I am air and everywhere. How could I have missed this?
A dull thud traveled through my plastic room, and a man strode into sight. The same man who had captured me in Decadent-I. He stopped a few inches from the glass and folded his arms across his chest, the black Institute branding stark against the back of the hand clutching his bicep. After a few moments, his lips lifted at the corners.
Young and lean from physical training, he had all the confidence of an immortal. A soldier, I assumed by the way he had handled my capture. An enforcer—one of the Institute’s elite demon hunters. The name stitched into his overalls read “C. Burnstein.” He assessed every inch of me like a hunter admiring a rack of antlers displayed on a wall. Fury burned in my chest. I welcomed it, let it simmer, stoked it higher.
“I would have preferred to kill you.” He strode to the left and stopped, measuring his words. “All past encounters with Class A demons such as you have resulted in failure. For safety reasons, we should put you down like the stray dog you are.” There was no spite or anger in his words. He believed them. In his mind, his words were facts.
“And knowing what I do about you, Pride, you’ll wish I had.” He unfolded his arms and tucked his hands into his pants pockets. “Perhaps that day will come.”
He waited for me to contribute to this monologue. He’d be waiting a long time. One of us was immortal. The other just a cocky demon assassin. I’d known many like him. So eager to ride into battle and be the right arm of good. Fortunately, heroes were often the first to die. His pride would be his undoing.
My lips twitched.
He noticed. “You should have left LA when you had the chance. If you had gone into hiding, maybe disappeared in the hills or the desert, you could have been spared the humiliation of what’s to come. But you couldn’t, could you? Your pride wouldn’t let you. That’s the problem with all you Class A demons—you so-called princes—you’re all so predictable.”
I approached the transparent wall. This man was nothing compared to me, physically or mentally, yet he lifted his chin and looked into my eyes without a shred of fear. Was he a fool? Or did he truly believe this would end well for him?
“My employers will run tests on you,” he said. “But that won’t be the worst of it. Not for you—”
“What’s your name?” I interrupted. He enjoyed the sound of his own voice, whereas I did not.
“Christian.”
“Interesting. Are you a religious man, Christian?”
“You mean, do I believe in god and the devil?” His edged smile sharpened. “I have one standing right in front of me. I believe in what I can track and kill. But the myths and legends around you and your name? No. To me, you’re a disease humans discarded thousands of years ago. And now we have destroyed you again. London, Tokyo, Dubai, Sydney. They all report that the demons are gone. You’re an endangered species, but nobody will put you on a list and save you. Rest assured, when the time comes, I will be the one to kill you.”
I pressed my hand against the clear plastic and leaned in as close as the wall allowed. “You should pray that when I escape, you are very, very far away, Christian.”
“Not this time, Pride. You see…” He tossed a gesture at the sparse room around him. “This is not the Institute. Oh, I used to work for them, but the Institute failed the second the veil fell. I’m from a department you won’t find on any government accounting sheet. You haven’t heard of us, and if we do our job right, you and the people we keep safe outside these walls never will.”
“Military.”
He didn’t confirm it. Didn’t need to. “When we’re done extracting everything we need from your body, this box”—he rapped his knuckles on the plastic window—“will be placed inside a secure facility, somewhere obvious, somewhere with excellent infrastructure that’ll allow the thousands of tourists to park right by your new home and pay thirty bucks a pop to come see you in all your glory. The Demon Freak Show. There was talk of sitting you beside the natural history museum. Folks will drag their kids from all over the United States to see the demon in its cage. The last one of its kind. They’ll all come to see the spectacle, to see how you are nothing to fear. You’re going to be LA’s next big tourist attraction. Ironic, isn’t it, Pride?”
A stream of thousands of admirers. That didn’t sound too bad. “You have me all wrong if you think I won’t enjoy humans admiring me.”
He chuckled and stepped back from the glass. From his pocket, he produced a feather. One of mine. A ripple of pain traveled through my wings. “It won’t be admiration, prince.” He dropped the feather, let it see-saw through the air, and when it settled on the floor, he twisted the heel of his boot over it, grinding the feather to dust.
A snarl bubbled free, my rage heating. I slammed my hand against the plastic wall. “This plastic box cannot hold me.”
“You are not the demon you once were. I think the box will work just fine.” He laughed and walked out of sight. A dull thud signaled a door had closed.
Make a mockery of me? No, it would never happen. It was impossible. I was Pride. They couldn’t reduce me to an attraction in a box. It wouldn’t happen. It couldn’t happen. Yes, I was weak, but I was still stronger than any human, stronger than Christian and the military outfit he worked for.
“I am Pride…” I snarled, hearing my words fill the space around me and travel no farther.
They would have to enter this room to begin their tests. I could wait for the right opportunity. I had all the time in the world to wait.
I waited for the people to come and the tests to begin. They didn’t. I waited for voices to crackle through a speaker, but all I heard was my own rustling feathers. Under the constant glare of white light, time became meaningless.
Why hadn’t they come?
They had a prime demon specimen in their grasp, so why weren’t they exploiting the opportunity? Where were the scientists? Where were the people? Why weren’t they falling over themselves to study me?
I didn’t need to eat to survive. They brought me nothing. I didn’t need to relieve myself. I did none of those human things, so nothing about me or my cage changed. But there was one way in all this nothingness with only myself for company that I could track the passage of time.
My feathers fell.
One after another after another, they fell. I gathered up the first ones and placed them gently in the corner of my white box. But more fell, and soon they carpeted the floor. My box was six strides by six strides. I paced. One, two, three, four, five, six. Turn. Back again. One, two, three, four, five, six. Turn.
Why weren’t people coming to admire me?
My wings ached. Burdens on my back. I couldn’t stretch them, so they had seized half-open, feathers thinning with every turn.
One, two, three… Humans had always admired me… four, five six. Turn. What was I if nobody looked upon me? One, two… I had been a shadow before. Now, I was a ghost. Three, four, five, six. A ghost in a white box. Turn. Would they forget me? What a terrible thing for people to no longer see me, remember me, love me.
How long had it been? Weeks. Months. At the rate my feathers were falling, it could have been longer.
I thought of the time I had risen as a god among mortals, of the years humans had worshipped and loved and admired me. I thought of Ramírez and the satisfied expression on her face as I was brought to my knees. She had every reason to hate demons. They all did. But I was different. I hadn’t fought them, though I could have. I’d exercised restraint. I’d saved people. I was good. Didn’t that count for anything in this post-Fall world?
“Look, Mommy, a demon.”
I lifted my head and looked in the little girl’s eyes. A tiny thing, no taller than her mom’s waist. Perhaps it was her sparkling eyes, but something about her seemed familiar.
She pressed her small hand against the plastic window and spread her fingers. “He looks sad.”
I didn’t remember them arriving… No, I did, but I didn’t wa
nt to remember. The people had started coming long ago. Streams of them stood, pointing and staring. They whispered things. Some prayed. Others cursed and ranted and blamed me for the crimes of my kin. So many anonymous faces peering inside my cage. Did they see a prince or a monster? Some time ago, I’d stopped seeing them, stopped caring, stopped listening.
Around me, feathers had fallen and shriveled like dead leaves. I picked one up—the smoothest and cleanest I could reach—and got to my feet. The ache wasn’t physical. It gnawed on my mind, dulling the edges. I hadn’t moved in a long, long while.
Everyone but the mom and her little girl pulled back from the window. The latter looked up, lips parting.
My wings burned hot and sharp. I didn’t need to look to know only shredded flesh and naked bone remained. It hurt to move, but the pain was good. If it hurt, it meant I was still here. Not a ghost. Not vanished and forgotten.
I crouched close to the window and lifted the feather.
The girl’s soft, plump lips stretched into a wide grin. “A feather, Mommy. Can I have the feather? Please, Mommy. Can I?”
“No, dear.” She pulled her daughter away. “Remember what Daddy said. It’s a trick.”
“But Mommy…”
Her little hand vanished, leaving a small, already fading outline on the plastic.
“You must never trust a demon.” The mom gripped her daughter’s hand and fixed her stare on me before hurrying away.
The girl looked over her shoulder and smiled a goodbye. Too soon, the crowd closed in and pressed against the glass, pointing camera phones and waving selfie sticks. What a game it was to see the demon in a box.
The little handprint had all but vanished. Strange how I wanted it to stay so I wouldn’t be alone when the people left.
I straightened and turned to gasps, not of admiration, but of horror. The sound only made my wings ache more.
The girl had seen what the others could not. She would have treasured my feather. Perhaps one day, when she was older, she would remember the demon in his plastic box and how he had offered her the last gift he could give.
“My superior asked me what would be the best way to break you.” Christian’s voice roused me from my numbed state. He stood at the window, alone, and took a bite out of the apple he was holding. The flow of people had left. I measured time by their comings and goings like the ocean tides.
“I told them pride is his strength and his weakness.” He waved the apple as he spoke. “Take it away, and he has nothing.”
Looking at the feathers surrounding me, it would be hard to argue that I was not broken, just… conserving energy for a chance to escape. There would be one. There always was. They still wanted to run their tests. They couldn’t resist such a wonderful specimen as I.
“This isn’t personal,” he continued. “It’s just how the world works now.”
“You said there would be tests.” I didn’t sound broken, did I?
The question lit his dark eyes with amusement. “Ah, were you waiting for those? They …decided against it. Any interaction might pander to your sense of pride. You’re not wanted, my demon friend. The only reason you’re still alive is the increase in tourism you bring in to the city. In the last six months, you’ve brought in an estimated six hundred thousand dollars. You’re good for the morale of the local population too. It does wonders letting people see how you’re nothing to fear. You’re the perfect exhibit. Low overhead, maximum profit. You’ll soon have your own merchandise and profits will increase tenfold.”
They had held me captive for six months. It felt like longer. I had lost too many feathers. What else would I lose in this box? My mind? “I have lived for thousands of years and seen civilizations rise and fall. I ruled in the netherworld as one of the Seven. And this box is the best you could come up with?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes the best solutions are the simplest. Why complicate things?”
“There are things I know. Things I have seen. I have witnessed history unfolding. Keeping me here, like this, is a waste.”
Christian finished the last bite of his apple and chewed slowly, dragging out his reply. “You’re not grasping the situation. You are obsolete. Demons are extinct. Nobody cares what you know or what you’ve seen. When the veil fell and the demons came, we learned from you. You slaughtered so many that we had to find new ways to fight you. That’s the marvelous thing about humans: we learn, we change, and we get better at what we do—”
“Don’t preach to me of humans,” I snarled. “I have known more of you over time than the number of those alive today.”
“We studied your ways, and then we evolved, just like you. Your time has ended, and so you’ll stay in this box for as long as you continue to make my employers money. The second you become a burden, I’ll execute you.”
“Evolved how?”
His smile widened. “Before your arrival, we didn’t even know the veil existed. Now we know exactly what and where it is.”
Dread shivered down my back. “The balance of the veil and its energies are not to be upset.”
“Upset?” He chuckled. “So like your ancient kin. So rooted in the past you can’t see the potential for the future.”
I approached the window. “What do you intend to do with the veil?”
“Do with it? Nothing. From what I’ve heard it looks as though the veil could be the clean energy source we’ve been looking for. Ironic that the most devastating war known to human-kind might provide its salvation.”
Somehow tap into the veil? “You can’t draw energy from the veil. Only higher demons and half-bloods can do that. The Institute’s half-blood experiment was terminated, and all the higher demons are gone.”
His eyes sparkled. “We’ve come a long way since your kind tried to take our world. Now be a good demon and perform for the masses. Maybe I’ll come by in a few months to let you know how things are going.”
Christian left, and after a few hours, the ebb and flow of people continued.
Day after day they filled the room outside my window, and night after night I stared into the empty room they left behind, their handprints smudging the plastic window. I had already tried breaking the seals around the door, but without my element, and with my strength waning, my efforts did more to occupy my mind than get me closer to freedom, but I tried again as part of my routine. Pace and try the door seals. Pace and try the window seals. One, two, three, four, five, six. Turn. The door. Turn. Pace. The window. Turn.
Drawing power from the veil? Princes at the height of their power could draw energy from the veil’s chaos energies to bolster their own. The Institute’s half-bloods, as rare as they were, could draw power from both sides of the veil, making them extremely powerful. I knew of only three half-bloods—Muse, Stefan, and Gem. They were all in Boston and none of them would ever let a military entity use them. They knew the dangers that came with manipulating the veil. They wouldn’t risk it. How then were Christian’s employers considering tapping into it? The veil was the elements. It couldn’t be tamed or farmed or harnessed. Could it?
Humans and their ingenuity. Manipulating the veil would get them killed or open the door to the netherworld all over again, but humans and their adventurous spirit… They couldn’t help themselves. Fools. Dreamers. There wasn’t much difference between a pioneer and the hundreds who had failed before him or her. Perhaps they could harness the veil’s energies. Perhaps I was wrong to doubt them. Time and time again humans had picked themselves up from the mud and powered through adversity. Why should now be any different?
What would my princely brethren think? That thought alone brought something of a smile to my lips. Humans tapping into the veil would rile the princes up. I had once enjoyed seeing my kin bicker and squabble like vultures over scraps of meat. But it would be different beyond the veil now. Many of the princes were dead. The others were trapped there in a dying world, the King of Hell somehow keeping them all in line with his Queen of Chaos subdued beside him.
A shudder shook my naked wings. There were worse places to be than inside a plastic box.
Chapter 8
Christian returned roughly a month later, more subdued than the last time he had sauntered into sight. He brought a chair and sat in front of the window.
“Did you have…” He struggled to find the right word. “Did you have offspring?”
“Many.” I was sitting in the center of my box, the only place where my wings didn’t brush against the edges of the room. The arches still pushed against the ceiling, but in this position, they didn’t hurt as much as when they touched the walls. “At one time, I copulated profusely with mortals.”
He scowled, and I smiled back, knowing perfectly well how my past grated on him.
“Producing half-bloods?” he asked, grimacing.
“Yes. Most died during childbirth. Those who survived their first few hours were later slaughtered.” Burned alive, most of them. I touched the scar on my chin, and then I withdrew my hand and curled my fingers in. It had been a long time ago. The memories were old and fragmented.
“Who killed them?”
“Why are you so interested, Christian?”
He waved my query away. “Who killed them?”
“Another prince.” My wings throbbed. I would never escape the memory of fire licking over their expanse. “Do you have offspring?”
“Me?” He huffed a laugh. “I wouldn’t tell you if I did.”
“Should I escape, I might seek you out, hunt them down, and torture them while forcing you to watch?” I nodded. “If I were a demon cliché, I most certainly would do those things.”
“You’re never getting out of this box.” He leaned back in the chair and stretched out his legs, getting comfortable on his side of my window.
Chaos Falls Page 5