The Pentagram Child: Part 1 (Afterlife Saga Book 5)

by Stephanie Hudson

  “Yes, yes, Nahu.” I told him to calm down in the only tongue that would be understood by his kind thanks to it being over 5000 years old. They usually stuck to old ways of a long since dead world they no longer knew anything about.

  I let my blades retract into my body and calmed my blood, letting my demon side know it had enjoyed enough fun for today.

  “Ammeni Enki, alka anna annu asru?” ( ‘Why Lord of Earth, come unto this place?’)

  “Sar Sha Hatti.” ( ‘The King of Sin’) He lowered his head in respect and held out an arm for me to precede him through the open doorway. I walked through the stone arch and came to an abrupt stop at the edge of a spiral staircase. It tunnelled so deep it became the epitome of the term ‘bottomless pits in Hell’ and I had neither the time, nor the inclination to descend its many steps. If anything I had just come to the realisation that my actions just now had more likely put those guards out of their misery, if this was what faced them in getting to their post every day.

  What was I thinking? I knew my father never wasted a good soul and those guards were like no other, even if now their bodies were rendered useless. There was always an endless supply ready to take possession of a strong soul needing a purpose and in my father’s kingdom there were always those ready to reward such services. It was the Kingdom of Lust after all.

  “Asar?” I asked him where and he pointed down the centre, off to the right.

  “Elenu dimtu, isten baba ina pilus duru” (‘Upper tower, first gate on tunnel wall’) I took in my directions wondering, in all the times in my life I had been here, if I had ever revisited the same place twice. The castle was easily the size of New York City, which was why I always chose some place high to land. The fight had just been a bonus. Usually my identity was found out a lot quicker and nobody wants to find themselves in a battle with their King’s son. But I hadn’t been back here in a long time, which meant Asmodeus had indeed been recruiting.

  I didn’t reply, nor did I bid the servant any parting words as such things weren’t done in this realm. I simply stepped off the edge and only let my wings unfold when I saw the first gate he spoke of. The air resisted against each feather as I slowed enough to grab a hold of one of the pillars and hoisted myself over the side to the steps. I ruffled my wings until comfortable again before pinning them back out of the way.

  Like most of my kind, our wings were not only an incredibly sensitive part of our bodies but also something we showed with pride. It reflected our important status within the supernatural world. Those who had been punished enough to have their wings removed were normally shunned from our kind and never granted another chance at getting them back. It was one of the reasons I reserved the punishment for those who were foolish enough to really piss me off. Tipping the scales in a way that affects greater numbers, or simply like the day at my warehouses when hunters tried to take Keira from me. Now that thought had me grinding my teeth and cracking my knuckles, desperate for another fight.

  These murderous thoughts were enough to last until I was close enough to feel my father’s presence within the castle. I followed the static air as it became thicker, something that always happened when you put two alpha males with such raw power in the same vicinity as each other.

  I walked into the last room where I knew I would find my father but frowned when I heard the sound of clapping and someone playing the Spanish guitar.

  “Ah the prodigal son returns!” I rolled my eyes at my father’s humour and came to a stop at the sight that met me. Asmodeus lay sprawled out on top of an island of piled furs, cushions and naked bodies all entwined in sexual acts. My mind flashed back to Keira’s family traditions and seriously doubted that this was one sight she would have witnessed upon her homecomings.

  “Abum,” I replied using the old word for father knowing how it irritated him so.

  “Now, now my Maru, is that anyway to greet your old man?” He asked throwing back the word for son in the same way.

  “And this is a way to great your son, with your cock firmly embedded in the hole of a restrained mouth?” I asked back, folding my arms and leaning against a pillar that for once wasn’t the statue of a naked being.

  My father’s smile turned wicked and pulled back on the hair he had fisted to lock the mouth in question to his erection.

  “It’s a hot mouth at that my dear but one that will have to wait.” He then released the female causing her to fall back and I couldn’t help but shake my head at the outfit she wore that he was getting off on.

  “A nun…really?”

  “A naughty nun son, so don’t kill the illusion.” I ended up needing to hold the bridge of my nose at the re-run of events we always seemed to play out. The sound of his deep laughter right in front of me had me opening one eye to see if he had done with this game yet. He slapped me on the back and said,

  “Come, I want to show you my new toy.”

  “I don’t have time for this.” I said to his back as he walked from me into the room. He looked over his shoulder with a smirk and said,

  “But yet you found the time to play with my soldiers…um?”

  “Trust me, soldiers like that needed the time taking and I would hardly call it a fight, more like playing dead without waiting for the command. Is this what your army has been reduced to?” I saw only a brief flash of fire in his eyes to know he had taken a hit to his ego with my last comment. Of course he quickly reined it in and said,

  “Please, they were merely younglings and now this way when their souls are recycled, they will have learnt a valuable lesson.”

  “So you’re thanking me?” I asked wryly making my father laugh.

  “From the looks of things you need to be thanking me for the relief… I bet your demon certainly enjoyed himself for those few short moments you allowed it.” This time it was the fire I could feel flash in my own eyes as my demon responded in agreement. Again he laughed, making me growl.

  “Come.” He nodded to where the music still played.

  “You have got to be kidding me?” I said after pushing my body from the pillar and following him. I could barely believe the new level of insanity my father had succumbed to.

  In the centre of the room was a naked man on his knees and hog tied in such a way he looked close to toppling over. His face was locked in a device, looking straight towards a large white sheet that was held at the wall by two servants. His eyes had turned milky white and his blank expression told me he was under the influence of my father’s demonic power.

  “I always wanted to watch this film.” He said as he petted his new toy’s arched back and then smacked his ass. In doing so it made the vision of the movie playing from his eyes jump, like a reel of film skipping a scene.

  There were two females fighting in a winter garden with samurai swords and I had to admit the sight looked appealing enough to hold my interest for a few seconds.

  “Apparently it’s called ‘Kill Bill’, but I am yet to find out who this Bill character is, so if you happen to come across a sinful soul who has seen the sequel, then do send them my way won’t you” I raised an eyebrow at my father’s new toy and wondered how much the poor soul being used as a projector thanks to his memories, wished electricity existed in Hell.

  “I have important matters to discuss with you.” I decided to get straight to the point.

  “Oh in that I have no doubt, come…sit.” He held out an arm for me to follow him to the orgy that continued even in his brief absence.

  “Alone.” My order rang clear and one I knew he wouldn’t deny me.

  “Very well.” He said not even bothering to keep the humour from his reply. The Demon was insufferable!

  “You know the last time I saw you, I remember you still found pleasures in thrusting your cock within the warmth of a willing vessel.”

  “Things have changed.” I snapped not being able to keep the memory of being told my Chosen One had finally been born from influencing my response.

  “That they have ind
eed.” He muttered and for once he didn’t lace the comment with flippancy.

  I followed behind him as he walked through a large archway and further away from the events I had first walked into. We walked in silence and only the sounds of our footsteps echoed the halls that normally held noises of a very different kind. If anything it only managed to enhance the sincerity of the conversation that we both knew would be shortly taking place.

  If I was honest, it had taken me all of ten months to calm enough to this point so that I didn’t end up having this conversation with my father’s neck at the end of my blade. Irrational thinking I know, considering it had nothing to do with my father’s decisions when a very unexpected guest turned up on his doorstep. But just the thought of them being in the same room together had me balling my hands into fists until I heard them crack once more.

  My father led me down a long hallway and to a door at the end. The size of the entrance and seriousness of the locking mechanism told me this wasn’t a room he shared often, if at all. It most certainly wasn’t a room I had ever been invited into and when he opened the door, I quickly knew why.

  Never once in all my years had I been inside my father’s private chambers and I only knew of one other soul who had…

  My mother.

  The large space was sectioned off into different areas and the one he led me to now was clearly used as his office. I found myself rolling my eyes behind his back as my father’s warped sense of humour even reflected in his private life. He walked up a few steps and turned back to smirk at me as I took in the church altar he was using as a desk.

  It was a handcrafted solid piece of oak, only there was nothing holy about it. It was heavily carved, with four panels cut at the front, each one displaying their own sexual scene that would make any pastor blush. Not surprisingly carved apples were the fruit of choice to frame the whole piece.

  “Won’t you take a seat?” He nodded to the chair in front but I ignored him, knowing what I had come here to say was best said standing.

  My father took his seat behind the altar in what could only be described as the most egotistical throne I had ever seen and I had sat in a quite a few in my time.

  “Nice chair.” I commented dryly on the matt black stone statue that was my father’s exact image of his Demon self, created in such a way it could be sat upon. The three famous sides of his personality sat at the top of the throne, the first being that of a ram. Lucifer always did say his humour would butt heads with his fellow Kings of the other circles… he was right of course.

  There was also his incredible strength in the form of a bull and lastly that of his hot headed temper which was a man breathing fire. Again I thought back to the erupting volcanoes and suppressed a knowing smile.

  “It is becoming of me is it not? Hand carved by Jainism monks…under the influence you understand, but I had hoped it would have included a naked form of some kind, however I thought best not to push my luck.”

  “And that would be a first.” He smiled back at me and then his fingers tapped against the serpent’s tail that acted as the arm rests.

  “But while we are on the subject of your true form I must ask why you still continue to choose that one in particular.” I nodded to the body that unnervingly looked like an older version of myself, wishing more for the demon depicted in his throne to be facing me instead.

  “Ah my son, your dear mother loves this form for a reason.” He threw back at me and I sighed, reconsidering my decision to stand. I used my power without much thought to move the chair back and answered his comment with a cutting one of my own.

  “Why, has she been down here recently?” I saw a flash of my father’s rage before it simmered. Good, I wanted that rage so I had something to battle. Just the very thought of Keira in this place twisted my insides like one of Vincent’s blades. Had she come into this room? What had she been forced to witness?

  “Touché Dominic.” He said fighting with his temper enough to force out his next question.

  “So tell me, how is my dear wife these days, does she still favour the sun?” I snapped out of my own ire and looked up at him, noting how his muscles had tensed. His skin had tightened to what looked like a painful degree. I shook my head at the same question I received every time. It was always about his Sarah.

  “She is very well but this is not news.” I replied the same as always.

  “You know it has not slipped her notice the obsession you still hold over her.” I added.

  “One night with a Goddess will do that to you son but this you already know…tell me Son, how is your own Goddess doing these days?” I growled low in my throat and crushed the arms of the chair, knowing I should never have sat down. I stood perfectly in sync with one single pound of my heart as I let his words ignite my temper. I kicked the chair back hearing it smash into the furniture behind me but not taking a second of care to look.

  “Fuck you! Do not play games with me old man for you know she isn’t mine anymore!” The last words came through in my demon tongue, as it was as angry with his last comment as I was. However, my father barely flinched at my outburst but merely made a tutting sound before speaking.

  “Now, now Dom, you know she will always be yours…a being of your birthright and keeper of my blood doesn’t lay claim to the other half of their soul and then truly walk away from it.” His voice became harsher with every syllable that left his lips, showing his mounting impatience.

  “And mother?” I pushed back, as was my nature. He surprised me when instead of mirroring my anger he simply relaxed his features, features that so resembled my own. Then he grinned that fucking grin of his!

  “She will always be mine, even as she sits in her gleaming tower of purity and thinks otherwise.”

  “And if your decision meant her death, what then?” I snapped making his fist come crashing down on the wood.

  “The idea’s painful isn’t it father?”

  “Fucking fates! Now you listen boy and you listen good. If I had taken any care in words spoken by any ideas the Gods had seen fit to say, then you and your siblings would never have been born!”

  “And if you’re wrong? Or I am wrong…?”

  “Or the fates are wrong.” He interrupted me and I closed my eyes at the hope in his words, ones I always carried buried and locked away in my heart.

  “I can’t chance her life, I won’t!” This was not an option for me!

  “Where is my son Dominic? Where is the fearless King I know lives inside you?”

  “Don’t play that card and don’t gamble with my pride, for you will lose!” I growled back at him knowing what he was doing.

  “But you let the Fates play and gamble with your very life, yet you are not brave enough to snatch back control. To take what you were destined to take…to demand and to OWN what is rightfully yours!”

  “I WILL KILL HER!” I roared in his face over the altar, throwing my arms back in my soul destroying confession.

  “If you truly believed that then why are you even here?” I took in his question and the anger started to seep from my blood, making me pant like a wild beast that roamed my father’s lands. Fuck, like this I was no better than that damned Hellbeast Cerberus!

  “You spoke about this to Sophia?”

  “I did.”

  “So you think me a coward?” I asked bitterly.

  “No. Trust me, I know of the strength it took for you to walk away from her but understand my son, that it took that very same strength in her coming here looking for you.”

  “You think I don’t know this!?” I ran a frustrated hand through my hair and then let the anger boil once more, only to slice my arm down and shout,

  “I know this! I am reminded of the fact every damn day I breathe on Earth’s plane but I am also reminded of what it feels like to have nearly lost her. You have seen her scars and you know the truth…where was my protection then?”

  “Where was the protection of the Gods? Where were the self-righteous Fates guidi
ng her then… guiding her to you? You put too much on yourself when only the ones above us are to blame.” He argued and I knew this conversation was getting me nowhere for I would never feel differently on the matter. It was a simple fact that where Keira was concerned, I could never seem to do right by her.

  “It no longer matters. I am removed from her life and therefore have removed the threat of taking her life.”

  “You’re making a mistake.” Why wouldn’t he just give it up!?

  “You mean to torture me, is that it?!” He simply shook his head at my questioning.

  “Then you say these things only because you don’t understand.” At this statement something deeper passed through my father’s eyes and if I had to choose the emotion I would say it was nothing less than understanding.

  “Come, I wish to show you something.” My father stood and walked up to the arched balcony that was joined from two small staircases either side of his altar. The walls on these sides were covered in books crammed so full they looked close to bursting from the shelves. I followed him up the steep staircase and saw that what originally looked like only enough space for one person to stand there was actually another room beyond its darkness.

  “Immaru!” My father spoke the word for ‘light’ in Sumerian and I sucked in a quick breath at what he had hidden there.

  “You see son, we are not without our similarities.”

  “Does she know of this place?” I asked in astonishment as I took in the cavernous space where every inch was filled with my mother’s image. It was a space so big that it looked like a hollowed out mountain and was impossible to see an end, even given my enhanced abilities. Her beauty shone from every surface in the room like a silent prisoner of Heaven lived down here.

  “No one but I knows of this place…and now so do you.” I shook my head as I was assaulted with an image of my father that I had proceeded to get wrong on so many levels. Yes I knew of his obsession with the only woman he really truly loved but for a being of his stature, then this news was a revelation. Understanding quickly dawned on me.

  “You keep this place hidden to keep her safe” I said trying to take in the hundreds or maybe even thousands of statues, sculptures, paintings and real life drawings of the woman that gave birth to me. It was a hauntingly beautiful sight to behold flickering in the firelight.