by Ivy Asher
“Toreon?”
He shakes his head as if he’s trying to clear it of something and holds up his hands as I step closer to him.
“It’s Morax’s compulsion,” he grits out as he takes another step away from me. “I think it’s kicking back in now that I’m no longer on the verge of dying.”
“Oh, fuck,” Delta says.
Toreon tries to grab onto one of the shelves, his fingers curling to grip the sides, but his body is at war with himself. “I have to go. I can’t stop it,” he growls, furious.
Vudu grips his arm, holding him in place, but Toreon’s body thrashes against the hold, even as his expression shows how hard he’s trying to fight it.
“We need a plan,” Delta says. “Quick. We need to go make an appearance now, before any more time passes and Morax grows suspicious.”
She’s right. Even though a lot happened, it’s been in a very short amount of time. Hopefully, we can still pull this off. But like she said, we have to hurry and get to the party.
I nod and look over at Vudu. “Can you take care of Shateel? We can’t kill her. We need to keep our disguises.”
Vudu can’t do more than nod, because Toreon starts really fighting against him, the compulsion riding him hard. Vudu uses his massive size and muscles to his advantage, but even he’s straining to hold Toreon back.
“I think Vudu should stay behind too,” Medley declares. At my frown, she rushes on. “We need someone to watch Shateel, make sure she doesn’t wake up and do something to sabotage us, but he can also watch the tunnel for us—closed or open.”
“You’re right,” I agree before looking at Vudu. It will be a good idea to have an escape route. “You okay with that?”
“Yes,” he grunts, just as he takes an elbow to the gut from Toreon.
“Toreon, is the compulsion pushing you to make a portal anywhere in particular? Can you stay down here and get to work slowly on what he’s ordered you to do?” I ask, hoping there’s a way we can all stay together or near each other, somehow, and stall Toreon’s portal-making so that he doesn’t drain himself.
“No, I have to go to the Origin Stone in Nihil. That’s where I’m supposed to build my portal,” he informs me, and worry creases Vudu’s brow.
I curse and try to figure out if there’s some way other than just letting Toreon go to execute what he’s being forced to. Maybe I can see if my darkness can shield him too? I dismiss that thought right away, because unfortunately, there’s no time to experiment.
“Let me go. You all know where I’ll be. The quickest way to end the compulsion is to kill Morax,” Toreon states, and the rest of us share a look, time breathing down our backs.
“Let him go,” I agree hesitantly, not seeing any other way around the compulsion until Morax is dealt with.
He immediately releases Toreon’s arms, and then Vudu leans down and places a searing kiss on my lips, surprising me. It doesn’t even last a second, but it brands me. “Be careful, little mate.”
“You too,” I offer, my tone slightly stunned and my hormones begging me to reach up on my tiptoes and get a little more.
Vudu runs his fingers down the sleeve of my dress before he steps back, moving to where Shateel is still unconscious on the floor. He hauls her up and then throws her unceremoniously back into the tunnel where she lands with a satisfying thump. Vudu closes the tunnel off with bars made of the earth itself.
I take a fortifying breath and turn to my sisters. “Let’s go.”
Toreon is already at the door and throwing it open, so we jog to catch up to him. I toss a look over my shoulder, seeing Vudu take up position in front of the barred tunnel, and I give one last plea to the universe that somehow we’ll pull this off. I won’t say goodbye. I refuse. So for now, I shove all my emotions into tidy little boxes to be unpacked later when shit isn’t about to hit the fan.
Leaving the wine cellar, we find an empty hallway, and all four of us go on high alert as we walk swiftly but quietly down the stone corridor lit with low burning sconces.
“You know where you’re going, Gatekeeper?” Delta asks, our steps rushing to keep up.
“We’re in the Sin of Gluttony’s palace. The Ophidian used a very detailed compulsion, so I know where to go.”
“Where?” I ask, holding up my skirt so I don’t trip.
“I’m going east and outside to the Origin Stone. It’s the shortest dimensional distance from Heaven and Hell.”
We reach the end of the corridor, and it spills us out into a large, empty room with nothing but four different flights of stairs, two leading up and two leading down. “You three need to go upstairs. Just follow the noise, and you’ll find the party,” Toreon tells us.
“Got it,” Delta says as she and Medley hurry over to the first stairway that leads up, leaving Toreon and I to have a moment alone.
Toreon spins around and grips my cheeks, though his feet won’t let him stop moving. “I wish you had your real face right now, but I’m going to kiss you anyway,” he says, and then he does just that, with so much heart in it that it makes my toes curl. And then it’s over, way too soon. “Kill that bastard and then come find me.”
“I will,” I answer with unwavering determination.
In a flash, he pulls away, his body immediately disappearing down a flight of stairs, and I have to swallow down a lump of emotion.
“Sable, hurry,” Medley calls, and I turn and race after my sisters, not giving myself time to worry about Toreon or what he’s about to do. I just hope he got enough of a power charge through the bond with Vudu so that he can do whatever he needs to do without getting hurt.
Taking up the rear, my sisters and I head up the stairs. While I hold my annoying skirt up, Delta and Medley are busy trying to hold theirs down. “If I flash y’all at some point while we’re runnin’, you’re just gonna have to deal with it,” Medley says. “This outfit ain’t fit for scythin’ or runnin’ around faster than a raccoon chasin’ a rollin’ trash can, I can tell you that.”
Delta laughs. “I already had to bathe naked with you tonight. What’s a little mooning after that?”
I smile and shake my head at the easy banter, thanking my lucky stars I’m not having that problem. I look down at myself, remembering that I just kneeled in Vudu’s blood and wondering if I look like something right out of the movie Carrie. I don’t spot a speck of blood on my skin, which surprises me at first, since I know I should have plenty of it on my hands and arms, but then I realize that I probably just soaked it up like Toreon and Vudu do with mine. Neat trick.
“Can you guys tell I have blood all over the bottom of my dress?” I ask as we hike up another flight of stairs, and then at the landing we start to jog down a long corridor that looks to have more stairs situated at the end of it. At least we weren’t forced to wear heels tonight. Small mercies.
Delta looks at me over her shoulder. “No. Thank fuck you’re wearing black, though.”
This next staircase is a little more promising than the plain stone steps we just ran up though, because there’s a carpet running down the center of it. Hopefully we’re getting closer to civilization.
“You were a total badass back there, Sable,” Delta tells me. “You scythed the fuck out of those demons. It made me all giddy and shit.”
I let out a surprised laugh. “Umm, thanks.”
“It’s awesome, isn’t it? When you’re holding the scythe? It makes you feel…”
“Powerful,” Medley finishes for her, and I nod in complete agreement.
“Did you name your scythes yet?” Delta asks us, our steps in sync as we continue to climb.
I blink at her back. “Are we supposed to?”
“Yep. Our scythes have feelings or something. They like to be named.”
“I thought of a name for mine,” Medley supplies.
“Don’t hold us in suspense,” Delta replies.
“Dolly Parton,” Medley says with a grin.
“Dolly Parton?” Delta repeats.
“Yeah, because she’s kinda top heavy, but she also knows how to cut a bitch.”
Delta and I both snort. “You’re so country, Medley,” Delta teases.
“What did you name yours?” I ask Delta.
“I named mine the Queen of Hearts, or Red Queen for short, because she wants to take Morax’s fucking head off,” she replies cheerfully. I can’t help but grin. My sisters are my kind of crazy.
“What about you, Sable?” Medley calls.
“Umm…” The answer immediately pops into my head. “Monster.”
Delta hums while Medley looks over her shoulder at me with a knowing smile. Because I don’t hide from monsters anymore. With my scythe, I’m the monster. Morax’s demons should be hiding from me.
The three of us are huffing a little by the time we get to the top, but it’s clear that we’re finally getting somewhere. The white walls are now embellished with portraits and crown molding, but we don’t stop to wonder which hallway or door we should take. We just keep going, heading straight ahead and hoping for the best.
“Speakin’ of bein’ badass,” Medley begins. “You sure picked up the darkness thing quick, Del,” she says. “I was so worried when we came back to the dungeon that you wouldn’t have enough time to master it, but you did it!”
“Yeah,” I agree. “And you guys were good. Even I thought you were under compulsion.”
Delta beams and walks backward for a moment so she can look at me. “Right? I fucking was badass! Which I’m totally not humble about because nothing has come easy to me. Not like it has with Medley. But as soon as she explained about the darkness...I don’t know, it just made sense. I knew exactly how to block him.”
“We’re gonna hand the Ophidian his two-bit behind on a Hell platter,” Medley says as Delta whirls back around to bump her fist.
We blindly take the turn down another hallway, and things begin to look even more homey, with fancier lantern sconces and plush carpets. I realize, as we’re hurrying past what I first assumed were family portraits or landscapes hanging up on the walls, that they’re actually paintings of food or drinks. For every single painting. Overflowing wine, decadent cakes, rich cheeses, hunks of steaming meat...I’ll say this for the decorative choice, it’s incredibly lifelike.
“Fucking Gluttony,” I hear Delta say with a shake of her head.
“It’s making me hungry,” I admit, making both my sisters snort.
At the end of the hallway, Medley nearly barrels straight into a short female who comes through a doorway carrying a bag of trash and wearing a plain gray outfit that looks like something a janitor would wear.
“Sorry!” Medley says, her sweet Southern twang coming out even inside the foreign body. “Didn’t see ya there!”
“Imp,” Delta mutters to me before she steps forward to address the creature that looks like a shorter version of the Wicked Witch of the West with her curved nose and green-apple skin. “I went down to the cellar to get more wine for our guests, but I heard voices and found these two in there,” she says, owning her maid costume before leaning into the imp conspiratorially. “We imbibed a little too much if you catch my drift,” she fake whispers with a grin. “Gluttony, am I right?”
The imp glares at her.
“Anyway, I got all turned around. Can you point us in the right direction of the party?” she asks sweetly, while Medley gives a very convincing drunken hiccup.
The imp rolls her eyes as if she has seen too much of this shit, but then she points a spindly finger at the doorway she just came from.
“Thanks!” Delta calls, and then the three of us waste no time rushing through.
“Fuck a duck, more stairs,” Delta curses as we find just that inside the room.
Luckily, once we reach the top of this staircase, we hear it. The hum of music. The raucous noise of a crowd. All we have to do now is follow the noise, just like Toreon said.
The three of us stop, doing a quick sweep of the room of marble, noting the pillars and bourbon-colored rug, and the life-sized portraits of more gluttonous spreads. Down a wide corridor, there’s a huge arched entryway where we can see the party is in full swing, all kinds of sounds and glittering light spilling out from it. Beside it, along the long wall, there’s a set of closed double doors, and we head right for it to stay out of sight.
“Alright, clothes check,” Medley says as we come to a stop, and the three of us immediately start to straighten our dresses and smooth our hair.
“Plan?” I ask as I check my hands and wrists and see that all I have to show for the slices in my skin are faint pink lines on my palms and wrists. This quick healing thing is amazing.
“Okay, we spread out when we get in there. We still don’t know what Morax looks like, but I clocked a couple of the Abdicated,” Delta says. “If you remember any of them, keep track so that we can weed them out. If anyone gets into trouble, just tug on our connection. We all need to try to find the Seven Sins of Lucifer’s inner circle and warn them. The last thing we want is for shit to go down and for them to think we’re on the wrong side, but we’ll have to be careful. We’re going to be watched, and Morax and the other Abdicated might realize that the guards and Shateel are missing. We just have to play our parts of mind-controlled dolls and hope Morax is cocky enough not to question too much.”
Medley and I nod in agreement as the three of us start making our way through the room. The further we walk across the marble floor, the louder the party becomes.
“The rest...we’ll have to make up as we go,” Delta admits with a wince.
“It’ll be just fine,” Medley says, her hips swaying with forced confidence. “We go in, we work our puppet-faced charms, and we ruin Morax’s plan.”
“Then we kill him,” I growl.
“Damn right,” Delta says with a grin. “Then we fucking kill him.”
Medley beams. “Let’s do this.”
28
I try not to fidget as I count to fifteen and wait my turn to push through the doors that lead into the party. I study a painting of ham and ignore my stomach as it gurgles with interest. We decided that it was best if we didn’t enter all at once. Individually, we have a better chance at slipping in and blending, which is why I’m waiting here on the other side of the tall walnut doors and trying not to pace.
My stomach growls loudly as I look at the stupid ham painting for the fiftieth time. Maybe there’ll be food inside. Then again, from what Toreon and Medley have said, the food in Hell can be pretty weird, so it’s probably best to ignore any hors d’oeuvre trays passing my way and just focus on tracking down the Seven Sins and figuring out who Morax is.
As I wait, I run through the scant few faces of the Abdicated that I can recall from Morax’s lair. Then I mentally go over Delta’s details about the Sins and what they look like as though I’m working through flash cards in preparation for a test. I pay careful attention to what Tazreel is supposed to look like. Delta said he was tan with long blond hair and sepia-like wings. I guess we also get our gray eyes from him, but Medley mentioned Tazreel’s have gold bits around the pupil.
The plan is to find him, give him some code word about how he fucked a pixie, and then get him to help us and warn the other Sins. I’m trying to be clinical about it all. I tell myself I’m meeting the Sin of Pride, not the man responsible for my existence. No big deal at all. From the sound of things, he’s not exactly the fatherly type anyway, which is fine, because I’ve never had that and probably wouldn’t even know what to do with one.
The fact that I’m going to have to approach him and try to get him to recognize me and the dire situation my sisters and I are in is a little intimidating, though. And apparently, I’m the only sister dressed like someone Tazreel would listen to, so I automatically drew the short straw.
My stomach grumbles again, and I push my palms against it, only to realize that I stopped counting.
Shit. Was I on ten Mississippi or thirteen Mississippi? I sigh. No time like the present I guess.
<
br /> I pull in a deep cleansing breath and let Hell’s air work its magic, helping me to feel less anxious. I smooth my dress down one more time, making sure all the parts of my disguised body are tucked away where they’re supposed to be, and then I shove my nerves and worry away as I crack open one side of the double doors and slip inside the giant ballroom that looks like it’s dripping in diamonds.
The entire room is various shades of creams and whites, with house-sized sparkling chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and patterns in the stone walls and floor that seem to catch the light and glisten somehow. It’s all breathtaking and beautiful in a way that doesn’t even seem real.
The crowd inside is boisterous, glammed out, and completely immersed in conversations, drinking, or eating. Some are even dancing gracefully at the center of the room, as if Hell has a ballroom dancing requirement. Medley said Delta’s first party had an orgy section, and honestly, I was expecting something similar here too, but it all looks very refined and civilized. Maybe the orgies happen later?
If it weren’t for the mass of wings everywhere or the other indicators like horns, tails, tentacles, and hooves, I wouldn’t even think I’m in a room full of demons right now. And not just any demons, but the upper crust of Hell, or maybe down here the lower crust is better...I’m not quite sure. Either way, this party looks like any other regular run of the mill, hoity-toity event. Not that I’ve ever been to one, but this is definitely what I would picture in my head at being told I’m going to go rub elbows with the Hellish one percent.
As I move further into the room, I discreetly scan the crowd for Delta and Medley, but I don’t see them anywhere. I do a quick check-in and feel that they’re fine through our bonds, and that serves to further steady me as I start searching for Tazreel or any of the other Sins.
Find Pride and keep my eyes peeled for Morax and his Abdicated pricks. That’s my mission, and I repeat it over and over in my head to stay focused.
Though my task is easier said than done. Because as I walk around the crowd, doing my best to stick to the edge of the room, I realize that there are too many demons in here to count, and it’s completely overwhelming. I don’t know how I’m going to pick out the demons I’m looking for.