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Faith. I had it in her. If I could get that back, I could get it all back.
I watched as Kelsey tried to pull the necklace off, but she seemed weak.
I hated seeing her weak. She’d likely felt like this when she’d seen me on the grass dying that day twelve years before. And she’d been strong enough to help bring me back.
You are weak. I’ll make you strong again. I’ll make you Profane again. You can leave all of this pain behind. Leave your name behind and simply be my enforcer.
No pain. No guilt.
No joy. No love.
No Casey or Kelsey.
I felt my finger move.
Why would he pick me if I was weak? What would the point be? He wouldn’t. If I was a weak witch, he would have killed me, rolled my head to the rebels, and moved on.
Instead, he’d made sure to mold me into a killing machine.
Because I was fucking strong.
Because I was Olivia Carey, and he had no power over me.
Like I was breaking through ice, I felt the spell crack around me, fissures forming and allowing me to move. Power. It was there. It had been for a long time, and he’d tapped into it, using me like a battery. What they’d told me so long ago had been true. My magic had come back, and it was mine, not some borrowed magic. It had been tainted and twisted with the demon blood until I didn’t recognize it, but now I did.
And that collar couldn’t hold me. Nothing could bind my magic.
It raced through me, a wave I didn’t bother to try to tame. I felt the collar break, felt the pulse of power, and then my muscles moved and I did what I’d intended to do when I portalled into this place. I stepped in front of my best friend and protected her. Like she would have protected me.
I let go of all the hate I’d held in my heart when I’d banished the warmth because it had been too hard to hold on to. I let myself be that soft, loving Olivia Carey I’d been and found the fierce warrior I’d become despite every single thing Myrddin had done to me.
I found the stream Mama Sloane was sending and plucked it from the air around me. The magic. I could see it, could feel it in a way I never had before. I was connected to it, and I could command it. I pulled on that thread and did exactly what that bitch wanted me to do. I pulled her out of time and space and gave her corporeal form.
She fell in front of me, but she no longer looked beautiful and young. Her slender form was gaunt and aged, her blonde hair a sickly gray and thin.
“Mother?”
I turned and Gray was helping Kelsey to her feet. Fenrir bounded over, placing himself between me and the witch on the ground.
It was a sweet gesture, but I didn’t need it. “Watch over your mom, Fen. I’ll handle this.”
“Yeah, you will.” Evan had a big grin on her face. “I’m pretty sure you broke Lucifer’s hold on all of us. And in his own freaking realm.”
“She did not.” Lucifer was scowling, but I noticed he’d dragged Lilith behind him. “She broke the wizard’s hold and set her own magic free. When it was apparent she was going to win, I let everyone go. I thought it was perhaps the old Lord Sloane. He might have been easier to work with than the child.”
I had some explaining to do, but not before I dealt with the problem at hand. “Gray, she’s your mom. What should I do with her? She was going to use the Eye of Night to displace Rain’s soul and take over the body. I believe she was trying to implicate Lilith in the attacks on both you and Kelsey so Lucifer would have no choice but to uphold his laws.”
“She wanted the Daybreak Kingdom, too,” Casey continued. He was standing near the wall. The insecure part of me would have said he was keeping his distance. But I was a different me, and I knew what my husband was doing. He was giving me space to work. He was trusting me to do this and do it right. “I suspect she would have later killed Gray and called it an accident. Then she would have held the keys to two kingdoms. She had to get rid of Lilith because of her powers. She’s the only one who would have been able to see what Gray’s mother had done.”
Because Lilith could read souls, and she would have known Rain wasn’t right.
“I deserve more than what I got, which was nothing,” Gray’s mother said, her lips thin and cracked. “I gave you a dark prophet, and all I got was a tiny room in a meaningless house.”
“Well, you are not being raped by a thousand demons,” Lucifer reasoned. “I mean I would think that was a positive, but if you’re unsatisfied with the experience, I’ll be forced to examine my methods. Another reward then. I’ll have you join the old Lord Sloane. What a match you were. He’s training young demons on how to torture a soul. Well, he’s being used to teach. I think you’ll like it.”
With a snap of his fingers, the woman was gone.
“All right then, we can return to the negotiations. Ms. Carey, I take back what I said. That was extremely impressive.” Lucifer looked me over. “No wonder the wizard wanted to use you.”
