by Izzy Shows
All the better that I had cut them out of my life.
“You may leave,” I said, dismissing the man with one hand raised. “Return immediately to Hell and await further command.”
He heaved a giant breath of relief. “Yes, sir,” he said, and his footsteps were loud and fast as he made his way out of my flat.
Rage flickered within me the moment I heard the lift leaving.
This was a new experience altogether, and one that I was not pleased to run into. Cassiel hunting me? That was something I had dealt with before, something I enjoyed even on the worst days. We could hunt one another until the end of time, and I hoped we would.
But my demons acting up? That was simply unacceptable. My fingers twitched as the anger flowed within me. I paced to one end of the room and back again, turned and went back. Kept pacing as I attempted to rein in the rage.
Why did I bother? It wasn’t like anyone was here to witness it. Lilith had gone out for the day, apparently. I couldn’t scent her presence in the flat.
I reached the end of the room again and slammed my fist into the wall, breaking clear through it. A dull sensation of pain registered, not enough to bother me, and not enough to indicate any real damage done to my hand.
Yet there was a hole in my wall that hadn’t been there before.
My brothers were right. I was losing my temper much easier these days.
Six
I didn’t waste any time, I went directly to Hell.
It was not a difficult thing to do for a Fallen such as I. I didn’t have to waste time going through the appropriate gates; I could simply appear wherever I chose.
The location I chose happened to be outside one of the barracks. I could smell my demons inside, and the indecision that lay therein. There was trouble brewing there, and they needed to be reminded who they were and who they served. I pushed open the doors and stalked inside.
Silence immediately reigned as I passed room after room, all the doors of which were open, heading for the commander’s room. I could feel their anxiety rolling off of them, feel their fear.
Good. They needed to fear me. If they hadn’t feared me when I walked past, that would indicate a larger problem. To some of these men and women, I was a myth, something that was talked about but which they had never encountered. It had been an age since I had last been down here amongst them, and I had no doubt that many cambions had been born and raised since then.
They didn’t know why they needed to fear me, only that their parents did, and their brethren.
I reached the commander’s door and lifted a fist to bang on it. I didn’t get but two beats out before the door swung open. The commander was standing on the other side with her eyes wide and her hair in disarray. She looked like she had just woken up, which didn’t particularly surprise me. It was now seven o’clock London, and time flowed in a similar fashion here in Hell.
Still, she should have been up two hours ago. If her soldiers were up before her, that didn’t speak well of her command.
“What excuse do you have for your appearance?” I said without hesitation or introduction.
Fear flickered in her eyes before she lowered them so that she didn’t quite meet my gaze. I felt it coming off of her in waves, the terror that her life would end any moment now. “I apologize, sir,” she said. “I have no excuse.”
“Correct,” I said. “Get yourself dressed and meet me in the arena in fifteen minutes.”
Her eyes jerked up to meet mine again, and indignation filled her features before a calm mask fell into place.
How long had it been since she’d been in the arena? A devilish grin spread across my lips. Too long, I suspected. If my assumptions were correct, she didn’t fight with the cambions in her charge, but rather had them fight one another. They were supposed to do that, but it was also her duty to maintain control by representing the strength of the nephilim. If she was lacking in that regard, she would need to be replaced.
I turned without further word and abandoned the barracks, not turning my eyes toward any of the cambions I passed by.
Another commander was waiting just outside the barracks. He appeared more put-together than the woman had been. His brown hair was slicked back, no signs of sleep were visible in his sharp brown eyes, and a quick sniff proved that he had recently showered.
Good. He understood the requirements of his job.
Apparently, things had not gotten so bad in Hell that I would need to replace the entire command, but I had a sneaking suspicion that my lack of presence had had a negative effect on the soldiers who fell under my command.
It was a mark against me, truly, not on them. They were only as strong as their leader, and they needed to be reminded of the strength I required from my people.
“Yes?” I kept walking, and the commander quickly fell into step beside me.
“I heard that you would be coming, sir, and if it is not too presumptuous, I thought you might want a report of the goings-on.”
“You are correct in that. Your anticipation of my needs is noted,” I said. There was no point in leading without the ability to give appreciation where it was due. Sometimes the carrot worked better than the stick.
The man practically preened with what he interpreted as praise.
“There has been some turnover, sir. Not all of the recent cambions have an appreciation for the fight, and I believe that is because we as nephilim have not been as stringent with breeding as we should have been.”
He was probably right about them. When you laid with anyone who turned your head, the resulting offspring wouldn’t be as strong as with selective breeding.
“That is something we shall have to correct,” I said.
“I’m glad you agree, sir. I have drafted an order that would need your approval, where the breeding of nephilim and human would need approval from the Fallen first.”
My eyes glittered with annoyance as I flicked my gaze over to him. “You would burden us with your inability to choose correctly?” His proposition was preposterous. We couldn’t possibly be expected to oversee every single request for breeding that came to our doors. “No, we shall have to draft a council of nephilim who have proven themselves competent, and they will oversee it.”
Something in his eyes told me that was what he had really wanted.
“But you already knew that, didn’t you?” I said. “You are not as dull as you appear.”
“Thank you, sir. You are correct. I don’t know why I hoped to get anything past you. Your reputation is well-known.”
“And yet you have not seen it in person, so you had your doubts. I do not have any doubt that you are alone in this line of thought. That is precisely why I am here—to lay to rest any rumors that I do not have everyone’s best interests at heart, and that I am anything other than prepared to see them through with an iron fist.”
He swallowed, and a healthy amount of respect and fear entered his eyes. Good. He needed to know whom he was dealing with, and that I would not tolerate further attempts to trick me.
We arrived in the arena, and I breathed in the scent of sweat and blood, allowing it to wash through me. It was a good, pure scent, one I had always enjoyed. One I needed.
How long had it been since I had fought with everything in me? Not since the attempt at Riordan’s vault, I suspected. There, I had been required to fight a doppelgänger. It had possessed all of my skill and strength, a true copy of me, and it had been a good fight. Cassiel and I hadn’t hunted one another since then, and as he was an angel, one of my brothers, he had the ability to fight me on equal terms. These nephilim didn’t possess the strength I required to truly test myself, and my brothers did not have an interest in fighting me.
A pity. I would have relished the opportunity to best one of them, but it would appear that I would have to settle for the nephilim at the moment.
Just then, the female commander entered the arena. She had a sword strapped to her belt, and her hair was pulled back into a tight
bun. Her clothes had wrinkles in them, but otherwise she appeared to have collected herself as best she could in the limited time I had given her.
“Sir,” she said with a curt nod.
I inclined my head to her, then walked into the center of the arena, gesturing for her to follow. A crowd had amassed in the seats surrounding the training arena. They wanted to see what would happen, wanted to know how I would fight and if a punishment would be doled out to their commander.
They did not know my intentions.
The commander followed me, her movements stiff. Did she know she was walking to her death even now? I doubted it. She did not look familiar to me, though no one in the garrison really did—as the other commander had said, there had been some turnover in recent years. I wondered who had appointed her, and how that had happened without my knowing.
I would need to keep a tighter hold on my army going forward. I had trusted the nephilim, and that was my mistake.
We faced one another. “Ten,” I said, starting the countdown.
She drew her sword, her gaze flicking up and down my form, taking in my lack of weapons.
“Nine.” I did not bend my knees, did not raise my fists. “Eight.” From all appearances, I looked like I was having a regular conversation.
“Seven. Six. Five.”
Sweat beaded on her brow as the countdown went on, and I could tell she was losing some of her nerve. When was the last time her sword had tasted blood?
“Four. Three. Two.”
She bent her knees, her fingers flexing and rewrapping around the hilt.
“One.”
She launched herself at me, letting out a battle cry. I side-stepped her attack, moving too quickly for her to see. She stumbled, then righted herself, whirling to face me again.
We continued in this manner for several minutes, her charging me and me dodging the attack with little effort. I was playing with her, and I could feel her apprehension growing as the realization sank in.
How long would it go on? She didn’t have a choice to do anything but fight.
I lifted a hand and twisted it to one side. The ground rolled beneath her feet, and she lost her footing, falling on her ass. Her sword clanged as it struck the ground.
I stalked toward her like a lion approaching its prey. She scrambled back on the ground, her fingers finding purchase in the dirt.
There could be no mistaking the boredom in my eyes as I regarded her. This was not amusing for me. This was a lesson that had to be taught, that she needed to learn. And yet, it was more than that, for she wouldn’t have time to remember the lesson. This was a lesson for all the cambions and nephilim who were watching, that I would not tolerate impudence or carelessness in my army. That I would not hesitate to carve the disease from my army. That I would crush those who stood against me.
They all needed to learn who and what I was, for they had forgotten. Or they had never learned.
She curled her hand into a fist and threw a bolt of dark energy at me. I deflected it with a lazy flick of my wrist, sighing.
“Come now, Commander. Surely, this is not the best you can do?” I taunted her.
I could see desperation in her eyes. Surely, by now it was beginning to sink in that this was the end for her. She was fighting for her life and belatedly coming to that conclusion. There was not going to be an escape for her, no matter how hard she tried.
She struggled to her feet and backed up several paces.
“Distance will not save you,” I said. “Nothing will, truth be told.”
Red energy collected in her hands, and I raised a brow. She had learned something new, it would appear, in her time down here. Most demons used the black energy that was inherent in our nature, but she had something else at her disposal. I narrowed my eyes, zeroing in on it to dissect it and determine what it was.
She threw it, and I caught it in one hand, tilting my head to the side as I looked at it.
“Fiend,” I murmured. “You have been learning from the little ones.”
I threw it back at her, and it scorched her shoulder, tearing through her armor.
Enough of this. “You bore me, child,” I said, and with a twist of my hand, her neck broke. A lift of the other hand, and her heart burst from her chest and jumped high into the air before it came to rest on the ground.
I turned to look at those who had come to watch the battle. “I shall not tolerate incompetence,” I said. “Let it be a lesson to you all.”
I abandoned the arena.
Seven
As I exited the arena, ten of my generals were waiting for me. These were ones I had hand-selected, ones whose faces I recognized. It reassured me that they had not been involved in the turnover that the male commander had spoken of; if they had, the taint would have gone further than I was comfortable dealing with on my own. I would have needed to bring in one of my brothers, and that would have been… distasteful, to say the least.
“Follow me,” I said, not halting my steps as I walked away.
The ten of them fell into line, two by two, behind me. I made my way into another building and through several hallways until we reached one of the meeting rooms. I took a position at the head of the table, though I did not take a seat, and waited until they had all filed in. The last one shut the door behind him.
They all took their seats, five on each side. I was pleased by how well they behaved. They knew better than to speak until spoken to, and they knew what I wanted from them.
But hadn’t I selected them for just those reasons? That, and they were ruthless fighters. I did not doubt that they kept up the traditional fights with their lieutenants and commanders. They knew better than to allow things to lapse, although at least one of them had failed me with their commander. I would have to find out whom she belonged to, but I had already made an example out of her. There was no need to divest myself of a good general.
“I am sure you are all wondering why I have returned after such a lengthy absence,” I said, beginning to pace at the head of the table. None of them responded, but it had been a rhetorical statement. I didn’t expect a response from them. “For all intents and purposes, as you will be telling those in your command, I am here simply to survey the army and ensure that they know who I am. From what I’ve heard, there have been turnover and dissension in the ranks, and that cannot be tolerated.” I turned to face them, my hands clasped behind me. “However, this is not the only reason I have returned. A foot soldier came to me this morning to warn me that there are some in his quadrant who are turning rogue. Torturing without permission. Fighting amongst themselves. Now, tell me, why is it that a foot soldier had to come to me to tell me about this? Why was it not one of you?”
There was silence in the room for several moments that seemed to drag out. I waited, perfectly willing to allow them their silence until it broke them.
“I cannot speak for the others,” one of them said at last, clearly unable to hold it together any longer. “However, it was… an embarrassment that I thought I could handle on my own. I did not want to bring it to your attention until I knew it was outside my ability to control.”
“And yet, I have to wonder what else you have kept from me in my absence,” I said, shaking my head. It was the truth: I did wonder at that, but to some degree I still believed in them. Believed they would have told me if it was something too big for them to handle.
“We are not actively keeping anything from you,” another one said.
My gaze swiveled to each of them, peering deep into their souls. I could sense their anxiety, their trepidation, and yet I detected no lie in their words.
No, they weren’t hiding things from me, but they still weren’t telling me everything I thought I needed to know. They were keeping things they thought weren’t terribly important. And who had told them they got to decide what was and wasn’t important?
It certainly hadn’t been me.
I inhaled through my nose, then let the breath out.
T
emper, temper, Malphas. Keep it under control.
I couldn’t allow anyone to find out how easily my temper was lashing out these days. I was like an addict going through withdrawal. Even now, standing in this room with my generals and trying to determine if any of them was capable of treachery, I was thinking about her. Wondering what she was doing, wondering if she was thinking about me.
Did she care that we weren’t involved in one another’s lives any longer? I wondered if she felt a sense of relief from the whole thing, if she was happy it was over and that she was free of me. She had been so angry the last time I’d seen her…
I shoved the thoughts away and locked them down. They had no business being here while I was dealing with important matters. Hell was more important than Blair; I had to remember that. I had to keep myself under control and remember what was truly important these days.
She was important, once upon a time.
She didn’t want to be important, and I had to respect that. She didn’t want anything to do with me; she’d said as much. I’d warned her that removing the mark meant losing the protection I had offered to her. She had spat in my face, quite literally. But how else was she supposed to react after seeing the scene I had orchestrated for her? I had been trading away someone’s soul. It made sense that she would worry I would do the same to her.
How could she not have known that I would never do such a thing to her? That I had kept her contract safe and always would have? That my protection would never have been taken from her… without her deciding it needed to be so.
But that had been the only option available. She would have been facing death if she’d kept my mark, and still I hadn’t wanted to take it from her. I had been selfish and wanted to keep her close to me.
