by Sam Cheever
I felt the soft touch of an expelled breath against my forearm.
My lips stopped at the fragrant juncture of her neck and her shoulder. I sucked on the impossibly soft skin there, following the pull of my tongue and lips with a tender bite to the sensitive skin.
She moaned low in her throat and pressed against me. I loosened my hold on her, thinking I had her in my sensual grip. A heartbeat later I lay blinking from the bed, my body sprawled unattractively beneath hers and a knife at my throat.
I sighed. “I’ve always hated that déjà vu thing.”
Her smile was not a nice one. “You’d better get used to it because apparently you’re stupid.”
Grinning, I arched my back, driving my still hard cock up into her belly. She jerked away from me as if burned by lava and strode toward the door. “Your dinner is on that table. See if you can stay out of trouble until morning.”
“Wait!”
She stopped with her hand on the doorknob but didn’t look back at me.
“At least tell me your name.”
She hesitated for a long moment. So long in fact that I didn’t think she was going to tell me. She turned the knob and pulled the door just slightly ajar. A single word, “Nidras,” drifted across the empty space in a husky whisper that was so soft I wasn’t completely sure I’d heard the name at all.
“Nidras,” I repeated as the door closed quietly behind her. “The legendary Demon Princess.” I pushed myself up onto my elbows and swore. I had the hots for a member of the royal demon family.
Son of a bitch.
Chapter Three
Roadkill
“I thought she was just a myth.” Christian Kairos and I had worked together at Cupid’s Arrow, our matchmaking service on Earth. We’d reconnected once I’d cleared the last of the Brimstone from my brain. He’d left Earth to live in Olympus when he found the love of his life in the famed city.
Christian had been one of my best friends at Cupid’s Arrow, before I’d joined the dark side and started shunning all my well-meaning friends there.
“Apparently not.”
Christian sipped his beer and thought about this for a minute. “Are you sure it’s her?”
I walked over to the computer I’d smuggled into Olympus when I’d discovered that Zeus still enforced the use of magical scrolls in the famous city and did a Google search for Nidras.
My lady’s stunning face appeared on screen.
Christian whistled. “She’s a beauty.”
“Yup. But don’t be fooled by her delicate good looks, she could fling you halfway across Olympus with just a thought.”
Christian’s face split in a slow smile. “Mmm, beautiful and strong. Makes me hard just thinking about it.”
I laughed. “Down boy, or I’ll tattle to Arion.”
Christian lifted both hands in a peace offering. “I’m just sayin’.”
I dropped down beside Christian on the couch and tipped my frosty mug back, enjoying the cold bite of the golden brew as it slid down my throat. We sat in silence for a moment, both of us staring at the face on my computer screen.
I rubbed absently at my chest. It had been fully healed for a week. But there was a sensation about it. Something I couldn’t explain. It was as if a small piece of something had been left behind when it was healed.
It had been nearly a week since I’d woken up at the Pleasure Palace and encountered Nidras. When I’d come out of my room the next morning she’d been gone. I’d asked around the pleasure house but nobody seemed to know who I was talking about. Even Sidra claimed never to have met Nidras.
I’d finally given up and come home. But I’d been trying to get underneath the whole soul sucker thing ever since.
I turned to Christian. “Have you found out anything more about these attacks on the demons?”
He shook his head. “Arion went through all the scrolls she could find in Zeus’ library about the royal demons but there’s no mention of that particular monster. There was something vague about a plague that would overtake the race if Princess Nidras didn’t fulfill her destiny. But we couldn’t even find a clear reference to what that destiny was.” He shrugged, taking a large swig of beer from his mug.
“Where else can we look?”
Christian thought about this a few moments. He grinned. “If you get desperate you can always ask the Fates.”
I swore. I hadn’t spoken to the three Graces since they’d banished me from Cupid’s Arrow. I wasn’t anxious to see them again.
Ironically, my reasons for not wanting to see them had changed. I was worried they’d pull me back to Earth. Back to Cupid’s Arrow. And I wasn’t ready for that yet. Every fiber in my body was screaming that I needed to find Nidras. She was in trouble and I had convinced myself she needed my help. And, if I needed to settle myself directly in the path of the soul sucker to do it, so be it. That’s what I would do.
Rubbing my chest again, I realized the Fates would have the information I needed about the royal demons. “I guess that’s what I need to do.”
Christian set his beer down and stood, clapping me on the shoulder before he turned toward the door. “Sux to be you, my man.”
I nodded. “It most certainly does.”
*
The three Graces were strolling in the Garden of Life. I approached them, fully expecting to be rejected as soon as I explained my mission. Surprisingly, they smiled at me as I approached and gave every appearance of being glad to see me.
I stopped before them, bowing slightly. “Your Graces.”
They inclined their heads regally. I noticed Clotho had a suspicious sparkle in her gray eyes. “You are in love, Hermes Adonis.”
I jerked and my head started to move from side to side in instant denial.
Lachesis flicked a delicate, white hand in my direction. “Do not bother trying to deny it. It is written all over your handsome face.”
My mouth dropped open but the denial sitting on my tongue wouldn’t extract itself.
Atropos took a step nearer and reached a hand to cup my cheek. “Such a beautiful boy, isn’t he sisters? Those beautiful dark brown eyes…”
“Those thick lashes…” Clotho added.
“And all of that gorgeous brown hair.” Atropos ran her finger down my nose. “You have a Greek nose, Hermes.” The soft finger touched the long scar running along my jawline. I reached up to grab the invasive digit, avoiding the look of pity I knew would be in her golden eyes. That scar served as a constant reminder to me of just how fragile my heart actually was.
It was given to me by the last woman I’d loved when, because of the curse of lovelessness all Cupids used to be under, her memory of me faded at the height of an extremely passionate affair. In desperation, I’d tried to reintroduce myself to her. I didn’t really blame her for trying to kill me, she’d thought I was a stranger trying to accost her but that didn’t make the loss of what we’d had any easier to take.
Atropos pulled her hand from my grasp and smiled. “You deserve love, Hermes. Though you’ve been a total ass for the last several years.”
Clotho snorted in agreement.
Brutally pushing aside the memories engendered by the scar, I looked hopefully toward the three goddesses before me. “Then you’ll help me?”
Lachesis bent down and picked a fat, white flower from a bush at her feet. She placed the enormous blossom over her nose and inhaled deeply. “Help you with what, dear boy?”
I realized then that they didn’t know who had captured my heart. I took a deep breath and dived off the metaphorical cliff. “I need you to tell me everything you know about the royal demons. Most particularly about Princess Nidras.”
All I heard for a long moment was the sound of horrified choking.
Finally, Lachesis reached out and smacked me upside the head. “You always were a stupid boy, Hermes Adonis.”
“So you won’t help me?”
Lachesis shook her head and dropped her butt onto a nearby, concrete
bench. “What is it with you Cupids? Why can’t you just fall in love with the harmless, sweet goddess down the street? Real love isn’t difficult enough? You have to fall in love with a cursed demon princess?”
I just stared at her. What could I say?
Finally she sighed, her slender form deflating visibly. “What do you need, boy?”
“Tell me what’s up with this soul sucker. How do I kill it?”
Clotho spoke up finally. “The only way to destroy the soul sucker is for Princess Nidras to fulfill her destiny.”
“What does that mean? What is her destiny?”
Atropos settled onto the bench next to her sister Fate. “Prophecy is unclear on what exactly her destiny entails. Only the royal family knows the details. But this curse was placed on Nidras centuries ago, when her great, great grandmother rejected a powerful sorcerer’s suit. Whatever she’s supposed to do, it’s ugly and will cause her much pain.”
“The monster was released to punish her for resisting her fate.”
I looked at Lachesis. “So it will keep killing her people until she gives in and accepts her fate?”
Clotho nodded. “Unfortunately, yes.”
I felt sick. I dropped to my butt in the lush grass, propping my arms on my knees. “There has to be another way.”
The three Fates shook their heads. Clotho reached out to touch my arm. “I’m sorry, Hermes. Maybe if you tried some sex, you might get poor Nidras out of your mind.”
I took her hand and kissed the back of it. “Always with the sex, Clotho.”
She giggled. “It works for me.”
I stood up. “Thank you for the information, Graces. I would ask just one more thing from you.”
Lachesis inclined her head. “Name it.”
“Tell me how I might find Nidras.”
The three goddesses shared a look.
Atropos shook her head. “She has gone rogue. It is believed she avoids her father because, as king, it is his duty to see that she accepts her fate. It is the only way to stop his people from being slaughtered. But forcing her to succumb to the curse would kill him. He loves his only child very much.”
Clotho chimed in. “Nidras doesn’t want to put her father in that position, so she avoids him except for public appearances, where she pretends she is doing what is required of her to appease their people. But she has determined to fight the monster rather than succumb.”
“I fully support that decision. In fact, if possible, I intend to find her and help.”
Lachesis sighed. “As I said before, you always were a stupid boy, Hermes Adonis.”
*
I tested the trigger on my weapon to make sure I’d unlocked it and checked my grip. The gun was an Olympian special, which emitted laser beams built on Olympian magic that was supposed to kill anything.
I’d been practicing with it for several days and found that the weapon disintegrated anything I placed between its sights, including one unfortunate gargoyle buck that had wondered haplessly across my path as I was shooting a concrete pillar on an ancient ruin.
Nasty creatures, gargoyles. But still. I felt bad about turning it into atmospheric gas.
The gun was one of many weapons I’d gotten from a truly seedy contact Christian and Arial had found for me in the dark bowels of the City of Gods. Thick bodied, full of warts and smelly, Bleark was the embodiment of all the worst traits a gnome can harbor. But he was the only creature on Olympus who could provide the type of weapons I needed. Weapons that would kill anything in their path.
My hand drifted to the handle of the long sword resting against my hip.
Part of my Cupid training had, of course, included fencing. But this sword was different from anything I’d ever used before. Its double edges were sharp enough to slice iron or steel. It could cut a man in half at the waist with a single, moderately hard swing. And if being cut in half didn’t provide sufficient damage, the blade burned its target from the inside out, so that even the slightest cut would spread to disintegrate the victim.
I also had several round objects clipped onto a leather sash I’d laid across my chest. They were hell-fire bombs. Filled with flame and ash from the lowest circle of Hell, those little goodies would annihilate anything I threw them at, leaving not a trace behind of the object they ate.
I was Rambo on steroids. I was super Cupid…hear me roar. And I was more than ready to face the soul sucker and save my lady love.
All I needed to do was find the monster.
Or…for that matter…my lady love.
The shadows rolled softly around me, thick with silence and the smell of overflowing garbage bins. It was well after midnight and the demons I’d been watching had scattered home hours ago. All except a large, tough looking female, who’d staggered from the demon club where I’d been keeping watch just moments earlier, a long, deadly looking knife clutched in her thick fist.
I’d followed her out of the bar and watched her disappear into the alley. But her footsteps had stopped a moment earlier and I hadn’t been able to catch so much as a gasped breath of sound since I’d entered the alley behind her.
I stopped, the gun held out in front of me and my hand still on the hilt of the sword and listened carefully. I narrowed my eyes in an effort to pierce the thick fleece of the shadows closing around me.
Finally I heard her. The sound was soft as a sigh. Like a final scrape of breath from between her thick lips. And then the shadows rolled and something long and black boiled out of them.
I could barely make out its form. Either it had pulled the shadows around it or they were part of its makeup.
I stared in horror at its featureless face and formless shape. It rolled and shimmered underneath a fall of black mist.
It didn’t breathe but somehow I could hear it standing there.
Then the shadows closed and it disappeared. I fired the gun, blinking at the satisfactory sound of the brick wall smashing into bits behind it.
Blackness rolled toward me and hit me with the force of a train, throwing me the full length of the alley. I hit the stone wall of the alley and slid downward, crumpling like a broken doll on its filthy floor. My eyes lifted and saw the blackness rolling toward me again.
I grabbed a hell-fire bomb and launched it into the center of that deadly blackness. The thing pulled in on itself and the bomb sailed harmlessly past, lighting up the other end of the alley as it turned a large part of the building next door into ash.
In the light of the bomb, I saw a crumpled pile of something that looked like dead demon at the far end of the alleyway.
I jumped to my feet and pulled the sword. Lunging a bit wildly, I plunged its tip through the roiling blackness and found, surprisingly, that the shadows had density. The monster split around my thrust and I could see residual light from the burning wall through the opening.
I experienced a moment of joy as I realized I’d damaged the soul sucker.
It was short-lived. The shadows lengthened and reached out to slam against me. I went down on one knee, still swinging the sword. I actually even connected a few times. But still the shadows pounded against my head, chest and shoulders.
The slimy floor of the alleyway reached up and grabbed the side of my head and the sword clattered to the ground beside me. I lay there, drooling blood, as something heavy landed on the center of my back.
Somewhere in my enfeebled brain I knew pain was imminent. I tried to lift my head and speak. But nothing would move.
I was like furry roadkill on the bottom of a large tire. All flat and spread-eagled, waiting for the next bulldozer to run over me.
I wished I’d listened more closely to the Fates. Turns out they were right. I always was a stupid boy.
Pain, like jolts of fire, spread across my back. Stars burst before my glazed, unblinking eyes. I wondered how long it would take for me to die.
The shadows flew sideways and the weight on my back disappeared. I heard the distinct sound of fighting nearby and wished I could sc
rape myself off the pavement and help.
I managed to get myself into a seated position after several moments of hard work but I was panting from the effort. Leaning against the wall behind me I tried to see what was going on.
Pure black fought against a slightly lighter charcoal in a seemingly formless mass in the center of the alley. I was glad someone had come to help me and I wanted to jump in and do my part but I couldn’t tell the bad guys from the good guys at that point.
So I sat and panted for a minute longer.
I had just managed to stumble to my feet when a high-pitched, keening sound made me cringe and hold my ears. The air in front of me flashed into brightness. Instinctively, I closed my eyes against the burning light. But as the squealing continued I risked opening them to see what was dying.
The light shot in twin beams from the outstretched palms of a very small, nicely shaped creature standing several feet away, facing the monster. She held herself rigid and upright, with military correctness, unbending in the face of the writhing, lunging and very pissed off monster before her.
I watched in awe as she brought the thing to its metaphorical knees and finally sent it screaming into oblivion as it disappeared with a final, ear-splitting shriek.
Nidras stood, unmoving for a long moment, her small hands still outstretched but no longer spitting deadly fire. I took a step toward her and the sound of my boot scraping against the ground made her turn abruptly.
Her small, beautiful face was purple with rage. She lifted her palms toward me.
My hands shot up defensively. “Whoa, girl! I come in peace.”
She stared at me for a long moment and then snorted. “You’re lucky you don’t come in pieces. What is it with you and this monster? You’re like a soul sucker magnet.”
I shrugged, grinning. “I’ve been searching for it.”
She dropped her hands. “Why in the name of all that’s evil and deadly would you do that? Are you completely stupid?”
This made me laugh. “Some would say that I am.”
“Some would be right, I think.” She turned away and started toward the street. I fell into step beside her. Her soft, flowery scent wafted over me, making my knees weaken with sudden, unexpected lust.
