If I recalled correctly, delivery of my soul to Pride granted him freedom from the underworld. Something he once said he prized above all else.
How exceptionally marvelous for him. His stay was over just as mine was beginning. And all he had to do was betray me to secure his heart’s greatest desire.
I supposed I understood that well enough.
Wrath continued toward the gate and didn’t look in my direction again. He pressed a hand to the column closest to us and whispered a word in a foreign tongue, too low for me to hear. Gold light pulsed from his palm and flowed into the black gemstone.
A moment later, the gates slowly creaked open. I couldn’t see what lay beyond and my mind promptly crafted all sorts of terrible things. The demon prince offered no formal invitation; he prowled toward the opening he’d made without bothering to see if I followed.
I took a deep breath and steeled my nerves. No matter what was waiting for us, I’d do what I must to achieve my goals. I nestled into my cloak and started forward.
Wrath paused on the threshold to the underworld and finally deigned to look at me again. His expression was harsher than his tone, which halted me in my tracks.
“A word of caution.”
“We’re about to enter Hell,” I said sardonically. “The caution speech may be a little late.”
He was not amused. “In the Seven Circles there are three rules to abide by. First, don’t ever reveal your true fears.”
I hadn’t planned to. “Why?”
“This world will turn itself inside out to torture you.” I opened my mouth, but he held up a hand. “Second, control your desires or they will taunt you with illusions easily confused with reality. You had a taste of what that’s like when you met Lust. Each of your desires will be magnified tenfold here, particularly when we enter the Sin Corridor.”
“The Sin Corridor.” I didn’t pose it as a question, but Wrath answered anyway.
“New subjects of the realm are tested to see which royal House their dominant sin aligns best with. You will experience a certain… prodding… of emotions as you pass through it.”
“I signed my soul to Pride. Why do I need to see where I’m best suited?”
“Live long enough to find that answer out yourself.”
I swallowed my rising discomfort. Nonna always cautioned that bad news came in threes, which meant the worst was yet to come. “The third rule is…”
His attention slid to the finger I’d pricked. “Be cautious when making blood bargains with a prince of Hell. And under no circumstances should you ever make one involving the devil. What’s his is his. Only a fool would fight or challenge him.”
I ground my teeth together. The true games of deception had clearly begun. His warning vaguely reminded me of a note from our family grimoire, and I wondered how we’d come to hold that knowledge. I tucked those thoughts away, focusing instead on my growing anger.
He was no doubt stoking my emotions with his namesake power. Which enraged me all the more. “Signing my soul away wasn’t quite good enough. So you resorted to trickery. At least you’re consistent.”
“Someday you’ll see it as a favor.”
Unlikely. I curled my injured hand into a fist. Wrath met my gaze again, and a smile tugged at the corners of his sensuous mouth. He undoubtedly sensed my growing fury.
One day, soon enough, I would make him pay for this.
I gave him a dazzling smile, letting myself imagine how good it would feel when I finally destroyed him. His expression shuttered and he inclined his head—as if reading my every thought and emotion and silently vowed to do the same. In this hatred we were united.
Holding his intense stare, I nodded back, thankful for his treachery. It was the last time I’d fall for his lies. With any luck, though, it would be the start of him and his wicked brothers falling for mine. I’d need to play my role well, or I’d end up dead like the other witch brides.
I brushed past him and strode through the gates of Hell as if I owned them. “Take me to my new home. I’m ready to greet my dear husband.”
TWO
From the darkness of the cave we exited onto a gleaming mountaintop tundra.
I blinked away the sudden stinging in my eyes and beheld this cruel, unforgiving world. Goddess curse me. This was as far away from home as I could get.
There was no sea, no warmth, no brightly burning sun. We stood in the hollow of a steep snow-covered trail, barely wide enough to walk on side by side.
A biting wind snarled through the craggy mountain pass and tore through my cloak. Behind us the gates closed with a clank that echoed loudly between the snowcapped mountains. I tensed at the unexpected clamor. It was the first noise I’d heard outside the void and it couldn’t sound more foreboding if it tried.
I spun around, heart thundering, and watched demon magic spring up from the bowels of this land and slither up the gates. The same violet-blue thorn-covered vines that had bound Vittoria’s diary wound through eye sockets and jawbones, twisting until the off-white skulls glowed with an icy, unearthly hue.
Cold air cut my breath short. I was trapped in the underworld, surrounded by the Malvagi, alone. I’d acted out of fear and desperation—two essential ingredients in creating a disaster. A flash of my twin’s desecrated body stamped that feeling into the frozen ground.
“You told me the gates were broken.” There was an impressive bite in my tone. “That demons were slipping through, ready to wage war on Earth.”
“The Horn of Hades has been returned.”
“Of course.”
The devil’s horns were needed to lock the gates. Apparently any demon prince could wield them, and I hadn’t known to ask Wrath for clarification. It was another way he’d worked around the “not being able to directly lie to me” rule of my summoning.
If that part was even true.