by Kayla Krantz
Shawn tilted his head to the side, trying to gauge Jack’s thoughts. He didn’t look warped in the same wonder that had overtaken Shawn. He stared straight ahead, face tight with determination. Once again, Shawn found himself wanting to ask Jack what had happened in the other dungeon, but the look told him everything he wanted to know. Whatever had happened had changed Jack. This wasn’t his goofball, fun-loving, smart-mouthed friend. This was a warrior, a warrior who had seen and survived combat.
A solider who was ready for the war to be over.
Jack started to walk ahead, down a path that led them past a fountain and one of many of the topiary gardens. Shawn found himself pausing every few feet or so to take in the scenery. Only once he realized how much Jack had progressed without him did he start moving again. A deep feeling of despair settled in Shawn’s stomach with Rhys’ warning playing in the back of his head again. If he wasn’t careful, he’d end up like Milo.
If he wasn’t careful, Jack would be alone.
Jack must’ve sensed it on some level. Whatever had happened with Asmodeus, Jack had faced alone. He was prepared...more so than Shawn at least. Jack kept his head high as he reached the ornate set of double doors that marked the entrance of the mansion. As Shawn jogged to catch up, he expected Jack to pause, to turn back and wait for him. Instead, Jack pushed through the doors with so much ferocity that they clanged against the wall inside like he’d been hoping to break them right off their hinges.
Shawn swallowed uncomfortably, following his friend inside as he at last came to a halt. A long hallway led deep into the mansion, a plush red carpet running down the center. Art lined the walls, broken only by spaces conserved by statues.
Shawn was about to say something on the topic when the sound of whispers drew his attention. He and Jack exchanged a glance before Jack grabbed his arm, pulling him against the nearest wall. He pressed himself as close as he could go, muttering a string of curses under his breath.
Shawn raised an eyebrow, unsure if he should question the reaction or not.
Jack looked at him from the corner of his eye. “I’m just gonna say there was whispering in the last dungeon, and it didn’t end well.”
On instinct, Shawn reached up, feeling the twin holes in the side of his neck, and shivered, curiosity diminished. “What should we do?”
“Investigate, of course,” Jack said, “but we need to be subtle about it. I don’t want to be seen before we see what we’re up against.”
Shawn allowed Jack to take the lead. They crept cautiously down the hall, neither of their footsteps making any sound. The hall split into several directions, one of them into a room. Jack peered into it first, eyes scanning from one end of the room to the other before he waved Shawn over to do the same. Shawn crouched beside his friend, studying the creatures inside. They looked to be...humans. They were dressed in suits and fancy dresses, some of them carrying champagne flutes while others held cigarettes.
“What do you make of this?” Jack whispered.
Be careful or that could be where you fall, Rhys’ warning played in his head again, and Shawn’s lip quivered. “I...it makes sense. Humans are prideful creatures. A lot of them sell their souls for riches and wealth.”
“It does, but this is just...”
“Jarring,” Shawn finished.
“Exactly.”
Shawn’s eyes continued to roam the room, and that was when he noticed something out of place—along the farthest wall appeared to be a line of bassinets with babies inside them. Shawn’s eyebrows raised as he and Jack made eye contact.
“You see that, right?” Shawn asked, gesturing to the wall.
Jack bobbed his head. “I don’t think whatever this is has to do with the adults.”
“Yeah, but how can babies be prideful?”
“They can’t be, but I guess people can be prideful about having one?” Shawn scrunched his face, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose more out of habit than actual usefulness. The cracks in both lenses made them nearly impossible to see through, but he wasn’t ready to toss them away. They brought him comfort.
“Time to find out,” Jack said and straightened himself out. He did one more scan of the room, and then without warning, walked into it.
Shawn blinked, scrambling to reach out, to grab his friend. “What are you doing?”
“We’re not going to get any answers just standing here.” Jack pulled himself free and continued on his journey.
Shawn stayed in his hiding spot with the dilemma of running to his friend’s side or standing back to create a plan just in case things went wrong. In the back of his mind, he was reminded of Beelzebub’s dungeon, the monsters that watched them from every table but didn’t attack until they were commanded to do so. Just like those creatures, none of these humans seemed to pay Jack any attention. They glanced to him in passing, but for the most part, he was left alone.
Then Shawn had another thought, one more unsettling. Could they be on another plane of existence, one parallel to the one they knew on Earth? Were these people not acknowledging Jack because they couldn’t see him? Feeling slightly better at the thought, Shawn took one step forward, ready to join his friend, when the feeling in the room changed.
As Jack approached the bassinets, every set of eyes in the room went to him. Shawn shrunk back into the shadows as one of the people dropped their champagne flute, the crash loud in the silence. Taking in a deep breath, Jack peered into the bassinet beside him before he stumbled backward, eyes huge as if he’d seen a ghost.
Desperate to see what had spooked his friend, Shawn rushed from safety, doing the same as Jack as soon as he caught sight of the creature inside the bassinet. Before he could say a word, the room erupted into the sounds of snarling and angry bickering. The people formed a circle around them, more champagne flutes crashing to the floor to add broken bits of glass to the chaos.
Shawn and Jack didn’t wait to see what they would do. They squeezed their way through the group and bolted down the hall, the sound of a dozen footsteps behind them. Shawn wasn’t sure why these people were angry or what they would do to Shawn and Jack if they caught up.
All he knew was that their eyes spoke of murder.
28.
IT DIDN’T TAKE long for Shawn and Jack to lose the crowd. Hunched over to catch his breath, Shawn pushed the glasses back up the bridge of his nose and asked, “What was wrong with the babies?”
Jack swallowed, peering around the corner as if he thought he would catch glimpse of the mob still chasing after them. “I don’t know, but they weren’t human.”
“My thoughts too,” Shawn said and shivered. In his head, he could still see the image of the tiny gray body, the sharp teeth, and the ugly matted hair.
“They were changelings,” Jack said.
“What?”
“Ever hear of the fae?”
Shawn shook his head.
“Like fairies. Legend goes they swap their children for beautiful human babies. Supposedly, human upbringings are better for fairy children than what they could provide.”
“What happens with the humans who are switched out?”
“I don’t know,” Jack said. “I want to believe they’re adopted into the fairy family, but that seems like too much of a happy ending for this story, doesn’t it?”
“It does,” Shawn agreed. In his opinion, if the ending wasn’t wrought in tragedy, was it really the end? “I wonder why the humans can’t see what their babies are.”
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s just willful ignorance, or maybe they really can’t see the truth.”
Shawn shivered. If this was information that applied to humans outside of Rhys’ game, how many “humans” were actually changelings trapped forever in a world they were never meant to set foot in?
“Whatever the case, it’s pretty clear they’re an important part of this dungeon. How do you think they tie in?”
Jack shrugged. “Maybe they don’t. So far with every dungeon there’
s been some kind of decoy mid-way through to keep us from the demon we’re supposed to face. Maybe this is just like that. I mean the mob gave up on us pretty quickly which hopefully means the first part of this place is already complete.”
Shawn wanted to believe the same, but it seemed too easy. “That’s not really the way our luck works though.”
“I know,” Jack said with a sigh.
“Maybe we should keep exploring, and see what else we can find,” Shawn suggested. “In a place this big, there’s no telling how many secrets are here. Maybe we need to find the actual babies.”
A tiny chuckle fell from Jack’s lips. “If that means we end up in fae territory, then we’re in real danger.”
“That would be different from this entire fiasco how?”
“Good point.”
Jack peered around the bend again, making one last check. They were in the clear. Shawn strained his ears, trying to pick up the sounds of anything up ahead, but his and Jack’s footsteps were all he could hear.
“It’s too quiet,” Jack said, glancing over his shoulder. “I feel like something is about to jump out at us.”
As if Rhys wanted to appease Jack’s fears, the sounds of approaching footsteps echoed with their own. Jack and Shawn froze, looking to one another. Without words they made the decision to stand their ground, to face whoever it was. As they watched, a man with short black hair, piercing blue eyes just like Jack, and a fancy blue suit turned the corner. When he walked, his chin was high and his back straight. He stopped at the sight of the two boys. Shawn shivered when the icy eyes landed on him, but Jack seemed to have no reaction. The man looked neither surprised nor angry. He simply regarded them as one would a door to door solicitor.
“Who are you?” the man asked at last.
“We mean no harm, we’re just passing through,” Jack said.
The man smiled and pulled on his lapels, straightening the fabric around his neck. “That wasn’t what I asked.”
To Shawn, they had nothing left to lose by telling the truth so he decided to do just that. “I’m Shawn, and this is my friend, Jack. It’s a...long story as to how we got here. The why is something else entirely.”
The man bobbed his head as he looked from Jack to Shawn. “Fitting names, fitting names. I am sorry if this seems crass, but what is it you are doing in my home?”
His home, Shawn thought and knew then that this was Lucifer. Everything about his body language and attitude made sense. He didn’t feel the need to turn into an ugly snarling beast to fight them because his biggest sin was pride. He was confident that he could win as just a man.
“It’s Lucifer,” Shawn said to Jack, much louder than he meant to.
The man smiled at Shawn as if he were pleased he connected the dots so quickly. “That is correct. If I can make my guess, you were sent here by someone. Someone you thought you knew.”
“Yeah. His name is Rhys,” Jack said.
“You seem like nice boys,” Lucifer said, unbuttoning the sleeve on his wrist to fold the fabric back to his elbow. “But I assure you he is not Rhys. He goes by many names, but perhaps the one you would be the most familiar with is Moloch.”
Shawn cringed, remembering his earlier suspicions. The conversation that Rhys had cut short. “I-is he the devil? Like the one that people sell their souls to?”
Lucifer tipped his head. “That would be more my domain. No. Moloch is a demon of wrath and anger.”
“Definitely sounds like our Rhys,” Jack muttered, staring up at the ceiling.
Shawn expected him to chirp in at any time, to tell them they were wrong, but he didn’t.
“I suppose this means we’ve got to battle,” Lucifer said, working on rolling up his other sleeve.
Shawn was taken aback. He had become so certain that this dungeon would involve the changelings that the thought of battling this demon who looked more human than monster threw him. “Why?” he asked. If Lucifer understood the path they were on, understood all that Rhys was doing, surely there could be a way to talk their way out of this.
“It’s just the way that things must be. This is a realm that normal humans, humans such as yourselves, should’ve never gained access to. Now that you’re here, you have to pay the price.”
“Is that what happened with the babies? You offered them up to the fae?” Jack demanded.
Lucifer waved a dismissive hand. “Don’t worry about them. Their debts, or more importantly, their parents’ debts have been paid. Everything is as it should be. Except you two. The longer you are here, the more the balance will be thrown off.”
“But the real babies could be in danger,” Shawn said. Surely even demons could have sympathy for babies deep down? Shawn thought of an ancient picture he had seen of Lilith, one with the demon devouring babies whole and shivered. Demons were demons because no deed, regardless of how awful, was awful to them.
Lucifer smiled, showing off his perfect teeth. “I assure you they’re not. Those humans out there? All you know is how vain they are for selling their souls. What you don’t know is that selfishness made them terrible parents. A lot of them didn’t just sell themselves for luxury. They offered up the lives of their firstborn children as well.”
Shawn felt his mouth hanging open though really, he wasn’t sure why he was surprised. If his biological mother and father showed up among the doomed people, he wouldn’t have batted an eye. Regardless, he still found himself asking, “And they don’t care that those things have taken their place?”
Lucifer shrugged. “They knew what they were signing up for when they made their deals. Wealth is more important to them than life.”
“Pride really is a demon,” Jack muttered, side-eyeing Shawn.
“So you see, the humans here are evil of their own accord. Sure, they don’t look like the monsters you’ve encountered so far, but they are of the same vein. They are my legion, my followers. That is why, my dear boys, you must fight me. Unless you would rather become them.”
Lucifer peeled his gloves off and tossed them to the floor. He clapped once, the sound echoing up and down the corridor. Shawn didn’t know why he winced, but part of him expected all the people from the lobby to come looking for them again, changeling babies and all. Only one man appeared. He was dressed in a suit, hands held together behind his back.
“Yes, sir?” he asked, bowing respectfully as he reached the group.
“My swords please,” Lucifer told the man.
He vanished with a snap of his fingers. Lucifer gave Shawn and Jack a pleasant smile each. There was nothing menacing about it, but it sent a chill down Shawn’s spine just the same. Even though this creature looked human, he had to remind himself that he wasn’t. It was a demon, just the same as Rhys. That had him wondering all over again just how many humans were really something else. He was sure that the world was filled with people just like the ones in the parlor.
A wave of sadness breezed through him, and he didn’t even try to fight it back. One of the biggest demons was humanity itself. If I get out of here, I’m never gonna trust people again, he thought.
Jack gave him a sideways look as if he were trying to guess what Shawn was thinking. For his sake, Shawn hoped that he wouldn’t be able to. There was no point destroying Jack’s faith in humanity too.
If he still had any.
The butler’s return broke Shawn out of his thoughts. He appeared from thin air, chin held high in an aura of elegance as he approached. A silver sword was held in each hand, polished so well that they shone in the light. Shawn had watched fencing tournaments on television before and knew this wasn’t right.
“These aren’t lances,” he said.
Lucifer smiled, a wide patronizing smile, as he took the weapons in each hand. “My dungeon, my rules.” Then to the butler, “Thank you, that will be all.”
The butler bowed and vanished with the snap of his fingers.
Shawn stared at the spot of air. In the back of his mind, he thought of all Lucifer h
ad told him about the humans, and he had to wonder: had the butler also sold his soul to be here? Or was his a different kind of quest? The thought made him think of Milo again, and the urge to cry for his lost friend wasn’t far behind.
When Lucifer locked his eyes with Shawn, it was easier to make the tears freeze. They had to beat him. They had to win this for Milo.
29.
LUCIFER’S VOICE WAS a silky purr as he said, “Who will do me the honors of going first?”
The boys exchanged another uncertain glance. As far as boss battles went, this seemed to be the most civilized. The swords made Shawn uneasy though. On the surface, this looked civilized, but there were plenty of other forces at work here. Thinking of the fae babies and soulless humans again made him cringe. If Lucifer could control his butler with a mere snap of his fingers, there was no telling what else he could get to come running.
When neither Shawn nor Jack answered, Lucifer turned his attention to Jack and smiled. “I guess it’ll be my choice then. You’re up, big boy.”
He tossed the sword, and Jack caught it easily. He bent under the weight before tipping his head back to study it like Shawn had done. It wasn’t common for Jack to look uncertain of anything, but right then and there, he didn’t look big. He looked small, as if he were shrinking in on himself at the prospect of the upcoming challenge.
Uneasily, Jack said, “Okay.”
Shawn took a few steps backward until his back pressed against the wall. The contact of the cool surface made it easier for him to center himself. To think. If they really wanted to get out of this dungeon, they could do it much easier than this, Shawn was sure. They could tag team Lucifer and be on their way. Lucifer smiled and that made Shawn sure that he knew exactly what Shawn was thinking. Lucifer might look weaker than all the other demons and monsters they’d faced, but he was the second strongest. The only one before Rhys himself.
Shawn’s shoulders drooped as all thoughts of a backup plan left his mind. So far, trying to think ahead had only gotten them in worse situations. For just this once, he would ride it out and see what would happen. Pushing his glasses back up his nose, he watched Lucifer turn to walk to the end of the corridor, Jack doing the same in the opposite direction.
