Gia pulled a book from the nearest shelf. That’s not my mystery to solve. Her only objective was to find a way out of here.
Determination fueled her as she hunted through Mammon’s texts. The demon had devoted most of his time and resources to getting the hell out of hell. In the end, he’d succeeded in the traditional manner—cultivating acolytes on the other side by letting them curry favor with him. He’d granted favors in exchange for flattery until they screwed up, accidentally releasing him.
Not being a demon, that path was closed to her. No matter what mediums told people, there was no way to summon a ghost from the underworld.
However, that wasn’t the only way demons crossed over. Soft spots between the two dimensions were another option—if she only knew where any were. But Mammon would have known, or at least that was what she kept telling herself. He’d been too thirsty to get out of here not to explore every option.
She hit pay dirt a few hours later. Secreted between the pages of an obscure demonology text, she found a map. It showed the topography of the entire continent, with little X’s marked on it. As maps went, it was an unprepossessing document were it not for one thing. One of the X’s had been annotated recently with the words ‘unknown witch’ and a date—one she was familiar with. Mammon had marked the spot where he’d landed after she’d banished him back to Sheol.
X marks the spot… She’d sealed that opening well enough to know it wasn’t the way back home, but what about the others? They couldn’t all be the work of Elementals. Some had been done by witches, which meant there was hope for her. Not much—but a glimmer.
While there were some very skilled practitioners in her world, few could do spell work on par with an Elemental. All I need is one scar. If Gia found a weak point, she might be able to do what Mammon had failed to—open a door to her dimension from Sheol.
Rolling up the map, Gia tucked it into her pocket. She wasn’t going to tell Snagat she was leaving. There was no need to advertise the fact the castle would be unprotected in case she failed. And if she got lucky right away, it wouldn’t matter.
Briefly, guilt flared as she considered the fate of the servants once she left for good. They’ll be all right. Once it was known the castle was without a ruler, it would be taken by another strongman in short order. Judging from Snagat’s example, the servants wouldn’t put up a fight. Their lives wouldn’t change that much…she hoped.
You can’t save everyone. Gia was good, but she wasn’t that good.
She grabbed her new favorite sword and opened a window, dropping to the ground without a sound. Then she struck out for the high ridge in the east, the location of the nearest X on the map.
Gia heard the someone long before she spotted him. The demon had been trailing her for a few minutes now, ducking behind piles of garbage or fallen stone—as if he had a prayer of going unnoticed. He was making enough noise to wake the dead.
Crouching at the top of a shadowed boulder, she studied her pursuer. Trim and built, he had taken the form of a handsome human man in his late twenties.
Gia narrowed her eyes. She had to hand it to him…it. The glamour was nearly flawless. But the fiend had made a telling mistake. He was too attractive.
Most demons, the smarter ones, fashioned glamours that resembled regular people. It helped them blend in and stay off the radar. But someone this beautiful couldn’t keep a low profile. His sheer prettiness forced eyes to him.
The man was shirtless, displaying a well-defined musculature across a tanned and toned chest. His stomach was even more flamboyantly rendered—his abdominal ridges were defined enough to scrub her laundry on.
Amateur. A glamour this elaborate was a waste of energy. Unless… He must be an incubus, the subclass of demons who specialized in seducing human females. It was the only possible justification for such an effort.
Gia sniffed, confident the blundering creature couldn’t hear her. Below, he kept wandering, his head turning this way and that, as if he were searching for something. Every few steps, he would glance over his shoulder, going motionless as if listening. He appeared totally oblivious to her presence just a few yards away.
Pulling back, Gia counted a beat, then leaped, using the power in her legs to propel her forward onto the incubus’ head.
The whistle of her sword cutting the air must have given her away. The demon snapped his head up, noticing her a split second before she jumped. He reared back, falling with a strangled yell.
“Argh—”
The noise cut short when he hit the ground, pushing the air out of his lungs. Not missing a beat, Gia rolled to the side in a single fluid movement, raising her sword for the killing stroke.
“Hey, wait!” The incubus put his hands up, pushing with his legs at the same time. Panic etched his features. “I was sent here by your sisters! Look.”
He wasn’t pointing at anything, but she saw what he wanted her to. The woven leather and handmade brass plate and small rings were unmistakable.
Baring her teeth, she lowered onto her haunches. Gia kept her sword pointed at his neck. A red rage misted her vision. “Where did you get that?” she hissed.
9
Salvador gulped, wincing and twisting away when the small movement made his Adam’s apple graze the tip of the blade of the large sword Gia held.
He didn’t know how that was possible on the astral plane, but this hellhole didn’t work like any place he’d ever heard about.
“I, uh, I got the necklace from Logan—well, Serin and Logan.”
The blade pulled back, but only by a centimeter. Gia stared down, her dark brown eyes boring into him as if she were staring directly into his soul.
“I was s-sent here to find you,” he stammered.
Gia didn’t respond, continuing to stand over him like the Archangel Michael, weighing his worth. Only she was fiercer and more beautiful than any angel Salvador had ever seen in a painting.
“Damn,” he muttered aloud, immediately regretting it when Gia raised the sword higher, scowling.
“Sorry,” he rasped, moving his head away from the blade. “I’m just irritated with Alec.”
The vampire could have warned Salvador the Earth Elemental was stunning.
Yes, Salvador knew she was attractive. He’d been caring for the woman for almost a week. Even covered in those root-like threads, that fact had been obvious. But he was a professional healer. He’d done what he always did whenever a comely female came under his care—he compartmentalized. They weren’t women or men, simply patients. He focused on their ailments and treatment to the exclusion of all else. Anything else receded into the background.
But the woman in front of him couldn’t be ignored or put into a mental box marked ‘untouchable’.
The symmetry and striking architecture of Gia’s face and figure was just the start. Salvador was sensitive enough to feel what was beneath. The surface beauty was nothing compared to the quiet power he felt radiating from her.
He remembered what Alec had said about the Elementals—that primitive cultures had worshiped them as gods. Salvador had scoffed at the time. He had been born into one of the most powerful witching families on Earth. A few of his ancestors had masqueraded as gods here and there throughout history. But standing next to an Elemental, they would have been exposed for the frauds they were.
Yeah, Alec should have warned him. If he had, Salvador might not be sitting on his ass with what was undoubtedly a stupefied expression.
Gia’s death stare sharpened a fraction. “Why?”
Her tone was flat, but it somehow managed to resonate in his ears, sending a frisson down his spine. “Uh, for not warning me I’d end up here,” he improvised. “Wherever here is…”
Salvador had been taught self-defense from the cradle, but he broke the cardinal rule now—never take your eye off the enemy. But he couldn’t help himself. His gaze darted back and forth over the barren landscape.
There were piles of rubble all around them, making a narr
ow corridor. It had been relatively easy for her to ambush him, but Salvador hadn’t had a choice. He had followed where the necklace had taken him, the copper and other metals warming progressively the closer he got to her.
“You’re in hell.”
“Excuse me?” Salvador blinked, whipping his head around again in disbelief before returning to Gia’s face.
Those fathomless dark eyes took him in for a breathless moment. Ever so slowly, her arm moved to sheath her sword. “I said you’re in hell. One part of it, anyway. This is Sheol, one of the seven known demon dimensions—the one closest to ours.”
He took a deep breath, reaching for the protective charm he wore around his neck. It wasn’t there. He belatedly remembered he had let Serin take it off in case it interfered with her spell. It wouldn’t have worked on the astral plane. It might have worked in hell, though.
“How did I end up here?” he asked. “And why do I feel normal?”
He’d been on the astral plane before, and he knew how it worked. People may look like themselves, but their bodies didn’t have form or substance. It’s one of the reasons only seasoned witches could astral project. Being bodiless was jarring, to put it mildly. Without special training, it could destabilize a practitioner. He’d been prepared for the experience of being a ghost. But in Sheol, he could hear his heart beating.
Gia still watched him with that clinical, assessing expression. “I was going to ask you the same thing. Why are you here?”
Salvador got to his feet. “I, um, I was drafted. Serin and the others failed to astral project.”
The corner of her mouth pulled down. “You’re a witch.”
His heart stuttered in his chest. Stop that. You were prepared for this. There was no way she wouldn’t figure out what he was. He just needed to hide who he was long enough for them to get out of here.
Elementals policed all Supernaturals, but their history with witches—his family in particular—was complicated and bloody. If she found out he was a Delavordo, the fact her sisters had sent him might not matter. She could kill him out of principle.
“I’m a healer,” he volunteered. “I’ve worked with Alec before. Your sisters brought you to me after you were poisoned. Well, technically, you just showed up in my clinic. You came out of the ground like monolith rising…”
Salvador trailed off as his simile went off the rails. “Not that you’re large or anything. You’re obviously quite fit—perfect, in fact.”
Her fine ebony brow raised, and he coughed. “I’ve been treating you—your body that is.”
Gia’s lashes fluttered, betraying a hint of surprise. “I’m not dead?”
His lips parted. “No! Of course not. Although, considering where we are, I don’t blame you for jumping to that conclusion.”
She tilted her head. “Well, it is hell.”
“Yeah,” he breathed, still trying to take it all in. “I’ve been searching for you for I don’t know how long. And I’m not hungry or tired, and I should be. I know I’ve covered miles in this search.”
“None of the usual rules apply here.” Gia gave him a final once over before shrugging, her muscles untensing.
“Most demons don’t have form when they cross over to our world,” she continued. “But the opposite happens to human spirits when they come here. However, I don’t know why we don’t tire or require food. Few people have crossed over to Sheol, then returned to tell the tale.”
Salvador nodded, trying to stay calm. “How do we get back? Also—can we die?”
She gave him one more narrow-eyed perusal before turning on her heel, flicking her finger to indicate he should follow. “I’m working on an escape plan.”
That did not sound promising. “I guess it wouldn’t be hell if it were easy to leave…but the demons manage somehow.”
Gia knelt, picking up a stone and studying it before tossing it aside. “That they do. But their way can’t be replicated. We’ll have to do it the old-fashioned way—by punching a hole through the barrier between our worlds and crossing back.”
The use of the plural untwisted something deep in his gut.
“Does that mean you’re not entertaining the idea of leaving me behind?”
She shrugged. “I can’t very well leave you here. Not if my sisters were the ones who sent you.”
Salvador heaved a silent sigh of relief. As long as you don’t tell her your name, you might actually get out of here. Fortunately, she hadn’t asked for it.
He cleared his throat. “Thank you.”
“So, can you share this plan with me?” he asked, hurrying after her when she turned and began to walk away. Technically, his stride was much longer than hers, but she moved so quickly he had to jog to keep up.
“Sheol is one of the dimensions that intersects ours, but since it’s a hell dimension, the barrier is not the same. It’s thicker on this end, kind of like a gravitational field…”
He frowned. “Sorry. I didn’t pay very close attention in physics class. I don’t follow.”
A flicker of something that could have been annoyance crossed her features, but it was gone before he could be sure. “You know how black holes are so heavy they pull everything inside?”
“Uh-huh.” Salvador stepped around a fallen pile of stones that littered the path. Up ahead, larger boulders clogged the trail. The terrain seemed to be getting rougher. Gia didn’t appear to be having any problems. She lightly hopped over the large stones, a ninja who wasn’t subject to the normal rules of physics.
“Well, it’s a bit like that. Think of Sheol as having heavier gravity than Earth. It distends the barrier, making it thicker on this side.”
Interesting. “I’m guessing that’s not accidental.”
“No. It is by design,” she acknowledged. “Just one of the many ways the Mother protects us.”
“That would normally be comforting, but since we have to get out of here, I’m going to go ahead and freak out now.”
Her eyes flicked to his. “Our best bet is to find a scar, a weak point for me to exploit. There’s one a few clicks from here.”
He brightened. “And you’ll be able to open it?”
“Only if an inept witch closed it. If it was an Elemental, we’re out of luck.”
Any witch capable of banishing a demon and closing such a barrier was, by definition, an elite, but he supposed Elementals had a different yardstick to measure by. “I know I should be insulted, but I just want to go home.”
Gia ignored him, pulling a piece of parchment from her pocket. She consulted what appeared to be a map, then pointed at a nearby ridge. “Can you climb that?”
He scanned the rise. It looked like a high hill, but he could see some recognizable structures in the mess. It wasn’t a natural formation, but he couldn’t make it out at first. He paused, recognizing a few architectural features—a lintel here and a piece of a pillar near the base.
“Yes. Were they all buildings?” he asked.
Gia nodded. “They were. And no—I don’t know what happened here. Our records have nothing on Sheol before it became a wasteland.”
Salvador stopped asking questions after that. He didn’t need to eat, but it was still an effort to climb the steep grade of the hill.
He grabbed hold of a twisted piece of metal to climb around a considerable pile of fallen stones. “I forgot—you never answered my question. Can we die here?”
Gia twisted to glance over her shoulder. “Oh, most definitely.”
The scar was closed too well. Gia insisted that meant an Elemental had sealed the barrier, but Salvador wasn’t convinced that was the case. A highly skilled witch could have done the work, but he wasn’t about to argue. There was little point.
Instead, he accepted Gia’s word without question, and he was almost pathetically grateful when she invited him to accompany her back to her castle.
“You have a castle?” he asked in disbelief.
“It was Mammon’s, the demon prince responsible for me getti
ng sucked here. And now it’s mine,” she said, gesturing as they topped a small rise.
His sense of timing was impeccable. Gia had been leading him back to her castle.
He blinked like an idiot at the imposing multi-turreted fortress. “Exactly how long have you been in Sheol?” he asked, following her along the dirt track that led to the rear of the structure.
“Is it always this…full?” he asked as they crossed a narrow channel that might have been a moat had it contained water instead of bodies.
She didn’t answer until they were inside. “I’ve made a few modifications. Just a few decorative touches.”
He snorted, thinking nothing could surprise him. And then he saw the library.
Salvador wasn’t sure how long he spent gaping at the shelves.
Up until that moment, he’d believed his parents had the most extensive collection of occult texts in the world. They do. On Earth. Salvador kept forgetting this was a different world.
Aimlessly, he perused the shelves, his eyes widening when he saw a copy of Agnodice’s Monograph of Rare Herbs and Poisonous Water Weeds. After that, he was like a kid in a candy store, running back and forth but refraining from touching.
The shelves seemed endless. He spun on his heel to take it all in, biting his lip to keep from comparing himself to Belle in the Beast’s library.
Gia got to work as he browsed. After a few hours—long enough for her to repeatedly decline her servants attempts to prepare a meal for them—he realized she’d never answered his question. “Does time move differently in Sheol? Have you been here longer than I think?”
Gia was quiet so long he wondered if she’d heard him. “I’m not sure how long you believe it’s been,” she murmured after a while, keeping her eyes on the piles of parchment in front of her. “For me, it’s been roughly a week. I was pulled here almost immediately after discorporating.”
The Elementals Collection Page 90
