WILLOW
I clawed at the stone, desperate to dig through. My nails scratched at the surface, blood leaking onto the seal as I moved to the border and
prepared to latch my hands onto it.
“No!” Gray shouted, diving toward me. He wrapped his arms around my waist, yanking me back from the seal as I struggled in his grip. My blood leaked free from the wound that wouldn’t heal, sliding down over my side.
Gray held me steady as he flipped me to my stomach on the Tribunal room floor. “Let me go!” I screamed, thrashing in his grip. Even now, my body felt so fucking tired that it took everything in me. Only adrenaline kept me going, the Source refusing to let me go.
“You’re no good to her if you’re dead!” he shouted, shifting me to my back. He raised his wrist to his mouth, biting himself and tearing through his skin with dull, human-like teeth. I winced as his flesh parted, ripping open to drip down onto my face.
He pressed it to my mouth, slamming it against my teeth harshly enough that I felt my lips bruise beneath the force of it. I shook my head from side to side, rejecting the blood from his torn arm.
Still, he pressed it into my mouth, forcing my lips to part. His blood slid through the gaps between my teeth, touching my tongue. His taste was as exquisite as ever, exploding over my tongue and tasting like pure, undiluted magic. I knew now it was the Source flowing through him, the taste of all things life and death that existed within him.
I grasped his arm, pulling him closer as the blood poured down my throat. Unable to stop, completely enraptured by the magic rejuvenating me, I knew I would drink from him until he had nothing left to give.
I was vaguely aware of voices as Gray spoke with someone else, the deep tenor of the other man’s voice familiar. I couldn’t be bothered to look as I drank, warmth spreading through my side as it finally healed the damage from the knife.
The bone knife I still held clutched tightly in my hands.
“Witchling,” Gray said, cupping my cheek finally. He tried to drag his wrist away from my mouth, but I held fast, sinking my teeth into his skin in my refusal.
He chuckled as another male came, grasping my hands and wrestling them away from his arm. Gray tore his arm free, leaving my lungs heaving as I watched him fall back onto his ass. He clutched his arm, the wound healing slower than it should have.
Leviathan helped me sit up, guiding my back up off the floor with a gentle, brotherly touch.
My eyes immediately went for the seal, a strangled sob catching in my throat when I realized I would have to tell Della and Nova that Iban was dead and Margot…
Fuck.
“Look at me,” Gray said, his face filling my vision. He put himself between me and the seal, capturing my face in his hands. “Beelzebub will never let anything happen to her. You understand me?”
I nodded, grasping onto that logic with everything I had. I didn’t know Beelzebub well enough to know if I could trust him or if he would be an ally or a foe, but what I did know was that the way he looked at Margot would have to be enough for now.
“She is to him what you are to me, my love,” Gray said, touching his forehead to mine. “We’ll get them back when we can.”
“We’ll have to. We’ll need them when the price of you being here comes crashing down on us,” I said, hanging my head. Charlotte said he didn’t know what his price would be, and I believed her from the way he studied me.
“What are you talking about?” Gray asked.
“The Maiden. The Mother. The Crone,” I said, watching as Gray’s face paled. He shared a look with Leviathan, his eyes wide when they finally
came back to me. “We upset the balance by bringing you here, and our daughter will be the one to make it right.”
“Charlotte was the crone,” Leviathan said, understanding dawning on him while Gray stared at me.
“And you’re the Mother,” my husband said, his hand dropping to touch the wound on my stomach.
“Not yet, but I will be,” I admitted.
Gray shook his head, his denial rising immediately. “This changes nothing. If you don’t want children, we will not have children. It is that simple,” he said, standing and pulling me into his arms. He lifted me from the ground, moving to the Tribunal room doors as the coven stepped inside.
Leviathan waved us on, signaling that he would deal with the witches for the time being.
“But the balance,” I argued.
“Fuck the balance. I’ll watch the world burn before I allow it to force you into something you do not want,” he said. Gray’s headshake sank inside of me, soothing the frayed edges of my soul. Tonight, I would grieve for the friends I’d lost.
Tomorrow, I’d find a way to move forward.
