Chapter 20
Ahead, a golden fog billowed, growing thicker the closer we got to the barrier. There was magic in it—magic that called to me.
Students glanced at me as we strode across the campus. None of them looked eager to approach the fog.
“Either of you ever seen anything like this?” I asked softly. “Do you know what it is?”
“No,” Kaito said, voice clipped. “But I suspect we’re about to find out.”
Dante simply lifted my hand to his lips for a quick kiss.
Then we walked into the fog.
Finding our way to the tower, we pushed in through the main door. Inside, everything had a strange sense of calm that didn’t sit right with me.
“Can’t say I was expecting this,” Hendrik murmured, an odd echo to my thoughts.
“It’s fine,” I said, surprising all three of us. That strange tug still resonated inside me, pulling at me.
I was welcome here… wanted.
And it wasn’t the Dean I sensed.
Quickening my pace, I strode down the corridor to the vertical tunnel. Hendrik lifted us to the top and we made our way to the Dean’s office. We found her door standing open.
Inside, the tableau caught me off-guard, but almost instantly, the surprise faded.
Some part of me had known.
A knot inside me unraveled as the beautiful woman speaking turned to me.
“Lily,” she murmured.
“Mother.”
Sonya, the Queen of Hell, stood with regal elegance in her full glory.
Horns. A crown. And bat-like wings rising from her shoulders as a tail whipped at her feet.
Damn, she was kind of scary in her bad-ass form.
She hadn’t come alone. A couple of her mates stood at her side. I recalled them from our last meeting. Nate, my human half-brother from our father’s side, and Luke, another angel hybrid like me.
Both of them looked at me with envy, Nate more especially, given that my mother had mated the literal seven sins—his being the sin of envy.
With the incubi and succubi gene only coming from the mother’s side, none of my father’s children with Silvia had been born as a supernatural.
Nate envied my gifts, even if they could sometimes be a curse.
Luke, on the other hand, envied my wings, evident in the way his gaze slid to them. He had a type of wings of his own, but he could only summon them in special circumstances, from my understanding.
My mother winced as she walked around her chair.
An angry, cracked wound marred its way down her torso, starting from her shoulder and ending at her hip.
I didn’t even know that the Queen of Hell could sustain an injury and the sight shook me.
“Who did that?” I asked, even though I already suspected the answer.
Nate offered her his jacket and she took it with her thanks, wrapping it over herself to cover the worst of the burn.
“Don’t worry about it, Lily. It’ll heal soon.
” She smiled at me, her pride beaming through.
“I knew you would return. I apologize it took me so long to come to you, but Lucifer has been a bit of a handful, lately.” She frowned.
“More so than I had expected, if I’m being honest.”
“Having Calamity on his side has that effect,” Luke offered, his tone dry. “You should have killed the bastard when you had the chance.”
She waved her mate’s complaints away just as the Dean entered the room with a glass of sparkling red liquid. “Oh, Lily. I’m so glad you’re here,” she said handing the glass to my mother.
I nodded in acknowledgment.
Sonya sipped from the glass, the contents giving off a faint glow as she emptied it. A slight shudder went through her body, then she smiled at the Dean. “Your tonics have improved, Guinevere.”
“You flatter me. I doubt you even need it.” The Dean flushed, looking pleased with the compliment.
I cut between them, not caring how rude I looked. “Mom. What happened?”
“Lily.” She sighed and after another sip from the glowing tonic in the wine glass, she put it aside and focused on me. “I’ll explain. But first, please sit down.” She hesitated, her gaze searching mine. “Are you well?”
Her concern wasn’t about my physical well-being, but my mental one.
Somehow, she knew that I’d learned the truth about my past. As if I needed more mental baggage to weigh me down.
The worry in her gaze, mixed with relief, hit me square in the chest and I nodded, forcing myself to speak around the knot in my throat.
“I’m fine. Mostly.” Stretching the tight muscles in my back, I forced my wings to open, then close.
“A few upgrades and all, plus a lot of questions, but I’m not feeling all that bad, considering I just came back from the dead. ”
My dry recitation made her smile.
“Lovely.” She glanced at Dante and Hendrik, hovering just a few feet away before meeting my gaze again. “As to… this…” She gestured to the injury that would have had me whimpering like a child.
It wasn’t until then that I looked at it again, a longer look this time, because it was… healing. Slowly, yes, but before my eyes, I could see healthy, pink skin stretching over the blackened scabs.
“You’re healing.”
“I’m the Queen of Hell, my daughter. That comes with a few perks.” Her droll response came with a slight smile. “Luc and I had a run-in earlier, if you hadn’t gathered already. He’s not pleased with the realms merging—nor with me refusing to let him take my throne.”
“I’m going to rip that red-eyed fucker’s head off and shove it up his ass,” Luke said.
“Get in line, pal,” Nate retorted, his arms loosely folded over his chest.
“Now, boys…” Sonya waved a dismissive hand. “We’ll deal with Luc when it’s time. And it’s not like he walked away unscathed. Besides, keeping him out of trouble was worth it. He would have stopped Purgatory’s descent had he known it was coming. Lily needs her new flight instructors, after all.”
“My what?” Blinking, I stared at her.
Dante crossed his arms over his chest, giving my mom—aka the Queen of Hell—a look that suggested he wasn’t thrilled with this idea. “And who would be these flight instructors?
Sonya gave Dante a faint smile as she approached me. “They are supernaturals who’ll be able to help her with her new form.” Her fingers hovered over my wings. “Those aren’t just pretty decorations on her back, Hunter.”
“I get the feeling you aren’t surprised to see these pretty decorations,” I said, opening, then closing my wings.
“No.” She sighed and brushed her hair back, gaze going distant. “I’ve known for years that the day was coming when you’d die—and then you’d return to us, reborn into your new form, your angelic self awakened. Renee predicted it.”
My knees threatened to give out.
“You knew?” Dante snarled. The Dean gave him a stern look that kept him in place, but he wasn’t going to back down. “You could have given us a fucking warning.”
“Dante,” Kaito warned, although for once, I sensed my mentor hadn’t been in on this particular secret.
If he had, he would have tried to stop it.
“I couldn’t have told any of you without risking changing the future Renee promised,” she said, flaring bat-like wings. “Would knowing have made it any easier?” she added as she returned to her chair.
“We could have done something,” Hendrik pointed out, dark eyes glinting with violence. “There had to have been another way.”
“There wasn’t,” Sonya countered. Her mates framed her on either side, but they didn’t step in to her defense. While they might envy me, I envied the clear ease with which my mother ran her mate-circle. “This was the only way.”
The room went silent and we all knew she was right.
She straightened with regal elegance, folding her hands in her lap before meeting my eyes.
“I will mend what grievances I have with you as best I can. That is why I am here, to help you and guide you.” She flared her wings behind her and her golden crown glittered with power.
“Purgatory and Hell have merged, leaving the inhabitants trapped in a world of in-between. Only you can enter it, Lily, and you must for all our sakes.”
I clenched my hands into fists. “You want me to return to Purgatory?”
She nodded. “Lost souls have been imprisoned there, as I suspect you know. Renee has been doing her best to protect them as the realms merge, thanks to Calamity, but there’s only so much she can do now that the realm has shattered onto Hell’s shore.”
She sounded so calm talking about lost souls, failure, Calamity. How could she take all of this in stride?
“None of that sounds good,” I said warily.
“It’s your destiny. You and you alone can release those souls from Purgatory. They don’t belong there.” She hesitated and glanced toward Dante and Hendrik before adding, “And two of your new Virtues also wait for you to free them.”
I shook my head as realization hit me.
Not because I didn’t believe her, but because some part of me had already sensed it.
“What the fuck?” Hendrik slammed his fist against the door. For a minute, I thought he’d leave, but then he whirled on my mother. “More Virtues?”
I shivered as Dante swung his gaze to me. “Was Cole not enough of a lesson for you? Now you’ve called more to your side? How many Virtues do you need?”
“Hey, don’t start on me.” Folding my arms over my chest, I looked down at the floor. My face felt like it was on fire. “I can’t control it.” I ran all of my powers on instinct, including my powers as a Champion of Calamity.
I understood now why I’d left a piece of myself in Purgatory.
Because my Virtues were there, and a part of me had always known.
From the corner of my eye, I darted a look at Kaito and saw a familiar, professional mask in place.
Great. Just great.
“Nobody asks to be a Champion,” Sonya said simply.
“Cole has been trying to interfere. Whether he thinks he can delay Calamity or change the outcome in order to save his brother, I have no idea. There is now an opening between here and Purgatory and he tried to prevent that from happening. He didn’t succeed, but he was able to divert it. ”
“Divert what?” Confused, I looked at her, then Luke and Nate.