Chained to the Devil’s Daughter (Mating the Elements #1)

46

Searra

I wasn’t necessarily happy that my first suitor was dead, but flames help me if I wasn’t relieved. Not because of the corpse in my garden, but because I’d finally gotten the opportunity to show Ash’ren I wasn’t always a ray of sunshine with rainbows shooting out my booty hole.

Despite my dark side, I hadn’t been able to kill my father the first time. Now, I knew I must stay away and allow my ferocious lover to fight this battle for us.

“Searra,” the whimpering voice brought me to the present, where my arm was slung around Fara in the garden.

“Shh, shh,” I said, attempting to pet Fara’s hair. The woman leaned away and pinned me with an incredulous stare. “What?”

“You’re really not going to punish me, are you?”

I snorted. “Why does it sound like that’s what you want?”

“It’s what I deserve, Your Bone—”

I groaned. “Stop.”

“You are the queen now, Searra.”

“But not to you!” I snapped. “Around you, Ash, Filly, I don’t want to be the Golden Queen of Bone Shards blah-blah-blah. I’ll be whatever my people need, and after what I’ve seen in the labor rings. . .” I shook my head and peered at my hands. “I’ll be whatever they need. But in this garden, I’m just me.”

Tartius barreled in right as Fara’s expression melted into the quiet sympathy that I always appreciated. “Your Majesty!”

I sent Fara a curt glare before responding. “Yes, Tartius?”

“The Ash Render, he—well, Devil! Devil’s gone!”

All humor fled my bones, replaced by cold dread. “Gone? Where is Ash?”

“He said he’s on the way to—”

“The portal,” I finished.

Suddenly, air wouldn’t reach my lungs. Fara’s fingers dug into my wrist and I shared a look of terror with my handmaid.

“Follow me,” Fara said, her tone cured of the embarrassment and anguish of before.

Forcing one foot in front of the other, I followed. Soon we’d rounded the palace to the servant’s entrance, and I broke free of my stupor. We charged through the narrow hallways that lined the palace like veins, brushing past many shock-stricken servants.

Once deeper into the palace, I stopped abruptly and pulled the Stinky Seeker free from my leg strap. I turned the tiny bone clockwise several times, coating the air around us and my whole body in the saccharine pheromones.

Geysis had assured us that Ash’ren would scent the beetle’s pheromones anywhere, even after the smelly particles dissolved from regular demonic detection, but I still requested Fara to meet Ash’ren at the gate and point him in this direction.

As far as I knew, my father and I were the only ones to know where the portal lay dormant; though, as far as he knew, his secret was guarded even from me. As a kid, I’d stumbled upon it by total accident. I had no clue what it was, only that my father would be furious if I revealed I’d been playing in restricted areas again. That was long before my father’s discipline had become unbearable. Before I’d lost my adventurous spirit to the fear of being perpetually unloved.

He’d never truly cared. I’d been an opportunistic baby, and he was a baby snatcher.

At the bottom of the many, many stairs—the length of the hike alone would be enough to ward off curious visitors—I was met by a dead end. I closed my eyes and felt the electric buzz of power permeate from the hidden chamber within.

Devil only ever laid his hands on me once. I was five, maybe six, visiting the palace library when I strayed too far from the picture books, of which there was only a small stack. I was drawn to the far side of the library, where books were covered with strange symbols, which seemed closer to picture books than scrolls and tomes. It was there in the restricted area that Devil found me, my head literally stuck inside of a dark ritualistic text. It had taken him a full hour to wrench me from the book’s clutches, my head dizzy and light, my stomach roiling with nausea. He’d given me a good tongue-lashing and a firm smack upside the head. I sobbed and sobbed, and my father had softened. That night, I’d eaten so many sweets that I could hardly sleep. Though he’d never apologized, I believed he was sorry.

I should’ve learned my lesson then, but sheltered princesses are often bored, in my experience. Though my fear for him grew, my restlessness did, too. The first time I stumbled upon this chamber had been an accident, the second a failure, and the third, an utter horror. The only thing they had in common: Bones of the Forgotten.

Removing my bone crown, I chipped off one of the spiky bones. Holding it in my palm, I squeezed until its thorns pierced my skin, sending a dribble of blood down my wrist, which I smeared against the stone.

Soundlessly, the bricks shifted. Heart hammering, I flattened against the wall, blocking the stones from closing again. Any second now, Devil would shout I know you’re there, Little Torch! and my hiding spot would be revealed.

When the admonishment never came, my courage returned. I peered around the corner into the dank dungeon buzzing with dark magic, easily the size of my spacious closet. Orbs of flame with no torch or candle floated ominously, strung through by red ribbons of— was that blood —that ebbed and dripped mid-air. An imposing shard of tourmaline ruptured the smooth concrete floor, seeming to grow directly into the ceiling. One yard across on all four sides, the monolith was a phenomenon in structure as well as function. A tear in space-time, where bridges to unknown worlds manifested for Devil to pluck souls from. Dormant for ages, it didn’t feel so harmless now.

Devil levitated a foot from the ground. A wooden book stand held the book that had tried to eat me as a kid.

The scene was more or less what I’d expected, except for the gruesome atrocities lining the far wall. Humanoid creatures lolled, half-dead. Each was strung up on two planks of wood that looked like an X , arms and legs spread wide and nailed down. It was the very stance from the Faith Keeper’s teachings. Millions of martyrs had died this way, and I now saw why. In hopes of opening the portal and bringing Devil fresh ground to destroy.

Something prickled at my neck, and I looked back to find Ash’ren descending the stairs. Black fire bent the shadows around him, his power palpable. I wasn’t sure it would be enough.

There was a faint whirring sound, followed by Devil’s triumphant guffaw. I watched in horror as the mirage of a forest formed on the monolith, like looking through a foggy window. Devil began to chant in between cackles, his wicked grin growing until he was unrecognizable as anything other than evil incarnate.