Poison Priestess by Lana Popovic (some good books to read TXT) 📗

that glimpse could never compare to witnessing him in the flesh. The aura of his power sears through me like liquid lightning, singeing every nerve. I have performed our Messes for nobles of every stripe and color, but this is no mere vicomte, no louche marquis.

This is le Roi Soleil himself, Louis XIV, reigning scion of the Bourbon dynasty.

Despite his solar emblem and allegiance to the god Apollo, this king is nothing so simple as the sun. He is both sun and moon at once, the eclipse that blots the heavens out. A beacon of burning darkness set against a ravening light.

And I find myself desperately short of breath at what I aim to do for him tonight.

He flicks his fingers at us, idly imperious. “Proceed,” he says in a knelling voice that makes even the single word sound like an edict.

“Of course, Your Majesty,” Adam says, inclining his head. “But before we begin, let us see whether the augurs remain auspicious.”

The king nods impatiently, surveying us with heavy-lidded eyes verging perilously on boredom. I get the sense that he anticipates only another overwrought diversion he must sit through, one more sordid spectacle that he is willing to endure for his maîtresse’s sake.

As if she can divine as much herself, the marquise reaches over and clasps his hand.

“Just wait, mon bien-aimé,” she coos to him, brushing her lips over his cheek. “The sorceress La Voisin is my personal divineress, well versed in matters of the arcane. And Lesage is her magician consort.”

When the king’s gaze rakes over me, I nearly feel its fiery brush across my skin. “No doubt I will be suitably impressed by their … skills,” he says, his dry tone belying the sentiment.

Something about his flippancy, this preemptive dismissal, grates at me. My stage fright all but forgotten, I set my teeth and lift my eyes to his.

“No doubt you will, Your Highness,” I echo, the ringing authority of my tone startling a frown from him. “Prêtre Lesage, let us consult the Morningstar’s will.”

Adam nods solemnly, though I catch the twitching of a muscle in his jaw, the wicked cast of his lips as he restrains a dangerous grin. No doubt he is just as irked as I am at being treated like some inept jester, when we are both performers of unparalleled ilk.

And neither of us came here to disappoint or bore a king.

“Bend your eye to us, O Lucifer,” Adam booms, stepping forward and spreading his hands. “And reveal your will in these blackest blossoms, these darkest of all blooms.”

As he speaks, he whisks a wild bouquet from nowhere, an extravagant posy of black dahlia and hellebore that seems much too huge to have been concealed. Before the king and the marquise can even register the shock of it, he flings the flowers above his head—where they disperse, transforming into bats with chittering voices and flapping wings.

“He is with us!” I intone with a touch of manic glee, loud enough to register over the king’s cry of shock and the marquise’s delighted squeals. “The dread lord has shown his presence here!”

The bats flap about the room’s domed ceiling, circling and diving, before swooping down to roost in the dark recesses that house the marble seraphim. The king watches their progress slack-jawed, clearly confounded but still unafraid. I let out a breath, sending silent thanks to whatever watches over me that Adam managed to get them properly trained.

“Join me, Your Highness, in this prayer to our shadow sire,” I say, hearkening back to one of my favorite openings. “In which we call on the prince of darkness by his many names. Mephistopheles, Belial, Asmodeus, Legion. Le Diable, and daystar of the damned.”

I lead us through a poetic prayer I penned just for this occasion, though unlike the marquise, the king does not indulge me by echoing the words. Then I turn to face Adam, who takes the candle from my hands and draws me close. We share a very deliberate kiss, slow and lingering, and I know just how beautiful we look together—mouth to parted mouth, black hair to red, his hand beneath my chin. We have practiced this in the mirror, honed the sacrilege of our candlelit communion.

Adam and the demon goddess Lilith in place of Eve, stealing a moment under the forbidden tree.

“Dread lord and shadow sire, we offer you our flesh,” I say against Adam’s mouth. “Along with our blood, and the darkest of our passions. We offer you all the storms that pass our lips.”

I turn away from Adam, breaking the kiss. Then, slowly and with care, I lift my hands to the robe’s hem and slide it off my shoulders, letting it whisper to the floor.

The stunned silence that falls across the room is unlike anything I have ever felt.

I stand before the king, naked and unflinching. Poised as one of the marble seraphim despite the frantic thrashing of my heart. A stolen glance at the marquise shows me the flash of her narrowed eyes, her gritted teeth. I know I am incurring a tremendous risk by provoking her thus, appearing in my full youth and beauty before the king.

But should our gambit succeed, any danger will have been worth it.

I can see the shock scrawled across the Sun King’s features as Adam takes me by the hand, leading me to the altar at a stately pace. I lie down upon it with aching slowness, uncoiling my limbs along its length with a snake’s languorous grace.

“Tonight, Your Highness, I offer you my body,” I say, tipping my head back so that my curls flow off the table and pool along the floor. “As a sacred, living altar. As Lucifer’s own avatar. As the Sorceress La Voisin, Priestess of Snakes.”

At that, Adam fetches one of the scrying bowls and tips its contents over my body, bathing me in a scarlet sluice of wine and pigeon blood. When he withdraws into the deep darkness beyond the candlelit altar, I count the prearranged number