Chapter 19
I chose an elegant green velvet dress for dinner. Lace adorned the top and along my elbows, giving me a sophisticated look that I hoped would earn me some respect.
Orion approached from behind me, easing a necklace around my throat. As he clasped the back, I brushed the chain with my fingers and tilted my head, letting my blonde curls drape over my shoulders. “What’s this?” I asked him.
He smiled in the reflection of my mirror.
I was in his bedroom where he’d been indoctrinated all this time, but now I quite liked it here.
This was where I had awakened as a goddess, and once this was all over, I hoped we could return here and catch up on lost time.
I’d help Orion forget the darkness of the past and forge a new one with light.
There I go again, hoping things go my way.
“It’s a token for good luck,” he said, flashing me one of his seductive smiles that had me blushing.
Samael entered the room and took out a similar bracelet from his pocket. He slipped it quietly over my wrist, then brushed his lips over my cheek. “Orion isn’t the only one allowed to give you presents.”
Azra appeared in the doorway, holding a cherry by the stem with his teeth. He waggled his brows at me. I have a gift too, sweet cheeks.
Rolling my eyes, I turned around and pulled up my dress so I wouldn’t step on it as I made my way toward him. “The others give me pretty jewelry and you have a cherry?” I asked.
He leaned in and talked to me telepathically again since his tongue was otherwise occupied.
I spotted the stem disappearing halfway into his mouth as he held the cherry out to me expectantly.
Your mother has been working on a nifty portal and I agreed to test it out.
So, while I was there, I took a little trip to my orchard and some of the trees are still alive.
I grabbed you one, for luck, he said inside my head.
I blinked at the cherry, now recognizing its unique angelic power. I took it with my teeth, then chewed around the dangerous pit.
One made of pure evil.
Something rebellious inside of me made me swallow both—the fleshy cherry and the pit, too. It had almost killed Azra once, but I was a goddess and fully awakened.
The dual power circled inside my chest before settling, making me smile.
Azra grinned, then revealed that he’d tied the cherry stem into a knot with his tongue as he stuck it out. He plucked it out of his mouth and tucked the knotted stem into my dress pocket.
Because, of course, any dress I summoned for myself would have pockets.
“You’re going to do great, beloved,” he whispered before pressing a light kiss to my cheek, then he flicked out his tongue to leave a cherry-flavored line on my lower lip.
I shivered, then curled my fingers through his.
“Let’s do this,” I said.
Orion claimed me on the curve of my neck with his massive palm, as he liked to do.
Samael took my other hand.
Then I formed a portal by willing it to be there. Ares and Hades could make their own.
With nothing else to stop us, I lifted an emerald velvet shoe and stepped through.
Unlike Hendrik’s tunnel-like portals or the ones that dropped through the ground, the type of portal from my Creation magic simply took me from one place and made me appear in the next.
My hair floated around me before settling and the light of my power dimmed, allowing us to see that we’d wound up in the entryway to my father’s dining room, just as I remembered it.
The first thing I saw when I looked up was Lucifer’s prison. Heat wafted from it, making my skin feel like I’d stepped too close to a fire, but there wasn’t one burning.
I clung to my angels while Orion stood behind me, giving me a moment to take it all in.
The cylindrical walls had noticeably degraded, leaving Lucifer’s enraged form trapped in midair. A rounded wall of solid magic encased him, bubbling every now and then like amber mixed with flakes of gold.
My Creation magic had contained him, combined with the other elements of my power. I spotted waves of darkness from my demonspawn form, as well as flickers of diamond dust from my angelic one.
My succubus side had drawn the power of my mates and all of their gathered lust, reinforcing the cage with a prison of silver bars that had begun to melt, in addition to tiny ruby gems that reminded me of little Blood Stones.
Inside, Calamity whispered unintelligible sounds while Lucifer’s frozen form seemed to blur every now and then, as if in an attempt to get out. Every time it did that, the focus of his shadowed eyes changed.
Lucifer had once been a king, and he was still a demon.
Calamity had changed him into something more terrifying than a prior ruler of Hell.
His massive bat-like wings speared upward into the sky as though he were about to attempt to launch himself.
The wicked talons curled and his long tail arched upward as if ready to strike with its pointed end.
His lengthy horns crowned his head, but it was the darkness in his eyes that frightened me.
It wasn’t like the empty void of a Dark Mage’s gaze. Lucifer held a god inside of him.
I knew what I was looking for now.
And it was a god of death.
“Daughter!” Derek boomed with glee, startling me.
I had walked in hooked onto the arms of my twins and I stared as my father waltzed around the table with a duo of females on his.
Human females.
Where did he find those?
They completely ignored me as they peered up at him in total awe. I noted the glazed look in their eyes.
The Incubus King was definitely influencing them. They probably had no idea where they were. If asked, I doubted they’d even know their own names. My father could have a consuming effect on humans.
“What’s the meaning of this?” I asked, then took in the other attendees entering the room through various portals.
Not all ones I had created, of course.
My mother, Sonya, entered through one of her making, along with her mates. The portal had probably taken her weeks to form, so that meant she had been ready.
And the fact that she’d left the portal open meant she didn’t intend to stay for long. A perpetual pit of fire burned down the hall and I spotted a number of the Incubus King’s sons marking it off with red velvet ropes.
A glittering purple one formed next, making my ears pop as a tinkling sound drifted through the air.
Evelyn, the Queen of the Royal Covens and a powerful witch, stepped through with a gorgeous red-haired vampire on her arm and a black cat near her feet.
She was stunning, with long silver hair flowing around her, striking blue-gray eyes, and a crown to match her title that glittered with a multicolor array of gems.
Each represented the Royal Witch Covens, and I took note that there were more gems than there were technically supposed to be. It meant she had reinstated some of the Outcast Covens.
I wasn’t sure why, but I liked that little detail about Queen Evelyn, a Champion who was rarely seen.
Another four vampires joined her, all of them with dark hair except one, who was an edgy blond, complete with tattoos and a lip piercing.
My eye was drawn back to the cat, though, and I realized with a small smile that he was actually the god.
I see you, I thought at him.
His tail flicked in response.
Evelyn took her seat with her mates while my mother eyed the females on my father’s arms with the same distaste that I’d expressed, but she didn’t seem to be surprised. “I’m with our daughter on this one, Derek. Do you care to explain?”
Evelyn accepted one of the bubbling drinks from a servant and raised a brow at my father as she took a sip, likely waiting to see what sort of drama she’d walked in on.
Witches tended to keep to themselves, outside of the Blood Coven, who worked for demons and supernaturals like my father. She wasn’t going to intervene unless there was a Calamity-related problem.
An incubus feeding on humans might be distasteful, but fully within his rights in his own home.
The Incubus King huffed at my mother. “Jealous, my dear? Don’t you have enough mates to appease you?” he asked, eyeing the four males at her side.
A vampire, a dragon shifter, a half angel, and one of his human sons were my mother’s companions. I’d grown to understand them, over time, and I knew it wasn’t a matter of “appeasing” my mother.
They were her resolved sins, just like my males were my Virtues.
I also knew that the Incubus King was an unresolved sin, as far as my mother’s mates went.
My mother’s mates echoed her disapproval.
Xavier, a vampire and Hades’s son, stood at her side and narrowed his eyes at the Incubus King.
“I believe the question is, where did you find humans at this stage in the game? They’re all but extinct by now.
The vampires are revolting and seeking other realms that still have them—they’re even working with witches to discover new realms, an incredibly dangerous practice. ”
“Which witches?” Queen Evelyn interjected as the cat jumped up onto the table and hissed. “Because it’s none of mine. We don’t work with vampires.”
Xavier gave the Witch Queen an apologetic nod. “There are other Outcast Covens, Your Majesty. I did not mean to generalize.”
She tilted her head in response, then soothed her cat familiar with a soft brush of her fingers. “Bast says to continue,” she said, flicking her gaze up. “But please do take care with your accounting, vampire.”
Sonya raised an eyebrow at the exchange but seemed amused rather than annoyed at the fellow Champion.
We were all strong women, as I was learning.
Fate didn’t pick the weak ones.
Xavier cleared his throat and continued.
“Rogue witches and select Outcast Covens not yet accepted into the Royal Coven fold have been contracted to tear open the dimensions in search of new realms. It’s all in the name of survival.
” He waved a hand at my father and the females practically sitting on his lap.
“And here you are with food hanging off your arms like nothing has happened.”
Derek’s eyes glittered with violence. “They were given to me, but if they offend you, I will dismiss them.” He pushed the girls away and they squeaked in protest. “Go back to your master. Tell him I don’t want his gifts.”
Master? Gifts?
I didn’t get to ask what he meant, because a servant ushered me to my seat right in front of Lucifer’s form.
A tingling of uncertainty threatened my magic as I attempted to lock down my emotions.
The other chairs filled with familiar faces.
And some unfamiliar ones, too.
“This is Sarah and Vicki,” Derek said, making my eyebrows pop up when Luke, my mother’s half-angel mate, coughed into his napkin quite violently.
“Also my unresolved sins,” my mother told me by way of explanation.
Oh.
I was relieved that the growing tension was interrupted by some other new arrivals.
Olivia walked in with Trevor on her arm, making my mood lighten, especially when Yuri skipped in behind them. She gave me a wink as she stuck out her tongue.
My heart twisted to see my friends again.
They didn’t even comment on my appearance, although I knew Olivia and Yuri were dying to catch up with me.
Soon, I thought hopefully.
The demis joined the entourage at the table, including Ally and Zero, who sat next to Trevor.
I hadn’t seen the other demigods in quite some time, but they looked tired.
Zero was missing his crackle of stormy lightning under his skin and Ally wasn’t even toying with one of her blades.
Instead, she sank into her chair and looked like she wanted to close her eyes.
The demis were a type of supernatural who fed on humans and mortals, too.
Without them, they were growing weaker by the day.
Everyone was feeling the effects of this Echo of Calamity and it made a new pang of guilt rattle around in my chest.
The Dean walked in using the fiery portal my mother had created. She gave me an encouraging nod, reminding me that even someone who had once been an enemy could turn out to be on my side.
I glanced up at Lucifer, seeing him in a different light now that he couldn’t try to kill me.
Although, he’d had plenty of chances, and he hadn’t killed me even when he could have.
Was that because, in some strange twist of fate, we could wind up on the same side?
Orion’s words filtered back into my mind.
“It has always been Noctis’s intention that the Champion and the Conduit work together, not against one another.”
To what end? What could a goddess of creation and a god of death accomplish together?
Chewing my lip, I pondered that while the rest of the dinner guests joined the table.
Aaron, representing the panther shifters.
Jess and Cindy, representing the demonspawn.
Havarti, representing the succubi at the Academy, even though my mother technically could have filled that role—or even me.
But Havarti had been with the succubi starving at the Academy this whole time. She looked thin, her cheeks sunken in, and the areas under her eyes were too dark.
Even Raze was here, wearing the hood I had suggested, as if no one would recognize the male with a strange scar on his forehead for what he really was.
We were missing my mates, but I didn’t try to bring them in. Not yet.
“Everyone, thank you for coming,” Derek said as he raised a glass in a toast. “Please find your seats and let us celebrate tonight. For tonight, we decide the future of all supernatural races.”
A loud clap sounded from across the hall and everyone turned to stare at the source.
I sucked in a breath as Balthazar entered the room, wearing my wings.
He had some of his own, of course, but mine were added like some sort of adornment. His closed tightly at his back, only allowing their talons to poke through.
My angel wing and Cole’s donor demon wing stretched out over his shoulders as he continued to clap. “Yes, Incubus King. It’s time to celebrate indeed.”