“But,” Bahmet sang, looking to the ceiling as if the light fixture were more interesting than me.
“But… I need you. Just like Eleanor. I need to save witches now, not wait until hate wipes our kind from history. I need younow.”
“Ah, well we are in a pickle then. You need me, my power, my access to magic far greater than anything Hekate could have ever given her children. Now, Hector, the question is… do I needyou?”
“Most likely not.” I lifted my hand, focusing on the shroud of dark magic that I had lifted into place before I had left Kai all those hours ago. “Saying that, I think you want this. Need it. Right?”
Bahmet sniffed the air, then snapped furious… no,starvingeyes at me. The demon sensed the secret I had kept from him, the power that Kai had returned to me willingly. My last grand request—one that came with too many risks to worry about.
It had been I who’d opened the portal for my allies to leave the trials. I’d waited until I knew Verena was back with Romy, Kai and Arwyn. It had been me all along. I couldn’t contemplate what state Kai was in, but the last time I’d seen him, he was leaning weakly against the door to the tavern, the colour draining from his face… life slowly leeching out of his body.
I didn’t have long.
Bahmet’s tongue fell from his furred maw, lapping the air like a hound. “My power.”
“Mine, actually,” I corrected, flexing the magic the demonic shard had given me. “Although, if you crown me your victor and help me save the world, it would be yours. Only if. So, you see, I do have something you need. Consider it a trade of good will. Something for you, in return for something for me.”
“The boy. Kai, is it? He would die without it. Fall apart like a puppet without strings.” Bahmet smiled, delighted in the death he expected I was going to confirm.
“Actually, I have a feeling Kai is going to be okay in the end.”
It was one layer of our plan. Kai would give me the shard of Bahmet’s power back. His body would fail, over time. I hoped that they’d all got out, and found the help they needed to keep his body going until I returned.
Romy, even with Verena returned, would never have left me here. But knowing that Kai was suffering, she wouldn’t have hesitated. It was a fail-safe, this decision. And, it wasn’t my idea. Kai had been the one to add this to our master plan, knowing that Bahmet wouldn’t take kindly to making me his victor… unless he would get the one thing back that threatened him.
“I could kill you now, but I haven’t. And I won’t either.” I stepped towards the demon lord, eyes dropping to the floor in a sign of mock surrender. “Crown me the winner. Use my body. Retrieve the power that I stole from you when I was nothing but a child in my mother’s stomach. Make yourself whole again.”
Bahmet could barely contain himself. There was a nervous, perhaps frantic, energy about him. Although he was motionless, his eyes never left me. His body was taut as if any second he would need to jolt forwards and stop me running.
I was caught in his web, except he’d mistaken me for a fly. We were both spiders, waiting to see who would strike first.
“Kn—kneel.”
The command was hot and sharp as a whip of fire.
I did as the demon asked, lowering to my knees before him, head bowed.
“Submission suits you, Hector Briar,” Bahmet said, running his gloved hand softly over my hair.
“I know,” I said to the floor, not bothering to look at him again. I sensed I had won this before the final act was complete. “I’ve already been told. Arwyn raves about it.”
“Love.” Bahmet snorted. “It can make you do a multitude of stupid things. It can make a mother stand before her family and take an athame to the gut. It can make a man hide behindillusions to protect the person he loves from despair. It can even make the strongest of wills crumble in the embrace of a burning pyre. But you, Hector, are not doing this for love. Are you?”
I nodded, a bead of sweet rolling down my temple. “That’s right. I’m doing it because I have to, not because I want to.”
“Good.” The demon continued running his hand over my head. “Good, good boy.”
The light bulb flickered, a static charge building in the air. I felt the crackle over my skin, a change that was wrong and right at the same time.
“Congratulations, Hector Briar. I name you my new Grand High. My victor. And for that, you shall be crowned.”
“Wait,” I snapped, no longer in control of my trembling body. “There’s one thing I ask of you, before I accept… I do have to accept, right?”
“Technically, although most victors are far too pleased with themselves when they get to this point, they let me in willingly. What is it you want?”
“Tomin,” I gasped. “Before we leave this place, before we face the real world again… there is something I must do first.”
Fingers of shadow worked through my skull, penetrating my thoughts. Bahmet dove in, searching for what I desired so I didn’t need to voice it.
