Nine.
The demon’s face twisted and reformed until it no longer resembled him . . . until it was no longer remotely human. A snarling, muddy animal snout snapped far too close to his face as his eyes took in the length of a matted, hairy body to crudely taloned feet.
This was no middling demon. It was a Demon Lord.
In that instant, Kyle knew exactly where he was.
“You can run only so far,” the Demon Lord mocked. “Your blood, immortal or not, is ours.”
Kyle mustered all his strength to club the creature away, and wrenched himself up through the portal, sealing it shut behind him.
Ten.
Falling to his haunches, he exhaled and vomited.
KEEP YOUR FRIENDS CLOSE
Sera hurried to where Kyle was hunched over, wincing at the stink coming off him. He smelled like rancid meat.
“I’m fine,” he mumbled, swiping at the back of his mouth with his sleeve. He turned to face her and Sera blanched at the livid, puckered flesh of his cheek.
“What happened?”
“Got a small taste of what happens to deifyre in Xibalba after that kiss.” His eyes flicked to Darika. “I ran into Lamasha.”
“Lamasha?” Darika’s eyes were round as she looked from Sera to Kyle. “Are you certain it wasn’t Ra’al? You know how much he loves to play with other forms. Could you have been mistaken?”
Kyle shook his head weakly while Sera concentrated on healing the welt on his face. “Trust me, I’d know Ra’al in any form. It was Lamasha. I was in the fourth.” He winced as the wound pulled tight, knitting together, and the pain lessened to a dull roar.
“Any more hints on what they are planning?” Darika asked.
Kyle shrugged. “I don’t know, but it obviously involves the rulers of the other dimensions. We have to assume that it’s no longer just Ra’al at the helm.”
Darika nodded thoughtfully. “His defeat at your hands would have been seen as weakness. A coup was to be expected.”
Sera frowned. The last time she’d confronted the Demon Lords of Xibalba, she’d had the misfortune to meet four of the seven: Ra’al, the most powerful lord, that of the seventh and the worst dimension of hell; Temlucus, lord of the sixth; Belphegar, lord of the fifth; and Dekaias, Kyle’s twin brother and lord of the first. They had all been terrifying in their own right, but she’d never met Lamasha, or the Demon Lords of the second and the fifth.
“The fourth,” Sera said, trying to recall what she’d read about the different dimensions in Xibalba, thanks to the resourcefulness of her little brother, who had scoured the Internet for information and nearly gotten himself killed in the process. “That’s the dimension of disease, right?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Kyle said.
Sera fought back a shudder as another waft of putrid air reached her nostrils. “What did she say to you?”
“She called me the false heir and she wanted me to kill her to take my place,” Kyle said. He looked like he had more to say, but sealed his mouth shut at the last moment. A flicker of something like resignation passed over his eyes. Sera squeezed his shoulder. She knew all too well of what it must have cost him to venture back into the Dark Realms after everything that had happened. Xibalba’s dark claim on him was hard to overcome. And she would know—she fought the pull of it every single day.
“Was that all?” she whispered.
He shook himself and shot her a caustic look. “No more than the usual. ‘Blood is blood,’” he intoned sarcastically. “‘You can never escape your father. You’re a prince of Xibalba. Take your place and reign in hell.’ Clearly, they didn’t get the memo that that ship has sailed, even if the Ne’feri didn’t.”
She grinned at his bravado. At least he still had a sense of humor about it. “You’re not Ra’al, Kyle,” she said. “You know that. They’re just trying to get to you. That’s what they do—sow seeds of doubt, hoping one will take root.”
“Yeah, I know.” The humor faded from his face as his fingers clenched the hilt of Mordas lying in his lap. “I hate that place. And knowing that I’m from there.”
Sera gripped his shoulders harder, forcing him to face her. “Listen to me. The Trimurtas made you an Azura Lord,” she said. “They saw something in you that was worth saving. Hold on to that. It’s about who you are now, not who you were or where you come from, do you hear me?”
“I don’t want to hurt anyone. You, especially. Lamasha said I would.”
She gritted her teeth. “If I thought for one second you were a danger to me, do you think I’d be here with you at my side?” She glanced at the silent goddess standing next to them. “Do you think Darika would be here? Or that Dev would let me be here alone with you? The Demon Lords are going to say anything to weaken you. Don’t let them in.”
“I know.” But his response was quiet. Whatever else that Demon Lord had said, it had shaken him to the core. And it had to do with her. She vowed to get to the bottom of it before he allowed it to eat him up inside.
Darika moved quickly back the way they’d come, drawing their attention. Her eyes narrowed down the hallway that had led them here. “Someone’s coming.”
Sera and Kyle scrambled to their feet. “Demon?”
“No. Human.” Darika squinted, confusion flitting across her features. “I think.”
Sera made her twin weapons disappear, and Mordas did the same in Kyle’s hands, while Darika resumed a more human appearance. They remained wary, but the face that peeped around the entryway was a familiar one . . . and explained Darika’s confusion.
The new arrival was half human.
“Nate!” Sera exclaimed, her relief turning instantly to aggravation. “What on earth are you doing here?” Her eyes flicked past him. “Alone! What were you thinking?”
“Tracked you.” Nate grinned. “And I’m not alone. There’s a Yoddha around somewhere, though I might have lost her.”
“You tracked us? What does that even mean? How? Why? Shouldn’t you be in school?”
“Which of those do you want me to answer first? Anyway, it’s lunch period,” he replied nonchalantly and sauntered into the chamber. “Smells like dead butt in here.”
“Are you serious, right now?” Sera threw her hands up in exasperation. “You have one minute to explain, or I serve you up on a platter to Mom. And we both know how that’s going to end.”
“Fine,” he said. “Don’t give yourself a heart attack. I overheard Mom and Dad talking last night, after your big secret meeting, about what you guys were going to do at the school, and I wanted to help.”
“You overheard? You mean eavesdropped.”
“Sure,” he said with a mischievous wink. “Anyway, I knew Mom would never let me, so I decided to bike over here during lunch and see if you’d found anything.” He glanced at Kyle, who wore the same incredulous look Sera knew she must have on her own face. “And it looks like you did. Was it a demon? Did you kill it?” Without waiting for an answer, Nate peered at Darika with interest. “Nice trident. I like your third eye.” He stuck out a hand. “You must be Durga.”
That eye—which no human should have been able to see—narrowed at him. “Thank you, and yes. Though please call me Darika.”
Sera sighed, staring from the goddess to her brother. “Darika, this is my little brother, Nate. He’s a know-it-all and is cruising for serious trouble.”
A smile crossed the goddess’s face as she studied Nate. “Half Sanrak,” she said. “Sophia’s blood. How old are you?”
“Eleven.”
Darika’s hand closed around Nate’s, and at the contact, Sera sensed a burst of energy so potent that it made her sway. She wasn’t the only one to have felt it either. Kyle inhaled sharply, and Darika looked surprised as she stared down at their joined hands.
“Powerful,” she murmured.
Nate’s green eyes lit up. “Powers? Like can I fly? Like Mom and Sera?”
“Possibly.”
He grinned and wiggled his eye
brows at Sera. “See? Told you I’m a demigod. Just like Percy Jackson.”
“A demigod who’s going to be grounded the minute we get home,” Sera muttered under her breath as she grabbed his hand and started down the hallway. She didn’t even look back to see if Kyle and Darika were following. She needed to get her meddling little brother out of there. “What if another one of those demons had been lurking down here? You can’t go running off like this without protection. It’s not safe.”
Instead of being chastised, Nate’s face lit up. “So you did find one! Was it totally gross?”
“Did you hear a word I just said? You could have been killed.”
He glared up at her. “You’re starting to sound just like Mom.” He pulled something out of a pocket inside his jacket. “I told you—I saw a Yoddha. And I can totally take care of myself.”
Sera halted in her tracks to stare at what looked like a glowing slingshot in his palm. “Where’d you get that?”
“Micah.”
“Micah?”
“Yeah, he’s been teaching me stuff. Mom asked him to.”
Sera’s brows snapped together. She hadn’t known about Nate’s lessons with a Sanrak deity. “What kind of stuff?”
“That’s classified.” He smirked, backing out of her reach. “But I’ll tell you if you have any valuable information to trade.”
She snaked a hand out toward him, but he darted out of the way and skipped behind Kyle, who looked like he was struggling to contain his laughter.
“You are so dead when we get home,” she warned him as they climbed the stairs and pushed open the heavy metal door to the upper level of the basement.
A row of industrial lights illuminated the space and they all blinked as their eyes adjusted from the gloom of the sub-basement. It was a storage room of some sort, filled with moldy crates and stacked old furniture. When they’d chased the demon through here, it’d been pitch-black.
“Did you turn on the lights?” Kyle asked Nate.
“No.”
Sera stared at him. “How’d you find us, anyway?”
“Skills.”
“Nate, I’m serious,” she said. “Did something draw you down here or tell you to come this way?”
“No, I told you. I tracked you.” Nate flushed as if imparting some precious secret. “Turns out I can sense deifyre—yours in particular.” Sera’s jaw dropped as she stared at her brother. He hesitated. “It’s because we’re related. Micah’s been working with me on identifying the differences between yours and Mom’s. They’re similar. Anyway, if I focus hard enough, I can pretty much find you wherever you are.”
“That’s . . . useful,” she said after a beat, frowning. “Not sure that I like the idea of being a GPS tracker in human form, though.”
“What else has Micah been teaching you?” Darika asked.
“Mostly how to control and gather my energy. It’s hard though, like trying to hold a breath inside my chest and then directing it to do things.”
“Like what?”
“Healing. Moving things. Using it as protection. Or as a weapon.” He paused, staring up at her. “Micah said my powers come from my mom, and that she used to be a power-ful warrior. Is that true?”
Sera felt Darika’s glance slide to her. They both had collective memories of their own past incarnations—all goddesses did. Sera felt the memories bubble to the surface. In a past life, Sophia had been Sera’s Sanrak guardian when she’d been another avatar. And Micah was right—Sophia had been a formidable warrior. She still was.
“Yes,” Darika agreed. “In her time, she was one of the greatest leaders of the Sanrak.”
The faintest whiff of sulfur made them all freeze. The smell meant one thing. With a frustrated growl, Sera moved to stand in front of Nate and shoved her brother behind her back as she, Kyle, and Darika took up defensive positions. Weapons appeared in their hands.
“More vetala?” Sera whispered.
“No,” Kyle said. “They didn’t smell like that.”
Her eyes scanned the space. “Where are they?” She didn’t have to wait long for the answer—a group of five juniors and seniors slipped out from a row of crates. Sera recognized two of them from geography. They looked just like a bunch of students skipping class, but the subtle odor said otherwise. “Kyle?” she asked.
He nodded, raising Mordas in his hand. “Demons.”
“Don’t hurt them,” she said as Darika shot her an incredulous look. Once more, Darika did not look like her meditative self—she looked ferocious, like her sister. “They’re just kids,” Sera justified. “They’re innocent.”
Darika’s eyes flared, her trident and sword appearing in brilliant starbursts. “They are not innocent. They knew exactly what they were doing when they agreed to be hosts. It’s a reciprocal trade. Don’t fool yourself, Serjana.”
Déjà vu, Sera thought.
Though Darika seemed more reasonable than Kira, she didn’t want a repeat altercation.
“They’re teenagers.”
“Who knew what they were doing,” Darika shot back.
Sera’s deifyre blazed. “You’ve been asleep too long if that’s what you think. In the teenage world, if someone promises you an inroad to the in-crowd, you take it. Everything in high school is life and death. You think a fleeting deal with a devil to be popular means that a kid is evil? It just means they want to fit in.” She turned to Kyle. “Do your thing.”
She watched as he sucked in a breath, stripping the demons from their human bodies and banishing them back to Xibalba in one fell swoop. But even as he did so, a new trio of kids appeared from behind the crates. Sera dismissed her weapons, shooting Darika a cautionary glare. Two girls rushed her, compelled by the demons within, but with immortal speed, Sera ducked, dispatching each with rapid blows to the temple. Their bodies slumped to the floor as Kyle exorcized the demons from them with a word.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the last student dive toward Darika, who grabbed the boy by the neck. Sera held her breath as the goddess held his body high. The boy’s eyes rolled back in his head as the demon within fought futilely against her immortal strength. After a tense moment, Darika released the boy, flinging him to Kyle’s feet. He quickly purged the demon from its host.
“Thank you,” Sera said.
“Don’t thank me yet,” Darika said in an emotionless voice. “Your affinity for the mortals has always been your greatest weakness. In the end, they will be the ones who destroy you.”
“That may be so,” Sera replied coolly. “But their souls are not lost to Xibalba. Who are we to condemn them?” She waved a hand. “I’ve seen the face of true evil, and this is not it. Trust me, they are pawns, not monsters.”
Darika bowed her head slightly. “As you say.”
“Sera,” Nate called out in a low voice, a thread of fear permeating his tone. She turned to see five of the ugliest demons she’d ever seen lurking a stone’s throw from where he stood. Her breath stalled in her throat.
Where did they come from?
These ones did not have hosts. And they weren’t small, either. The largest was the shape and size of a massive gorilla. A dark gray hide riddled with bulging veins covered its entire mass, a row of razor-sharp tusks protruding from a gaping lower jaw. Red eyes jutted from its head and its clawed fists were the size of shovels. The other four were smaller but no less hideous. Jagged teeth pushed outward from their mouths.
“Pishachas,” Darika whispered from behind them. “Flesh eating rakshasas.”
Nate’s eyes were like round green orbs as he stared at the demons, his breath coming in spurts and fits. Sera could see that the pishachas reveled in his fear.
“Don’t move,” Sera warned him. “And try to relax.”
“What?” he squeaked. “Why?”
Darika’s voice was low. “Pishachas are known for being vicious. And greedy. They consume anything and everything, and feed off human emotion.”
Their eyes converged on Nat
e.
Despite his earlier bluster, his small body trembled. “Sera . . .”
She signaled to Kyle and Darika. There was no way she could take out all three of them on her own without putting Nate in danger. Even with his fledgling Sanrak gifts, he was still human, which meant he could die if one of them bit him.
The creatures shrieked to each other, and Nate clapped his hands over his ears. They seemed fixated on him. Sera guessed that it had to do with the Sanrak energy mixed with his mortal form.
“Child,” the big one articulated after an eternity of chatter, its distended eyes fastening onto Nate. “What you?”
“A boy.”
“Not boy.” A narrow tongue snaked out to lick one of its own crimson eyeballs. “More.”
Sera took advantage of the pishacha’s preoccupied fascination to attack. She gestured to Kyle as she surged forward, dispatching one of the smaller pishachas with her swords. The rakshasa shrieked as the celestial flames of her blades cleaved through its bulbous body. Two more turned to ash as Darika took care of them, and Kyle destroyed another.
“Run, Nate!” Sera flew at the big one, but it sneered at her and winked out of sight as Nate scrambled out of its reach. “Where’d it go?”
“It’s shaded,” Kyle shouted as he swung Mordas in wide arcs. “Still here. Darika, can you see it?”
Her third eye emerged as she scanned the room. “Behind you.”
“Where’s Nate?” Sera yelled, sudden awareness prickling her skin. Panting, she swung around, trying to see where Nate had run to last. But just as she spied him hiding near one of the crates, the lead pishacha materialized out of thin air and clutched him in its grip. Nate looked so tiny in the shadow of the hulking demon that her heart faltered.
“Don’t hurt him,” she blurted out.
The pishacha leered at Nate, its eyes rolling backward as if scenting something too delicious for words. Its thick claws caressed her brother’s vulnerable neck, and Sera knew that one wrong move could be disastrous. She raised a hand, motioning to Kyle and Darika to remain still.
“What do you want?” she asked in a low voice.
Dark Goddess Page 13
