Page 107 of A Study of Blood and Ichor

I followed his slow, deep breaths, mimicking them until the pressure in my chest receded. Squeezing my eyes shut, I took one last shaky inhale before I re-opened them and stared at Vain. He was so close, and so unlike what I could have ever imagined.

“You’re…an archdemon.”

“Yes,” he said, as if it were the simplest answer in the world.

“Vain…”

“Is not my true name. It is the one I gave myself,” he said and laced the fingers of his other hand through mine. “I once told you that I am a demon of many names. But my first and true name given to me by my mother, is Vencula.”

A dizzying wave crashed into me, and I became breathless all over again.

Vain’s thumb swept over my cheek. “Breathe,” he said again, little more than a gentle whisper.

My lips parted before I quickly clamped them shut again. Every time I tried to force words past my lips, I ended up choking them back. “I have…so many questions.”

“Ask anything of me, my love. Anything, and I will answer it.”

A sob cracked through my chest. Without ever realizing it, whatever mark summoning Ghen all those years ago had left on my soul had only worked to break me down over time, whittling away at my self-worth and allowing every regret I harbored to tear me apart from the inside. He had taken so much from me. Not only Sascha, but now Rory too had become nothing but collateral in the archdemon’s devastating wake. And no matter which way I looked at it, I kept tracing every fault line back to me.

“He’s dead because of me.”

I tried to bury my face in my hands, but Vain’s grip was iron-clad. He tightened a fist at my nape, tugging at my hair to keep my head up, and the dull pain was a surprising distraction from the cleaving ache in my chest threatening to split me in two.

“None of this,” he said, “is your fault, Ava.” Vain sighed out through his nose, his gaze flickering briefly before coming back to mine. “My brother made a promise long ago that I would never know peace in this world or ours. We never quite saw eye to eye on many things, and our vehement dissension on mortal life proved to be the driving force of our division, one that devolved our bitter rivalry into that of all-out war.”

Vain’s hand tightened in mine, and I squeezed back. He paused, hesitating before he continued.

“When the first witches summoned us into this realm and we were met for the first time with mortal life—so fragile and precious—all Ghen could see was human weakness. A thing to exploit. He saw all mortals as beneath him, something to rule over and control. Whereas I could look at any human and see the vitality in them, their lust for life. Even all the heartache, all your wicked wants and desires. I saw your kind for what you are, fallible and imperfect creatures. And I celebrated it. To me, there is nothing more wondrous. Nothing as beautiful.”

The reverence in Vain’s voice was heady. He spoke about humanity with an almost breathless amazement, like we were something to be worshiped and cherished. Such an odd notion to hear come from the lips of an archdemon.

“When I took one of the first witches as my familiar, binding their soul to mine, Ghen decided my fascination with humankind was a weakness. He took it as a reprehensible offense against demonkind. But I was happy. My brother allowed my affections for my familiar to bloom into something so profound, so that when he did destroy the one thing that I had truly come to care for in my pitiful existence, he made sure it hurt me more than anything, to the point where it nearly destroyed me.”

I realized his hand in mine was shaking, so I steadied it by clasping my other palm on top of it.

“His greatest malefaction led us to war, one which my brother won. Ghen either thought me dead, or presumed he’d buried any hope of me resurfacing after my defeat. He’d broken me in more ways than I could have fathomed, and so I hid. I slipped into your realm and took a long series of mortal vessels to conceal my true form. I have lived thousands of lives, enough to last me for eternity. But I am done running.”

Vain's throat bobbed before his grip tightened in mine. “Now that whatever connection between you and Ghen has been severed, I will make sure he can never find you again, not even when he does eventually come crawling back through one of the rifts. I will never rest in order to keep you safe. That is my promise to you, Ava.”

There’d been a time once where I would have never believed a demon’s promise, not trusting it could be anything other than a lie or some sort of manipulation. But I’d been so wrong. When Vain looked at me, there was nothing but pure, unconditional devotion swimming in his eyes.

“Who else knew about you?” I asked.

“Only Alastair. But that is only because the cunning bastard already had his suspicions and worked the truth out of me one night when I had gotten my vessel particularly drunk, and so I may have been a bit more forthcoming than I meant to with certain details that gave away my identity. But I entrusted no one else with my secrets. Not even Rory knew. I wanted to shield him from the pain of that knowledge for as long as I could.”

Vain’s hand left my nape and he swept a finger across my cheek, catching my tears that had fallen while he’d spoken. The mention of Rory had my sobs breaking free all over again, and I was unable to control the emotion barreling out of me. It was all too much at once, I felt so heavy with grief and guilt that I never felt as if I might know the true feeling of happiness again.

Vain held me to his chest and allowed me to cry until I was sick of it. Until every last piece of me was spent and I felt a space hollow out in my chest, large enough where it felt like I could breathe again.

The silk of his robe was wet with my tears when I finally stopped crying. He placed a gentle kiss to my forehead and rose to step up to the wall by his bedside table. With a wave of his hand, he revealed a hidden panel that held a small safe inside that was fitted with all manner of magical locks. The small door swung open, and he pulled out a wooden box with wrought iron fastenings clamped over the lid. The mechanisms of the locks clicked open with a snap of his fingers, and then Vain reached in and presented a book to me.

It was obviously very old, given the worn state of the dark leather bound over the cover, with a series of demonic symbols etched down the spine and a red six-pointed star carved on the front. I recognized it immediately from the heavy weight of its presence and the power of what it contained. Without even having to touch it, the sinister ancient magic within seeped out like it was a living, breathing thing, and I recoiled away from it on instinct.

“How? When did you—” I started.

“Eldin slipped it into my pocket at the party to keep it out of Ghen’s hands.”

I stood slowly, staring up at him, my head spinning. “So, you had it? All this time?”

---