by Jade Bones
"What are you doing?" I hiss.
"Trust me," she whispers and rests her palm against my neck.
The world spins, just as it did last night when Mal's hands were roaming my skin. It's as though my spirit wants to fly free, but there's no place it would go but here. And so I'm left with the sensation of being lighter than air, of being anchored to my body by the whimsical intangibility of my fiery heart.
Mal grins, slow and wicked, as she studies my expression. Whatever she finds there, it makes her emotions soar, our bond flaring between us until the air itself is charged with golden sparks.
Somewhat drunkenly, I remember what energy I feed on and realize what this means.
Her eyes widen at the same time, her energy faltering into vulnerability, but it's too late to take it back. For one tiny moment, we soar without ever leaving the ground.
But, inevitably, we land.
The smell of the dancers’ sweat meets my nostrils, and it’s tinged with fear. Inside me, the wolf rears its head, sniffing the ground and snarling at a threat I can’t locate. Is it Mal? Is her power about to turbo-charge again?
Fuck, what if I lose control of my power and turn the ballroom into an inferno? At a pinch, I think I could control the flames now it’s happened once before, but there’s no guarantee I can control the wolf. It wants to turn so it can guard us, and there would be no hiding my demonic bloodline if I did that.
They could lock me in chains, like the other demons. Separate us.
When she sees my other form, Mal might even thank them for it. There are still so many secrets between us, and one night of fucking won’t erase that.
The wolf in me snarls, hunting for the danger it senses nearby, and my lip curls in response.
Turning back to Mal, there is a new haziness to her expression, a vacancy that belies her growing power, and my heart flares with fear and grief. I’ve located the threat, right where I least wanted to find it.
ELEVEN
Mal
My vision turns hazy, and even though my heart thuds rapidly in fear, the sensation is too distant to access. Dreamy.
Succubi feed on dreams, don’t they? Is that why nothing of the last few days have made sense—they’ve distorted our reality into dreams?
The knowledge seems unimportant. The dancers swirl around us, and even though the air is tinged with unease, I don’t care why.
My magic tingles at my fingertips, gloves long forgotten, and it wants. A shiver of fear runs through me as I remember last night, how I fed on some kind of energy between us. It’s all a distant blur, but what the hell did that mean?
It didn’t feel evil.
Could this power be good, after all? Now that I’m around Aeden, anchored to him, it no longer seems to divide body and spirit but unite them instead. And when I drift in the spirit plane, it’s so easy to see the truth of what people are and what they want. Their dreams. Surely that could be good.
I sound like a succubus myself now, drifting in dreams.
Some dreams are nightmares, witch. Beware of those who feed on nightmares.
The voice snaps me out of my walking coma.
Holy shit, my magic is going wild. Last night it was joyous, uniting body and spirit. But that isn’t what it wants right now.
Now, something has tainted it, and it wants to rend body from spirit permanently.
I try to snatch my hands away from Aeden, lest my magic attempt to try it on him first, but something keeps them there. My body is no longer within my control. I drifted too far from the anchor, and something else has come between us, taking my magic for their own.
I was stupid, so stupid, to let this magic in even for a second.
When my eyes snap to Aeden’s, there’s a fierce desperation there that begs me to reach for him. It promises to anchor me and draw me back, even though I can see his own fear rising.
I can’t let him help me. That same trance from the key is descending on me again. This magic wants to take, and the closest victim is the one beneath my fingers. I won’t let it. Struggling, I try to pull free from the trance. I have to fight this alone, like always.
And then I have to run far, far away, so I can never hurt anyone again.
TWELVE
Aeden
Player three enters the game. A surge of triumph courses through me, and it isn't my own. I spin around, searching the room, and find Professor Jacob's eyes locked on the two of us. Can he sense our bond? Does he know I'm a demon?
Bright lights dance in my vision, the ceiling crackling as though lit with flame. The music grows faster, and we all follow along as if in a trance. Stunned, I turn back to Mal, but she is as horrified as I am.
And as powerless to stop it.
Through the fog of magic that builds around us, I see the other dancers, their smiles never faltering. They haven't noticed the change, the way their magic is being turned back upon them to trap them in this mounting frenzy. How can they not notice? It's as though these witches see only what they expect—their own energy reverberating from their invisible bonds and feeding back into them as magic.
That's what they see because that's exactly what's happening.
The magic trapping us in this dance is the magic of our demon-witch bonds. But these witches are so cut off from their demons they don't even notice. They think their bonds are igniting because their demons are feeding or resting; and with their demons locked away Devil knows where in the academy, they have no way of knowing this is false.
They will turn her against you, little demon. Make no mistake of that. And they will use the power of the succubi to do it.
The voice whispers in my head, but it's seconds too late. I try to pull back from Mal, but I can't. Her fingers latch onto me like steel, far stronger than any human should be. Her emotions flare down our bond, and it isn't love, there's no love here at all, but her power still grows.
Like someone else is feeding on it. Not me—there is a third line tapping into our bond, and this line isn't limited to the energy of Mal's that resonates in me. This parasite feeds on everything. Every thread of energy Mal experiences is fuel for its power, and through her it sucks and drains us both.
The power of the succubi... Is this what the voice means?
"Why are you doing this?" I growl, our frenzied dance growing faster and faster.
Mal doesn't even notice. Her eyes are glazed again, far too vacant as she whirls and steps through the sway of the music.
The succubus in my head laughs. I am doing nothing, although the keys are crafted from our power.
"Then who?"
Demons with souls far paltrier than yours. The succubus seems to sigh. And round the circle grows—but we tire of this game. Are you up to the task of changing the locks? Or do we need to call a locksmith?
"What," I grit through my teeth, "the actual fuck are you talking about?"
Laughter surrounds my thoughts and fades away. There is no response.
My eyes land on Professor Jacobs, and I have at least one answer to my many questions. Power dances in his eyes. Sweat trickles down my forehead, and the faces of the surrounding dancers are turning fearful. They may not know what is happening, but their spirits are becoming wise to their own loss of control. To the way their bodies move without their permission.
Mal needs to break her spirit free. Fighting against the power that compels my body into place, I snatch Mal's bare hand from my neck and press it to her face.
It isn't like the last time. Her body doesn't go limp; instead, she glows brighter, my heart flaring as her anchor while her soul snaps free to lead her body instead of the other way around. I can see it in the faint aura that surrounds her, the way her eyes seem to see through me.
She pulls me from the dance, and we whirl to see Professor Jacobs staring at us, his eyes dead.
A thousand years dead.
He smiles. "Such a strong bond between you," he murmurs. "Truly a shame this era never caught onto the strength of proximity. We were
always stronger with cohabitation."
This era?
And round the circle grows, getting larger every time, the voice whispers to me again. Then, firmer, change the locks, little demon.
This is the moment; he’ll turn Mal against me—against all of us. And I’m tied to her as an anchor. She’ll have all of my power at her disposal.
I can’t let her.
Mal shakes her head, eyes glazed as if she, too, heard the voice, and reaches forward to brush her finger across Professor Jacobs’ wrist. She howls in pain the second they touch, but the sound from the professor is far worse.
As Mal collapses to her knees, a low whine comes from all around me. Professor Jacobs' mouth opens, jaw elongating far more than it should, and he sheds his human disguise. Demonic features twist into a terrible smile: pointed teeth, blackened eyes. A circlet of gleaming ebony sits upon his head.
A demon king.
Alaztair’s words echo in my mind—don’t trust the king—and I understand now who brought us here, who has been manipulating and twisting us. Stoking our power. Feeding our bond so our power was just right for the taking.
And how this demon takes.
The wolf in me tears free, launching at the threat as my body transforms. But the king stops me with a flick of wrist, golden chains snapping around me and holding me down. Mal stares at me, confused and scared, and her magic swirls around her. Arrow-like. Searching for a target.
It can only be cut free at the source.
I wrap my mind around our bond and shatter it. My power roars, flames licking the ground as my magic loses its tame channels, but at least I’ve cut it off from her as well. At least he can’t turn her on me.
I pretend severing our bond doesn’t hurt more than anything else ever could.
Auras flare in response to the demon king’s power as he lifts one hand high, dampening the flames of my power until they, too, are confined by the chains. A blackened staff flies into his palm, and thin streams of light stretch from every witch in here to the center of the staff. The light that beams from Mal to the staff pulses, growing stronger as the other strands grow weak.
He's feeding on the bonds, drawing on their power and anchoring them all to my witch. The one he sacrifices as a key. He replaced our bond with something far stronger.
Behind us, the dance continues, the music wild and erratic as the terrified faces of the dancers pass by. Round and round the circle grows. But Mal’s face is the only one I see—betrayed, terrified. Cut off from the only magic she could use to fight the demon king off.
Alone.
I tug against my chains, fighting to reach her. Too late, I understand the truth of what my mind's intruder has tried to warn me for years. They will turn her against you.
Mal was never my threat, but a victim, just like me.
I was never meant to withdraw from her; I was meant to save her. And now I've failed.
She drags her gaze from mine and pulls all of this new magic to her, fighting to control it. I try to repair our bond, but I can’t reach her. She withdraws from me completely.
The air twists, and she disappears from view, the demon king vanishing a beat after.
The chains drag me through the ground, pulling me towards the North tower and locking me away with all the other demons. Through the darkness, I glimpse threadbare beds and barred windows.
The last of my flame dies.
THIRTEEN
Mal
There's a voice in my head, but I can't quite hear her words. This must be the succubi Stacey said might talk to us, but goddammit, woman, can you speak up? The din reverberates, ringing with all the magic this demon king is feeding into me, making it impossible to hear my own thoughts.
I said good morning, sweet witch.
"Fucking seriously?" I growl, clutching my temple and trying to see through the fog.
Etiquette is the basis for society, don't you think?
I don’t know where I am, but the rush of wind in my hair tells me it’s high up.
"I think I'm drowning in magic," I hiss back. "And I need help. I need that trophy."
The succubus laughs. The trophy was only ever a symbol. These moments in time are important to reconstruct accurately. They must be anchored to the truth.
"How is a dance trophy 'the truth'?"
Because this dance is the first time we nearly escaped. Her voice is practically purring. The second, I recall an ocean... although the sea is far from here. The third—she laughs—I don't think the third is for you. You prefer a bed to the kind of fun that comes with leather straps.
Three times... My addled brain tries to make sense of this. The succubi nearly escaped three times, and this was one of them.
"Was the fourth time a pit in hell?"
The voice turns cold. There has been no fourth attempt. Now, we will succeed, and make Beelzefar rue the day he ever thought to lock us away at the bottom of that godforsaken pit.
So the pit was the first time—the time they were captured. Good to know. Stacey was first, I'm second... The buzzing in my head grows stronger, but I think I can make sense of it.
"The king must revisit the times you nearly broke through your prison walls?" I suggest, the world a little clearer now the more I focus on her voice and ignore the pain of the demon king's drain. "And that's when he sacrifices us to strengthen the prison. He's visiting the weak points, or something."
Very clever, sweet witch. And have you found your key?
"I'm working on it, sunshine."
Work faster. Make yourself worthy of our gift, even if it was unwillingly given.
Screams echo in my mind, and I drag myself free of the haze of growing power to realize it comes from somewhere far away—the people dancing in the ballroom. A vision of it appears before my eyes: smears of blood drag on the ballroom floor, and at least one dancer slumps over, unconscious, while their body drags them involuntarily around.
The vision fades, and I’m standing at a balcony atop the North tower. The only door out of here is a locked, golden gate. Wind howls, and the foundations shake, the entire building swaying from side to side.
The tower. It crumbled during a celebration—like a dance. This event must have triggered the succubi's near escape, and now we're drawn back to it again and again to repair the gaps in the fence. Our bodies line the walls—my body.
Not this time.
The demon king's head turns towards me, and he smiles. It isn't a pleasant smile.
“Nearly time to dance, witch. Your power would be stronger of course with your demon nearby, but this will have to do.”
“You need me at my strongest, don’t you?” I throw at him, buying time while I try to think of a way to give my power up completely, so he has nothing.
It’s not like I haven’t wanted to all my life.
The king laughs. “You are already at your strongest. I need you activated.” He clicks his fingers, and to my horror I can feel the magic within me begin to surge.
Stacey never said anything about this. She just said I had to recreate a stupid key, and that would be it—nothing about being activated, whatever the hell that means.
Although she did say we represent the keys.
In hindsight, it’s kind of obvious now that the trophy was only a symbol. My bad.
I tug my magic back, wrestling with him, but it’s like trying to pull my own veins back into my body—the pain sends me to my knees.
"Don't waste your energy fighting," he simpers. "The chains prevent your dream guard from reaching you, even if he has managed to transform. Your energy is better spent... growing."
And then. He fucking. Sniffs.
His mouth spreads into a grin as he inhales the scent of my growing energy, and it's almost enough to knock me off course from contemplating the giant bombshell he's accidentally dropped.
Dream guard?
What the hell is that?
The voice chuckles in my head. A little joke. What better to guard you when you
are counting sheep?
I remember two wolves fighting and the warm fur that snuggled into me last night—what I thought was a dream.
"Holy shit," I breathe.
The wolf I saw before I dragged myself and the king out of the ballroom was definitely Aeden. This must be why he can't create human features; he already has another body.
And if that body is a dream guard, and the succubus says they unwillingly gave me a gift… it doesn’t take a genius to put together dreams and gifts and come up with: I have succubus power.
“It’s because of the keys, isn’t it?” I breathe. “We represent four keys, based on different dreams—of course this is succubus power. So which key am I?”
Intoxicated by the dreams of your body, and you still don’t know?
The dreams of my body? “Good to know you remain cryptic as fuck even in the face of failure,” I mutter drily. “Would it kill you to help me out?”
What kind of dreams even are there? Physical makes sense, and then—oh God—Stacey was probably suggesting sexual. But—
A body can’t dream, it can only feel. Touch, smell, taste—all the senses I lose when I walk in my spirit form, and all the desires I witness in the auras there. Evocative.
Sensual.
I groan. “I’m the sensual key, aren’t I? That sounds like a bad TV movie.”
Like a cat called by name, my magic lifts its head, burning with the urge to take. I swallow thickly, knowing what that means now. How it feeds.
“I don’t want to feed,” I mutter, fighting my magic even as I know I need it.
The voice in my head is scornful. Take, take, take—whine, whine, whine. Why deny a feast laid out in your honor? This is not taking. It is graciously receiving.
“There’s no feast—”
Oh.
I know what I have to do.
The lines of energy trailing into the king's staff are beginning to stutter, which I assume means his ritual is nearly over. In other words, he's nearly fattened me up, and he's ready to bare my neck to the slaughter. According to Stacey, he's done it many times before. It’s probably why his touch hurts me so much.