by Jenn Stark
The next demon was more what she’d expected to catch in her net. Thickheaded, thick necked, and squat, this creature exuded far more malevolence than Boltar—and he was equally strong. Once more, dismay curled through her. What was Marcus thinking, choosing demons of such power? He more than most knew Cressida harbored deep doubts about her abilities. Was he trying to test her?
Before she could open her mouth to speak the ancient words, the demon’s lips quirked into a harsh, cruel sneer. “You pull me into your machinations at your own risk, priestess,” he rumbled. “When I fill you with my seed, you’ll learn the error of your ways.”
Cressida’s patience snapped. “You won’t touch me, demon. That isn’t your purpose here.” She lifted a hand crackling with power, the sight of which merely caused the demon to hoot softly with pleasure.
“Oh, I don’t think so. You’ll scream my name, I promise you. It is Zeneschiah.”
“She is not going to be screaming your name,” commented the Syx from the end the line. “I am totally out if I have to hear that ridiculous word even one time more than necessary.”
The smug derision of the Syx managed to accomplish what Cressida couldn’t on her own, breaking the momentary surge of energy from Zeneschiah that seemed to reach out and throttle her. She knew she didn’t have to worry long-term about any of the demons attacking her. When the ritual was completed and all five of her chosen were verified as consorts, they’d lose much of their free will to oppose her. But then again, Zeneschiah wasn’t actually opposing her, which was a little more concerning. Despite all the research she’d done on the horde, coming face-to-face with their depravity was more alarming than she’d anticipated.
The next of the chosen was the human, who was already showing the wear of the continued hold on his soul. He was a Connected of some power, a sensitive, and she didn’t miss the spiked Christian cross he held in his grip. Why had Dahlia chosen him? It didn’t matter; he was the least of her concerns. “Tell me your name, mage.”
“Jim Granger,” the man said, his voice low and resonant, the voice of a man of experience, even understanding. She sharpened her gaze on him, but he looked back with blank eyes. He wasn’t trying to break her hold on him. He wasn’t trying to understand it or fight against it. He was bending to its sway, which was exactly his strongest move if he wanted to preserve his energy. She frowned. Maybe she would have to worry about him after all.
“You will be my consort, Jim Granger,” she said. “Do you understand?”
He quirked a smile. “Not even remotely. I look forward to being educated.”
That earned another snort from the Syx, but Cressida didn’t need to confirm him as her choice. The two demons and the human were the question marks. She only needed the Syx to dispatch the other demons at his earliest opportunity. She didn’t think it would take much, particularly with Zeneschiah.
When she would have turned away, however, the Syx had the gall to clear his throat. “Your lapdog back there wants the full show, princess,” he murmured beneath his breath. “Probably a good idea to give it to him.”
It was only then that Cressida became aware of Marcus’s stare. He was focused on her with almost laser-like intensity, though there was no trace of compulsion in his gaze. He wasn’t strong enough to compel her. Still, she longed to glance his way, to understand what he so desperately wanted her to do, but she was the high priestess of this coven now. She couldn’t afford to look weak, especially when so many of her fold were working hard to keep the veil steady, restraining the demons within the confines of the pentagram.
“You may as well get it over with,” the Syx taunted softly. “What’d you say your name was? I didn’t quite catch it with all of Hellboy’s heavy breathing.”
Cressida’s gaze snapped sharply to meet that of the Syx’s, and once again, she fought the urge to step back. Not because the Syx was leering at her, though. The quality of his stare was different—far more powerful, far more dangerous.
“I am Cressida Frain,” she said slowly and distinctly. “High Priestess of the Scepter Coven, first among witches. You are my consort. Tell me your name.”
“My name is—”
For a moment, all the magic in Storm Court froze, and the world fell away. There was no Marcus or Dahlia or Elysium with her on the dais. There were no dancers writhing on the floor or demons panting for their energy. There was only Cressida and the Syx, and an aching maw of pain that seemed to open up and threaten to swallow her whole. The Syx maintained his glamour, looking as dark and dangerous as ever, but the word that came out of his mouth was no word at all. Instead, it was a howling wind that blew up between them, so bleak and desolate that it sounded as if it contained the wail of a hundred thousand souls, each trapped in their own personal, ice-bound hell. The sound of it was agony to listen to and stopped the breath in Cressida’s throat, the blood in her veins. Her bone’s very marrow turned to crystal as she stared at the beautiful Syx, his eyes holding hers in a fierce, unholy challenge.
Then his grin stretched farther, and the spell was broken. The dais was back, Marcus and Dahlia and Elysium holding firm, as if nothing had happened in the intervening seconds.
“But it’ll probably be easier for you to call me Stefan,” the mighty demon of the Syx said. “Since we’re being so neighborly and all.”
Chapter Four
Stefan felt the power of the Scepter witches close around him, and it took every ounce of his training to let it happen. He kept one eye on the two demon thugs that Cressida had inexplicably included in her cohort of consorts, and the other on the human, Jim Granger, who seemed particularly amused to be along for the ride. Normally, it took humans far longer to obtain that kind of perspective, if they obtained it during their lifetimes at all. He would need to rifle Jim Granger’s thoughts to understand exactly what this man had seen in his thirty-odd years on this earth to allow him to transcend the here and now so easily, detaching from what was right in front of him.
It would no doubt be interesting research.
For the moment, however, Stefan had other issues. He kept working until he could finally feel his body relax enough to slump forward, faking the twilight sleep that was the closest he was ever going to get to being fully knocked out in this world, at least by a force other than simple exhaustion. Demons didn’t sleep like normal humans did, because they weren’t normal humans. Their bodies didn’t run down or give out; they simply stopped—until they started again. It took very little time for a demon to recover from most damage inflicted upon its corporeal form, and its glamour could maintain the effect of perfect health through all but the worst attacks.
It was the glamour that Stefan manipulated, allowing himself to appear to sink into a nearly somnambulant state, which was what he assumed the witches were after. The other demons succumbed much more quickly, but there was more to being a Syx than simply having the stones to knock out other demons. He wasn’t so sure he wanted the witches of the Scepter Coven to understand the finer points of his transformation into one of God’s most dangerous hired guns. He’d never had much truck with witches, and he saw no point to trust them now.
The moment he shut down, however, the witch’s pentagram blew a fuse.
He saw it happen as if in slow motion, the wave of energy that flowed through the room an almost palpable wave. First the mini-horde of demons still assembled on the dance floor of Storm Court remained static, almost confused, then they jerked into action, their energy moving quickly into full and aggressive force.
“No.” He heard Cressida’s shout—not a screech, not a panicked yelp, but an aggressive denial of what was happening in front of her face—but he couldn’t react at first. He could sense the force of multiple witches striving to keep him in check, and Michael’s orders had been clear. He was to obey this little wisp of a witch and bow to her every wish until he was faced with Ahriman. Then the gloves could come off again.
Nevertheless, he’d spent millenn
ia protecting humans from demons, and it was maddening to watch the worst of his kind take chunks of flesh out of God’s children, biting and tearing and—
“Stop them.” Cressida was suddenly in front of him, her voice clear where everything else was muted. She obviously was the primary witch subduing him, which surprised him. He’d thought the male witch on the dais would’ve done the honors, with all the big swinging-dick energy he was exuding.
He focused on Cressida. “Stop them, how?”
“However you can,” she said. “I waited too long. The spell is breaking, and I don’t want the mortals hurt. They believe they’re initiates with a chance to learn the sacred arts, but they’re not. They’re merely bait.”
Stefan scowled at her. “That’s not cool.”
“I know—I know. We were desperate, though. We had to draw in demons without them suspecting why.” Another cry sounded deeper within the throng of dancers, and she paled. “Please, go. As—as a favor to me.”
Stefan’s brows shot up. A favor was something entirely different from a compulsion. A far more interesting something. “I can do that.”
He swung around, the spell of submission falling off him like boxers on the bedroom floor, and instantly identified the problem. A gang of demons had crowded around one corner of the pentagram, all but blocking out the hurricane candle that served as the symbol of the ward the witches had created. They couldn’t stamp the light out, but there were so many of them—far more than would typically be called forth for a spell like this—that they were blunting it enough for an unexpected pivot: while typically demons would be eager to depart the witches’ pentagram, in this case, more demons rushed in. That continued to overload the spell, wearying the Scepter Coven witches and breaking their hold.
But the demons didn’t have a clue why they’d been called to the party. They certainly didn’t know a Syx had been invited too. And where there was one…
He weighed his options. Michael would be pissed, potentially. But Michael had stuck him in the middle of this mess without any information. And the moment this trouble was past, he was going back into the witch-run Zombieland, cut off from his brothers. That wasn’t cool either.
“Knock ’em flat. The humans. Can you do that?” he asked Cressida.
She stared at him, obviously perplexed. “Why?”
“Because I need the place cleared from about three feet up. If you can do it, tell me. If you can’t, stop being such a sissy about it.”
His taunt had the desired effect. With a twist of her lips, she slapped her left hand to her right wrist. Instantly, all across the room, the crowd of mortal initiates dropped, boneless, as if their legs had been knocked out from under them. Before the first head connected with the first puddle of spilled vodka, Stefan moved.
The witches had chosen fire as the grounding points of the pentagram—normally, they would use salt or blood or a spelled rock or something. But fire, Stefan knew well, was a far more flexible tool when it came to demons. Fire was the symbol of the one place in the universe they least wanted to be, and for a Syx, it was a tool of inestimable proportions.
He lifted his hands, and all five points of the pentagram exploded upward and joined together, making a molten dome that caught the demons in place. They jolted, staring upward, their faces transfixed in fear. Stefan knew he would have only a moment to act, but a moment was all that was needed.
He summoned the Syx.
In another instant, the world snapped tight, and five other figures burst into the room. Warrick, the leader of the demon enforcers, barely gave Stefan a grin before he and Gregori shoved their shoulders into the nearest demons, sending them flying in an explosion of black blood. Finn, the youngest of the Syx and newly redeemed, showed no sign of the incredible trials he’d endured a scant three weeks earlier, but instead rushed forward with a gleam in his eye and, apparently, a song in his heart as he singlehandedly took down another knot of demons. Raum and Hugh, the last of the Syx, saluted Stefan briefly before they too raced forward, roaring with bloodlust. It wasn’t often anymore that the entire team of the Syx could fight at once, and it was a good feeling.
It was more than a good feeling.
Even as he continued to fell his own demons, Stefan watched with interest the progress of his fellow Syx. There was a difference in them, without question. Warrick and Finn fought with less intensity but greater effect, as if they’d unlocked some mystery of their opponents that had been withheld from the others. Was this why the archangel had been so reluctant to let them fight together? Was their obvious shift in abilities important?
He fought his way over to Warrick, who was plowing through demons like he was pulling weeds out of a row of green beans.
“They’re summoning Ahriman,” Stefan shouted when he got close. “They’re going to attack him. Think it’s their right.”
“They’ve been misinformed.” The leader of the Syx glanced over, dropping his voice as Stefan neared. “Ahriman wasn’t even in Serbia. The horde got it wrong.”
“They don’t seem to care. There’s some old-ass grimoire they’re quoting about how to take him down, and according to Michael, I’m supposed to help.”
Warrick scowled. “I know the Scepter Coven grimoire.”
“Figured you would. So tell me how to fix this.”
“Well, it’s been a while…but if I recall correctly…” His eyebrows suddenly shot up. “Wait a minute. You’ve got to marry a witch?”
As he howled with sudden laughter, Warrick caught another demon by the throat and hurled him to the ground. The demon’s snarl of surprise turned into a cry of terror as he exploded in a geyser of black spray, then disappeared completely to the other side of the veil.
“Try to focus,” Stefan pressed. “There’s got to be a reason they need a demon. Because based on the assholes she chose as candidates besides me, any demon will do. So it’s not about me being a Syx. What can a witch and a demon do together that they can’t do apart?”
Warrick’s grin only deepened. “Besides make little demon-witch babies?” He lifted his hands as Stefan tossed a demon at him, punching the creature beyond the veil. “I don’t know, honestly. But you’re right, there has to be a reason the grimoire demands a demon. But I can’t think it will be a reason you’ll much enjoy, if there are witches involved.”
“Agreed. Witches are a pain in the barbed tail.” Stefan turned, then turned again, taking in the carnage. The demons were all but ended, and Raum and Hugh were making their last rounds, knocking down the ones who struggled upright like whack-a-moles. As always, the fight was over too soon. “Thanks for coming, man.”
“Felt good to work together,” Warrick said, clapping him on the shoulder and grinning. “Now you’ll have to name your firstborn after me.”
And then, as quickly as they’d arrived, the Syx vanished.
Stefan straightened, looking around the room. There was a hiss and a crackle, then the music came up again, and with it the dancers—except now a good third of them were covered with goop. But as he braced for the inevitable screaming, Cressida strode forward, her red hair practically on fire beneath the bright lights, her silver cuffs gleaming.
“You have passed the test and survived the trial!” she announced, her arms arcing wide. “Celebrate as initiates of the Scepter Coven!”
The music pounded even louder then, and a cheer went up, those dancers covered in the thick dark liquid looking like they’d suddenly died and gone to heaven, though they literally had no idea what that meant. Stefan watched them, stupefied. As part of his payment for his sin, he couldn’t remember what heaven looked like, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t filled with people stained with demon blood.
Cressida turned back to him, her jaw set. “Thank you. The pentagram was fully broken as the attack continued, and there would’ve been far worse casualties than a few ruined bandage dresses without the help of your team.”
“No problem, princess.” Ste
fan grinned, then staggered forward as the now-familiar wave of magic hit him once again. This time, it didn’t come from Cressida but from behind him, on the dais. He watched her eyes narrow as she took in whoever it was who’d delivered the blow, but it didn’t take a genius to figure it out.
“Who is that dickhead?” Stefan gasped, and Cressida’s mouth tightened.
“My prime consort. Marcus Frost.”
“Consort.” Stefan breathed through his nose. Whatever Marcus was leveling at him, the witch was definitely frosty. “You seem to be racking up quite a few of those.”
“I figure among all of you, I should find at least one who can get the job done.”
Stefan managed a laugh beneath the surge of power being leveled at him. “I guess that depends on what your definition of the job is.”
“Cressida.”
Stefan swiveled as another young witch approached, the pretty blonde from the dais. He hadn’t caught her name yet, but she seemed to know Cressida well. “The others are below. We need to move before the club’s management investigates all the screaming.”
“Agreed.” Cressida nodded, though in Stefan’s book, the screaming hadn’t sounded all that different from the music currently thudding through the sound system. He didn’t complain as she reached out and took his arm, though he also didn’t miss the intensity of the pressure on him increasing.
“So this Marcus guy. If he’s your consort already, why the nonsense with the rest of us? What do the rest of us have that he doesn’t? Besides balls?”
“Stop it. He can hear you,” Cressida said beneath her breath, but Stefan didn’t need her to point that out. The intensity of the compulsion spell jacked to a higher level, well past the point of pain.
“He better not be pulling this shit on the exorcist. I don’t give a damn about the demons, but he dicks with one of God’s children and he’s done.”
