Page 1 of The Demon Court

ChapterOne

There ought to be tears when plotting a man’s demise. Or at least hushed whispers, quiet chambers, and secretive movements. Not the strange mixture of laughter and smiles that surrounded Selene.

But maybe this was different. They weren’t plotting to just kill him, after all.

They were going to make his life miserable as well.

Idle chatter and the hushed whisper of sorceresses mingled in the air. She could pick out each voice by name. Minerva, Sibyl, Ursula, Bathilda. Mother, sister, cousin, friend. Not by blood, no self-respecting sorceress would ever have a child of her own womb, but by circumstance and necessity.

They moved around her like the undulating waves of the sea. They crested, hands rising as they wove a spell around her, then broke at the floor where they carved runes into the cold stones with knives usually used for sacrifice. Today, they were sacrificing for her.

Selene had never thought this day would come. A foundling like herself, trained to be a sorceress but not yet welcomed into the fold, was never given an important task. But she’d been born for this. Molded and shaped since the day she was left shrieking at the front door. Her mother had known what a rarity they had been given, and what opportunity they would use her for.

Today, she would tempt a demon king, and then she would bring him to his knees.

Wind whistled through her dark hair. The columns at the peak of the Tower only funneled the bitter cold ever closer. And it was always cold, this high in the mountains. The home of the sorceresses, the Tower of Silver Thread. Home to the Eternal Sisters, Wives of the Night Sky.

The white marble floor reflected the cold light of the sun, which even here cast no heat upon their home. Seven women surrounded her, for seven was the number of sorceresses. Each had their part to play in this spell that would weave her to them. Together, they would cleave Selene to her purpose forever more.

Why had she agreed to this? Because she wanted to finally be part of a family that she’d always looked at from the outside. If she succeeded, they would take her as their own. As she had dreamt of since the moment she’d been born.

The first workings of the spell thrummed through the air. She heard it, the whisper sound of a violin in the distance, screeching like a woman’s scream. The spell suddenly fractured around her. Silver threads hanging in the air, suspended for her to see all the fine points of their unbreakable spell, like a spider’s web woven only for her.

“Daughter,” her mother said. Minerva’s voice had deepened through years of smoke inhalation and prophecy seeking. The wind whipped around her, hugging close to her body and crackling with energy. That was Minerva’s special talent.

As they all had a special talent.

Selene ducked her head, avoiding eye contact with the High Sorceress as she approached. In this moment, the woman before her was not her mother. There was no softness to her. No kindness in those features at all.

“You were delivered unto us as a gift. You will stand beside the Beast and you will bend him to our will. Too long has this land suffered without the hand of a sorceress plucking at the strings of life. You will be the first act in our battle to take back our land.”

The first act, but not the last.

“I accept,” Selene said. Her own voice had yet to suffer from the terrible misuse of spell work. Someday she would sit in that smoke filled room, chanting with her sisters as she sought her own future. But not yet.

“You will tempt him,” the High Sorceress’s voice weaved around her. The spell warped as she spoke, drawing closer and closer to Selene. “You will make him believe he has found a rare rose while you set roots throughout his kingdom. Every movement you make, every word you say, it will draw him to you. Like a moth to a flame.”

The other sorceresses repeated her words. The spell flexed again, and then it was upon her.

Selene gasped. She’d felt the touch of magic before, but never like this. It was sticky and warm, clinging to her skin like the web it was meant to be. She didn’t mean to touch it. It was a reaction her body could not prevent. One moment, she felt it touch her and the next, her pinky finger just barely brushed against it.

She didn’t think anyone even noticed she’d touch it, but Selene did. She felt the tiniest of rips. One thread of that spell had stuck to her hand and when she jerked to remove that touch, it... loosened. Snapped. Gaped a little and only she knew that there was a hole there.

A weakness.

Selene opened her mouth to tell her mother they needed to do it again, but then pain struck her to her knees. Gasping through it, Selene reached for the High Priestess. One hand outstretched, her fingers curled into pained claws.

No one would help her. They all stared, eyes burning with glee, happy to see the pain settle into her because that meant they had done the spell correctly. It should hurt. Magic always did.

The sizzling ache curled up her body like she was being burned alive. It hissed through her mouth, singed her torso and seared her lips. Only to rest at the base of her neck, where spine met skull. A symbol would remain there, she knew. A symbol that only other sorceresses could read.

Cursed.

Hunted.

Burdened with purpose.

On her knees before her sisters and mother, she took a deep breath and then staggered to her feet.There is no room for weakness here, her mother’s voice whispered in her ear. A memory from long ago but never forgotten.

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