An enormous man with a mane of golden hair stepped forward and kissed my hand. Based on Solron’s adoring looks, this was Bael.
“You’re such a miracle,” Bael said. “You shouldn’t be as powerful as Barbatos brags about. You should be completely human. Would you be opposed to a witch doing a lineage spell on you to find out how this is possible? It would mean I could allow more demons their requests to go topside if their offspring could inherit their powers.”
“Can the witch be Charley? I know her.”
I had no idea what a lineage spell was, but I had to admit I was curious. None of this would be happening right now if I hadn’t inherited all this from my father. I didn’t regret a single thing, but I had to admit I was curious. I wish this didn’t have to happen in front of all of Hell royalty, but I was going to take one for the team if it meant more demons could travel.
Charley and Finn came forward, holding hands.
“I knew I’d eventually be doing this spell on you.”
“Does it hurt?”
I was still remembered the last time I got hit with magic. I ended up with a black eye and a busted lip. I’d seen Charley fling something at Ares that made his entire body break out into bleeding sores. Could she do this without maiming me?
“I’ll need some of your blood.”
Of course, she did. It had to involve my blood.
Another witch stepped forward, holding a chalice and a dagger. Where did she get that? They both looked like they were involved in ancient rituals. Did she just cart that around with her to parties just in case? Barbatos saw the look on my face.
“I keep those here just in case I need a witch’s help on something. It’s just a little blood, River, not a lot.”
He said that like cutting my palm open so a witch could spell my blood wouldn’t have sounded totally insane to me before all this. Even after going to the Underworld and Olympus, that probably wasn’t a good idea, even if I trusted Charley. I mean, I couldn’t be the only one thinking giving your blood to someone with magical powers was a bad idea, right?
Charley put the chalice on the table and handed me the dagger. I winced as I dragged it across my palm. I held it and let my blood drip into the stone cup. Exactly how much blood did she need, anyway? Could I get in on some of that magical healing once I’d bled enough into this chalice? I was getting so spoiled.
Everyone was so engrossed in my blood. Charley leaned over and started chanting. I’d heard Charley and Finn do this many times, but I didn’t understand a word of it. It seemed to be in a language I’d never heard of before. I knew a lot of Latin, but this had to be older than that.
My blood started swirling in the cup, and a purple haze rose and covered her face. It was like she was gulping it in. I had reservations about magic being done on my blood, but this was pretty fucking fascinating. The cloud cleared, and Charley just grinned at me.
“Welcome, sister. One of River’s descendants was a member of the Sisters of Trinity coven. They were a female-only coven who would take a warlock lover long enough to get pregnant, then disappear. They culled any male offspring. They were super against having men in their coven. One must have defected to take up with a male human which isn’t like them at all. Her child wouldn’t have had any powers, and it wouldn’t have been passed on through the ages.
“You won’t have any magic as I do, but this could change things for us. Many in the supernatural community can’t mix with humans because their children would be powerless. This could be a game-changer for us as far as love and marriage go.”
I held up my hand. I got it. I totally did, and it was nice to have the last piece of the puzzle as to why I could do the things I could. But none of these people understood humans like I did because they raised me as one.
“That’s all well and good, but if you ask a human to bleed into a cup so you can chant over it doing a magical DNA test, they are going to nope right out of there so fast because they’ll think you’re a Satanist.”
Bael just yawned.
“Satanists are quite lovely and misunderstood. We don’t have to do it like that. There are other means to get blood.”
“Like what?” I demanded.
I didn’t care if he was the King of Hell. You just couldn’t go around stealing blood from humans to do spells on. Bael just laughed at me instead of arresting me and bringing me to his dungeon for torture.
“I like your spunk. We have highly qualified doctors here. Some are demons, and some are witches. People give blood for various reasons—medical tests, to save lives, or to feed Vampires if they don’t have someone willing to let them take a bite. It’s the same on Earth.”
I just snorted. I couldn’t help it.
“Humans aren’t lining up to donate blood for Vampires. Sorry, not sorry. They don’t even think they are real.”
Bael just winked at me.
“That they know of. Some unattached Vampires have gotten jobs in blood banks and hospitals until they can find a donor. They still keep their jobs after that because they still require money.”
Well, I’ll be totally fucked. That made sense. I needed to learn more about the supernatural community. Even if it was dormant and I didn’t inherit any of those powers, I needed to learn more about witches and warlocks. Charley knew about the coven my ancestor came from. Maybe her magic could get me a name, and I could understand more about what happened to her. Did they kill her for taking up with a human? I had so many questions.
“Enough about Vampires and spells. This is a party,” Barbatos said. “Let’s show my daughter everything Hell has to offer.”
Bael’s eyes glittered dangerously. He wasn’t about to kick me into his dungeon like I did to Aphrodite back to Earth, right? Yeah, I was still a little scared of Bael.
“Your father has been bragging nonstop about your demonic form. Can we get a peek? We’ll show you ours if you show us yours.”
Why did I think I would get through this party without getting asked? My backless dress now made total sense. They cut it for my bat wings should I want to whip them out. I was suddenly super self-conscious about it. I knew my monsters liked it, and my father seemed impressed, but I was surrounded by Hell royalty now. I knew everyone had this thing with impressive demonic forms.
“They aren’t demons, but her monsters are pretty impressive too,” Solron said.
Bael practically squealed and clapped his hands.
“We want to see it! We have so many species of demon here. Please show us!”
My monster just shrugged.
“I’m going to need some space,” Pavlina said.
“So will I unless you want your clothes burned off,” Demos said.
Tryphon just tossed his hair over his shoulder.
“This is a nice ballroom and everything, but it’s nowhere near big enough to house the Kraken. I can show you some tentacles.”
“We love tentacles here,” Bael said.
We had that in common.
Kimon just shrugged.
“I’ll do it if my baby bird is okay with this.”
This was like, the worst peer pressure I’d ever felt in my entire life. I could hear my stepfather’s voice in the back of my head. If everyone else jumped off a bridge, would you jump too? Still, this wasn’t super horrible. It wasn’t going to be like my first time trying a cigarette where I choked so hard, I nearly vomited. I could do this. I got the feeling they wouldn’t say anything to my face or taunt me if they found it lame.