The Red Scrolls of Magic (The Eldest Curses, #1)(93)

“That’s not how it is,” Magnus said. “I love him.”

“Do you?” Asmodeus asked. “Or is that just something you tell yourself, so you can do what you want, the way you did when you burned your stepfather alive? Demons cannot love. You said that yourself. Everything you are is half mine. Surely that means you inherited only half a heart.”

Magnus turned his face away. Long ago the Silent Brothers had told him warlocks had souls. He had always chosen to believe it.

“Everything I am,” said Magnus, “is all mine.”

“And does he love you?” asked Asmodeus, and laughed again.

His voice was a mimicry of Catarina’s, calling back her voice asking the same question, telling Magnus that there was no love that he could hold sacred and safe away from Asmodeus.

“He could never love something like you,” Asmodeus pursued. “Alight with magic from Hell, and burning everything you touch. He may want you now, but you never told him about me, did you?” Asmodeus smiled. “Which was wise of you. If he did know, I’d have to kill him. Can’t have one of the Nephilim knowing about my eldest curse.”

“He doesn’t know,” Magnus said through his teeth. “And stop calling me that.”

“You knew telling him might endanger your warlock friends,” said Asmodeus, and Magnus knew, with some despair, that Asmodeus was flipping through his memories like a card deck. “But you were glad for the excuse, weren’t you? You feared if Alexander Lightwood knew about your kinship to me, he would turn away in disgust. You know he still will. He will come to hate and resent you for your immortality as he withers away. He was born to righteousness, and you were born to night everlasting. Your corruption will eat away at him. He will not be able to bear you long, being what you are. It will destroy him, or he will destroy you.”

Asmodeus’s voice was no longer fire and smoke. It was drops of cold water into an ocean of despair. It was nothing Magnus had not told himself.

He looked down at the knife. The emblem on the handle and guard, an insect with spread wings, marked its master. He looked over at Shinyun, whose eyes were glued to the point of the blade. Sweat poured down her face even as she was frozen in place.

“You understand. You have always known it would not last.” Asmodeus’s breath stirred Magnus’s hair. “Nothing will ever last for you, except me. Without me, you will be truly alone.”

Magnus bowed his head. He remembered stumbling through scorching-hot sand, filled with despair and smelling smoke from the ashes of his whole life. There had been a time when he had been so desperate, he did not know what his answer to Asmodeus would have been.

He knew now.

Magnus turned and walked away from his father, and threw the knife down in the dirt.

“I’m not alone. But even if I was, my answer would be the same. I understand what faith is,” said Magnus. “I know who I am, and I know who I love. My answer to you is no.”

Asmodeus shrugged. “So be it. Remember, when you die, that I tried to give you this chance. I wanted you, but I am more than happy to adopt.”

Asmodeus lazily waved a hand, and Shinyun fell to the ground, gasping. Her hand was still closed tight upon the sword hilt. Magnus did not know how much she had seen, or absorbed.

Shinyun, finally able to move, climbed to her feet. She looked up at Asmodeus, then at Magnus, and then back at the blade.

“Shinyun, my daughter,” said Asmodeus. “You have been chosen. Embrace your glorious destiny.”

Her unreadable face was tipped up to his. She walked toward him, his most faithful worshipper.

“All right,” said Shinyun, and drove her sword into Asmodeus’s side.

Asmodeus’s bright form blurred until he was only a shimmer in the air, then resolved into shape farther away, a shining image above them both.

“Treachery amuses me,” he said. “I forgive you. I understand your rage. I know your pain. This is all you are. I know how deep your loneliness has always been. Seize this opportunity. End Magnus’s life, and you will have all that you wished for: a father, legions of demons at your command, and a world to rule.”

Shinyun’s head turned toward Magnus. Her shoulders slumped, then bunched, muscles gathering with new resolve. She hurled herself at him, sword in hand, and knocked him to the ground.

Her tears fell hot on Magnus’s face. She hit him with her free hand, again and again. She hefted the sword. Then she hesitated.

“Don’t,” Magnus choked out, through a mouthful of blood.

“I have to!” Shinyun raged. “I need him. I’m nothing without him.”

Magnus said, “You can be something more than this.”

Shinyun shook her head. There was nothing in her eyes but despair. Magnus scrabbled in the dirt for the knife he’d thrown away, touched the hilt with his fingertips, then drew in a deep breath and sighed. He let the knife go.

Shinyun lifted the blade in both hands, held it above Magnus’s heart, and brought it down.





CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE




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The Fool’s Knight


ALEC LOOKED DESPERATELY AT THE vision within the pentagram. He stared at every Shinyun, and every one looked the same. He searched the face of every Magnus, and they were all Magnus. Magnus swinging a blade, Magnus gasping on his knees, Magnus with his hands held high, Magnus with Shinyun on his chest, her sword held high for a killing blow.