Demon Marked

“I have a report that says a demon in Duluth almost ripped her apart while you waved a crossbow around. You didn’t even know who or what she was. A woman died for you, and yet when she returns from the dead as a demon, you don’t even question where she came from?”
    “He did.” Ash’s fingernails dug into his biceps, her eyes glowing. Suddenly fierce, defensive. “He was trying to help me find out who I am.”
    “Was he? It’s strange, though. That doesn’t fit what I know of him at all. Raised by a demon, bent on revenge.” Her head tilted as she studied him. “When you first met her, what did you think? That she was Madelyn, come to taunt you in Rachel’s form? Or maybe a demon who’d been plotting with Madelyn.”
    Jesus. Whoever her sources were, they’d informed her well. But that was no secret. Even Ash knew that. “Yes.”
    “And then you intended to kill her.”
    His heart thudded. He felt Ash’s fingers tighten, then her soft laugh. “No, he didn’t. I was too useful to him.”
    Lilith’s eyes narrowed. “Is that true, Nicholas? Say it.”
    God. What did it matter? “That was then,” he said.
    “So you did intend to.”
    Fuck. “Yes.”
    “Truth,” Hugh said.
    Ash’s breath stopped. Obviously shaken, she looked up at him.
    Nicholas shook his head. “I wouldn’t now. I’d die before hurting you now.”
    No pronouncement of truth came. Somehow, the silence seemed damning. He touched Ash’s face, her hair.
    “Not anymore,” he said, and didn’t look away until she nodded. He turned fierce eyes on Lilith. “What the fuck?”
    Her brows lifted. “I’m just trying to make sense of this. You didn’t know she was Rachel, but you offered to help her. But Ash says that it’s because she was useful. Useful for what? She doesn’t know anything, either.”
    “I didn’t know that.”
    Lilith looked at Ash. “You lied to him? There’s hope for you, then.”
    “She didn’t lie,” Nicholas said. “And I was using her to find Madelyn.”
    “Truth.”
    “Madelyn,” Lilith repeated. “Funny. You want to protect her, but you put her in the path of the demon who’s most likely the one she’s bound to obey. The demon who most likely intends to kill her in order to complete that spell.”
    Ash began shaking again. “Bound to her?”
    “Yes.” Lilith stepped closer, her voice softening. “I think you remember this, too—because Lucifer would need you to. Or Madelyn would have told you after the transformation. Did she bring you out of Hell? Was she the first person you remember?”
    “Yes.”
    “And you’re terrified of her now.”
    “Yes.” She pushed her face against Nicholas’s shoulder. Chest aching, he slid his hand into her hair, held her to him. “Yes.”
    “Because a part of you knows that if she speaks, you must obey. Any order she gives, you must carry through, or you’ll break your bargain with her . . . and return to the frozen field.”
    Ash cried out, and he felt tears against his skin. Hot, burning, but he remembered her fear of the cold, her terror of the memory that was lost to it. Now he knew. She’d been down there, suffering. Tormented in ice, eaten by dragons. And even though she couldn’t remember it, she carried that frozen field within her.
    “Stop,” he said hoarsely. “Stop what you’re doing to her.”
    Lilith’s gaze hardened when she looked at him. “That was Rachel, you realize. She and Madelyn probably had some kind of bargain. Don’t interfere between me and my son, something simple like that. Something she probably agreed to, not understanding exactly what it meant. Then she saved your life, and paid for it—with death, and then with torture.”
    And that was enough. He didn’t know what this woman was doing, but she wasn’t helping Ash or protecting her in any way. And trying to use Rachel to guilt him into giving Ash over to Guardians who’d promised to kill her if her existence proved too dangerous wouldn’t work. He wasn’t a Guardian. And he’d see the whole fucking world burn before he sacrificed her life for anyone else’s.
    “Lucifer took your powers,” he said. “But you’re still a demon.”
    “Truth,” Hugh said, this time with a hint of a smile.
    Lilith’s brows shot up. “And you’ve never been transformed, but you might as well be one, too. You brought Ash here, knowing that Madelyn would find you.”
    “You’re throwing shit out there. You don’t know that.”
    “But I think I do.