“Mmm! Now that is sweet. Who would have thought he would taste like spun sugar?” Again with the hyena laugh. “I can see the horror in your eyes, little princess. Now that’s what I love to see,” he crows triumphantly.
Devon’s eyes are closed, but I can hear his rattled breathing. I know that he isn’t dead yet, but it is a near thing. I will my body to respond and unfreeze with everything in me. I can feel the black, ever present void start to stir deep inside me.
The creature must have felt the shift within me as well because Sabrina’s eyes widen and start to fill with black. “You dare defy me? Ruin everything that I have planned so carefully,” he screams into my face. “You are lucky that I brought him to you breathing at all!” The creature wearing Sabrina backs up a few steps, dragging the full weight of Devon’s six foot frame with him. “You will learn not to defy your betters, little princess. I will enjoy teaching you this lesson,” he sneers, then rears back Sabrina’s head and sinks his razor sharp teeth into Devon’s jugular. Blood spurts in all directions as Devon jerks from the ripping of his throat.
I see his eyes open briefly. Within them is a look of longing, pain, horror, and then finally peace as the creature rips out a chunk of his throat. Devon breathed his last breath not four feet from where I stand. I could do nothing to stop it. All the power in the world at my finger tips and I can’t save my best friend. I am screaming in agony inside my head. The black void finally boils over and I break free of the paralysis, just in time to see the Sabrina creature fling Devon’s lifeless body away from it like so much trash. He turns back around toward me and stutter steps back at what he sees.
The full impact of my power is glowing from the inside out. I am the moon incarnate. My eyes are glowing like green lightening, my feet are hovering at least six inches off the ground, and there is a cyclone of wind engulfing my body. “You dare to take those I love from me? To taunt me like a child, then use those I hold dear like a useless toy?” My voice sounds like the full force of a waterfall rushing over thousands of rocks. It thunders off of the ancient trees surrounding us.
The words HIGH DEMON are whispered through the back of my mind.
“You think yourself above me, Demon?”
The creature wearing the Sabrina suit takes another step back, as I take a step toward it.
“Your time on this plane of existence is done.” I take yet another step toward the Demon and wave my hand to hold the creature in place.
The Demon’s eyes bulge, clearly not believing that I had the power to freeze one as he in place.
I gather all the power I have waiting dormant inside me. I have never used this much or felt this much power inside me before. I hold out my hands and see a green translucent sphere start to form between my hands. As it grows in size, the demon redoubles its struggles.
“You are worthless. Nothing inside you is worth saving,” I roar at the Demon. “So now you die.” I fling the orb toward the Demon. Following the giant orb of power is a green stream of pure power.
Whatever magic the Demon owns is working against mine, trying in vain to keep itself and its shell alive. I push more of myself into the constant stream of my power that’s battering at the High Demon. Finally I feel the Demon’s shields falter and an unholy roar fills the air as he starts to turn to ash from the inside out. I keep pelting him with wave after wave of green lightening shooting from my palms. I don’t just want to kill the body he had stolen. I want to sever him, and then burn him to ash as well.
The ash that is Sabrina’s body falls away and what is left is a black snarling and snapping creature. He is covered in scales from the tip of his tail to the sharp points of the many horns crowning his head. Still I shove my power at him, trying to kill the High Demon where he now stands.
“You cannot kill what is eternal little girl,” the Demon roars.
I can feel myself starting to grow weaker as the immense amount of my power continues to flow from my hands to strike at the Demon. Then all of a sudden I hear a ripping sound. A scarlet red gaping hole appears suddenly behind the Demon and sucks him into it. As suddenly as it appeared it is gone, along with the murderer of my best friend, one of the few people on this earth that I have ever let myself love.
Everything in me falls away. I stumble and land on my knees, crawling over to Devon’s prone, cold body. He is torn and bloody from head to foot. It looks like someone had taken bites out of various parts of his body. My Goddess, the torture he’d endured all because he knew me. I sink my fingers into his shirt and fist them tightly. I throw my head back and scream out the pain and torment that is consuming me from the inside out. I scream and scream as tears flood down my cheeks.
I hear someone stepping through the trees, the crunch of heavy boots as they walk near to where I am kneeling over my friend. I turn my head and look upon a beautiful stranger with hate-filled eyes.
“I mean you no harm, Princess.” The stranger holds his hands out in a pleading fashion. “My name is Tristan. I’m here to assist your friend in passing into the light. He will finally find rest from the turmoil of this world.”
“What are you,” I find myself asking yet another person. I can feel my hands start to tingle with power. I won’t let anyone else take Devon from me. He deserves to be laid to rest somewhere as exquisite as he was. Was…I try to hold in my sobs and fail. I lay my head onto Devon’s still chest and wretch with pain.
“Child, you need to calm yourself. I’m not here to harm the daughter of my Goddess.” The stranger takes yet another step closer.
I whip around on my knees with my palms already glowing. “Come any closer and you will die where you stand,” I snarl at the stranger.
Faster than my eyes can track, the stranger moves forward and gently touches me on the forehead. Everything around me starts to fade to grey around the edges. I get one good shot out of me that I am pretty sure hit its intended target before everything goes black.
Dammit. Not Again.
Chapter 20.
I awake with a crushing feeling in my chest. It takes a moment to recognize the feeling as grief. Then everything comes flooding back to me, like watching a horrid film strip behind my swollen red eyes. I can hear someone weeping in the distance. It sounds like Jessa. I can also hear several men’s voices discussing something that sounds to be pretty serious.
I look around and find myself once again tucked into my bed in Gavin’s cabin. I close my eyes and try to block out the events that had happened right before I blacked out once again. Or was knocked out. I shake my head to make sure nothing up there hurts. My head feels fine, but the rest of me is faltering under the weight of grief. I lock my eyes on the exposed beams of the ceiling and will myself not to give in and cry. Of course it doesn’t work. Gut wrenching sobs start to pour from me. I turn to my side and hug Jaxx’s pillow. It still smells like him. I feel the bed shift and look behind me to find Jaxx sitting there. He is wearing a somber look on his face.
“I wish I could take your pain. I would gladly bare it. If only it would stop your heart from breaking.” Jaxx strokes away the hair that is stuck to my cheek.
“It is not only my heart that was crushed, Jaxx.” I bury my face back into the pillow.
“I know you don’t want to leave the haven you have wrought for yourself, but everyone is waiting on you.”
“Waiting for what,” I snap. “Haven’t I been through enough for one day? Don’t I deserve a time out? Just this once I want to be left alone and not have to face the next tragedy that is going to strike.”
“They are waiting on you to say goodbye to your friend. They want to hold Devon’s funeral pyre at moonrise.”
That shakes me from my grief as nothing else could have. Say goodbye to my best friend. My family. Can I do that? How can someone go on from losing someone that you love as dearly as I love him? “What time is it now,” I ask Jaxx.
He lays himself down behind me and spoons me. He pulls me into his chest and wraps his strong arms around me.
“An hour until the ritual.”
“Can’t we just stay here like this? Just you and me. Shut the world and its sadness out and just stay here in this bed? Just us for always?” I feel him gently shaking his head in the negative.
“You know I would love nothing more than to cocoon you and me in our own little world and never leave, but others need you. Jessa needs you.”
Jessa. God, how she must be broken. My friends are hurting. My family is broken all because a fucked up creature wanted to hurt me and those I love. I can feel anger replacing the soul sucking grief. I stiffen in Jaxx’s arms. “How do I kill a High Demon? How do I find him again?”
“That is something that we are going to work out. This I promise you.”
I take a deep breath and pull out of Jaxx’s embrace. I sit up and look down at his beautifully handsome face. “I would be forever lost without you, my love,” I tell him while I stroke his cheek. I lean down and press my lips gently to his.
Jaxx takes me into his arms and holds me while I grieve silently. We lay in our cocoon for the next hour, until it is time to say goodbye to a pivotal person in my life. A beloved friend. A part of my heart went with Devon when he drew his last breath, a piece that I will never get back.
I stand stoic throughout the burning ceremony of my friend. Jaxx stands behind me with his arms wrapped tightly around my waist. No one says a word as Jessa lights the pyre where our friend lay still and cold. No one shares words of wisdom or sings songs of joy. We grieve in silence.
Silently I am wishing it was someone else burning. Wishing it was someone else that died his horrid death, someone else who deserved to have their life stolen from them far too soon. Devon deserved a full life with laughter and love. What he got was pain and torture in the end.
I see Jessa across the flames. Up until this point I was too scared to look into her face. Afraid that when I did that I would see blame there. Blame for what happened to our friend, but there is no blame, only angry grief as a scarlet tear runs down her face and I vow to avenge our friend.
“I will find the one who took you from us,” I speak to the flames that engulfed Devon. “I will make it so that you did not die in vain.” I look at the others surrounding the pyre, meeting their eyes one by one. “I vow that I will take those who only live a life for darkness and snuff them out. There is a war coming. A war I plan on winning so that no more innocence is lost.” I hang my head, take a deep, shuddering breath, and pull my mother’s jeweled dagger from the strap on my thigh. I slice my hand open down my life line. The scarlet runs true as I fling the droplets of blood into the flames. “As I vow it, so let it be,” I intone.
“Then we have much work ahead of us, my daughter.”
We all startle and turn to see my mother standing behind us in all of her glowing glory.
The End. For now…
Join Ella as she continues her journey in Twisted Illusions.
Acknowledgements
The cover of this book was made by: Tasha Gwartney
This book was edited by:
Wendi Starusnak of Starusnak’s Editorial Services
~I would also like to give a shout out to all of my wonderful beta readers. You all gave me such heartwarming support and encouragement. You guys rock my heart!
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1.
Chapter 2.
Chapter 3.
Chapter 4.
Chapter 5.
Chapter 6.
Chapter 7.
Chapter 8.
Chapter 9.
Chapter 10.
Chapter 11.
Chapter 12.
Chapter 13.
Chapter 14.
Chapter 15.
Chapter 16.
Chapter 17.
Chapter 18.
Chapter 19.
Chapter 20.
Acknowledgements
The Awakening: A Witch-Vampire Romance: Feel the Heat. Page 21