Queen of the Damned

by Debra Dunbar

  Which was probably one of the reasons why no one in Hel took me seriously as the Iblis.

  “Most of our household is in Patchine,” Rutter told me.

  “How many are here in Dis?” This was important as I didn’t want to have to teleport a few hundred Lows. First off, they tended to puke when I teleported them. Secondly, they’d learned how unpleasant the experience was and ran away if they knew what was about to happen. This resulted in me running all over my house, trying to catch Lows. The process reminded me a lot of what happened when I needed to give Boomer a bath.

  “Us is it,” Snip said. “And nobody is in Eresh except for a few of Ahriman’s old household. They can stay there. We don’t like them anyway.”

  Relief over only having to grab and teleport two Lows warred with a niggling feeling of concern. “Why are you the only two in Dis? Did something happen to the house that rendered it unlivable? Did Snot vomit all over the place again?”

  Rutter laughed. “No, although that was pretty funny. I knew that was gonna happen when Fatty dared him to eat a barrel full of pickled bitey fish.”

  “Lows aren’t safe in Dis right now,” Snip said, answering my question. Out of all my Lows, he was the one most likely to keep focused.

  “And why aren’t Lows safe in Dis?” I prodded.

  Lows really weren’t safe anywhere. Other demons liked to catch them and play with them, and that play usually resulted in their deaths. No one cared. There was no blood price for killing a Low. They didn’t have friends or family that would avenge them, so they were fair game. But that had always been the way things were with Lows. Their short life expectancy and usual violent death didn’t keep them from living where they wanted to live and doing what they wanted to do. If you knew you’d probably be slowly dismembered tomorrow, you might as well live it up today.

  “There’s a demon who’s taken up a new hobby.” Snip grimaced, telling me exactly the nature of this “hobby.” “He’s snatching Lows left and right, off the streets, out of their beds. He even is taking them out of their homes.”

  I would have liked to say this was a surprise, but it wasn’t. Eventually this demon would get bored and get a new hobby. Until then everyone would just need to stay out of his way.

  “You guys don’t need to leave Dis,” I told the Lows, thinking that I’d need to add this to my announcements at the meeting. “You’re affiliated with my household. I’ve made sure to mark every one of you. You’re safe here.”

  Household members were under the protection of their head demon. Mess with them, and you would find yourself on the pointy end of a powerful demon’s claw. Outside of my weird, quirky group, Lows were not technically considered members of a household. Stealing one wasn’t a big deal unless they were marked. Even then it wasn’t a capital offense. Retribution might happen, but no one would lose a head over a broken Low. It was the same type of punishment allowed if a demon were to swipe a bowl of roasted beaks, or an ugly piece of artwork. They weren’t even considered as valuable as toys—those humans and other creatures we called our own for the purposes of whatever enjoyment they might bring to us.

  “We’re not safe here,” Rutter whispered. “That’s why we were so glad to see you. Not that we’re not always glad to see you, Mistress. You are the best thing ever. Better than a steaming pile of entrails, or a quart of eyeballs, or shredded brains.”

  Nice to know how I ranked in terms of “cool and desirable stuff”.

  “You’re safe here,” I repeated. “I marked you.” There were a zillion Lows to grab and play with. No one would bother grabbing one that had been marked. It wasn’t worth the annoyance of a slightly irritated master or mistress when five feet away an unmarked Low was there for the taking.

  Snip shook his head, his yellow eyes big and sad. “No, Mistress. Not after they took Sinew, and then Booty, and then Lash. We figured it would be best to leave Dis and hide in the Patchine house instead. Rutter and I were just here to grab a few bowls because all those ones in the Patchine house got broken last night.”

  I was mildly interested in why all my bowls at the Patchine house were broken, but that curiosity was completely overridden by the first part of Snip’s statement.

  “They took Sinew, Booty, and Lash? Who took them? And did they get taken all at once, or over a period of time?”

  I knew the risks of asking three questions of creatures that generally struggled to answer with a one-at-a-time approach, but I was starting to get pissed. Was I so disrespected that someone would take a household member that I’d marked? Even if that household member was a Low?

  “Yes, Mistress,” Rutter replied. “They was taken one at a time. When Sinew went missing, we didn’t think much about it. Figured maybe he’d fallen down a well, or got eaten by a sand wyrm or something, but the Lows on the street said they saw him being snatched. Even then, we thought maybe someone didn’t see his mark, or didn’t care, but then when Booty went missing, we knews something was going on. Then Lash…well they dragged him right off our front porch a few days ago. That’s when everyone decided to leave Dis. I mean, next time they might even come inside and take us! At least if they tried that in Patchine, we could hide in the dungeon.”

  That house was like a labyrinth, and the dungeon was pretty inaccessible. It was a good place to hide if someone was coming after you. If they really wanted to get my Lows, they could always just fireball the place into debris. Although, there wouldn’t be much left alive to play with after repeated fireball attacks.

  Still, my brain furiously chewed over the situation. Were these demons targeting my Lows in particular? Was this a personal slight to me? I was the only one who afforded Lows an actual rank within my household, so I could be wrong. Maybe these demons were just grabbing whatever Lows caught their fancy, not realizing the offense in snatching mine.

  “Did they follow you to Patchine? Are you all under any sort of attack there? Have any of my Lows gone missing since you moved?”

  Again I doubted I’d get all these questions answered, but couldn’t seem to summon the patience for one-at-a-time line of questioning.

  “I don’t know, Mistress.” Rutter wrung his tentacles together. “Poo-poo went missing last night, but he’s probably just lost on the third floor again.”

  Okay. Now I’d need to mount a search for Poo-poo on the third floor, just to be sure. Now for the big question that neither one had answered.

  “Who is doing this? I thought you said it was just one demon, but then you mentioned ‘they’?”

  Snip and Rutter exchanged a wary glance. “Rumor has it that they are nabbing these Lows for a higher level demon, maybe even an Ancient. The ones who took Sinew, Booty, and Lash are Cheros and Oor.”

  “They live in Dis?” I asked.

  Rutter nodded.

  As if I didn’t have enough to do, now I needed to look for Poo-poo on the third floor. Come back to Dis and make Cheros and Oor regret the moment of their birth, then go attend this meeting I’d set up with Criam and his Ancient mistress. So much for a quick trip to gather intel and send out some spies, then getting the hell out of Hel. It seemed like every time I stepped foot in this place, I had more shit to do. Hopefully this shit wouldn’t take very long because I had birthday party planning and a Ruling Council meeting on my schedule, and neither of those two things could be put off while I searched my house for a lost Low and beat up some bullies.

  Before they had a chance to realize what I was doing and run away, I shot out my arms and grabbed Rutter and Snip by the ear and horn. Then as they screamed in protest, I teleported the three of us to my house in Patchine.

  Chapter 7

  Poo-poo was indeed lost on the third floor and not kidnapped like the others had been. We found him locked in a closet, gnawing on an old coat that must have belonged to one of Ahriman’s former servants. He’d obviously been there for a while to be attempting to eat a coat. Or not. With Lows, there weren’t usually a high degree of gourmet sensibilities.

/>   After gathering them all together and promising them a party, then waiting for the cheering and body-slamming joy to quiet down, I got to business.

  “Groups of demons are planning to sneak through the gates into the human world,” I told them. “I need you guys to find out who the leaders are, how many are in the groups, and what they plan on doing once they’re on the human side of the gateways.”

  Half a dozen arms, legs, claws, tentacles, and other limbs shot into the air. I sighed, wishing I hadn’t taught them this, but waving appendages was better than a bunch of Lows trying to talk all at once.

  I randomly pointed to one, figuring they all had the same question anyway.

  “We’re gonna need a lot of parchment and stuff, because there’s a lot of demons wanting to go vacation with the humans and I won’t be able to remember them all,” the Low whined.

  “Yeah,” another spoke up. “And how big of a group is a group. If there’s two demons wanting to cross, do we write that down?”

  I thought for a second. “No. Five or more. And I’m especially interested in groups of a hundred or more. And don’t just stand by the gateway and make a log of who is crossing. I need to know about those who are planning to cross. I need enough time to get out a warning before they actually go through the gateway.”

  “How the fuck are we supposed to do that?” another Low complained. “I can stand by one of the gates and take notes, but I can’t read demons’ minds to figure out if they’re thinking of crossing or not.”

  “Might as well put every demon in Hel on that list,” Rutter spoke up. “Everyone wants to vacation sometime or another.”

  “No, no, no.” This was one of the major drawbacks of having a household full of Lows. They were idiots. “Groups of five or more, and especially groups of a hundred or more, who are planning on crossing sometime in the next few weeks to six months.”

  I figured anything longer than six months out would pretty much net me every demon in Hel as well. Almost every Ancient and high-level demon had fantasies about storming the gateways and running unhindered around the human world for a glorious century or two. It was kind of a bucket list item for demons, but I only wanted those who were actually laying down concrete plans to do something in the near future.

  “When should we check in, Mistress?” Snip asked.

  “If you find out that something is going down in the next week or two, then I want to know right away either by mirror or sending someone across the gateway to tell me. Otherwise, compile a report and get it to me weekly.”

  All the Lows looked at each other, then down at the floor where their various lower limbs shuffled.

  Ah yes. Asking for a report was like telling them to sprout feathered wings and fly. I’d been hanging around with angels for too long. These were Lows. They weren’t going to do a report if their lives depended on it. Lucky bastards.

  “Okay, not a report, then. Get me a list. I want a list weekly of any groups of demons planning to cross the gates. Get me names, if you know them, level and specialty, number of demons in the group, their leader’s name and level, and when they plan to cross as well as their intentions once they’re on the other side of the gateways.”

  That got a me a lot of confused expressions. Ugh. How the fuck was I going to get this information? It was just too much for these little guys to remember.

  “Okay, work in teams of three. One in your team remembers to get information on the leader, the second one on the group members, the third the timing and intentions. Is that easier?”

  There was a chorus of “Yes, Mistress.”

  “Snip, you’re in charge of compiling the information on one sheet of paper and getting it to me every week. Can you do that?”

  He saluted. “Do you want me to continue working on our extra-special, secret project as well?”

  At his words, the other Lows erupted into loud complaints of favoritism and demands to know what this special secret project was. I couldn’t remember what the fuck it was, so I just gave Snip a blank look.

  “Amael-say,” he prompted. “Ancient emon-day who led the ebellion-ray in aru-aay?”

  I winced, but thankfully none of the other Lows was smart enough to figure out pig Latin.

  “Yes. Continue with that project.”

  I was immediately subject to an onslaught of whining that had me making up special project designations for what I’d just instructed them to do. It was time to get the party show on the road, but first, I needed to figure out what the fuck was going on with my missing Lows. Then meet with Criam and his Ancient.

  “So what’s up with these demons who took Sinew, Booty, and Lash?” I demanded.

  “Cheros is just an asshole,” Snot spoke up. “She likes to play with Lows, although she’s pretty good about letting us go before she kills us. She’s fast and sneaky. Got me once.” Snot wiggled a stump of a bony tail at me. “She doesn’t usually work with another demon, though. And neither Sinew, Booty, or Lash have turned up. None of the Lows they took are turning up. Word has it she’s grabbing them for someone else.”

  That was what Rutter had alluded to. “Why? And who?”

  About half of my Lows shrugged.

  “Sometimes demons like to kill us,” Snip told me. “Happens every couple years or so. Usually it’s a frustrated warmonger, but could be any type of demon. They’ll kill a few thousand of us, and either get bored and stop, or get bored and start trying to kill higher-level demons. If they do the latter one, then usually they work their way up the hierarchy, killing more and more challenging demons until someone kills them first.”

  “How often does this happen?” I asked. “I know you said every couple of years or so, but how often do they kill a few thousand then get bored, as opposed to the other, self-destructive, type of activity?”

  Rot wrinkled his snout. “Every year or two this sort of thing happens. About ninety percent are the demons who kill a few thousand of us, then get bored eventually and stop. Most aren’t stupid enough to kill anything higher than Lows.”

  I was appalled. “So what happens when one of those demon serial killers starts up? Do you all run and hide or something?”

  They all stared at me.

  “Uh, no, Mistress,” Snip replied. “Ain’t no sense in that. We all know we’re gonna die sooner than most. When the killings start, we just try to be smart, and hope they’ll take other Lows. Figuring it’s like that Darwin human wrote about. Only the smartest and strongest Lows survive. We just all hope we’re one of the strong and the smart.”

  That was gut-wrenchingly pitiful. They were so resigned to their fate. Like a bunch of fucking lemmings, hoping a few thousand others were ahead of them on the cliff edge.

  “But this is different,” Rutter added. “This isn’t a Low-killer like usual, and it’s not Cheros just wanting to play. She’s partnering up with Oor, and he’s not usually a demon who pays any special attention to Lows unless they’re in his way or something. They’re both collecting Lows for another demon, and none of us know who that demon is or if he’s killing the Lows or just torturing us somewhere long-term.”

  “So maybe this is the serial-type Low killer, only this guy doesn’t like to do his own shopping?” I conjectured. “He likes the Lows delivered to his door so he can torture and kill them in the privacy of his own home?”

  “Maybe.” Snip chewed one of his tentacles. “I don’t know why we haven’t found bodies, though. They’re not coming back injured and broken, and we’re not finding bodies. They’re just snatched up and taken away, and never seen again.”

  It bothered me. And it really shouldn’t bother me beyond the fact that these two assholes were taking my Lows, ones I’d marked as part of my household. I needed to stop being a sentimental fool and just ensure that my own Lows were safe. Not because they needed to be safe or anything. No, it was because this was a slap in the face to my authority. These demons were showing me great disrespect, taking what was mine. That was it. That’s what was p
issing me off, not that my Lows were scared, or that they were sadly resigned to the fact they were going to be murdered or anything.

  And not the rest of the Lows, not the hundreds and thousands who weren’t in my household. What happened to them wasn’t my problem. I needed to confront these two asshole demons, teach them a lesson, and make sure that they were snatching Lows who weren’t mine. That was the extent of my problem here. Whatever happened to the non-household Lows wasn’t my concern. I had enough on my plate without becoming their savior. Nope. Not happening.

  “How many other Lows have been taken?” I asked, unable to help myself. Damn it.

  “We don’t really keep track,” Snot explained. “Lots of Lows are out on their own, all solitary like. They’re usually the first to go. It’s safer when we group together. From what I heard, I’m thinking maybe twenty or so Lows from Dis. Not too many.”

  A few others agreed with his assessment. Not too many. Twenty Lows snatched off the streets of Dis in the last few weeks was “not too many’.” I guess not when they were used to losing a few thousand to killers every few years.

  “This should have come to my attention the moment it started happening,” I scolded. “You guys need to let me know when Lows go missing like this.”

  Snip tilted his head as he stared at me. “You mean in the household, Mistress? Or do you really want to know when other Lows go missing as well?”

  There were a collective inhalation, a sense of electricity as all eyes turned to me, their grotesque faces raised up to mine with…hope. No one had ever given a flying fuck about them before. No one.