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The teal spiderwebs disappeared, the throne shutting once again. The red light disappeared, and most of the humans were now gone.
One of them, however, wasted no time to break free of the sirens and run toward Henrik.
“What’s happening to him?” Adrian yelled, just as two sirens pulled him back.
Adrian…was still alive?
Jacques put up a hand to signal Adrian to stay. “Don’t come closer!”
“Answer me!” Adrian screamed.
I came to my feet, shaking as I tried to run forward to meet them. I couldn’t make it, my feet folding beneath me. I hit the ground, body shaking.
“Are you all right, Esmeralda?” Luc asked, coming up behind me and taking my arm. “Are you hurt?”
I gripped on to the top of his robe. “What’s happened? Why is Henrik wrapped in black light?”
Luc huffed as he looked over his shoulder.
“Luc?”
“He can’t be sentenced,” Luc answered. “We can’t sentence those who have lost control of their souls.”
The words didn’t make any sense. “What are you saying?”
Luc clenched his jaw and released it before answering.
“Henrik has lost his humanity,” Luc said. “He’s demon possessed.”
CHAPTER 34—HELPERS
“This is unfortunate,” King Melchior said, leaning his chin on his hand as he sat on his throne.
Luc and I, as well as Jacques and one of the other Judges, had been called to the throne room after the trials to discuss Henrik’s fate. Adrian and the remaining guiltless crew had been released, free to return home by the ship they had been brought in with.
Once they left the den, Luc told me, the entire crew would forget everything that had happened here.
Did that mean that they would forget me? Or Luc? Or about the Eros entirely? I didn’t know. Luc refused to answer when I asked, which definitely meant I wouldn’t like the answer in one way or another.
Regrettably, I wasn’t able to speak to Adrian or Henrik in the chaos. Henrik had been taken by the Judges and other sirens before I could even get close to him, and Adrian had followed them. The king had dismissed everyone else in the court immediately to attend to the situation, and then after some time, he called everyone into a meeting to discuss the next step.
I wrung my hands together.
“Increase the guards around the throne room,” King Melchior ordered Hugo. “As well as the hallways. Put the sirens on emergency shifts until we can extract the demon from the boy.”
“How could we not see that Henrik was demon possessed?” I asked. “Shouldn’t it have been obvious?”
Jacques shook his head. “Demon possession is rare, for starters. Only a small percentage of those who deal with the dark arts get possessed. The host—in this case, Henrik—has to be weak and vulnerable for the possession. That’s why demons usually go after children, not adults.”
Jacques’s eyes dimmed for a moment. He blinked before I could catch the meaning of it.
“The pure sirens knew,” Luc said. “When the spiritual world was reconnected, they called for demon blood. As an incarnate, I thought they were talking about evil humans. It never even occurred to me that one of the crew members was possessed.”
“It’s quite impossible to tell,” the king assured Luc. “It isn’t until they get close to the Eros that their greed takes over.”
“The demons start to slip up and show themselves,” Jacques said. “You said that Henrik resisted your charmspeak, correct?”
Luc nodded.
