Chapter Twenty

Max had given up on begging Ember to let him go; she'd only laugh at him while Fraco ignored him completely. Though it seemed selfish, he really wished that Rafael was there with him as at least then, he'd feel much calmer and could distract himself. The one thing keeping him from bursting into tears was the constant little blue animals that would fly into the cage, dance around him and then whisper in his ear, "Love Papa." Max had attempted to copy them, but the most he could do was send a small blue butterfly and hope that Magnus loved it. As he shuffled around to get more comfortable, he watched Ember whisper to Fraco in the corner of the room. Unlike the basement of the café, this one was much larger, cold and grey with the only light daring to enter the room coming from six small rectangular windows at the top of the walls. Soon, a small blue monkey danced through the window, between the electric bars and around Max. He couldn't help but giggle as he watched it swirl around him and clap its hands before whispering, "Love Papa." Once it disappeared, Max attempted to create another butterfly.

"What do you think you're doing?" Fraco boomed.

The butterfly fizzled into the air before Max could send it, as fear hit him and rendered him frozen. It turned out that Magnus had made sure that only Max would see the things he was sending, but Max didn't know how on earth to do that. Ember slowly walked up to the cage, her eyes were fixated on him and she looked like an angry lion ready to devour her prey.

"What have you been sending Magnus?" she demanded,

"Nothing that concerns you," Max replied.

His punishment for replying with such attitude was Fraco pulling him into the agonizing charged cage bars and when he fell to the floor, the pain became too much for such a young boy to bare. If Rafael was there, or even uncle Jace, Max knew he would've be able to cope with the pain, but this was all too much; he was alone, helpless and feared that his family had been hurt. The terror built up inside as he cried and soon it began to overflow. His fright and despair morphed into an immense pulse of energy which dispersed throughout the entire basement, making Ember, Fraco and anything standing collapse, turning their demons into dust and shattering the glass windows into sand. After wiping his tears away, Max watched his glowing blue hands fade and saw the destruction he had caused. The basement had been turned upside down, the cupboard doors were either hanging onto their hinges for dear life or had completely fallen, tables had been flipped with some of them even missing their once sturdy legs, chairs had been snapped in half like twigs and he could finally feel fresh air hit his skin. He wasn't sure if what he had done was normal or something only he could do like reading minds, but his hands never glowed blue when he did regular magic. With a groan, Ember got up with her hair turning white and fear in her eyes as she slowly walked towards the cage.

"Your father would be proud," she said as she reached in and stroked his hair,

Max coiled away from her towards the back corner of the cage, "You don't know my Dad or my Papa,"

"No, but I know your real father; I did some searching."

Max had begun to wonder about the demon that created him months ago, but he never asked, because he had all the family that mattered. The idea of being the child of a demon made him feel like he was a monster and his horns were a symbol of that, but Magnus always assured him that he was only what he wanted to be. It seemed that Ember had an obsession with him and maybe if he knew why, he could stop her.

"Your father is a greater demon called Morax. He's the president of Hell and was put in charge of teaching demons how to read the stars and know about the precious substances that come from the ground. Like you, he can read minds and feelings as well as control them to turn even the most innocent into the greatest sinners. It's said that he has the head of a bull with a blue body and his eyes glow blue when he possesses the minds of men," Ember's eyes glistened with the every word.

Hearing about his true father made Max feel uncomfortable and his fear of Ember was joined with fear of himself. If he's the son of the President of Hell, what does that make him? Could he turn into the same bull-headed monster?

"My fathers are Magnus and Alexander," he adamantly replied.

Ember laughed psychotically as she walked away and pulled Fraco up by his collar. The pair stood opposite each other and began chanting spells with their eyes lock on one another. The words that spilled from their lips were ones that Max had never heard before, but something about them sent a painful chill down his spine. A flash of light took over the room and once it disappeared, there was a large crack in the ceiling which unveiled an aphotic red sky with snarling and growling demons morphing from the black clouds, their eyes glowing and their dark power filling the room in the form of a twisting dark red fog. There was a menacing whisper that spread around the room as Ember chanted more and her hair became black with every word. All sorts of demons emerged from the fog, stood in a perfect formation like sinister soldiers and waited for their orders from Ember. As their words faded, the crack in the ceiling closed, yet the whispering carried on in Max's ear as if it was right next to him.

"We must get going," Ember grinned as the cage bars disappeared and she pulled Max towards her, "Hell is waiting."