Page 17 of Discord and Cinder (Fire Witches of Salem #7)
I expected to see annoyance in his eyes, or even a smugness that he could make it through that horrible, awful, very bad place when I was ready to become its next victim. Instead, I was met with compassion, and if I didn’t know any better, I’d say he blinked back unshed tears.
“I think… Yeah, umm…” I wiggled out of his embrace, and he lowered my feet to the ground. My dress had gotten hiked up too high for my comfort, so I shimmied it down and made sure my girls were in their proper places.
I swear I heard him sniffle as I adjusted my clothes, but when I looked at him, the only evidence of tears I could find was mine, along with my snot, smeared all over his lapel. I rubbed my hands over my face and wiped my nose on my sleeve.
His lips twitched, tugging into a smile on one side. “All good?”
“I will be.” I hiccupped, and the last of my tears rolled down my cheek. “That was intense.”
His eyes grew misty, and he swallowed hard. “We need to keep moving.”
“Wait a second.” I grabbed his hand before he could walk away. “It affected you too, didn’t it?”
He scoffed. “No. I’m Prince of Hell, I?—”
“You were a prince. Now you’re just a demon, and you teared up. Are you all good?”
As he took a deep breath, his gaze locked with mine.
The sigil on my arm heated, and it felt like we were opposing ends of a magnet, completely opposite in every way, yet drawn together by a force too powerful to fight.
My body drifted toward him, the incredible urge to take his face in my hands and kiss him overpowering me.
Thankfully, my feet stayed firmly in place, and I blinked, snapping out of that alternate reality where I was falling for a demon. Whew. It was the trauma bond. It had to be because light witches and dark demons did not mix. Ever.
He cleared his throat. “I believe our blood bond caused me to feel your emotions. I’m fine, but we must keep moving. This way.”
He kept a firm grip on my hand, and we skirted the tree line, heading toward a town on the horizon. Sometimes it felt like we’d been walking for hours, but when I focused on the sensation, it seemed only minutes had passed. The orange ball in the sky didn’t seem to move, so it had to be minutes.
“Is that a sun or a moon?” I asked. “It’s been like twilight the entire time I’ve been here.”
“It is the moon. The sun never shines in Hell.”
“How long have we been walking?”
He stopped abruptly, tugging me behind a tree as a pair of harpy-hounds passed overhead. “It’s hard to say. Time isn’t as linear here as it is on Earth, and my period away has made it difficult to comprehend. The forest’s energy-draining power didn’t help either. Let’s keep moving.”
He dropped my hand and peered at the sky. When the harpy-hounds disappeared into the horizon, we paced forward, leaving the so-called safety of the tree line. Even just walking close to it made me feel icky, so I can’t say I minded losing our cover too much.
Finally, after who knew how long away from the Forest of Suffering Souls, the last of the sadness drained from my system. I furrowed my brow as we continued our trek toward the town, a spark of anger replacing the despair that almost unalived me.
“If you knew the effect that place has on people, why did you drag me into it? You knew it could kill me.”
He glanced at me. “Technically, you’re already dead.”
“You know what I mean.”
“You’re a Holland witch. If you were as strong as you claimed to be, you would have been fine.”
I scoffed. “I have never claimed to be any stronger than I am. That place kills demons . I don’t buy it for a minute that you thought I’d be okay. Were you trying to kill me?”
He glanced again, arching a brow. “Perhaps I was teaching you a lesson.”
I gave him a sideways glare. “And what lesson would that be?”
“That you’re out of your element here, and you need me to survive. I chose that route because of its danger. The only safe way off the palace grounds is through the front. The hunters would assume I took you that way because every other route would likely obliterate you.”
My jaw clenched. “First of all, I do not need you to survive. I’ve gotten along just fine without you for thirty years.”
He laughed dryly. “In the earthly realm. Hell is different.”
“You’re ruled by an evil, narcissistic tyrant whose brainwashed minions stroke his ego and help him get away with whatever he wants. If you have laws, they sure as shit don’t apply to him. Believe me, it’s not that different.”
“And your second point?”
“Second, next time we have a choice of challenges that’ll likely kill me, I’d rather battle a boss-level dragon than take an emotional hit like that.”
“I know.”
“Then why didn’t we go another way?”
“Because Lucifer and his ‘brainwashed minions’ know that too. Your demeanor makes your preference obvious, so I chose the least likely route.” He jerked his head to the left, indicating I should follow him down an alley.
We entered the town, and he picked up his pace. “I believed our blood bond would protect you. I thought I could share my immunity to the forest, but the bond works both ways. Your pain numbed my resistance. I didn’t intend for you to suffer.”
“Is that an apology?”
“No.”
I followed him down the alley, and we made a right at the first corner.
The squat buildings here were made of clay bricks and mud, the streets of cobblestone and rubble…
a stark contrast to the city he’d taken me to before.
Aside from the humid heat and sulfurous stench, it felt like we’d stepped into a sixteenth-century English town, frozen in time.
He stopped at the next corner and peered right then left. “Your bag is in the house two blocks ahead.”
An air raid siren wailed from somewhere above. Or maybe it was below. Hell, it sounded like it came from all around me and inside my head at the same time, chilling me to the marrow. Discord’s hands curled into fists, and the tendons in his neck tightened.
His reaction made my heart dip into my stomach, and I bit the inside of my cheek. I knew we were screwed, but I just had to ask anyway. “What does that mean?”
He let out a slow breath. “It means the hunt is on.”
“Well, shit.”