“I assure you if I get close enough, I can kill him,” Trent replied.
“Don’t even try. I’m not joking. I lived through a prophecy, and there was no getting around it. I firmly believe Myrddin’s wrong about his interpretation. Probably because he used that fucker Stewart as his focal point.” The magic Myrddin had worked wasn’t so much prophecy as seeing into the future. It was a form of clairvoyance that became prophecy once it was spoken aloud. And Myrddin was interpreting what he’d seen all kinds of wrong. “The prophecy concerning Dean and Lee talks about a weapon.”
“That’s what you want the primals to help with,” Trent deduced.
“I’ve already given the prophecy to Henri and Hugo.” I’d met with the academics the night before, and we’d talked about Marcus and everything that had happened. They would give me their thoughts when I returned to Frelsi. “I need the primals to look at it and see if they can figure out what this weapon is and where I should look for it. Now tell me what’s wrong with Gray.”
Trent growled but he turned toward me, laying his head down on my lap. He took a long breath through his nose as though surrounding himself with my scent, our mingled scents. They would form a blanket of comfort around him. “After we ran, he needed to stay away in order to avoid leading Myrddin’s forces to us. Like I said, he could protect your brothers. Both Nate and Jamie were willing to state they would stay out of the war.”
“We should bring them to Frelsi. Once Myrddin knows for sure we’re here, he’ll use my brothers as a way to draw me out.”
“No, he won’t. He can’t use them against you at all,” Trent said, his tone going grave.
“Why wouldn’t he…” The answer became crystal clear. “Tell me they didn’t sign a contract.”
“They didn’t.” The “they” portion was emphasized heavily.
The enormity of what had happened hit me. “Gray did.”
“It was already signed by the time I spoke to him again. Sasha had moved us to New Zealand, and we’d been there a couple of months before Gray returned to us. We had a pretty big fight, and one that I regret now. I didn’t realize how long it would be, how much this war would cost us. Deep down he did, though I understand he can’t see everything. He was playing a bit fast and loose by protecting your family, but I suppose putting himself on the line made it acceptable to whoever judges these things.”
Heaven. I was pretty sure it was Heaven who decided what a prophet—dark or light—got to do. No matter how much Hell likes to think of itself as this mighty, independent thing, I often wonder if they’re not merely a recalcitrant child who serves their father’s purpose. I wonder if Hell isn’t a necessary thing because all beings must find a balance between their light and dark, and sometimes that means punishment.
I often think if Heaven chose, Hell would cease to be.
Unless someone took that choice away. Unless someone wanted to cut out the dominant plane. To tell Mommy and Daddy we’re on our own now. That’s what Myrddin was attempting to do. He planned to close off the Earth and Hell planes from the Heavenly planes, and then no interference could harm his plans.
I wasn’t so sure about that, but I wasn’t about to test the theory.
I got the feeling I hadn’t heard the worst of it. I needed to know everything. “What all was part of this contract?”
Trent sighed and hugged me closer.
“Who is he working for?” I knew when one of my men didn’t want to talk about a specific thing, it was probably bad news.
The grim look on Trent’s face had me bracing myself for whatever he said next. “In order to protect your family, he has to descend at least once a month for a week of Earth plane time, and he must work as a focal point for Lucifer Morningstar. Sometimes it’s more than once a month, but never for more than a week.”
“I’m sorry, what?” Yep. It was bad.
“Don’t get upset with me. I didn’t sign that contract, Kelsey.”
“No, Gray did, and now he’s fucking working for Lucifer? Who thought that would go well?” I rolled out of bed and started looking for whatever clothes I had left.
Trent sat up, his gaze going stony. “Nicole was pregnant. Jamie had gotten her pregnant, and they’d just found out.”
“Well then Jamie should have protected her. He should have wrapped Nicole up and figured out where you were and hidden with you.” All I could think about was how nice and safe and happy Frelsi seemed to be.
“Kelsey, I couldn’t have handled them. And I wouldn’t even have known what to do with a bunch of humans on some of those planes we found ourselves on. Keeping Lee alive was hard enough. We didn’t have a home most of the time. I have no idea what we would have done with a human infant. Gray did the best he could. I know we think he knows everything, but he was as lost as I was when you were gone. He was trying to protect your family the best he could. And me. He knew if Myrddin put Jamie or Nate up for public execution, I would have come running. I would have done it for you. Gray made sure that didn’t happen. He made sure I could do the job I needed to do without worrying that I was letting you down.”
I shook my head because this whole situation was fucked up. “He’s working with Lucifer. With the literal devil himself, and you think I’m not let down?”
Trent’s eyes went steely. “I didn’t have a fucking say in that, Kelsey. Gray does what he thinks is right, and most of the time he doesn’t ask for my input. Do you think I wasn’t upset? He didn’t consult me or I would have told him we would find another way. But quite frankly, at the time I was dealing with traumatized children and the fact that I had no idea if my mate was alive or dead, and I was holding on by a fucking thread.”
I was handling this all wrong. I was losing my shit when Trent needed me to totally keep track of it. I took a long breath. “That is not a being I want in our lives. Lucifer Morningstar is as bad as it gets. I didn’t want Gray working for his father, much less for Lucifer. How much damage is already done? Fen won’t call him Papa.”
Trent stood, and I knew he was upset with me because he started to look for his clothes. “Fen sees the world in black and white. He doesn’t understand that Gray was trying to protect us all.”
I had to point out some truths to my mate. “There are bounties on the kids’ heads, so he didn’t do a good job of it.”