by Rhyll Biest
Adriel raised his muzzle. His nose told him the skin was a mix of human, demon and beast—some of it hellhound.
He shook his head and blinked at the way Valeda’s feet hovered a good inch above the ground. Her eyes, silvery white instead of navy, and the gore splattered over her armour made him want to sink lower, to disappear from sight. She wasn’t right.
Another scent—thick, heavy and familiar—set his nose twitching. His gaze settled on the iron collar Paimon gripped in his rotting hand.
Gorgon fat. Lots of it.
‘If you don’t put the collar on, I’ll kill him in front of you.’ Paimon raised the black iron collar and held it out to her.
Valeda’s white, milky gaze slid to it. ‘I’m not a fan of collars.’
Paimon smiled. ‘That’s not what I heard. You wore one for Adriel for a good week or so, didn’t you?’
Adriel’s hackles rose at the sound of his name and the fat thread of jealousy in Paimon’s tone.
She cocked her head. ‘I don’t recall. Now, tell me why I shouldn’t kill you.’ Her voice, sweet but colder than ever, contained other, older voices that intertwined with hers. It was her and yet not her.
He whined.
Paimon laughed. ‘Did you hear that? He misses you. Are you sure you’re willing to risk losing him?’ He prodded Adriel in the side with a boot.
White-hot pain exploded in Adriel’s back, wrestling him down into darkness. When he opened his eyes again, the room wore a coat of frost and Valeda had lain her swords on the ground.
‘I’ll take that as a no,’ Paimon muttered.
Adriel shivered as Valeda’s gaze—lovely and terrible all at once—met his. Even through the inconceivable distance created by her archdemon status, he felt her love. And something more. It began as a twitch in his chest, then it spread like wildfire to his extremities. She was healing him without so much as laying a hand on him. The power that took …
‘This is all our mother’s fault,’ Paimon murmured. His rotting cheeks twitched. ‘She’s the one that started all of this.’
‘Is there a reason I should care?’ Valeda cocked her head, her gaze shifting to her brother even as her healing crept through Adriel’s flesh.
Paimon stood, leaving his throne to advance on her. ‘She,’ Paimon pointed a finger at Valeda, ‘never gave me the status and power I deserved. And then she married you to him.’ He spat.
The spray froze midair and fell to the ground, green snow.
Valeda, the new Valeda, was displeased. Adriel recognised the way her gaze never left Paimon’s. It was the focus of a predator.
‘What are you raving about?’ She studied her brother, white and silver gaze unwavering, as she circled him. Adriel fought to keep her in sight as his shattered bones wove together.
‘She never loved me, only you did.’ Paimon’s fist clenched and unclenched around the collar in his hand.
‘Did. Not any more.’
Silence.
Adriel blinked but couldn’t speak, the agony of each bone in his body regenerating too sharp to allow speech. Paimon looked just as agonised by her words.
‘Why not any more?’ His tone spilled as thick and dark as blood through the room. ‘Because of him?’
Adriel’s skin twitched as Paimon’s gaze rested on him, heavy and hate-filled.
Valeda’s bright white eyes widened. ‘This is my husband?’
Satisfaction curled Paimon’s lips into a smile. ‘He’s not strong enough to shake off the curse I placed on him. He’ll stay that way forever now—a hellhound.’
Not even a ripple of distress marred Valeda’s tranquility. ‘I like hounds.’
‘Then we’ll keep him as a pet.’
Crippling pain seared Adriel’s nerves as his bones stitched together, but through his pain he saw Valeda’s eyes narrow. ‘We?’
‘We. Cadere will marry us.’ Paimon’s eyes dared his sister to contradict him.
Valeda flexed her fingers and extended nine-inch claws of ice from the tips. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Ah, but I won’t give you the hound unless you give me your hand.’ Paimon gave one of Adriel’s ropes a tug. ‘And he’s such a very fine hound.’
Adriel snarled and bared his fangs, snapping.
‘Give him to me? What makes you think I can’t take him?’ Nothing but winter blew through Valeda’s voice.
Paimon grabbed at the necklace of bones around his neck. ‘Cadere won’t like that. I know you think you’re strong with Lore’s maleficence inside you, but Cadere is stronger and older, and I can summon her at any time using these bones.’
Valeda’s laugh, filled with dust and age, made Adriel’s pelt crawl.
‘She’s not going to help you.’ In a single leap she was on Paimon, her long ice claws extended. Her brother’s decaying flesh shredded like broiled meat under her slashing blows.
Paimon dropped the rope and fought back, wrapping pus-yellow tentacles of decay around his sister. She screamed and tore at them, writhing while slashing her ice claws through his flesh and rending the tentacles. Where they touched her skin, the tentacles raised blisters and a puff of steam. Her skin rippled as she self-healed, but more and more blisters formed as acid dripped and splashed all over her.
His voice high with panic, Paimon gripped her shoulders with rotting hands. ‘I’m sorry, sister, I’m sorry. Don’t make me hurt you any more.’
Adriel stretched his legs as he regained sensation in them, then he shifted to a crouch, ready to spring. He hesitated. If he touched the tentacles they might burn him.
They won’t harm you, not with your thick pelt and scales.
Use Paimon’s curse against him.
A red veil descended over his vision as a growl rumbled free from his chest. His veins prickled. He leapt to his feet, ready to tear at the filmy tentacles with his razor-sharp fangs and claws.
Paimon, bone peeking through flesh where his sister had flayed the meat from his face, dismissed him with a glance, focusing instead on Valeda. ‘Our mother married you to a commoner, for Lilith’s sake. Can’t you see that she never loved you? Only I do, and I need you.’
Untrue. With a wild snarl Adriel hurled all his weight against the ropes anchoring his collar. The knots gave way, sending him tumbling across the stone floor, but he regained his footing and leapt, jaws gaping wide.
He found Paimon’s thigh and bit down, exerting massive pressure.
The reptilian part of his brain commanded that he shake and worry his prey, and he obeyed.
Paimon screamed, his vile blood pouring into Adriel’s mouth. Decay, he’s filled with decay. Nonetheless Adriel brought him down and worried him against the stone. He was ready to finish him off when Valeda approached.
He flattened his ears. What was she doing?
Her hand was extended, an expression of sorrow in her beautiful eyes—the eyes that looked nothings like hers.
When she bared her teeth at him he backed away, confused.
She bent over her brother, her ivory hair shifting with static. ‘Paimon, my love.’
Adriel whined. Why was she speaking with that odd voice? Where had the electricity dancing over her skin come from? His confusion grew as her eyes and hair turned blue.
‘Sister,’ Paimon gasped, and held out his trembling hand. ‘Save me.’
‘It’s me, Mnemnos.’
Paimon gaped. Had enough flesh remained on his face to look confused, Adriel was certain Paimon would have frowned.
Valeda shook her head, her features rippling, her hair and eyes shifting colour. ‘Get out, get out.’ The static cloud released her hair in a rush.
She blinked and drew a deep breath before her gaze dropped to the hand her brother held outstretched to her. ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’ She slapped it away before stabbing her ice claws through his bloated gut. She cut him wide open before reaching inside him with a rough thrust. She fished in his belly. A loud crack pierced the room as she split his rib cage apart to sear
ch higher up.
Adriel stared at her as she scooped out her brother’s innards and ran her bloody fingers through the putrid mess searching for something, oblivious to her brother’s dying gasp.
‘Ah, there you are.’ She jerked something free from her brother’s body and buffed it against her tunic before holding it aloft, her long claws of ice dripping black blood. She eyed the jewel, its sparkling malice, with reverence.
As she stared at it, mesmerised, Adriel snapped his jaws around Paimon’s neck. He worried and tore at the putrid flesh and bone until he had worked the head free, then he tossed it across the room.
Valeda looked up from her prize to laugh. ‘Very good, hound.’
Vile, caustic blood burned his mouth, snout and eyes and he shook his head in pain, sneezing and snorting it out.
When he recovered he saw Valeda’s eyes shining with unrecognisable greed as she eyed the thing she held aloft, her horribly burned face repairing as she studied it.
She glanced at Adriel and held his gaze. His hackles rose. She didn’t smell right, she didn’t sound right, and she didn’t look right. A low growl escaped him.
She laughed and a snowflake fell on his nose. He shook it off and bared his fangs.
Her smile died and she bared her own fangs of ice, twice as long as his. ‘This is mine, not for little doggies.’
A wave of her hand and he found himself flying, hurtling head over tail through the air. He hit the wall and yelped, curling into a ball as pain exploded in his spine. He tried to stand but gagged at the bone-deep agony in his limbs, his eyelids growing heavy as his brain turned sluggish.
His gaze flicked to Valeda, Paimon’s maleficence held aloft in her hand. She raised it to her lips.
If he could just stop her from consuming it …
‘Valeda, stop.’ Cinna raised her hand, a demon by her side that Adriel didn’t recognise whose skirt was a ragged patchwork of natural fibres and filth, her skin and eyes the colour of mud, and with a whip hitched to her belt. She smelled … bad.
Valeda looked at Cinna and her companion, silvery white eyes alight with curiosity. ‘Who’s Valeda?’
‘You’re Valeda, I’m Cinna, and this is Cadere.’
Valeda’s eyes narrowed. ‘Cadere. I know that name.’
The stranger fingered her whip. ‘Don’t pop that maleficence; it’ll make you even nuttier than you already are.’
Eyes bright with defiance, Valeda stuffed the jewel in her mouth and swallowed. She closed her eyes. ‘Mmmm-mmmmm. Tasty.’ When her eyes flicked back open, her gaze, wholly black and as deep and terrible as a dead pool, scoured the room. Silver horns sprouted from her head and branched into complex antlers that she then reabsorbed. She flexed her neck and smiled. ‘Bow before me if you wish to live.’ Her voice, a bloodstained hurricane, shook the stone walls, coating them with dread. The lead weight of her midnight gaze was mercifully trained on the she-demons rather than him.
Cadere rolled her speckled eyes as she stroked her whip. ‘If I had a demi-dollar for every newly minted archdemon who spoke those words …’
Valeda laughed a dry whisper. ‘You challenge me?’
Adriel whined from his spot on the floor. He had no word for the whip or concept of what it did, but the stench—the rot and the pestilence it carried—smothered his nose like a scratchy blanket.
Unfurling her whip, Cadere took her time answering. ‘You’re juiced, but you don’t have the driving skills yet.’
Valeda smiled. ‘Well, I was prepared to ride the rainbow of friendship with you, but I’m very adaptable. I can kill you if that’s what you prefer.’
‘We’ll see.’ Cadere flicked her whip. It snaked high into the air and Adriel growled, baring his fangs at the arc of pestilence.
Valeda glanced at the thong and froze it solid, brushing the air with a gesture that exploded the frozen matter into a shower of decay.
Adriel backed away on his haunches to avoid the rain of death.
Cadere, however, simply tossed her broken whip aside and produced another, and then another, so that she held a whip in each hand and lashed and cracked them with deadly ambidextrous skill.
‘Have you ever considered taking that show to the circus?’ Valeda’s lip curled.
‘All of Hell’s a circus, or haven’t you worked that out?’
Valeda dived for her swords of ice, scooped them up and swung at Cadere’s head.
Cadere swayed out of the way, her tall bony body more flexible than it looked, and the blade missed her face by an inch. She unfurled her whip. ‘Last chance to reconsider.’
‘I wish you’d reconsider that shitty patchwork skirt.’ Valeda hurled an ice sword at Cadere’s head.
Cadere dropped to a crouch to duck below it, bringing her within attack range. Adriel whined, conflicted. He dared not attack Cadere. There was no way to come between the two and survive.
Valeda glanced up at the plaster ceiling above Cadere’s head, and where her gaze lingered a dozen wickedly long icicles formed. She raised her hand and they rained down with force.
Rather than fleeing, Cadere allowed the daggers of ice to thud deep into her flesh. The odour of rot filled the room as brown blood oozed from her wounds. She shrugged, the icicles in her flesh rippling like quills, before raising her whips, her look dismissive. ‘You fight like a mortal.’
With one lash she bound both of Valeda’s swords and tugged them from her hands, while the lash of her second whip coiled around Valeda’s throat.
Valeda used claws of ice to free herself from the noose, but Adriel saw the deep wounds the lash left in her throat, and he smelled the high, sharp scent of fear in her sweat. Blood sprayed from her throat and she stepped in it, her bloody boots leaving silver footprints in the frost coating the floor. She evaded and lunged with new weapons, all of which Cadere managed to disarm her of.
And then she slipped.
She slipped in her own brother’s gore and fell to her knees. Cadere’s whips laid into her at once, lashing her over and over, layering Valeda in blanket upon blanket of decay and disease, until her ice armour slid away and her pale skin was exposed, bubbling and blistering from the whip’s touch.
Valeda fought back, slicing at the rotting blankets with her ice claws, freezing them solid, but Cadere produced each layer so quickly that Valeda was quickly overcome, smothered in disease.
Black tears dripped from Cinna’s eyes to run down her cheeks as Valeda screamed and screamed. And then she stopped screaming.
Cinna’s black tears and Cadere’s grinning mud face blurred together as he leapt to throw himself over Valeda to guard her, unheeding of the foul blanket clinging to her.
He lowered his head to nuzzle her face. A nudge confirmed her skin was cold and waxy.
Wake up.
His ears caught a tiny sound. Cinna’s shuddering indrawn breath as she stared at her sister wide-eyed. ‘What have I done?’
He roared and lunged at her, fangs bared.
She sidestepped and he crashed into the wall and lay there winded. Cadere contemplated him with swirling gold-and-straw eyes for several heartbeats before exiting the room, a hand firmly wrapped around Cinna’s wrist. The rage ebbed from him and he blacked out.
When he came to, he found himself a demon once more, and naked.
Calm determination filled him as he crawled to Valeda. The residue of pestilence had receded and she lay in just a tunic, supine and vulnerable, her white hair spilled around her. He put a hand on her wrist and felt for a pulse. None, but he intended to transfer every healing drop of power within himself to her. Everything he had was hers, had always been, and would always be.
He put his mouth over hers to push his energy inside her but frowned as it climbed up and down her length before travelling back to him. She couldn’t be dead, she couldn’t be. It had happened too quickly, and things didn’t get to end like that.
A jumble of memories crashed over him—their first kiss, her holding him as she learned to rollerskate
, him removing the slezak quills from her face, their bodies tangled together in bed. How could it end this way? How could that be?
‘Stay with me.’ He gripped her hand so hard the circulation in his fist dulled.
But she was already gone.
***
Valeda blinked and sat up. In the orchard, silver branches met above her head, densely intertwined, allowing only tiny flashes of light to fall through and illuminate the grass and fallen silver apples.
She scanned the straight rows of apple trees but saw no-one. Where was she? The warm, soft grass under her hand suggested it wasn’t Hell.
She stood then strolled around the orchard, but she froze when she spotted a she-demon seated beneath an apple tree reading. In one hand the she-demon held a partly munched silver apple. Her skin, hair, eyes and even her clothes—an ensemble of boob tube, hotpants, leggings and roller skates—were all silver.
Stamped on her boob tube were the words ‘Silver Siren’.
She looked up from her book. ‘Don’t you think you’re being a little overdramatic?’
Valeda blinked. ‘What?’
‘I mean, come on, he really digs you. Don’t you think you should try a little harder to stay alive?’
Valeda narrowed her eyes at the smart-arse question. ‘I’m an insane archdemon without a heart. What do I possibly have to offer him?’ The knowledge that she’d hurt Adriel clung to her like a stain. She’d killed her brother too, but that didn’t hurt at all. ‘Plus, I’ve got a head full of crazy voices. He didn’t sign up for that.’
The she-demon rolled her silver eyes as she chewed a bite of apple. ‘Duh, don’t let them take over. Kick some of those little bitches out.’
She frowned. ‘How?’
The she-demon threw her book down. ‘What do you want? A frigging PowerPoint presentation? When did Hell’s royalty lose all their initiative and become so needy?’
Worry tightened Valeda’s chest. The most important question in her life and she didn’t know the answer.
The she-demon emitted a put-upon sigh and shook her head, pigtails bobbing. ‘Think. How did your mother do it?’
