.” He shrugged. “It’s not a matter of whether or not you can trust her. As with most people, it’s more a matter of what you can trust her for and to what degree.”

I frowned at him in confusion, and he took my hand, willing me to understand. “Bella is serious and driven. She’s very passionate about what she believes in. Very much like you in some respects. You also get really fired up when you think something isn’t right. She isn’t some terrible, evil person. But she learned at a young age that it is acceptable to make sacrifices to achieve your goals. She’s ruthless, when she has to be. And… I think Junaid tempered that side of her, balanced her out a little bit. He was the softer side of the duo. Now that he’s gone, I think maybe her moral compass has shifted a little off center.”

I shook my head. “I lost someone too, but it didn’t make me into a raving, heartless psychopath! Don’t make excuses for her.”

He just gave me a sad look. “No. You’re right. Losing Hasumi didn’t send you into a murderous rage. But as much as you loved them, it is different. For starters, you only had a short time to get attached. Bella has been with Junaid since she was a teenager. He has been the one sense of security and love in her life. Losing him, she lost everything, Andy. I know it’s not fair to make comparisons like that, but you are still surrounded by people who love you, while she is essentially alone. Oh, she has her rebels and her acquaintances in her cause. But she’s a very closed off person. From what I’ve seen, she has no actual close connections the way you do.” He shrugged. “You and the others had each other to lean on to get you through your grief—remember the ceremony we did? All the time we’ve spent comforting each other and just being there together through it. I’m sure she had nothing like that to help her survive the day her world fell apart. All she has now is this cause.”

He gave me a wry look. “And… you and Bella have different personalities. Different ways of coping. Her way is to rage and fight on. Your way….”

I sighed. “My way is to hide in a pocket world where the chances of anything bad happening to the people I love ever again is much, much less than if I were to run off into a magical war and drag them along with me.”

His chiseled lips curved up into a sad smile. “It doesn’t make you weak, you know. You love them. And you are more of a protector than an avenger. It’s your big heart that makes you who you are. Not everyone is so lucky.”

I huffed. “Us,” I said evenly.

He tilted his head. “I don’t follow?”

I squeezed his hand. “You said I want to protect ‘them’ because I love them. You didn’t include yourself in that statement.”

He widened his eyes at me as that sank in. “Should I?”

I chuckled and leaned in to brush a kiss across his lips, which he eagerly returned. “It’s early days for us still, maybe, but yes… I think you should.”

He smiled against my lips, then pulled back a bit to press a kiss to my forehead. “Us, then. You reacted the way you have because you want to protect us. Because you love us. And we love you too.”

I probably had the goofiest look on my face. Luckily, there was no one there to witness it but River.

But the levity faded as my thoughts returned to what he was saying about my sister. “So, she’s lonely, bitter, and hurt. And she learned from my parents—and from living on her own once she escaped them—that sometimes you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet. While I’m just a big softie with morals who doesn’t understand being a jerk.”

He quirked a brow at me. “Essentially, yes.”

“And the answer to my question about whether or not we can trust her is ‘that depends.’”

He huffed a laugh. “Essentially.”

I tried to realign my black and white thinking. You’d think after all I’d seen and done the past few months. After all the varied discussions I’d had with my lovers about right and wrong, good and evil, that I’d understand the real world was all drawn in shades of gray. But sometimes I slipped back into old thinking patterns.

“We can trust her to put the cause first,” I muttered. “Over everything, up to and including the people around her. We can trust she does want the cult gone and the SA to be either destroyed and replaced or fixed so people are safe. But we can’t trust her to play by the rules.” I sighed. “I can’t trust her to think like I do. I can’t trust her to keep me or any of my people safe while we help her save the day.”

He nodded. “That is my assessment, yes.”

I closed my eyes and let one more fucking challenge sink into my brain with all the others we were facing. “Can I trust her to do what’s right after this whole thing goes down?” I whispered. “Because what will she do when she no longer has this big cause to focus her obsession?”

“Three times,” he said softly. “It took me three tries. I reversed time and reset the world three times to save us all from her desperation and anger. It took a lot of magic. But I did it. I will be by your side. And I will keep a very close eye on Belladonna Lovell, especially once the fighting is over.”

That helped. Even if River’s powers were limited, they were astounding. He had the ability to divert disaster if it came to that—as long as we were alert and ready for it when it came. As long as it was something he could fix in a limited window of time.

But first, we had to survive long enough to win a war.