Slumped against the wall of an alleyway, clutching my prizes like a dragon would with gold, I watched my chaos unfold. And I wouldn’t leave the scene of my crime until I sawthem. Soon enough, members of the Coven arrived, ready to clean up the mess I’d left in my wake. Satisfied, and before the Coven caught my scent, I disappeared. No point being caught by them now… considering I wasn’t only the Witch Hunters’ number one most wanted. I also wore that crown for my people too.
Apparently, not everyone was happy I had killed their acting Grand High, Jonathan Bailey, even if he was a Witch Hunter sympathiser.
2
ARWYN
Chapter 2: Arwyn
I gripped the edge of the bathroom sink, nails bending back against the cheap porcelain, delighting in the agony I could cause myself. Glass and blood decorated the bowl beneath me as I looked into the jagged shards left clinging to their place in the mirror in front of me.
My distorted reflection looked back, bloodshot ringed blue eyes hung with shadows, my jaw hidden beneath the recent growth of a scruffy beard and a grimace that had set upon my face since the day the Witch Trials had ended. I hardly recognised the person I saw, and yet I still preferred seeing this stranger instead of the demon lurking beneath the confines of my skin.
Amongst the shards of broken glass and the smudges of my blood from my torn knuckles, a needle waited. Its vial was empty, the liquid currently pumping through my veins as it worked to subdue the demon inside of me.
I hadn’t taken my dosage of thistlebane for two days and Bahmet had almost taken control again. The injection I’d administered would offer me another couple of days of peace from the demon at most, but I’d found that the more I tookthistlebane, the more I needed it. My first dosage of thistlebane had kept Bahmet at bay for over a week, but now it barely kept me safe for forty-eight hours.
Breathing heavy, my throat sore from last night’s sobbing, I tried to steady myself. If I didn’t let go of the sink, I would force the porcelain to snap beneath my fingers. Iwantedto break it, Goddess I wanted to break everything around me. If I could I’d turn this entire house upside down, smashing through walls and tearing down the ceiling until I was buried beneath all my work. Perhaps I would have done just that if the throbbing ache in my torn knuckles wasn’t enough. The pain was close to pleasurable, a feeling that wasn’t new to me.
Finger by finger I pried myself free of the sink, lifting up my mangled hand before wide eyes. In the fluorescent glow of the bathroom light I saw bone beneath where the glass had made a mess of my flesh. I held my breath, silently counting down the seconds. As I expected, it healed. Bahmet stitched my broken skin together and closed it with fresh seams until only old blood remained on unmarred skin.
I sensed what his act was. A final plea, ‘I can help you’ or ‘you need me’ before the thistlebane completely severed his ties to me—at least for now.
Allowing myself a moment of contemplation, my eyes fell back on the biggest shard of broken glass. I imagined what it would feel like to pick it up and draw the edge across my neck again and again until even Bahmet couldn’t help me. Would the agony quench my burning need? Would it be enough to bury all other thoughts, all other sufferings unseen?
Would it finally takehimoff my mind?
Hector Briar lived within me as much as the demon possessing my body. And yet he was one occupant that I didn’t really wish to evacuate. No matter if I deserved his memory or not, I clung to it because I had no other choice.
Without Hector, I couldn’t survive this.
Everything I’d done since my victory of the Witch Trials had been for him. Whether he knew it or not, my actions were a direct result of me still trying to prove myself to a man who hated me, and rightfully so.
I had killed his mother—took the athame from my father’s hands and drove it into her body too many times to count. I then lied my way into his orbit, only for the truth of my deceptions to bring his universe crumbling down. I was the rightful owner of Bahmet and his power, because I was a monster through and through. A monster waiting for his just punishment. So, I left the glass shard in the sink and turned my back to it, because if there was one soul who deserved to offer me pain it was Hector.
When this shit show was over, and the world was safe from interfering people and their nefarious desires, I’d give myself to Hector and allow him to wreak whatever punishment he felt was justified against me. And all the while, no matter what he would do, I’d love him.
I would love him because that feeling was far more painful than drawing glass over my flesh. Day and night, no matter the hour or the distance between us, I yearned for him in ways I’d never believed possible. My heart burned—my mind ached as though claws tore through it whenever he occupied my thoughts.
I left the bathroom, my knees almost buckling beneath the weight of my feelings for Hector Briar. If the footsteps beyond my bedroom door didn’t prickle in my consciousness, perhaps I would’ve fallen down and given in to my storm of regrets. But I had a part to play. I had a job to do whilst I bided enough time for Hector to do what he needed to do.
Find me.
And he would, if given enough time. After getting to know the air-witch, I knew that he wouldn’t be wasting a single hour notlooking for me. Not for the reuniting I longed for, but to finish off the one trial Hector never managed to complete.
Hector Briar would kill me, and I would let him. In doing so, he wouldn’t only free me from Bahmet, but also from another demon who had lorded over me my entire life. My father—the man who didn’t bother knocking before he entered my bedroom.
“My son. I trust you are well?”
Father Tomin stormed into my rooms, looking anywhere but at me. My body stiffened in his presence, as if every muscle was made from stone, My spine straightened out to a rod of steel and my blood turned to liquid fire within sizzling vessels.
“I’m well, Father,” I lied. “Are you?”
Our interactions were, and had always been,detachedsince I returned his victor. Tomin wouldn’t look at me in the eyes, and yet he kept me on a leash, close enough that he always knew where I was and what I was doing. Because, as much as he hated me for it, he needed me.
I was his half-witch son who held the key to giving him a kingdom. A key who refused to fit in any locks as of yet—even though Tomin hadn’t worked out how I managed that part yet.
“I’ll be better once tomorrow is over with,” Tomin said, pacing grooves into the floor. “Everything is in order. Everything we’ve worked tirelessly on will go to plan. As long as the Coven doesn’t catch wind of our movements until the final chance, we should see success by dusk tomorrow.”
