Succubus Lord 9

by Eric Vall

  “And I could turn into a roadrunner or a coyote or something that would blend in,” Aruna offered.

  “I’m not going to risk it, period,” I reiterated. “Not when my parents’ lives are at stake.”

  “Jacob … ” Superbia sighed and placed her hand against my chest. “You have grown far more powerful than any of us could have ever imagined. You’re a king now, with a whole harem of powerful succubi and an army of friends and allies who would lay down their lives for you. But I’m not talking to you as any of the above. As your friend, your madame, your lover … you can’t take Beelzebub in a one-on-one battle. If you go alone, you will die.”

  “I have no choice,” I explained. “I got my parents into this mess, and I’m going to get them out of it. Even if it means I have to trade my life for theirs.”

  My friends tried to protest some more, but I was already on my way to the garage. I held out my hand, summoned silver Hellfire into it, and called a set of keys to me. I heard a few more desperate pleas as I entered the garage, but I ignored them.

  My parents were in danger, and I wasn’t going to do anything that could possibly risk their lives.

  I clicked the unlock button on the fob as I approached Stella, our bright red Maserati GT, and she chirped in response. I tossed open the door, plopped down into the low seat, and cranked the engine to life.

  My phone dinged as a new message notification appeared, and I opened it up to see a set of coordinates. Then, as I was punching the numbers into the dashboard-mounted GPS of the car, it went off again.

  I glanced down at my phone and instantly felt white-hot rage boil in the pit of my stomach.

  It was a selfie of Beelzebub standing next to my dad. My father looked absolutely terrified, his eyes wide with fear and his lip trembling as sweat poured down his face. The King of the Eighth Circle had one of his bony claws extended against Dad’s face as if he were caressing him on the cheek.

  When I found this fucker, he was going to pay. I was going to snap his lanky ass like a fucking twig and hang him with his own goddamn intestines. Then maybe Todd and I’d play soccer with his severed head.

  Jesus. Maybe Beelzebub was right. Where were all these brutal thoughts coming from? Was I really destined to be the brutish leader that the Fourth Circle was used to having?

  My thoughts were interrupted by Libidine pounding on the window.

  I rolled it down and gave the succubus a piercing glare.

  “I said I’m going alone,” I reiterated. “I’m not going to change my mind.”

  “I know you won’t, my love,” Liby said sadly. “You’re much too headstrong for that. I just didn’t want you to leave without saying goodbye.”

  The dark-haired succubus leaned her torso against the door of the vehicle, and her massive breasts pushed up into a huge line of cleavage. Her violet eyes stared at me as she grabbed me by the shirt, yanked me in close, and pressed her tender lips against mine. We kissed passionately for a solid minute before Liby pulled away.

  “Just for luck,” the Sister of Lust said as she pulled away and shot me a wink.

  “I’ll be back,” I promised. “I can’t die yet. I haven’t even got to see how Todd’s love story with the redheaded waitress works out.”

  “Oh,” Liby giggled. “You certainly can’t miss that. It’ll be the inspiration for an Oscar-winning film some day.”

  I gave the succubus one final nod as I clicked the garage door opener, and then I put Stella in reverse and backed out into the driveway. I whipped back into a small plot in the front yard, turned around, and headed for the main road.

  I had to drive through the suburbs for a few minutes, but once I was out on the open road, I kicked the car into the highest gear and floored the gas. There was the squeal of tires against the asphalt as I gunned it and shot off down the highway like a bat outta Hell.

  The coordinates Beelzebub gave me were way out in the middle of nowhere, somewhere off the beaten path in the desert. It was definitely a trap, but I had no choice. I was completely on my own, but I was almost certain Beelzebub wasn’t going to be.

  As I cranked up the tunes of the rock song on the radio, I tried to push my feelings of doom and gloom to the back of my head. I was currently sitting in a super-sexy red sports car, I was King of an entire Circle of Hell, and I’d just made out with an amazingly hot succubus that thought the world of me.

  Even if this somehow was my last day alive, I’d say I had a pretty damn good life.

  I drove out for about another hour, with nothing around me but the desert, the setting sun, and the kickass jams of Metallica. Finally, the GPS dinged.

  “Turn right, brother!” the voice of Hulk Hogan growled from the dashboard.

  Todd had made the command decision to change all of our vehicles’ GPS navigation voices to famous pro wrestlers. As annoying as it could be sometimes, I had to admit it made me chuckle every now and then.

  And I definitely needed a humorous moment right now.

  I slammed on the brakes and whipped the car around so it was facing in the right direction.

  There was only one problem. Stella may have been the fastest car that we owned, but it wasn’t exactly built for offroading. In fact, it was built for the exact opposite. There was nothing between me and my destination but open desert, and I would never make it there on time if I went by foot.

  I was gonna have to improvise.

  It didn’t take very much effort to conjure up the feelings needed for a protective spell. I cast a large strip of purple Hellfire as far as I possibly could, just inches above the sandy landscape before me. Then I kicked Stella back into gear, slammed down on the gas pedal, and sped off into the night.

  I continued into the desert for about twenty more minutes, making sure to cast new strips of enchanted road as I drove.

  Then I saw them.

  My parents were both tied by their hands to a large metal pole that had been leaned up against a large rock formation. Right next to them stood Beelzebub, who almost looked bored as he sat back against the structure and zoned off into space. Of course, when he saw me approaching, he sprung to his feet.

  I slowed down to a crawl, decast my protective spell, and stepped out of the car. I was still wearing my full suit of body armor, and I had the Unhallowed Sword strapped to my waist alongside the Divine Desert Eagle and a few small incendiary grenades.

  As I walked toward Beelzebub’s position, I summoned purple flame into my hands, cast it over my body, and created a suit of glowing Hellfire armor. At the same time, a dull throbbing started in my temples, and the dusky air around me lit up with blue light.

  Those would be my horns.

  I wasn’t going to fuck around with the King of the Eighth Circle, and I wanted him to know that.

  “There’s the man of the hour!” Beelzebub exclaimed happily as he saw me approach. “And he actually listened to me and came alone! Doesn’t that make you happy, Maria?”

  “Don’t fucking talk to her!” I growled and blasted a shot of red Hellfire at the Demon King.

  Beelzebub threw his large black wing in front of the attack, and it bounced off harmlessly.

  “He’s definitely got your temper, doesn’t he, Jeff?” he cackled and patted my father on the head. “Do you know how many different profane names he’s called me in the last few hours?”

  “Not enough, you sonofabitch!” my dad shot back.

  “Let them go, Beelzebub,” I demanded. “This is between you and me.”

  “Of course it is,” the King of the Eighth Circle said through a devilish grin. “It’s always been about the two of us. Two Demon Kings who want the same thing.”

  “What is he talking about, Jacob?” my mother asked with fear in her voice.

  “I’ll explain later, Mom,” I promised, but I didn’t take my eyes off the demon in front of me. “We don’t want the same thing, Beelzebub. I just want to be left the fuck alone with my friends.”

  “Is that what you really want, tho
ugh?” the King of the Eighth Circle questioned. “If that was the case, you would have stopped when you were ahead. You had everything you could have possibly ever wanted. You had the Divine on your side … multiple succubi at your beck and call … multiple successful business and a huge mansion any mortal would kill for. Yet, here you are, sticking your nose in places it doesn’t belong.”

  “You’re trying to overthrow the entire order of the universe,” I growled as I came to a halt about one-hundred feet away from my enemy. “I can’t just sit around and do nothing while you’re putting innocent peoples’ lives in danger.”

  “And that, my friend,” Beelzebub cackled, “is why you’ll never truly be accepted as a Demon King by the other Kings of Hell. You’ve got far too much good in you. That’s why you can’t stop running back to the Divine pigs, right? Because you want to ‘do good’ in the universe?”

  “That’s right,” I assured him. “As stuck-up and annoying as they can be sometimes, at least they’re on the right side.”

  “Right side?” the Lord of the Flies scoffed and slapped my dad on the shoulder. “Get a load of your son, will ya? He still thinks there’s a ‘right side’ in this war.”

  Beelzebub pulled away from my parents and began to pace around in the sand with his bony hands behind his back.

  “You see, Jacob,” he explained, “there is no right side in the eternal war for the fate of the universe. Uriel understood that, and I know deep down you do, too.”

  “Call me old fashioned,” I snarked back, “but I think that literal demons from the pits of Hell are pretty clearly the ‘bad guys’ in this situation.”

  “Then why do you ally yourself with so many of them?” Beelzebub shot back. “Some of your closest friends are succubi, imps, Demon Lords, and the Souls of Sinners who were damned to eternal Hellfire. If you truly thought they were evil, you wouldn’t be working with them.”

  “They might have demonic origins, but they’re not evil,” I growled. “You, on the other hand--”

  “Am what?” Beelzebub laughed. “Insane? A heretic? A radical?”

  “You’re a fucking abomination to the universe,” I shot back, “that’s what you are.”

  “Oh, that’s rich,” he said as his eyes narrowed. “Especially coming from you. Do you even really know what you are?”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” I demanded.

  Beelzebub recoiled in surprise, and then an evil grin of realization crept up his face.

  “They haven’t told you?” he asked rhetorically as he pointed to my parents. “None of the Divine have told you, either? Azazel didn’t even rub it in your face as he was dying?”

  “Spit it out, asshole,” I growled. “What, you think you can insult me by calling me a mortal? How fucking original.”

  “But you’re not a mortal, Jacob.” Beelzebub smiled and crossed his arms over his chest. “You never have been. Isn’t that right, Mr. and Mrs. Ralston?”

  The Demon King looked over at my parents, who remained deathly silent. They were both staring down at the ground with shame on their faces, and they looked like they were frozen in place.

  “M-mom? Dad?” I stuttered. “What’s he talking about?”

  “Jacob … ” my mom muttered. “I’m sorry. We should have told you sooner.”

  “Dad, what’s he talking about?” I asked again, this time more forcefully.

  “Oh, you should probably stop calling him ‘Dad,’” Beelzebub suggested. “Isn’t that right, Jeff?”

  “Liar!” I growled. “I’ve had about enough of your bullshit, Beelzebub. Stop trying to get into my head and face me like a man.”

  The Lord of the Flies laughed as he spread out his massive bat wings and summoned his trusty bow into his hand with a snap of his fingers.

  “As you wish, Nephilim,” he said with a tone that oozed venom.

  Even though my adrenaline was pumping and I was ready to kill this bastard, his words echoed in my head.

  He was lying. He had to be lying.

  Everyone made it a huge point to call me “mortal.” There was no way I was a fucking Nephilim. And how the fuck would that even happen? My parents were super-strict Christians, through and through.

  The next thing I knew, a flaming red arrow struck me right in the chest and sent me tumbling through the sand. I came to a halt, spat out a mouthful of sand, and pulled myself to my feet.

  Son of a bitch, I hadn’t even seen that coming. He really had gotten inside my head.

  “Jacob!” Dad gasped. “Are you alright?”

  “I’ll be fine,” I promised. “Believe it or not, I’ve taken much harder blows than that.”

  Before I could continue, Beelzebub fired another enchanted arrow at my head. This time, I was able to toss up a shield of purple Hellfire just in time, but the impact was massive. My feet slid back into the sandy ground, but my barrier held.

  If I wanted any sort of shot at Beelzebub, I was gonna have to get in close. His bow and arrow was a weapon tailored to keep his opponents far away, and the near-impenetrable hide of his wings made it so my Hellfire was no good.

  However, Beelzebub wasn’t a brawler. If I could get close enough to the fucker, maybe I could take a shot at him.

  And with the Unhallowed Sword, all I’d need is one good strike.

  I decast my protective spell and took off as I tried to flank Beelzebub to the left.

  He took aim with his bow once more, and I felt a blast of intense heat and the spray of sand as his arrow just narrowly missed me. The Lord of the Flies let out a growl of frustration as he aimed once more, but this time I was ready.

  The second Beelzebub let go of his arrow, I threw up a portal of green Hellfire in front of its trajectory. The flaming arrow reappeared directly behind the King of the Eighth Circle, struck him between the shoulderblades, and caused him to stumble forward.

  Now was my chance. I summoned my bronze Hellfire of judgement into my hands and blasted it down at my opponent’s feet.

  The Earth shook beneath Beelzebub and caused him to fully lose his balance and fall to his knees.

  I used this brief distraction to close the gap on the fucker. I unsheathed the Unhallowed Sword as I ran, raised it above my head, and prepared to crush Beelzebub’s noggin like a watermelon.

  Unfortunately, the Lord of the Flies was onto me.

  He threw out his razor-sharp wings as far as they could go and began to spin around rapidly. The Demon King created a deadly funnel cloud of sand and spikes, and I was headed right toward it.

  I tried to halt my momentum, but I was coming in too hot. The next thing I knew, one of Beelzebub’s wings struck me in my chest, and sparks flew from my armor as I stumbled backward. Something felt warm and wet underneath my armor, and I glanced down to see a massive slice on the breastplate with dark red blood oozing out beneath it.

  Thank god I had this enchanted armor, or those fucking things would have cut me in half.

  Beelzebub rose up into the air, still under the cover of his miniature sandstorm.

  I tried to hit him with a blast of yellow shuriken, but they instantly scattered into the wind when they hit the funnel.

  A flaming red arrow shot from inside the storm, and I quickly rolled to the side to keep myself from being skewered.

  This fucker knew my armor was damaged.

  I was sure he was going to take every opportunity to attack this weak point, so I couldn’t let him have even one chance. I ducked out of the way of another arrow as I tried to figure out how to get him exposed again.

  Then it hit me. Maybe I could trap him in his own deadly spell.

  I quickly threw up four walls of purple Hellfire, one on each side of the funnel cloud. Then I slowly began to close the walls around Beelzebub.

  “Very clever, King Ralston,” the Demon King’s voice sneered. “But not quite clever enough.”

  As soon as the purple barriers hit Beelzebub’s wings, they were torn to shreds. The King of the Eighth circle sudd
enly popped out of his funnel and unleashed another arrow down onto me.

  This time, I wasn’t ready. I tried to hop to the side, but the projectile struck me in the left shoulder, spun me around, and caused me to fall to the ground. My shoulder felt like it was on fire, but I didn’t have time to dwell on the pain.

  Beelzebub came down onto my position with his wings aimed at my neck, and I just barely rolled out of the way in time.

  I hopped up to my feet, gripped the Unhallowed Sword, and brought it upward in a slashing motion. My blade connected with Beelzebub’s right wing, and the fucker let out a hiss of pain as I put a foot-long gash in his hide. I instantly cast a portal of green Hellfire beneath my feet and fell down into it, just as Beelzebub took a swing at my head.

  I reappeared a few feet in front of the Demon King’s exposed body, and I unloaded the strongest blast of Divine Light I could muster.

  Beelzebub let out a grunt as he was tossed backward. As he tumbled, he closed his wings around his body so he was curled up like a ball. Once he was about fifty feet away, he popped them open and took to the sky.

  Without warning, another arrow careened toward my position.

  I leapt out of the way as a spray of sand shot into the air, and then I tried to regroup.

  Now, I knew my blade could cut through his wings. The problem was, I couldn’t get close enough to him to make it count. As soon as I got within a few feet of the fucker, he either shot me with an arrow or spun around like the tasmanian devil.

  If I wanted to even the odds, I had to take away his agility.

  I really wished Eligor was here. She could have used her elemental magic to summon tendrils or something that would hold him in place. The only thing I had even close to that skill set was my silver Hellfire, but where was I going to find enough metal to make a restraint?

  Then it hit me.

  The car.

  I dodged away from another one of Beelzebub’s projectiles and took off in a full sprint toward Stella. As I ran, I summoned silver flames into my hands, cast them around the sedan’s two doors, and then turned them into liquid metal. Then I spun around and commanded the silvery substance to encase the demon in its embrace.