Page 32 of Sin of the Saints

We complete each other like puzzle pieces, one complementing the other. The damn bell rings wildly, stinging and torturous. As though reading my mind, Bar crushes the bell in his hand, relieving me somewhat of its weight and influence.

Good God, what’s happening here?First he manages to hurt me, now he’s released me of that damned bell.Where is this strength coming from?

The crumpled metal falls to the ground, and I ride the wave of the orgasm flowing through me with such pleasure that mywhole body trembles. Bar groans and spills himself inside me, climaxing with me in a harmony of animalistic, savage sounds.

I look at his eyes and see they’re blue as the sky I always imagined in Heaven. But I know we’re not in Heaven, everything around us is burning. We’ve brought ruin to the cabin and all the lands of Adam. And the person looking at me isn’t Bartimaeus, it’s the Devil himself, and we’re surrounded by the flames of the underworld.

Chapter Eighteen

Hillel

“Then theLordrained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from theLordout of heaven1.”

Lilith had developed an obsession over He who sat on high. It was the same obsession that had ultimately driven her to her doom. Her fury was the force that drove her, until all else around her vanished as far as she was concerned. Her offspring had sensed her rejection, and her lover had been filled with a sense of jealousy and wishes of vengeance.

“You’ve forgotten your place!” Hillel brings his wrath down upon Lilith. “You’ve neglected your obligations as mother and woman!”

“I’ve forgotten nothing.” She lowers her voice. “I am she who bearsHisdamned curse. I didn’t ask for any of it.”

“Shut that pit you call a mouth!” He makes fists of his hands and his veins threaten to burst.

“I’ll do no such thing. You have no power over me!” Her flames wildly rage around her.

He bursts into dark and malicious laughter. “It seems you’ve deceived me. Apparently,Heis the only one with power over you. You’ve never been able to break free ofHischains.”

“And you have?” Bitter laughter bursts from her. “You yearned to sit on high, but you plummeted down, right into the underworld. The only ones you rule are the damned souls you steal fromHim. Settling forHisleftovers!”

The sound of Hillel slapping Lilith casts a paralyzing silence around them.

Lilith exhales heavily, and the hatred within her wells up. She breathes flames at Hillel. The fire is her ally, the only one that hasn’t betrayed her yet. She surrounds Hillel and he retreats in terror. Lilith lunges at him, her talons razor-sharp blades as she slices up Hillel’s back.

“You’ll fly no longer, damned to this place you shall remain forever. If all you wish is to imprison me, I’ll punish you the same way! I’ll make this place your prison.” She spits on him as he lies in his own blood, then she fixes his white wings to her own back – at which point they instantly turn black as the tar that fills her heart. “I don’t need you anymore, Hillel,” she spits her harsh words at him. “You and your offspring will go no further. I refuse to bearHiscurse. And if you, or they, dare to bring more offspring into the world, I’ll destroy them myself.”

With these last words she abandons Hillel, leaving behind only heartbreak and the legacy of revenge.

In his heart Hillel swears that someday he will return to the lands of Adam, to drag her back with him to the only place she belongs: Hell, the place of the accursed.

Lilith sent her wrath into the righteous hearts of mankind, and achieved her goal. She brought Hell to Earth, turned the lands of Adam to a realm of sin with her own hands. And as shepredicted, God smote Sodom,Gomorrah and everything around them.

As soon as she had the upper hand, having fulfilled her heart’s desire, the rage in her cooled and emptiness consumed her. A bitter taste lingered in her mouth, she had no place left in the world. Not in the heavens, not in the abyss. There was no one left to hear her parting words before she dissolved into the shadows. She was unworthy. She would forever be banished, banished, banished.

“Lilith.” Her name leaves a sweet taste on my lips. It’s the name I bore as a prayer in the underworld, waiting until I was strong enough to break her curse and reincarnate in the realm of Man. And now, as my vessel is finally free of his stubbornness, I’ve managed to break free.

I open my eyes and see the full truth. Lilith is my truth. She’s my creed and my faith, and thanks to her my vision is clear.

I look at her beautiful face, but even the differences are so reminiscent of the image burned into my mind. Her black hair clings to her sweaty cheeks, her eyes are like two lost neon lightbulbs. Her parted lips are juicy and I’m almost tempted to fix my fangs in them.

“No!” she screams, squirming and fighting my grip, awakening me from the trance she’d caught me in. Damn it, she’s stubborn. I’m still sheathed inside her, and I have no intention of letting her flee from me again.

“Hear me, Lilith!”

“No!” she shouts, and the crimson aura around her stokes the flames, which have already burnt up the entire cabin.

The girl Lilith chose in her current incarnation is worthy of her, I can’t argue that, but it’s time to put an end to her misdeeds. Our offspring Ashmedai has lost control of things. And if I don’t protect her, she might discover that all her past incarnations were child’s play compared to what he’s planning for her if his designs succeed.

“Bar! Bar!” She keeps screaming his name, and jealousy burns within me. I gag her with one hand, using the other to thrust my erection into her as it stirs to life again. I’ve missed her, longed for this moment. I have no intention of apologizing for that.

“Shut your mouth for a moment—” I want to explain it all to her, to have an opportunity to defend myself, but she squirms so quickly that my hand slips from her mouth a bit, and her fangs pierce my skin as she bites down.

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