Page 52 of The Damned (Coven of Bones #3)

M A R G O T

The manor in the Sixth Circle, Heresy, looked far more like the gothic churches of Europe than a home.

The building was tall and narrow in width, with towers that jutted toward a sun-filled blue sky.

A rose window sat in the front of the building, perfectly centered among the natural-colored stone columns and gables.

Gargoyles sat atop the roof, staring down at us as we approached.

Their eyes glowed red within their still faces, guardians watching all who chose to enter.

There was a lightness in Beelzebub’s step that I hadn’t expected after all that had transpired in the past day, and he shoved the front doors open without care for formalities.

“Lord Beelzebub!” the butler said, a jovial smile lighting his face as he stepped forward.

He clapped the archdemon on the back, the motion so familiar and less restrained than I’d seen in most of the other circles.

The inner foyer around us was a sprawling hall with a domed ceiling at the back where light shone in the skyward-facing windows.

The rose window at my rear cast a pattern of light on the floor, an illusion of shapes and shadows.

“Good to see you, Vrasarth. Is my brother around?” Beelzebub asked, and I spun to look away from the shapes on the floor so I could look at him fully. He grinned, showing a complete lack of shame for the secret he’d kept.

“I’ll fetch him for you,” Vrasarth said, nodding to me politely before he darted away.

“Brother?” I asked, genuinely curious as to how that had even happened. Demons were not born, they were created. Beelzebub hadn’t had a childhood. He hadn’t been raised in the same sense that I had.

He’d simply been nothing one moment, and then existed the next—a fully formed adult archdemon with thoughts of his own.

“If you want to analyze it deep enough, all the archdemons are like brothers to me. Lucifer is the closest thing we have to a father, so that would make us half-siblings or close enough. But Belphegor and I were made on the same day. My magic had taken root long before his, waiting for the Source to free it from the earth and put it into the body Lucifer had crafted for me, and yet she saw fit to create both of us on the same day. It took years for the others to come to be, so I have to assume there was a reason for her decision. We’ve been close ever since. ”

“We were taught that Belphegor wasn’t an archdemon, though,” I said, attempting to keep the words light even through my confusion. I might have said it had been a lie, but all the archdemons had come through the gate with Lucifer.

Belphegor had not.

“He was meant to be,” Beelzebub said, nodding thoughtfully.

He looked toward the stairs at the corner of the foyer, as if keeping vigil for his brother and carefully crafting his words in case they were overheard.

“Lucifer assumes it has something to do with forming two of us on one day, but He can’t be certain what went wrong.

The Source has never told Him why she didn’t give Belphegor enough magic of his own to claim archdemon status.

He still rules over Heresy, but he’s more susceptible to the magic in other circles than the rest of us, so he rarely leaves.

When we came to the surface, he carried Lucifer’s cot to do his duty and actively chose to return to Hell before the portal closed. He will never leave this place.”

“That must be difficult for him,” I said, looking around the manor that now felt like maybe he was compensating for something.

All the manors had been grand in their own way, but this was something different entirely.

This rivaled the opulence of greed, with no reason as to why that might be the case.

The statues at the corner of the room depicted nude figures, carved into white marble that was reminiscent of Greek antiquity instead of the gothic architecture surrounding them.

Many of them were in an intimate embrace, hinting at the sin of lust as I looked around for signs of the other circles.

Vines twined around a column, the leaves large like I remembered from Gluttony.

The flames of Wrath climbed at the base of the rose window as I spun, protruding from the wall to look more realistic in the relief above the door.

Confusion made my brow furrow as the demon hurried down the stairs.

It was the same one who had been etched into stone at the portal, the reaper waiting to cleave intruders in two.

His face was so similar to Beelzebub’s, a distinct combination of beauty and roughness, but his frame was smaller than the one at my side.

He was leaner and a bit shorter, lacking the overall brutality that Beelzebub’s sheer size gave him.

A third eye sat in the center of his forehead, blinking as he reached the bottom of the stairs and embraced Beelzebub in a firm hug.

The two men laughed until Belphegor pulled back, studying Beelzebub’s face intently.

“You missed me so much you had to come home?” he asked, pulling away slowly.

Beelzebub patted his brother’s cheek condescendingly. “Keep dreaming. How could I possibly miss a little shit like you?”

“Why else would you be here?” he asked, turning his attention to me. “And why would you have brought me such a lovely gift?”

I sighed when he took my hand in his, leaning down to press his lips to the back of my hand.

That eye at the center of his forehead remained fixed on me even as his others looked down at the hand he kissed.

It was unnerving to have something so unblinking fixated on me, and it was only Beelzebub’s warning growl that ended the moment when Belphegor lingered too long.

“Not a gift,” he grunted, tugging me by the waist. The growl lacked the venom he’d had with the other demons who’d made comments toward me, displaying his trust in his brother.

At least once he had made his intentions clear.

Belphegor’s eye widened, a broad smile at his mouth hinting at trouble to come, but whereas the trouble we’d faced thus far felt dangerous, this was of the teasing kind.

“ Oh, ” he said, nodding along in agreement. “Well, welcome to the family, random woman I’ve never met. I see my brother works fast, but I have just one question before I approve.”

I flushed, the word family drawing up all the horrible hangups I had with my own.

Family wasn’t something I’d wanted to find; it was a bond that had never been anything but inconvenient for me.

“What’s the question?” I asked, letting Belphegor guide me out of the foyer and into a sitting room off to the side.

He guided me down onto the sofa, taking the seat next to me as he grabbed a deck of cards off the coffee table and shuffled them in midair.

“How are you at Siege?”