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Everything inside me tensed at the sight. Something dark moved through my veins, so familiar to fear it took me by surprise.
What?
“The witch Asmodeus trapped in brimstone… and Vindictia’s sister.”
My brows dropped as I stepped toward the statue. I reached out a slow hand and my mind split open, setting trapped memories free.
37
ASMODEUS
My mind was a prison and I could feel myself slamming against the bars as my hands cupped the side of the witch’s face. My blood thrummed pleasantly. Warm and right in my veins. Her eyes glowed venom green as she looked up at me, batting her thick lashes. Every blink transfixed me.
I wanted to be all she needed of me. Wanted to exist to please her.
“Tell me you love me, Asmodeus.” She pressed her lips to my cheek but they were cold. My teeth chattered as a shiver rolled down my spine.
“I…” What? What did I feel besides the sea of numbness that flooded my chest and made my fingers tingle? The same numbness that made time feel like a blur I couldn’t catch hold of. I didn’t know.
“Go on,” she urged.
My eyes fluttered, my lids entirely too heavy. I looked around the room with its tapestries and endless candles. Darkness even in its eerie glow. They were everywhere. They were around the bed, along the floor, on the mantle. Cream wax dripped from each one as the flame flickered reminding me of home.
Why wasn’t I home?
Where was I?
No matter how I shook my head to try to loosen my thoughts, they never shook free from wherever they were stacked up on some unseen shelf. Collecting dust as they hid from me.
“Surrender to me, Asmodeus.”
Surrender. Surrender what, exactly?
The tip of her finger traced the flesh of my chest. It pressed into my skin, just shy of digging under my flesh and cutting me open to bare my emptiness to her. To show her the numbness that filled me.
“Give me the key.” Her voice was a sultry sound that clouded my thoughts and made me feel like they weren’t mine.
“The key,” my mouth repeated words my brain didn’t know how to hold.
“Yes,” she breathed the word against my skin. “Give me the key, Asmodeus.”
My mind swirled as I tried to understand what she wanted from me. The past few months had been a blur of time. Days stretched on but were also gone in a blink. I couldn’t remember when I first laid eyes on this woman, all I knew was that I saw her and I had fallen. Tumbled into oblivion. Now I didn’t even know if I wanted to find my way out.
Key.
A thrum sounded somewhere in the distance in a far-off place I knew would forever be safe. I didn’t know where it was and I likely never would. It came from a place I didn’t know of even though it was mine.
The box.
She wanted the key so she could unlock the box. Why couldn’t I remember what was inside the box?
“Asmodeus,” her voice was coy. “Give me the key and let me show you just what we can do together. Surrender to me and let me show you what a world set in the palm of our hands would look like. Let me fill you with a power you hadn’t even dreamed was possible before me. Let’s rule this world, let’s rule them all. Give me the key.”
The fog in my mind cleared just enough for a sliver of panic to quicken my heart. This wasn’t real. She wasn’t anyone to me. She was merely someone who thought she could handle what was in the box. A monster who wanted the taste of unbridled power.
No, I couldn’t give her the key and there was no way I could let her have the box.
A storm surged inside me. Something in me balked, giving me the moment of clarity I needed.
