The imprisonment imposed upon him by his failure to defeat Apollyon in their last match was fading, allowing him to stretch the limits of his cell, but it was still powerful. It hindered him and stopped him from going where he pleased in his own damned realm.
It had irked him before, in the millennia when he had been allowing the angel to win and keep him imprisoned in the bottomless pit in order to stop the princes of Hell from escaping into the mortal realm and beyond. It pissed him off now that those same princes had escaped the boundaries of Hell and were free.
It pissed him off now that he had seen the valley again.
His thoughts drifted back to it as he issued orders to his men to retrieve information from the three demons who had been allied with the princes. Information was more important now than ever. It was only a matter of time before Heaven desired knowledge on the princes in order to aid their attempt to locate the four rogue fallen angels.
Lucifer wanted all the information that he could get on the bastards, and then he would make Heaven pay dearly for it and his help.
They would have to bargain for it.
He smiled grimly and watched the two senior Hell’s angels go to work on the demons, using their claws to shred the flesh of one and force the other two to talk in order to avoid the same treatment. He had trained his men well. It wasn’t long before one of the demons broke, muttering panicked things to himself about the princes.
Lucifer stepped forwards, his own black nails growing into claws as he approached the babbling brown-skinned demon.
A flash of Nina standing in the valley stopped him in his tracks.
She had looked beautiful bathed in sunlight.
It had threaded her rich auburn hair with gold and the way she had smiled at him, her face aglow with happiness, had almost brought a smile to his lips too.
Had almost given him a share of that joy that had shone in her pale green eyes.
It had faded before taking hold though, driven away by the sight of the valley. It had been centuries since he had locked the doors and shut that small slice of paradise away, because it was a paradise that felt like Hell to him now.
It was a place he had made but couldn’t step into while he was under the laws of Heaven.
He could only enter it in the times when he had won against Apollyon, securing his freedom for a few centuries. He had created it as a substitute for the mortal realm after realising his power negatively affected that fragile world whenever he ventured into it, even when he tried to contain it, and he had no desire to end that plane.
So he had spent time in his valley instead.
Lucifer lowered his hands to his sides and looked at his men, silently issuing them orders to continue with their interrogation.
He didn’t feel like bloodying his hands today.
He backed off a few steps, an unfamiliar heaviness pressing down on his chest.
In his mind, he didn’t see the three demons as his men terrorised them, spilling their vile black blood onto the bleak obsidian ground.
He saw Nina standing in the valley, surrounded by nature, seemingly at one with the beauty.
As if she had been made for that place.
For him.
She was light with a seed of darkness inside her heart.
He was darkness with a flicker of light.
A sigh escaped him and the yellow eyes of the demon on the right of the three narrowed in a way he didn’t like, one that said the male knew something was affecting him and he wasn’t his usual self.
Lucifer flicked his left hand forwards and the male’s head exploded, showering black blood and bone over three of his men and the demon beside him. One of Lucifer’s men looked back at him and he snarled, flashing his fangs as his eyes briefly burned crimson, warning the wretch to return to his work before he suffered the same fate as the demon.
The fallen angel wisely obeyed.
Lucifer huffed and tried to keep his mind off Nina and the valley, but it was impossible. She constantly filled his head, was all he could think about and had been from the moment he had set eyes on her in the courtyard.
He tried to focus on something else, but the something else his mind chose was the valley, and he immediately pictured her in it.
It had given him both joy and pain to take Nina there. Joy he had gained from seeing how much she enjoyed the world of his creation. Pain he had gained from being unable to remain there with her as she had wished.
He looked over his shoulder, his gaze scanning the winding path that cut across the cragged bleak land to the spires of rock that rose in a curved wall around the courtyard of his fortress. A fortress that had towers so high their roofs melted into the dark ceiling of Hell.
His home.
She waited there.
For him?
Fuck, if he was feeling honest with himself, he had been waiting for her the entire fourteen hours she had been in the valley. He had tried to work, had attempted to focus on his duties and the things that required his attention. In the end, he had drifted around the castle, feeling for the first time just how cold and empty it could be.
Because he had wanted to be elsewhere.
With her.
He turned back to face the castle, filled with a pressing need to return to her. It had nothing to do with seeing her again, or hearing her voice, or smelling the soft fragrance of her fading perfume.
It had everything to do with business. He needed to return to her and ensure that she was obeying his command to stay in her apartment, and also to see if she had remembered anything else about Mihail.
His men were under strict orders not to enter her room and to teleport if she dared to venture into the corridors or other rooms, but the chances of her seeing one of them in their natural form of an angel was still too high for his liking. She seemed to take seeing his powers in her stride, was coping well with the things he had revealed to her to test her mind and see whether perhaps he could push her a little again to make her remember things, but he knew that if she saw his men for what they really were, it would be too much. It would break her.
That was the only reason he was returning and the only reason he was keeping her locked away.
It had nothing to do with any sort of desire to protect her or spend time with her.
He walked the snaking path back to the fortress, his gaze on it the entire time, shutting out the black lands around him.
It would have been quicker to teleport, but shifting the passage to the separate plane where the valley existed from its original location to Nina’s room, and then turning day into night for her had expended a vast amount of his powers, weakening him. Looking back, he should have walked to the prison and teleported back, but he had wanted to reach it quickly.
Because he had wanted to return to her.
Lucifer shoved that thought out of his head and clenched his fists to stop them from trembling. He cursed the sign of weakness, one he hoped his men hadn’t noticed. It was only temporary. Within the hour, he would be back at full strength.
If he had realised that altering the valley would drain him so fiercely, he wouldn’t have done it.
He snorted at that.
Fuck, he could even taste his own lies now.
He would have done it even if it had killed him.
He would have done it because he had wanted nothing else in that moment than seeing the pleasure and astonishment he had known Nina would feel on seeing the stars and the valley bathed in moonlight.
He had wanted to impress her.
“You seem awfully distracted today.” The deep male voice coming from his left instantly drove thoughts of Nina from his mind and he teleported a short distance on instinct, placing some land between him and the angel.
“Venturing beyond the boundaries of your prison again?” Mihail ran ice-blue eyes over him and shifted his weight to maintain his balance on the tall basalt rock near the path.
Lucifer sneered at him for daring to look down on him and flexe
d his fingers at his sides, his claws emerging as he thought about bringing the angel down to the level where he belonged.
Under Lucifer’s feet.
“I am well within the boundary.” He calmly pointed to the invisible wall that surrounded him but Mihail’s cold eyes didn’t move from him.
The angel spread his glossy pure white wings, an intimidation tactic that might work on the lower angels, but failed to make an impact on Lucifer. The span of Mihail’s wings was nothing compared with that of his own.
The wings he had once possessed anyway.
Now he possessed only a shadow of them, but they were both beautiful and terrifying, fitting for a king of Hell.
They burst from his back, ripping through the fine material of his suit jacket, and he spread them. The black shadows fluttered, forming shapes like feathers for the briefest of moments before shifting and regrouping, in a constant state of flux. Their span exceeded that of Mihail’s wings and the angel raised a pale eyebrow at him, his eyes turning colder as he glared at Lucifer. It seemed the little servant of Heaven hadn’t realised he possessed wings again.
He now possessed far more than mere wings.
Lucifer threw his right hand forwards, unleashing a black orb of energy that shot directly towards Mihail. The angel’s icy eyes widened and he kicked off, launching into the air just as the orb struck the rock. It exploded, blasting black fragments in all directions. Mihail grunted as the tiny splinters hit the backs of his bare thighs, each leaving a red streak on his golden skin.
None touched Lucifer.
They bounced off the invisible wall of his power and onto the black ground, tumbling away from him.
“An unprovoked attack?” Mihail sneered at him, beating his broad white wings to keep him stationary in the air. His black armour seemed to suck all light from around him, making the dull white inlay stand out, revealing the pictures of demons being defeated by men carved on it. “That is rather like you.”
“I did not think you had come to talk.” Lucifer threw his other hand forwards, unleashing another ball of energy that expanded as it rocketed towards the angel.
Mihail beat his wings and shot left, evading it, his long white ponytail streaming over his right shoulder.
“I have not.” The angel halted in the air again and drew a white blade from it. “I have come to take the mortal female from you.”
Lucifer frowned at that.
Why would the bastard want to take her back rather than use her against him?
It didn’t matter.
It wasn’t going to happen.
Lucifer lowered his head and glared through his lashes at the angel hovering above him, his lips peeling back off his emerging fangs as he growled.
Nina was under his protection now.
He wouldn’t surrender her to Mihail.
Mihail quirked a pale eyebrow at him, curiosity crossing his wretched face for a heartbeat before it turned to horror.
Lucifer pressed his wrists together and shoved both of his hands forwards, snarling as he unleashed a blast of black energy directly at the angel. Mihail attempted to dodge it, but it caught his right wing and sent him tumbling through the air. Lucifer didn’t give him a chance to recover. He kicked off and beat his shadow wings, shooting towards the angel as he attempted to right himself.
He roared as he pulled a flaming black blade out of the air at his side and launched it in a sweeping curve, aiming straight for Mihail’s neck. Mihail’s blue eyes grew enormous and he twisted at the waist, his bare stomach rippling with the effort to turn himself in time. His white blade came up and Lucifer snarled out his fury as it blocked his strike and pressed forwards, driving the angel backwards through the air.
Mihail grunted and tried to shove forwards to counter him.
No use.
Lucifer grinned and swept his arm out and the angel went flying backwards, sailing through the air with his wings streaming past him and the most wonderfully shocked look on his face.
A jolt of pleasure ran through Lucifer, igniting a hunger to see the angel begging for mercy at his feet.
He beat his wings, each sweep of them gaining urgency, born of that hunger to finally defeat the one angel capable of defeating him.
Mihail hit the enormous black spires of stone that surrounded the courtyard, but not as Lucifer had anticipated it. The male struck them with his feet first, coming into a vertical crouch, and kicked off. The force of the pressure he exerted to launch himself back towards Lucifer cracked the rock and Lucifer growled as a whole spire collapsed, crashing into the courtyard.
He had only just fixed it up after Asmodeus had killed a fucking dragon in it, the creature’s lava-like blood destroying half of the pavement.
Lucifer flew harder, clutching his sword in his left hand and hurling his right one forward to unleash another blast of energy. He put more of his power into it this time, all of his fury and hunger to kill.
It shot towards Mihail, expanding rapidly until it was three times the size of the angel, easily able to swallow him whole.
Mihail rolled at the last second, spiralling out of the path of the orb.
Leaving it on a direct course for Lucifer’s castle.
“No!” Lucifer bellowed and teleported in an instant, reappearing in the path of the blast, between it and the fortress.
He sent his sword away and shoved both hands forwards, at the orb shooting towards him, and braced himself for contact, focusing all of his power on his hands so he could contain the orb and attempt to change its course.
It hit him hard and he grunted as the blow knocked the air from his lungs and hurled him backwards. The energy seared his palms, hotter than the boiling lakes of Hell, and he gritted his teeth as his suit jacket caught fire, rapidly burning away and taking his shirt with it, leaving only tatters behind. Shadows streamed from his arms, sinking deep into the orb.
The fortress loomed behind him and Lucifer growled as he beat his wings, twin feelings he hadn’t experienced in a long time surfacing within him to devour him as he struggled with the ball of dark energy.
He had to stop it from striking the castle.
He couldn’t fail.
If he did, Nina could be injured.
Or worse.
He threw his head back and roared as he flew harder, each desperate beat of his wings draining his strength, making him shake from weakness, until he was struggling to breathe. Fear closed his throat. Despair and doubt filled his heart, mocking him. He was going to fail again.
He was going to fail her.
He was going to kill her.
He would protect Nina with his life if it came to it.
His hands began to melt into the black ball of energy and he cried out as it burned him again, destroying his fingers first before it ate away at his palms, gnawing up to his wrists. He shoved more desperately, his teeth gritted against the pain and his fangs cutting into his lower lip. It was no use. He couldn’t slow the blast enough, not even with his shadows countering it, attempting to consume the energy back into him.
He looked back at the castle.
There was only one thing he could do, but it would leave him vulnerable to Mihail. The angel would easily be able to kill him, and then he would take Nina.
Lucifer realised he was going to lose no matter what he did.
And he didn’t like it.
It brought memories back to the surface, pain that refused to die and haunted him every day of his life.
He had been filled with such cold certainty before in his long existence.
Back when he had realised that no matter what he did, he would not escape the pit and he would not be allowed to return to his beloved home in Heaven.
But this time he had a choice.
He could choose to save Nina.
He could sacrifice himself for her sake.
She was worthy of such an act.
He focused all of his power, digging his shadows into the orb to anchor it to him, and teleported
.
He reappeared close the plateau, with his back to the wall of rock that supported it, facing the castle. It shimmered through the black orb, just visible to him. The last of his strength left him and his shadows faded, but he kept his eyes on the fortress and his thoughts with Nina as his grip on the orb disappeared.
The energy pulsed over him and he tossed his head back, arching violently forwards as he bellowed in agony, so loud the ground trembled and the air vibrated with his roar.
Pain devoured him.
It ate his awareness of anything but it, blazed so deep in his bones that he was sure they were burning to ashes just as his hands had, that he was going to be consumed by his own power and this was the end for him.
Numbness followed it.
And then voices.
He cracked his sore eyes open, trying to seek the source of those voices, sure that it was Mihail and his men come to kill him.
A broadly-built male with familiar black hair and golden eyes towered over him, his obsidian armour as glossy as the raven wings furled against his back. Beside him, a petite hazel-eyed female lingered, her hand clasping his and the softness in her gaze making Lucifer want to end his own life.
The male nudged him with the toe of his black leather boot.
Lucifer bared his fangs at the angel of his own creation and shoved onto his knees, and paused when he saw he had hands again. He stared at them, and then slowly shifted his focus to the woman. Liora. A powerful witch.
She tucked her long chestnut hair behind her ear and smiled, and it was enough to make Lucifer want to vomit.
The witch had restored his hands for him.
The perfect end to a shitty fucking day.
He owed her and she knew it.
It was bad enough that Asmodeus had witnessed everything, and Lucifer knew from the smug look on the maggot’s face that he had witnessed everything. The fight against Mihail and what had followed as he had attempted to protect his castle from his own energy blast. Not only that, but Mihail was gone.
Dark and Damaged: Eight Tortured Heroes of Paranormal Romance: Paranormal Romance Boxed Set Page 51