Chapter 19 Diantha
Diantha
“Diantha.”
“It’s not going to work,” a feminine voice replies. “How many times do I have to tell you?”
“Diantha, come back to me—”
“You can’t glamour her! Stop trying. Smelling salts work on everyone regardless of—”
“Zitta, per favore.”
I can’t open my eyes. Not yet. Instead, I lift a hand.
“Diantha.” A preternaturally warm touch. On my forehead, then my cheek. “Amore, stay with me.” That word confirms who I already knew that touch belonged to. Under his breath, he says, “I told you so.”
I blink an eye open. I’m on the floor, facing a familiar hearth with the last embers of a fire warming my face. My head’s on a pillow, a soft blanket tucked under my chin. I sense people around me, their energy anxious and pulsing. I force myself to roll over.
“I’m here.” The words stick between my teeth.
A collective sigh of relief. I shift around, my limbs slowly awakening as I start to straighten. I still can’t really see anything—the room’s dark and my head is spinning.
“Wait, wait, wait.” A firm but gentle hand presses into my shoulder. “Stay.”
The woman leaning over me is Misha, the beautiful vampire I saw working at Hades House.
She’s not dressed like a sexy security guard anymore—she’s in a sweatshirt with the neckline cut away, her long braids plaited together and hanging over her shoulder.
Her delicate eyebrows are pulled into a frown, the fire dancing in her dark eyes.
“Drink this.” She presses a mug to my chest. Before I can grab it, Orfeo’s hands are around the cup and he’s lifting it to my lips. The liquid smells medicinal, tart.
I must make a face because they both laugh.
“It’s not going to taste good, but it’ll help bring your strength back,” Misha offers.
I take a long sip, and she’s right. The liquid is hot and sour. It somehow tastes both rotten and fresh.
“Ugh.” I pull away from the mug and shake my head, cringing.
But almost immediately, I feel a weight lifting off my limbs, like the exhaustion has been extracted from my bones.
I push myself up and let the blanket fall away.
I’m back in my regular clothes. The room swims into focus.
I’m in Orfeo’s living room, laid out in front of the fire.
They’re both kneeling beside me, concern woven into their expressions.
“Did I die?”
“No.” Orfeo chuckles, smoothing hair away from my face. I let my eyes flutter shut as his fingertips skim my flesh. “Not this time. But you were gone for a while.”
“How long?”
Orfeo and Misha trade a loaded look. “Two hours,” he says finally.
“Fuck.” I drop my head into my hands. An extremely long time to leave my body unattended—definitely longer than the forty-five-minute lecture Bowen had planned. “Was my body here the whole time?”
They trade another look. What the hell?
“No,” Orfeo says, chewing at his bottom lip. I didn’t know vampires could look nervous. And yet, here he is. Nerves and all. “Uh, your body did…disappear. For a moment.”
I reach for the tea and Misha reads my mind, offering me the mug again. I throw back another horrible mouthful. Whatever magical properties this tea has to heal me, I need them ASAP.
“And then, what? I just appeared again? What the hell did Bowen say?”
“Not much. He managed to distract the others while I carried you out. I think he told them you were having issues with claustrophobia and I was escorting you home.”
Usually, I would find this humiliating. But right now, I’m too…everything. Tired, hungry, energized, overwhelmed.
My entire body went…somewhere. For a moment in time, I blipped out of existence here on Earth and resurfaced out in the ether. Amongst the stars. In different clothes. More proof of the fact that I’m…
How the hell am I supposed to tell them everything I just learned?
“We need to talk.”
Misha glances over her shoulder and makes eye contact with Leo, who I hadn’t even noticed. His large frame had somehow melted into the shadows. He pushes away from the wall beside Orfeo’s front door and steps into the living room.
“Let’s go, Meesh.”
She makes like she’s going to stand, and I reach out for her hand. “No, wait. We all need to talk.”
In the nanoseconds leading up to telling Orfeo, Misha, and Leo everything, I’m overwhelmed with the sudden and inexplicable feeling that I am a liar.
I didn’t meet Hecate in the Dream Place, halfway between life and death.
Hades isn’t my father.
My mother isn’t trapped, her soul isn’t tangled in the fibers of the universe, tossed back and forth at Hades’s whim but never fully allowed to rest.
You just want attention, a nasty little voice whispers.
All that deified blood coursing through my body and somehow, still, I’m anxious and self-deprecating.
As soon as I begin the story, the pieces tumble out of me.
I tell them about the basin’s missing panel, how I pressed my hand to it and was transported through the universe, through time and space and realms. I tell them everything I saw, what I already knew about my mom going missing.
I tell them about Hecate and her message, and how the last piece of the story—the panel missing from the basin—is obviously that someone must overthrow the evil being looming over the city.
And how I think, ipso facto, it has to be me.
By the end, I’ve been talking for so long my lips are dry and my throat hurts. I’ve pushed myself up from the floor and have been pacing back and forth from the living room to the kitchen.
No one interrupts me.
“I can’t just vanquish Alfo and Nis. That’s not enough to send a message to my father, not strong enough for a blood bond with someone as powerful as him. I need to send as many demons and beings as I can back to hell.” I pause and flash an awkward smile. “Minus you guys, of course.”
“We would become your subjects,” Misha says as if this is obvious, and maybe I’m an idiot.
“Wait…” I must be hearing things. There’s no way. “What?”
“You outrank Alfo, naturally,” Orfeo says. “You are an Underworld goddess and the daughter of a witch. He’s just a brainless, ball-less demon.” He flashes Leo a darting look. “No offense.”
Leo rolls his eyes without looking up from his phone. I think he might be playing Tetris. “Used to it.”
“So, once you vanquish him,” Orfeo continues, “our debts will transfer to you.”
“Okay, hold on. I’ll inherit everything from him? Including his little…little…” I wave my hand helplessly in a circle.
“Drug trafficking business?” Leo offers.
“Yeah, that.”
All three of them trade anxious looks. Misha speaks up first.
“Yeah, that…We’ll need to figure that out, I guess.”
“Guys, I don’t want you or anyone to be in debt to me!”
“Diantha.” Orfeo tilts his head down, fixing me with a fierce look through his brows, his tone calm and even. “Please. Consider it a formality. You can absolve us, grant us our freedom.”
“What about you?” I ask Leo, altogether tempted to snatch his phone out of his hands. “You can’t just…just become my follower. He’s your brother, that has to mean something.”
Leo considers this for a moment. “I think I should leave town for a little while, so as not to raise suspicions that could result in Alfo punishing or vanquishing me before you have a chance to take care of him. And then, once the war is over, I can pledge my allegiance.”
I lift my brows. “War?”
“That’s what this is. We’re not painting a mural or picking daisies here. You are overthrowing Alfo. You’ll spare those who pledge allegiance. The rest will be vanquished.”
I collapse onto the couch beside Leo. Across the sectional, Misha has her lips tucked around her teeth, a finger twirling rapidly at her hair. She’s anxious too.
“God, it just sounds so…” I pinch at the skin between my eyes.
“Because it is,” Misha says, voice firm.
“This is a big deal. It’ll affect the entire community.
” She scoots forward on the couch and fixes Leo with a severe look.
“We need to figure out when, where…how we’re going to do this.
If Diantha needs to sacrifice a lot of demons, let’s find a way to get a lot of demons in one place.
And we need an army. There aren’t many vampires willing to go against Alfo. ”
“You have my commitment, Meesh. You know that,” he says.
“We can call on my coterie,” Orfeo offers almost sheepishly.
He’s leaning back against the stone mantel of the fireplace, one hand buried in his hair while the other holds a cigarette that seems to be infinite.
The firelight catches on his bone structure—the hollows of his cheeks, the sharp angle of his jaw, the hook of his nose.
He catches me watching him, and I quickly tear my gaze away.
I hear Hecate’s voice in the back of my mind. Start again.
Leo nods. “Good idea.”
“And I can contact the last of my coven,” Misha says, before turning to me. “I was a witch before I was a vampire.”
“Can I ask a question?” I interject. At once, they all look at me. Three pairs of supernatural eyes with their glowing irises and perfectly symmetrical faces. I try not to lose my confidence as I ask, “Why do you have to pledge yourself to me?”
“Good question,” Orfeo says, stubbing out the last of his cigarette in an ashtray. “We’ve all taken an oath of servitude to Alfo, for varying reasons. This is different from our debts. A debt can be worked off, but an oath of servitude is a choice.”
Misha scoffs. “A choice we made at knifepoint.”
“Regardless, we made it. It is an alliance, like being in a gang. When we shift our servitude to you, it is a sign of commitment and trust in your leadership, regardless of whether or not you grant us our freedom. Our commitment will make you stronger.”
“But if you take the oath of servitude,” I begin, locking eyes with Leo, “he’ll notice?”
“We are only half-brothers, but I believe…yes. He will register the shift.” Leo’s large shoulders slump forward and he works his jaw with his hand. “It will activate him, put him on edge, at the very least. He could flee or snap.”