Chapter Thirty-One
As a demon is about to draw Emilia’s biggest fear, someone says stop. Emilia hears Wrath say he will be the one to sacrifice a secret from the heart as his prize for winning the hunt. Yet, the rest of his demon brothers don’t agree to this and tell Wrath that cannot be his prize. Instead the princes decide Wrath must bed Emilia. Wrath tells Emilia she can still give up a secret, but Emilia tells him she doesn’t want to reveal her fear or secret. Wrath reveals he doesn’t want any outside force affecting what they’ll do. Then Emilia realizes that they don’t need to do anything in specific because the princes didn’t mention anything in particular.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Later when the two are about to sleep, Emilia offers Wrath a drink. She walks over to the champagne and pours a sleeping potion into it. Emilia quickly leaves the room and rushes to the stable and mounts Tanzie, the horse. They ride off to Pride’s territory in search of the Bloodwood forest. After crossing Pride’s territory, Emilia crosses Envy’s, knowing he wouldn’t do anything because he wanted her to find the Stars of Seven. Once she arrived at the tree, someone appears and asks Emilia who she is and they say they have information and expect payment. The figure tells her she’ll tell Emilia anything in exchange for a favor, collected in the future at her discretion because she already knows Emilia’s secrets better than Emilia knows. Emilia asks about her twin and where the seven sisters are, the figure answers neither saying, Emilia cannot expect to find answers to anyone else’s mystery, when she doesn’t yet understand the mystery of herself. Then Emilia says she cannot access her magic to which the Crone responds about her prince, if Emilia wanted to know the truth about him, then she should carve his name into the tree and take one leaf. The Crone says Emilia does know who he is but chooses to remain in the dark because she fears her own truth, not his because Wrath is her mirror. Emilia spontaneously decides to carve what she thinks is Wrath’s true name into the tree before leaving.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Emilia finds Wrath in the kitchen the next day and tells him she visited the Curse Tree and made a bargain with the Crone. Emilia tells him she wanted to know about her sister but the Crone insisted she needed to discover her truth first and part of Emilia’s truth was to be found if she acknowledged who Wrath is. Wrath pleads saying he hope she refused to carve his name in the tree because the Crone is worse than his brothers. He’s scared Emilia carved the wrong name because if she carved the right one, she wouldn’t be standing in front of him. Yet Emilia needed to know whether she was right and so she crushed the leaf. Nothing happened to her, meaning her guess was right. Emilia tells him she knows witches and demons are enemies and that there’s more to their story. Wrath was the devil, Samael. Emilia calls him a liar but he denies it. She can’t believe she fell for his seduction and temptations. Wrath tells her unlike Pride, he’s never had a consort but was cursed by the First Witch. His penalty for not aiding her was steeper, she stole something very important to him, something he would do nearly anything to get back- the Horn of Hades. Wrath tells her they are his wings, not horns and the First Witch cursed them into mockery of mortal lore, then hid them from him. In order to restore them, he needed a spell found in her grimoire. Wrath tells Emilia that Pride’s sin of choice makes it nearly impossible for him to deny being the king of demons and mortals assume that’s who he is because his pride keeps him from admitting the truth. Emilia tells him that he’s the evil incarnate and it’s hard to wrap her head around that. Wrath leaves quickly after.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Emilia wonders whether locating the First Witch was the true reason behind the murders. It would make sense for someone to try and find her to make her pay for what she’d stolen and if every prince of Hell lost their wings, or something as precious, it could be any one of them. If Emilia was the First Witch, it would also make sense why Wrath had hated her the night he was summoned by her. He had called Emilia a creature then, swearing he’d never be tempted by her when she believed demon bargains were sealed with addictive kisses. Emilia goes to Celestia and asks whether she is the First Witch Celestia says neither her nor Emilia are the First Witch. Emilia says she’s been trying to solve a riddle about a key that doesn’t necessarily open a lock and the seven stars and sins, and the angel of death. Celestia says it’s the Temptation Key she’s looking for. Emilia believed this meant Wrath had the Temptation Key. She rushes to Wrath’s study and realizes the paperweight he keeps on his desk is the key. This makes Emilia believe that the Triple Moon Mirror might be hidden in plain sight as well, but the only mirror she had been gifted before leaving to Envy’s house didn’t fit with the key. The Seven Sisters were somewhere in the Sin Corridor and Emilia had a feeling they had the mirror. They were Emilia’s salvation so Emilia quickly packed some essentials and the Temptation Key, the Crone’s spell book and changed clothes. Emilia walks to the Sin Corridor.
VII
Emilia called out for someone and stopped at a tree with a carving. There were no sounds, footprints or indications that the Seven Sisters were near. Emilia began scratching the tree till blood reaches her hands. She puts blood on the number 7 on the tree. The trunk clicked up, revealing a set of stairs within it. Emilia entered the tree and went down the stairs. At the bottom she is met with Celestia, who tells her she’s about to make a critical choice and tells her she may leave if she wants. Emilia finds out Celestia is the Crone and is calling in her favor. She asks Emilia once she activates the mirror, return her spell book. Celestia then waves her hand and magic bubbles in Emilia, who finally dives into her source. Celestia tells her once she finds her answers to come find her with her payment.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Emilia goes through the spell book and finds a note that says “Some truths do not grant the freedom you seek. Once known you can’t ever go back. Choose wisely. -S.” Samael, Wrath offered similar words to Celestia. Emilia goes through with the plan and whispers, “Past, present, future, find. Show me my biggest desire hidden deep within the universe’s mind.” A vision of Vittoria and Antonio in Wrath’s place is shown. Antonio tells Vittoria he vows his life to her cause and that she is his angel. Vittoria tells him to give her one moment before they’ll leave. Emilia removes herself from the vision and returns to House Wrath. She runs to where Antonio is staying but he’s no longer there. Instead there lies an enchanted skull that says “come to the shifting isles, sister. We have much to discuss about breaking the remainder of our curse.” Emilia finds Wrath and shows she can summon fire. She believes the cornicello was made to keep her power in check not his. Wrath is unable to say anything because of the curse. She tells Wrath that if she accepts the marriage bond, some of that will change. The curse may not fully break but Emilia believes there are some bonds more powerful than dark magic and there’s nothing more dangerous than love. Wrath tells Emilia he’s been locking into the possibility that the horns may have been spelled to ensure she forget certain things. He also says he hoped the truth properties of the Crescent Shallows would remove any blocks from her mind and didn’t anticipate the extreme reaction it caused. The Crescent Shallows lock the gates of hell. They become husband and wife.
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