Page 8 of The Damned (Coven of Bones #3)

B EE L ZE B U B

Most of the witches were dining around the grounds, either in the hall or out on the grass, sitting in small groups as if it would offer them safety.

It was not lost on me that they kept to their own houses, the colors of their uniforms a dead giveaway to what enabled them to separate.

I couldn’t say for sure if that had been the case before the archdemons arrived, or if it was a consequence of the bloodshed from the day before.

The memory of my songbird’s tears wetting my skin was enough to make me seek her out in every cluster of red I passed. The overwhelming need to check on her was strange to me, a new complication I hadn’t anticipated.

I should hate her for everything she stood for, for the lighter side of the magic she’d been gifted by Lucifer when He turned His back on us and left us in Hell to pursue His next adventure on Earth.

I should absolutely despise her for the pull of her song on me, for the way it was a constant battle to stay away from her.

I hated that I looked for her in every corner, checked the shadows for the gleaming light of her soul that radiated warmth and beauty.

That need to seek her out had only gotten worse since the day prior, and even knowing I had been a willing participant in offering her my chest to hide her tears, I couldn’t help but feel like there was more to it.

I didn’t regret the contact, even as I struggled to stay away from her the next day and finally succumbed to the urge to hunt down the little siren wherever she’d hidden herself away from the rest of her Coven.

Being there for someone who needed me felt strangely uplifting, like I’d done a good thing in offering comfort to my enemy.

I’d meant it when I said she was far more interesting than most of those I’d encountered since coming to Hollow’s Grove.

I fully intended to make the best of the situation and allow her to be my entertainment until Lucifer made sense of His infatuation with His wife.

The very notion that He’d bound Himself to her willingly was ludicrous, both of us knowing exactly what that meant for Him.

It made Him vulnerable in a way He’d never been, opened Him up to the possibility of death. He’d worked too hard and struggled to find a way to make a new home on Earth just to throw it all away on an ungrateful witchling who didn’t even seem to like Him half the time.

I couldn’t understand the path He’d taken to come to that choice, and it wasn’t like He was willing to discuss it with me.

Prying Him away from His wife was near impossible at the present time, getting anything more than a calm assurance to be patient even more difficult.

The archdemons were restless, antsy to get started with what we’d all expected to occur when we finally joined Lucifer above the surface, and yet here we were.

Fucking waiting on Lucifer, all over again.

So I sought out my own witchling, scouring the grounds for her.

I forced myself to walk rather than fly, knowing that approaching her from above would frighten her too greatly.

I didn’t know why I cared, not when I should have wanted to toss her to the demons as a plaything.

I should have wanted to watch her suffer as I had, for all my centuries in Hell.

But it wasn’t with retribution that I sought her out. It was with concern.

She’d bolted from the Tribunal rooms as soon as she was able, escaping the bloodshed as a woman I had to assume was her mother screamed for her dead sister and tried to get Margot to come with her to lay her to rest. Margot hadn’t been able to do that, retreating from the situation and leaving the former Tribunal member who must have been her aunt to her fate.

As she deserved for what she’d tried to do to her own kind, for what she had done to the witches who had already passed.

A blur of red raced in front of the tree line at the edge of the woods, moving faster than I’d thought possible for a witch. While they had magic at their disposal, they were physically human and lacked all the extra benefits the archdemons had been blessed with.

We’d never been confined to a human form the way the witches were.

Our immortality was pervasive, sinking into every fiber of our being in a way that couldn’t be denied.

We were stronger and faster. We possessed better senses than the witches.

That didn’t even begin to touch on the elements of magic we had that I’d never encountered in any of the witches who had died, given that they all came to Hell to pay for their sins against God.

But Margot ran at the tree line, pushing her frail human body to the limits. I watched her for a moment, the familiarity of a vice sinking into my skin. It made my magic tingle, my addiction to her so potent in the air as she ran that I groaned long and low as I fed from it.

I inhaled as I swallowed it down, taking a moment to savor the thickness of it.

Her magic tasted like she smelled, something sweet and light like vanilla, with a hint of rosy florals as I drank her down.

Only when I’d fed fully did I step closer to her, her shoulders squaring even as she ran.

She spun in an impressively smooth maneuver, stopping her sprint and sliding over the wet grass at the edge of the woods.

She never once slipped or fumbled, placing her feet shoulder-width apart as she faced me and her elbows bent at her sides.

I recognized the stance all too well, a fighter’s stance if I’d ever seen one.

The tension in her body didn’t ease when her eyes found me, when she realized it was me who had sought her out in this secluded place where no one could see her, where no one would hear her scream.

Smart little witch.

Where so many others might have started to fall into complacency, soothed by the comfort I’d provided in her time of need and the multiple interactions she’d successfully walked away from without any harm coming to her, my songbird wasn’t convinced.

She watched me like the predator I was, seeing the violence that had been inked into my skin as Lucifer’s second-in-command.

For every battle I’d won, for every war I’d prevented within the hierarchy of Hell on His behalf, He’d granted me an Enochian tattoo that lent me more and more access to the Source by my own right instead of drawing magic through Him.

Her chest heaved with the force of her breathing, her skin slick with sweat in spite of the chilly autumn air.

She wore a baggy red T-shirt that hung down to her knees, her white leggings fitted to her like a second skin.

She’d pulled her short hair back into two little braids that went down the sides of her head, her face bare of all traces of makeup.

She looked so young without all the adornments that were expected of the Red witches, her natural beauty something she should have been able to embrace freely if she’d desired to.

It served as a stark reminder that she’d only had twenty years to come into her own, most of those spent in childhood.

What had I been like twenty years after my creation? I’d been made into adulthood, never having been a child like the rest of the demons. Even those I’d created who served me within the Third Circle I called home had been made as fully grown beings.

I had no idea what it was to be a child, what it was to grow and suffer an ever-changing body.

“What do you want?” she asked, breaking the silence as I studied her, trying to make sense of the feelings stirring within me. I thought it was almost sadness, a longing for something I’d never even considered missing before.

I shifted uncomfortably, not wanting to provide the truth in my answer. But something in the fragility of her face without the mask she donned to interact with her own kind made me do it anyway, feeling like the least I could do was match the vulnerability she’d exposed twice now in two days.

This was the real Margot, beneath the expectations of her Coven, and yesterday had been the Margot she could become if given the chance.

The one who rose above the society that wanted to hold her down and keep her obedient, speaking out against those who wronged her without heeding the fear that made her tremble.

“I was worried about you. Haven’t seen you around the school today,” I said, neglecting to inform her that I had, in fact, gone to each of the classrooms I realized she frequented in my borderline obsessive stalking of her over the course of the last few days since she’d sung for me.

We didn’t always speak, didn’t always converse, but I knew she saw me lurking.

Her eyes widened in surprise for the briefest moment before she caught herself, schooling her features back into that impassive expression that drove me crazy.

I wanted to see the emotions on her face, wanted to watch them play out like my favorite movie.

“I’m fine. No need to worry about me,” she said, reaching down to grasp her leg behind her.

She stood on the remaining foot with more balance than many managed on two, going about the motions of a post-workout stretch before she started walking.

I followed after her, hating that she had the nerve to walk away from me.

“We both know that’s bullshit,” I said, moving more quickly than she could with my longer stride and catching up to her.

I took up pace beside her, allowing her to continue on her evening walk even though my presence clearly made her uncomfortable.

“A woman who is fine doesn’t run like that. ”

She snapped her head to the side, glaring at me derisively. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe I just like to fucking run?”

The curse in her husky tone sounded more forbidden than it should have. “Running is one thing, running yourself to the breaking point is another. That’s a coping mechanism if I ever saw one.”

She scoffed, her mouth twisting into a smile as the sound burst free. It coated my skin in warmth, wrapping itself around me like a spell all its own. “What are you, my therapist now? Somehow I think I’ll pass on taking any advice from the likes of your kind. Thanks but no thanks,” she said.

“More like the demon on your shoulder,” I offered, smiling wryly at her. “But I know a thing or two about vices and addictions. It’s a dangerous path.”

“How fortunate that my habit is a healthy one,” she returned with a sardonic smile, the fake sweetness angering me. I hated the mask, hated the false pretense she constantly donned in an effort to appear okay.

“Songbird,” I said, my voice dropping into a low whisper as I tried to convey the seriousness of this conversation. I wanted the real her, not the show pony they’d turned her into. “In all honesty, what happened yesterday—”

“Don’t,” she snapped, her feet stopping immediately. She turned to face me, her brows deep slashes of frustration as she issued the order. Despite the strength and determination written into the lines of her face, her legs were far less sturdy than they’d been only a moment prior.

She’d run herself too hard, her energy depleting and muscles aching already now that the adrenaline was wearing off and she could feel her true exhaustion.

“It would be perfectly understandable if you weren’t feeling fine,” I said, continuing on in spite of the warning in those burning mahogany eyes. They were like tiny pinpricks of flame when she was angry, hinting at the depth of the rage she kept carefully tucked away.

“I said don’t,” she said again, holding up a hand as if the words weren’t enough to communicate her desire not to have this conversation.

“I said I’m fine and I meant it. I will be fine just like I always am.

The last thing I need or want is an archdemon nagging at me because he’s too stupid to know the difference between actually liking someone and being trapped under their fucking spell. ”

The words were harsh, but the way she sank her teeth into her bottom lip contradicted them, hinting at her uncertainty in speaking them. My songbird wasn’t used to standing up for herself, attempting to turn a new leaf since the day before.

It said something about my addiction to her that I would gladly give her a safe place to explore that, letting her hurl whatever insults were necessary at me and taking them in stride without returning them.

Hell, maybe I even liked them.

“Everybody needs somebody to turn to,” I said, shrugging my shoulders and trying not to consider the fact that it had been a long time since I’d felt that. My brother was the closest I had to that sort of bond, and I didn’t see anyone else stepping in to fill the role.

She leaned in, coming closer without ever touching me.

The scent of her filled my lungs, those deep eyes glaring up at me.

“That doesn’t mean I’d ever choose you,” she said, the quiet words lacking all emotion.

That made it strike harder, an honest truth that wasn’t buried in rage and anger she couldn’t control.

It should have pissed me off to be so easily dismissed when I was genuinely trying; instead, I found my mouth spreading into a wide smile as she faltered.

She shook her head as she retreated, making her way up to the school and leaving me to linger at the edge of the woods. Her hips swayed as she went, not in a way that she forced, but with the natural sex appeal of a woman who just radiated lust even when she was so determined not to.

The meek Margot of a few days prior seemed like a thing of the past when it was just the two of us, her sass driving the conversations and dominating space. She might claim not to rely upon me as a safe space or person to turn to, but the change in her demeanor said more than her words could argue.

I shoved my hands into my pockets as I made my way back up to the school, abandoning my patrols for the night in favor of stalking my favorite witch and making sure she made it back to her room safely.

This goddamned spell would be the end of me.

If I found her sudden burst of confidence so attractive, there was no doubt that others would, too.

And the witch was mine .