Page 33 of The Coveted
I would not let Lucius make it to that point—when the parable became a prophecy—and he took the whole world to Hell with him.
“But we were just beginning to have such fun,” Sebastian said, his demeanor back to its usual joviality. His moment of understanding was merely a fleeting glimpse, never followed to its natural conclusion.
“I bet you were,” Lucius purred, his eyes shifting as a grin took shape. “I do remember how much you like a bit of fun, dear Sebastian.”
A moment passed between them, and I found myself wanting yet again to puke on Lucius’s black shoes. Even if I wasn’t madly in love with Daelon, I still wouldn’t touch Sebastian with a ten-foot pole. Taryn and her playful flirtations had a far better chance of bedding me.
“Áine,” Sebastian said, stepping toward me. His smile was shy now, but his eyes were still suggestive and brooding. “Before you go, I wanted to ask… would you let me accompany you to the ball? I want to be your first.”
I almost choked. Oh, god. “Um, sure. Yes,” I stuttered. “Sorry, I only learned about it today.” I bit my lip, trying to block out Lucius’s energy and sharp gaze.
Sebastian’s face lit up. “I’m sure any of the ladies will be more than willing to help you with preparations. Don’t let their jealousy get to you.” He winked. “Right, then, she’s all yours.”
“Indeed,” Lucius said, and my heart dropped.
Chapter11
As Lucius and I walked through the gardens, I realized just how much I’d been missing the outdoors. This land didn’t feel right, though. It felt just as energetically murky as human cities, but it was still better than the suffocating walls of the castle.
“Each day I allow you to breathe should feel like a blessing,” Lucius said beside me, and I stiffened at the severity of his tone. His stride was elegant but taut, his body far too close to mine. “I hope you keep that in mind as you get closer to the nobility.”
“Is this what you wanted to talk about?” I asked, crossing my arms. The blush-colored tulle of my skirt whipped around in the wind. “I do value my own life, you know.”
He eyed me sideways. His lips twitched with a dark grin. “I’m pleased you’ve at least come around to acknowledging the truth of your predicament. That your life is in my hands, and your power is dull and dim in the face of my own.” He stopped in front of a cherry blossom tree, which was in full bloom even though it was winter.
All of the gardens were enclosed by an invisible energy like a greenhouse. I felt the tree awaken and come alive with my gaze, its branches swinging lightly and reaching forward.
Lucius turned to me. Something strange flashed in his eyes. “Wouldn’t you agree?”
I unclenched my jaw. “Yes,” I forced out. I wasn’t in the mood for more asphyxiation.
“You remind me of my mother,” he said suddenly, staring back toward the blooming pink branches. “She was the same kind of weak and feeble-minded.”
I clenched my fists at my side, taking in a silent, deep breath. It would seem I had much to learn about this mysterious queen. “What happened to her?”
He turned to me, his eyes ablaze. “Watch yourself, little witch.” He clucked his tongue. “Or what happened to her will happen to you.”
I was going to assume she was part of the clearing away of the old to make room for the new. He was silent, still refusing to tell me why he pulled me away from Sebastian. “Okay, then. Why castles, and balls, and nobility? I gather you could have just as well implemented a modern dictatorship with mansions and galas instead…”
“What is modern? What is archaic?” he asked, spinning to face me again. For the first time ever in our conversation, his features and aura were not teeming with aggression or hostility. He suddenly appeared relatively normal and stable. On the outside at least.
I shrugged, still silently building up my defenses in case his mood shifted. “So you just like the… aesthetic?”
He paused, and the corners of his lips turned up. He mirrored my shrug. “I’m God. I can fashion this world exactly as I please.”
“And yet you didn’t mask yourself as a god when you first appeared to me. You chose to wear the skin of the Devil.”
He gestured for me to walk with him again, and the cobblestone pathways continued to prove uncomfortable for delicate, tall heels. A couple servants curtsied to us and then scurried away, refusing to meet our eyes.
“I’m not in the camp that ever saw Lucifer as the villain of that classic human myth,” Lucius said. “He was the only one who told Adam and Eve the truth. The god of the humans’ Bible commanded them to live naturally, naked and ignorant, content with living in a garden without questioning if there was another way. If there was anything more. Lucifer showed them how to truly be human, in all of its complexity. He was the bringer of light and truth. He freed them from the chains of weakness and subservience to a jealous god. You need not look further to see who the true villain of the story was than the way they were punished—for the actions that an all-knowing god, no doubt, already knew they would undertake. He punished them with suffering and banishment for gaining truth, and thus power, which put them a step closer to becoming gods themselves. If they had eaten from the Tree of Life, too, they would’ve gained immortality. Why would a true god put such trees in their garden if not to take and eat from?”
I didn’t recall hearing this version at Sunday School. But I was beginning to understand the myth he had concocted about himself and his Kingdom, and the way he justified his unnatural power and destruction. He saw the Universe’s cycle of give and take as a form of enslavement and ignorance imposed upon witches. By claiming more power than what had been given to him, severing the ties to this natural order, he saw himself as fulfilling the Universe’s—and his skewed understanding of the Christian God’s—greatest fears. He became a type of deity himself, in which power began and ended with him. But it didn’t actually begin with him. He gained his power through unnatural means, and it was my job to return it from whence it came… somehow.
“It is because of me that witches can now truly be free. No longer subservient to petty gods and frail goddesses. Maybe even you can claim such freedom, if you so choose. I have a feeling you will cling to ignorance until your final breath, however.”
I glanced at him, but his gaze was steadfast into the void—toward something I could not and would never see. I wanted to point out the inconsistencies in his particular brand of egotistical legitimacy myth, but I knew it would earn me a dose of pain. Which of course spelled pleasure for him.
I bit my tongue.
