Blood? Dexter wondered. Wasn’t Rolxoth a demon, too? Dexter turned his head to watch Rolxoth stagger away, then he realized that he could move again. He struggled to rise to his feet but only made it to his knees.
Rolxoth limped to the black flames and stepped into them. The flames climbed across his body, making him scream as they burned the mortal flesh from his body. He stood there, immolated, until he exploded in a cloud of noxious gas and was gone.
Chapter 15
Dexter stared at the flames. Rolxoth was gone. The ring he’d worn—the ring Jia had been trapped in—was gone with him. Just like that, gone in a puff of smoke. He rocked back on his knees and slumped down, sitting on his calves.
“Captain?” Tasha said, walking up to him. She knelt down beside him and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Captain?”
Dexter wasn’t a captain right then. He wasn’t even a man. Jianna was gone. They’d saved Port Freedom and maybe even the void from evil unimagined, but he’d failed to save his daughter. He looked up at Tasha and slowly shook his head. “I don’t know,” he whispered.
“Sir, yes you do. You always know what to do. You always have plan. Even when you say you don’t, we know you’re working on something. What are we going to do, Captain. How are we going to get Jia back?”
“Jenna?” Dexter asked, turning to peer through the flames across the dais. He saw a few shapes moving, but couldn’t make anything out. “Where’s Jenna?”
“Master, may I go?”
Rosh grunted. “Go where?”
“Through the portal,” Volera said. “I can do it.”
“Thought you wasn’t one of them no more?”
“This close I can feel it. I can feel my power over there. Everything that was stricken from me awaits.”
“What’s that mean?” Rosh growled. “You go there you gonna be like you was?”
Volera’s head dropped. “I don’t know,” she said. “It’s possible.”
The giant warrior scowled. “I’m going, too.”
“You can’t,” Volera said. “When one of my kind comes here, they must expend a great amount of energy to remain and survive, unless they take on the guise of a native of the realm. Rolxoth did that, and when he entered the portal his mortal form was cast aside. For you to go to my realm you would need to take on the form of a native, but you cannot do so.”
Rosh’s scowl deepened.
“Master, I’ve learned many things from you. I’ve learned your weaknesses and your strengths. No, let me finish. I’ve also learned that many of your weaknesses are hidden strengths.”
Rosh clamped his mouth shut and listened to her. “I’ve learned about emotions other than anger and vengeance. I may never know love, but I know it exists and I see its many forms. It has no power of its own, but it can lead to power that may be greater than any out there. How else could a band of mortals find and defeat beings that are nearly mighty enough to be dukes of hell?”
Rosh nodded. “Go, and if you go back, then heed my final command. You bring that girl’s soul back to us or I’ll come and find you. It won’t matter if you’re hiding in the void or in hell, I’ll find you.”
Volera smiled. “Yes, My Lord, I hear and I obey.” Volera pushed herself up to him and kissed him. She backed away, leaving Rosh’s face red, and turned to the dais. She drew her sword from its scabbard and held it at her side, then walked into the flames.
As with Rolxoth, the flames raced up her body and consumed her. Her armor combusted and fell away, leaving behind her impossibly proportioned pale body gleaming amidst the black flames. In seconds it, too, was consumed. She screamed, the sound of her wail on the border of agony and ecstasy. Then Volera was gone, consumed by the flame in an instant without the demon-spawned puff of smoke.
* * * *
Volera landed on the cracked red plain that stretched away to the horizon. A crowd of demons surrounded the portal, thousands deep in places. Each wanted to be chosen to come through and ravage another realm. Each sought to add to their power by devouring anything they could get their hands on. Only those chosen by the portal’s creator would be allowed through, but thousands flocked each time hoping they might have a chance to increase their power and raise their station.
She stepped free of the blue flames, her sword at her side. As soon as she was free of it she gasped and fell to her knees. She felt herself filled to bursting as everything rushed back in to her. All of her lost powers and her private reserves of captured souls. All of it was there. Her experiences and her might.
“Duathrym!” Volera cried out, her voice echoing across the plain. She rose up, her signature black and red armor forming around her flawless red skinned body. She was powerful again, powerful and unstoppable! Rosh had caught her by surprise before, now she had her powers as well as those she’d learned while trapped in his realm. She could do anything now! Even her role as a fury was too small for her.
The minions of hell separated, a path appearing between Volera and Rolxoth. She snapped her arm forward, her whip reaching out an impossible length and wrapping around his neck. She hauled him back, dragging him across the parched ground until he lay before her. “Rolxoth, how rude of you to leave.”
“Volera!” Rolxoth said, starting to rise.
“You will kneel!” She snapped, jerking the whip and driving him back down.
“Come now, you’re home again. You have your powers back. Surely you realize there’s more than being the concubine of a bumbling oaf of a mortal!”
“I have one task that remains,” Volera said, twisting her whip and tightening its hold on his neck. “The bumbling oaf gave me a final command of service, then I’m free. He was a fool,” she admitted. “But I must obey this final command.”
“What command? You’re more powerful and you’re free of him! Work with me and we can rule those foolish humans!”
She twisted the whip further. It wouldn’t shut him up but it would cause discomfort. “Another time, perhaps. Oh wait, you won’t have another time, will you?” Volera grinned at him and thrust her sword into his chest. She ripped it up, until it burst free between his shoulder and neck, then she let him fall back to the ground. Lacking a face she missed the expressions she would have otherwise seen while he died. She felt his anguish as he screamed and cried out in her mind. Before it was over she stepped on his twitching arm and let her sword sever his finger. She picked it up and pulled the ring free, then clutched it in her palm.
Volera turned to the flames. She was free now. She was mighty enough she could be a princess of hell with the powers she had. She had a fresh soul in the palm of her hand, a beautiful virginal one brimming with power. Those were the best kind.
Volera chuckled. She had another soul with her too, the damaged soul she’d taken from Willa. It was a part of her but that could be remedied easily. She knew how to do it now that her lost powers were restored.
She glanced at the ring again. Should she return it to the humans? Would Rosh expect something from her? Would he try to fight her again? Would she be able to beat him this time? She’d learned and grown so much, but so had he.
Volera frowned. Rosh had defeated Falcyon single handedly. No being had ever accomplished anything of the sort, on this realm or another. Was facing Rosh worth the risk? Volera scowled. Fear was something she’d not felt since she was a far lesser being. She didn’t like it, but it served a purpose. Fear kept those that heeded it alive. She hadn’t lived for countless eons by ignoring the things that kept her alive.
* * * *
“Been a while,” Logan said, pacing back and forth.
“The flames are nearly out,” Jenna whispered. She sat with Dexter’s arm around her and their backs against the wall.
“I’ll go after them,” Tasha said, starting forward.
“Knock it off!” Rosh snapped. “You heard her, going through there would be the death of you.”
Xander nodded. “She’s right. It takes powerful magic to survive on another dime
nsion. I’ve read about it but I’d need to spend much time studying and practicing before I could hope to protect you for even a short time.”
“You know a lot about everything, but you can’t do much,” Dexter snapped. His frustration got the better of him as he continued. “All these spells and magic you talk about but you don’t hardly do a damn thing.”
“I nearly died for you!” Xander spat out after a moment of open mouthed shock. “Twice now!”
Jenna’s hand dug into Dexter’s thigh, silencing him before he blurted out something foolish. Dexter glared at the wizard then nodded and looked away.
“She’s not coming back,” Jenna whispered, staring at the diminishing flames. Whether she meant Volera or Jianna, nobody but Jenna knew.
“She’ll come.”
Dexter looked up to Rosh, surprised at the conviction in his voice. Rosh, the man who trusted no one and needed no one. Rosh, the man who was unstoppable. Rosh, the man who had killed an army of demons single handedly. Now Rosh put his faith in a trickster and a seductress. Dexter shook his head slowly.
“Told ya.”
Dexter’s head jerked back to the dais. The flames had burst back up, nearly reaching the ceiling some twenty feet above them. A figure emerged from them, a figure that sent tendrils of terror and excitement sliding down Dexter’s spine.
Clad in a strange metallic black armor that revealed more than it protected. Her red toned thighs were displayed all the way up to the top of her hips on the side and the neckline plunged beyond her breasts nearly half the distance to her navel. She wore matching black and scarlet gloves that covered all the way to her elbow and knee high boots with a stiletto sharp heel several inches long. The final proof of her demonic heritage were her eyes: they were black abyssal pools.
Volera stepped off the dais, walking with an unnatural ease in the impossible boots. She stopped next to Rosh, rustling her leathery wings and extending them to their full eight foot span for effect. She grinned at him and licked her sharp teeth. Her tail slipped between her legs and rubbed its way up and around his leg suggestively.
“Got your old life back,” Rosh grunted.
Volera nodded. “Everything returned to me the moment I stepped through the portal.”
“Yet you’re here.”
She shrugged. “You gave me a final command, master.”
Rosh could hear the lower case word in her explanation.
“Gonna miss having you around,” he said. “And I better not hear that you plan on going back to doing what you done.”
Volera smiled sweetly at him. “You’ve a city of mortals hell bent on destroying every demon they find. It would not bode well for them to find me here. There would be much death.”
Rosh sighed. “Give me the ring then.”
Volera held her hand out until Rosh put his under it. She placed it in his palm, then dragged her black nails across his palm and fingers. “Put the ring on her finger and she will be restored.” She hesitated, staring with her bottomless gaze into Rosh’s eyes. “I have a gift for you, if you’ll have it.”
“This mean I owe you something?” Rosh asked.
Volera’s lip twisted up. “I like the sound of that. The most powerful mortal I’ve ever encountered owing me a favor.”
Rosh scowled, making Volera laugh. “No, Rosh, this is a gift from me to you. Not something I would think myself possible of, but perhaps you’ll understand why if you accept it.”
“All right, let’s have it then.”
Volera closed her eyes, then shuddered. “It is done,” she whispered. She opened her eyes and, for a heartbeat Rosh thought he saw a glimmer of moisture in them.
“What’s done?”
“Koda has a soul. His own soul, in full. What Willa entrusted to me was the other half of their soul. Now it is fully his, he need not worry ever again.”
Rosh stared at her, the muscles in his jaw twitching. In a move that dropped jaws around the room the burly warrior grabbed Volera and crushed her in his arms. He squeezed so hard she gasped at the borderline abuse. When he let her go he gruffly said, “All right then, best be going before somebody shows up.”
Volera nodded and stepped back. She started to turn then stopped and looked back at him. “Will you miss me?”
“This some kind of demon seductress trick?” Rosh asked her.
Her smile seemed almost reluctant. “No, it’s a question.”
“I already told you that.”
“No, you said you’d miss having me around. There’s a difference.”
Softly Rosh heard someone to his left say, “Duh!”
Rosh glanced sharply and saw only Bekka, Haley, and Xander standing, and none of them were looking at him. They seemed to be focusing very hard on looking at everything other than him, in fact. Rosh scowled.
“Yeah,” he said, turning back to Volera. “Yeah, I’ll miss you. And not just cause the Chance was a lot easier to sail with you around.”
Volera’s smile grew. She turned away from him and walked towards the flames. Her foot was on the first step of the dais when Rosh blurted out, “Well, what about you?”
She stopped and looked back at him over her shoulder. Her face was framed between her furled wings but he could see a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “What about me?”
“You gonna miss me?”
Volera sighed. “My kind don’t feel such things,” she said. “Survival on my realm requires ruthless determination and ambition. And power, it requires immense amounts of power. What I learned serving you combined with the power I once had and now have again has made me more powerful than ever. If I stay on my realm it won’t be long before I rise above the ranks of being a fury.”
“Oh,” Rosh grunted. He shrugged to show it didn’t matter to him. Something bugged him though. He chewed over her words and gasped when he figured it out. “If?”
She turned to face him fully, ignoring his question. “Would you, perhaps, like another gift? This one comes with a responsibility. A great responsibility, as you mortals consider it.”
“Don’t plan on taking my firstborn do you? He’s been dead and gone for thousands of years.”
Volera chuckled. She walked back to him and reached out, running a gleaming black nail across his jaw line. “You’re the most delightful bumbling oaf I’ve ever met.”
“Huh?”
Volera shook her head. “Something Rolxoth said before I gutted him and cut the ring off his finger. A private joke.”
“Oh.” Rosh hesitated then he shrugged. “Why not, just found something else that can’t kill me.”
Volera smiled, a twinkle somehow showing in her eyes. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you not to make a deal with a demon?”
“Actually,” Xander interrupted.
Nearly everyone save Rosh and Volera shouted in unison, “Shut up!”
Xander fell silent.
“So let’s have it. How you going to outdo the last gift?”
Volera stroked her fingers across his cheek and then looked back at the purple flames behind her. She sighed and closed her eyes, then knelt down before Rosh. “I have no soul,” she whispered, even though everyone in the room could hear her. “I thought that once I was rid of Willa’s soul I would be free of this realm. Free of you. Free of what I’ve learned and what you’ve instilled in me. I was wrong, it’s still there. But without a soul I can’t survive on this realm long without a Master to give me what I crave. Rosh, will you be my Master?”
Dexter coughed, choking on his own spit at hearing Volera’s gift. Jenna slapped him in the stomach to silence him, driving what little air he had left out of him.
“This like before?”
“No,” she said. “Similar, but now all my questions have been answered and I know what I want. I know what I need, if you need me as well.”
“All right.”
“All right?” She sounded incredulous.
“All right?” Bekka shouted at him. “Rosh, you’ve won the heart of one o
f the most desired, loathed, and ruthless beings in all creation. You don’t just say, ‘all right’!”
Rosh blushed. “Um, okay. Yeah, I’ll take you. Uh, I mean, I’ll be your Master.”
Before his eyes Volera’s wings drooped and fell off, disintegrating into smoke before they came to rest on the ground. Her horns fell away and even her tail, which Rosh still found strangely appealing, disappeared. Her armor was gone, leaving her skin, now a deeply tanned shade instead of red, on display. “You’re still a bumbling oaf,” she said, rising to her feet and embracing the embarrassed man.
“Just don’t run around calling me Master and Lord and Sire and all that nonsense,” Rosh said after he’d sealed the deal with a kiss that raised the heat level in the room a few degrees.
“Hey, the flames are gone!” Bailynn pointed out.
They all looked and even the blood red circle that had been visible from within the obsidian was gone. “I am yours,” Volera breathed, clinging to Rosh. “Master.”
“Bah!”
###
Afterward by the Author
Thank you very much for reading Voidhawk – Lost Soul. Once I’d finished The White Lady I knew I had to get the crew back together again, but the question that plagued me was how? I’d set the stage, but what could motivate Dexter, Jenna and the others? The answer was right in front of me – literally. It was one of my children. Children have a powerful way of motivating people, especially when their safety is involved. My apologies to Jianna, I never intended to use her as a plot device but she did an excellent job of it!
In the interest of protecting the innocent, no harm was done to Jianna during her time spent out of body. I have plans for her down the road – good plans, not the kind where I torture the character in the hopes of seeing what interesting things happen.
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