12. Deva

12

DEVA

“That is absolutely heartbreaking.” Briar’s voice was filled with so much sorrow that my eyes pricked. “Nothing I say can change what you went through, but I am so sorry you had to endure that.”

I’d taken the time to explain everything to the three of them, from the beginning to the present. I told them about my true heritage, my misconception and the lies told to me, how I’d been brought into Astaroth’s organization, and finally what had happened most recently—the whole dying thing—and our theories about my magic.

It was a lot of information, and I had found myself getting lost in the past, surrounded by words that while coming across as a story, were my truth. My past, present, and in many ways, my future.

“It’s hard to think about, but then I remember it brought me here. With all of you and the guys.” What happened to me had been horrific, but who I’d become as a person and where I found myself now weren’t things I could be regretful of.

Since arriving on campus, our time together had been shorter than I would have liked. If we did return to DIA, which was my sincere hope at the end of all this, I wanted a weekly girls’ night. It was hard to step away from spending time with the men I loved, but my friendship with the three of them filled up my cup in different ways.

“Well, once we defeat Astroth, you’ll finally get to relax,” Lavinia said, anger sparking in her gaze. “We’re going to demolish that piece of shit.”

“Bloodthirsty,” I teased as Odessa nodded in agreement.

“Anything you need, any way we can help, just say the word, Deva.” Odessa’s tone was solemn and serious, but it brought something to mind.

“I’m just so thankful that this entire thing didn’t make you…well, hate me.”

“Hate you?” Lavinia squeaked. “Because of the assassin element?”

“I mean, yeah.” I shrugged. I didn’t know how I was managing to have a relatively casual conversation about my very dark past, but apparently it was happening.

“Deva, anyone can see how horrible you feel about it,” Briar said, her brows furrowing.

“A choice isn’t a choice if your life’s on the line,” Odessa added. “Or brainwashed into believing something.”

“Or because you’re a literal child and know nothing else,” Lavinia finished.

“I know you’re right,” I said softly, “but I still appreciate it. I’m about to go into this meeting with the Society, and I’m not sure that everyone will feel similar.” Although this conversation had provided me with a strength I hadn’t realized I needed.

“I think you’ll be surprised.” Odessa stood up, offering me a hand. “Come on, let’s get you to that meeting. You’ve got this.”

Hopefully . I hopefully had this.

Taking her hand, I stood and pulled on a jacket, wrapping myself in Lazaro’s scent along with the oversized garment. Hopefully he wouldn’t mind that I stole it . My three friends were talking and slightly distracted as we walked out of the tent, something I was glad for. Otherwise, they probably would have noticed my hesitation.

Was I really brave enough to do this? To show my face in public with everyone out there knowing the truth? I’d kept the secret of the blood on my hands safeguarded for so long, the guilt rotting me from the inside. How could I expect others to accept it when I’d already condemned myself?

I had to be brave. In order to win this war, hundreds of people would have to be brave in the face of darkness, and it started with me. I couldn’t afford to falter.

Shielding my eyes from the bright morning light, I stepped out of the tent and into the camp. Although to call it a camp felt like a gross misrepresentation—it felt far more like a metropolis.

Our tent was near the center of the encampment, which was a large empty space with a bonfire roaring in the center. The tents in the innermost ring were reserved as meeting spaces or were for high-ranking Society officials. Past that were rows of smaller tents, people carrying both weapons and more domestic items like food and water as they moved about. I watched in awe as I realized that the Society of Shadows was more than just organized—they were a military group, and their training shone clear right now.

My eyes followed the plume of smoke from the bonfire as it rose into the sky, catching sight of the mountains in the distance. We were much closer to Astaroth than before—which meant that he absolutely had eyes on us.

We had to be careful.

“We need to have the meeting inside with as few people as possible,” I said to Grim, who stopped his conversation with one of Odessa’s men to listen. I briefly noticed that all four brothers were here with her—here to support the cause—and that Lavinia had two men with her as well, the three of them talking to Briar to the side of the larger group.

Grim examined my expression for a long moment and nodded. “We can go to the strategy tent. Come on, little jaguar.”

“I’ll see you guys later!” I called out to my friends, who waved back with encouraging smiles.

As we walked, Grim squeezed my hand. “How are you feeling about the conversation?”

“With the three of them?” I asked. Grim nodded. “Good. Really good. I’m not sure everyone will be as forgiving as they are, though.”

Before Grim could respond, a familiar feminine voice filled the air, ladened with so much enthusiasm it was like she was trying to prove my insecurities wrong.

“Deva, honey!” I grunted on impact as Cage’s mother, Idra, held me in a vise-like hug. I tried to hug her back, but my arms were pressed against my sides.

“Hi.”

“I’m so glad you’re okay.” She pulled back, holding my shoulders. “We were all so worried. So incredibly worried.”

Taking a moment to calm my racing heart, I stared up into her warm crimson eyes. A look of understanding filtering through them, Idra spoke quietly. “And you were worried too. I can tell.”

“I never wanted anyone to find out,” I admitted, glancing at the women Idra had arrived with, concerned that I’d find judgment in her expression.

“Astaroth thought he’d hurt you by revealing that piece of information. Alienate you.” Grim’s mother, Circe, all but shoved Grim aside to get next to Idra. Meeting her with a hug, I took a moment to soak in both of their open expressions. I didn’t see an ounce of mistrust or anger there.

“But that didn’t and won’t happen,” Idra said.

“We stand by our people, past be damned. We know you as a person now, and you’re a good person, Deva. A really good person.”

“I wish it had never happened though.” I swallowed.

“We can’t control the past,” Ketura—Lazaro’s mom—said. “You may be his daughter, but you are nothing like Astaroth. You sacrificed your own magic to ensure he wouldn’t gain more power, even as you faced death.”

“Thank you.” I offered a small smile, her words helping me to relax. If Ketura could keep an open mind, maybe, just maybe this wouldn’t be as catastrophic as I had assumed.

“As much as I love this reunion,” Cage said, breaking into the group, “I think we should get Deva inside. I don’t like all these bastards out here looking at her.”

“You mean your brothers?” Idra demanded incredulously, looking around to find the ‘bastards’ in question.

“Anyone who’s not the five of us.” Cage shrugged and tugged me against him. Over his shoulder I saw the four brothers I recognized, plus two others I didn’t know. It was insane to think that he had three other brothers as well.

“Deva, it’s good to see you awake.” Grim’s father, Phelan, motioned to the entrance of the tent. “Grim said you wanted to keep the meeting as small as possible. We’re all here.”

I nodded. “There’s no way Astaroth is this close and doesn’t have eyes and ears on us.”

Stepping into the tent, I instantly cataloged that Oz and Alek had made themselves at home, relaxing on a bench to the far left. Lazaro and his father, Hellebore, stood talking nearby, the second offering me a nod of greeting.

“There she is!” Cage’s father, Leandor, was the last to greet me as the room grew a bit louder, everyone trying to get settled. With all three sets of parents, my five men, as well as Professor Boneclaw—who slipped in at the last minute—I tried to not feel nervous about everything we were going to talk about. This was as small as the meeting could get, I knew that logically, but it still felt like too many eyes on me.

“Alright, here we are,” Circe announced from the center of the room. “Deva, we are so glad you’re safe.”

“Thank you,” I said sincerely. “Do you mind?” I asked, motioning to where she stood.

She looked momentarily surprised before saying, “Do not feel the need to explain yourself to us, Deva. We understand if you’d rather not.”

“I want to. I want to clear the air and explain it to everyone at once,” I said, and she nodded in understanding, going to sit by her husband. As much as I was dreading this discussion, I wanted to take control of it. We were at the point where we couldn’t afford to waste time or get distracted, both of which were easily possible when diving into the past.

“As all of you know by now, I’m more interconnected to this situation than I may have led you to believe,” I expressed, keeping my voice even and calm. “I grew up believing I was abandoned. I believed that the only person who cared about me, to any extent, was Astaroth.

“When he gave me the name Ayla, I was proud. I sought his approval in so many different situations and felt a sense of worth whenever I achieved it. When he congratulated me on killing. When he praised my skillset in the classroom and then on the field. When he used me as a success story for his rituals. I’d been proud of every single moment, because it was all I had.”

Inhaling, I closed my eyes for just a moment. “Even then I didn’t understand the need to kill unblessed witches, but I did it. I did it because I understood the not-so-veiled threat that came with not listening; I’d seen the children who disobeyed disappear. I did it because killing was all I knew how to do.

“But as I slowly came to terms with my life not being normal, I knew I needed to leave. So at sixteen I finally escaped into Carmina. For two years, I slept on the streets and stole to survive.” My gaze darted to Grimshaw. My last job—stealing from his estate—was now a fond memory. “But when I saw the chance to apply to Dark Imaginarium Academy, I immediately took it. I figured that if I was off the streets and protected, Astaroth would never find me. Because somehow I knew he was looking for me, even after two years.

“Unfortunately, going to DIA had the opposite effect, and as Kazimir would tell you—” I looked at my boys, pausing. “Have they met him?”

“Yes,” Lazaro said, so I continued.

“Astaroth immediately targeted me. Hurting those at DIA and within the sector was a means to cause chaos, but also to lure me out. He was successful, obviously, because here I am. We essentially walked right into his trap, even if it couldn’t hold me.” A smile crept onto my face at the thought. “I don’t think he’ll know what to do with the fact that I didn’t die…”

My thoughts strayed momentarily before I got back on track. “I don’t know why he’s decided now is the time for war. I don’t think it’s just me. After all, he decided to kill me easily enough. But I do know that if he’s gone this far, there is only one way to stop him. And that’s to kill him.”

Having said my piece, I gave Professor Boneclaw my attention. “I was hoping you could explain how I came back?” I’d shared every piece of information I had with this group; now it was my turn to be on the receiving end.

“Yes, I can help with that,” Boneclaw said, joining me in the center of the room. “Deva, good to see you alive .”

“Feeling less dead than I would have assumed,” I said, unable to help myself. His chuckle sort of made it worth it—he seemed like a tough cookie to make laugh.

“Right.” He nodded and looked toward the crowd. “When Alek and Deva came to the school, I began to look into the ritual they’d both undergone, never having seen power like theirs before. It takes a certain eye to notice, but the signs of having multiple magics were very apparent. Occasionally, their use of power would even highlight the runes under their skin. It was fascinating to me.

“When I heard Deva had been taken by Astaroth, I left my post at DIA to bring forth the information I had gathered so far—but before I could even do that, the runes on all five of them”—he looked toward my men—“appeared. It added to the mystery but confirmed the hypothesis I’d already been working on.”

I didn’t breathe as he continued.

“The rituals changed these two fundamentally. They took magic that wasn’t innate to them and embedded it in their skin.” He waved a book with scrolled text sunken into dark leather. “It killed them— several times over —each time being reborn into something new.”

“However, this process isn’t Astaroth’s invention. In fact, it’s rather old and more complicated than his version. Something he’s obviously unaware of, because in all technicality, each time the ritual was done, it was left incomplete.

“The process of this ritual has one end goal—and it’s not rebirth. No, the true end goal is for the owner of the magic to cast away all of their old power, making way for new magic to emerge from beneath—the magic forged through the ritual. But that can only happen when the old magic is pushed out completely.”

“We believe it’s a hybrid type of magic,” Oz said, adding to the conversation. “A mix of blessed magic and the ability to combine runes to create magic that has never been experienced or seen before.”

Boneclaw nodded. “It is extremely powerful, and Deva has officially awoken hers. When Astaroth tried to kill her and she sent her power to the five of them, it left her with nothing , and her true magic was able to make an appearance. Magic she’d been accumulating and growing for years, each ritual only making it more and more intense.”

“When she woke, she nearly brought the entire dungeon down on us,” Alek said, and I couldn’t help but smile at the pride in his voice.

“But why was she able to share it with them?” Hellebore asked, looking at my men. “I know they’re together, romantically, but for magic to transfer like that you usually need a familiar or forced blood pact bond.”

I was going to guess Lazaro’s father knew that because of how much they experimented with fucking magic. I nearly shook my head at that. I was well aware that despite being the ‘good’ guys in this situation, the group of people gathered here—myself included—were far from righteous. I wanted that to change, though. I wanted better for the Society of Shadows and Carmina.

Our pasts didn’t define us —which meant everyone could change, right?

“I have a theory about that,” I said to Hellebore, biting down on my lip. “I think it may be the moonstone. I have a piece of moonstone embedded in the center of my chest, and when I was using my magic on campus, it overloaded and some pieces broke off…and now they have it as well. I think it may act as a bonding agent between us.”

“Except that your heartbeat sounded around us before we received those pieces,” Grimshaw pointed out.

“I’m not sure. I suppose it doesn’t really matter…Professor Boneclaw, what you’re saying makes a lot of sense. Because even when I was ‘dead,’ I was in an unconscious realm where I could train and practice with runes.”

I could tell everyone in the room found that tidbit of information fascinating. That was all I was sharing about it, though—meeting my mother would remain a private moment.

“I…have a ton of magic now. Your sons are tied to me. And Astaroth is more powerful than ever.” I stated it bluntly, needing them to understand how dire this situation was—although it felt like they had a good handle. “We need to act fast because I can guarantee he is planning something.”

“Well, it’s a good thing we have something planned as well.” Grim’s father offered me a smile before standing and walking up to me. His hand on my shoulder was comforting as he spoke directly to me. “I couldn’t think of a better partner for my son.”

Oh.

“Thank you,” I whispered, going to sit by my men. A weight was lifted off my chest for so many reasons as I melted against Oz’s side.

As we began to talk about bringing Kazimir into the meeting along with Grim’s Aunt Edna for strategy, my heart stirred with the realization that I’d managed to find a true family. There was a long way to go, but their unconditional acceptance was something I had never experienced.

It was something I would defend with the same fervor with which I fought for those I loved. With every ounce of my being .