Chapter 1
Sabrina
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Arm jerking back fromthe recoil, I lower the gun with a grimace. Sadly, the only thing the gunshot murdered was my ears, yet even the ringing can’t chase away the echo of Ash’s declaration.
‘You’re going to help me fix your mistake, and set all of the demons you betrayed free.’
Not wolves,demons.It makes a horrific sort of poetic sense, but I don’t have time to delve into it right now. Not with Ash’s smug face staring at me, waiting for the tiniest chink in my armor to appear for him to exploit.
“That’s a pretty bold claim.”
His umber eyes glow with unabashed delight as he brushes off his shirt, drawing attention to the fact that the bullet never pierced the dark haze coating his skin. It simply melted into a corroded, mangled mess that clinks as it hits the floor. "I'm a pretty bold man. Empires weren't built by the weak, after all."
Damian and Hunter edge closer in the circle of snarling hellhounds my other mates have erected around me, the latter taking his stolen gun back from me. But after my failed murder attempt, what happened to Boden when he attempted to tear Ash’s throat out, and how easily Kaige was cast aside? They’re wise enough to hold back for now, searching for a breach in his defenses.
"No, they were built on the blood, sweat, and tears of people a hell of a lot stronger than the man taking the credit for their efforts."
He clucks his tongue. “As someone with so much blood on her hands, you don't have much room to talk; either of you. Always prattling on about peace, yet zero hesitation to go straight for the throat.” Shadows dance across his eyes, yet not so much as a sliver of his irises are engulfed. “Lie to yourself all you’d like, but deep down you know that the monotony of peace would drive you insane. You love the thrill that comes with outwitting people that underestimate you; it’s one of the things I’ve always admired most.”
Rumbles surround me, and I thread my fingers through Cinjin’s fur, as much for his comfort as for mine. “I think you need to start at the beginning.”
Am I going to trust anything that comes out of his mouth? Hardly. But if life has taught me anything, it’s that the best lies are told with a few grains of truth sprinkled in. While Ash isn’t directly messing with my head anymore, that doesn’t mean I’m thinking clearly after the revelation whiplash Damian’s dad just delivered. Between being the reason my parents are dead, Annika really being my sister, shifters being demon possessed humans, and the unkillable monster smiling in front of me? I need a fucking minute. And there’s no better way to stall than giving an evil villain the opportunity to brag about how he outsmarted everyone around him.
Lifting the gemstone fragment, he rolls it between two fingers staring wistfully as if he can watch his memories playing out in the facets. “It’s human nature to never know peace. They always hunger for more. Land, power; the list is endless. Even when they have everything most of us could only ever dream of, it’s not enough. There’s a void in their souls that can never be filled, and since they can’t know peace, they ensure no one else is able to, either.”
Slipping the shard back into his pocket, he holds his hand out in front of his chest. Shadows coalesce on his skin, rising from the surface and taking form like living figures acting out his story in the palm of his hand. “Misery loves company, and thus, the first demons crawled out of the void of their blackened souls to help ease their suffering, shedding a fraction of the pain from their shoulders that they were unable to bear. A counterpart for each human, one that saw what they were too blinded by selfishness to understand. The hole in their hearts wasn’t something that could ever be filled, because it wasn’t meant to be.”
Flicking my gaze from the humanoid shapes crawling out of the shadowy chests of the originals, I find Ash staring at me intently and I swear he’s able to see right through me to the creature that’s holding her breath, completely frozen in place. “If there’s nothing in life left for you to desire, to set your sights on obtaining and drive you, then there’s no point in living. Once you grow complacent, you’ve taken the first step into your grave.”
Shaking his head, he gives me a rueful smile. “It’s their fault we’re as powerful as we are. At its core, the world desires balance. The more the humans destroyed themselves, the stronger we became.”
Boden carves a path through the others to take a place at my side with a pained grimace on his canine face as he works his tongue, still trying to shed the acidic taste from his mouth. Stroking a hand down his neck, I absentmindedly coax his beast into relaxing, using our connection to funnel a little energy his way in a bid to accelerate his healing abilities. It all comes far easier to me than ever before, like the last time Ash was involved and messing with my head. The more directly I focus on a problem, the more the answer eludes me, but my subconscious is able to work ten steps ahead while I try to catch up.
Ash’s shadow puppets turn on each other, beheading and setting some of them ablaze in a smoky imitation of being burned alive. “But in true human fashion, they couldn’t stand the thought of anything kicking them off the top of the food chain. History may be written by the victor, but you’ve seen for yourself that they weren’t ashamed of the horrors they committed. Not once have they attempted to hide what they did to those they dubbed witches, werewolves, or the monsters that go bump in the night, nor a plethora of the crimes committed against their own kind. Humans revel in their brutality, sing songs of the slaughters they orchestrated as if they were something to be proud of, yet claimusto be monsters.”
His gaze skips to a point over my shoulder. “Care to weigh in, Xander? Or would you rather I be the one to tell your son what other secrets his father kept from him?”
I don’t turn, unwilling to tear my eyes off of Ash, to give him an opening. With a warning sound, Damian spits, “Of course he wouldn’t tell me about what he did for Sabrina. He was keeping her safe and away fromyou.”
“The Nightmares came first,” Xander whispers, and all of Damian’s vehement protests shrivel up and die a swift death on his tongue. “The original demons, those of us that could really see people for who and what they were. We have an innate ability to become exactly what someone desires or fears, wringing out maximum suffering to devastate them in a bid to take as much agony from their shoulders in one fell swoop as possible. And naturally, they painted us as the demons that plagued them, the beings that caused their suffering instead of alleviating it.”
Damian’s voice is little more than gravel. “How do you know that? Why have you never said anything?”
Forcing myself not to look, I keep my gaze locked on Ash, unwilling to give him my back. But I grip Damian’s wrist tight enough that my nails dig into his skin, reminding him to stay with me in the here and now, to not let Ash win when he’s clearly trying to throw Damian off balance by pitting the two of them against each other.
A rush of wild energy whips around us as Xander loses his grip on restraining it, but it’s nothing compared to the onslaught from Ash when he dropped his mask. “How could I tell you stories about demons running around and not make it sound like a fairytale? Of the humans who attacked us, murdered my friends and family after all we’d done to help them, and have you not think that I was completely insane?” he croaks. “It sounds delusional even to me, and I wasthere!”
A few seconds pass before he adds, “Or to tell you how I failed. My one purpose was to keep the darkness that consumes the humans in check, but they didn’twantto be saved. They wanted to be angry, to lash out at everything like it would ease the ache we couldn’t ever fully eradicate. Sins, Chameleons, Elementals, or any of the other demons they came across, it didn’t matter to them that they had no part in managing the humans. Whatever breed of demon the humans came across was cut down without mercy, convincing themselves that if we were purged from existence, they’d finally have peace despite being the ones always seeking out war. We existed to be their balance, so when they went to one extreme, we were forced to become the other.”
Releasing a shaky breath, he whispers, “How could I look you in the face and admit that I was the same kind of monster as the one that was tormenting you? That I knew, and couldn’t stop it because while I hate how Acheron went about things, he wasn’t exactly... wrong.”
Running my hand along Bo’s side as a deadly rumble escapes him, I remind myself that this is all a story, that it isn’t necessarily true. But it’s difficult to hold onto that knowledge when they speak with such conviction, and honestly... are making a lot of sense.
It’s almost impossible to keep my eyes open in the face of Xander’s pained voice, but with Ash’s attention completely rapt on my face, assessing me, I can’t afford to show that he’s getting the reaction he wants. “How could I tell you that you were stronger than those around you not because I taught you certain skills sooner, but because you’re the son of one of the last original Nightmares, when everyone else alive today are ghosts of who they should be?” he demands, and at that, I finally break, eyes closing with my heavy exhale.
‘A different mark for a different kind of alpha.’And if Damian is one, so is...
