21. Madelyne

twenty-one

Madelyne

A pproximately a half hour later, we’re all clean and ready for dinner so once again I send the four of us to a new place with a thought. When we arrive in the dining room my mom and dad are already here looking sickeningly cute all wrapped around each other on one end of the table.

“Belz. You’re in my seat,” I huff.

“It’s not your seat anymore, Amica Mea .” He smirks at me. “The devil sits at the head of the table.”

Oh shit. That’s me. I sit in Luc’s seat now.

“I knew that.” I saunter to my new seat ignoring my mates’ laughter.

As I reach for the chair to pull it out, two sets of hands beat me to it. Zar and Zeph stand on either side, pulling my chair out for me.

Smiling at my thoughtful mates, I take the offered seat just as the doors open. My missing mate walks in with an agitated Geo in tow. The demon’s entire body is tense and his eyes dart around the room until they land on Reed. The second they do, his entire demeanor changes. His shoulders relax and his eyes darken at the sight of his mate.

A look at my bestie shows a similar reaction. Before Geo walked in, he was laughing at me and my mates but the atmosphere of the room shifted with his appearance. Reed’s cheeks pinken and he licks his lips as his mate strides to his side.

“Geo! Thank you for coming,” I greet him before my bestie could do something embarrassing like jump his bones in a room full of people. “Please, sit here.” I gesture to the seat on my left.

His eyes widen when I offer the seat directly next to me. “Yes, my- Maddy ,” he corrects himself before I can scold him again.

Reed’s eyes sparkle and his lips twitch as he follows his mate around the table and sits between him and my dad.

Oz stops by my seat to kiss me before taking the empty seat by Zeph, leaving one open seat for our last guest.

What’s taking him so long?

Just then, the doors open with a flourish and the ex-devil saunters in, breezily claiming his seat without a word.

Once everyone is seated it’s awkwardly quiet for a moment before Luc smirks at me across the table.

“Are we planning on eating at this family dinner?” he teases.

Oh, right. That’s another job for me, isn’t it?

Yes, Princess. Oz chuckles in my head.

How… Ummm how do I get the food to come out?

Luc always clapped twice to signal the staff. Belz reminds me.

I don’t want to do that. That seems so… rude .

How do you politely signal the staff to bring out the dishes? Zar looks at me with a raised brow.

I glare at all my mates. I don’t think I actually told the staff about this dinner. They probably don’t have dishes ready to serve anyway.

Masculine chuckles fill my head and I roll my eyes.

Assholes.

Whatever. I’ll just magic up some food. I don’t think Dad or Reed are ready for a feast of Hell food anyway.

All of my favorite foods from Earth and Hell fill the table and Reed gasps.

“Oh my god! That’s so cool !” he gushes. “Shit. Is that offensive?” His eyes widen as he looks around the table at the demons surrounding him.

Luc is the first to laugh. “Not at all. We’ve gotten used to it with Maddy here. Though, she has been using more Hell-friendly words lately.”

“ Hell-friendly . What’s that mean? You say devil instead of god?”

“Basically.” Luc shrugs with a laugh.

“But she’s the devil now, right? That would just be weird. I can’t do it. Sorry, Mads. I’m not changing. And if you ,” he turns to Geo, “ever say devil in bed, I’ll murder you where you stand… or lay.”

“Rest assured, the only name I’ll be saying is yours, sweet boy,” Geo responds in a husky tone that would make me blush if it were directed at me by one of my mates.

“Good.” Reed nods once as his formerly pink cheeks turn bright red.

“Okay. Can we not talk about your sex life at the dinner table?” I groan.

“Why? You’re the devil now so suddenly sex is inappropriate dinner talk?” my asshole best friend arches a brow at me.

“No. My parents and grandfather are at the table. That’s what makes sex inappropriate dinner conversation.” I scowl.

“Valid.” He shrugs.

Rolling my eyes, I address the rest of the table. “Well, let’s eat.”

Everyone digs in, passing platters around and filling their plates. Dad’s too busy making moon eyes at Mom to touch the food, so she puts some on his plate for him with a grin.

Reed gets passed the plate of foyiorin and looks at it in disgust.

“What the hell is this?”

I laugh at his reaction. “I know it looks super gross. But it’s actually really good. You’ll like it.”

He scrunches his nose but takes a small scoop of it before passing it to my dad, who blindly takes it and hands it to Mom.

“So, Madelyne. I’ve seen the aesthetic changes to the castle. Have you made any other changes yet?” Luc asks before taking a bite of his food. “Oh, this is good. What is it?”

Smiling at his reaction to my all time favorite food, I say, “Mac and cheese.”

“Why have we never had this before? This is human food?”

Laughing, I nod. “It is. We do some things right, especially when they involve cheese.”

“Mmmm, I’ll give you that.” He takes another big bite and moans.

When I don’t immediately pick the conversation back up, he waves his free hand at me.

“Oh. Right. Well, when I got called away yesterday, I did my first official soul sorting. Which turned into my first official torture room assignment. These two demons were arguing about the sin this soul should be assigned to so I took it from them. Turns out he was a competitive eater. I didn’t think he deserved to be tortured for all eternity because of that so I changed up his punishment.”

“Changed it how?” Oz asks.

Biting my lip, I explain about the nuns telling him to repent in the hopes he does and can leave Hell.

Luc smiles at me. “Good job, Neptis . I knew you would be a great ruler.”

“Well, that explains what happened in torture hall four.” Oz shakes his head.

“What do you mean?”

“This morning I felt something happening with the torture rooms. When I got there, I found every room in hall four was different. I was just in that hall last week, but today every room is different. Each room I went into had someone shouting at the soul to repent. Now I know why.”

“But I didn’t do that. I only did that to one room,” I argue.

“That’s all it takes, my dear,” Luc says. “The magic of Hell felt your intention and is changing to suit your wants, needs, and desires. Just like the changing of the crests and the decor. Hell is learning what you want and will change itself to accommodate you as its ruler.”

Holy shit . That’s crazy. Awesome. But crazy.

“So… How exactly did Mads become the ruler of Hell ?” Reed asks around a large mouthful of foyiorin.

Oh good, he did like it, maybe Reed can adapt to hell after all.

“It’s a long story, and to be honest, I’m not sure exactly how it happened, or rather why it happened now ,” I tell him.

“I know,” Luc says, putting his fork down. “Hell sensed I was no longer fit to rule. When I got back to my room that night after I slayed Bartlby for his crimes against the kingdom, I found a note on my coffee table. I had completely missed it in all the chaos over Snowball missing. Those… imbeciles had the balls to leave me a note admitting to their crimes,” he seethes. “When I read their words and thought about them killing my sweet Sera, I lost it. I flew into a rage, destroying everything in sight. It wasn’t until I reached the back of my closet where all of Sera’s belongings still were, that my anger turned to grief. After learning the details of her death, I just couldn’t take any more. I wanted to give up. To join my mate in whatever afterlife waits for us.”

“ Avus !” I gasp. At the same time mom says, “You wanted to kill yourself?”

He looks at us sadly. “I just want to be with my mate. Surely you two can understand that.”

Okay. I guess he’s got us there. But still.

“That’s no reason to give up on life,” Mom glares at him. “Even being separated from my mate for years, knowing, thinking ,” she corrects, “I’d never see him again, I never once considered suicide .”

“I never said I wanted to kill myself. I just want to be with my mate, same as you. Thanks to Maddy, I know I’m not alone anymore. I have three mates out there. And now that my connection to Hell has been cut, I can leave and find them.”

“When are you leaving?” I suck in a breath. I knew he would be. I guess I was just expecting it to be a little longer.

“Soon. Tonight, tomorrow… whenever you let me.” He shrugs.

“Whenever I let you? Like I’m going to stop you from finding your mates?” I gape at him.

“I didn’t think you would. But I know Hell is still new to you and being the devil is a big job. We haven’t gotten through half of the lessons I had for you. I’ll stay for as long as you need me, Neptis .”

“I’ll always need you, Avus . But your mates need you more. Go find them and be happy . If you ever need us , you know where to find us.”

“Thank you, Neptis . You’ll take care of Snow for me? She’s been acting… odd. I’m not sure if it’s the new mate or if it has something to do with what happened to me but please take care of her for me.”

“Of course.” I agree with a smile. “I think Killer would make good on his nickname if we didn’t and I will have Zar check on her as soon as possible.”

“Thank you Neptis . I trust that I am leaving her in the very best of hands.” Luc gets this far off look like he’s remembering a traumatic experience.

“Since we’re talking about leaving…” Mom hedges. “I can never thank you enough for bringing your father back to me, Madelyne. But Hell isn’t where we belong. I know Robert can stay thanks to your necklace, but…” She looks to my dad for encouragement and he smiles softly and nods his head. “We’d like to go back to Earth.”

“You want to leave me?” My body deflates as the air is stolen from my lungs.

I just got them both back and now they want to leave me again?

“Maddy, no ,” Dad says. “We love you more than anything. We never want to leave you. I’ve been sick with worry since you’ve been gone. To finally have you back, to know that you’re okay? That means everything to me. But your mother’s right. This is your home now. Not mine. We may live in alternate realms, but it’s not like we’ll never see each other again.”

“I can’t leave, Dad,” I sigh.

He looks around the table as if to confirm I’m not making this shit up. “Well, I can come to you then. I’ll always have this necklace, and your mom can bring us for visits. I just don’t think we’d be happy here long-term, sweetie.”

“I understand. It just sucks,” I mutter.

“We can always write, dear. I know Hell phones and Earth phones aren’t compatible. But even from Earth, I’ll have the power to send letters,” Mom assures me.

I wrestle with the feelings of abandonment welling up inside me.

We aren’t leaving Sweetheart. Zar sends me the first thought but he is immediately followed by resounding love and support from all of my mates.

Never, Angel, Zeph adds

They’d have to pry me off you with a crowbar, Princess. Oz chimes in.

“Let them go, Amica Mea. ” Belz says out loud as he reaches for my hand, giving it a squeeze. “They can come back and we can write. It will be okay.”

“Yeah, Mads, and bonus you have me! And Geo of course. We’ll be here.” Reed chimes in, finally breaking me out of my sadness.

It will be okay. I have my mates, I have my bestie, I can do this.

“They’re right, of course you can go back to earth, Mom. I only ever wanted for you both to be happy.” I raise my glass. “In that case I guess this is a celebration. A bon voyage party if you will. Let’s enjoy dinner and afterward I will send you all wherever you desire.”

Hours later after sending my parents back to my childhood home and sending my grandfather to Florida of all places, those of us remaining in Hell decide to retire to our rooms for the night.

“Goodnight, Reedy Bear, tomorrow we’ll figure out a way to keep you busy around here.” I squeeze Reed in a bear hug before moving to Geo. “Goodnight Geo, thank you for everything. Tomorrow morning I need you to report to Belz to get your new uniform and for you to be formally introduced to the team.”

“A new uniform?” Geo inquires.

“Of course, I have to have my ‘Queen’s Head Advisor' looking his best, don’t I?” Geo’s eyes turn into saucers and it’s the last thing I see before sending him and Reed back to their place in a cloud of black smoke.

Turning to my mates I wrap my arms around Belz and sigh before closing my eyes and sending us back to my quarters, only when I open my eyes I'm not in my quarters.

“These aren’t my quarters!” I utter in complete shock that my magic had done something wrong for the first time.

Belz chuckles. “Look closer Amica Mea, I think these are your quarters now.”

Looking around, I notice first that I’m in the section of the castle formerly known as Luc’s mansion, but not in Luc’s room. I’m in a new room, a room that is perfect for me, for us . Before I get the chance to fully look around and explore the newest addition to my magical castle I notice curled in the corner on top of an absolutely ridiculously large dog bed are my two favorite pups.

“There’s my sweet puppies!” I make my way over to where Fireball is protectively wrapped around Snow. “How are my goodest little puppy dogs tonight?”

Bending down to scritch their heads I see that Snow does in fact seem a little off.

“Zar, can you please come check on Snowball for me? Luc was right. I think something is wrong.” Panic creeps up on me now that I’m seeing her in person.

Zar comes closer and lays his hand on Snowball's head before he chuckles. “Nothing is wrong with her Sweetheart. Something is very right. She’s pregnant and if my magic is correct she is going to have 4 pups before too long.”

“Pregnant?” Zeph and Oz ask in unison

“I didn’t even know hellhounds could get pregnant,” Belz adds.

“Well they obviously can, because she is.” Zar snarks back at him.

“Alright, alright boys that's enough, Snowball is pregnant and needs her rest and I am absolutely exhausted. I think it’s bedtime.” With that I rise to my feet stripping off my clothes and crawling into my new much larger ‘made for 5 full grown demons sized’ bed and I think I’m asleep before my head even hits the pillow.