by Jenny McKane
Eventually, there was a light up ahead of them and the hallway opened up into a large room. The room was a giant circle, which made sense as they were probably directly below the foyer now. Sure enough, the beginnings of tree roots were located directly in the center of the giant room, letting Sunny know that they were at the bottom of the demon tree. It must extend hundreds of feet into the ground below them, as they were just starting to see the beginnings of the roots.
When Sunny's eyes left the tree, she took in her surroundings, and suddenly wished she hadn't. The giant circle of a room was aligned with cages against the wall. The cages were rusty and old and huge. She moved cautiously, not seeing anybody moving around inside the room. They were alone, from what Sunny could see.
Keeping her eyes alert so that she would not trip over some stray piece of equipment, Sunny attempted to move closer to one of the cages and see what resided inside. She picked the one closest to her, and as she approached she sucked in a breath.
Crumpled in the bottom of the cage was a cherub. Sunny would know cherubs anywhere, thanks to one of Michael's nasty little henchmen named Rub. They were fleshy, stocky, and fair. Like tiny little gorgeous angel babies with nasty tempers and foul mouths. But this one, this one was bloody and beaten and looked half-dead to Sunny. But the worst part was that one of its wings had been cut off of its back, leaving a pool of blood coagulating over the sore.
As her eyes traveled and took the cherub’s body in, she gasped when she noticed that the small angel’s leg had also been cut off and replaced with an ill-fitting body part that looked like it belonged to a demon. The cherub’s new leg had tomato-red skin and sharp black talons on its toes. The crude stitching that joined the demon leg to the cherub’s hip was done with thick black thread and messy stitches. The wound looked like it was not healing, and the angels entire body, covered in bruises and cuts and blood, looked infected.
And the smell was enough to make Sunny’s eyes water.
“Are you seeing this, Plaxo?” Sunny whispered.
A choked sound behind her let her know that he was. And it sounded like he was taking it as badly as Sunny was. She couldn't take her eyes off of the cherub’s body, and it was only when Plaxo’s small voice called her from a few cages over that she tore her eyes away from the battered body to see what Plaxo wanted to show her.
Plaxo materialized in front of the largest cage in the room. Immediately, she wished she hadn't looked. Inside, was the gray, mangled body of a Seeker demon. Seekers were the most terrifying breed of demon that Sunny had encountered, grotesque and dangerous all in one. Their claws looked like black knives protruding from their fingertips, and sharp black fangs filled their mouths whenever they opened them. This Seeker was just as terrifying, but had a few modifications added to him to take it to the next level.
The Seeker, laying on his stomach and unconscious, had a pair of bloody angel wings attached to his back. She was not an expert in wing identification, but Sunny could tell that the wings had come from a rather large, powerful Angel. A Dominion maybe?
For the first time since arriving, Sunny looked at the tables that formed a ring directly around the tree. She felt woozy at the site of various body parts that had been harvested from both angels and demons, that were being used to create these little experiments.
“Azrael's ultimate weapons,” Sunny murmured to herself.
Footsteps sounded from down the hallway. Despite the fact that Plaxo had rendered her invisible, Sunny crouched down low.
“Good evening, my patients,” a familiar voice hissed to the victims in the room. “The doctor has returned and is ready to continue our important work. Shall we begin?”
When Sunny's eyes found the majordomo Alder, dressed in a lab coat, she felt her insides turn to lava. The sick bastard was behind all of the torture and bloodshed happening in the basement of Azrael's castle.
Sunny had a hunch that he was also behind the torture and whatever was happening to Gideon. And just like that, more pieces started to click into place.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The day had come. Sunny found herself sitting at the front of the Grand Ballroom in Azrael's keep, deep in the heart of the Shadow Realm. All around her, demons were busy preparing for the wedding of the realm’s only crown princess.
Once trussed and dressed in the horrible puce color that had been selected for Sunny, most likely by Nesta who had a mean streak a mile wide, Sunny had been sent to sit and stay out of trouble while the wedding was prepared. There were enough guards on the first floor that Sunny was given some range of movement, but not nearly enough.
In fact, for the last few days, ever since discovering the secret of the dungeon below them, Sunny's guards had been extra tight in the squeeze they gave her. She was a certain that Selah knew Sunny had gotten out, and she was stuck.
She had gotten out of the dungeons without Alder discovering either her or Plaxo, but little good it had all done in the end. There was nobody to tell, and no way for Plaxo to get out of the castle without abandoning Sunny completely. He refused, over and over again, to do that, no matter how hard Sunny pleaded with him to leave and get word out about what they had found.
“Be as mad as you like, Lady Hunter,” Plaxo had said defiantly. “But your wrath is nothing compared to the archangel’s if I abandon you now.”
Plaxo had been unmovable as the concrete he seemed to be made out of, and she had lost.
Tables were set up all throughout the floor of the dining room, and Sunny sat motionless at one of them. Her shoulders were slumped, her head was down, and despite the fact that she seemed immobile, her mind raced.
The information they had gathered was useless. All of the effort that she put into freeing Gideon from his poisoning was useless. Now that Plaxo was not allowed to leave and retrieve more of the antidote, they could not give any more to Gideon to free him from the mental chains that bound him. Useless. Failure.
Yes, Sunny was wallowing. She was less than an hour away from watching what was likely the love of her life unwittingly marry another woman. She knew it wasn't Gideon in there, but it didn't matter. Gideon was being taken from her, despite how hard she had tried to change the tide, there was nothing she could do.
Failure.
Whispers of Michael's voice swirled in her head. The nasty tone of Rub’s mocking jabs at her each time she had failed them. She was worthless as a Hunter and had wasted everybody's time. And now? It was likely that everyone on the human side of the portal was under attack and likely in trouble. And she had gotten nothing accomplished.
She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream and throw things and rip her elaborate hairdo out and stab somebody with the pins that had been used to assemble it. But she still had to stay alive, no matter how defeated she felt.
Despite feeling that she had hit rock bottom, Sunny knew that it could get much, much worse if she wasn't careful.
Her mind returned to the fact that Gideon was now essentially lost to her. If not now, at the end of the ceremony, the demon blood within him would be bound for eternity to Selah's. The thought made Sunny's stomach seize. She had teetered on crying and nausea the entire morning, and only held together her composure because of Nesta's watching eyes. The old demoness maid still looked like she wanted any excuse to turn Sunny in to Azrael.
Bound. The word was like a dagger to her heart. The only thing that made it worse, was the glee with which Selah had told Sunny, who had no idea that was what happened when demons wed.
She hadn’t necessarily wanted to know, but Selah was more than happy to break it down for Sunny.
“You mean you didn't know?” Selah practically tutored. She was enjoying Sunny's ignorance immensely, and probably knew the pain that would follow would be great. “Demon blood bonds demons together after that ceremony. Eternity, Sunshine. Eternity.”
Eternity.
The word had burnt a hole in her heart. Sunny was at the point where she knew that she was losing Gideon for good in
the next hour. She was hopeless and helpless now, as she sat in the ballroom.
It was probably part of Selah's torture plan to make Sunny watch all of the preparations being made, and all of the celebrating building up. It also got Sunny out of Selah's hair so she could truly enjoy her day. It was all she had ever wanted, she had said. Everything she'd ever dreamed of was finally coming true.
Sunny couldn't help but think bitterly about everything she had hoped that would come true when she entered the demon realm. This hadn't even been a consideration, she had been so sure that their plans were airtight. Nothing could have gone wrong, she’d been so certain.
“She's corrupted,” Plaxo had said plainly the evening before.
He had gone along with Sunny for a last dinner before the wedding, and invisible of course. When they returned to Sunny's room and she had gotten into bed to attempt to sleep, Plaxo sat on the end of the comforter. His heavy weight was a comfort.
“The princess is corrupted by the Shadow Realm,” Plaxo said. “There's probably more to it, considering the princess's father.”
He meant Azrael was probably influencing Selah, if not downright poisoning her like he was the rest of the castle. It would have fit in with his plans. And it would explain the way he eyed his daughter when she wasn't paying attention. There was no patriarchal love there, just a shrewd calculation that only Sunny seemed to notice.
“Is Lady Hunter certain she wants to witness this?” Plaxo had asked her first thing upon waking in the morning. “Plaxo can get Lady Hunter out of the castle during the ceremony so that she can return to the human realm.”
That was all that was left. She had failed to free Gideon, and now that he would be eternally bound to Selah no matter what happened, there was no point pulling him across the portal. The shell of the man that she had known was gone, and what was left of him belonged to Selah. And Azrael. There was nothing more that she could do now.
So, while she wasn't giving up complete hope that someday she might be able to return and retrieve him, she knew that her time in the demon realm had been a failure and that it was time to return after the wedding.
“Why would Lady Hunter torture herself and watch the Half-Breed marry that monster?”
Plaxo calling Selah a monster was pretty significant. Plaxo was a wise demon who was incredibly impartial, so what he must have been witnessing around the castle clearly affected him.
Sunny was staring at her feet when a body sat down next to her. She glanced over and the breath left her. It was Gideon. What was he doing here? A small, tiny spark of hope bloomed in her chest. But when his eyes met hers, he said nothing. As always.
Vacant.
“Hello,” she said. She knew she probably shouldn’t push her luck by speaking to Gideon with so many guards around, but honestly, Sunny was beyond caring at this point.
Gideon didn't look at her.
“Hello.”
He was still lost to her, and she didn't understand what he was doing here. Why was he sitting next to her, when all of the chairs in the ballroom were empty?
Sunny was feeling incredibly emotional mixed with a dash of awkward, so she continued talking.
“Big day?” She didn't know what she was after, only that she didn’t give a crap anymore.
“I think so,” he said, unsure of himself.
It made her heart splinter even further. He had no idea what was happening to him, and the fact that Gideon had been struck down from such a fierce warrior to a husk of who he once was had her eyes stinging at the corners.
Guests were beginning to file into the room, and she saw a guard headed Gideon's way.
“I hope the day goes well for you,” she said. Her voice was shaky and it was nearly impossible to keep it from breaking. “I hope you get everything you need out of it.”
Gideon’s eyes swept to hers, and for the briefest flash of a moment, she swore she saw all recognition in those hazel depths. They weren't vacant and hollow for just a fraction of a second as he searched her face. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out.
What was he going to say?
Despite the people filing into the room, Sunny had an insane urge to sweep the glamour ring off her finger and show her true self to Gideon just to see if he’d react--perhaps give her a shred of recognition. Her hands burned to do it, her mind trying to keep up as it imagined the many consequences that would follow.
But before he could begin, it was over. The moment had passed and the guards had come to collect him for his final preparations somewhere in the back. Without looking back at Sunny, Gideon stood and followed the demons who had come to collect him. That was it.
That was her goodbye.
Sitting there alone, as guests took their seats around her, Sunny let the tears fall from her eyes. They were hot and they didn’t stop, but she was grateful to feel anything at all at that point. In a few hours, she would leave this place and leave Gideon behind to an unknown future. More than likely, he wouldn't live very long. Selah was powerless here, and Gideon was clearly being used as some sort of test weapon. A beta.
No, Sunny thought. Even if she could get back to try to save him, the likelihood was high that Gideon would not be here any longer.
When the all of the tables were full of guests dressed in their nicest demon finery, when all of the candles had been lit, giving the entire ballroom a soft glow, the overhead lights dimmed and the show began.
There were a few similarities between a demon wedding and a human wedding that Sunny could differentiate. First, the bride made an entrance. Unlike in the human realm, Selah was not escorted from the back of the ballroom to the dais by her father, or anybody for that matter. And while she did not hold a bouquet of flowers in her hands, she was dressed in a stunning white gown that hugged every curve perfectly. Her dark hair was immaculate, and she glowed with happiness. Sunny almost wanted to be happy for her in this tiny moment.
But she couldn't. Selah had betrayed her and betrayed Gideon. And because Selah could not convince Gideon to stay with her before, she was content to keep a fraction of the man that she supposedly loved for herself. Not caring that Gideon had been utterly destroyed from the inside out by her father and his madman Alder.
Selah’s hips swayed as she walked down the makeshift aisle that went through the center of the ballroom straight to the front, where her father and her groom-to-be were waiting. Both of her brothers, Vitaly and Victor, stood on either side of their father and Gideon. They didn't look like groomsmen so much as henchmen, Sunny mused, able to find a little bit of humor in this dark situation.
Sunny thought she had blended into the crowd relatively well, but as Selah passed by, she shot Sunny smirk over her shoulder that burned straight into Sunny's chest. She was gloating.
She vowed to kill the bitch for that one.
When she reached her father, he gave her an adoring look, probably the first one Selah had ever received in her life, and he smiled.
Except, Sunny noticed that the smile was more feral than emotional, and that it didn't reach his eyes. She felt a shift in the energy in the room. She watched as Vitaly and Victor exchanged knowing looks with each other.
Shit, she thought. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.
Just as she had decided to stand and make a run for it, consequences be damned, Azrael spoke.
“Dearly beloved,” he began, his smile creepier than ever. “We are gathered here today to discuss the fact that my little girl has been a very, very naughty demon.”
Sunny wanted to scream a warning to Selah but couldn’t. Her throat had seized in a panic and so the Crown Princess of Hell had no warning when her father brought a gleaming blade above his head and brought it down against her shoulder, completely severing it from her body.
Panic erupted in the room and Sunny knew in the very core of who she was that it was all going to be over soon.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
If she were to miraculously survive the ensui
ng shit-show, Sunny swore that she would never forget the sound of Selah's scream for the rest of her life. For however long that might be. As it were, she wasn't certain that she was going to make it out of the ballroom without a sword pushed through her gut. Especially when Azrael sought her out in the crowd and pointed it directly at her.
“My daughter, deceptive little bitch, has brought a human into my realm,” Azrael announced as he leveled a finger straight at Sunny. She felt her mouth go dry, and her skin begin to burn. Holy hell, she was in deep shit.
Azrael continued.
“I knew she was up to something when she willingly returned home three weeks ago,” Azrael continued, ever the entertaining host.
“And so I let her continue to believe her own little charade. Let her believe she was smart enough to deceive me, her father, and you, her fellow demons with her trickery,” Azrael said, his smile as relaxed as ever. He wasn’t nearly as rage-ridden as Sunny thought he would be when she imagined the moment she might be caught in his palace. “She was up to no good, that much I knew. But I was curious to see what her and her little pet were up to. Surely, a human would not venture into hell for a social call with an old school chum, would they? Clearly, she has been sent by the angels to wreak havoc in our realm and weaken us.”
He was providing a show for his guests. It was as simple as that. The more entertained they were, the longer they would stay, and the more of them at that would donate, unwillingly, their life force to his stupid demon tree.
Sunny wondered if she had attempted to get any of that out to the crowd around her if she would manage to get a sentence out before being killed. She doubted it. The guards were already slowly advancing towards her.
“Who are you, human?” Azrael asked her.
She didn't answer, and when she felt two pairs of rough hands grab her arms and shove her forward, she knew she was about to be a part of the spectacle. She was about to take center stage in the Azrael Show.