He shrugs. “Lilith works in mysterious ways.” He pauses. “You don’t believe me,
do you?”
“It’s a little hard to believe the words of a demon.”
He nods. “Tap into my memory. He showed me everything.”
His mind is the last place I want to be.
“Don’t get any ideas, sis… that is the only memory you can tap into and you know I
can control what you will or won’t see.”
I look at Hunter. “I won’t leave your side. I know you need to know… we all do.”
I take a deep breath and close my eyes and I feel cold as soon as I see his dad and
the woman, Lilith. They walk into the room where Samael and I once were. We both
look asleep, and I know that we are stuck in that illusion. Lilith draws blood from
my arm and then from Samael’s. She mixes our blood inside a golden goblet while saying
words in a language that I don’t understand. Then she walks to a woman in the corner
of the room. I don’t know what she is but I know she is not human. Humans could
never survive that place.
“Okay, Callie, it’s time!” she says, smiling.
She hands the goblet to Callie.
“Now drink it!” she orders.
Callie drinks it slowly. Once done, Lilith places one hand over Callie’s stomach
and says a few more words in that language. She then guides her out of the room.
Callie… I remember Trent said she was the one who took care of him.
I abruptly get thrown out of his memory. My stomach feels like it’s in knots.
“Who is that woman? What is she?” I ask Benjamin.
“Obviously she is a demon. From what I understand, she owed Lilith a favor.”
I tell Hunter that I’ll tell him everything I saw later. For now, we need a plan
and we have no time to waste.
I stand up and almost fall back down. I feel dizzy from being in Benjamin’s head.
Even though that was the only memory I could see, I could feel the despair, the sadness,
the darkness…
I take a deep breath. “This is the plan. If you agree to it, I will help you.”
“And if I don’t?” he asks.
“I honestly have no idea.”
“Go on,” he says curiously.
“We are going to get Trent out of there.”
“Trent?” he asks.
I roll my eyes at him. “The kid. His name is Trent.”
“Oh.”
I look at Hunter, “We’ll have to split up.” Hunter immediately tenses but doesn’t
say anything. I grab his hand and face Benjamin. “You and I will go through the
wards at the cabin. Hunter and Chase will go in through the Otherworld. I know that
your father will sense me there, so tell him that I came for you. That I regret what
I did and that I will help him, as long as I can stay around Trent.”
He nods, “Go on…”
“I need you to keep guard. As soon as your father is busy with something… well, any
opportunity we get, I want you to distract him and I’ll take Trent and run toward
the Otherworld.”
“What about the wards?”
“I can put one up for a few seconds to keep him out of the room and Trent can open
the ones to get us out of there.”
“He can?” he asks puzzled.
“We’ve done it before. Only, your father got to Trent before I could get him out.
With your help, we can both get away. If you play it right, your father doesn’t
even have to know that you had anything to do with it.”
He nods. “And then what? How are you going to keep him from getting the boy again?”
I look around the room, at Ethan, Jennifer, Chase, Hunter, and finally… Stephaine.
Stephaine was the one who spoke up. “They have everything they need to keep him
protected, Ben.”
“Okay then. You should rest and have your weapons ready. This is going to be hell…
no pun intended. I have about twenty hours until I have to report to him and I think
we should use every minute to prepare. And just so you know, he is still my father
and I won’t let you hurt him. So don’t get any ideas. I’m not going there to attack
him. I’m only doing this to keep his actions from hurting Steph.”
“I can’t promise you anything. I’ll do what I have to do to defend myself.”
“You won’t need to. I will keep him away. Just stick to getting the boy and getting
out of there.”
After Benjamin and Stephaine leave, I tell everyone what I saw about how Trent was
created. Hunter seems surprisingly relieved, while I become more worried at the fact
that Callie, the one who was raising Trent, is a demon. After I tell them everything,
we are all too emotionally tired to discuss it any further.
Ethan offers his room so that Hunter and I can rest. I lay there, staring at the
ceiling. Hunter grabs my hand and runs his finger over the ring he gave me.
“I don’t like the idea of us splitting up,” says Hunter.
“I know, but it’s the only way.”
He agrees and lies on his side, watching me.
For some reason, I can feel myself blush at the way he is looking at me.
“We don’t get many quiet moments like this. It’s nice,” he says, “… in spite of everything,
it’s nice to get a couple of normal hours.”
I laugh. “I wish I could agree with that.”
“Why do you say that?” he asks.
I shrug. “In a way, all of this madness keeps me sane. It doesn’t give me time to
think and process things through. It doesn’t give me time to think about all the
years we lost and how eventually, I’ll be noticeably older than you.” I take a deep
breath. “Earlier today, I caught myself thinking about how things used to be and
the other day, when Chase was telling me about how Kim is doing, I actually got jealous.
That’s not who I am, Hunter, and it’s not who I want to be. I just feel like… I
don’t know who I am anymore and sometimes I just want to keep busy so that I don’t
have to wander.”
He leans on top of me, his lips inches away from mine. “I told you before, I know
who you are and I won’t let you forget it.”
I let out a laugh. “Who might that be?”
“You’re still the girl I fell in love with. The stubborn, determined, beautiful,
caring—”
I put my hand on the back of his neck and pull him down, toward me, kissing him.
***
We actually get a few hours of sleep before someone is practically taking the door
down.
We quickly stand up and run to the living room. I hold my dagger in hand and Hunter
holds his sword. I can smell that demonic smell before we even open the door. Hunter
goes in front of me and opens the door to find Benjamin standing there.
By then, Ethan and Jen are out there too.
I drop the dagger to my side.
“What now?”
“Time to go, sis.”
“Ugh, I wish you’d stop referring to me as your sis and why do we have to go now?
We still have a couple of hours.”
“So it turns out, mother dearest was following me around. I’m not sure what she knows,
but Steph was able to see a vision of her at the Academy, and she was telling others
that they need to get us both and keep us there until they find father.”
I’m still wearing a short black nightgown that was left in the house by none other
than Ember. So it turned out, she helped Ethan and Jennifer get the place before
she ran away on her own. Honestly, wardrobe is the last thing on my mind. I throw
on a pair of boots and I’m ready to go.
I look over at Hunter. “It is safer if you get to the Otherworld from here. Steph
will portal us to the cabin.”
For the first time, I understand how Hunter feels. Just like he doesn’t know if I’ll
be able to get out of there okay, I also don’t know what will happen to him in the
Otherworld. Of course it doesn’t help that I have this horrible feeling that something
is going to go terribly wrong.
I’m surprised Hunter doesn’t try to talk me out of it. He just walks over, puts his
arms around me, and whispers in my ear, “Be careful out there.”
“Just… no matter what happens… I love you, Hunter.”
He squeezes me tighter. “I love you too.”
He looks over at Benjamin. “If she gets hurt at all during this, I’m coming after
you.”
Benjamin grins. “She is nephilim. She can defend herself.”
Hunter gives Benjamin a look that clearly says that he doesn’t care; he would still
go after Benjamin if anything happened to me.
I take a deep breath. “Let’s go.”
Benjamin laughs. “You might want to hide that dagger of yours. I don’t think father
will let you keep it if he sees it.”
I put the dagger in my right boot and throw myself into Hunter’s arms one more time.
“I’ll see you soon,” I say and smile at him, but he is serious. At this moment,
I don’t think he could even fake a smile.
As soon as we get to the cabin, I notice the difference in Stephaine’s mood. She’s
as worried as Hunter and I. Benjamin on the other hand, is calm… so calm that leads
me to trust him even less.
“Make yourself comfortable,” he says. “I want to have a word with Steph and then
we’ll go.”
He takes her outside and I watch them through the window. He holds her hand and does
all of the talking. She just watches him and cries.
I feel tempted to tap into her mind, but fallen or not, I know her enough to know
that she would either keep me from going or give me signs if she knew that Ben was
up to something.
When he goes in for a kiss, I have to look away. For one thing… ew… but I just can’t
start feeling sorry for them… not now. Not when I have to watch my back while going
with him into his territory.
After a while, Stephaine walks into the cabin, alone.
“Where is he?” I ask.
“I need a few minutes alone with you. I told him I needed to talk to you.”
“Hmm okay.”
“He has changed, you know. He really has.”
“You don’t owe me any explanations.”
“I know and I also know that this won’t change anything between you and Benjamin.
I just want to ask that as a personal favor, you don’t allow him to spend more time
alone with his dad than necessary.”
“We’ll be in and out of there quick,” I say.
She nods. “But if something goes wrong—”
“Nothing will go wrong. I can’t think like that and you probably shouldn’t either.”
She gives me a sad smile. “Let’s hope you’re right.”
She looks over at the window and calls Benjamin in.
His eyes are locked on hers as he walks in, and then he looks at me, and his expression
changes immediately.
“Let’s go,” he says. His eyes are already darker than they were before, his tone,
cold. He looks over at Steph, “It’s not safe for you to stay here. Go back the angels’
lake house. I’ll meet you there when we return.”
She nods, “Be careful.”
“I will,” Benjamin and I both say at the same time.
As soon as she is gone, he looks at me. “Follow my lead.”
We walk over toward the end of the hall where there is a gray metal door which doesn’t
look like belongs here. He says a few words that I can’t understand and the door
opens. Everything looks pitch black on the other side, but we get blasted by the
heat of the fire before we even step through the threshold.
I’m not sure I ever felt so nervous in my life. I take a deep breath reminding myself
that I need to do this for Trent.
“Let’s go,” he orders.
Once we step over the threshold, we’re in the hallway of the house where Samael and
I used to be. As soon as the portal closes behind us, Ezra shows up at the other
end of the hallway.
“About time—” he stops as soon as his eyes lay on me. He cocks his head to the side
and grins. “Explain,” he orders Benjamin.
Benjamin looks him in the eye and I’m freaking out that this might be the moment when
Benjamin turns things around and I won’t know what to do because we came here with
one plan only, to get Trent and get out.
“Yes, father. She came looking for me. She misses the boy,” he laughs the creepiest
laugh I’ve ever heard and I get this feeling that I’m screwed. “She offered to join
us and teach him more, just as long as she gets to stay with him.” Benjamin continues.
Ezra has his eyes on me and I look down, away from his gaze.