A Demon’s Book Of Shadows (Witches & Demons #1)

22. Amon

22

Amon

As we ascended the tunnel, light illuminated the walls and the elated look on Lucy’s face. Her excited expression didn’t reflect the shock I was feeling. I had taken witches into my family’s shadow archives before, but never had I seen one do what Lucy did.

A book of elements was what Lucy had withdrawn—what all witches derived their magic from. These elements were earth, water, fire, and air. And Lucy had somehow summoned every one of them. The elemental texts were so old, they rarely emerged as books. Their messages were often found in forests, rivers, and oceans. Their language was composed of the unpredictable nature associated with the elements. The last time I had seen one of the elemental grimoires up close, my mother had still been alive.

I stumbled in my footing as her hand grazed my face. “What are you doing?”

“You still have feathers sticking out of everywhere,” she teased.

“Better feathers than bones,” I said, knowing that my shadows only took on that feathery form when they were infatuated. I was lucky they decided to go with feathers today and not some of the more gruesome things they had been known to mimic .

Her touch was soft and warm and curious about the hidden parts of me. I had a problem. The scent of Lucy’s magic buried itself into my skull. I needed to get my shadows under control, or they would be ripping out of me to explore her themselves.

As the tunnel narrowed and we left the shadow archives behind us, the smell of cold night air distracted me from her for a moment. As shimmering silver stars emerged in the night sky, I focused on where I must take her next.

My shadows gathered around us both. When they dispersed, we emerged in a dimly-lit room. The windows were cracked open. Drapes drifted in the wind as I settled us in for where we would stay the night.

“Where are we?” Lucy asked, as she walked into the space.

My stomach twisted. This definitely wasn’t the most romantic spot, but it was safe, and that was all that mattered. “We’re at my apartment.”

Lucy spun, taking in my living arrangements. Thankfully, I’d done some housekeeping. There weren’t any whisky bottles or cigarettes left over from my brothers. And the sink was clean.

“Demons live in apartments?” she asked, clutching the book of elements to her chest.

“Where did you expect us to live?”

“I thought you might cocoon up at night like my familiar does and just disappear when you feel like it.”

I chuckled. “Neither the Bone Threader nor Melrose can find us here.”

“How come? ”

“Hold out your hand.”

Lucy did so, and a beam of moonlight fell into her palm. There were so many colors and textures, her magical aura creating all of it. I traced my finger over the grooves, loving how soft she felt. The lines were like little rivers rushing through a forest and into the prairie.

“Has anyone told you that you hide your magical talents well?” I asked.

The skin on her chest crimsoned. “Has anyone told you that you hide your personality behind a bunch of bones and feathers?”

“That’s my nature, and the meaning of my name. One who is hidden, I will always remain.”

“Get out. Amon means hidden one ?”

“It does. My mother named me Amon because she felt that she could never meet all of my hidden shadows.”

I draped my hand over the magical aura hovering in her palm and sent it up toward my ceiling. The colors broke open, flashing, then disappearing.

“Let me guess, you have a magical barrier around your place?” she asked.

“Just like your Mom had at her home, only mine is much more established and resistant toward wendigos.” A feather formed in the air. I snatched it and handed it to Lucy.

She took it from me and tucked it behind her ear.

Jealousy panged my gut. “You witches are lucky. Your magic is always so colorful.”

Lucy stroked the feather, making the colorful iridescence shimmer in the moonlight. “Is your apartment the only place we are safe?”

“Krim’s bar has a shadow barrier too. But Shadow Daddy’s is getting ready to close, and I don’t want to disturb my brother’s late night baking experiments.”

Lucy’s eyes went wide as she glanced at the clock. “Oh my goddess, it’s after midnight!”

“Settle in. Shower is that way.” I motioned to the hall. “We can eat something if you’d like.”

“Do you have any suggestions for twenty-four hour takeout?”

“Greasy’s Diner?”

“No, I hate that place. My ex used to eat there all the time. I’m pretty sure he was also eating the waitresses.”

My cock twitched. I might not be a wendigo, but I didn't think eating anything other than Lucy could satisfy my appetite tonight. While sex was necessary for a witch and demon to bond their magic, it wasn’t the only thing that made the goddess erupt. I was desperate to see how she reacted to the touch of my shadows, who eagerly wanted to explore her.

I’d learned a little while ago why Lucy was intentionally suppressing the goddess that lived inside of her. She stopped practicing her magic after her father passed. I needed to dig deeper, or the Bone Threader would take advantage of her.

“Why don’t we look at this book?” she asked, holding up the text.

I peeled another feather off my shirt. “We will. But first, you should call your mother. She will be worried sick about you. ”

Lucy grinned as she set the grimoire down on my coffee table. “I can’t wait to share my adventure to the shadow archives. She will absolutely love it!”

“ And we can’t wait to share ourselves with you .”

I slapped my arm.

Lucy’s brow furrowed. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” I ground out as one of the horny voices of my shadows threatened to come pouring out of me.

Lucy turned, gathering her things in the silver aura drifting through my window. Her face was a porcelain sculpture etched in moonlight. The subtlety of her features contrasting against the mess of my creative space had me transfixed.

I can’t do this. I needed to get myself under control, or the Bone Threader would win. He knew how unpredictable shadows could become toward a witch when it came to the possessive nature of our inner demons.

I eyed the book of elements. “Once you’re settled, we’ll take a look at that book.”

While Lucy grabbed her phone and dialed her mom, I went out onto the balcony of my flat. Maybe some cool night air would help silence the insistent voices in my head.

“ Come on, Amon. Stop hiding us from her. You know you want to throw that book in a ditch and take a look at her sprawled out on your bed .”

“ No, the kitchen table !”

“ How about we tie her to the bed and introduce her to your belt collection ? ”

I shook my head. So much for fresh night air.

I walked back inside, hoping to distract myself with something other than the witch who was making me go mad. My tattoos were thick and matted on my forearms. They were way too comfortable with discussing taking Lucy to bed.

Lucy tossed her phone back into her bag. “Just like I thought. Mom was more excited than worried.”

“Your mother is a very trusting woman. I was amazed that she suggested that you go with me without having met me before.”

“Mom’s a woman of instinct. She’s taught all of her daughters to trust their guts over anything else. All of us sisters are so lucky to have her.”

Something deep in my chest ached. I rubbed the spot, wishing the place that had been numb for too long wouldn’t feel the way it did. How much I missed my own mother.

I sat down on my sofa and tugged the book of elements next to me. “Well?”

A strand of Lucy’s hair fell into her eyes, taking the feather with it. “Well, what?”

I snatched the feather as it fell onto the book, hovering momentarily as it finally settled atop it. Lucy’s intoxicating scent exploded through my nostrils. “Do you want to hear the story about how Melrose became locked in the grimoire from this book, or from me first?”

“I thought you said I had to capture the book so you could cast a spell to protect me from the wendigo.” Scrutiny twisted her expression. “Am I missing something? ”

My jaw clenched. Yes, she was absolutely missing something. All I wanted right now was for her to be close to me. I hated rushing magic. Casting spells and hexes could wait. Right now, she was safe. Was it selfish to want to take advantage of her closeness?

I slumped on the sofa, trying to appear less intimidating. Fuck. I was so out of practice. What was wrong with me?

Lucy’s eyes scanned my hand, then arm, where my tattoos continued to darken. “Somehow I think hearing the story about Melrose from you would be much more intimate.”

“ Oh, Amon! Please, take me now !”

“ If only you could hear the dirty things she’s been thinking about you .”

“ Where do those tattoos near your cock go? I want to lick you like a popsicle .”

I crossed one of my legs over the other before my shadows got any devious ideas. Shit . Apparently they were already listening to her thoughts.

Lucy sat next to me, mimicking my guarded posture. She also crossed a leg over the other, eagerly awaiting my story regarding the book of elements.

“Any questions before we begin with this bedtime story?”

“I do have one. You mentioned that you had brought other witches into your family’s archive. Was Melrose one of them?”

“She was. Three hundred years ago, she lost someone dear to her.” I shrugged. “And I wanted to help her, because I was in love with her. ”

Lucy’s eyes drift away from me, returning quickly. “What did she lose?”

“She’d lost a younger brother. How he died, I can’t recall. It was so long ago that even his name escapes me now. He had been a sickly child who moved from the city to the country to find medicine. That’s when my mother met him.”

“Your mother?”

“My mother was a medicine woman. She was very connected to the earth spirits, or what modern witches today call familiars. She possessed a very rare magical talent that involved all four elements, or directions. She was very close to an ancestral spirit named Changing Woman, a spirit who was known to give guidance to witches practicing spirit medicine.” I spun the feather in the opposite direction. “My mother’s tribe had a healing tree they would visit when they offered prayers to their ancestors. The tree of shadows, or the sacred spirit tree. They believed this tree housed all four directions, or elements.”

The feather continued to spin, catching moonlight and reflecting colors between us. The cover of the book began to change as branches and roots threaded over each other.

Lucy’s eyes widened. “That tree I’ve been seeing, it’s this tree of shadows, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “I think it’s been showing up to you for a reason. The tree of shadows exists in the Summoning, a place where all three magics dance as one. The energy there is very powerful. Sometimes the magic that forms there is so powerful, that the spirits who get too close to the roots become trapped. When I was a boy, both my mother and father forbade my brothers and I to go anywhere near it.”

“I know that your mother is deceased. Is your father still alive?”

“He is, but he’s not around. He works overseas most of the year for the demon council.”

“We’re the opposite.” She shifted uncomfortably on the sofa. “My father passed away seven years ago. Cancer took him sooner than any of us were ready for.”

My shoulders rose then fell as I blew out a sigh. “I'm sorry. It's not easy losing a parent. I miss my mother all the time.”

She glanced at me. “What happened to your mother?”

I flexed my hand as my fingers had suddenly gone numb. “When I was still quite young, long before I even knew Melrose, my mother became so enchanted by the earth spirits, that she became swept up by their magic.” Emotion clogged my throat. “My father found her body at the base of the tree one day. The tree of shadows is where my mother died.”

Lucy’s hand came to mine. “I’m so sorry.”

Her touch was so present, so different from what I was used to feeling. Distance and loneliness was my true being. “I still feel her spirit at times, but not like I used to. There is a part of me that I lost that day. A part of myself I don’t think I’ll ever recover. And quite frankly, I don’t want to.” I pulled my hand away from her. Lucy’s comfort was too much. I didn’t want to be vulnerable like this. I gazed down at my palms, watching the stains of ink blur behind my tears. I shouldn’t be this weak, not with Lucy so near.

I needed to protect her from being swept up by the magic of that tree like it had my mother.

Her fingers traced over my forearm. “When I first met you, I thought these were just tattoos. Now I understand that they have histories of their own.”

“Histories?”

Lucy’s eyes clouded with fatigue. “You just said that there was a piece of you that you lost. What I don’t understand is why you don’t wish to recover it.”

I grabbed a blanket from the edge of the sofa and pulled it over her. “I lost that piece of myself so long ago, sometimes I think it's best if I just forget it completely.”

Lucy shifted closer to me, her soft body fitting snuggly. “How old does that make you?”

My throat became dry. “Try over three-hundred years.”

Lucy looked up at me, curiosity brimming in her blue eyes. “Well, you don't look old. Do demon's usually live that long?”

I shrugged. “My father has always said my brothers and I got the best of both worlds with magical genetics. We got his longevity, and our mother's creative spirit. I was born in July when the moon was missing her face, so my shadows apparently took advantage of her missing identity and multiplied themselves.”

Lucy traced her finger over my forearm, finding the serpent that snaked along the veins bulging toward my wrist. “So this whole multi-shadow streak of yours is due to you being born on the new moon? ”

“I guess. I never really put that much thought into it. I've gotten by just fine without having all of my shadows,” I replied. I could care less about my fragmented shadows right now. All I wanted was for her to continue caressing my skin. Her touch made me feel whole.

Lucy yawned. “Three-hundred years seems like an awfully long time to be missing a piece of yourself.”

She tucked herself close to me, her body soft against my ribs and torso. I breathed in her scent, overcome with her presence. I didn’t want sleep to separate us. I wanted this moment to linger on like my loneliness had for all of these years.

How weak was I that I could break so easily at the simple touch of Lucy’s magic?