CHAPTER 17
__________________
––––––––
He wasn’t the brightestmorning star—she was. Yet Lucifer was worshiped and Lilith forgotten, intentionally ignored when history had been written by men in a way that stole every glory from their female counterparts while repressing females as much as possible.
They feel threatened by us,a dark, lovely voice whispered to me.When we become too powerful, they can’t get a hard-on.
That’s not true with my demigods,I protested. They—they—
Yet you can’t remember their faces now,Lilith said. Her elegant hand brushed a wild strand of hair behind my ear.You’re growing weak, my Belle Celeste. Hell is sustaining you, but if you don’t know how to feed in this realm, you’ll become weaker.
She’d been the one who’d urged the angels to choose freedom and leave heaven’s gate. She’d led the fallen angels to war so they could all be free of those rules that bound their true natures.
She’d fallen first after they lost the war, and Lucifer had followed her. Together they’d founded a home—Hell—for all the fallen.
Hell wasn’t like heaven, and the fallen could no longer return to their former home.
They’d blamed her for the cost of freedom and punished her by erasing every record of her imprint and influence on history.
But mostly they’d done it because she was a powerful female.
As her daughter, I’d finally learned the truth.
“Mom,” I called.
She sat with me on a marble bench, waves of silver flames surrounding us, guarding us.
She didn’t look exactly like the Lilith whom Loki had shown me from his memories. She’d turned all silver. Her eyes sparkled with silvery light. A diamond crown rested on her silvery head between her beautiful silvery horns.
She smelled like a night rose that wasn’t from this world.
My mother was lethally beautiful.
She was no longer the Queen of Hell. She was now queen of everything and nothing.
“Look at you, you’re all grown up,” she said with approval, her cool hand cupping my face. “My daughter who carries my genetic imprint and my power and more.”
I wanted to lean into her touch, but I didn’t.
“I’m my own person. I’m Mari—”I stuttered. I was beginning to forget my former self.
She laughed musically. “Of course you are. We don’t have much time, dearest, and I don’t have enough power to come to you again. More importantly, we can’t let our enemies know we’ve reconnected.” Her expression turned lethal again, silver flame leaping in her eyes.
“Know what your enemies truly desire,” she said. “Lucifer longs to return to heaven more than anything. He wants to reclaim heaven and defeat his former brethren. Ares has always wanted to rule Mount Olympus. He has both a superiority and inferiority complex. He tried to overthrow his father and failed.”
“My existence rekindled their ambitions,” I said drily.
“They never give up their hunts,” Lilith said. “And they never forget a grudge. Use that against them.”
“Tell me how to defeat them without my Living Flame, mother.”
“Bring them to me,” she said with vicious, hungry delight.
A dozen ideas twirled in my mind, but nothing clicked.