“This is Sally,” Terrin said, a look of martyrdom coming over his face.
“That’s Prince Sally to you,” she said with a little laugh as he grimaced. “Or ‘Your Infernal Highness, Lord Sally of the twenty-seven legions.’ Or even, ‘Sally the magnifique.’ French makes everything better, don’t you think? Not that it’s an official title, you understand,” she told us in a confiding tone, “but I think it has a snazzy ring to it, and it annoys the other demon lords, so I like to use it. I understand you have a little issue with Bael you’d like taken care of?”
“Prince Sally?” I asked, wondering if the day would come when I wasn’t confused by things everyone said.
“Dio,” Kristoff swore, rubbing his face. “That’s all we need.”
“What do we need?” Pia asked, turning to him.
“Um. I hate to sound like the stupid one here, but why are you a prince and not a princess?” I asked. “Unless . . . oh. You’re a transvestite?”
“Me?” Sally said with a tinkling laugh. “A transvestite? Oh, my, I’m going to have to remember that joke to tell everyone. Me! Hee hee hee.”
Terrin rolled his eyes heavenward. “Now that Sally—who, I assure you, is not a transvestite—is here, I will take my leave of you all. The mare is awaiting my return.”
“Ah, gotcha. You two are . . . together?” I said, nodding at Sally.
She smiled at Terrin and blew him a kiss. “We are indeed together, aren’t we, sweetness?”
“Alas, that is the truth.” He sighed, and toddled out of the room.
“He’s so cute when he’s in Saint Terrin the Martyred mode, isn’t he?”
“I heard that,” he protested as the door closed behind him.
Sally took the opportunity to give me a very thorough visual examination. “You look quite charming in that dress. The color goes well with your skin tone,” she said at long last, not at all what I expected. I looked down at the amber-colored short lace dress, brushing a hand down the beading at the neckline, becoming aware of Alec staring at my legs.
Stop it. You’ve seen my legs before.
Yes, but I hadn’t realized until this moment just how much of them your dress exposes. In the future, I would prefer that you get them made so they fall below your knees, not above.
That’s seriously control freak, and going to do nothing but make me walk around in a bikini.
“However,” Sally said, interrupting the lecture that I could feel Alec about to deliver, “your hair! My dear, when I was at the Carrie Fae Academy of Good Looks and Perky Bosoms, we had one rule, and that was that bad-hair days should be abolished from this earth. You are not doing your part to achieve that goal.”
I touched my hair, an indignant retort on my lips, but she gave me a smile that had an awful lot of teeth in it, and added, “I’m a prince because the rules of Abaddon say that all demon lords are princes, regardless of gender.”
“Good lord, you’re a demon lord?” Pia asked, just as shocked as I was.
I pressed up against Alec. “Jesus wept!” Alec, we have to get out of here! She’s a demon lord!
“Ulfur!” Pia said, reaching for him. “Kristoff, don’t just stand there! Do something!”
One that the Sovereign of the Court of Divine Blood has recommended to help us.
“Do what, exactly?” Kristoff asked Pia.
But all three of us are here! Together! She could use us!
“She’s a demon lord!” Pia said, waving at Sally, obviously having the same thought that I was. “That’s bad, isn’t it?”
Yes, Alec said slowly, his mind turning over all sorts of possibilities. That’s exactly what I think the Sovereign intended.
“I am not an it, and I am not bad,” Sally said with another toothy smile, this time shared between all of us. “Well, sometimes I am, but most of the time, I’m just naughty, if you get my drift.”
You mean this woman is supposed to boot Bael from power and take over his position? But what’s to stop her from using us then?
Bael will be destroyed. So will his power. You will no longer be able to channel it; thus, no one could use you.
“Oh,” I said aloud, understanding at last why Alec wasn’t in the least bit panicking. “You’re going to take Bael’s position, aren’t you?” I asked Sally.
“Well . . .” She brushed at nothing on her wool power suit. “I admit to having a tiny little urge, a very tiny desire, to be the premier prince of Abaddon, but really, I’m doing it because the Sovereign feels it is important that you get some help.”
“I don’t understand,” Pia said, releasing Ulfur from the death grip she held on his arm.
“I don’t, either,” Ulfur said, giving Sally a doubtful look. “If you’re a demon lord, why does the Sovereign trust you?”
“Yeah,” I said, wanting to know that very thing.
She shrugged. “You’d have to ask the Sovereign that. Right now, I have work to do. And I think we should start now.”
The door to the hall opened, and two people strolled into the room, one of whom was a familiar-looking woman bearing a long, black sword.
“Wrath demons! ” Ulfur said, stumbling backward, but not fast enough. Sally grabbed him, sending him flying toward the door, before turning to me. I thought at first she was simply getting him out of the way of the demons, but one look at her face told me otherwise.
“Alec—” was all I had time to say. The two demons, one of which we’d seen in the Akasha, leaped forward, heading straight for Alec and Kristoff. I screamed and kicked at Sally as she jerked me out the door with her, shoving Ulfur before us.
Chapter Fifteen
You’d think that two people with reasonable intelligence and in a good state of health would be able to overpower one tiny little poufy-haired woman, but if that tiny woman was also a demon lord, you’d be very, very wrong.
“Ouch!” I yelled, trying to punch Sally when she slammed me against the back of the elevator, throwing Ulfur in after me. “You son of a bitch! I’ll get you for this!”
I lunged at her, unable to get up with Ulfur lying across my legs, but I did try to bite her. She waved a hand and I hit the floor again.
“Oh, please,” she said, making a gesture that had me frozen to the floor, Ulfur lying half on top of me.
She stepped across our bodies, pressing a button and humming softly along with the elevator music as we began to descend.
“I knew it! I knew a demon lord couldn’t be good!” Alec!
Beloved, are you all right? Where are you?
In an elevator, lying on the floor. Alec, the wrath demons . . . Sally is evil! I knew she was evil! She took us all in!
Why are you—sins of the saints!
What’s wrong?
Other than the fact that Kristoff and I are trying to keep from being beheaded by two wrath demons, you mean?
Oh. Am I distracting you?
Are you harmed?
No.
Then you are distracting me. I will come to you as soon as we destroy these demons’ forms.
“Good, bad . . . that’s so black-and-white when there are so many shades of gray that are far more interesting,” Sally said complacently.
“Oh, you think you’re so smart,” I growled. “Just you wait until Alec takes care of your demon minions! Then we’ll show you what’s what. Right, Ulfur?”
“Urgh,” he groaned.
“Exactly. You’ll be one sorry chickie, and I just can’t wait to tell your boyfriend about you.”
Sally continued humming for a few seconds as a horrible thought occurred to me.
“Merciful Mary! He’s in it with you, isn’t he? Oh! And to think I believed him when he said the Sovereign recommended you. What bull! Well, I can tell you, we will be having a little chat with this Sovereign dude, and telling him . . . it . . . all about you and Terrin!”
Sally was about to reply when the elevator opened to reveal a couple with a small child in hand. “I’m sorry, but would you mind wait
ing? My friends here are about to threaten me with untold torments, and I’m very curious to see what exactly those will be. I hope they include thumbscrews. I love thumbscrews. They look so innocuous, and yet can give you such marvelous results, don’t you think?”
The couple fled toward the stairs, the small child in the man’s arms.
“That’s just one more thing I’m going to mention to the Sovereign,” I told Sally’s ankle.
“Tattletales never end up good,” was all she said as we descended again.
“What are you going to do with us?” I tried very hard not to let even so much as a hint of a quaver taint my voice.
“A friend has badly wanted to see you, and I am obliging him.”
“Friend? You have a friend? I thought people like you just used others.”
“Such ingratitude,” Sally said, buffing a nail with absolute lack of concern about anything I said. “And to think I’ve gone to so much trouble about you. Ah, here we are.”
We hadn’t descended to the basement, or some dank lower floor that only hotel employees used; no, the doors slid open to reveal another cream-and-gold-colored hallway, and three pairs of legs. Men’s legs, two pairs in black pants, one in jeans. I couldn’t move my head to look up and see who they were, but I knew without a single shred of doubt that Sally was about to hand Ulfur and me over to Bael.
“I’ll get you, too,” I told the pair of feet nearest me. His shoes were expensive-looking, the kind you see on billionaire businessmen as they step out of their limos. “And if I don’t, I know a vamp who will!”
“Why is it mortals insist on believing they have the least amount of power against me?” a plummy English voice asked as the expensive shoes stepped to the side. “What did you do to them, Sally?”
I wondered if I should let Alec know that Sally had grabbed Ulfur and me, but decided that distracting him with that information now could have deadly consequences. I’d wait until he gave me the all clear; then I’d tattle on Sally like she’d never been tattled on before.
“Damn you!” I snarled at the shoes, struggling to force my body upright. It was no use—whatever Sally had done to us held me to the floor like I was nailed there.
“Just a simple immobility spell, my prince. She was getting a bit difficult. Well, you know how mortals are—they can raise such a fuss over the most trivial of things.”
“Trivial like betraying us when we trusted you?” I gasped, outraged at her callousness.
“Bring both the woman and the lich. It will be my pleasure to show them both what my wrath truly consists of.”
I did not like the sound of that. Maybe now would be a good time to tell Alec what was going on. Then again, if he was still battling with Bael’s wrath demons, it might make things worse.
Much worse.
“Be careful,” Sally advised. “The female bites.”
No, I had better take care of this myself, at least until Alec was free to help Ulfur and me.
“Damned straight I do!” I glared at the pair of shoes nearest me as two hands hefted me up, slinging me facedown across a man’s shoulder. I growled as my face was buried in his suit coat, blinding me to everything but a narrow slice of floor visible when I rolled my eyes to the top of my head. “I swear by all that’s holy, you’ll pay for this! You all will!”
“She’s also fairly antagonistic, although that probably is to be expected,” I heard Sally say as she followed behind us.
“Where are you taking us?” I demanded to know of the man’s back.
Bael wasn’t hauling me around, but it was he who answered . . . in a bland voice that nonetheless left my skin crawling. “I do not recall giving you leave to speak, woman.”
“And I don’t recall giving you the right to make me your Tool, and yet here I am!” I snapped in return.
“Cora, Cora, Cora,” Sally said in a disapproving tone. “Dear one, I realize you are not versed in the etiquette of Abaddon, but surely even you must realize that one simply does not snarl at Lord Bael without suffering the consequences.”
I had a horrible feeling that the word “suffering” was going to take on a very real meaning, one I was pretty darned desperate to avoid, so despite my desire to do otherwise, I kept the string of abuse I wished to hurl at everyone’s heads behind my teeth.
“Silence the woman if she continues,” Bael said in an offhand voice as a door was opened and I was tossed onto a bed, Ulfur dumped next to me. We were still immobile, so I couldn’t even roll over or shove Ulfur’s torso off my legs, but I could see Sally as she faced Bael near the doorway of the hotel room.
“Oh, I will, naturally, because you know, life is just too short to put up with people lipping off to you. Well, not my life,” Sally said with a giggle. I ground my teeth and wished I could fire some of Bael’s power right at her. “But you know what I mean—life in general. In fact, I had better silence her now, because she’s sure to scream and beg and plead and generally carry on, and I wouldn’t want to disturb you.”
“The day will never come when begging and pleading disturbs me,” Bael said with a gesture that had his two companions dissolving into nothing. “But you may silence the woman if you desire. She will not need to have a mouth in order to be unmade.”
“Hey!” I said, my skin crawling again at the casual way they both talked about what could only be torture. “I am right here! And I like my mouth! Sally, for the love of all that’s holy . . . er . . . for the love of . . . crap! All I can think of are appeals to your goodness, and you’re so utterly not good, the comparison would be obscene. I don’t know why you’re doing this, but I should point out that Alec will not tolerate you abusing me in any way, shape, or form. And I know Pia won’t let you do anything to Ulfur, either. What . . . er . . . what did you mean we would be unmade?” The last bit was directed at Bael, who ignored me to consult his cell phone.
“Do you know,” Sally said slowly, looking particularly thoughtful as she sat on my feet, making me bite back an exclamation of pain, “I believe Cora might have a point? That brings to mind something I should tell you, my lord.”
An unearthly wail rose high into the night, like the sound of a thousand souls in torment all crying out at once.
“Jesus wept, what was that?” I gasped, the hairs on my arms standing on end.
“Oh, dear, that would be just exactly what I was going to mention,” Sally said, tsking softly to herself. “That was one of Bael’s sweet wrath demons, Cora. Evidently the Dark Ones destroyed it. And although I would never presume to speak for the Lord Bael, I believe he’s referring to the fact that his Tools cannot be destroyed. Otherwise”—she gave a delighted little giggle—“he would simply kill you and be done with it.”
“You are the meanest person I have ever met, and I grew up in the San Fernando Valley—you haven’t seen mean until you’ve been deemed too lacking to join the popular girls’ clique,” I told Sally, even though I couldn’t see her where she sat crushing my feet.
“Flattery, my little dumpling of delight, will get you everywhere. Now, what was I saying? Oh, yes, about the unmaking. You can’t be destroyed, you see? Otherwise Lord Bael would simply squash you into a Cora-shaped smear on the carpet. But I imagine he doesn’t want you to be left sitting around annoying him, either.”
“I do not,” Bael agreed, obviously in the middle of texting something. My inner devil gave a little deranged giggle at the idea of Satan addicted to his smart phone. I wondered if he did Facebook. “The entrance the lich used to gain access to my palace in Abaddon in order to steal my Tools has been sealed up, so no others will be able to use it.” He glanced up, his gaze on Ulfur for a moment. “The lich will, of course, be suitably punished for his part in wasting my valuable time, but once I am satisfied that my vengeance has been wrought, it is better that the Tools be unmade so that they will pose no further threat.”
Fear on Ulfur’s behalf gripped my guts at his intentions about punishment. I heard Ulfur gasp in horror, but he said noth
ing, evidently feeling the less attention that was focused on him, the better.
I agreed and, in an attempt to draw Bael’s attention to me, asked, “But what’s this unmaking stuff? I thought Terrin said there was no way to separate the Tools from us?”
“There isn’t, sugar, there isn’t,” Sally said, rising and patting my squashed ankles. “I’m afraid when Lord Bael unmakes the Tool inside you—and he needs to find the Agrippa who made the Tools in order to unmake them—then you’ll be unmade, as well. Sad, of course, but what can you do? We can’t have you Tools running around where anyone can take advantage of Lord Bael. That would be unthinkable.”
“Oh, completely,” I said with acid sarcasm. “Sally, you amaze me, you really do. You look so nice, but you truly don’t have a heart, do you? It doesn’t bother you one single damned infinitesimally small bit that you’ve betrayed Ulfur and me, does it? You honestly do not have one single iota of sympathy for us, or even care that he, that man who is essentially the devil, is going to torture and destroy us. It just doesn’t matter a fig to you, right? ”
“Dear one, I am a demon lord,” she said with a gentle smile. “Heartless is what we do best. Besides, Lord Bael would never tolerate someone who had compassion as a prince of Abaddon. It’s just not done.”
I closed my eyes for a moment, my heart sick. I had to figure out a way to get Ulfur and me away from them . . . or at least survive long enough for Alec to finish off the second wrath demon so he could come save us. I’ve never been a big fan of women needing a man to save them, but I was willing to recognize there was a time and place for it, and if ever I saw one, this was it.
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