Dagon
Chapter forty-three
Iwas seething with anger – anger at myself, at King, and at the whole damned world.
I was furious that Diablos felt forced to point a deadly weapon at our father.
Furious at King for the disgust I saw on his face, and enraged that Wild thought he needed to protect the others from me.
Most of all, I was livid that this entire mess had caused Di to raise his walls, making our bond feel muted.
Di chose me, chose to stand by my side. It shouldn't have had to come down to this. King meant so much to both of us… why did we have to stand against each other?
Little did King know I had always been a demon. Now he knew. He must know I'm a Starborn. Part of me felt guilty for who I was, for the angel who unknowingly raised a demon. But I pushed that part deep inside. Di needed me, and I would stand proudly next to him.
“You have nothing to feel bad about. It’s not your fault you’re a demon. It’s not your fault! You didn’t know King was an angel.” Di's voice resonated in my mind.
I should have known Di would be able to hear my thoughts. My emotions were all over the place, fueled by anger and pain. I was projecting loudly.
“It doesn’t make it easier. If my powers hadn’t been suppressed, I would've known to stay away from King.”
“Then we wouldn’t have met.”
“One way or another, we were always going to meet, my love. Always.”
Turning my attention back to King, I saw his hands trembling, his power pulsing dangerously through the room.
"What? How?" King's voice cracked with pain.
I hated myself for causing him pain. Before being an angel, he was my father. Losing him would destroy a part of me, no matter how hard I tried to convince myself otherwise.
A wave of anger hit me through the bond – Di's anger. I shut down my thoughts and tightened my hold on his hand.
Di remained silent, knowing this was my story to tell.
“I’m a demon, a Starborn, I’ve always been.
” At the word 'Starborn,' something flickered in King's eyes, likely disgust. “I grew up in Hell until I was twelve. There was an attack on the Starborns. Our parents were killed. Me and my little brother tried to run away, but he didn’t make it.
" My voice cracked. With Di's support flowing through the bond, I continued, "He was killed in front of me.”
The room got the kind of quiet that follows a sound no one knew how to brace for.
Andras closed his eyes and took a exhaled deeply. Bren made a sound I had never heard him make before – small, wet, like he had been hit. Luc reached for Andras's hand without looking. Wild stayed standing, still half-positioned between me and the rest, but I saw his throat work twice.
And King.
King… who had pulled me out of a park when I was thirteen and named me his son, did not move.
His hands stopped trembling. His power stopped pulsing through the room.
His whole body went into the kind of stillness an angel's body goes into when it is praying and grieving at the same time.
I could feel him counting backward through every conversation we had ever had.
Every meal. Every birthday. Every time he had watched me sit on his couch quieter than the other boys and not known why.
He was looking at a thirteen-year-old who had just lost everything and tried to steal his wallet because nothing on the surface had taught him a kinder way to get bread.
His eyes were wet.
An angel's eyes were wet.
He didn't say anything. I think he couldn't.
"Someone sealed our powers, instructing us to hide on the surface until we're safe, but only I survived. Losing my brother devastated me. I never reached the safe place and refused to unleash my powers. I lived on the streets for nearly a year, then tried to steal from a man one day…"
King's jaw tightened, and I wanted this over.
He'd never accept me fully, but I had to speak my truth.
"You helped me, and gradually I trusted you.
I became part of this family, and I'll forever be grateful for that.
No matter what, you're my father, and I'm sorry.
I didn't know you were an angel. If I'd known… "
King's voice was strained. "If you knew?"
"I never would've come with you. I would've stayed away."
Something in King's chest did something visible. The kind of small collapse a man performs when he realizes the child he raised believed the child himself was the problem.
He didn't answer me. Not yet. I had given him too much to hold all at once.
Silence descended, only broken by Blue's soft breathing. King stepped forward but stopped as Blue rose. Turning to Di, he asked, "And you?"
"Long story short, I loved Dagon for a long time. We stayed apart, but distance didn't erase our feelings. Dagon learned I was his mate, but stayed away thanks to you," Di snapped bitterly.
King recoiled, eyes wide with horror. "What?" Why the horror, though? Because his sons were together and mates or because of something else?
"I'm his mate, and he's mine. Accepting our bond made me a demon. I pledged my soul and loyalty to Lucifer when bonding with the bow and arrow."
King's eyes shattered, his breathing ragged. "You pledged loyalty to Lucifer?"
"Yes. Don't worry, he won't force me to do anything."
"How can you be certain?"
"I know because he told me."
"Who?"
"Lucifer."
King shuddered visibly at the name, looking upward as if asking for divine help. Maybe he was. It was the gesture of a being trying to find something familiar to look at while the foundation of his world was being rearranged in front of him.
Through the bond, I felt Di go absolutely still beside me. Bracing.
King's lips moved silently for a long moment.
Then he looked back down at us, at his demon son and his Lucifer-pledged Archer son standing in his living room holding hands, and his shoulders did something I had never seen them do.
They lowered.
They released.
The angel who had walked centuries on this earth and protected seven objects and raised six children was, in front of me, putting down a weight he had carried longer than I had been alive.
The weight of certainty. The weight of knowing what was right.
He set it down because his children had become things his old certainty could no longer hold.
After a long silence, King finally looked at us.
Anger, pain, and betrayal all swam in his eyes.
He took a step toward us. Blue got up but only received a glare from King.
King didn’t stop advancing, and I tensed.
When he was before us, he stopped. Blue was the only thing standing in his way.
After a second, Blue stepped away, went to Bren, and lay on his feet.
If I hadn’t been busy getting ready for whatever King would do, I would have made fun of Bren and how he froze.
He stopped one breath away from us.
He didn't reach. He didn't speak.
He bowed his head.
Not the small bow of a man hesitating. The full bow of an old being acknowledging a wrong.
His chin against his chest. His hands – those terrible, ancient angel hands – open at his sides where we could see them.
I have no weapon. I will never raise one against you.
I am wrong and I am asking permission to come closer.
He held the bow for three seconds.
Then he raised his head, and his eyes were red-rimmed, and only then did he lift his arms.
He didn’t waste a second. He wrapped his arms around both Di and me. I was paralyzed. It didn’t help that King held us in a death grip like he feared letting go.
“I’m so sorry, sons. I love you. Both of you. It doesn’t matter what you are. You’ll always be my sons.”
"I made a mistake. With both of you. The day I sat Dagon down in that hospital corridor and called your love something it wasn't. That was my mistake. Not yours. Not yours, Di. Not yours, Dagon. I told myself I was protecting you. I see now what I was actually doing."
He drew a breath against my hair.
"I won't ask you to forgive me. Not today. Not for a long time, maybe. I just… I needed you to know I see it now. I see what it cost you. Both of you."
A tear slipped down my cheek. I buried my head in King's neck, feeling Di do the same from the other side. King's acceptance seemed like a cruelly beautiful dream.
"I'm sorry about your brother, little dragon."
My heart twisted painfully. Nodding silently, I struggled to hold back my emotions.
"Thank you," I whispered.
When we finally collected ourselves, Di asked, "How are you okay with this?"
King chuckled. "Did you expect me to hurt you? To try and kill my own sons"
We exchanged glances, and King's jaw dropped. He sighed deeply and said, "My beliefs haven't changed overnight. But I know my sons. You're not like other demons."
‘I could be’ was left unsaid. I was a demon, after all.
Admittedly, a strange one, but still a demon.
King chose to see his son, the son he knows, instead of the demon who I was.
Sooner or later, it was bound to backfire.
I didn’t think he was comprehending everything yet. However, for now, it was enough.
Our brothers approached cautiously. Andras hugged me tightly, expressing sorrow over my brother, then scolding me for keeping secrets.
Luc silently hugged me for a long time. What surprised me was Wild's hug.
It was awkward, but I knew he meant it. Bren hugged me too, and then eagerly asked for more details about me being a demon. He pointedly ignored King.
We sat down and explained the entire journey, King's rage over his friend's friend betrayal radiated powerfully. "I'll kill him," King growled, his angelic veneer slipping momentarily.
It took us a long time to answer many questions, mainly from our brothers, but we told them everything.
King broke the silence eventually. "Fireborns, Soulborns, and some Starborns working together? Why?"
“Power,” Bren said with a somber expression.
“How would an object created by Lucifer give them power? Maybe they can find a way to control it, but I suspect they wouldn’t be as strong as Lucifer.” Wild interjected.
Di arched a brow, and I felt his hesitation throughout the bond.
Still, he answered, “The object is powerful. It carries the flames of Lucifer. One hit, and you’re burning in them and a goner.
Permanently. I still don’t know everything about it, but can sense the power.
It’s far greater than anything I could have ever imagined. ”
What a clusterfuck of unanswered questions. If someone had told me all of this would happen when Di and I left on this journey, I would have laughed in their face and probably punched them.
Di stiffened beside me, and I asked him, “How are you?”
“I’m not sure. I wanted to speak with King alone if you don’t mind?”
“Go. I’ll be waiting for you here.”
“King?”
“Yes?”
“Can we speak alone for a second?”
King nodded, following Di out. Left alone with my brothers, their reactions surprised me. Bren and Andras playfully demanded to see my demon form, almost overwhelming me with curiosity.
When I did, I barely got away from them. They wanted to touch everything, and that was a big no-no.
We laughed, and I told them more about me and my life before becoming part of the Hughes.
I finally felt like I could breathe with ease.
I had my family, my brothers, dad and Di.
That was everything I would ever need. I loved my family, and I would do anything to protect them.
For once, they could also love and see all of me, and I realized how precious this acceptance was.
But underneath the laughter, underneath the brotherly chaos and the demands to see the wings again, I kept one part of myself trained on the bond. On Di. On the thread between us. On what was being said in another room of this house I had called home for fifteen years.
If anything in his voice changed.
If anything in his body changed.
I would know.
I would come.
That was the new shape of being his mate. Even at peace, part of me was always listening for him.
I had been listening for him for eight years already.
This time, I wasn't alone in the doorway.