Page 159 of Demon's Beauty

Good.

Let them scowl.

It won’t change a damn thing.

If they feel the coven is immune to change, set in stone with no room to question long-held standards and beliefs, they’re in for an awakening.

And it all starts tonight.

Stopping in front of Esme Hawthorn, I find her as inscrutable as ever.

There’s no hint on her hard, stoic face of how she’s feeling. Nothing but the perfect High Priestess mask as she takes my measure and begins the Rite.

“Soleil Pendergast,” she says, voice carrying over the clearing to all the assembled witches. “You stand before us prepared to pledge your life and your magick to the Crescent Coven?”

“Yes, High Priestess.”

“And you do so willingly, with an honest heart and accepting of all the Goddess asks of you?”

“Yes, High Priestess.”

“A sip of ceremonial wine,” Esme says, handing me a chalice. “As a marker of your bond with the earth, with the Goddess’ bounty, with us all.”

I take the chalice and drink, then hand it back and steel myself for what comes next.

“Now go forth with our blessing,” she says, and this time I might fool myself into believing a small smile turns up the corner of her lips. “And we shall all bear witness as the Goddess judges your worthiness.”

“Thank you, High Priestess.”

With head held high and eyes fixed firmly forward, I make my solitary journey to the Veil.

Just at its threshold, I pause. Waiting. And waiting.

Until a flicker of magick sends the ether tumbling from pearly white to the deepest blue of midnight—its tendrils reaching out for me—and I know it’s time.

One step forward, then another, never faltering, never doubting as I step inside.

The feel of this non-place in the ether is familiar.

Threaded with a different type of magick than what enveloped Finn and I when we made our bargain and cemented our mate bond, but with the same expansive, endless depth. Like I’ve dissolved completely and am one with the heart of the Goddess.

This time, though, there are no words for me to speak.

There’s nothing but the rush of power over me, through me, strands of magick fanning out in an infinite web. When I close my eyes, I can see them, can follow them from me to the coven and back again. From realm to realm, to the stars and the earthand beyond, and I’m just one part of a whole almost too large to comprehend.

For a few weightless moments—or maybe hours, time seems to work a little differently here—I simply allow myself to marvel. Some deep, intrinsic part of me knows I’ll never experience magick like this again. I’ll never understand so clearly how all of it makes sense, how I make sense, the acute joy and overwhelm of knowing my place in it all.

But the time doesn’t last, and my reason for being here comes rushing back soon enough.

I gasp as the ether ripples, reforms itself around me, raises all the fine hairs on my body and pulls me deeper into whatever the Goddess has deigned to bestow upon me.

From all that chaos, a path. The threads of magick braid tighter and coalesce until I can see it clearly. My own magick, too, joins those threads as they lead me from the ether back to the human realm and my coven of sister witches—all my power joining theirs to make our collective stronger.

Well,almostall of my power.

There’s no way for me to know what this journey feels like to other Ascended priestesses, but in my final moments before I step back out of the Veil, I understand.

I’m tied to them, and to Finn, and to myself.