Page 19 of Realm of the Wicked

I stared at the row of blades. How could something so unsuspecting cause so much damage?

She waved her hand toward a set of ornate double doors, similar to the ones Damien had led me through the night before. ‘The dining room is through there. We eat dinner promptly at seven, and you’ll be expected to dress for it as well, I’d assume.’

‘Dinner?’ She had mentioned it previously, but in her whirlwind of information, I’d forgotten to bring it up again. The dining-room doors were carved with a depiction of the last supper, including a shadowy figure resting his hand on Judas’s shoulder.

Agatha nodded her head gravely. ‘Oh, yes. D can be a stickler for certain traditions, and dinner is certainly one of them. I tried getting out of it when I first arrived here, and that was the first and only time I tried to disagree about dinner.’ She hesitated, rolling her lip between her teeth. ‘Damien has a good heart, really, but it doesn’t change his role, Stella. He’s been in environments neither of us could ever imagine, and it’ll serve you well to keep that in mind, I think. His temper has a hairline trigger, at best.’

I met her concerned gray eyes. ‘He said something similar to me last night. Said he would never hurt me if he could help it, but I shouldn’t trust him either.’

Agatha nodded. ‘I’m not surprised.’

I waited for her to continue, to tell me more about Damien, but she was silent, looking at the looming dining table. It was already set for three, an overwhelmingly large table for so few people.

‘How long have you been here? You talk like you’ve known him forever.’

‘Oh, God, it’s got to be getting on… sixty years.’ She closed her eyes, counting quickly in her head. ‘Fifty-nine this year. Feels like a lot longer.’

It took everything in me for my mouth to not drop open at the number. The woman standing in front of me, with her bright hair streaked with gray tied up in a messy bun couldn’t have been more than early fifties at most, and that was probably pushing it. Her face was so youthful, glowing with life. So unless she’d been brought here as a child, which completely changed my current viewpoint of Damien, she was far older than she looked.

At my silence, Agatha turned and with one look at me, burst out laughing. ‘That should’ve come with a disclaimer. I’m sorry.’

‘No worries.’ Once more, I found myself very worried. What was happening inside this house?

‘Time passes differently here. I was fifty-one when Damien brought me here, and I’ve aged a bit, definitely a few more gray hairs, a couple more wrinkles, but nothing like what I should be doing.’ She pushed a stray hair away from her face, closing the door to the dining room and waving me forward. ‘The kitchen is just up here.’

The kitchen was easily the warmest room in the house, both in temperature and decoration. Agatha’s hand was apparent in the cheerful yellow walls, a color I couldn’t seem to picture Damien choosing. The white cupboards and countertops shone like they’d been recently scrubbed. She’d been here long enough to choose wall colors, and call Damien, D, and yet she didn’t seem like she was here by force. Agatha looked content, puttering around the kitchen, offering me fresh orange juice and a muffin loaded with blueberries.

She leaned against the countertop as I took a bite of the muffin, the gesture eerily mimicking Damien. ‘Go ahead and ask.’

I choked on my bite of muffin, a blueberry lodged in my throat. ‘Ask what?’

‘The question that’s so loud on your mind, you’re practically screaming it at me.’ Agatha’s smile was genuine, without an ounce of malice. ‘It’s okay. I’d be curious, too.’

‘Why are you here?’ I spun the small, blue plate in front of me around, watching my muffin spin with it. God, it was like she knew what I was thinking before I even said anything. Was this a common thing here, or was she just wiser than I imagined? ‘You don’t seem like a prisoner. And you said Damien brought you here, so you’re human. Or you were at some point.’

She nodded, taking the seat across the island from me. ‘No, I’m not a prisoner. I made some poor choices during my time on Earth. Choices I’ve long since atoned for, and chose to let go of. When Damien arrived in my room, I begged for a second chance. To be completely honest with you, I’m not sure why he agreed. Maybe I caught him when he was feeling extra lonely, or maybe he was already looking for an extra body around here. Whatever his reason was, he gave me a choice. An eternity in Hell, or a lifetime in his servitude. I chose the lesser of two evils.’

‘Must be nice. He didn’t give me a choice,’ I muttered.

‘Didn’t he?’ Agatha cocked her head to the side and looked over me. ‘I won’t pretend to understand everything, but I’m fairly certain you were given a choice, even if it wasn’t the one you hoped for.’

I sighed, looking out the large window. The tone of her voice said she understood far more than she was saying. I wondered how much Damien had told her about me. I could just make out the edges of an overgrown garden, tangled vines weaving themselves around wrought-iron fencing. ‘I guess in the technical sense, yes, I was given a choice. But I was led to believe it wasn’t a real choice.’

Agatha hummed, taking a sip of her water. ‘Stella, I don’t understand why Damien does half the things he does, but I’ll tell you this. He always has a good reason for his actions.’

I cut my gaze back to her. ‘Why am I here?’

‘That is a question for Damien.’ She shook her head, her face giving nothing away. ‘That’s not something I can or will answer.’

‘But you know something,’ I protested. ‘You must know something. All he would tell me is that he wanted me, so he took me.’

‘Maybe that’s all there is to it. Haven’t you ever wanted something, and wished you could just have it?’ Agatha shrugged, getting to her feet. ‘Would you like to see the gardens?’

I did. But my exasperation bubbled up quicker than my curiosity, a flash of irritation that no one could tell me exactly what my purpose was here. ‘Could you take me to Damien? I have some questions I need answered.’

This wasn’t Hell. But he was the Devil. We were still on Earth. Grace was safe. Damien won’t hurt me. The longer I spent inside the walls of the estate, the more my mantra didn’t feel enough.

I needed answers, if I was to remain here, and I needed them now.