Wyatt saw me as the lone stranger, riding in to town and picking off my enemies from a rooftop in a stealthy, sneak attack. Like a demon sniper. That certainly appealed to the little imp who wanted desperately to hide under a rock, but I didn’t see how it would work here in Dis, without even a decent sized cactus to shield me. Besides, the element of surprise had gone out the window long ago.
I had a shotgun I wasn’t sure would even work in Hel, a really cool duster, and hopefully luck, that fickle mistress, would continue to walk by my side. But I was still an imp in human form, against a mighty demon. I’d just have to wing it. Rely on whatever mad skills happened to spring to mind.
“Haagenti. I’m gonna kick your ass!” I shouted. Or at the very least, bite it.
The approaching demons looked at me oddly. They’d never thought I was all together sane anyway, so none of them should have been surprised. We approached, imaginary spurs clinking like bells in the silence. The atmosphere was appropriate. Dis was vaguely desert–like with woody, brown spiked flora sparsely dotting the landscape, and a haze of crimson heat.
None of us launched an attack as we drew near. I hopped aside to avoid a thorny tumbleweed that would have done nothing to my reptile shape, but would have swollen my human skin like a balloon with one touch. The mojo from Wyatt’s gifts was fleeting, vanishing along with the tumbleweed. What was I thinking, approaching Haagenti in such a vulnerable shape? There was no time to do anything different. I’d committed myself to this human form, and to assume another at this point would likely be seen as a sign of weakness. I stopped and awaited Haagenti’s last few steps. I wanted him to make the first moves so I could react to his attack. It might not be the best fighting strategy, but it was one that had always worked for me.
The other demons held back, and Haagenti in his bull–lion form, sans wings, came insultingly close. That’s when I realized that these other demons weren’t here for back–up. They were witnesses. My resolve wavered. He was that confident. He’d brought a group along to watch me get pummeled, humiliated, and eventually killed. Plus I recognized two of Haagenti’s household. Assalbi, no doubt still pissed from my smack–down at Taullian’s party, and Progemon. They held back with the others, who seemed to be here strictly for the enjoyment of watching a fight. This battle was to be mano a mano, and Haagenti wasn’t worried about any risk to himself. Of course, he didn’t have much to worry about: soft human flesh against the might of his horns and claws.
“Oh good,” I told him. “There weren’t nearly enough demons to see me kick your ass, and send you running away at the elf festival. This will ensure you can’t cover it up this time with excuses and lies.”
He snorted, pawing the ground. “If it wasn’t for Zalanes and those darned elves, I would have you in my dungeon right now.”
It sounded like a Scooby Doo episode. “ I would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn’t for those darned kids and their dog….”
He eyed the stock of the shotgun rising above my shoulder. “No one recognizes you as the Iblis. You dare to carry a stolen weapon? A symbol of power you don’t have?”
I smiled. “So you want me to put it down? Fight you without it? That’s hardly fair, an unarmed demon in human form against your bull–lion shape. But then, you like to stack the odds in your favor, don’t you?”
“There is no one stopping you from assuming a more defensive form. And besides,” he gestured to the crowd behind him with a lion tail. “I’m giving you the respect of a one–on–one fight. Respect you don’t deserve.”
I rolled my eyes. Yeah, I was a thief, a liar, a deceiver—all reputable traits. What sins had he committed lately? Carefully I unbuckled the scabbard holding the Shotgun of the Iblis and sat it on the ground, edging it away with my foot. I wasn’t worried about anyone stealing it. Even if they could, no one wanted the thing. No one but Haagenti, it seemed.
“I’ll fight you in this form, with only my demon powers and my human flesh. I wouldn’t want anyone to say I’d won a fight unfairly.”
Haagenti laughed, a bellow of sound. “I’ll remember that as I gut you.”
It was a stupid, asinine decision, to fight Haagenti as a human. One of those impulse things. I should have taken the chance and assumed something with decent physical weapons, with a tough hide or even an exoskeleton. Maybe I figured death would be quicker, less painful this way. Who knows? I never really understood some of the things I did.
We carefully circled each other, watching. He wasn’t a fool, wasn’t rushing his attack. He’d probably not fought a human or had any direct contact with them beyond the Elven slaves for centuries. And I’m sure he wasn’t sure what powers I’d managed to acquire during my time on earth. Finally he shot a short burst of energy at me, more to gauge my reaction than to actually harm me. As I’d done at Taullian’s festival, I absorbed it instantly.
A bolt of lightning came my way next, but I’d played with lightning since I was in my crib, and I’d learned many things since then. I grabbed it, and split the blast into a thousand shards of light, sending them skyward in tiny sparks. The crowd made a gratifying “oooo” noise. Their appreciation snapped whatever control Haagenti had and he charged, swiftly impaling me on a horn. Before I could grab him, he’d tossed his head, ripping my abdomen and sending me flying over his back to land in the hard, red dust.
Damn, that hurt. I pulled back from the damaged area and quickly stuffed a dangling section of my guts back inside. I didn’t care that anyone saw the extent of the wound, but I was concerned that the intestine would get hooked on Haagenti’s horns and he’d completely disembowel me. I staggered to my feet, holding my side and watched Haagenti come in for a second attack. This time I succeeded in grabbing both horns and snapping them off with a burst of energy. Haagenti roared, swinging his head in pain, and I slashed with my new weapons, managing to rake one along his neck and jam the other into his shoulder.
For humans, injuries like ours would have been the death of us, but we were demons, and we were in Hel. With no threat from angels and plenty of energy to draw from this was almost foreplay. Haggenti staunched the bleeding, and recreated the horns in a flash while I rapidly repaired my gut wound. Within seconds, the only thing remaining was the horn in Haagenti’s shoulder, annoyingly out of reach and impossible for him to remove without opposable thumbs. I knew it pissed him off to have it there, visible to everyone.
He rushed again and, this time, I stepped forward into him, too close for his horns and hooves to have any effect. I slammed him with a burst of raw energy as he raked one of his rear lion claws across my thigh. He grunted with pain from my blast, but his claw did far more damage on my human flesh. Falling to my knee, he seized the advantage and pushed me flat, pinning me with his weight. Now the fight began in earnest. Haagenti pounded me with blasts of energy while I took precious time to repair my leg. I absorbed as much of the energy as I could, pulling it inside my gigantic stash, but it was coming too fast for me to absorb it all, especially while trying to fix my injuries. Instinctively, I’d pulled back, withdrew from my human form as Gregory had taught me. That meant my physical body was taking immense amounts of damage, but my spirit self was not. I let him hammer away at me, let him think he was bringing me close to death. Little did he know I was probably the only demon who could live inside a dead physical form.
I had a choice. I could let him kill my physical body in a rage, play possum, and hope he just went away. But that wouldn’t solve the problem and I was getting really tired of this feud. Knowing how much it would hurt, I extended my personal energy, my spirit being back into every cell of the flesh as I began to absorb and convert his attack. It hurt like fuck, but was worth the look of surprise on Haagenti’s face. He increased his attack, energy pouring into me like a hot stream. I struggled, but I managed to convert it all. Furious, he began drawing directly from our environment, slamming me with the maximum he could.
“Why won’t you fucking die?” he roared.
B
ecause I’m a cockroach, I thought. And we are really hard to kill.
He was getting sloppy, desperate. I let some of his attack spill away from my control, burning and searing my spirit self with damage that would leave a permanent scar. His elation at this success was palpable. With another roar, he tried to increase the volume of the energy he was pounding into me, but he was at his maximum. Still, he pushed, and there, his own spirit self, right on the edge of his physical being, right within reach. Finally.
I seized him, and I pulled.
Mine.
He spooled out from his body like a line of thread into my grasp. Tearing, Shredding, Devouring. Before he could even register surprise, before he could make a sound, he was gone. The only remains an empty shell, a lion bull form collapsed on top of my prone body.
I took a ragged breath. The actual me, the spirit being, was injured, and that would never heal. I’d forever carry these scars, but at least no abilities or skills had been lost. My physical body was severely damaged, and although I could survive its death, I hadn’t yet figured out how to move it around as a corpse. There was no time to repair it though. Haagenti was clearly dead, and I had to act fast. I shoved the heavy body aside, squirming and shuffling to wiggle myself free. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Assalbi and Progemon run towards me, as if in slow motion. Their shouts rang out as I rolled to my scabbard. They were Haagenti’s household, and with his death, they’d be mine to do with as I pleased. Clearly they wouldn’t relish that fate, and I knew they’d try to finish me off before I had a chance to fix any damage.
Grabbing the stock of the shotgun, I yanked it free of its holster, thankful I hadn’t bothered to snap it in tight. Wyatt had said the artifact wouldn’t need loading, I sure as fuck hoped it didn’t need to be racked either because I had no time left for that shit. I pointed the barrel in the general direction of the advancing demons and pulled the trigger. I suck at shooting. I couldn’t hit an elephant if it were two inches in front of me. I just hoped the deafening noise of the shotgun blast, and the sight of an unknown and unfamiliar weapon would buy me some time. Imagine my surprise when Assalbi flew backwards in a spray of red. Progemon halted to look at the other demon in astonishment, so I took the opportunity and shot him too. Those two shots did more for my mojo than anything I’d done to date. I looked at the Shotgun of the Iblis in admiration and thought that I should have just blown Haagenti’s head off when he was a hundred yards away, sort of a combo of Wyatt’s plan and Gregory’s “mighty show of power”. It would have saved me a whole lot of trouble and hurt. Next time that would be my strategy.
I quickly fixed my physical body, which was beginning to go into convulsions, and stood up to observe my latest victims. They weren’t dead, but watching them flop around in their own blood as they squealed was gratifying. It took them forever to repair themselves, making me wonder if the artifact had some effect beyond just physical damage, like the white stuff the angels attacked with. Finally Assalbi and Progemon rose to their feet, still bleeding and vomiting in the red dust. The crowd parted as they staggered back, rejecting them and making it clear to me they would not avenge Haagenti’s death.
“Listen up, Bitches.” I shouted, raising my shotgun to the sky. “I am the Iblis. I killed this worthless piece of crap as our blood feud warranted. There will be no weregeld.”
The spectators nodded in agreement. Good. There would be no retaliation, but I knew many would discount this as a lucky break. Suddenly I realized what Gregory really meant. There were no more rocks to hide under. It had always been my habit to fly under the radar, to be underestimated in order to gain an advantage, but this was a time to show power: a time for others to fear what I really was.
“I am the Ha–satan, the Iblis. I ripped Haagenti out of his form and shredded him to bits. I consumed him. I am a devouring spirit. If any of you cross me, this will be your fate too.”
There was an air of discomfort, but no one objected. Devouring wasn’t an acceptable form of fighting. It wasn’t an acceptable form of anything. What I’d done was icky, kind of psycho. But what revolts the sensibilities also terrifies.
I put on my scabbard, slipped the Shotgun of the Iblis into its holster, and turned around to leave—the lone stranger, striding off into the sunset. Wyatt would have been proud.
After a few steps, I realized I had no idea exactly where I was. I wasn’t familiar with Cyelle enough to know where the elves had gated me, and I’d only been in Dis a few times. I had a feeling that heading to the city shimmering in the distance wouldn’t put me anywhere near my destination. So much for my grand exit.
“Uh, hey,” I called to the retreating crowd. “Can anyone tell me which way to Wythyn?”
One pointed to his left, never turning around. The others kept walking. Clearly I’d impressed them with my mighty show of power.
“Hey!” I shouted. This time I punctuated it with a shotgun blast and was gratified to see demons flinging themselves to the ground. “How do I get to Wythyn, and how far is it as the human walks?”
A tall, black, shadowy form with horns and red eyes approached me, eyeing my shotgun.
“Northeast.” He pointed off into the endless sea of red dust. “About two days if you walk in your current form.”
“Thanks,” I told him, setting off.
I wasn’t going home without my horse.
30
I walked for about four hours, my clothes plastered to me with sweat. Thirsty, hungry and tired, I realized there was no way I could walk all the way to Wythyn. The Elven forest was to my right, receding into the haze, but I was certain it was still Cyelle. I longed for the dewy coolness, but couldn’t risk capture until I was sure it would be Wythyn elves hauling me away, not Taullian’s.
Two days I plodded along, turning my head slightly to see if I were still being followed. A couple of the demons had left the group after I headed away and continued to trail behind me, close enough to keep me in sight, but far enough to be safe from a shotgun blast. I considered stripping off all my clothing, securing it into a bundle around the gun scabbard then transforming into something more suitable for the climate, something that could travel quicker than a slow human walk. My followers caused me some hesitation. I’d made a big deal about fighting Haagenti in a human form. Would changing into something more demonic decrease the effect of my statement? Would it be seen as a weakness that I couldn’t travel the entire distance in the form I’d come to prefer? In the back of my mind I wondered if resuming my reptile shape here, in Hel, would cause me to fall back into the demon I was long ago. Would I shed my humanity as I shed the human form? I’d gotten used to walking that knife–edge between the two, come to enjoy the duality. I didn’t want to lose that, didn’t want to upset the balance.
I saw movement to my left and a flash of sun on scales, but it wasn’t a demon. A sand serpent, surfacing from its tunnels deep below, tested the air for the scent of prey. Glancing quickly, I saw a figure in the distance behind me. One left. I wondered how long it would be until he gave up. Hopefully before I collapsed from dehydration. Another flash; this one closer. I pulled the shotgun from the holster and held it ready. Sand serpents didn’t usually mess with demons, but they weren’t particularly smart and often mistook us for an easy meal. In human form, I’m sure I smelled like an easy meal. Another flash. I stopped and waited, gun at the ready.
Ignoring the tickle of sweat rolling down my neck, I tapped my foot lightly on the hard–packed, red clay, just to let the serpent know where I was. The ground shifted slightly under my feet, softening into dusty sand. I jumped early, not wanting to rely too much on slow human reaction times, and shot the flash of red that rose from the ground where I’d been standing just a second before. Red flew apart in chunks, and the headless body vanished back underground. Sand Serpents didn’t need their heads to survive, it’s not like their brains were all that useful anyway. It would take him a few hours to form a vestigial head, a small nub, before he headed out in search o
f another meal. He wouldn’t be back though. They weren’t that stupid.
The demon following me had halted, watching from a distance. I kept him in my line of sight as I checked out the chunks of sand serpent scattered on the red desert floor. I’d lucked out. The lower jaw held a water bladder, and somehow it had managed to stay intact. This one was a good size, almost a gallon of liquid. I stuffed some of the salt–rimmed scales in my coat pockets, and grabbed a couple pieces of meat, brushing the desert dust from them. With my water tucked under my arm, munching on a piece of meat, I continued on.
Still, that fucking demon followed me. I wondered if he’d eaten the rest of the serpent’s head. He must be in a form that didn’t require much water or he would have turned back long ago. The sun was setting off to the east, tingeing the red landscape with lavender and brown. I’d finished my food and nearly all the water, and wasn’t relishing another day and a half of this bullshit. I especially wasn’t looking forward to tromping through Dis in the dark of night in human form. I was going to have to change shape. I thought about confronting the demon, but every time I stopped, he did. Every time I headed toward him, he retreated. The darker it got, the closer he came, and finally, as night fully descended, he was only about ten yards away.
I turned to get a good look at him and was surprised to see a Low.
“Why are you following me? What do you want?”
He looked respectfully at my feet, scaled claws by his sides. He was hunched over, as if he would have been more at home on all fours, and this added to the air of subservience.
“I offer myself to your household, Iblis,” he said, bobbing his head to emphasize his deference.
Fuck. I already had one Low in my household. Were they all going to flock to me for protection and status? What was I going to do with them all?
Elven Blood (Imp Book 3) Page 28