Good Intentions (The Road to Hell Series, Book 1)

by Brenda K. Davies

  “I do. When Mac said you had siblings I’d thought there was a chance, no matter how small, Bale’s vision could have been wrong about you being the last of Lucifer’s line, or that you were not who we sought, but I don’t believe so now.”

  “You will leave my brothers out of this!” she spat at me. “They have never shown any differences.”

  I lifted a hand to calm her as her fury beat against me. “They will remain safely where they are. This has come from your father’s line if they show no differences.”

  She gazed at me for a minute, her expression unreadable as she tried to process this information. “I never knew my father, but I always believed he was out there, somewhere.” She dropped her head into her hand. Finally, she shook her head and focused on me once more. “If you can open and close gateways to Hell why can’t you close this gate?”

  “The gateway the humans tore into our world is unnatural. The gateway Lucifer opened into our world wasn’t natural either, but it was much smaller and my ancestor was able to control it. I have managed to close the gateway the humans created more than it was originally, but I cannot shut it completely.”

  “But Lucifer only opened the gate before; maybe he can’t close it, which means I couldn’t either.”

  “Maybe not,” I replied. “But you may be one of the most powerful beings on this planet. Our main focus is for you to develop your powers before we take you to the gate and see if it can be closed.”

  “And if it can’t?”

  My teeth ground together so forcefully my jaw ached from the pressure. Part of the plan had always been to take on Lucifer, if it became necessary, but I would find a way to keep her protected. “Then you may be capable of destroying Lucifer.”

  She looked as if I’d slapped her. The color drained from her face so fast I thought she might pass out. She inhaled sharply and her hands flattened on the table. Wordlessly, she slid into the chair. Her gaze focused on the tent wall behind me, before shifting to me. “How is that possible?”

  “It’s the combination. You do possess the abilities of all three species.”

  “I seem to be leaning more toward the demon side,” she murmured. “Nothing I can do is truly angelic.”

  “As far as we know, but we could discover more, and you will become more powerful and better able to handle those powers. It is possible you could walk in all three worlds, but we won’t know until we are at the gateway. If you are capable of entering and withstanding Hell, then you could take Lucifer on, if you become proficient enough with your abilities. The main focus, after we develop your powers further, will be trying to close the unnatural gateway.”

  Her fingers drummed on the table. “What abilities does a human have?”

  “They have the ability to one day enter the other realms as a soul. The ability to let love and hate fuel their actions and drive them to feats they never believed possible. There is more power in a human than they realize. You do not possess all the abilities of angels or demons, but your combination is rare, and it may be what we need to defeat Lucifer.”

  Her fingers slid to her neck and she fiddled with her necklace. “What more can you do?”

  “You haven’t scratched the surface of the things demons are capable of, or yourself, I’m guessing. With time, you will learn more.”

  “How do you know I’m the only offspring left? There could be dozens, maybe even a hundred or so, fallen angel kids running around out there.”

  “Humans are known for many things, including being afraid of things they don’t understand, especially people who are different from them. Not all of the offspring would have had your eye color, but all of them would have been different in some way, even if it was only in a small way. Think of the witches who were slaughtered, the people who were burned at the stake over the centuries for being different. Some of them actually were. Most of the angel lines were lost in this way over the years.”

  She rubbed at her temples as she bowed her head. When she looked at me again, shadows marred underneath her eyes. “What do you expect me to do to close the gate?”

  “I do not know. Perhaps your instinct will take over and you will know what must be done when we get there.”

  I didn’t know what kind of reaction I’d expected out of her, but her eyes remained unwavering on mine. She didn’t say a word, yet I could almost see the thoughts tumbling through her mind. I listened as the seconds ticked into minutes on the clock in the corner.

  “And what if it doesn’t?” she finally inquired.

  “We will figure that out when we get there, but this is the closest we’ve ever come to having a possible way to shut the gate down and saving the human species.”

  “But if the gate is shut down, and you haven’t been able to defeat Lucifer before, how will you do so now? I’m thinking he’s not going to give up even if the gate is closed.”

  “If we can draw him out beforehand, then with you, the weapons the humans possess, and the demons who will join us at the gateway, we have a chance of being able to defeat him. We’ve never had the human weapons on our side before; they won’t kill him, but they will slow him down, and we’ve never had your abilities before. This battle will be different. If he doesn’t come out, and you can enter Hell, we can go after him.”

  She looked as if I’d just dropped a bomb on her as she blinked at me, opened her mouth to say something, but then closed it again. More minutes ticked by before she said, “So, you plan to fight Lucifer on Earth?”

  “Yes, if we can.”

  “Nothing could possibly go wrong with that,” she muttered.

  “We’ve never had this kind of opportunity before. Out of it all, even if we cannot defeat him, the gateway must be closed.”

  “What if it’s not me?”

  One could hope, but I knew that most likely wasn’t true. We’d never encountered another human like her; she could do too much for her not to be the one we sought. “I’m almost certain it is you, and we will work together until you are ready for the journey.”

  “The journey?”

  “It will be a long road to get us to the gateway, and it will not be an easy one. However, we will worry about that when the time comes.”

  Much like her father, her stare was unrelenting and unfathomable. I had no idea what was going on in that head of hers. “I know you said I’d be staying here, but I think I should go back to town.”

  “You’ll be staying with us from now on. I don’t trust humans around things they don’t understand and fear.”

  She winced at my words. “I can guarantee they don’t understand you and they fear you, but you’re doing fine,” she retorted.

  I folded my hands on the table before me as I leaned toward her. “They know what we are; they have an idea of what to make of us even if they fear us. You look completely human, you came from one of their towns, and you just became a flamethrower in front of them. They have no idea what to make of you, and that makes them volatile where you’re concerned. I’m not going to have our greatest asset injured or possibly even killed by a bunch of idiots.”

  A muscle in the corner of her right eye twitched when I said the word asset. “Possible asset,” she replied.

  I couldn’t deny she was fiery. I wondered what it would be like to have that fire beneath me as I took possession of her body. My eyes slid to her breasts again under the thin brown shirt she wore. I’d told her she couldn’t go back to town because of the humans, but her biggest danger may be staying in this tent with me.

  “Possible asset,” I replied. “Something we will begin to dig deeper into tomorrow.”

  “Where will I stay?” she asked.

  “You can have my room.”

  Her hand clamped on the base of the goblet. “Your room?”

  “Yes. I will stay in here.”

  Rising, I walked to the back of the tent, undid some buttons, and pulled up another flap to reveal the room beyond. I heard her rise and pad over to stand behind me. Her warm breath
heated my skin when it blew against my arm.

  Stepping aside, I gestured for her to go into the tent beyond. It was as large as the main meeting area, but it was more elaborately appointed with a king-sized bed and an armoire holding my human clothes.

  “Make yourself comfortable,” I told her. “I’ll have Mac arrange for someone to bring your things here.”

  Her hand fell on my arm before I could leave her. I gazed down at her tanned, calloused hand resting against me. Beneath her touch, my skin rippled and I felt a stirring within the markings covering my arms. What would happen if she were to run her fingers over them, to trace every intricate design? Would she be able to feel the power within them?

  And what would it do to me?

  “What about a bathroom?” she inquired. “I don’t know what you demons have to do, but we humans do have some other needs.”

  I grit my teeth against the scorching passion her touch provoked in me. “I’d forgotten about that. Our bodies may be the same as a human’s in most ways, but feasting on souls makes us different in other ways.”

  Her eyes ran over me. I could see the questions running through her mind as her gaze briefly rested on my waist before darting upward. The shirt hanging over my waist was the only thing covering the evidence of my erection; otherwise, she would have had a clear view of exactly what I wanted from her.

  “So, bathroom?” she prompted.

  “I know of one you can use.”

  “Not outside would be preferable.”

  I walked through the room to the back of the tent. I undid the buttons holding the flap closed and pushed it upward before gesturing for her to exit. Holding the flap back for her, I inhaled her enticing scent as she slipped by me to go outside. I emerged beside her into the large, grassy clearing with at least forty tents encircling it.

  The tents were all smaller in size than mine as they didn’t have the main meeting room attached, but they all looked similar with their heavy, green canvas siding. The breeze blew against them, causing the canvas to flutter in the currents of air. Most demons were still on the training fields with the volunteers and soldiers, but some milled around the clearing and by the tents playing games.

  I pointed to the small house at the bottom of the hill where we stored food for the livestock in camp. “Because the house is on the outskirts of the other homes, no one has moved into it. It’s too far away from the others for the humans to feel secure staying inside it at night. You can use the bathroom in there,” I told her.

  She stared at it for a minute before responding. “Okay.”

  “There is a shower over there.” I turned and pointed to the shower at the edge of our camp. A simple hose hung over a wood wall that did little to shield the demon within from view. On the wall was a bar of soap and a bottle of shampoo, two things I actually preferred about this world to our own. As a whole, demons were exceptionally clean, but in Hell we used rocks to scrub our flesh clean in the warm, red waters; the soap and shampoo was a nice bonus.

  “I’ll use the shower in the house. I prefer walls to open air and exposure,” she said.

  “You humans and your modesty.” Then I realized I much preferred her to shower in private. No one else would see what belonged to me.

  “I guess we really can blame Eve for that,” she muttered.

  “Perhaps.”

  “Perhaps? Isn’t that the story? Eve ate the apple, kicked from the garden, yada, yada.”

  “There are many stories, some are true, others are questionable. If you think there were only ever two humans on this earth to begin with, you’d be wrong. There were others already here, but Adam and Eve were the favored ones, and the only ones granted entrance to Eden. Eve did pluck the apple, and she did get them booted from the garden, but your ancestors were already running around with loin clothes covering them when Adam and Eve emerged from paradise.”

  “I guess nobody wanted bug bites on their privates.”

  A short burst of laughter unexpectedly erupted from me; her eyes widened at the sound, and a smile curved her luscious mouth as her eyes twinkled in amusement. Sitting in the center of the clearing, Shax, Bale, Verin, and Morax stopped in the middle of their game of cards to look at us in surprise. It had been a long time since I’d laughed around them. Corson had been flirting with a pretty girl from town; he had her blonde hair twined around his finger when he looked at us. The girl pouted at him, but he didn’t pay her any attention.

  Ignoring them all, I took hold of River’s elbow and led her back into the tent. “I suppose that would explain it,” I said to her as I closed the flap and slid the buttons back into place. “You’re probably hungry.”

  “I am,” she admitted.

  She followed me into the main tent where a meal already waited for her. Sitting in the seat across from her, I watched the candlelight playing over her features as she dove into her meal.

  “Do you think you could pull me into one of your visions again, like you did today?” I inquired when she finished the last of her chicken.

  She pushed her plate away and wiped delicately at her mouth. “I don’t know, but if I did it once, I don’t see why I wouldn’t be able to do it again.”

  I tapped my fingers on the table. “It will be interesting to find out.”

  Her eyes went to the tent wall as laughter echoed outside. The scent of smoke and the crackling of a fire drifted to me. They must have already started the bonfire on the hill. A bonfire I would make sure River stayed far away from.

  “It would be best if you stayed inside at night,” I told her. “Things can get a little wild out there. If you have to go somewhere, come and get me and I will take you.”

  Her mouth pursed but she nodded her agreement.

  CHAPTER 23

  River

  Over the next couple of weeks, I didn’t really know what was expected of me as I continued to train with Kobal and the others. The volunteers I’d come here with avoided me now. The demons all watched me like I was the mouse and they were the hawk circling above. I didn’t think they planned on picking my remains, but they were definitely intent upon my every action.

  I’d also noticed a growing tension and withdrawal from Kobal as time slipped by. He still trained with me every day, but he seemed to be holding something of himself back. Yet sometimes I would catch him looking at me with such hunger in his gaze that it would cause my entire body to quicken with longing.

  My dreams of him had ebbed since moving into his tent. I blamed that more on my exhaustion when I finally did fall asleep than a waning in my yearning for him. No, that grew every day his distance did.

  Even Mac stayed away from me now, but his eyes were always on me whenever I was on the field. Unlike the others who watched me with rapt curiosity and animosity, the sadness in Mac’s eyes troubled me.

  I didn’t understand any of it; the humans accepted the demons more readily then they accepted me. Kobal had been right, they had no idea what to make of me, and they were afraid. That fear had made them distant and wary. The demons didn’t know what to make of me, and I wondered if perhaps some of them disliked me for my supposed heritage or at least because of who had possibly created me.

  I didn’t know what it was, and by now I was so exhausted from the nonstop training, stress, and uncertainty, that I was getting to the point I wanted to hit every single human and demon who gave me a sidelong glance. Or if I could figure out how to make that handy-dandy frying things ability work, maybe I’d burn all their pants off them and watch them run around with their asses on fire.

  However, I hadn’t been able to set anything on fire since that day with the madagans. Kobal had to be wrong about who or what I was; I kept telling myself this, but the certainty he was right had taken hold of me. I hadn’t admitted it to him, but when he’d told me what he believed I was, a part of me had lit up in an aha moment, and it had all made sense. A part of me, deep inside, could not shrug away his words no matter how badly denial kept screaming through my head.r />
  Perhaps they were all right to distance themselves from me. I was the only living ancestor of Lucifer himself, of evil incarnate. I tried not to think of things in terms of good and evil as Kobal had told me to, but I couldn’t shake the feeling there could be something inherently evil within me.

  Then again, maybe there wasn’t, but could I be easily turned to evil? Lucifer had been an angel, the morning star, and now he was looking to destroy and enslave the human race. Was there something in me that could make me become like him too?

  I didn’t care what I had to do, I would never let something like that happen to me. I would never become like him. Still, I couldn’t rid myself of the idea that my mother had been right, and I really was an abomination who never should have existed.

  I lay awake at night torn between fantasies of the man sleeping in the room next to mine and plagued by the idea I could become a monster.

  I didn’t dread traveling to the gate or trying to close it; that was easy-peasy compared to the idea my DNA shared the same code as Lucifer’s. I could face what would come with the journey to the gate; I could prepare and fight any threat. I couldn’t fight genetics.

  Moving through the food line, I could feel the hostility and dread radiating around the people who moved hastily away from me. I was worse than the smelly kid in class, as I had a five-foot-wide space around me. Demons lingered nearby and I had no doubt they were there to watch over and protect me if it became necessary. Grabbing an apple, I placed it on my tray and turned to face the crowd.

  The heads around me bent down and shoulders hunched up. The tops of their tables became extremely fascinating as people pretended not to see me. I took a deep breath before winding my way through the tables to sit at an empty one in the back. My gaze slid over the people at the tables around me; it settled on Carrie who focused intently on her sandwich.

  A pang of betrayal and longing speared through me. I should be used to this shunning and loneliness by now, but I wasn’t. The apple I bit into felt like lead in my mouth; it took all I had to swallow it down as tears burned in my chest. I missed my brothers, my home, and Lisa; I missed not being an oddity. I missed companionship and people who cared for me. I missed Gage’s smile and Bailey’s giggles. I even missed his atrociously stinky diapers.