Hell Born

by Marie Bilodeau

  This was why Max had brought me here. He’d brought me here so that I could find the information I needed to find my friend. But I couldn’t do it from the shadows. I couldn’t do it hiding here. And maybe, just maybe, this light would be willing to look me in the face, and I could find friends here, instead of those who feared me.

  I took a deep breath and counted to ten.

  Then I lowered my hood and I stepped out of the shadows.

  Chapter Twelve

  Stepping out of the shadows wasn’t nearly as dramatic as I thought it would be. I dropped the protective fold and nobody seemed to care about the purple-skinned demon girl. I took a deep breath and lowered my hood.

  But nobody paid me anymore mind than before. I fit in! Nobody seemed to even notice me.

  And that was all well and good, sure, but how was I supposed to get information on Clay? I mean, who the hell was I supposed to talk to about anything? And how was I going to broach it?

  “Hey, how’s it going? Have you seen my sort of blood-thirsty, thuggish-looking friend? Do you know about this particular guild that might have gotten him kidnapped and potentially killed?”

  I looked down at Max, who glanced back up at me. He seemed to be about as out of ideas as I was. Great. Another recluse who wasn’t good at speaking with people. I really needed Clay. He was decent at talking to people. He could certainly always get the information we needed.

  A few people walked around us. They didn’t glance at us suspiciously, or like we didn’t belong here

  Despite that, I still felt so…seen. And I wasn’t necessarily a fan, still.

  “What do we do now?” I whispered to Max. He wagged his tail and looked at some nearby Traded.

  “I don’t know what to ask, Max,” his tail stopped wagging. I stood frozen in place, unable to do anything but feel noticeable.

  My fingers were still wrapped around the sigil, its edges still sharp. I needed to know about this guild. I needed someone to tell me where it was from. I just wasn’t sure how to go about that without attracting all sorts of negative attention.

  Was I overthinking it? I mean, these were still people, just going about their lives. Some of them had probably gone to school like me. Others had grown up in the bush like Ian. But we were all Traded, so we had each other’s backs.

  Right?

  Really, I just needed to talk to one of them. If I just talked to one of them, then hopefully I could get the information I wanted, or at least be pointed in the right direction.

  I was suddenly struck with inspiration. If I could get one of them to tell me where people shared information, where somebody had their fingers on the area’s pulse, and especially that of the guilds, then I could probably find the path to Clay.

  So I wasn’t asking random people about the guild, or Clay. I was only asking who I could get information from. I grew excited as I worked through the idea. I was looking for a guild to join, after all. It made sense that I’d ask around about who knew about the guilds!

  Confident enough in my theory, I took a deep breath, twisted my lips into what I hoped was a charming and welcoming smile, and took a step forward.

  And then stopped dead as Blake stepped out in front of me.

  “Hey demon girl!” he said, his lazy grin promising only pain and ridicule. “Stepping out of the shadows? Does it feel good, being out in the light?” He stood uncomfortably close to me. I could smell his breath. It was even more annoying that it smelled good, like peppermint.

  The upside of meeting Blake, however, was that Blake knew Clay. Chances of Blake wanting to help me weren’t exactly high, but maybe I could get something out of him.

  “Have you seen Clay?” I asked, trying not to let my disgust show on my face. My lips twitched, trying to maintain their smile. I was pretty sure it was slipping steadily away from disarming.

  He snorted. My fingers curled into a fist, but I kept my hands in my pockets. Two of Blake’s buddies from schools stepped up beside him. I’d never bothered to learn their names, just referring to them as Blake’s shadows. It seemed to still fit, and I wondered if they’d all been sent to the same guild.

  Of course they would have been. Guys like Blake had all the luck.

  “D’you lose your buddy?” he asked in a teasing tone. Had he adopted a British accent? Pretty sure he had. Did he think it gave him some kind of air of authority? Probably. Blake was such a loser. I needed to talk to someone else. He wasn’t worth spending sanity points on.

  “Never mind,” I said. “I hope you’re having fun out here, in whatever guild actually decided to put up with you.”

  I tried to walk away, but he stepped in my way. Max growled. Blake cast a glance his way.

  “I see you’ve found another reject for your friend? Maybe you don’t even need Clay anymore.”

  Out of sheer reflex, my knee came up, intending to connect with his groin and leave him on the ground. But before I felt that satisfying crunch, my knee stopped all forward momentum, frozen in the air, disappointingly short of hurting Blake. I stood there on one leg, not able to go further with my knee, and not able to bring it down, either. I glanced up at him, surprised. He leaned in further.

  “If I were you,” he said, uncomfortably close, “I would just forget about your buddy, and go find yourself a guild that will put up with you. Probably one of the circus guilds would love to have a demon to show up, don’t you think? I mean, look at you. You don’t even fit in here, where it’s all Traded.”

  He snorted and gave a warning glance at Max, who now stood between us, growling at him.

  “Losers,” Blake whispered, in his definitely new British accent. He smirked one more second, then the pressure released my knee and I could move my hands again. I let my foot fall, but I didn’t back away from him. I knew better than to back away from bullies and give them any ground.

  I also knew that my chances of landing a blow on him were non-existent, so I just glared at him.

  “Bye, Tira,” he drawled, now sounding a tad more southern, apparently still refining his new accent. He turned his back to me and walked away, making it clear he didn’t see me as a threat. His two shadows gave me a look that I think was meant to be threatening. I glanced back at them, and they moved a little bit faster, closer to Blake.

  I watched them go. Max nuzzled my hand and I gently patted him.

  Blake was wrong about so much. Clay was worth too much to give up on, and I certainly never would. Blake had been right about a lot too, though. And that stung. I still didn’t fit in here. I didn’t know how to approach anyone. I was still only hanging out with outcasts, and probably would never do anything but that. And I still didn’t know where Clay was. But if one good thing had come out of meeting him, it was that I now understood a little bit more about Blake’s powers. He’d stopped my movement, because he’d seen me coming, because I stood in front of him.

  I vowed that if ever I were to confront Blake again, I’d make sure that he didn’t see me coming. He wouldn’t have the chance to stop me twice.

  “Let’s go,” I told Max. He began walking towards the right and I followed him. I had to trust that Max had my best interests at heart. I had to trust that someone in this world still found it worthwhile to lend me a hand.

  #

  I wondered if Max led me somewhere to get information, or simply led me away from Blake. I was okay with it either way.

  The crowd thickened around us and I resisted the urge to merge back into the shadows. I focused on Max, finding it difficult to look up and meet eyes. I pulled my hood back up, deciding it was a worthy compromise to not folding in the shadows.

  People parted to let me walk through, either out of suspicion or kindness. A few tried to pet Max, but he growled at them. A small smile graced my lips. It looked like I wasn’t the only one who was done with people today.

  I followed my grumpy buddy, analyzing people’s boots around me. Or feet, if there were no boots. There was a lot of good fashion. The Traded seemed to ex
cel at good footwear. There were tall boots and short ones, heels and no heels, there were fancy runners with shiny laces and holographic covers, there were some studs and some zippers, some leather and some synthetic.

  The feet without shoes made me glance up a few times. Hoofs leading up to a perfectly normal looking person. Twigs to branches with sentient movement. Hovering feet to crystal wings and elongated bodies.

  I looked down at my own practical black boots and thought that I needed to go shoe-shopping. And that, should my feet be free, they’d just look purple. But I didn’t have hooves, like some of the people here.

  Weren’t demons supposed to have hooves?

  The quality of noise and amount of feet around me changed and I glanced around.

  The buildings didn’t seem as old. They were a few newer builds, made of some metal I couldn’t even recognize. The metal seemed to absorb the sunlight instead of reflecting it, so it still felt comfortably shadowy down here. There were fewer Traded, too, and I found myself breathing a bit more easily.

  Crowds were a problem, regardless of race or origin.

  I glanced inside one of the nearby shops. It wasn’t a shoe shop, much to my disappointment. Maybe a soap shop? Were soap shops a thing? The individual working inside was also a Traded, her eyes a little too wide to be human, her skin a little bit too blue. But something else struck me. She seemed older. She looked to be at least forty.

  But the Traded had all arrived here twenty years ago, as babies.

  I stopped and glanced in, then slowly kept walking when Max nudged me with his nose.

  “Is that person older?” I asked Max. He looked at me, and then looked at the person in the window. I swear his little doggie eyebrows lowered, perplexed.

  In the distance, at the end of this street, I spotted an older woman with white hair and a stooped posture. She looked like a grandmother, except that wings protruded from her back. Great, leathery wings, which she’d accessorized with delicate pink tulle to soften them.

  It certainly worked. Nobody seemed terrified of her. But she did seem like a grandmother to me, as she vanished into one of the stores. That was really strange. There shouldn’t be any Traded old enough to be grandparents. We were all new, weren’t we?

  But then, we probably all aged differently. It made sense. Different races from different worlds. I tried to imagine that, aging faster than anyone else around you, and I was suddenly grateful to age at the right speed. Or at human speed, I guess.

  I did enjoy the pink tulle idea, though. Maybe dressing all in black was too scary and didn’t help my demon-ness. I looked good in black, but maybe I should try more sparkle and flair?

  I shuddered at the thought of standing out on purpose. Scratch that idea.

  Max sniffed the ground a lot, which caught my attention. Maybe he’d managed to get Clay’s scent. He’d found that emblem in a dirty gross bathroom garbage, after all, so his sense of smell wasn’t in question.

  My heartbeat quickened and my focus sharpened. Max began walking faster, still sniffing the ground. I accidentally shouldered a few people as I went by, and didn’t care.

  Clay. He was nearby. He had to be, or Max wouldn’t be moving this quickly, this enthusiastically. He’d been so cautious so far, but now he seemed possessed to move at a greater speed. He brought us down a smaller side street, blessedly empty of people.

  Max stopped abruptly just before the corner and I almost ran into him. He looked back at me. I nodded and folded the shadows around both of us.

  I peeked around the corner. It was a darker alley, but not dark in the way that human alleys were. Dark in the way that a Traded might make it.

  I reached down and crouched, holding Max in my arms to make sure that he was fully hidden from view. I didn’t know how useful my powers could be against a Traded who could fold darkness like that. Was it similar to my own powers? And what hid in this alley that they wanted to keep it hidden that badly?

  It was probably a guild entrance, I realized, my pulse quickening. I’d never actually been to a guild. We’d had open houses at the school, sure, but those were all tables lined around the gymnasium with smiling humans telling us what was so awesome about them, giving us the impression that we’d get a choice.

  If what Ian said was true, that had never even been in the cards.

  I crouched down near him, quiet, holding on to the shadows. I looked down the alley, focusing my eyesight beyond the darkness. The closer I pulled the shadows to me, the more I could pierce the darkness ahead. I realized that I was pulling the shadows from the alley, gathering them around me.

  That was strange. Did I always move the shadows when I manipulated them?

  I almost yelped in surprise when two burly-looking individuals walked right by us, not spotting us. I’d been so intent on the darkness ahead that I hadn’t been paying attention. Neither had Max, from his jump.

  The two men carried a limp form between them, feet dragging on the ground, head dangling, long hair falling wildly around it.

  I couldn’t see much of him, but I could see the shape of his body, I could see the width of his arms, I could see the details of the clothing just enough to suspect that they dragged Clay. My heart skipped a beat and my hand went for the dagger in my boot.

  As though sensing what I’d seen, Max stiffened and focused his gaze back on me. I looked at him, wishing I could communicate with him, not daring to even breathe a word. The darkness of the alley had rallied again to cover the two men, and the pull called on my shadows, too. Keeping them wrapped around us proved challenging.

  I have to save him, I wanted to tell Max. But something stayed me. I don’t know if it was Max’s large eyes, staring back at me with worry, or if it was that power, pushing back against my own.

  Or maybe it was the fact that Clay seemed unconscious, but alive. And the knowledge that even if I found a way to beat those two surly looking guys, who were probably Traded, I’d have to find a way to drag Clay out of here, still. I was strong. But Clay was heavy. I couldn’t help him if I got captured, too.

  I hated myself in that moment. I hated my lack of courage to step out of those shadows and take my chances, to grab my friend and run.

  I clung more tightly to Max, who seemed to relax at the assurance that I wasn’t about to desert him. We crouched silently and focused on Clay. I forced my eyes to pierce the darkness, to watch them drag him into one of the two thick doors in the alley.

  And then I waited, breathing deeply, for those dark shadows, deeper than my own, to dissipate, so that I could follow.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I missed my weapons even more ferociously than I had earlier. I had one dagger and one throwing knife (thanks to the assailant at the safe house), and that was it.

  The weight of the shadows around me seemed to vanish, turning into just my usual comforting cloak. I released a long breath and shared a look with Max.

  “Time to go in,” I said, giving him a confident grin. Clay would have bought it. Ian, however, did not. Or so I gathered from his growl.

  “Look, the weird darkness is gone. I can sneak in, folding shadows around me, find him, wait ’til he’s awake, and then we can both walk out of there. It’s a perfect plan!”

  I didn’t need to be able to understand him to know that he wasn’t buying what I was selling.

  “Well, I’m going to help my friend,” I stood up. “You stay here like a good boy.”

  He half-growled, half-snorted, and his fur began to recede, revealing human-looking flesh. His paws turned to hands and feet. He stood up beside me.

  “You’re naked again,” I offered.

  “Keep your eyes up!” he growled at me.

  “No problem,” I said. “But I’m going after Clay.”

  “I know.” He sounded genuinely distressed. “I just think that there might be a smarter way to do it than just walk in there, don’t you?”

  “Sure,” I offered, “I’m sure there are multiple smarter ways to do this. I don�
�t have another way right now, so why don’t you come up with something?”

  “I can sneak in there and at least see where your friend is. Then I can report back and lead you directly to him, instead of having you wandering around in there.”

  “I can hide in the shadows,” I cocked an eyebrow. “Besides, I think people might be suspicious of a dog walking around.”

  “I can be more than just a dog,” Ian offered. He didn’t look like a Max at all right now. “Look, let me go in there and figure out who exactly they are and what they’re doing, and where they’re holding him. He’s unconscious right now anyways. What are you going to do, drag him out of there?”

  I shrugged, crossed my arms. “I can probably wake him up.”

  “I’m sure you can,” he looked discouraged. “But he might be loud about it. Can you wait while I go in and investigate? Will you trust me with that?” He sounded more and more exasperated.

  Worse: he made a good point.

  “I don’t know that I have that much of a choice,” I mumbled.

  “I’ll take that as a high compliment that you trust me then,” he sarcastically noted.

  “How long are you going to take?” I ignored his tone.

  “Give me half an hour,” he said. “I can get in there, scout around, and come tell you where he is.”

  Half an hour seemed like forever right now. Half an hour was enough to do a lot, including kill Clay. But if they’d wanted to kill him, they would have surely done so beforehand, and not bothered to drag him into whatever this place was.

  “Can you do it faster than that?” I asked, my tail moving in an annoyed fashion behind me. I hated when I lost control of my tail, like some unruly accessory. I forced it to stop moving, kept my eyes up, staring into Ian’s eyes. He seemed to consider the question.

  “I guess it depends on how big the place is…” he pondered. “I’ll come back as quickly as I can, half an hour tops.”

  “I guess that’ll do.” He raised an eyebrow at me. I gave a short laugh. “I appreciate it. I really do. Thank you, Ian.”