Page 18 of What The Hex (The Family Spells)
“Hex, accompany your fiancée and try to be accommodating, please.” She leaned in close to me, giving me a hug that left me cold and empty inside. How could my grandmother hug me like that when she was literally throwing me into the lion’s den, knowing I was going to be raped, knowing my soulmates were being hunted. It was my choice to distance myself from Grace and her husbands; nobody else had the right to take them from me. “This is important for the coven,” she whispered, reminding me that Coven always came first—even over family.
Hell, maybe that’s why my mother had left so long ago?
“Come along, my demon darling,” Violet purred, reaching out and taking my hand. I had no choice but to follow.
“You’re lucky I’ve decided to forgive you for your infidelity,” Violet said as several handmaidens swarmed around her, fixing her red dress so that it lay in perfect folds on the floor. The handmaidens were some minor form of demon, all of them sporting the same gold shackles as me and Con. They weren’t going to be telling our secrets anytime soon.
I watched the small creatures flutter around with small, leathery wings, and muscular legs that reminded me of a kangaroo or something.
“Gee, thanks for that,” I said, staring at the vial of red liquid on the table across the room. The urge to go for it and try to break it was strong, but I wasn’t stupid. That vial would be spelled like crazy to stay intact, and the last thing I needed right now was to find myself incapacitated from refusing to follow orders.
I needed my wits about me if I was going to get out of this. I had a plan, but it wasn’t a good one under the best of circumstances.
“How about I forgive you for shoving your vile tongue down my throat, and we call it a day? Violet, there are other witches for you to marry.”
“There are,” she conceded, not even looking at me. Instead, she was preening in the mirror, letting the minor demons fix her hair and makeup. To be fair, she was beautiful: lavender skin and silver hair, eyes like new coins, snow-white horns, and wings to match. My own wings curled around my body as I fought back a surge of pure hatred.
I’d never liked Violet, but I’d tolerated her. I’d made out with her, fooled around a little, but I’d never wanted her the way I wanted Grace. And now, I couldn’t even stand looking at her.
“But they wouldn’t be you, Hex.” She glanced over her shoulder, even though I knew she couldn’t see me. Her silver eyes stared at the spot just slightly above and to the right of my shoulder. Con hissed at her, but Vy just smiled. “You’re more important than you think.”
“How so?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest, and edging toward the wall to lean my shoulder against it. Closing my eyes, I searched my body for one of the tattooed spells etched into my skin. Unfortunately, the one I was looking for was inked into my dick.
Hecate’s ovaries.
It always came down to my dick, didn’t it?
It was painful as hell to pull an inked spell, and I gritted my teeth as I summoned it, letting the magic crash over my body in a wave.
As I’d expected, Vy spun around, her hair lifting in a supernatural breeze as she tested the spell to see what I was casting. She didn’t need her eyes for that.
A smirk curled around her lips.
“A spell for stamina, huh?” she asked me, but I didn’t bother to respond. She could make her own assumptions about what I was doing and why. “I like the way you think, Hex Sorciere.”
I grunted as Con reached out and pawed at my ear.
What are you doing? he asked, but I didn’t know who was listening in on us, so I just shrugged. The little black cat growled under his breath and bit my ear hard enough that it hurt. I ignored him and pulled another spell, a dragon tattoo from my right forearm that would give me extra physical strength.
Violet continued to study me with her sightless eyes, tasting the magic I was casting as I pulled a spell for scalding hot palms (all the better to touch a woman with, my dear), one for perfect hair, one for the whitest smile … shit, I was a superficial fuck.
But all of that was working in my favor, even as I groaned and bled and used spells I’d been saving for years for all the wrong reasons.
When Violet finally turned away from me, closing her eyes and letting her handmaidens braid her hair into a loop on the back of her head, I let loose a third-eye spell (for seeing through walls) trapped in the shape of an inked heart. Using the wall I was leaning against to send my magic through the building, I went on a metaphysical search.
