Page 7 of Malice
“The horsemen. They’re not looking for their partner. They have found her and are with her right now. I made certain of it.”
“That’s a good thing, right? Means things are further along than we thought,” Asher asked, glancing between Hades and me.
“Yes and no,” I allowed.
“Is this about the child?” Remi asked.
My brows raised. Perhaps this wasn’t going to be as hopeless as I’d originally thought.
“You know the one from the Book of Ted?”
I scowled. So much for that theory. “You clearly don’t understand the book.”
“Yeah, well, that’s because it’s written in some ancient as fuck form of demonish. You try reading it,” Remi retorted.
“I don’t have to read it. I wrote the bloody thing.”
They stared at me as though I’d just whipped off my clothes and started prancing about like an elephant.
“And you couldn’t have mentioned this sooner?” Asher asked.
“No,” Drystan answered for me, challenge radiating through him.
“How did we misinterpret it?” Asher conceded.
“Lucifer isn’t looking for a child. He’s looking for Merri so that he may conceive one.”
“Fuck,” Hades muttered. “He’s going to use that sweet little succubus to make the antichrist.”
“The horsemen are currently trying to beat him to the punch and ensure her womb is already occupied.”
“How’s that supposed to work?” Hades asked. “Merri is a succubus, and succubi are notoriously infertile.”
I smirked. “Not if they’re bonded to their partners.”
“Bonded? Succubi don’t have bonds,” Hades said, his disbelief palpable.
“Don’t we? Just because it’s something you haven’t witnessed doesn’t mean it was never so. One could argue the lord of the underworld had never bound himself to another until Persephone.”
Hades made a sound somewhere between a huff and a snort. I’d take begrudging agreement over further protest.
“When you say bonded, do you mean like mated?” Asher asked.
I raised one shoulder in a shrug. “It’s complicated.”
Remi threw his hands in the air. “Of course it is. Why change things now?”
“Mate bonds are like a strike of lightning. Instantaneous and irrevocable. Even without a mating mark, the call to be together is stronger than anything else. For us, a bond is woven slowly, the threads creating a powerful connection over time. Fate is still at play, and a sense of...” I trailed off, waving my fingers through the air as I searched for an appropriate word, “magic.”
“Magic?”
I nodded. “Put simply, once a bond has started to form, it will not be denied. Not without great cost.”
“What do you mean, it won’t be denied?” Hades asked.
“Exactly that. It will force the issue if it feels it is being ignored.”
Remi cleared his throat, but Asher spoke first. “How?”
