We followed Lilith down a hall behind us. It dead ended into a room with sleek black bookshelves lining each wall and going all the way to the ceiling. There was a ladder on rungs that could move to follow the shelves and plenty of different gothic style sofas in the center of the room. The books on the shelves were all old, thick books lined with leather and bound with string. A large chandler hung in the center of the room.
"What's with you guys and having books from three centuries ago?" I laughed, gazing around at all of them.
"We like to know our histories," Lilith answered. "To you it's just religion. To us, it's our past. What our fathers have done, who they hurt, who they helped. It's apart of us." She walked to the back of the large room. "Now it's your history too." I shivered again as a draft came across where I was standing.
Holden wrapped an arm around my shoulders. "You're cold again?" he asked. I nodded. Normally, I'd be searching each book, curious about what answers each one contained, but I clung to Holden's warmth. The angel blood coursing through him made his body temperature higher. He was normally sweating from his heat but over the last few days, he could use me to cool off the same as I used him to warm up. We were inseparable under normal circumstances, and now it was a whole other level.
"It's apart of being the enchantress," Lilith called from across the room as she searched the shelves. "The first one was burned alive by the mortals for what she could do. The second heard the story and cast a spell on herself so no enchantress would ever meet the same fate. It's where the whole 'witches don't burn' theory came from. The side effect from it is that your body craves heat. You're basically cold blooded now."
"Like a reptile?" I scoffed.
"Yup. Probably feet better if you go sit on a rock in the sun," she laughed. I laughed a little at her comment, but slid my hands under Holden's shirt. She must have spied the book she wanted because she dragged the ladder over to the correct spot and climbed up. "Holden, catch," she said, holding the book out. He pulled away from me. I whimpered at the cold as he met her across the room and she dropped it into his hands. "Can she read Latin yet?" Lilith asked as she climbed back down.
"Kind of. It looks like English to me," I replied. They met at a regal couch only big enough for two with a coffee table in front of them. Holden motioned for me to join them. I took advantage of the small space and planted myself in his lap. I soaked in his warmth.
"That's how it is for all of us. Can you speak it?"
"I haven't tried. I understood it when Holden spoke it." She opened the large book and searched the pages.
"You said you made someone disappear. Was it the whole person?" she asked.
"Uh, yeah? Was I going to make half of him disappear?"
"You could. What happened when he disappeared?" she asked. I leaned into Holden. He leaned over and whispered to her. Her eyes widened and then settled on me as they leaned away from each other. "I would've done worse," she shrugged, looking back to the book. "What was the first thing you did that was weird?"
"Making Ben disappear," I replied.
"How long ago?"
I looked at Holden. "Uh, three weeks ago? Yeah."
"That lines up with when she died," Lilith said. She kept flipping through pages and finally settled on one. There was a picture of a woman in a white dress. She stood on a pyre, her arms bound to a large plank of wood behind her. Her face was contorted in a scream as flames engulfed her. I almost reached for the page but I pulled myself from the trance.
"When who died?" I asked.
"The last enchantress," Lilith answered.
"There's only ever one, Ronnie," Holden whispered.
"How do you know so much about this?" I asked. "And what are wing patterns?"
"Remember the swirls you draw in class?" Holden asked. I nodded. "Each one was a different wing pattern for a different angel. You drew Michael's, Uriel's, Azreal's, Lilith's, and mine. You hadn't seen mine yet when I saw you draw them the first time. Each angel or nephilim has their own unique pattern of tattoo for their wings."
"The enchantress is the one who gave us the ability to hide our wings. Before her we had to hide so no one saw us," Lilith added.
I nodded.
"As far as me knowing so much, the enchantress was created by my father as a way to get back at God for killing all his children. She was supposed to be evil but daddy dearest wasn't very good at the whole magic thing. He interpreted the spell wrong and ended up with a beautiful woman who refused to harm a soul. My father cast her off a few years after I was born. We were both ignored by him and bonded over it. She realized the amount of power she held and we worked together to figure her powers out. She only lived a few years before she was burned alive and then I trained the next enchantress.
"This went on for a couple hundred years and eventually I got bored and just left after one of them died. The next girl was on her own."
"Could you teach me?" I asked, sitting up.
"Woah, don't even think about it. I'm retired." She stood up and walked towards the door. I got up and followed her. "Especially when your element comes in."
I ignored the element comment. There would be plenty of time for questions later. "Please? I'm in danger. This might be the only way I get out of this," I grabbed her arm, turning her around.
Everything around me faded. I was standing on a pyre, my arms tied behind me. Everything around me was wooden and it was on fire. I was wearing an old dress that was completely white. I looked out, past what was directly in front of me. There were men and women, watching as I screamed. Then my eyes locked with a pair of red ones. She was standing in the tree line in the distance, obviously trying not to come too close to anyone. The heat bit at my ankles, up my legs. The further it went, the more I screamed.
And then it was gone.
"Ronnie?" Holden's voice rang out. "Ronnie!"
My eyes snapped open and I gulped in a deep breath. "What was that?" I asked.
"You fainted," Lilith scoffed.
"No," I shook my head. "That wasn't your memory?" I asked her.
She shook her head.
No, it wouldn't be her memory. I saw her, but it wasn't like I was in her head like when Holden showed me his. "What did you see?" Holden asked.
"I was... I was being burned alive," I said, knowing how insane that must have sounded.
"I'll teach you," Lilith spoke. "I'll teach you how to control it." Holden and I looked up at her. "But it won't be easy and if we start this, we're ending it. Got it?"
I nodded.
"Good. We'll start tomorrow." With that, she was gone. Holden helped me to my feet and wrapped his arm around me as he guided me down a maze of hallways. Eventually, we came to a closed door. Holden pushed it open and placed his hand on my back to guide me inside. It no longer felt like the large gothic mansion we were currently standing in. It felt like Holden's small cottage back home. The decor was more dramatic than his house, but there were still plants everywhere. I guess Lilith took care of them when he wasn't here. There was a large canopy bed in the center of the room with a fireplace to the left.
"Dad dropped me here a lot as a kid. Lilith made sure I felt at home." I nodded as I walked around and looked at the plants. "I'm going to see if Lil has any clothes you can borrow," he said and disappeared back down the hallway. I only vaguely recall him saying that and almost forgot that we had no clothes. Our bags got left at the motel in our haste.
I was too wrapped up in the plants. I looked a beautiful purple flower with small petals. Aconitum napellus. Wolfsbane. The one next to it was purple as well, but it grew differently. One stem with many flowers growing off. Salvia officinalis. Sage. I looked all around me at the different plants in the room. I could name each of them in Latin and English. Vervain, poppy, nightshade, monkshood. The click of the door shutting pulled me from my amazement and I turned to see Holden with a small stack of clothes folded in his hands. He set it to the bed.
"She said you could borrow this, but she hates sharing so she's got some clothes coming for you tomorrow." I nodded.
"What about you?" I asked.
"I have stuff here. I stayed here a lot while you were... gone." He set the clothes on top of the dresser and came over to me. "How are you doing?" he asked, placing his hands on my hips.
I shrugged. "I'm as good as I can be. I just found out I'm a witch. That's not exactly something easy to swallow."
"You'll get it, amica mea," he said.
My love. I heard it correctly this time.
"Do you want to shower?" he asked. I nodded. He lifted my shirt over my head. I smelt the angel blood as it passed my face and wrinkled my nose. It smelled like iron and sulfur. I almost gagged at the smell. "What's wrong?" he asked once it was off.
"The smell," I said.
"What smell?" He lifted the shirt to his nose. "He bled on you?"
"I don't know. It happened fast. I don't really-"
He pulled me against his chest, holding me tight. Who was Azreal in all of this, really? Was he just doing as he was told and I was unfortunate enough to be the victim? As badly as I wanted to confide in Holden, I didn't want him worrying about what his dad might do to me.
"I want you to do something for me," he whispered.
"What?" I asked, setting my hands against the sides of his neck.
"I want you to learn how to fight," he said. "You'll have your powers, but if it comes to anything else, you won't win. Not like this. I don't want you to have to ever need to use the ability, but I want you to know it in case."
"Only if you teach me," I agreed.
He smirked. "Lilith might be the better teacher. I don't think I'd go hard enough on you. And, she's smaller like you. Her fighting style would work better for you."
"Try," I said. "If it doesn't work then she can take over but I want to do this with you."
He nodded, a smile tugging at my lips. "Do you know anything about fighting? Take any self defense classes?" he asked.
"A couple. My mom made me take them when I came home. It was just a million different ways to get out of someone's grasp. How to hold keys between my knuckles to punch someone in the eye. That kind of thing," I replied.
"That's better than nothing. You can show me tomorrow. Tonight, I want to take care of you."
He dropped his mouth to mine, his grip on my waist pulling me tighter against his warm body. I reached between us and pulled his shirt up. He parted from me long enough to rid himself of the material and then was against me again. He reached for my waist, pushing my shorts down until I could step out of them.
My tongue traced along his bottom lip and he opened his mouth to me. He lifted me up by the waist and I felt him lay us on the bed, me on top of him. I smiled into the kiss as his hands landed on my ass, kneading the soft flesh there. I kissed along his jaw to his neck as I felt his length against my inner thigh, though he was still wearing his jeans. I groaned, wanting nothing between us.
I kissed my way down his body but when I got to where his jeans had just been, they were already gone. I looked up at him and he chuckled. "You wanted then off so bad they flew across the room," he laughed. I smirked at him and took his hard length into my mouth.
Who's laughing now? I thought to him. I took him as far into my mouth as I could.
"Definitely not me," he said in response as the head hit the back of my throat. "God, Ronnie," he moaned. I slid my way back up, flattening my tongue along him and swirling it around the tip. His hips bucked into my mouth and I took him all the way down this time. He looked up at me. "Fuck, you don't have a gag reflex," he moaned.
You could've known that sooner if you let me touch you, I thought as I swallowed around his length, pulling a moan deep from his chest.
He reached for my hair and held it all out of the way, encouraging my actions through gentle pushes and pulls. I bobbed my head faster up and down his length until he pulled me by the hair to come up and kiss him again. "Ride me," he said, grabbing my leg to make me straddle him. I obeyed, inching my way down his impressive length. "God," he groaned once he was fully buried inside me, sitting up to hold me against him. I relaxed on top of him for a moment as I adjusted to him. "Ronnie," he choked out. "I need you- fuck... I need to move."
I nodded and lifted myself up until just the tip of him was left before dropping back down and taking him all the way in. I was slow with my movements, too slow apparently. He held the back of my neck and rolled me under him, pounding into me so hard that I could barely think. I wrapped my legs around his waist, letting him go deeper as I lightly tugged on his hair at the nape of his neck.
"Holden," I screamed out, my other hand digging into his shoulder. He pulled out for just a moment, shoved my knees together and to the side before sliding back into me. A moan fell from my lips at the new way he felt in me. I strung together profanities I barely recognized as words as I fell apart under him. My own release triggered his. He twitched in me, his hips bucking and then coming to a complete standstill as he collapsed against me.
His warm skin felt nice against me. I felt like an ice cube. "You're so cold," he whispered. "It feels nice."
"You're warm. I like it."
He pulled away from me at some point, but I was too tired to pay attention. After a few minutes of him fiddling with something, he picked me up and carried my naked body. He set me down somewhere soft. There was a pillow under my head and plenty of blankets under me and eventually on me. I felt warmth on my face too. I opened my eyes, just a little and saw the fireplace roaring in front of me. Holden had made a little pallet on the floor so I could be warm.
I looked behind me where he was settling in. "You don't have to sleep here," I said. "I know it's probably too warm for you."
"You're not giving off heat anymore, doll. You cool me down. I'll be alright," he assured, curling behind me and pulling the blanket up. For once, I didn't need his help to fall asleep.