Chapter 20
This ruined all my plans. Balthazar wasn’t supposed to be here.
“Where are they?” I asked as I shot to my feet.
He held up his hands. “Relax, little one. Your remaining Virtues are safe.”
As sure as fuck they are.
When Ares and Hades entered the room next—through a materialization of will rather than a portal—I realized I’d been tricked.
Hades twirled the ring I had gifted him on his finger, while Ares looked annoyed but resigned.
Because they’re with Balthazar.
I’ve been set up.
“Would someone care to explain what is going on?” my mother asked with an edge to her voice. The temperature in the room blazed with heat as the air turned wavy.
Queen Evelyn stood, too, with all her vampires at her side. Her black cat familiar puffed out, hardly looking threatening, but I knew not to underestimate a god.
Lucifer’s prison reacted to the tension in the room and shimmered as if it were alive with fire. He seemed unaffected inside of it, but I could have sworn his eyes shifted.
And looked directly at me.
“The fate of all supernaturals is on the line, Sonya,” a sultry feminine voice answered.
I recognized the female Derek had introduced as Vicki. She was a siren, if memory served, and she leaned into Sarah.
Sarah had once been a muse, but now she was a mermaid. Or something like that. My crash course in my mother’s unresolved sins was still shaky.
I scanned the room and realized something big was happening. Something bigger than me.
There was no way this dinner had been an impromptu thing. My Creation magic only went so far and perhaps I had been the arrogant one in thinking I could speak anything I wanted into stone.
Hades had been slated to arrive at Orion’s doorstep this morning for other reasons than just one of his regular check-ins. He’d been coming to set all this in place with or without my involvement.
This meeting had already been planned. It hadn’t been my idea at all. He’d simply spotted an opportunity and let me walk into a trap of my own making.
“Vicki, whose side are you on?” Sonya asked as an uncharacteristic hurt thrummed in her voice.
“We’re on your side, Sonya,” Vicki insisted, her voice cracking with an echo of hurt that seemed to surprise my mother. “We were always supposed to have been on the same side, but you just don’t listen.”
My mother’s lips pinched together as she looked at the other female. “Did you know about this, Sarah?”
Sarah glanced down and toyed with a necklace boasting a gorgeous blue gem. “I knew.”
“Well, I didn’t,” the Dean snapped as she stood, the power of the Underworld sending shadows swirling around her fingertips.
Anyone who was in charge of Fortune Academy controlled all the collective power of the campus, which was still a formidable force.
“I’m here to protect the interests of the Academy. If this is some sort of trick—”
“Enough bickering,” Balthazar said, lifting one clawed finger in protest, a pop sounding in my ears as a thrum echoed through the room.
“We only needed to find a way to get you all here in one place.” He glanced at me.
“Having your help bridged a large gap. I could never have achieved bringing all the Champions here without you.”
My mother and Queen Evelyn stiffened but didn’t attack.
Likewise, I waited for Balthazar to play his hand. When this fight broke out, it would move fast, and I needed to make sure my Virtues were still alive.
I couldn’t feel them, but that was hopefully because they were still in the Void. Unlike other realms, the world the Dark Mages lived in was off on its own and much more difficult to reach.
There I go, hoping again.
Balthazar grinned, showing off his sharp teeth. “Hades, if you will?”
The muse waved his hand, sending the air behind him rippling with smoky dark-green currents.
My hope instantly transformed into rage, making my heart pulse and send a shock wave through the room.
Because my Virtues stepped through the shimmer in the air… in chains.
I flinched to go to them, but both of my angels held on to my wrists.
Not yet, my star, Orion said inside my mind.
Beloved, Azra echoed next, his voice laced with hatred. Focus on the power I gave you. Burn it, make it molten, and then use me to stop this.
Samael also squeezed my hand, whispering similar sacrificial offers inside my mind.
And I didn’t blame them. My heart thrummed with the echo of shared suffering.
Logan wore a brace over his chest and binds on his wrists and ankles, preventing him from shifting. I knew because I felt his pain. His bones constantly fractured, attempting to obey his instincts, but never being allowed to re-form properly left him trembling in agony.
Hendrik wore a dark crystal around his neck, one that reminded me of the pain capsule we’d all had to feed during the week at Cole’s hideout.
It felt like coming full circle back from the original days when Hendrik had asked me to power a Blood Stone, back when I didn’t know what that was.
This was no Blood Stone around his neck, but rather something darker. Something lifeless that brought everything else around it down into the depths of sorrow.
A Necromancer’s toy, I decided.
Kaito had chains over his mouth like a horse’s bit, preventing him from speaking.
Dante’s scars continually bled, leaving streaks of red down his chest and over the chains adorning him.
And Asher, my sweet incubus mate, had tears streaming down his face.
His body seemed unharmed, but his soul was broken. His pain was the most agonizing of all because I knew he was reliving his worst memory over and over again.
I deeply regretted using that as his source of suffering when training Seth’s crystal.
Because that was what we’d been doing. It hadn’t just been a power source.
It had been a part of a master plan.
Seth stepped through last, looking pleased with a quick scan of the room. “Good” was all he said, then nodded at Hades.
Orion doubled over, his sunlight flaring as darkness battled with his light.
My angels, too, bent over in pain as old bruises bloomed to life. Their offers of sacrifice didn’t matter.
Seth already had us where he wanted us.
I stared, horrified, as I realized the crystal had been used to learn their pain, too.
“Sorry, little goddess, but if you want your mates to live, you’re going to do what I say,” the Dark Mage told me, his voice quiet and low but carrying with ease. “Release Calamity from the prison you created. Set it free.”
My mother joined me, and all her mates stood behind her.
Queen Evelyn took the other side, then the three of us joined hands.
I stood to my full height, feeling confident with the trifecta of Champions to face this enemy. I whispered my response, which released a shock wave of power through the room.
“Gladly.”