I forced myself to put the book away. I needed to find a way out of here, and when I did, I needed to talk to Samael. Lucifer had been centuries old when Samael was just a child. How could he hope to go up against him?
I placed the book back where I found it and wandered. I’d managed to get turned around, and whenever I drifted too close to the flames, the heat pouring off them warned me away. Something was glowing to the right. I followed the tiny white sparks and frowned.
A single leather-bound book sat on a stand. The book blazed with white light, illuminated as if from within. I stared at it.
The Nephilim Prophecy.
Everything around me disappeared, and I lifted my hand, reaching for the book.
No. Opening a magic book in a strange realm definitely wasn’t a good way to stay alive.
The compulsion pulled at me, and I gritted my teeth, frozen in place. I couldn’t back away, couldn’t seem to move, except to take another step forward. It was as if I was caught in thick, unyielding glue.
I palmed one of my knives. I broke wards with my blood. I’d break this too. I sliced my hand and the world turned purple. The book left its stand, floating into the air, and my magic streamed from me, mixing with the white sparks dancing above me.
The book fell, and I watched as my hands opened.
I caught it.
Every instinct I had, every part of me urged my hands to put it down. I couldn’t explain the clenching of my gut, the pounding of my heart, but I knew that if I opened that book I was in deep, deep shit.
My hand moved to the cover.
“No, goddamn it.”
I focused every ounce of my willpower on my hand. I dropped my shields and pushed my magic against the compulsion.
It made no difference. My hand moved, and I opened the book.
26
Samael
Ipaced back and forth. “Get that seelie woman here. Now.”
Sitri turned and pulled up his phone. Across the room, Lilith shook her head at me. “You can’t dodge fate, Samael.”
“Fuck fate.”
“If she’s in the library, it’s too late. Humans are such curious creatures.”
I whirled and focused all of my attention on her. Lilith paled and went silent. I turned and went back to pacing.
“Mariam is on the way,” Sitri announced. “She said that if she’d known about the prophecy, she never would’ve sent her after the amulet.”
I closed my eyes.“So far, they’ve lost a sword, an amulet, and a belt,”she’d said. And I, who’d been so focused on controlling the situation, the prophecy, and Danica herself, hadn’t bothered to clarify which amulet it was. Instead, I’d been distracted by the vision she presented in her dress the night of the ball.
And now we’d all pay for it.
A rumbling BOOM shook the room. I glanced around, ready to order an evacuation of the tower, but the room itself wasn’t shaking.
That sound had just warned every demon alive.
Bael’s face was expressionless. “She opened the book.”
Lilith shook her head. “And so it begins.”
* * *
