_JOCELYN( THE DEMON)POV_
I've been called many things in my time—devourer, corrupter, the whisperer behind broken vows—but never reckless. At least not until Garland threw that word at me like it was a blade meant to wound. His voice thundered, thick with disappointment, as he stood before me.
"You've gone too far, Jocelyn," he said, his voice cold enough to make even the fires of the pit flicker uncertainly. "You tampered with the fate of an entire bloodline. One mortal's ruin wasn't enough for you—you brought down his entire family."
I scoffed, arms crossed, wings half-folded behind me in irritation. "It's not like I intended to wipe them all out. They were just… collateral damage. Casualties of my feeding. You make it sound like I did something unnatural."
"You did."
"Did I?" I challenged, my lips twisting into a smirk. "I only emphasized what was already there. That bad woman Alycia, she already had the suspicion. I just fanned the flames. It's not like I forced her hand. If humans are that easily swayed, then perhaps they weren't meant to thrive."
Garland's silver eyes narrowed. "You stripped choice from them. Fate was supposed to give them a fighting chance. There Is a possibility that Dwayne might change his fate, discover that Alycia was only using him if things were allowed to play accordingly."
I let out a short, humorless laugh. "Change his fate? He barely lifted a finger to fix things. If he was supposed to change, he would have. I only sped up the inevitable. You're putting far too much trust in your precious humans."
His silence stretched, long and heavy, before he finally spoke again, his voice as calm and sharp as a dagger sliding between ribs. "Because of your actions, your power will be sealed for one hundred demon years."
The smirk fell from my face. "You're not serious."
"I am."
My wings flared in disbelief. "You're sentencing me—one of the oldest, most efficient feeders of relationship destruction—to powerlessness for a century over a few humans?" I sneered. "They're very good at replicating themselves, you know. A few missing won't lead to extinction."
"You're not being punished because they died," Garland replied. "You're being punished because you had no remorse. You didn't just feed—you played god."
"Don't act like you're above this," I snapped. "We're demons, Garland. This is what we do."
"And even demons have rules."
I growled low in my throat. "So I'm stripped of power for a hundred demon years—which is basically a thousand human ones! I didn't ask to be some babysitter of fate. I did my job."
"And now you'll learn consequence."
I clenched my fists, fury boiling in my veins. "I can't believe you're doing this to me over Dwayne. Of all the humans, you pick him? That pathetic excuse of a man whose choices led to his own downfall?"
Garland studied me for a moment, then, with a smile that sent a chill crawling down my spine, said, "Very well. Since you are so confident in your lack of remorse, let's amend the punishment."
My eyes narrowed. "What are you plotting?"
"You will go to the human realm."
I tilted my head, suspicious. "As what?"
"As Jocelyn," he said, voice maddeningly serene. "The wife of Dwayne."
The air left me. "You what?"
"Time will be reversed," he continued. "To the day she was freshly poisoned—before all your manipulations. You will inhabit her body and walk her path."
I stared at him, stunned. "You expect me to play housewife? With Dwayne?"
Garland gave a slow, cold nod. "You will live as Jocelyn for three human years. You are not permitted to harm him. Not physically, mentally, emotionally. No manipulation. No sabotage."
I rolled my eyes so hard it hurt. "You think I'm going to fall in love with him in three years? I wouldn't fall in love with that man if you gave me three centuries. He's the human I despise the most. Love and relationship—the things I loathe—and you want me to live them with the very symbol of everything I hate?"
Garland gave me a hard look. "If you succeed—if you endure the three years without falling for him—you may reclaim your full powers, because right now I'm taking half away from it. So your powerd will be back fully, and without limitation if you succeed."
"And if I don't?"
"If you fall in love with Dwayne," Garland said, his voice like final judgment, "you lose your powers. Permanently."
I scoffed. "That's the easiest bet I've ever made. You honestly think I could fall for him? Garland, please. I'm still a demon, even if you want to dress me in a housewife's skin."
"Then take the bet," he said. "Show me you're as immune as you claim."
My pride wouldn't let me back down. "Fine. I accept. I'll spend three miserable years playing dress-up with your pitiful human, and then I'll walk away untouched and triumphant. It's better than wasting a century in the Void."
Garland raised his hand, and the runes that lined the dark chamber began to glow. "So be it."
Before I could speak another word, the ground beneath me vanished, and I was falling—not through space, but through time. Everything warped and twisted around me. My wings dissolved into mist, my form bent and reshaped, compressed, caged into a body not my own.
And then—I gasped.
I was lying on a bed.
Sticky. Cold.
The air was still. The taste of iron filled my mouth.
I looked down at the dress clinging to my limbs. Blood. Jocelyn's blood. The signs of the poison still lingered in her throat, even though I now held the reins.
My body convulsed once before settling. The veil between realms had sealed. I was no longer in the Infernum. I was in the human world. As her.
I stared at the cracked ceiling above, heart racing—not with panic, but with rage.
I had become Jocelyn. The human woman whose pain I once savored like fine wine.
And soon, that idiot man would walk through the door, Dwayne—the man who never saw the knife in his own back, never realized the role he played in his own ruin.
I gritted my teeth.
Three years. Three long, mortal years.
It was laughable.
Garland truly thought this punishment would change something in me.
But he'd made one fatal miscalculation.
I may be caged.
Some of my powers may be sealed.
But I am still a demon.
And I do not fall in love.