Ronen
Chapter
Forty
The castle staff fused themselves to the wall while I charged toward the healers’ wing, the vibrations of my steps barely softened by the blood-red carpet. Halfway there, I stopped. Breathed. Clenched my jaw.
Would Sam really betray us?
The question clawed deep, ripping open an artery and bleeding out every good thing he had ever done.
Why help us? Why keep us alive if he had these bigger plans?
I scoffed. Our blood.
What better fucking guise for a blood-witch? Pretend to be a healer and puncture our veins for the sole purpose of creating infections and Heaven only knew what else. The hellion’s already created an improved variant. And mine?
What would the one and only Dark Seraphim and shadow-wielder’s blood create?
Sam had filled so many vials. He practically had the needle shoved into the hellion’s arm before she was ready.
The thought made me sick. Almost as sick as knowing we had a blood-witch in our dungeons that I had indulged. She had reminded me of myself when Etan kept me prisoner. I thought I was helping her. Instead, I’d housed our enemy, made her comfortable, and given her gifts to keep her sane.
I slammed my hand against the glass window. It rattled and strained beneath the force of the blow. My hands fisted, tempted to try again and watch it break.
For fuck’s sake.
I connected with Rune, in need of… her.
And there she was. My gorgeous hellion—asserting her dominance over Matt.
Pride swelled in my chest at the masterpiece of it. But it paled in comparison to what she’d said in the dungeons. She had set aside her need to stand alone and let me in.
Even if the plan clawed at every instinct I had, I trusted her to see it through.
And I wouldn’t be far.
Alexei, my Dreads, and I would be close enough to end anything that touched them.
Today, after everything she learned, she walked into that arena and took charge with a resilience that grounded me.
Seven Hells. This brilliant, strong creature continued to knock me to my knees. I ached to complete our bond. To make it official to the world that she was all fucking mine.
We’ll be there soon. Keep an eye on her, I ordered Rune, pulling out as the truth crushed my reality.
I didn’t lie to Lucille when I told her she claimed me first. Sure, she didn’t kiss me like our made-up rule dictated.
A rule I could’ve easily satisfied before I presented my shadow flower.
She wanted to kiss me. I felt it. More than that, I had felt the brush of her chilling, soothing essence against my own when she told the pet she’d found home.
Words couldn’t express how badly I wanted to kiss her then, to make her understand this was it. I ended where she began. For all the days I breathed and every silence after.
But I couldn’t do that until I relieved my festering guilt and admitted I knew she had been killing her mom. Then face the very real possibility that I’d lose her and this fragile, imperfect, breathtaking story we’d begun to create.
I inhaled deeply. It didn’t ground me like the hellion. It didn’t strengthen me. The air filling my lungs did nothing to ease the hollowness growing in my chest.
Moving through the healers’ wing, I never caught sight of Sam.
I paused near his lab door, the glowing yellow lock inciting rebellion in my body.
How badly I wanted to break it down and find the truth.
Even wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze out his answers.
Was he in there now, crafting unforeseen disasters with our blood?
“Need something, General?” an attendant asked, peering up from her paperwork.
“Is he in there?”
“Yes.” She smiled politely, as if trying to soften the but lingering in her answer. “He’s not seeing anyone right now, though.”
“Of course.” My shadows coiled inside me, twisting and squeezing, wishing for an outlet. “But I need you to ask Sam for some test tubes.”
She started to rise. “I can get you some—”
“No. I’d like you to get them from Sam. Inform him Aspen and I are going to the Eternal Forest, near the lightless trees. I’m assuming he’ll want samples.”
She gestured toward his door. “Why don’t you…”
Pressure pulsed behind my eyes, and my lips flattened.
Her ponytail bounced as she nodded and scrambled out of her chair. She knocked on Sam’s door. “Elite Healer?” she inquired timidly.
“I’m busy!” he barked.
My shadows slammed against their cage, and I crossed my arms to keep from cracking my knuckles, squeezing my biceps instead.
“The general’s out here. He’s asking for some test tubes. Says he’s going to the Eternal Forest with Aspen and figured you might want samples.” Every sentence rose into a question.
Silence followed. A crash. Something shattered, and he cursed.
“Just give him supplies from the closet.”
“But he—”
“I’ll take it.”
She scrunched her nose and waited for me to explain. When I didn’t, her cheeks flushed. “Okay. Okay,” she muttered, grabbing her green amulet and fiddling with the chain as she hurried off.
I only felt a little bad as I left before she returned.
On my way out the door, Vanessa slammed into my chest.
She stumbled backward, and I caught her shoulders before she landed on her ass. She blinked at the tall wooden doors, then peered around the hall. The pupils in her brown eyes were blown and the whites glassy. Sweat pasted her brown, frizzy hair to her temples.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“I…” She blinked aggressively and finally looked at me. “I… was coming here.”
“For healing?” I noted the sickly pallor of her complexion.
She massaged her temples and stepped out of my hands, staring down at the red carpet as if it held her answer. “No.”
“No? Are you here for Alexei then?”
Her head snapped up. “Yes.” She surged forward, her legs tangling in the skirts of her red kitchen uniform. I steadied her as she tripped.
Was she drunk?
“Yes! I came to tell him what I saw.”
“Well, he isn’t here. So you can tell me.” I wasn’t entirely sure her information would be reliable with the state she was in.
She nodded eagerly and leaned close, lowering her voice.
“I saw Sam in the servant passages and followed him to the dungeons.”
I gripped her harder and tugged her away from the damned doors toward the end of the hall.
“What else?” I demanded.
“He had a key and dipped his finger into a vial of blood before wiping it across the doors.”
Creeping dread slid across my neck like pointed claws. “When did you see this?” I whispered harshly.
She rubbed her head. “I don’t… I don’t remember. Maybe a couple days ago?”
“Did you see anything else?”
Vanessa dropped her hands, but pain lined her face. “Lucifer.”
I straightened. “You saw Lucifer in the dungeons?”
“No.” Morning light reflected off the sweat rolling down her neck. “I don’t know. I think he wants to talk to you.”
For fuck’s sake. I didn’t have time for this.
“You think?”
She wiped her palms on her white kitchen apron. “I think I’m getting things confused. I did see Sam. And Lucifer when I dropped off his food. He said to find you and tell you he needed to speak with you.”
Find me?
“I thought you were searching for Alexei?”
“I was…” She frowned. “I don’t know. But he said it was important and needed to happen now.”
Now? I needed to meet up with Alexei and my Dreads. But that wasn’t her problem.
“Thanks, Vanessa. I’ll take it from here.” I took a step, then paused. “Maybe see Bree for a hydration draught and something to numb your headache.”
She nodded, worrying her lip as I left her there and luscelered to Lucifer’s hall.
The ice had since melted from the tall stone walls and fixtures. Not even a drop of water soaked the plush carpets, as if he’d had a Power or Archangel dry them. Interesting.
I knocked on his new door, my shadows skimming just below the surface as I remembered how our last conversation ended and thought about Lucille and the gates.
“Enter, General.” His order carried teeth. Strength. A tone reminiscent of a time before Saraqael’s death.
Frost melted from the handle, and I strode in expecting… a fight? A drunk? A disheveled king rotting in his own stench? His sitting area covered in ice?
Instead, it was nothing I expected.
Lucifer sat behind his opulent desk like a king who had reclaimed his throne.
His deep burgundy suit wrapped around his toned form, perfectly pressed, every button gleaming.
His white hair lay styled, each strand willed into place.
He ran a finger along his chin as he analyzed the books and scrolls covering his desk.
I stilled, and my shadows stirred. How could a sight both relieve me and churn my gut?
“I suppose the kitchen girl found you, then.” Lucifer slowly looked up and eviscerated me with disapproval. “Were you planning to report the blood-witch’s escape this afternoon? Tonight? Next week?”
“You knew?” I approached. Tsal-mawet rested on his desk beside books on the gates, Hell, and demons.
“I was starting to suspect. Her escape confirmed it.”
Since when? I wanted to snap.
But this wasn’t the drunk from before. His gaze was sharp, clear, like the moment he threw me from his rooms. Dominance and an unspoken challenge shuddered through the room, my breath clouding in front of me. His icy stare dared me to question him.
The last time I’d seen him, he’d been slurring his words. Now he appeared like nothing had happened in the last two weeks, and that same clarity sang within his ringed eyes.
“What tipped you off?” I asked.
And why didn’t he inform me?
Lucifer settled back in his plush leather chair, confidence slashing through his forced smile. “Did you know I gave Sam the key to the dungeons when you placed the infected down there? I wanted him to study them.”
“No, but I remember you ordered us to find a cure, then changed your mind.”
“Sam never gave me my key back. Said he accidentally spilled some blood-banded’s infected blood on it and it melted.”
“You didn’t believe him.” It wasn’t a question.