“You’ve gone too far,” I growl, ignoring him. “Bringingback Cassian? You crossed theline, Lucifer.”
He tilts his head, amused. “Ah, but you never told me you had a line.”
My fists clench. “He staked her. He killed her.”
“Yes,” Lucifer smiles. “And yet, here we are. I gave him a head start. You should be thanking me for the dramatic tension.”
“I should rip your fucking throat out.”
“You can try,” he says lightly. “But let’s not forget that I am an all-powerful fallen angel. Besides, what would that make you, Rapha? The demon of wrath? The demon of revenge ?”
I sneer. “Don’t act like you didn’tplanthis. You knew I was losing myself.”
He shrugs. “Of course. I wanted to see what you’d do when you realized you’re just like every soul you’ve harvested. A hypocrite. A pawn. You just won’t let her go, will you? Even if it’s destroying you.”
“Your stupid games are destroying me, Lucifer. Not Drusilla. I’d give my life for her, and if that’s what it takes, then so be it. I wanted to spend my days with her, but if all I get out of this forsaken bargain is for her to live the life she deserved, then so be it.”
“Oh, you don’t have to give up your life for her, Rapha. You simply have to embrace what you are becoming or lose what you love the most.” Lucifer replies as if it’s that simple.
“You know if I give in to this entirely, I will destroy her.”
“But isn’t that part of the fun, Rapha? Will you destroy her? Will you destroy yourself? Who will lose? In the end, it doesn’t matter. I still get to watch the show.” He claps his hands gleefully. “So many twists and turns. It’s better than Love Island.”
I hate that he knows my weakness, that he knows he’s won, has always known he would win. How could I have been so stupid? I went in blindly, something I learned eons ago not to do. But I was desperate when I made that bargain with him, nearly insane with my need to bring Drusilla back.
Lucifer stretches out luxuriously on the throne. “Come now, darling. We both know why you’re here. You want someone to save you.”
For a heartbeat, I say nothing. I breathe—or try to. Every inhale feels like ash scraped over broken glass.
Because he’s not wrong.
That’s the worst part. Somewhere in the pit of me, beneath the rage and fire, I do want someone to pull me back. To claw me out of the rot before it becomes all I am. But not him. Never him.
“I’ll save myself,” I say tightly, voice low and shaking with restraint. “Or I’ll burn trying. And if I fall… I’ll drag you with me.”
Lucifer’s grin widens like it’s all a game. “As delicious as your threats are, Rapha, I fell a long time ago.”
I can’t take the smirk, the scent of sulfur, the sound of my soul unraveling.
I blink out of Glutton Hall before I lose control, reappearing at the edge of Whispering Hollow in Fable Forest, the town neighboring Screaming Woods. The witches here don’t deal in dreams or pity. They deal in blood, truth, and consequence.
It’s past midnight, and the forest is hushed but alive.
The branches whisper secrets in a language only the damned can hear.
The trees here are older than memory, gnarled and silver-barked, heavy with moss that glows faintly green in the dark.
The air hums with latent power, the kind that can twist fate if you’re foolish enough to ask.
Nestled at the heart of it all, partially hidden behind thick brambles and swaying ivy, stands the witches’ house.
It’s crooked, not in the way a cottage sags with age, but like it was always meant to defy symmetry and rules.
The stones shimmer faintly with embedded runes.
The chimney leaks a thin curl of lavender smoke.
Mushrooms cluster along the base, glowing softly in unnatural hues of blue, violet, and a sickly gold.
Wind chimes made of bone and crystal clink gently in the breeze. I see no lights in the windows, but the air around the house pulses like it’s watching me.
I knock on the heavy oak door. The ivy covering it shifts as it creaks open.
A woman with dark braids and silver eyes peers out. “Rapha. Come in. Quietly.”
I don’t ask how she knows me. She’s a witch, after all.
Inside, five more witches gather around a worn table. One raises an eyebrow. “What do you want?”
“I need help.” I hate the rasp in my voice. “I made a bargain with Lucifer.”
Silence.
“And?” another witch with a deeply-lined face and snowy-white hair prompts.
“I used to be a vampire. Now I’m… this. I’m greed . And I need to know how to stop the hunger before I lose the last of what I am.”
She studies me. “We can’t save you, Rapha. But we can show you what’s left.” She gestures to a tall mirror framed in gnarled oak and woven roots. “Look.”
I step forward. My reflection stares back.
At first, it’s just me, my horns, eyes rimmed in red, a mouth that smiles too little. Then the aura bleeds in.
Black.
The color of a void. Of consumption.
But at the crown of my head between the horns, a sliver of sickly green pulses faintly.
“The last trace of your human soul,” the white-haired witch says quietly. “You are nearly gone.”
I swallow hard. “Can it be saved?”
“One way only. No more trades. No more reaping. The next soul you touch will finish the job.”
My stomach drops.
That rush. That surge of ecstasy, of invincibility, is a part of me now.
But Drusilla is everything .
If I fall, I take her with me.
“Are you willing to lose her?” the witch asks.
I stare at my reflection. The demon stares back, already pulling at me to trade another soul. “I don’t know.”