Page 111 of Dancing With Demons

Grim and terrible satisfaction burned in my chest as they took up the chant, and I watched all of Lucifer’s plans crumble.

That dead-inside monster was counting on being able to control me to the end. He wanted to use my fear of remaining in hell for the rest of my mortal life. He wanted to use my fear of my sister remaining in hell for the rest of her afterlife. He wanted to use me period.

But not anymore.

By the end of the hour, there would be hundreds of people personally invested in keeping me and whatever powers I possessed out of Lucifer’s clutches. That bitter bitch would get nowhere near the power he killed my sister for. He would forever remain the kicked-out-of-heaven reject he was born to be. My mother’s delusions of a big, happy reunion would remain that—a delusion. And Ronin would never get the only thing I knew he wanted more than power.

Me.

“How’s that for making them feel my wrath?”

Ronin shoved through the crowd, rushing over to me. “Charlotte—”

“So what did you think?” I sliced in. “Did that go the way you planned?”

Turning my back on him, I left him calling my name without a single glance back.

RONIN

I trailed behind Charlotte to our first class of the morning, close enough to watch over her, but not so close as to provoke her. But going by the scowls she kept tossing over her shoulder, I wasn’t far enough.

Flashes of her mutilated mouth roared through my mind. Gushing red blood, and the way she fainted—eyes rolling up in her head and flopping limp on the bed... as though she’d never get up again.

The last thing I wanted to do was upset her again, but I still couldn’t leave her to her own devices.

I flicked up. My pet’s fallen into a particularly deadly pit of vipers.

Kama, Raven, Eris, Ursula, and Sauda fluttered around her, sticking to her like glue ever since she made her morning announcement.

“So, you’re really a witch?” Kama purred, trailing a finger down Charlotte’s arm. “You know, I’ve never fucked a witch before.”

“And the longest-living goldfish made it to forty-three years old,” Charlotte replied.

Kama shot her a confused look.

“You know,” Charlotte continued, “since we’re blurting out random facts that no one cares about.”

I smothered a laugh as the princesses cracked up. Even the hardest, sharpest version of my Charlotte was funny and witty. Would there ever come a time when a single word from her plump lips didn’t make me pitch a tent?

“I can never love you now. Because of you, I’ll never smile again.”

My grin evaporated. Yes. The answer was yes.

“So, you weren’t bullshitting with all that All Hallows stuff, right?” Sauda edged in between Kama and Charlotte. “The legend is real?”

“Real enough to close the gates of hell so tight, not even the most powerful beings in hell can open them. Doesn’t get realer than that, does it?”

Sauda inclined her head, accepting this. “And the hallows of the air, flame, wood, and sea... You sure you don’t know who they are?”

“I do not. After my foremothers cast the spell to banish the supernaturals, they destroyed all traces of what they’d done and then killed themselves,” Charlotte said. “And they did it for exactly this reason. They didn’t want anyone reversing the spell, setting the supernaturals free, or claiming the power of the All Hallows for themselves.

“But that’s why I had to come. The Hallows are no longer in the mortal realm. Someone had to come to hell, discover who they are, and collect their secrets once again, and my sisters trusted me with this task,” Charlotte lied through her teeth. “It was the only way to bring about the age of the witches, and take our rightful place as leaders of the mortal realm.”

Gods, this woman’s such a fucking liar. It’s so hot.

“And anyone who helps us in this task will be greatly rewarded.”

“But once we get the feather of the air hallow, burn the flame hallow’s sire, and all that other stuff,” Kama interjected. “What exactly do you do? How are you supposed to bind it all together into a grand power that can be shared?”