Calladia covered his hands on her chest with hers. She swallowed, feeling the giddy lure of the cliff edge. This time, she jumped. “I want this,” she said. “I want you.”
The grin that lit up Astaroth’s face was a wonder to behold. “Then take whatever you want. It’s yours.”
And Calladia did.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Is that it?” Astaroth asked skeptically. A red door was positioned between two trees a short distance away, but no accompanying structure could be seen. “Bit dodgy.”
“Probably a concealment spell.” Next to him, Calladia was winding yarn around her knuckles, setting a base pattern for whatever defensive or offensive spell she wanted to be ready to use. There were shadows beneath her eyes—a night of marathon sex would do that—but she had been smiling and relaxed all morning, and Astaroth had been staring at her like a besotted swain since she’d woken up.
Since before that, actually. He’d woken early and spent long, drowsy moments admiring her. She’d been curled up facing him, fists balled under her chin and lips parted around soft breaths. An unbearably tender feeling had swelled beneath his rib cage, yet more evidence of what he’d acknowledged the night before.
He had fallen in love with Calladia.
It was a seismic shift in his worldview, and he wondered if he would have been open to the possibility if he hadn’t had his brains scrambled and his memory erased. His past was still jumbled, but the present felt so vividly intense that Astaroth couldn’t comprehend how he’d hidden his human emotions for so long.
He was starting to wonder why he’d hidden them for so long.
There were practical reasons, of course. If he didn’t remember joining the demon high council, he at least remembered the bite of unbridled ambition in his youth. Lilith, too, had encouraged him to mask his feelings to avoid being punished for his genetics while he sought power. He’d attained heights few demons dared aspire to, and he’d done all that despite the human tendencies that might make him a less ruthless competitor.
But the memories Astaroth had now, scattered as they were, were largely limited to his time with humans. If ambition had been the sum of his existence, why couldn’t he remember serving on the demon council?
Maybe living on Earth had given him an outlet to explore humanity. And Calladia, with all her fire and foibles, was humanity in its most tantalizing form.
“So,” she said, squaring her shoulders as she faced the door. “What now?”
“I advise knocking for the initial approach,” he said. “Unless you’re desperate to kick it in.”
She gave him a faux-chiding look. “You’re no fun.”
“That’s not what you said last night.”
To his delight, she looked flustered at the reminder. “I suppose you have your moments,” she said, eyes flicking to his crotch. Then she marched up to the door and rapped on it.
Astaroth followed, adjusting his grip on a branch he’d picked up during the hike. It was sword-length and fairly straight, and it was better than nothing should the witch prove dangerous.
The door creaked open, revealing . . . darkness. “Who goes there?” a female voice called.
“My name’s Calladia, and this here is Astaroth,” Calladia said. “We’re looking for Isobel.”
“I’m Isobel. And did you say Astaroth? As in the demon?” A hand curved around the door, pulling it wider, and a witch stepped into view. She wore a long blue dress belted with a silver chain and had straight black hair, pointed ears that indicated mixed heritage, and dark, fathomless eyes. Her silver necklace held an odd pendant: a filigree cage with something blue inside.
Astaroth felt a strange sense of déjà vu. “One and the same,” he said. “Have we met?”
The witch looked him up and down. “You’re quite the notorious figure.” Her lilting accent was unidentifiable in the way many immortal accents were, heavy with the weight of varied places and times. If what Alzapraz claimed was true, Isobel had mastered life magic to the point of extending her life span indefinitely.
“Alzapraz sent us in your direction,” Calladia said. “He says you can help with memory issues and possibly restoring immortality.”
“That old warlock is still causing mischief, hmm?” Isobel pulled the door all the way open and beckoned them inside. “Come, have a cup of tea and tell me what you seek.”
She waved a hand and whispered something, and torches flared to life, revealing stone walls and a flagstone floor topped with woven rugs. The furniture was heavy and Gothic-looking, herbs hung in bunches from the rafters, and a cauldron bubbled in the fireplace. At the back of the room were several closed doors, and a wrought-iron staircase wound up to the next story. A wall-mounted television was the only modern touch—it was paused on a scene that showed a group of people in yellow, red, and blue shirts pointing odd-looking guns at someone in a poorly constructed dragon costume.