Chapter 22
Slade
The summons arrives the way all hell-summons do—burned into reality itself.
A thin ribbon of smoke unfurls near Piper’s windowsill, coiling through the morning light.
The scent hits first—silver, ash, and a faint sweetness that always clings to Lucifer’s magic.
The parchment materializes a heartbeat later, embossed with the Ninth Realm sigil, humming faintly as though it has its own pulse.
Piper freezes mid-step, eyes wide. I feel her magic contract, a startled inhale beneath her skin.
“Don’t touch it,” I say immediately.
She touches it anyway. The scroll warms under her fingers, then unravels itself with a dramatic flare I know Lucifer added purely to irritate me.
Her eyes flick back and forth as she reads. Her breath tightens. Her jaw sets.
I step closer. “What is it?”
She holds it out with two shaking fingers. “He knows, this letter confirms it,” she whispers.
A rush of heat spikes low in my spine. “And?” I ask, realizing she isn’t telling me everything.
“He wants me to come to the Ninth Realm,” she says softly.
“To question you.” My voice turns colder than winter steel. “About what you touched. And what you read.”
Her gaze lifts toward mine—uncertain, but not afraid. I think she stopped being afraid of hell the moment she opened Veda’s grimoire. I wish I could say the same.
“He can’t hurt me, right?” she asks.
The truth rises like a blade I wish I didn’t have to hold. “He won’t,” I say. Not that he can’t. Because he absolutely can. But he won’t, not while I fucking breathe. “Get your coat,” I murmur. “We’re going.”
She hesitates only long enough to slip her boots on. Then, she stands, her curls spill down her back like dark fire as she pulls on her jacket.
I watch her. I always watch her, because I can’t stand to miss a single second. And the curse watches me, pulling us closer every time she breathes.
We step into the hall, taking the back exit and descending down several flights of stairs to the basement entrance. I don’t hesitate, hand waving as my magic calls to the Ninth Realm of Hell.
The portal opens with a low groan of stone and stars. The Ninth Realm presses in the moment we step through—warm, luminous, humming with the kind of magic mortals aren’t built to feel all at once.
Lucifer waits for us at the foot of the obsidian bridge like he’s been expecting a parade. Tall. Effortlessly regal. More starfire than man. His smile is an insult. “Slade Athalar,” he says with that smooth, infuriating silk he’s perfected over millennia. “And little Bellamy.”
Piper bristles. “Don’t call me that.”
He ignores her entirely, eyes sliding to me. “She opened the grimoire.”
I step in front of her without thought. “That is none of your concern.”
He tilts his head, his burning with fury. “Everything involving Veda Bellamy is my concern.”
Piper stiffens behind me. I feel it like a tremor through the bond—anger, grief, the lingering ache of a wound given to her bloodline five hundred years before she was born.
Lucifer smiles faintly, amused by the tension. “She has her ancestor’s fire. Veda used to get that same look when she wanted to burn down the world.”
That does it. Piper slides out from behind me, chin lifting with a fury that crackles like embers. “You would know,” she snaps. “Since you’re the one who broke her.”
Lucifer goes utterly still. The entire bridge seems to hold its breath. I step forward, prepared to end this with violence if I have to. But he… laughs.
A low, indulgent sound. Feral at the edges. “Oh, little Bellamy,” he says, leaning back with infuriating grace. “Veda wasn’t broken. She was misguided. And I am not responsible for her choices.”
Piper’s voice trembles with rage. “You rejected her.”
“She offered me a son,” Lucifer replies, bored. “She gave me a daughter. The bond snapped because it was meant to snap.”
Her eyes burn, the sconces flickering in response. “You used her.”
“She asked to be used,” he answers simply. “Power was the only thing she worshipped more than me.”
I feel Piper’s fury rise like a storm. Her magic flashes through the air, bright and sharp—wards sharpening around her, the pendant at her throat glowing like a star about to burst.
I step in close, voice low. “Piper. Enough.”
“No,” she hisses. “He destroyed her life. He ruined an entire bloodline. He—”
Lucifer raises a hand, stopping Piper in her tracks. She glows. The curse hums like a living thing, hot and alive beneath her skin. My own magic snarls in response, coiling protectively, furious at the pull radiating off her.
“Slade,” she whispers, “why is he looking at me like that?”
Because he sees the bond tying itself between us—feels the curse responding to her anger. Because she’s too much like Veda in all the ways that mattered—and none of the ways that would have saved her.
Lucifer steps closer. This time I don’t let Piper slip past me. My arm snakes behind her, drawing her against my side, my aura flaring high and sharp.
“That’s close enough,” I warn.
Lucifer lifts a brow. “You shield her more fiercely than any mate I’ve ever seen.”
“She doesn’t belong to you,” I say.
He grins. “She looks at me like she wants to stab me. Veda looked at me like that too.”
Piper lunges, and I catch her around the waist, pulling her back against my chest. She shakes with fury. “Say her name again and I swear I will—”
“You will do nothing,” Lucifer interrupts, voice soft and razor-sharp. “You came into my realm. You rifled through my archives. You stirred old magic. You owe me an explanation.”
“You owe my family an apology.”
Lucifer considers her for a moment—really looks at her. The curls. The stubborn chin. The curse coiled around her ribs like a serpent waiting to strike. “…No,” he says finally. “I don’t.”
She lets out a breathless laugh of disbelief, anger spiking so hot the air warps. He steps back with a lazy shrug, dismissing us with a wave. “You may go.”
I blink. “Just like that?”
“For now.” His smile dips wicked. “But you will return.”
Piper crosses her arms. “Why would I ever come back?”
“Because the next rite nears,” Lucifer says. “Lupercalia. A delightful celebration of passion, blood, and bonding. I expect to see you both.” His gaze drags over her slowly, insolently. “In or out of clothes.”
Piper’s magic detonates in a flare so brilliant the bridge lights up.
I snarl and take a step forward. “You don’t speak to her like—”
Lucifer lifts a hand, amused. “Calm down, Athalar. I’m not inviting her to my bed. I’m inviting her to her birthright.”
Her breath stutters. “My what?”
“You’ll understand in time,” he says. “But for now—leave.”
Piper is shaking when I guide her back through the portal. Not from fear. From fury. From betrayal that isn’t even hers—but burns through her blood as though it is.
When the portal seals behind us, she sags into my chest, breath trembling. I hold her, one arm banded around her waist, my magic wrapping her like a shield. “He’s a bastard,” she whispers.
“Yes,” I murmur into her hair. “But he can’t touch you.”
She tilts her face up to mine. “He already has,” she says softly. “He touched Veda. And that means he touched every one of us.”
My jaw tightens. Because she’s right.
And because I would burn every realm—hell included—before I let him do it again.