“Your punishment will be decided by the Court of Remediation. Until then, you are stripped of your position, your authority, and your access to any contracts bearing my seal.” His lips curled back from those massive teeth. “You wanted Victor Morningstar’s attention so badly. Now you have mine.”
They seized her. Lilith didn’t scream, didn’t beg. She just looked at Ava as they dragged her toward the side entrance. Fifteen years of obsession, and this was what it had bought her.
The doors closed behind her.
Marchosias settledback onto his throne. The golden idol still sat in Victor’s pocket; they’d never had to present it.
“You argued well, human.” Marchosias’s voice had lost its judicial edge. “Better than most demons who stand before me. Better than Lilith ever did, for all her centuries of experience.”
“I had good motivation.”
“You had your family.” Several of his eyes grew distant. “I remember what that was like. Before.”
Victor’s hand found Ava’s. Through the bond, she felt everything he couldn’t say in front of a Duke.
“Go home,” Marchosias said. “Take your family’s freedom. Live your lives.” He paused. “And tell no one what you saw here today. The tears of a Duke are not for mortal gossip.”
Ava blinked. She hadn’t seen him cry.
But when she looked at the throne, at the massive figure hunched upon it, she saw him holding a golden idol. Not the one Victor had brought; a different one, older. He was studying it with those scattered eyes, and he wasn’t looking at them anymore.
She understood. He’d been a god once. Worshipped. Loved. Now he was this: a Duke of Hell, presiding over contracts and deals, remembered only for what he could give, not what he’d been.
“Thank you, Your Grace.”
“Don’t thank me.” He didn’t look up from the idol. “You saved yourself. I simply chose not to stand in your way.”
They turned and walked back up the aisle. The gallery parted before them; demons stepping aside, some nodding with grudging respect.
At the doors, Victor squeezed her hand.
“You did it.”
“We did it.” She squeezed his hand. “I couldn’t have done any of this alone.”
“Yes, you could have.” He smiled, the unguarded one she’d only seen a handful of times. “But I’m glad you didn’t have to.”
The doors opened onto Pandemonium’s streets. The red-black sky stretched overhead, and somewhere in the distance, the transit station waited to take them back to the surface.
Ava stepped through, Victor beside her. They still had twenty-five years of debt to Andromalius. Still had a restaurant to save. Still had her parents to face, and explanations to give, and a life to figure out.
But she was walking out of Hell on her own terms. That was enough for now.
CHAPTER 24
The crossing back was easier.
Ava stood solid on the bone boat, her body holding together without Victor’s wings wrapped around her. The Ferryman accepted their passage wordlessly, payment already rendered on the journey down. Pandemonium’s lights receded behind them, swallowed by the black water.
She looked at her hands. Real. Warm. But when she caught her reflection in the dark surface, her eyes had changed. Gold threading through brown, silver at the edges. The chains had left their mark even after shattering.
“Your eyes,” Victor said quietly.
“I saw.” She touched her face. “That’s not coming back, is it?”
“No. The binding changed you. Even rejected, it leaves traces.” He took her hand. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” She watched her strange reflection ripple and reform. “It’s proof I was there. Proof it happened.”
