by Diem, J. C.
I was on foot when I neared the capital city of the sixth realm. Unlike the other realms, this city was still deserted. The palace had split down the middle and had collapsed in on itself after the Hellmaster had unleashed his quake. Whole tiers of buildings had been destroyed in the aftermath. No one had attempted to rebuild it yet.
My carriage appeared shortly after I left the demolished city behind. I noticed that the coach seemed larger and took stock of myself. I’d been growing during our journey and was now over eleven feet tall. My wings were only half-formed and I couldn’t really move them yet. Openings had magically been created in my armor to accommodate the leathery appendages.
Feeling my horns, I saw that they were three quarters of the way towards the back of my head now. I’d far surpassed the normal size of a lord and was well on my way to becoming the first Demon Princess, just as my image on the doors had indicated.
Thoughts of Nathan kept creeping into my mind as I brooded inside the carriage. I’d been here for several months by now and he’d been in Vepar’s clutches the whole time. Pushing images of him in her bed away, I realized it would be well past November back on Earth by now. My eighteenth birthday had come and gone without my even knowing it.
My mother had been murdered over a year ago and my entire life had changed in that moment. I’d learned that monsters were real and that I was one of them. With so many evil souls inside me, I’d been drawn to my darker half. If I’d ingested angelic essence first, maybe things would have swung in the other direction.
I wondered if I’d have become as evil as Zach had turned out to be if Nathan hadn’t stolen my soul. Zach had certainly hidden his malevolence well. I could see why my guardian had tried to stop that from happening to me. Yet hearing that he’d rather see me die than allow me to become whole had been hard to take.
Instead of giving me the benefit of the doubt, Nathan had taken my choices away when he’d removed my soul. He’d condemned me to remaining in this form. He wouldn’t tell me where he’d put my essence, so I was doomed to either stay in hell forever, or to die if I returned to Earth.
My anger rose that he’d put me in this position. He’d said he loved me, yet he’d proven otherwise. Zach had pretended to care and he’d been playing me the whole time. He’d been sleeping with Candy while trying to get me into bed as well. When I’d finally been ready to take that step, he’d intended to harvest my soul.
“I have the worst taste in men,” I muttered and thought I heard a faint snigger inside my head. I knew it had to be Sam. A sad smile flitted over my face even as I strengthened the barrier in my mind again. I’d let it slip enough to allow him to listen to my thoughts again.
With each realm we travelled to, the gloom became lighter and the temperature grew warmer. The smell of sulfur also became more prominent. Dormant and active volcanos became more numerous, as did the settlements.
Again, some towns were deserted and others were bustling with activity. We avoided the capital cities even though no one was attempting to follow us. Demons simply stared with accusing crimson eyes. To them, I was probably one of them now. They couldn’t understand why I would turn on my own kind.
They didn’t know about the visions that Fate had sent me. They intended to rule the world, but they would instead destroy it. I’d seen fire ravage New York and reduce the city to ruins. Once the hellgates broke open, their bloodlust would take over. They would cut down anyone they saw, no matter if they were men, women or children.
Despite the warmth that surrounded me, I shivered at the memory of seeing a little girl about to be skewered by a Demon Lord’s sword. I’d woken up before I’d seen her die, but the memory was burned into my mind.
Glancing out the window, I saw that we were galloping parallel to a river of lava. We were in the third realm now, which meant we were nearing our goal. The third realm was riddled with volcanos. Gigantic black boulders dotted the dismal landscape. Petrified trees were clumped together. Ash coated the ground, nearly hiding the fact that a swarm of arachnoids had taken up residence next to the road between the river of lava. The smooth, sandy soil and dimples were a dead giveaway.
Peering out through the other window, I saw a group of imps sprinting away from the road towards the safety of a large boulder. I realized they were running from me. At my mental command, the nightmares came to a stop. More arachnoids were on this side of the road as well. They were spaced far enough apart for the imps to have been able to avoid them.
A straggler looked over her shoulder and skidded to a halt when she saw me. My blond hair gave me away instantly. “It is Hellscourge,” she called to her friends. Heads popped up from behind the boulder to gape at me. Emaciated and hideous, they wore loincloths or tunics made of crude black sackcloth. The lowest of the low, imps were despised by demons. They’d been brought to the underworld as humans as punishment by their masters. Over time, their bodies and souls became entwined until they were as damned as the human souls that were sent to hell.
Gathering into a group, the imps shared a whispered conversation. I heard snatches of it and realized they were arguing about whether they should ask me for help or not. The female straggler took matters into her own hands and started back towards me.
Eager to talk to me, she stepped too close to an arachnoid nest and the critter burst up out of the ground. Calling on my axe, I sprinted to her just as the spindly legged, gray skinned horror reared up behind her. Several of its legs had latched onto her and she shrieked in terror. A cross between a spider, an insect and the corpse of something unidentifiable, it had sharp teeth that could easily tear her apart.
Swinging my axe, I sliced its head off then kicked its body back into its nest. Fortunately, we were too far away from the other arachnoids for them to have been disturbed by the scuffle. The closest ones made chittering noises before they settled down again. The imp was bleeding from cuts made by the arachnoid’s claws. “Are you okay?” I asked.
Nodding, she threw her thin arms around my legs and hugged me. She looked like a child standing next to me. “Thank you, Hellscourge,” she said and sniffed back tears. “We imps cannot die, but it would have been very painful to be eaten by that thing.”
Patting her back gingerly so I didn’t accidentally break any of her bones, I eased her back a step as her friends gathered around. Nearly identical in appearance, they looked like refugees from a prison camp. “What are you guys doing way out here?” We were miles away from any settlements.
Looking around to make sure we were still alone, the female answered me. “We have run away from our masters.” They appeared to be terrified, yet determined.
“Where are you going?”
“To the first realm,” one of her friends replied. “We are going to join the resistance.”
I blinked to hear that. “What resistance?”
“The imp resistance,” the female said. “We are tired of being treated like garbage. We are going to band together and demand that the Hellmaster release us from our bondage.”
While I admired their courage, I couldn’t help but shudder at their idea. “I take it none of you have actually ever seen the Hellmaster,” I said.
“Well, no,” she admitted. “But surely he will see reason. The captains and lords have plenty of other servants and they do not need us. It is wrong for them to take us captive and to bring us to hell where we become monsters. It is time to put a stop to it once and for all.”
“What if he says no?”
Now it was her turn to blink. They were so caught up in their rebellion that they hadn’t even considered the idea. “Then we will unleash our fury on him,” she said.
To my shame, I almost snorted out a laugh to hear that. Imps were considered to be so insignificant that they were mostly overlooked. Sam had proven that they weren’t as useless as they appeared. His ability to camouflage us had saved our butts a number of times. Some of the imps had developed abilities of their own that shouldn’t be discounted.
Reaching a decision, I gestured at my carriage. “I’m headed to the second realm to kill the Prince. You can hitch a ride with me if you like.”
Their eyes lit up and they nodded eagerly. “We would greatly appreciate it,” the female said. Her wounds had already healed and I envied her ability to repair herself. Before I’d ingested Raziel and the other two angels, I’d been able to heal just as quickly. Now I needed to dredge up my wrath to be able to restore myself.
Being careful to stay out of the range of the arachnoids, we followed our footprints back to the carriage. There were around twenty imps and they couldn’t all fit inside the coach. Some of them crammed inside. The rest either sat on the roof or on the bench seat at the back of it. It was a tight fit, but I didn’t mind being squished. While I’d once been a loner, it was nice to have some company again.
₪₪₪
Chapter Thirty
During the journey, the imps told me their stories of how they’d been captured. They changed seats every time we stopped so they could all take a turn riding in comfort inside. The female I’d saved from the arachnoid was called Rashida. She was the last one to tell me her tale.
Sitting across from me, she was squeezed in between two other females. “I lived in India several hundred years ago,” she began. We all spoke in the demons’ language because it was the universal speech here. “I was at the market with my mother, buying food when I saw a strange man watching me,” she continued. “I was only fifteen, but I was very beautiful and was desired by many.”
Her tone was matter-of-fact rather than boasting. Now that she was an imp, she was far from the beautiful teen she’d once been. “At first, I was not worried when he began to follow me,” she went on. “Then he suddenly snatched me up. The next thing I knew, we were stepping through a doorway into a dark hallway with yellow lichen on the walls.” Heads nodded in sympathy. They all knew what it was like to be taken to a portal that led to the shadowlands.
“I came close to losing my mind when he left his vessel and I saw that he was a demon. He killed the man he had been using as a puppet then told me he was going to make me his slave forever.” Tears welled in her eyes and the other imps gave soft sighs of shared pain.
Her face twisted in hatred when she continued. “I was the captain’s favorite pet for several decades before he finally grew tired of me. He cast me aside and I joined his other victims in servitude when he travelled to Earth to find a new toy. I vowed that I would never let anyone abuse me ever again.”
The females on either side of her gave gasps of pain when long thorns appeared on Rashida’s flesh. They scrambled away a moment before a noxious fluid began to drip from the tips. “You are doing it again,” one of them said as she crawled onto the lap of one of the males.
Looking down at herself, Rashida grinned sheepishly. “Sorry. That always happens when I get angry.”
Her story was heart wrenchingly similar to Heather’s. Princes were far larger than captains and it was rare for women to survive their ordeal at their captor’s hands. Unlike Heather, Rashida had survived her abuse. She’d transformed in more ways than one when she’d slowly turned into an imp. She’d gained a weapon that would make sure no one could touch her with the intention of harming her again.
“That’s a pretty cool defense mechanism,” I said as her thorns withdrew. The holes that had been poked in the leather seats closed over until they were flawless again.
“Many of us have evolved over the centuries,” she said. “Most of us have found ways to remain unnoticed.”
“My friend, Sam, could camouflage himself and change his appearance to look like he was someone else.” It hurt to talk about him, but I knew he was something of a legend to them.
“Sam is our hero,” Rashida said solemnly and heads nodded in agreement. “He is the first and only imp who has ever escaped from this dismal place.”
“He is the reason why we are starting this rebellion,” another imp said. “He has proven that we deserve more than the lot that we have been given.”
While I agreed with their sentiment, I wasn’t sure that confronting the Hellmaster was the best way to go about it. He had been powerful enough to oust Satan and he was also a complete mystery. From the careless way he’d treated his underlings when he’d punished me for killing the princes, he didn’t have any regard for them at all. I had no doubt that he would have far less compassion for the imps.
“Well, at least I can take you guys all the way to the capital city of the second realm,” I said when they fell silent.
Rashida’s expression became grave. “I should warn you, the final Prince that you will face is not like the others that you have encountered. I have heard that he has access to several powerful runes.”
Only one of the other rulers of the realms had used runes against me. He’d had his hellscribes set traps in a secret palace that he’d fled to when he’d heard I was searching for him. While they’d been annoying, they hadn’t been particularly deadly. Then again, he’d had the floor of his throne room altered so some of the flagstones fell out from beneath me when I touched them. He’d also put a trap around the pedestal where he’d left his piece of the mystery object of power. Only my quick reflexes had saved me from falling into a pool of magma. Sam had rescued me, with the aid of two soldiers that I’d taken control of.
“Thanks for the warning,” I said. “I’ll be careful. I never rush in and start swinging without scoping the palaces out first. I just wish Sam was still with me,” I added wistfully. “He was an expert at sneaking us in without being detected.”
We fell into a sad silence. None of these imps had been to the palace in the second realm. They couldn’t give me any insights into what I could expect to face. I was on my own and I would just have to do the best I could.
Each time the nightmares stopped to let us out so they could have a rest, the imps crowded closely around me for protection. We were on foot when we finally reached the hellgate that would take us to the second realm.
The gate watched us approach with a flinty expression. The stone gargoyles glared down at us and hissed menacingly. I’d never seen one leave its gate, but I knew they could be sent to carry messages when necessary. I’d put a stop to them warning the princes that I was arriving when I’d defeated the master gate. Unfortunately, I couldn’t do anything about the raven. It had been following us for the past couple of hours.
“Open up,” I ordered the hellgate. I didn’t bother to ask which realm he guarded. There were only two left. Fate was ensuring that I would travel to each of the nine realms in consecutive order.
“You seem to have attracted some vermin,” the gate said as a crack appeared in the middle of his face. He eyed the group of imps snottily. “I can call on some hounds to disperse them, if you wish.”
“You can call on the beasts that live in hell?” I asked in astonishment. I thought they could only create creatures in the shadowlands.
“Of course, but only if they are nearby. They usually avoid us. They do not like to be commanded by inanimate objects.”
“You can sense a pack of hellhounds in the area?” Rashida asked and looked around warily.
“There are several, actually,” the gate replied, sneering down at her. He turned his attention to me. “I would be happy to call them and have them chase this riffraff away.”
“The imps are with me,” I said flatly. I didn’t bother to say they were part of my entourage. They were so low on the hierarchy that they weren’t barred from passing through the gates. Humans were also classified as being too unimportant to keep out. The downside to being so pitiful was that they couldn’t command the gates to open. They had to wait for someone else to open them before they could pass through.
Looking around, I saw a flash of scarlet eyes in the distance. Sure enough, we were being followed by several packs of hellhounds. I hadn’t even noticed them as they’d stalked us. Going on a hunch, I motioned for the imps to stay put and jogged towards the packs. Th
ey were usually territorial and kept their distance from each other. It was unusual for them to band together like this.
Stopping a short distance away, I waited for the alphas to step forward. There were five, which meant there were thirty dogs in total. Kneeling so I was at their level, I held my hands out and allowed them to sniff me. One by one, they licked my fingers submissively. “What’s up, guys?” I asked as I took turns to pat them. “Why are you following me around?”
One of the alphas looked at the hellgate and whined. It stood open, patiently waiting for me to cross into the shadowlands. “Do you want to come with me?” I asked. I’d killed their ruler the last time I’d been here and they were now master-less. Since they were in hell rather than waiting in the nowhere lands, maybe they’d never been called on to be servants.
They couldn’t communicate with me as easily as the nightmares and crab beetle could, but they crowded around me eagerly. “Okay,” I said and stood. “You can tag along, but don’t attack the imps. They’re my friends.” Some of the hounds looked disappointed, but they would have to obey me if they became my servants.
The rest of the hellhounds joined us as I jogged back to the waiting imps. None of them had dared to step into the mist beyond the gate. They were understandably apprehensive that thirty hellbeasts were following me. “Don’t be scared,” I said when I reached them. “The hounds won’t hurt you.”
“I have never seen anything like this,” Rashida said and shook her head in disbelief. “No creatures have ever willingly served a master before. They are always compelled to follow orders.”
“I find that kindness and respect works a lot better than treating them like dumb animals,” I said. I just hoped my original hounds wouldn’t be upset that five more packs had joined me.
“Are you going to enter the shadowlands, or must I remain open all day?” the hellgate asked with exaggerated politeness.
