Page 52

Chapter Twenty-Nine

A single candle burned low on a table. Ena squinted in the dark, trying to make out where the furniture was, and where Ty might be, when an arm reached out and looped around her waist from behind. She opened her mouth to speak just as a hand reached out and covered it.

She squirmed and mumbled incoherently into the hand, but he didn’t let go, so she bit him.

“Damn! Easy, viper,” Ty said from behind her. He released her mouth, shaking out his injured hand, but kept his arm still looped around her waist. “What are you doing here, Ena?” he asked in surprise.

“I need to talk to you,” Ena replied angrily. His arm finally loosened around her waist, so she spun to look at him. She could just make out his face in the dimly lit room, and it still took her breath away.

Somehow, in the days they’d been apart, she’d forgotten just how beautiful he was.

Thick lashes framed his light-green eyes as they bored into her.

His perfect, kissable lips were parted slightly as his dark brows lowered in confusion.

The candlelight danced in his beard, making the mix of lighter blond hairs glow against the darker browns and reds.

“Are you okay? Did they hurt you?” he asked, concern etched on his face.

“Asks the man who just grabbed me when I came in the room,” she said, still feeling a bit irked at his welcome.

“I wasn’t sure who you were at first. My venator doesn’t work in here and I heard a commotion outside the door. Are you sure you’re okay? I’ve been asking about you, but they wouldn’t tell me anything.”

Her temper softened at his distressed tone. “I’m fine. They’re letting me go,” she said, giving him a small smile.

He nodded in relief before flicking his eyes to the door behind her. “What happened to the witches standing guard?” he asked, watching it like someone was going to burst in any second.

“I took care of them,” Ena said with conviction.

Ty looked at her then, a hint of suspicion creeping in. “What did they tell you?” he asked cautiously.

“That you’re to be put to death tomorrow,” Ena said, swallowing her fear at the thought. “Drowned.”

He nodded, a look of solemn understanding settling on his face. But there was no surprise. He expected this. “Come to say your goodbyes to a doomed man then?” he asked, giving her a sad smile.

“Doomed?” she asked. She didn’t like hearing him talk this way. “You’re giving in so easily?”

Ty shrugged. “I won’t go down without a fight. And if I do, Steig and Turner already got away. I know they’ll keep going without me. And you…you’ll be okay too,” he said, as if trying to convince himself.

“I never pegged you for a martyr,” Ena said, feeling annoyed that he was so accepting of his death. Why wasn’t he fighting? Insisting they flee right now? Part of her was screaming to, but she needed answers first.

Ty just rolled his eyes, as if this conversation about his death was pointless. “What did you want to talk about, viper?” he asked, sitting back on the table.

Ena took a deep breath, studying him for a few seconds, but she allowed the change of subject. “You told me you’d tell me everything. I want to know why you want the amulet.”

“Why?” he asked suspiciously. “So you can run and tell the rest of your Coven? They’ve been asking me that same question for days, along with a surprising number of questions about my mother,” he said ruefully.

Did he suspect the same thing Ena did? That the only reason they’d kept him alive so long was because of his mother? Ena didn’t know, but now was not the time to open that jar.

“No,” Ena said, trying to control her annoyance.

She’d come here to help him, and he was just clinging to this bullshit.

She took a deep breath. “Look, I…when I put on the amulet, I had a vision. I saw a ritual being done, and it seemed…well, it felt wrong. And when I spoke to Heran about it, she told me something, something I didn’t know before.

She told me that witches were the ones who bound daemons to serve Iblis.

That it wasn’t their choice. She told me that’s why you want the amulet. To break that bond. Is that true?”

Ty hesitated for a second, watching her, gauging her reactions.

He’d clearly kept this information to himself for so long, she knew it went against his nature to admit to it.

Finally, he sighed, as if coming to the same realization she had: that it was time for them to be on the same page. “Yes, it’s true,” he said.

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why do you want to break the bond?” Ena asked, feeling exasperated again.

“Isn’t it obvious?”

“Not to me,” she said flippantly.

Ty sighed again, as if he were dealing with a difficult child, and rubbed the back of his neck. “How much do you know of our kind and the Underworld?”

“Not much. Only what I’ve been told, and clearly not all of that was the truth,” she said, not even trying to keep the frustration from her voice.

Ty nodded. He understood her frustration, he understood her anger, and he looked at her with that understanding as he told her the truth.

“It’s true that your kind bound us to Iblis hundreds of years ago,” he said.

“But even before then, witches and daemons were constantly struggling for dominance over one another, fighting for power over the land, the resources, and alliances with the mortals. Your kind was suspicious of us, because our Powers were often of the mind, more subtle and insidious than the earth magic of witches. Disagreements occurred, mistrust grew, and witches, to maintain their control, well, let’s just say they decided to control the narrative.

They blamed all chaos and disruption on daemons, causing mortals to mistrust us as well.

Eventually, we became so, for lack of a better word, demonized, that we were no longer welcome in mortal villages, so we settled in the Underworld. ”

Ena had never heard any of this before. She’d always been told that daemons chose to live in the Underworld, not that they had been forced there through a power play.

“Soon after that,” Ty continued, “the three Covens used the amulet to bind us to Iblis, cutting us off from being able to interpret Gaia’s will or access her magic.

And the rest is history,” he said, as if it were that simple.

“But, of course, there were consequences for what the witches did. Their magic could no longer be used against us, and vice versa. No one is quite sure why that happened, but powerful spells can often have unexpected ripple effects.”

Ena stared at him, rapt with attention as he continued, his tone filling with anger now.

“Of course, while your kind and mortals thrived above ground, daemons suffered below. Forced to interpret and carry out Iblis’s will in exchange for our Powers, for our way of life, we survived only on what we could steal, or the little we could make and catch for ourselves around the entrance to the Underworld.

We traded a little with mortals, using the natural metal deposits in the Underworld and our skills in metallurgy to create a cover for our missions.

But, of course, we couldn’t make ourselves too well known, for fear of being found out.

So, for a long time, daemons lived this way and came to accept our fate.

Eventually, the amulet and everything the witches had done became myth, and we started to internalize the lies that had been spread about us.

That we were evil. That we were only good for spreading chaos, discontent, and discord.

But I know that’s not true. And that my people deserve better. They deserve a chance.”

The room was silent with Ty’s declaration.

She’d never heard him speak this way before—so passionately, so full of righteousness.

Part of her wanted to argue that her kind would never be so cruel, could never be so power-hungry and malicious with their magic, but the more she thought about it, the more she knew it to be true.

Just because witches served Gaia did not mean they were immune to greed or apathy.

She’d seen the ways the Covens played politics with one another, vying for influence and power over the mortal villages.

And while it was true that they helped mortals, their help always came at a cost, a trade to better the Coven.

And sometimes, even though help was requested, it was denied because of Gaia’s will.

But now, after all the lies, Ena was starting to wonder, how much of it was truly Gaia’s will, and how much of it was witches’?

“How did you learn all this?” she asked. “How did you find out about the amulet?”

Ty looked at her, as if deciding how much to reveal. He’d clearly never shared this all before. Ena wasn’t even sure if all daemons knew. He made it seem like they probably did not.

“A few months ago,” he began, “I was on a mission from Iblis in a village to the west of the Aquilo Coven. The people there were flourishing too much, or so we were told. Their alliance was strengthening the Aquilo Coven, and Iblis feared the power of the witches was growing too strong, so I was sent to disrupt it.”

“By using your furor ?” Ena asked.

“Yes. Unchecked rage can really throw a wrench in alliances,” Ty replied with a rueful smile.

“I was there for a while, undercover of course, and I made…a friend.” Ty looked away again, guilt briefly washing over his face.

“He was a mortal, a book binder in the village. And he was a collector and purveyor of rare books and manuscripts. He shared with me the myth of the amulet. Of course, he didn’t know who, or what, I was.

Not until it was too late.” Ty went quiet again, and when he looked up, Ena could see the pain in his face.

“After that, I started looking for more information about the amulet on my own, until I found a vague reference that led me to believe it might be in the matriarch’s house at your Coven. Obviously, that was incorrect.”