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I offer him the barest of head shakes and confess, “I love you, Neo. But I am not your servant. I vowed on our wedding night to be your Ezer, your equal, your shield. Side by side, we face our battles together. The warrioress of light to your Dragon.”
When all his muscles flex behind me, and he cups my breast, I whimper to the Halo warmth radiating from my chest down to my core. My body always responds to his touch.
“I am bone of your bone, flesh of your flesh, and now blood of your blood. Three in one, Neo.” I turn my chin as much as possible to study him out of the corner of my eye, unsurprised to discover his black-fattened pupils. “I can’t exist on my knees,” I breathe against his jaw, close my eyes in a gasp at how he rubs the calloused pad of his thumb over my nipple pebbling through the paint.
“And yet,youdisappeared on our wedding night,” he snarls low in my ear, nipping its base. “Youtook my mind.Youstole the heart right out of my chest and left me bleeding. And the only reason I came back was because Lux found me after she’d climbed out of the Chasm and into my Tower. She used her halo to bless me with a new heart. So, tell me, Elysia, why should I believe a fucking word you say when all you are is a tempting mask who wears Death’s mark?”
Gold-specked tears glisten from my eyes. How can I possibly reach him? I won’t appeal to him by indicating she could be a liar. Not when she wears an angel face, swaddled in silvery skin that is marked all over with myNoralice…
Suddenly, Neo pauses mid-stroke, every muscle thickening. His shades reinforce around my throat and chest to squeeze. I narrow my eyes, confused. “What did you just say?” Before I can recover, Neo mounts me and thrusts my arms above my head. “What thefuckdid you just say?”
“Neo!” I cry, whipping my head to the side, eyes canting to where he seizes my wrists. “You’re hurting me!” Fear paralyzes me. Too spent to do more than nip at his shades with my Halo dust, I have no defense against Destruction…except perhaps, Death.
“Neo!” In the most bizarre twist of fate, Lux’s shimmery voice and her faux halo light settling upon him become my salvation. “Let her go.”
Fury swarms through his nostrils. After eyeing me for one long moment, he pushes on me, shoving me harder. Fingers clawing at my throat, I suck deep breaths as he stands, then bows his head to his first wife. Envy colors my cheeks red. She cups the side of his face while he traces his fang mark before studying the hundred-bite roadmap on her flesh.Myinvisible roadmap. The best deceptions are woven with kernels of truth.
After his mouth folds hers back in a deep kiss, he swivels his head to me, his eyes like dark ravagers. “She had no right to take that from you.” Of course, Lux has already shared my stolen history with him.
“And yet, everyone needs grace…even those who have fallen so far from it.” Oh, her audacity! I shift, so my back is turned from them, wishing I could stuff my ears and block the sound of her advocating for me, “Elysia is a Princess, Neo. Let us not forget how you destroyed her home and her father. Or how her mother is but a puppet for your Father. It’s little wonder she sought vengeance, especially when her ultimate quest is the packaged deal of demise for you and your Father.”
It’s a sharp stab to my gut, and I hold my ailing stomach. Lux has just checked me. I still can’t fathom if she’s simply a twisted machination of the Father or if her story is true. Did she come out of the Chasm? If I want to give Neo a new heart and recreate our bond, which is the key, then I have to know who I’m dealing with. Between her and the ever-preying Scourge looming into Tenth Court territory and the double-sided coin of dealing with Thanatos, the non-venomous serpents are slithering closer to my heart. Closer when Lux crawls into the bed alongside me after Neo departs to clean up the mess I left in his Court.
I consider the tragic paradox of it all and turn over so I may face Lux. Smiling, she reaches to finger a few of my curls, rubbing the gold threads woven into the dark strands. Her gold irises are nothing like the splendor of Thanatos. His are constellations while hers are witch light burning a hole straight through my chest. Ice shoots up my spine.
“You don’t know how we first met, do you?” Lux combs my hair back onto my shoulder. I clamp my mouth shut, eyes narrowing, discerning for any lie in her silver-lilt speech. “I was a child crusader, Elysia. Yes, I was deceived as many children were by such horrid race-culling beliefs. I bore a cross and banner and followed Nicholas of Cologne over the Alps, seeking the holy land. Someday, perhaps I will share with you what happened to me during those years—such as my hundred bites—just as I have with him.”
I grit my teeth, noticing how luminous smoke crawls off my skin, but I lock my flames in a cage, so I can listen to the rest of her history.
She taps her nose against mine, and I cringe, belly roiling with scornful heat at her invasiveness, at the way she lulls me, “But while so many lives were lost, I was the one child who finally arrived in Jerusalem. I joined the Knights Templar.”
Oh, heavens The Knights Templar!
“I was a protector of the Grail. And Neo was my greatest foe.” She smiles and fingers the Grail ring at my neck. “After I was reincarnated, I couldn’t believe he’d given this to you. You must understand…mine and Neo’s rivalry went on for months. Back then, his Father had tasked him to seek the Grail instead of the Everblood for a time. So, I would run from the Prince for days with the Grail, hiding with vampire Templar families who kept me safe, much like your Underground. He would catch me, we would fight, we would spar, and then…he’d protect me.”
She touches her knuckles to my cheek as if reminding me of that familiar battleground. I freeze. Holy fuck, she’s good. No wonder Neo fell in love with me. For all I know, Lux could be my foremother.
Lux smiles and rubs her finger along my painted bodice where my heart beats. I stiffen, pinching my lips, but don’t interrupt. “Over time, we discovered that we shared far more in common than we realized. Yes, he and his brother were still fused, but their history kept ripping them apart. Neo had grown to hate his Father more over the centuries. Not Thanatos, who still sought his favor.” She wrinkles her nose in disgust, her gold carousel eyes riding mine, mirroring her circling finger, which travels down to smear the paint around my breasts. Her pale fingers are too foreign—like flaming rods, preparing to brand me. All I want to do is lean away and scramble out of the sheets, but I force myself to swallow the knot in my throat and endure.
“Only I knew that side of the Prince of Destruction that no one else had. Enough for him to trust me, to show me the Altar. Oh, that night was glorious, Elysia!” She fawns, pressing her hand down over my heart, overlapping my wedding ring. “We shared our trauma. And I captured a dragon.” Her eyes glint while mine are ready to combust. So much of me wants to burn every sterling strand on her body. “After we shared our love, we made a choice. We made a blood oath. We vowed to hide the Grail from his Father. So, if it took centuries for the Everblood to arise, then at least the Father wouldn’t be able to find the Grail. Webrokethe Grail!”
When Lux squeals and thumbs my ring, the Grail piece at my chest feels like a molten poker against my skin. I hold my breath, so ready for flight when the silvery strumpet’s fingers cross to forbidden territory, and she taps her fingernail three times around each nipple, counting, “One, two, three, four, five, six pieces. Neo melted down one piece and made it into a ring…for me. And I for him.” She wags the ring at my chest. “When the Father discovered Neo’s betrayal, he forced Neo to destroy me, and Thanatos reaped my soul and claimed it for his own. I guess the Prince of Death wanted to claim my afterlife as a trophy against Neo. So, now you know, Elysia. All my history, my trauma, my sins laid upon your Everblood altar.”
Lux cups my cheeks and touches her lips to mine. My chest tightens like a bowstring, and I clench my jaw so hard, it aches. She tastes like sin and suffering. She tastes like sulfur from the Chasm. She tastes like…destruction. Every part of her is a live wire with lightning tendrils branching from her angel-white skin. Oh, how Neo must love that, I glower. My Halo itself short-circuits before her as if she’s a scourge in my blood, blazing right through mine and Neo’s oath with her poison.
Suddenly, Lux nips my bottom lip, her teeth like fangs sinking in as she purrs in a low threat. “Now, who do you think Neo truly believes is here to kill his Father and bring his salvation? The reincarnated soul of a Knight who was the Prince’s greatest foe and lover? The one who helped him split the very Grail and hide it from his Father before he was forced to destroy her? Or a raging feminist with a smart mouth and the daughter of the Phoenix Queen who killed the Prince’s brother? Neo knows you’re only here to finish what your mother began.”
Lux shatters the dam that has held back all my tears. I start to crumple into an Elysia-shaped ball, wishing I could fold in on myself until there’s nothing left but the Halo the Goddess should take back. I’m not strong enough for this. My breaths turn to shreds as a hollowness settles inside me.
Wrestling with Neo’s patriarchal positions is one thing. Thanatos’ with his Death secrets is another. But Lux is like the soul of ten thousand child crusader ghosts haunting me with her heart’s fire.
“Now, perhaps if you show yourself to be truly penitent…” Lux hints and begins to mount me, dominating me and moving against me, taking more of my breath. “Perhaps if you lay your Ezer down on his altar for even one night topleasehim, to please both of us…” A devilish grin spreads on her lips.
As soon as Lux cups my breasts, I scream to Thanatos,Noralice!
Lux’s lilting laughter becomes a kite tail fading behind me when the black hole cosmos of Thanatos’ Soul Plane sucks me into its quavering dark arms. Again, he catches me, harnesses my trauma, and wraps cold shades and frost around my body. He holds me until the shaking stops.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I sob into Thanatos’ shoulder, clinging to his robe, burrowing my fingers deeper.
