Demon

by Kristina Douglas

  The stranger rose. “Time to go.”

  My feet were no longer stuck to the ground, but my enforced silence was still in effect. He took my arm in a fairly brutal grip and led me back to the car, and it wasn’t until he shoved me inside that I could speak.

  “I have to pee,” I said in a flat voice. It was a lie, but I figured it was my only chance at getting away.

  He shot me a glance. “Then I expect you’ll be uncomfortable for the next few hours.”

  I subsided, not bothering to try the door. Even normal people could lock car doors from a distance. He pulled out onto the empty road, his expression the same. Empty. Grim. Purposeful. He really was going to kill me.

  “What’s your name?” I hadn’t wanted to know, but the silence was driving me crazy.

  “Does it matter?”

  “Hell, yes, it matters. I want to know why you’ve been following me all these years.”

  “I thought you failed to remember beyond the last year or so.”

  “I don’t even remember my own name. But I remember you.”

  He looked at me then, the deep black emptiness of his eyes chilling me. “Azazel.”

  AZAZEL CONCENTRATED ON THE NARROW, sun-baked road ahead. Her cluelessness was beginning to annoy him, but if that was her main line of defense it was easy enough to deal with. As long as she didn’t shift into her real form, his job would be relatively easy. What he couldn’t understand was why she wasn’t putting up a better fight.

  She had weapons she hadn’t begun to use, not the least of which was her ability to shift into Lilitu, the storm demon, the birdlike monster who could claw the entrails from a man, given a moment of inattention. It would be useless against him, but she wouldn’t know that. She never remembered.

  It wasn’t the first time he’d battled the Lilith. With the curse of eternity on his head, he’d come face-to-face with her in many demonic forms, and each time he’d vanquished her. But never completely.

  He’d destroyed other demons and abominations in the thousands upon thousands of years he’d been on earth. Most obviously the Nephilim, as well as others that Uriel had allowed to run free in an attempt to vanquish the Fallen. But the she-demon Lilith was beyond even his control. And he’d waited long enough.

  He hated to think of her as female, but now that he was around her he couldn’t continue putting her in the nongendered group to which most demons belonged. Her destructive power was like that of no other female, and he’d always tried to think of her as it. Particularly given the unacceptably prophecy he was determined to avoid. She was dangerously female, and even now he could feel her seductive power.

  She hadn’t reacted to his name, but she should know exactly who he was. It was always possible she was telling the truth, that she didn’t remember anything. He’d been watching her for the last five years, and her behavior had been odd, supporting what she said. By the time he’d finally taken her, she’d already lived under four different names in four different cities. He’d assumed it was an effort to avoid him, but there was the slight chance she really didn’t remember. He could sense very real distress coming from her, and he needed to fight it.

  Demons were expert at clouding expectations. And most creatures felt distress when they saw death staring down at them. He had no room for pity or second thoughts.

  The landscape had gotten scrubbier as the day wore on. They’d reach their destination well before nightfall—he’d have more than enough time to take care of things. He wondered vaguely if he’d return afterward, to see if there was anything left. The idea should have filled him with grim satisfaction. For some reason it was no longer as soothing.

  She—it—was doing too good a job.

  “Azazel?” she said, obviously trying to sound normal. “That’s an odd name. Is it Middle Eastern?”

  “Biblical,” he said briefly.

  “My name is Rachel Fitzpatrick.” At his uncontrolled snort, she changed tacks. “All right, so Fitzpatrick isn’t my real last name. Since you seem to know more about me than I do, why don’t you tell me what my real last name is?”

  He said nothing. Richard Thompson was on the radio, and he leaned forward to turn it up, wanting his mournful voice and stinging guitar. The moment he pulled his hand away, she reached out and turned it off.

  He glared at her. “If you want to be able to move and talk,” he growled, turning it back on, “you will keep your hands off the radio.”

  She sat back, folding her hands in her lap. They were normal hands—pretty, even. Odd—she wore no rings, no polish, none of the adornments women had used since the beginning of time. Yet he could almost imagine those hands on his body.

  He shuddered, fighting it. It was so easy to forget, to see her as a desirable female, when he’d done his best to submerge his sexual nature. He glanced at her face. Her curling red hair was the same as always, a snake’s tangle to ensnare men, to make them want to bury their faces in the silken strands. He was immune—the moment he felt even the slightest pull, he was able to slam a lid on it. She wouldn’t reach him as she had so many men. He couldn’t let her.

  RT was singing “Can’t Win,” which seemed absurdly prescient. When it was over he turned the radio down again, glancing over at her. “That isn’t your name.”

  “Then what is it?” she said, her voice breaking with frustration. “For God’s sake, if I’m going to die, don’t I deserve some answers first? At least to know why I’ve been targeted by a killer? I’ve done my best to be a good person. If I did something bad in the past, something that deserves punishment, then at least I should know what it was.”

  “Your crimes are too numerous and horrific to detail.”

  Her forehead creased, and he wanted to smooth it. She was working her wiles, and he forced down his reaction. “That’s wrong,” she said. “Now I know you’ve got the wrong person. If I committed horrible crimes, I’d know it. I couldn’t commit … atrocities and then live a normal life. You’ve got the wrong person. You’ve got me confused with someone else.”

  “I’m not confused.”

  “Then who am I? What did I do?” she cried.

  And tired of her whining, he finally answered.

  “You are evil, a succubus and a murderer of infants. You are a nightmare, a horror, a monster.” He looked into her dazed face. “You are the Lilith.”

  C HAPTER T HREE

  YOU’RE OUT OF YOUR MIND,” I said. My voice shook, even as I tried to be firm. I felt as if the universe were suddenly made of sand and everything were shifting beneath me. “Not that that’s news—I already figured you had to be demented to want to kill me. So who told you I was Lilith? Your neighbor’s dog?”

  He stared at me. “What are you talking about?”

  “Son of Sam,” I said briefly. “You know, the serial killer? I imagine you’ve studied his work.”

  He shook his head. “I am not a serial killer. Think of me as an executioner.”

  “Oh, that’s extremely comforting.” I was clenching my hands tightly together, so tightly they were cramping. I was getting nowhere with my whines—I needed to work on this logically. “Look, assuming by some wild chance I actually were this Lilith, why would you want to kill me? She was Adam’s first wife, wasn’t she? Trust me, I don’t feel anywhere near that old. For that matter, I don’t think I believe in Adam and Eve. It’s a nice story, but that’s about it. And even if I were Lilith, is that any reason to kill me?”

  “Do I need to tell you all this?” he said, ignoring my protests. “You were Adam’s first wife and you refused to lie beneath him. You ran away, and when he begged you to return you refused. You chose to consort with devils and take the souls of babies, as bloody and terrible as Kali the Destroyer or any of the bloodthirsty demons that have roamed the universe. You fornicate with beasts, you seduce men in their dreams, and you slaughter newborns.”

  I stared at him, stunned, and managed to pull one last ounce of attitude from my weary soul, not quite ready to give up.
“Honey,” I drawled, “I don’t seduce anyone, in dreams or out. Nor do I fuck animals or murder children.”

  “I said beasts. Other demons, neither animal nor human. And you can argue all you want—I know who and what you are, and you have admitted you do not.”

  “In that case, don’t you think you should think twice about killing me?”

  ‘“No.”

  There was something implacable in that short, cool word, and I gave up, staring out into the scrubby, deserted brush. None of this made any sense—he might as well be talking about a stranger.

  Except for the part about newborns. Why had I felt the desperate need to get as far away as I could from my newborn goddaughter? It had been nothing but instinct, strong enough to make me throw everything away and vanish.

  And what exactly had I thrown away? No memory, no history, no family. Could he possibly be right? I leaned my head back and closed my eyes, closing out everything, doubts and stray thoughts and fear. I closed my eyes and waited for what would come to pass.

  It must have been hours later when the car came to a stop. I sat up, looking around me with dazed acceptance. The sun was close to the horizon, and we had pulled up to a deserted building that might once have been some kind of farmhouse. The windows, doors, and most of the roof were long gone, and it looked as if no one had been anywhere near it in decades.

  Azazel looked over at me. He must have sensed that I was past fighting him. I unfastened the seat belt I’d been wearing, the seat belt I’d been silly enough to wear, considering I was going to die anyway, and slid out of the front seat to stand in the scorching heat of the late afternoon, waiting for him to come around the car.

  “Inside,” he said. I went. I was past romanticized visions like Marie Antoinette on the scaffold. Impossible as it seemed, what he’d said made an eerie amount of sense. I knew there had to be some reasonable explanation, but I couldn’t find it, and I was tired of running. If there was any truth to his crazy allegations, and I was beginning to believe there might be, then … then I wasn’t going to fight it. If I had somehow been involved in the deaths of babies, of innocent newborns, I would rather die than risk doing it again.

  The inside of the house was empty, nothing but a single chair bolted to the floor in the center of the main room. There were chains and ropes in a neat pile beside it, and belated panic swept through me. “No,” I said. “You’re not going to burn me alive.”

  “No, I am not. Sit.”

  It wasn’t as if I had any choice. He could move faster than I could, he was stronger, and if I was the demon he said I was, all my abilities had vanished along with my memories. “Is there anything I can say to make you change your mind?” At least I didn’t sound as pathetic as I felt. Though why dying with dignity should matter was debatable. If I screamed and cried and begged, no one would know but this son of a bitch. No one would pass judgment.

  I sat. He knelt at my feet and began to tie my ankles together, and I looked down at him, at the broad shoulders, the silky black hair that had fallen forward, obscuring his cold face as he prepared my execution, and I had no idea why I moved my hand.

  I put my fingers under his hair and stroked his hard face like a lover, my fingers caressing his skin and dancing across his mouth. He froze and looked up at me, his deep-blue eyes burning into mine with such heat that my entire body was swept with arousal, and I swayed toward him, wanting his mouth.

  He stumbled back away from me, cursing, and cold reality hit me once more. I dropped my hand and turned my face away, refusing to look at him.

  “If you do that again,” he said in a harsh voice, “I’ll strangle you myself. Though you would probably prefer that, would you not?”

  He moved back in, grabbed my wrists, and tied them with quick, jerky moves. I ignored the pain—it no longer mattered. I was sickened by what I had done, by the rush of emotion and longing I’d felt for my soon-to-be murderer.

  I managed one last salvo. “Prefer strangling to what? You said you weren’t going to burn me. Are you just going to leave me here to starve to death?”

  He shook his head, threading the heavy chain around my tied wrists and ankles and clamping it to the floor. He really wasn’t taking any chances. He moved away, and that shaken expression was gone, leaving him stark and cold and beautiful in the waning light.

  “I’m leaving you for the Nephilim.”

  “And they are …?”

  His disbelieving snort would have been annoying under any other circumstances. “They are an abomination. As are you. You cannot be killed by human means, and I prefer not to touch you. The Nephilim are a fitting end for you.”

  “And just who are the Nephilim?” I demanded again, not certain I wanted to hear the answer.

  “They prey on the unearthly. You. And my kind,” he said. “We have killed most of those that roam the world, but there are still some here in Australia. I am leaving you for them.” He brushed the dirt off his dark clothes, almost as if he were brushing off the guilt of killing me. “It will hurt,” he said. “But it will be over quickly. And you shouldn’t have too long to wait.”

  There was almost kindness in his voice. An executioner’s mercy. I watched as he moved toward the door, his figure outlined by the setting sun, and my voice stopped him, for just a moment.

  “Don’t.” My voice broke this time. “Please.”

  But he left without looking back, and a moment later I heard the car start up, heard the tires on the rough terrain. I listened until I could hear nothing, and the darkness began to close in around me.

  And I waited to die.

  HE DROVE FAST. HE OPENED all the windows, ignoring the dust that was swirling into the POS Ford, his foot down hard on the accelerator. A car accident wouldn’t kill him. What was true for the Lilith went for him as well. It would take an otherworldly creature to finish him, and as appealing as that sounded, there would be no one around to do the job.

  He could have waited. Bound himself to that chair beside her and let the Nephilim come. When he’d felt her cool hand slide over his hot skin, he’d wanted to. Nothing could make him want to release her, nothing at all, but dying with her might have had a certain desperate symmetry.

  He could have waited to make certain they’d finished her, but he knew what he could and couldn’t do. And there was no way he could watch as they tore her into pieces, feeding on her flesh while her heart still pumped blood. He would come back in the light of the new day and find traces, blood and bone and skin. The Nephilim left destruction in their wake, and there would be enough left to bring proof to Uriel, if he chose to do so.

  He was driving east, and in the rearview mirror he could see the sun on the horizon, sinking low, bright splintery shards of light spearing outward toward him. They would come for her as soon as the sun disappeared. They would come, and they would feast, and it would be over. There would be no way for any of the insane prophecies to come true. The Lilith would take no more innocent newborns; she would steal into no man’s dreams and take his very breath.

  And she would never marry the king of the fallen angels and rule over a hell on earth.

  That particular prophecy had been scorched into his brain since the beginning of time. He had no idea who had existed longer, the Lilith or the Fallen, but they were both from before time was measured. The harsh judge who’d cast out Azazel’s kind and cursed them was the same who’d cursed the first human female much more cruelly. The Fallen were left alone, simply to serve as couriers for souls between death and the hereafter, cursed to subsist on blood. The Lilith was taken up by demons and forced to lie with them, and she’d disappeared.

  He would hear of her—stealing into men’s dreams and leaving them drained and near death during the Middle Ages, leaving infants lifeless in their cribs—but then she would vanish again into obscurity. This time she would be gone for good, and the Fallen would continue with their endless quest to find the First. Lucifer, the Bringer of Light, entombed in a living darkness, waiting fo
r them.

  After the death of Azazel’s beloved Sarah, the Fallen’s stronghold had become not a haven but a prison, and he’d left Sheol in search of the demon destined by a sadistic Ultimate Power to be his bride. To destroy her would be to destroy one more source of evil in this misbegotten world—and ensure that that particular curse never came to pass.

  The speedometer was climbing, but the road was empty, and if he lost control he would walk away. Nothing could kill him but fire or another otherworldly source—the Lilith, the Nephilim, Uriel’s host of angels, who were more like Gestapo storm troopers than seraphim. But no one would put him out of this pain that had slid from unbearable to merely numbing.

  He heard the unearthly howl, ululating as the last spike of sunlight shrank below the horizon. He was too far away—there was no way he could actually hear the Nephilim as they caught the scent of her and moved in—but the sound shrieked into his mind, and he could see her, the tangled red curls, the pale skin and soft mouth, the frightened eyes. The eyes that called to him. The soft mouth that moved him more than he wanted to admit.

  He slammed his foot on the brakes.

  The car went into a spin in the swirling dust, coming to a stop sideways at the edge of the road. He soared upward, smashing through the metal roof as if it were aluminum foil, straight into the rapidly cooling air.

  The Nephilim were already advancing on the deserted house. He slammed through the remainder of the roof, bits of lumber and debris coming down with him as he landed a few feet behind her. He folded his wings swiftly and moved toward her.

  She sat absolutely still, and her eyes focused on him, on the knife in his hand, as he stepped in front of her. “Decided to do it yourself?” she said in a voice that didn’t hide her fear. The Lilith was afraid of nothing, not even death. Could he have been wrong about her?

  The groans and grunts of the Nephilim as they converged on the house were chilling, and their stench preceded them, the filth of decomposing flesh and ancient blood and maggot-ridden organs. She could hear them as well as he could, and she was trembling.