by Tarisa Marie
Mason slams his fist into the brick wall, I expect to see bits and pieces of it fly apart, but instead he jumps back waving his fist around in pain. “Fuck!” he shouts.
Apparently when a hunter is turned, whatever makes them a hunter screws off before the transition begins. Mason is surprisingly no stronger than I am right now.
“I can’t believe this. I’m so angry. I’m so pissed off. I just want to kill everything.” He struggles to steady his breathing. “I’ve only been like this for hours, and I’ve killed three people and can hardly control myself. It’s like when I first became a hunter all over again, except I want to kill everything, not just demons and I think it’s worse.”
I don’t know what to say because he looks like he’s struggling far more than I have been with the hunger part.
“Mind over matter,” I try to help him. It’s what’s kept me sane.
He ignores what I’ve said. “If I had been around Aria or Crispen for a few moments longer, when the transition kicked in, I would’ve taken their souls.”
“Calm down, Mason,” I attempt.
He scowls at me. “Calm down?”
I nod, half expecting guards to come flying into the room. “You’re not the only one going through this,” I try.
He stops and turns to me. “My brother did this to you, didn’t he?” Anger flashes over his face, but then dissipates and is replaced by frustration and annoyance. “Ugh, I should kill him, but I can’t. I don’t even want to anymore.”
I shake my head. “No, like you, my soul was taken from me without permission.”
“It’s Aiden’s fault I’m like this, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t blame him. It’s this stupid changeling connection thing, isn’t it? Now what? I’m his slave?”
“Well, usually if the one who turns you dies, you get thrown into the pool of extras and assigned to someone new by the council, but I have a feeling that Aiden will have alternative plans for you.”
Masons scoffs. “I’m so hungry. How? I just killed three people!”
“The first day is the worst, then you start to control it.”
“Why do you get this luxurious room in this huge place with all the important demons, surely you’re not all that important.”
“I don’t know. Aiden invited me to stay here. He’s my friend,” I explain. Is that the right word though, ‘friend’? Are we not more?
“Why does Aiden get to live here?” Mason, rages, punching the wall with his other fist. He’s going to break both of his hands. “Why am I so flipping weak!?”
“Aiden is kind of the big bad boss of hell,” I explain, trying to up the mood with a grin and a wink.
Surprise flickers across his face. “What did you just say?”
“Surely you’ve heard of Lucian. Well, he’s dead. Aiden is his son. So he’s the new boss around here.” I shrug and begin sorting through a pile of books. Remaining flippant and calm is the key to not raging out.
I don’t see Mason’s reaction, because my back is turned to him.
I finally give Mason a book to read on demons to make him shut up with his ranting. My patience level is dwindling down. I feel like I’m babysitting an annoying, bratty kid. I know I should feel empathy or sympathy or something, but I don’t. I’m not sure if I miss emotions like these or not.
Aiden comes back into the room over an hour later, a strange look on his face. “Forrest and Maxwell are being imprisoned, not sentenced to death. Thanks to my input. I mentioned that Forrest could be of great use to me and argued that Maxwell was forced into escaping by Forrest.” For some reason, deep down I am relieved by this. Why, I don’t know. Why don’t I want him dead after what he did to me?
“Mason, this is Terry. You’ve met before. Terry is going to be introducing you to life as a demon throughout your transition, because I’m too busy with Megan to help both of you,” Aiden gestures to the doorway. Terry steps into the room, clearly happy that his son is going to remain living. “You will listen to everything he says.”
Mason, as if a zombie, nods without fuss. For a second, a part of me thinks having a changeling would be fun, then I snap out of it. Oh my gosh it’s really all downhill from here, isn’t it?
“Megan, we have a further problem. Your brother Landon is here and requesting to see you. Would you like me to tell him to buzz off?”
I shake my head without thinking. I am extremely curious as to why Landon helped Mason even after Mason killed his father. “Take away his weapons and let him in. If he has no brass, then he can’t hurt me.”
Aiden hesitates, but nods. Terry and Mason disappear, and Aiden returns a minute later with Landon trailing him.
“Would you like me to stay in the room?” Aiden asks.
I decline his offer and Aiden reluctantly leaves, obviously worrying about me. As soon as I see Landon, I start to regret my decision. I recall the fear and terror that I felt last I was around him. It makes me uneasy even though I know he can’t hurt me, not really anyway.
Landon doesn’t speak until we are totally alone, door closed. “Megan. How have you been?”
“Fine.” I answer. So much has changed since the last time we were in a room together. I’m a completely different person now.
“How is this life treating you?” he asks, something strange in his tone.
“Fine,” I answer again.
He nods. “Good. I brought you something.” He digs into his pocket and pulls out a small bottle with pink fluid in it. “I don’t have a lot of time before Blayk notices I’ve run off and comes looking for me.” He hands the bottle to me. I take it and eye it suspiciously. “We share a father. My mother was an alchemist. Our father raped her, took me once I was older, and then killed her. That is something she gave me to take during my transition. It helps your mind retain the ability to feel emotions that demons normally cannot. It was her life’s work. I just taught myself how to make it by following her old notes, and I want you to be the test subject.”
“Why me?” I wonder, not sure if I should believe him.
“You’re my sister, and I don’t need another sibling or family member lost to the darkness,” Landon coaxes. “It can’t hurt anything if it doesn’t work.”
I eye the bottle. He’s right, the shit can’t kill me, right? What am I afraid of? What if it really can retain my emotions? What if it makes me like Aiden, able to feel? Isn’t that what I want? The temptation is almost overwhelming.
Landon smiles slightly. “I’m sorry for everything your genetics and our family has put you through. One day, I hope we can be friends.” I’m so shocked by his words that he manages to slip out of the room before I can question him.
I pinch the small bottle between my thumb and forefinger as Aiden walks back in, glancing over his shoulder at Landon. I notice that I’m beginning to be able to track demon’s quick movement easier.
“What is that?” Aiden asks me, sounding skeptical.
I debate lying, but I am too excited by the thought that this bottle could contain the key to keeping my humanity, and what will it hurt to tell him anyway? “Landon claims that if taken during transition, it can help retain human emotion.”
Aiden looks dumbfounded. He looks like he’s thinking way too hard.
“His mother was an alchemist and sort of taught him how to make it, or so he claims,” I continue.
Aiden eyes the little bottle. “Are you going to take it?”
“Do you think it’s a trick?” I ask him.
“It can’t kill you, right? You’re not risking anything by taking it.”
Before I can second guess myself, I pop the lid and take the bottle like a shot. It tastes disgustingly like lime. Aiden’s eyes widen like he’s surprised that I actually took it. He rushes to my side and lies me down on the bed as if he think I’m about to get dizzy.
“If this works, Megan, I’ll be the happiest guy alive.”
I don’t quite understand what he means. Warmth washes over me.
�
�I’ve heard rumors that this stuff once existed. A long time ago. I thought they were myths or it had got extinguished along with the alchemists.” I begin to fall sleepy, and I wonder how Aiden knew I was going down. Was it my heart rate? My breathing? I feel his warm, soft lips on my forehead for a long second.
Chapter 23
Aiden’s P.O.V.
Megan has been asleep for two days. Two days. I’m beginning to become uneasy and restless. It’s not just that she hasn’t woken up either. It’s that I need her. I need her around to keep me sane in hell. I meant it when I told her that she was my rock. She is. She keeps me from going psychopathic. If this crap Landon gave her doesn’t work, then not only will she lose herself, but I will lose myself. I am trying so hard to keep my cool, but with Megan gone, I don’t even feel like myself anymore. Just this afternoon, I killed a guard for not standing in the right place and getting in my way while I was walking. I killed him. Hell doesn’t affect me quite as strongly as it does most pure bloods, but it still affects me drastically.
I’ve also caught myself fantasizing about going down to the cells and killing Forrest and Maxwell for what they did to Megan. I know that I don’t really want to kill Forrest. If I did, I’d hurt Terry and Megan. Why am I so possessive over her? She’s just a woman. No she’s not just a woman, she’s far more than that.
I read through one of my many books on alchemists. If Landon’s mother was an alchemist, then that means that he might possess alchemist power. If so, then it’s possible that he can help me save my siblings from their curse, well Crispen and Aria anyway. Mason, well, it’s too late for him. He’s doing well though I think. Terry tells me that he’s learning and already beginning to accept his fate. It won’t be long before he’s as brainwashed and zombified as the other changelings. This saddens one part of me and amuses another. I am sick and twisted, becoming sicker and twisted by the day. I need Megan back. I need her soon, because I don’t know how much longer I can do this. I tell myself that I’m acting that I’m putting on a show and giving the demons what they want to see, but I don’t think I’m acting anymore. The only thing keeping me in check is that I want to be the best man I can be when Megan finally wakes up. I want to be there for her, because I haven’t been there for her as much as I should have over the last few days. I know that.
I chuck the alchemy book across the room out of anger. It hits a cabinet and falls to the floor. The door of the cabinet swings open. I could use telekinesis to shut it, but instead I walk over there, needing a break from my desk.
I grasp the handle of the cupboard, and I am about to close it when something catches my eye. A familiar book. A book that used to belong to my mother years and years ago. I thought it was left abandoned with her body and the old house. A rush of hatred towards my father fills my veins. He’s the one that sent his guards to kill her. If I’d been home, they would have taken me to hell with them. Luckily, I was with my step father, and he ran with me like my mother told him to if something ever happened to her. Years later, my father’s men would find me again and kill him and my step mother, causing a ripple effect that would lead to my siblings becoming hunters and eventually Mason becoming a demon.
I pull the burgundy covered book from the wooden shelving and another familiar items becomes visible. It’s my mother’s old jewelry box. She used to adore it. I find that there’s a smile on my face. I pick up the jewelry box that I was never allowed to touch as a kid. As soon as my fingertips brush it, I feel like I’m being electrocuted. I pull my hand back. It’s made out of brass. Thinking back, I never saw my mother touch it. She always used to key to unlock it and pull the lid up. I don’t even know what she kept inside of it, jewelry I would assume.
Would it be invading her privacy to open it now? That is if I can get the sturdy box open. I never knew where she kept the key, and I’m sure that it’s long gone now.
“Lucian tried to open that box for years, Mr. Castile. He never could. He believed your mother had it spelled by an alchemist,” Terry voices from the doorway. “Sorry to intrude.”
“You know about this box?” I ask him, surprised.
“Just what I’ve just told you. I nearly forgot about it. It’s been centuries, since I’ve seen it.”
I close my eyes, focusing on the past. Where would my mother have put the key all those years ago?
“He kept this, because he wanted to know what was inside?” I ask Terry.
“No, he kept it, because he loved your mother and he mourned her in secret.”
“He killed her,” I argue.
“No, the rebels killed her to anger him. He would have let her raise you the way she wanted. He was never after the two of you.” Terry grimaces, like he thought I knew this. The rebels were the small group of pure blood demons who disagreed with the way hell was being run years ago and caused all sorts of demonic illness in humans and murdered humans by the thousands. They believed that demons should rule both hell and earth. They were extremists. They lost sight of what truly mattered. They were eventually wiped out, but not before the creation of the hunters.
My father led me to believe that he killed my mother? Why? “What about when I was taken from my step parents?”
“The rebels, but your father caught them and killed them before they could use you as leverage.” Of course. One of the most harmful emotions to demons. Love. Demons, even pure blood demons, can love deeply, and it is the thing most used against them in battle. For this reason, they tend to do what they can not to fall in love and give into their biggest weakness.
“Why?” I ask him. “Why would Lucian lie to me?”
Terry shrugs. “Maybe he wanted you to think that he was stronger than he was, that love didn’t faze him. It wasn’t something he liked to admit, but I saw it.”
“Why has no one tried to pick this lock?” I ask Terry. Surely someone could’ve just picked it.
“It’s been attempted. I’m telling you no one could open that box. We all tried.”
I open the burgundy book and flip through the pages. It’s a book on alchemy. “Why did he keep this, and why is it in this cupboard and not on a book shelf?”
Terry shrugs. “He kept his favorite belongings in that cupboard there you’re in. I guess it must have meant something to him.”
“Jesus Christ. Find Blayne Resch’s son Landon and bring him here,” I say almost rudely. My temper is getting worse and worse by the second. What will I be like in a day or two more?
Terry returns an hour later with Landon, apparently he wasn’t too hard to find.
He greets me the way he should, and I point to the box in the cabinet. “I hear you might be a descendant of the alchemists. Think you can open that box? It’s believed to be sealed by their power.”
Landon chuckles which surprises me. “It’s just a box. Can’t be that hard to open. Why can’t you do it?”
“Because I’m not an alchemist,” I say slowly as if he’s mentally slow.
Landon looks to me confused and then shakes his head, clearly confused. “What?”
“Are you slow?” I ask, angrily. I literally have no patience.
“Mr. Castile, sir, you are an alchemist. Your mother was my mother’s best friend. They were both alchemists. Our mothers were the ones who created the elixir. The same elixir that I just gave Megan. The elixir that helps one retain human emotion during the transition from a halfling to a pure blood.” The slender man stops to clear his throat, then he continues. “That’s right, Aiden. Your good two shoes father Lucian fell in love with an alchemist. The demon’s biggest enemy at the time. He lied about many things to her. As an alchemist, she couldn’t see his true eyes. She didn’t know what he was, until like many alchemists, she was attacked by the rebels. She was turned into a demon just to taunt your father. The rebels knew about the relationship those two had. The alchemists had been planning to infiltrate hell by creating a bunch of demons who could feel. Of course, they were running out of time to make a difference because the rebel
s were knocking them off like nothing. While in transition, your mother took the elixir.”
Landon shuffles across the room to look at a painting on the wall. A painting of my father. “Naturally, your mother ran from the alchemists, thinking that they’d probably kill her if they knew what she was. Your father found her quickly, saw she was in transition, and explained what he was. He took her to hell. When she was through the transition and the elixir worked, she began to realize how dark your father really was, but she still loved him at first, thinking she could change him. You were conceived. She ran eventually, after you were born, not wanting you to be exposed to the darkness of hell. She knew it had an influence on her, and it would have an influence on you one day too. Plus, it’s doubtful Lucian would’ve been a good influence. One day, she worked up the courage to tell my mother what happened to her and explain that the elixir had worked. Since it was in her blood, it is in yours. Maybe not a potent, but it’s there.”
My mouth nearly falls open. Terry looks as stunned as I do.
“I think I would know if I was part alchemist,” I blurt out before I get the chance to think. Not only that, but this actually explains why I am the way I am. It explains why I can feel unlike the other demons. I know he isn’t lying. I know because the fact that I can feel is proof enough.
“Apparently not,” Landon teases, making me unbelievably angry.
All of this time I’ve been looking for an alchemist, and I’ve been one myself? Is this some sort of sick joke?
Landon sets his thumb on the lock, the only part that is not brass. He mutters something, and the lid clicks open. Inside, rests the key to the box and a bead. I look closer and realize that it’s a single pearl. Why lock something like this up so tightly?
“Holy shit,” Landon mutters to himself as he stares into the box.