King of Hell (The Shadow Saga)

by Christopher Golden

  In the night sky, Octavian saw a falcon he assumed must be Allison. It flew down toward a Lexus that had slipped halfway into a hole in the ground and alighted on the grill, where wings flowed into arms and it grew to become not Allison, but Charlotte. A moment later Allison stalked from between two cars, dragging a massive devil across the ground with her fingers thrust into its eye sockets.

  "I am the King of Hell!" Lazarus declared, and as Octavian watched, the sorcerer began to levitate himself in an armor of purple-black light that spilled from his eyes, but he didn't attack, confused by Danny's arrival with such powerful Demon Lords.

  The spell Lazarus had used to attack Octavian had weakened with his distraction. He looked down to see that the wound in his abdomen had almost completely healed. Octavian was not yet fully whole, but he gripped the handle of his sword and stood, tearing free of the remaining wisps of Lazarus's magic as if it were nothing more than cobwebs.

  Danny glanced around at the demons gathered there. They sensed the power in him, just as Octavian did. Just as Lazarus must.

  "You're nothing!" Danny shouted. "You worked the system and bought votes to get yourself the throne. You're not a king, you're a fucking politican!"

  Octavian could feel Lazarus's fury. With the Lords looking on, he had to do more than attack — he had to defend himself.

  "Tell me!" Lazarus shouted. "Before I have my legions tear you apart, who are you that you think you can speak to me this way and live?"

  Danny kept walking, marching across the pavement and shattered glass and dead demons to stand just below Lazarus, staring up at the sorcerer with defiance in his gleaming red eyes.

  "I am Orias, son of Oriax, of the bloodline of Shaitan himself," Danny said. He grinned, and the cruelty in that expression made Octavian shudder with the thought of what the young man had sacrificed this night. "I'm the rightful king of Hell, motherfucker, and I command every denizen of the inferno to cease hostilities and return with me to perdition immediately."

  Lazarus seemed about to argue when Lord Malephar loosed another earthshaking cry, and its meaning seemed clear. This is your king. Obey him.

  Danny — Orias — glanced only once at Octavian, but it was clear the demon despised him. Then Danny turned and began to walk back into the atrium, where he stood by the portal and watched as Lazarus's army marched one by one through the bloody pool that hung in the air, returning from whence they had come.

  Squire nodded to Danny — Octavian saw the moment pass between them, steeped in regret and farewell — and then the hobgoblin went to stand by a dented Dodge Caravan. Allison, Charlotte, and the blond vampire Octavian didn't know emerged from the throng of departing demons to stand beside him.

  "No!" Lazarus screamed. "You can't do this! The others support me! I am the king!"

  Some of the demons hesitated, but only for a moment. Lord Haagenti came along behind them, and if this ancient, cosmic evil had chosen to follow Orias, son of Oriax, they would not argue.

  Lazarus turned to face Octavian. He looked lost and desperate, but then his hatred returned, magnified a hundredfold, and the purple-black magic that burned around him flared outward like wings of malevolent fire.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Phoenix's World

  Ardsley-on-Hudson, New York, USA

  Lazarus shifted his eyes only slightly — a tiny glance to the left, where Allison and the other Shadows had alighted on and around an overturned car — but it was enough for Octavian to notice, and it bought him a precious second or two. Lazarus turned and let loose the torrent of magic that had been building up within him. Huge arcs of bruise-purple light churned toward Allison, Alex, Charlotte, and the blond Octavian didn't know. Allison and Alex dove to take cover behind a car and Charlotte began to turn to mist, but the blond — too new to her abilities — was slow to react.

  An icy calm had descended upon Octavian. A grim certainty. Double-edged sword clutched in his right hand, he thrust out his left and willed his own magic to manifest. He could feel it in his marrow, and in the roots of his soul, but this time it did not erupt from his hands or eyes. Instead, he drew the magic from the air, summoning a crackling sphere that formed around Alex and the others. Lazarus's attack collided with that shield in a barrage of dark hues and cold flames.

  Entropy, Octavian thought. Lazarus had used the same spell to kill Kazimir, and now he'd tried it again.

  Lazarus screamed in rage and desperation, pouring on his attack, trying to blast through the protective sphere around the four Shadows. His plans had failed — Squire and Danny Ferrick had seen to that — and now he wanted to hurt Octavian in any way he could.

  "Leave them be, Lazarus!" Octavian said, striding across the cracked and buckled pavement toward him. He stepped over the broken corpse of a black-hoofed devil. "Even with your army gone, you can still have your heart's desire. You wanted revenge against me, and here I am!"

  The sorcerer sneered and glanced his way, but instead of turning his attack toward Octavian, Lazarus floated across the lot toward the overturned car around which the four Shadows were arrayed. Thirty feet from them, he faltered slightly. Octavian only felt it because his own magic powered the sphere protecting the Shadows. Lazarus descended to the ground and began to walk rather than levitating himself. His face had turned ashen, the entropy hex leeching strength from him, consuming him from the inside.

  "I will kill you, Peter," Lazarus said, "but not until you've watched your friends die. They were lost in Hell, just as I was, and you came looking for them. You abandoned me, but braved the fires of damnation for them."

  At that, Alex leaped from the overturned car and pushed toward Lazarus, trying to stride out to meet him.

  "You self-centered prick!" Alex shouted, moving forward, forcing Octavian to extend the sphere around her and the others, even as Lazarus's magic raged and burned against it, trying to find a weakness . . . to break through and kill her. "You need to get over yourself."

  Octavian picked up his pace. Sweat slicked the back of his neck. "Alex, no!"

  Lazarus faltered again, but this time it was recognition that caused him to hesitate.

  "Alexandra Nueva," the sorcerer said, eyes almost completely clear of that purple-black mist. "Is it you?"

  "You left me, you piece of shit," Alex said. "Peter and Meaghan and the rest, they didn't know I was alive. But you did, and when the time came when the magic you'd learned could have gotten us both out of Hell, what did you do? You made me your prisoner! Peter should have come back — should have made sure — but what you did was so much worse. Blame him for never coming for you, but you can't blame him for your sins, you son of a bitch. You've got to lay claim to those yourself."

  Lazarus stared at her a moment, but already Octavian saw the barrage of entropic magic that churned against the shield around the Shadows begin to diminish. Charlotte must have noticed as well, because the mist she'd become took human shape again.

  "Is he . . ." the blond began.

  Allison held up a hand to silence her, then shot a hard look at Octavian. They didn't share the telepathy that existed amongst blood-kin, but he knew her well enough that he could almost hear the thought: Finish it.

  Lazarus lowered his hands and the magic stopped flowing from them, purple-black light making afterimages on Octavian's eyes as it faded. The sorcerer nodded once at Alex and then turned toward Octavian.

  "I have sinned," he said. "There's truth in her words. I have made choices that I ought to regret . . . but I regret none of them. If I had not committed those sins, I would not be here to make you regret your own decisions."

  Octavian drew to a halt perhaps ten feet from him, so close that he could see the beads of sweat on Lazarus's forehead and the dark circles under his eyes.

  "I've already told you how sorry I am," Octavian said, and he let the magical protection around the Shadows fade. Charlotte and the blond muttered in concern and dropped behind the car for cover, but he kept his focus on Lazarus. "Unlike you,
I have many regrets, and not finding out for myself whether you still lived will always be among them. But there are others. Opportunities squandered and trusts betrayed. With the long lives we've led, are any of us without such regrets?"

  Lazarus shook with rage, and perhaps with weariness. "You dare to compare —"

  "No," Octavian interrupted. "I'm not comparing. We've both spent too much time in Hell."

  The sorcerer's face turned into a mask of bitter sarcasm. "Oh, listen to the sympathy in your voice. Now, what? Are you going to tell me it's not too late? That you came back from Hell and found love and became a hero, and I can do it, too, if only I would turn toward the light?"

  Octavian narrowed his eyes. "After the things you've done? Not a chance."

  The magic had been simmering inside him and now he unleashed it. Bright copper light erupted from his left hand, burning Lazarus's face for an instant before the sorcerer managed to fight back, casting a hex instead of trying to defend himself. The two mages stood nearly toe to toe, copper fire raging against a fresh wave of indigo, a furnace between them.

  Close enough that Octavian saw the very moment that Lazarus realized his mistake. Too late.

  He drove the sword up through the sorcerer's abdomen at an angle, the point cleaving bone as it punched out through his back. Lazarus grunted, eyes going wide, and sank down onto the sword. His hex faded but did not vanish. Already weakened, and now impaled, he tried to fight on, fueled by madness and vengeance. And yet the resignation in his eyes made Octavian wonder if perhaps he had not been quite so much a madman after all.

  Octavian focused on the spell he'd cast, feeling for the particular frequency and melody in it, and he altered its purpose. It absorbed what little power remained in Lazarus's hex and then expanded into a shimmering blue sphere that immediately contracted around the sorcerer. Octavian released the handle of the sword but when Lazarus tried to reach and draw it out, he found he could not move his arms. Octavian had bound him so tightly that Lazarus was paralyzed.

  "Squire made the sword. It cleaves magic. Whatever connection you do have is being severed."

  The Shadows gathered around Octavian. Allison came up beside him, and then Alex and Charlotte and the one he didn't know.

  "This is Phoenix," Charlotte said, gesturing to the blond.

  "Phoenix," Octavian said, nodding to her in greeting. "Rising from the ashes. I like it."

  "Are you going to kill him?" Phoenix asked, glaring at Lazarus.

  "I'm not sure that's possible," Octavian replied. "But I have something else in mind."

  Broken glass crunched underfoot and Octavian glanced up to see Squire emerging from the wreckage of the hospital atrium. His axe hung from the thong tied to his belt, one side of the blade broken and jagged. The dark blood of demons had spattered his clothes and face and his yellow eyes gleamed with anger.

  "The last of them are leaving," Squire said. "And Danny's gone."

  Octavian felt the weight of his old friend's bitterness and resentment, and he knew that he had earned it. He could have argued that they'd had no choice, that Danny taking up the mantle of his inheritance — sitting on Hell's throne — had saved thousands, perhaps even millions of lives, but what would be the point? Squire knew those things already. The hobgoblin's deepest pain came from the fact that he'd been the one sent to persuade Danny, and the young demon had been unstable to begin with, and easily influenced. When Octavian had sent Squire, he had known that Danny would have a difficult time refusing his last remaining friend. But Squire had known it, as well. Whatever became of Danny now, they were both responsible, and every time Squire looked at Octavian, he would feel the weight of his own guilt.

  "He'll be all right," Octavian replied. "He's the king."

  Squire scowled at him, not even glancing at the Shadows. "Meaning we just painted a big fuckin' target on his back. Yeah, he'll be just fine."

  Octavian knew he ought to say something, but he could think of nothing that would mend the rift between himself and Squire. With luck, the two of them would live for many decades to come, so perhaps time would do what words could not.

  He glanced at Allison. "Watch Lazarus a minute," he said, and strode past Squire.

  Kazimir had died. Lazarus had destroyed Santiago and Taweret as well. Octavian had sacrificed his life as a young man in order to fight the Turks, but all of the bloodshed that resulted had not saved Byzantium. Centuries later, he had safeguarded his entire world from demonic invasions, the goddess of chaos, and other supernatural threats. He had exposed the darkest secrets of the Roman Church. Yet, for all the good he had done, so much anguish had resulted. The ruination of the Vatican sorcerers had left the world exposed. The loss of the Gospel of Shadows had left him unprepared more than once. If he'd had that ancient grimoire, he believed he would have come searching for Lazarus years ago — he had certainly thought about it often enough — and he wondered how different things might have been. How many would still be alive?

  Nikki might have lived long enough for him to become her husband.

  In all of his long life, Octavian had never felt the absence of departed friends more keenly than he did in this moment. He missed Nikki and Meaghan and Father Jack and Keomany — the woman she'd been — and he found that he missed Will Cody most of all. Cody's humor would have been so welcome now.

  The thought of his old friend made Octavian smile, just a little.

  "Peter!" Allison called. "What happened to Kuromaku?"

  "Working on it," he replied.

  With a wave of his hand, he swept all of the glass and twisted metal out of his path, crossed the last few feet of broken pavement and stepped over the window frame and into the hospital atrium. The new portal Naberus had created still shimmered in the midst of the ruined lobby, the bloody red surface smooth and undisturbed by the October breeze. The last of the demons had already passed through and the place had become unsettlingly quiet. Octavian glanced at the oval frame of the portal, a thin ribbon of human flesh and bone that had been manipulated into this shape by the gateway demon. He saw what might have been part of the dead woman's face and looked away, having seen enough of death for one night.

  Octavian stepped over dead demons and the remains of patients and hospital staff until he came to the body he'd been looking for. Kuromaku lay amongst the corpses, his skin a slate gray, cloaked in a sheen of magic that had dimmed considerably and continued to fade even as Octavian knelt by him. He put a hand on Kuromaku's arm, which had the rough texture of stone but remained pliable. A small sigh of relief escaped him and he trembled with the power of all of the emotion that he'd been holding back.

  The hand that touched Kuromaku's flesh began to glow with warm amber light. The most powerful spells he knew all came from deep within him, that core that had nothing to do with flesh or bone but with spirit, but this one seemed to spring from something even deeper.

  A frisson of amber light spread over Kuromaku's still form and his flesh slowly returned to its original hue and texture.

  Kuromaku frowned and groaned, stretched as if waking from a deep sleep, and then opened his eyes. They had no trace of the gleam that had been in them when he had been under Lazarus's control.

  "Hello, brother," Octavian said.

  "I've missed the entire battle, haven't I?" the samurai asked.

  "Mostly," Octavian replied. "But it's not quite over yet."

  He helped Kuromaku up. The Shadow could control every atom in his body, but still the spell that had almost killed him had left him stiff and slow. They turned to walk back out into the chaotic mess the parking lot had become, but Octavian paused when he saw that Phoenix had entered the atrium behind him. The others had remained outside and Octavian could see them standing guard over the rigid, paralyzed form of Lazarus, but Phoenix stood before the portal and stared up at it. Tears of blood streaked her face and she had one hand over her mouth as if to keep from sobbing.

  Realization struck.

  "You knew her," Octavian
said.

  "Her name was Annelise," Phoenix said. "She was a friend of my father's. I can't leave her like this." She turned and looked at Kuromaku and then at Octavian. "Will you burn her? Leave nothing but ashes. I'll let the wind take her. I think she'd have liked that."

  "I can," Octavian said. "But you're a Shadow now. You could do it yourself, if you'd like. You can be the fire that burns her."

  Phoenix hesitated a moment, and then she nodded. From the way she stood, the cant of her head, Octavian realized she wanted privacy. He gestured to Kuromaku and the two of them left the atrium for the last time. Outside, Kuromaku and Allison embraced. Octavian heard the rush and crackle of fire behind him but did not turn around.

  Squire stood a short distance away, gazing across the ravaged lot and through the trees, where they could see the moonlit ripple of the Hudson River below.

  "I know we both did what had to be done," Squire said without looking around. "And I know we have to live with it. I just don't want to be lookin' at your goddamn face as a reminder."

  "One last favor," Octavian said. "And then you never have to see me again."

  "I'll do it," Squire replied, not taking his eyes from the distant, darkened river. "But not for you."

  "Fair enough."

  On the Shadowpaths

  Phoenix hurried to keep up with the others as they marched through infinite darkness. She wrapped her arms around herself for warmth, although she didn't really feel cold. Squire had called these the Shadowpaths, which made it sound as if they were somewhere, but to Phoenix it felt very much like nowhere at all. The ground underfoot felt firm enough, but the couple of times she had begun to stray from the path the terrain had become spongy and uneven. In those moments she had looked into the depths of thick charcoal fog that obscured everything and heard the whispers of hungry things. Now she did her best to keep pace.