To Hell and Back by L.B. Gilbert

Chapter Thirty-Five

Rhys sat behind his desk, his jaw clenched so he wouldn’t let the fire loose on the traitor sitting across from him.

Ravenna was pale, but she knew better than to try to defend herself at this moment. Not with his assistant holding proof of her lies in his hands.

Veda and Naveen stood on either side of his chair. Above the valley, the rest of his clan hovered.

Most were angry, their pride wounded over the fact that the enemy had struck in the very heart of their territory. Every last one had already pledged to come back to hell with him. They just had to find a way back to Sheol. He had to.

Only Sanaa and her family would stay behind. Thomas was still recovering from the shock of seeing Valeria hurl his infant daughter off a three-story deck. He didn’t blame her. He’d seen what was happening, understood the circumstances. So, he wasn’t angry, but he also wasn’t okay.

There was a lot of that going around.

“The DNA results are back,” Veda said from his left. “It’s confirmed. There’s less than a one percent chance that Ravenna is Valeria’s mother—it’s zero-point nine percent to be exact.”

Ravenna finally reacted. She lifted her mutinous gaze. “I thought you could tell by how my blood smelled. Why would you need a DNA test?”

Rhys had told her about the damning scent print when she kept insisting, she was Valeria’s mother.

“Thomas recommended it—he’s the bear you saw, by the way. The one we used to make you assume we all were.”

Rhys leaned back in his chair, studying her, trying to puzzle her out. She had lied to Valeria, used her, and, in the end, she had betrayed her to save her own skin.

But her grief at losing Valeria was real, too. And it was the only thing saving her from his fire.

Except in Ravenna’s case, he might have to use his claws. He’d gone beyond anger to a cold place where ice flowed in his veins. It wasn’t something expected or familiar. Even at the height of battle, Rhys had always burned hot.

When Ravenna didn’t respond, he pushed without mercy. “We didn’t need the DNA test to tell us that you weren’t her mother.”

“Then why did you test it?”

He took the test results from Veda, then tossed them in front of Ravenna. “Because people have a much harder time lying when confronted with irrefutable truth.”

She stared at the paper without seeing the words on it, a flat expression in her eyes.

“Having the DNA results also opens another avenue of inquiry.” Rhys templed his fingers together. “Say we wanted to compare Valeria’s DNA with someone else’s…Salvador Delavordo, for example.”

Ravenna jumped up from her chair so fast it fell over. “You can’t do that.”

A lick of ice hit his mind. “He is her blood. Her family. You’re just the woman who took her from him. From all of them.”

Raising a hand to her head, she fisted her fingers in her hair. “Your ignorance is breathtaking. I saved her from those monsters. Do you know anything about them?”

“We know who all the major clans are. The Delavordos are one of the seven families who think they rule this planet. I have no love for them or any other witching clan. But I do not presume to pass judgment on their internal matters.”

He leaned forward. “So, choose your words carefully. Explain why you think you had the right to take their child and raise her as yours.”

“I carried Valeria in my womb.” Ravenna fisted a hand and beat it against her chest, pounding it over her heart. “She was a part of my body and my soul.”

So much was suddenly making sense…”You were a surrogate.”

Ravenna sighed with her entire body, as if speaking the words aloud had taken something—perhaps the delusions that got her through the day.

Coming around the front of her chair, she let herself drop on the cushion, covering her face with her hands.

Given the Delavordo’s reputation, there might have been a compelling reason Ravenna ran off with the child she was carrying.

“Start at the beginning,” he said, making it clear from his tone that it was an order.

She dropped her hands. “Lucia Delavordo is a magical parasite, a tick that gorges itself until it has bloated itself with power.”

Lucia. She was Salvador’s mother. Wife to Fulgencio, the current patriarch of the Delavordo clan.

“That is not the beginning,” he snapped. “I will judge Valeria’s biological mother on her actions, not her reputation or your opinion, however colorful.”

A spike of anger heated the air around Ravenna, but she wisely kept her mouth shut. It took her a few minutes, but she finally composed herself enough to speak.

“I am Romanian born,” she said. “I grew up in a small rural village, but the strength of my talent was such that I was plucked from my home and sent to a minor noble house for study.”

Rhys nodded, aware that while time and technology had advanced considerably, the underlying structure of the witching world was archaic by current standards.

Arranged marriages, a tightly regimented structure, and bloody internecine feuds and skirmishes instead of large-scale warfare. Elegant, deadly, and ruthless, the members of the major witch clans were arrogant, but, among their kind, they had reason to be.

An outsider witch with talent was their favored prey.

“How did you come to be a surrogate for the heads of the Delavordo clan?”

She lifted a shoulder. “I was approached by a third party shortly after my twentieth birthday. The man was a visitor who had stayed with the family for a few days, long enough for him to see how frustrated and dissatisfied I was.”

Her eyes were distant, deep into the past. “I was grateful for their patronage when I was a child, but as I grew older, my talent outstripped theirs. They began to sabotage all my opportunities for advancement.”

“But this man took you aside, whispering in your ear about an opportunity to get the power you sought?”

“Not power,” she said. “Just buckets of money. But with the amount he quoted, I knew I could get as much power as I wanted.”

She closed her eyes. “It was five million euros. That amount of money can change a person’s world, open any door. The go-between also disclosed that despite having one child, the couple had suffered more than half-a-dozen miscarriages attempting to have a second.”

Cocking her head, she lifted a shoulder. “I was young and idealistic back then. I thought I would be helping a wounded family complete itself. I had been an only child, and I hated it. I wanted to give their kid a sibling.”

How altruistic. Sure, these reasons had probably crossed Ravenna’s mind, but he would bet every piece of gold in his hoard that she wouldn’t have made the deal without the cash.

“Did they renege on their deal?”

“No, I did.” The words were so quiet that a normal human wouldn’t have heard them.

“You discovered the identity of the biological parents and balked?”

She shot him a mulish look from under her lashes.

“I met the couple before implantation. And yes, I was scared when I realized who they were, but I told myself their reputation had been blown out of proportion. All the evil things I’d heard about the family were old stories. Legends. Nothing about the current generation.”

If that were true, then it was less because Fulgencio and Lucia’s hands were clean than Ravenna had been young, without access to the right whispers.

“But I eventually saw them for what they were. You just can’t stand in their presence and not feel their evil. It’s behind their every action, including the miscarriages and even resorting to using a surrogate.”

“Explain.”

“Lucia and Fulgencio had a son, a skilled and strong one by all accounts. But they weren’t satisfied with him. I don’t know why. They had done things to themselves, Lucia in particular, to enhance their magic—terrible things.”

She closed her eyes. “They planned to concentrate all that potential in their offspring. They conducted rites, messed with things that should have never been touched…they were making a monster.”

“Valeria is no monster.”

“Yeah, I know,” Ravenna snapped. “You’re welcome.”

The idea that this woman was taking credit for Valeria’s morality, for her kindness and consideration, was too much.

“You traded her safety to save yourself, so save me the sanctimony, because whatever else was true, Lucia and Fulgencio would have guarded their child far better than you did.”

It wasn’t even a question. Perhaps the world might have had to deal with some Delavordo attempt at world domination, but according to rumor, even the son they claimed to have disinherited was closely monitored by his parents, any threats to him eliminated.

“I told you I was captured by those bastards. I crossed one too many people, and I ended up in a bad spot—a very bad spot,” Ravenna said slowly, looking at her hands. “Things were…done to me.”

“So you broke under torture? Offered up your daughter?” Rhys asked. He didn’t even try to sound sympathetic. If it had been Sanaa, she would have never offered up her flesh and blood to save herself.

“Valeria would have understood. And I didn’t give her up.”

He raised one eyebrow, staring at her coldly. “Only because you didn’t know where she was. You had to go looking for her.”

Ravenna’s lips compressed.

“Oh, I see…” Rhys sat back deeper into his chair. “I did wonder how you found her here. So, what is it? Do you keep a spare vial of her blood to do a tracking spell?”

“I’m not stupid,” she snapped. “I used a tethering hex. It requires consent, but she was a child and I was her mother. She doesn’t even remember doing the ritual. We did so many together. It was part of her training—and I did train her. We learned every spell I could get my hands on. I got her ready for the future.”

Ravenna broke off and scoffed. “Blood. As if I were an ignoramus. Anyone could take a vial off me. A thimble full alone is worth a million dollars on the black market. “

“Why? I understand her ability is remarkable, but there are Elementals out in the world, four to be precise. And they are more powerful than any witch.”

“You don’t get it.” Ravenna passed a hand over her face. “Lucia and Fulgencio weren’t the only ones who were altered. Valeria was genetically modified at conception, her DNA spliced or mutated on every chromosome. She was meant to combine every magical talent the Delavordos could get their hands on. No Elemental could stand against her. Or at least that was their intention.”

“Ah.” And Valeria did possess all magical abilities, in a way. It just didn’t manifest the way her parents intended. “She can copy any magic. But the ability fades with distance to the source.”

Ravenna’s voice was flat. “It doesn’t have to.”

Rhys’ stare was flat. “Explain.”

“Idiot man.” Ravenna threw up her hands. “It should be obvious by now—whatever Valeria kills, she keeps.”

She turned, staring out the window at the forested peaks around them. “I know this for a fact.”

Suddenly, he grew very hot, his fire close to the surface. “I’m supposed to believe Valeria is a murderer?”

“No…it wasn’t her.”

He waited, and Ravenna rolled her eyes. “I had to.”

“Sure you did.”

Ravenna’s chin jutted out. “There was an incident when she was young. A witch Valeria was copying realized what she was doing and figured out who she was. It was a miscalculation on my part. She was a known associate of the Delavordos, and she put two and two together.”

“Did she plan on returning her for a reward?” he guessed.

Ravenna laughed. “No, idiot. She grabbed a blade—a cheap athame—and she was coming up behind her, getting ready to slit her throat—Valeria was only nine”

He frowned. “You’re certain? Maybe she was going to use it on you.”

She lifted a shoulder. “I couldn’t take that chance. I jumped up, pressed my gun into her gut, and pulled the trigger. Then I grabbed Valeria before she could realize what was happening. I didn’t realize until months after that she’d kept that witch’s power…permanently.”

So it wasn’t necessary that Valeria do the killing. Only the death mattered. “What is the nature of the stolen talent?”

“Something she would never use, not after she understood what it did to others—not even to save her own life.” Ravenna put a hand over her eyes. “With extended touch and effort, she can pull someone to her, take them over and make them love her to the point of obsession. She becomes the most important thing in their lives—the only person who matters.”

Well, damn.No wonder Valeria had kept so many barriers between them.

Like you were any different?In the beginning, he’d been so determined to prove she wasn’t Gabrielle that he’d taken too long to realize it didn’t matter.

Rhys knew his witch in a way he hadn’t known his delicate Viennese flower.

Valeria was vibrant, brilliant, generous, and strong in a way Gabrielle had never been. And it was Valeria he loved—mind, body, and soul. He would for the rest of his life.

He cast his mind back to their early interactions, the way she would avoid touching him, every move in his presence careful and deliberate. “I can see why she would be reluctant to use that ability. I take it she has conscious control over it.”

Otherwise, she would have never laid a hand on him. He would never know the sweetness of her kiss.

“Yes,” Ravenna murmured. “Now.”

Rhys wasn’t good at subtext, but he knew there was a hell of a story behind that—an unpleasant one. But he didn’t want to hear it from Ravenna. He and Valeria would have a heart-to-heart when he got her back. And he would get her back.

“My men are scouring every database on this planet, and every book in our libraries, for a way into Sheol. Can you help…or are you just going to write Valeria off?”

It was the only reason he was bothering with this interview now. That and he knew his mind was not clear enough for the painstaking research required. Rhys was better leaving it to his men. In the meantime, he would pry what he could out of this witch.

Ravenna gripped the arms of her chair, her knuckles white. “I thought that place was your home. Why can’t you open the door you came through?”

“Because we did not open it.”

No, that had been the Mother—the entity that truly ruled this planet. She had heard their pleas, and she’d opened a door. Her Elementals had been waiting on the other side, ready to destroy them in case they were a threat.

When they had asked to stay in peace, the Elementals had been ready with a contract detailing the terms and requirements of their asylum.

His people had been so war-weary they’d been ready to sign whatever the Elementals had put in front of them. But, to their credit, the pact had been fair. The clan had vowed not to make war, and not to disrupt the balance between good and evil. They would not try to rule. In exchange, they could live in peace.

Too bad that last had taken them so long to figure out.

Ravenna had lost color. “You didn’t?”

“No.”

Nodding as if this were expected, the witch pushed to her feet.

“Your clan can stop looking for the answer,” she announced. “I can do it. I saw enough of the cross coven spell to recreate it, and I know how to tweak it so none of your people have to die to open the door.”

Rhys raised a brow. An Elementals could do it without a death, but their spellcraft was the best in the universe. Could this witch pull it off?

It was possible. Ravenna had been wandering the world like a displaced Ronin, studying every spell and type of magic she could get her hands on. If there was a witch on this side of the barrier who could figure it out, it was Ravenna.

He crossed his arms, his fire flickering in irritation. She could have said so before. Witches…infuriating creatures.

“Are you sure?” he asked, resisting the urge to strangle her.

She nodded. “. But I will need supplies, some rare ingredients.”

Rhys signaled to Naveen. “Get her whatever she needs.”