Epilogue
Akosua, Angel of Fire
She was used to the warm, golden kiss of the fire, but in this realm, it was all wrong. Here, it was blue, lifeless. Cold.
Akosua withdrew from her place before the hearth and resumed pacing the tower she’d been locked in.
Her clever brown eyes swept over the courtyard beyond the row of slits they called windows.
A horde of demons stalked the perimeter of the castle, horns and hooves and wings jutting out of their mismatched armor.
How this realm stayed fortified was beyond her.
When they weren’t stabbing each other in the heart, its wretched inhabitants were playing dice, drinking themselves into oblivion, or daring each other to jump off the drawbridge. None ever survived the fall.
Fools. All of them, she thought.
Her gaze tracked the blood that smeared the ground below the windows. A clump of what looked to be skin and perhaps hair was wedged between the cobblestones.
Must have been what was left of the last guest.
A being made of hellfire and shadow swept through the purple sky. It landed in the field beyond the battlements, its deep roar shaking the windowpanes.
One of their sentries returning from patrol, she presumed.
The tops of dueling axes and swords glinted in the endless twilight: the closest things she ever saw to stars.
Here in Chthonia, she never witnessed a sunrise or sunset. It never got fully dark, it never got fully light. The realm was stuck. She was stuck. She was—
She slammed her palms onto the stone windowsill, stopping herself.
Spiraling would only blow her cover, and then she’d end up in a fiery pit or on one of the many spikes that lined the road.
Hand pressed against her diaphragm, she inhaled deeply, closed her eyes, and willed herself to breathe.
Akosua yearned to hear the calming words of her archangel sisters. Instead, she was met with the constant barrage of the demons’ thoughts. It took all of her remaining will to block their twisted fantasies, their absurd questions, their croaky inflections out of her head.
It was enough to drive the sanest mind mad.
Even when she didn’t hear them, she felt them—invisible claws raking through her brain as if it were a mine they could pillage and ransack.
Instead of Gaia’s and Fei’s familiar voices flowing through her mind like a soft wind, she heard a jewelry box chirp. Followed by a creakkk from the wooden four-poster bed and a rattle from the armoire’s drawers.
At night, an unseen presence pulled the silk sheets off the mattress.
Everything in this room, in this godforsaken realm, was possessed. Cursed.
Even the air hung over her like a ghost, heavy and haunting.
A knock echoed through the bedroom. Her eyes shot open. The candles flickered. So did her heart.
Someone was at the door.
Akosua gulped, her throat dry, parched, aching with an endless thirst no matter how much water she drank.
The flames from the hearth cast a shiver down her spine. She wrapped her arms around her waist, holding in her body’s warmth, the long sleeves of her red velvet dress dragging across the floor.
Flying imps scattered like moths as she opened the door. Pesky, nosy little critters—no doubt they’d had their ears to the wood, eavesdropping on her, reporting back to the demon king himself. Before her, one of his slithering regents stood, bug-eyed and hunched.
“Tharros,” she said, mouth set in a firm line. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”
The lesser demon removed a ratty handkerchief from his pocket, dabbing his bone-white, scaly temples. Demons, they always ran hot. Meanwhile, another shiver raced down her spine.
“His Royal Highness has considered your request for an alliance.” The words hissed out of his lipless mouth, the thin slits of his nose flaring.
“Oh?” She kept her face neutral, even if this news made her insides twist.
“There’ve been some advancements in the Mortal Lands,” he stammered, a forked tongue darting out. Akosua found herself leaning farther back. “Xegdrelath accepts your offer.”
Relief unfurled her spine.
“On one condition.”
She stiffened.
“A betrothal.”
Akosua gulped, suddenly needing to lean against the doorframe. “A—a what?”
Tharros gave her a smile that was all venom and fangs. “You will wed the demon king when Mortal Earth celebrates winter solstice.”
The words spiraled around her; she could hardly hear them over her pounding heart. In earthly time, that was only a few short months away.
Coming here, presenting this…alliance, it was the only thing she could think to do to ward off the demons from torturing her sisters and using their magic to infiltrate Mortal Earth.
Their Source certainly wasn’t strong enough to protect them—not anymore, with the Angel of Water gone and her daughter stubborn as all hell, as human teenagers often are—and it would never be that powerful again, not until River took her rightful place among the Watchers.
But despite River’s stubbornness, Akosua believed in her.
She’d seen the way the girl stared at the rain, how she maneuvered her surfboard, those days when she’d watch the ocean for hours—water called to her.
The lesser demon cleared his throat, tilting his head.
She had to be careful with these thoughts—that they weren’t flashing across her face or leaking to another prying mind—but this was supposed to be temporary.
A betrothal would bind her here forever.
The little hope she’d been clinging onto guttered out. She couldn’t bear to admit it, but… Perhaps she’d put too much faith in the Angel of Water’s daughter.
“The tailor is waiting,” Tharros continued, yellow eyes narrowing.
Her skin grew hot, and she hoped a flush wasn’t rosying her ebony cheeks. “Now?” she managed to say, her head spinning.
“Something wrong?” he spat.
She snapped her gaze to his. “Nothing is wrong.” Keeping her voice steady, she walked across the threshold, continuing the performance she’d been giving since the day she entered the realm. “I accept.”