Heroes

by David Leadbeater

  “Are you enjoying your freedom?” he grated at her, stopping three feet away.

  “Are you?” She nodded at the dripping head.

  “This place has its pleasant diversions.” Samael flung the head away and Lilith watched it bounce across the beach, leaving a blood trail. “Are you hurt?”

  “I cut myself so you would find me.”

  Samael coughed. Lilith knew he didn’t believe her. “This place,” she said. “It festers.”

  Samael inclined his head.

  “I meant before my father came. Before the hierarchy came. It reeks of evil.”

  “It’s a consequence of those in power. Don’t forget, we have been corrupting this world for centuries.”

  “And they can’t win,” Lilith said. “I realize that now. So what’s the point?”

  “And what of your mother?”

  She’d been expecting the question and had already steeled herself for it. She regarded Samael without an ounce of emotion. “I felt nothing.”

  “From the age of five you have wanted nothing more than to see her. You have fought and screamed and escaped time after time.”

  “That’s what kids do.” She shrugged. “They test their boundaries, and their parents.”

  Samael, despite his twisted face, managed to give her a surprised, agreeing look. “Children are devils,” he said.

  Lilith hid her revulsion at the joke and tried to smile. It didn’t quite work so she turned to her other method of persuasion.

  “I brought you this.”

  She handed over the bible artefact, the one Ken had given her in the first hell. Samael nodded. “Excellent. I know Beelzebub will be glad to get it back.”

  The bright blue sky shone over Samael’s broad shoulders. She shifted on the bench as a warm breeze wafted past her face. “I want to go to my father.”

  “Another turn-around.”

  “I want to see what happens when he turns this earth into the eighth hell. You’ve seen it happen before.”

  “I have,” Samael said. “Thousands of years ago. It’s a spectacular event.”

  “Take me to him.”

  “You’ll come willingly?”

  “Yes, but first I have a plan.”

  Samael allowed his spear to rest in the crook of his arm. “What plan?” he asked suspiciously.

  “Let me go to the Chosen. Let me convince them I’m one of them. On their side. And then let me lead them into my father’s trap.”

  Samael pursed lips that were cracked and raw. Pus leaked out. Lilith looked away. After a minute he said, “They have no means to hurt Lord Lucifer.”

  She nodded. “I know. But they don’t know that. These Chosen – I met one of them already. They have hope. It is blind. But any and all hope is dangerous. It needs smiting. I can get them close if you and my father can lay the trap.”

  “Laying traps is my forte.”

  “I know. I thought you’d enjoy it.”

  “And how would you find the Chosen?”

  “I’ve already contacted Aegis and told them about the bible artefact that Ken gave me. They’ll let me into their inner circle and, after that, I’ll ask to join the Chosen in their fight. From there, it’ll be pretty easy.”

  “And how will we know you are close?”

  “How else?” Lilith held up her cut palm. “I’ll draw blood.”

  “It could work,” Samael mused. “Destroy the Chosen in one battle, instead of across the world. I will ask your father.”

  “No,” Lilith said. “It has to be now. Aegis are expecting me.”

  Samael hesitated. Lilith knew better then to push him or play to his ego. Kings of Hell were susceptible to very little manipulation.

  “You are Satan’s daughter,” he said finally. “It is a good plan. It might even work. I say – go. But if you change your mind or try your tricks I will know, little one. And my wrath will be great.”

  Lilith didn’t miss the shifty glance of his eyes and the meaning of it. He was looking in the direction of her mother’s house, telling her than he wasn’t fully convinced and that, if she betrayed him, the first casualty would be Abigaille.

  Lilith hated it, but nodded. “No tricks,” she said. “I’m on your side now.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  We waited for darkness and moved out as the first tendrils started to fall.

  Driving trucks, we approached the outskirts of Las Vegas. The Devil was busy making it, and Caesar’s Palace, his own. His demons, his devils, his minions and he were focused on their task, which in turn had given the world a little more time.

  There were fifteen of us. Ten main players and five Special Forces guys with the capability to sneak into any place in any part of the world. They would get us in, we would do the rest.

  Sounds easy.

  I wished. I was seated in the back with Tanya and Lysette, Natalie and Leah, whilst Lucy, Ceriden, Ethan and Cleaver traveled in the other car. Belinda was in the front passenger seat. We drove with no lights, by the glow of the full moon, until we saw Las Vegas and its strip of casinos.

  “The lights are still on,” Lysette said. “I guess the Devil likes a good show.”

  “Kinkade tells of humans forced to perform,” Leah told us, “putting on shows for Lucifer and his legions. Of blackjack and poker dealers playing all day and all night. Of high-class restaurants being forced to serve their own staff as dessert. Trapped men and women are forced to gamble for their lives, to fight in the Paris and Bellagio fountains, to join the enormous pyre in the middle of the Strip or face a lifetime of torture.”

  “We can’t let that stand,” I said. “C’mon.”

  The Special Forces guys called us together and bade us follow their every command. We drove through the outskirts at first until signs of demonic activity grew. Despite the artificial light the streets were still cast in shadow, but the fiends were everywhere. We found a quiet parking lot and left the cars behind. Before we’d traveled five minutes, the Special Forces guys had taken out three demons. We didn’t want to use our powers in case it drew attention to us.

  We crept through the darkest streets. Human and inhuman screams pierced the night, from street level and above. The warm air smelled of burned things, of devastation and death. It reeked of brimstone. We saved one woman from demonic attack only to see her run from us and get taken by a horde of wayclearers. We waited for a group of nine-foot-tall beasts to stalk past us. We were crouched in shadows, behind dumpsters and among garbage. The beasts were clad in chainmail, wore helmets and carried swords. They were headed for the Las Vegas Strip.

  As were we. Mandalay Bay was the first hotel and casino we spotted.

  “It’s not like we can mosey on down the main road,” Lysette said, indicating the many roaring fires to our right.

  “This way,” one of the Special Forces guys said.

  We followed a route that took us behind the main hotels, close to the interstate. There were times I managed to get a glimpse of that wide highway. I truly wished I hadn’t. People had been caught by the hell-beasts leaving Vegas, driving away. They had been attacked from all directions and their vehicles still burned. Demons stalked the broad road.

  At last, we approached Caesar’s. This had proven to be a much better, quieter road. Demons, like tourists it seemed, preferred the Strip. I knew Caesar’s. I’d stayed once before, a long time ago before Lucy was born. This wasn’t the Caesar’s I recalled.

  Rubble reached high up the Octavius tower, the rear high-rise. It was a rubble not only of soil and dirt, but of masonry and building blocks, of cars and coaches, of men and women. Shapes crawled amid the rubble, climbing it, sorting through it, and then jumping inside the Octavius tower through broken windows with their spoils. Across from that stood the Palace Tower, its façade cracked and pitted, its windows smashed. I saw several gargoyles still clinging to the building though and knew Kinkade would be sending his updates.

  We approached the conference center, which was situated at
the back of the complex. Our Intel told us the Devil had set up his HQ beyond that, in an internal area overlooked by the tall towers. It was the pool area, called the Garden of the Gods, an extensive, interlocking oasis comprising of seven different pools, cabanas, bars and many statues. Lucifer was busy making it his pit.

  A door was breached, and we found ourselves inside the conference center. One of the soldiers had a map which I was grateful for since I was pretty sure there were people that came to these hotel-casino complexes and wandered around searching for a way out until they died. Everything was dark in here, and silent. Another good sign. We paused briefly for a final Intel check.

  Lysette called our own HQ where a commander was waiting.

  “Seems every available beast is helping Lucifer turn that place into his own little version of hell,” came the answer. “Kinkade’s spotted flying demons ferrying the heavier stuff. Every kind of statue you can imagine. Humans, dead and alive. Even wounded demons are being dropped in there. He’s making it the focal point of the world, of all his worst machinations. I’d hurry. He’s only vulnerable there whilst they’re still forming it. There’s all manner of beasts and humans being ferried in and out.”

  That was what we needed. The soldiers double-checked their weapons. I gathered my strength. Lucy and the vampires stood resolute, fists clenched. Tanya and Natalie were with me, both kitted out in Kevlar as were we all. Not that we expected to be hit by bullets, but some kind of armor seemed prudent. Leah stood among us, as brave as anyone I’d known. She carried no weapon other than the power to heal. Belinda wouldn’t drift far from her side. Cleaver ratcheted his shotgun and looked around as if expecting his power to reveal itself.

  I let out a long breath. “Kill the Devil,” I said. “And save the world.”

  “It’s that easy?” Lysette asked, head tilted.

  “It has to be. I don’t have any other ideas.”

  “There’s a long history of the Devil trying to make earth his own,” Leah said. “I recall from when I was . . . twinned . . . with Kinkade. He knew all of it. Think of major events. World wars. Ruinous plagues. The Crusades. He was killed, and stopped, on every occasion.”

  “But he never got this far,” I said.

  “That’s true. But the good news is, he’s on the other side of that wall.”

  I looked to where she pointed and saw we’d come to the far side of the convention center. Carefully and slowly we all crowded around one of the few windows that overlooked the pool area.

  I felt my legs start to shake as I looked upon probably the most terrible tableau my eyes had ever witnessed.

  First, the winged demons had dropped bodies into the pools, lifeless, limp, pale bodies. Then they had pinned bodies to the tower walls that stood to either side, nailing men and women in a cross-like position up to five stories high. Some still lived. Pools had been filled with rivers of blood that snaked among mounds of dirt and corpses the entire length of the complex. Statues had been daubed with dark ichor.

  At the far end, where you would have exited the pool to enter the hotel, the Devil had made his throne. He’d carved it out of human bone and fused the joints with demonic fire. He’d surrounded it with death too, so that a carpet of bones ran around the foot of his throne. There was an honor guard of chainmail-wearing demons standing before the throne and, although they were tall, the seat was six feet above their heads.

  And finally, I got my first real look at Lucifer.

  He sat in human form, wearing a smug grin as he regarded the hell he’d already wrought. He had a handsome face, burning eyes and a forked tongue. His arms were too long, and his legs ended in taloned feet with claws that had ripped through his trousers. He held a statue’s white head in one hand and flicked several casino chips through the fingers of his other. Humans lay prostrate at the base of the throne, face up and face down, some painted, some naked, others covered by recently flayed demon hide and screaming as fresh demonic blood scorched their skin.

  I struggled to take it all in. Even Ceriden – a demon himself if you wanted to get technical – shook his head, opened his mouth, but couldn’t think of anything to say.

  Belinda, my best friend, lover and confidante, was at my side.

  “You ready for this, muffin man?”

  I appreciated the levity and smiled. “This is no place to talk about muffins, love. Maybe later.”

  She placed a hand on her right hip. I noticed a new T-shirt under her jacket and reached out to take a look.

  Sassy Since Birth.

  “Well, I can’t argue with that.”

  “You’d do well to remember that comment,” Belinda said. “For later.”

  I reached out for her hand, more serious now, and squeezed it. We were both ready to put it all on the line again. Belinda tried to smile but it was quickly replaced by the grim visage I knew from battle. She didn’t expect to come through this.

  “You guys ready?” a soldier asked, his voice rasping.

  I looked and I nodded, though I felt anything but ready. We were about to attack the Devil in his new domain. We were humanity’s last hope. It didn’t get much harder, or more desperate than this.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  It was bad timing. We made our move just as the hierarchy demons arrived.

  I smashed open a door and the others ran past me. Ceriden, Ethan and Lucy were at full pelt. Natalie was with me. Tanya and Cleaver were a step behind the vampires. We ran through dead things, blood and sticky demonic ichor. Our boots crunched beneath us.

  The Devil saw us immediately. To my great satisfaction a look of utter surprise crossed his face. He couldn’t believe that here, in his most private abode, his enemies were attacking.

  His guard drew swords. We kept running, closing the distance. Winged demons and other beasts screeched in anger and started toward us. Then we heard a dreadful, loud flapping sound in the sky and looked up to see three of the remaining five hierarchy demons descending. They were like avenging dragons, their claws reaching for us as they fell, their mouths open and ready to breathe fire.

  I unleashed all my power at them. It was too early, but it was the only thing that would save our lives. My power blast met the fire they spewed and stopped it in mid-air, both forces of nature battling until their fire died and my blast evaporated. With Natalie’s help I’d already prepared another and sent that firing up a split-second later. It ripped among the hierarchy demons, scattering them like bowling pins. One smashed into the Palace Tower, making the entire structure shudder. Another dive-bombed into one of the pools, its huge snout sending a bow-wave of human detritus before it. The third tumbled end over end and, fortunately, crashed down among the devil’s guards, crushing and killing most of them.

  I cheered. Ceriden, Ethan and Lucy were already among the remaining guards. Ceriden fought one in hand-to-hand combat. Ethan held another off until Tanya joined. I’d forgotten how awesome she was, a lethal dancer, all steel, death and vengeance. The Devil’s guard was all but decimated. At my side, Leah watched carefully, and Belinda watched us both. There were several random demons around that she took care of.

  I couldn’t stand on my laurels. I’d gotten lucky. We’d hit with the greatest element of surprise, but now we were all targets.

  “Abaddon, Astaroth and Asmodeus,” Leah pointed all the hierarchy demons out, “will hit harder than ever now. They’re humiliated. You have to hit first, Dean.”

  I was on it. My friends were closing in on Lucifer. The Special Forces soldiers were between me and one of the demons, spraying lead. I focused on the other two. Astaroth sprawled in the pool, wings flapping, hind legs scrabbling. The noise it made was horrific, a cross between a tortured wail and a ferocious roar. It started to rise. I blasted it, forcing it onto its belly and underneath the water.

  I switched my attention to Abaddon. The demon had landed amid the Devil’s guard and was speared in many places. It was already on its feet though, wooden stakes sticking out of its underside like po
rcupine quills, staggering as it shambled forward.

  I glanced at Natalie. “Give it everything.”

  We gathered our power, Natalie augmenting mine. To the right, Belinda grabbed another random demon by the neck and twisted. The snap was like a branch breaking but it still clawed at her as it went down, still crawled away with its grotesquely hanging head lolling to one side.

  The Devil was regarding the vampires who’d reached the foot of his throne with a surprised interest. They couldn’t reach him. I knew they needed my help.

  But Abaddon was still coming. Blood leaked from his many wounds, a green seeping arterial mess. One of its huge claws came down on a wounded demon, crushing it and smearing its remains into the ground. Abaddon then lifted its massive set of jaws to bellow at the black night air.

  I unleashed everything. The release of power sent me to my knees. I was temporarily spent and so was Natalie. Our blast struck the roaring demon in its exposed chest and, to my amazement, took it right off its feet and sent it slamming back through statues, cabanas and bars, smashing into the hotel and demolishing part of the wall. The sound was tremendous, the impact devastating. Mortar crumbled.

  Abaddon didn’t move.

  I was on my knees, looking up at Natalie. “We killed it. We killed that bastard.”

  But it was by no means enough. Not yet. Astaroth was rising from the pool. Asmodeus had hit the ground and was shaking itself. Lucifer had risen to his feet and was looking at the dead Abaddon.

  Ceriden started to climb the Devil’s throne.

  I wanted to destroy that throne. It would bring the Devil crashing down, but I couldn’t. Lucy was also there, ascending bone by bone. Surely her new strengths would protect her? I couldn’t risk it. We were so close to victory. I kept Astaroth and Asmodeus at bay, but they were closing in. The Special Forces guys sprayed them with bullets, grenades and missiles, ripping holes in their flesh and drawing forth their life-blood.