by R. S. Black
“Dora?”
I looked at his confused expression. “The kids, Luc. They’re gone.”
The cages were empty. And no matter how far down I ran, it was the same, cage after cage, row after row. There wasn’t even a tingle or awareness of para close to me.
“They must all be gathered. Please, please,” I chanted, begging God to just this once hear the prayers of an abomination.
Yesterday had been loud. The song of the worshippers had been so deafening it’d vibrated up the soles of my heels. Today it was as silent as creeping death. It gave me the chills. And unlike yesterday, there was no golden light to follow; everywhere I looked it was pale misty blue.
I tried to recall the tunnels I’d taken through the convoluted maze to get to the large antechamber. I had to backtrack several times.
“How big is this place?” Luc finally asked, glancing around.
“Huge. Massive.”
We were in the room where Billy and I had crouched on the beams, watching as the kids were yanked from the arms of the adults. Where were the kids? Were we already too late?
“Did you notice different routes into the chamber, or was there only one?” he asked.
“Uh.” I squeezed my eyes shut, thinking. “Yes. A group had led a procession of sheep in from the sides.”
“Okay.” He nodded. “Then it might be best if we split up here. You take straight ahead, and I’ll go left. Hopefully we can circle around and come at them from both sides. Pandora, whatever you do, do not engage until I give the signal.”
I turned. He clapped my shoulder. I glanced at his hand, then at his solemn countenance.
“Keep to the shadows.”
I smiled softly at his use of our ancient battle cry. It’d been centuries since Luc and I had fought side by side. It felt good.
“And you.”
I went north, and ten paces in I smelled the sulfur, stronger than before. It almost seemed to coat my body with a sticky residue, clinging to my pores. I gagged at the stench of rotten eggs. This was different than yesterday. I frowned, fighting my nausea, and began to wrap myself in glamour. I was getting close now.
Ahead, I finally saw the entrance to the room. It was pitch black with thousands of shadowy figures standing unmoving inside.
I crept in, keeping to the walls. The electric slide of parasites radiated up my arms and settled in my brain with an explosion of awareness.
Then the light spewed like a volcano, spearing the room with its red-hot intensity. The statue of Moloch, red hands glowing and ready to accept its deadly offerings, snared my eye.
Cries rang loud as red-robed figures, both vamp and human, tore off their clothing and began to writhe and sing in exultation to their god.
The room looked as if it’d grown in dimension and proportion. As if by magic, it was three times the size it’d been last night. At its center was a steel cage filled with children and more sheep, but what was odd was that not a single one—man or beast—uttered a sound.
I fought to breathe against the excruciating crush of panic.
A black robe walked up to the cage. Was it the same person from yesterday? Was that Vyxyn?
The black robe swung the door open and yanked out a lamb. Oh God, where was Luc? I scanned the room.
I couldn’t find him.
The animal was unnaturally quiet, as if thralled. It didn’t utter a sound even as the black robe picked it up and slung it over its shoulder. The black robe turned and carried the lamb toward a gray slab of stone.
Yells, chants, and whistles erupted. The thunderous volume vibrated the very rocks.
In all the chaos another figure darted in, this one dressed in a red robe. It was wrapped in glamour so tight that no one else seemed to notice it. This time it yanked out three children. But these screamed—cried and kicked—and in the tussle one of the kids managed to shimmy up the figure’s robe. I caught a flash of its naked ankle and the undeniable mark of Nephilim.
I couldn’t wait for Luc, not another second. I shoved through the group intoxicated by the promise of bloodshed. I screamed for Luc. But over the madness it didn’t matter. I doubted anyone heard or cared. To them I was another voice in a crowd.
The red robe slapped one of the children’s faces, spinning the little girl around until she dropped to the ground. A scarlet trail leaked from her lip.
“Oh, Luc!” I screamed. Then I saw him racing out of a tunnel toward the slab and the black robe.
I kicked vamps out of my way. But still they pressed in on me. I wasn’t gonna make it in time. “Oh please, please don’t let this happen.”
My panic began to give way to a burning anger, and I could feel my claws sharpen, my eyes turn.
The red robe straddled one of the children. Jubilant screams and songs rose up around me. Eerie howls of glee shivered down my spine like cold, wet fingers. The air sizzled with the lust of both human and vamp.
I was almost there. I shoved two more people out of my way. The kids battled for their life. They bit and kicked at the red robe, pounding small fists into the back of its head even as the knife came crashing down into the body of the one it straddled.
“No!” And something inside me snapped. Pandora was gone, and in her place something wicked came.
I swatted, clawed, and killed until finally I reached the robe. I pummeled my fist into its head, snapping its head back and unmasking the Neph.
I blinked. So shocked it startled the demon to silence.
“Pandora, please.” Kemen held up his hand. “This isn’t what it looks like.”
“Pandora gone,” Lust growled. “You’re next.”
I reached for the sword in my scabbard and pulled it free.
Kemen stood, kicking at the children who screamed and cried, “Why did you hurt us? Why?”
Something was wrong. I could sense it, feel it. I screamed at Lust to go away, but she was firmly in control.
No. Stop. This is wrong. Not Kemen. I tried to shake Lust’s grip, tried to regain control of my body, but I was too weak and she was too strong.
Kemen didn’t even move, or try to defend himself. He stared at me with huge sad eyes as I skewered his belly with my blade.
Lust threw her head back and laughed, kicking him to the ground. She straddled his body, smearing his blood on her hands.
Noooooo! I shouted over and over until my throat grew hoarse. I could feel myself grow stronger, begin to take back control of my body.
Lust sensed it and panicked as she started to lose dominion. Her panic spurred her on. She sharpened her claws and sank them deep into his chest, ripping out his heart. He jerked, but was still alive. Hand covering the hole in his body as he tried to stem the flow of blood.
“Pandora...” His voice was feeble, weak.
Lust licked her lips. There were two souls inside my body. Mine and Lust’s. And we were waging war against each other.
I slapped at the demon, kicked her. Fought my way out of the little black box of consciousness she’d trapped me in.
She stood and poised the tip of her sword at the base of his throat.
“Neph, don’t.” A new voice, a low growl. I knew that voice. It washed over me, slamming Lust with a wave of sexual desire.
“Bi...lly...” And for a fraction of time the voice was mine, but then Lust took control again and growled, “Not stop us.”
I grabbed hold of Lust’s soul with my vaporous fingers and squeezed her. She hissed. “Pandora. Let go,” she huffed.
No. You will not kill him. You will not.
Then she slammed her awareness against mine, and it was like having ten thousand bolts of electrical impulses run through my brain, frying cognizant thought and any control I’d had. I cried and jerked. My grip on her went slack for a second. That was all it took.
She cackled and swung the blade at Kemen’s neck, lopping it off.
I shrieked, and pummeled her as I slipped into the madness of grief. Then a body slammed into me, arms wrapped around
mine. Then another body, and another.
Little arms around my neck. Mouths on my calves biting and grinding. I grunted, trying to shake them off.
Clapping.
“Well played, Neph. Well played,” said a small bell-like voice. A little Asian girl walked up to me, wide grin splitting her face. I drowned in her black liquid gaze, lost to the tumultuous swirl of silver dancing through her eyes.
The discovery of shock hit my demon full in the face. The little girl was really a demon in disguise, and I’d recognize the evil glint in her eyes any day. Her name was Chaos, second in command to Wrath.
Lust’s fear raced through my body like venom pumping through blood. I’ve always had the awareness of sharing my body with another, but for the first time in my life I felt alone and abandoned. Lust had tucked tail and run. She’d hid so deep in my consciousness I could no longer sense her.
Chaos snapped her fingers, and a shimmering net, its luminous strands nearly invisible, spread around us. The humans and vamps continued on in worship, not one glancing in our direction. We were suspended in a different plane of existence. A realm separate and yet part of present reality.
“Oh no,” was all I could say in that moment when the reality of my circumstances finally hit home. The kids crawling on me weren’t kids at all, but more demons. LCDs, to be exact. That was why I kept smelling sulfur, because this cavern was crawling with full-blooded demons. How many of the kids I’d seen had actually been kids?
Oh my God. Oh my God. OhmyGodohmyGod...
The one on my back stopped moving, as if waiting for Chaos to give some form of acknowledgement.
“Hello, sister,” Chaos spat. The “s” in sister flickered with the sibilant sound of a snake’s tongue. She grabbed my chin, yanked my head down, and pierced my flesh with her black-clawed hand. My blood trickled down her chubby fingers and she giggled.
“Chaos,” I snarled, the horror of my mistake only just beginning to take root. Kemen hadn’t been killing children. He’d been killing LCD.
Chaos had taken a form I’d never seen her use before. But Lust recognized her brethren. Of all Wrath’s creations, Chaos was at the top of the pecking order.
“It was you, wasn’t it?”
She lifted a delicate brow. “Me?” But I could tell by her smirk she knew exactly what I was talking about.
“You were the black robe yesterday. You were the one that stabbed me. That’s why I didn’t sense you. It was you.”
God, I was so stupid. Of course it was a demon. A true demon. I should have known by the sulfuric stench, Neph smelled of sulfur, but never so strongly.
She sighed, squeezing her hands together as if she’d discovered a juicy secret. “My, how observant we are. I think you deserve a cookie for that.” She laughed, and the sound chilled my blood.
“The black robe today? He was a ruse. You were the one all along.”
Her lip curled. “Of course I was.”
“How long have you been following me?” The eyes on the rooftop. Had it been her and not Billy all along as I’d assumed?
“Please.” She glanced at her nails. “Don’t flatter yourself, Pandora. I have better stuff to do than follow you around all day.”
Then she clapped her hands, and the sound of it was like thunder. “Have fun boys.”
The LCD on my back squealed, and as one they began attacking me. They wrapped their fingers in my hair. Pulled and tugged. Ripped out hair in chunks. Others grabbed hold of my arms. My legs. They tried to force me to the ground.
“Dora,” Luc screamed, his fear sliced through me.
“Lu—” I tried to call back, but a hand shoved down my mouth.
Chaos gave a lazy smile as she licked my blood off each of her fingers with long strokes and moans of appreciation. She made no move to join the LCD, as if to do so were beneath her dignity.
I bit down on the hand in my mouth, and the LCD howled. A fist connected with the back of my head. Fingers shoved their way into my eye sockets, threatening to gouge my eyes out.
Now, when I needed to call on the power of my demon, Lust wouldn’t respond. She’d gone catatonic in Chaos’ presence.
A set of sharp teeth clamped onto my neck and pierced the flesh. My heart slammed against my chest. They were going to kill me, and Lust wouldn’t help me.
I rolled, slamming my weight down on the demon attached to my neck. There was a muffled crunching sound, and the mouth released me. I gasped, covering my neck as hot blood spurted with the rhythm of my beating pulse.
Then someone head butted me. Lights danced inside my vision. I grabbed a neck. More hands began to claw at my body. I choke slammed the one I held and shoved the others off me.
Something pricked me from behind. I jumped to my feet, turning in time to see another LCD with a needle in one hand and vial of my blood in the other. He grinned.
And in the instant it took to blink, I remembered the vamp in the field also trying to take a vial of my blood. But where he’d been unsuccessful, the LCD had triumphed. But I didn’t have time to think on it more.
I reached for him, but another tiny body slammed against mine with the force of a freight train. It knocked the air out of me and flung me back to the ground.
I couldn’t stop this. I’d get one away from me only to have another take its place.
“No.” A man’s roar filled my head. I turned to look and spotted him out of the corner of my eye. It was Billy, and he was shoving bodies away as he raced toward me.
Hands on my leg, shoving my pant legs up, reaching for my ankles. Teeth cutting into my thighs. Tongues licking my face.
Someone squealed when my birthmark was revealed and traced the flesh with the tip of his sharp nail, drawing blood. I kicked his teeth in and was able to shake him.
I slapped at the LCDs, tried to move, but I was pinned down. My efforts were growing weaker and more useless by the second. Their strength overwhelmed me. Even in child form, they were more than I could handle alone.
I was bleeding everywhere, from my nose, my eyes, my mouth.
I continued to punch, but my muscles trembled with fatigue.
A large body slammed against mine. Covering me. Crushing me.
I saw silver hair and a dagger swing toward me. I was not going to die this way. I elbowed Billy and connected with his nose. The bone-jarring impact freed my hand just enough so that I could reach down the front of my shirt.
“Pandora!” I barely heard Luc yell.
“Do it now,” Chaos ordered. I wasn’t sure who she was talking to, and frankly right now I didn’t care. All I knew was that somehow I had to shake Billy off me.
“I will not let you kill me, Priest.” I snatched the ring and slammed it against the side of his neck, reciting, “Dust to dust, ashes to ashes.”
“Don’t do it,” he snarled, slapping my hand hard enough that the ring fell to the ground.
But it was too late. Red and pink flames shot out of the ring. At first a thin line, the flames became larger, wider and thicker as they grew and threaded between us, like a snake curling around prey and squeezing tight in an ever-contracting circle.
The flames licked at my body, singed the hairs on my head. My skin blistered. The LCD on me howled as the inferno devoured them.
Chaos sang with laughter as she shed her skin, revealing her true form.
“Pandora,” Luc yelled, but it was a whisper inside the netting Chaos had cast. Like the memories of a dream, his voice echoed faintly.
Shredded wings pulled from Chaos’ back. She grew ten feet tall, covered in green scales of iridescent brilliance. Her face was a frightful distortion of beauty, the snout long, and her breaths sounding like the squeal of a dying pig. Tusks curled from the bottom of her jaw. Red eyes glowed with satisfaction. She curled her black-taloned hands around her mouth and yelled, “Father, take us home.”
Luc was so close, screaming my name. Billy jumped to his feet, drew his knife up.
The clap of thunder roared around m
e. Darkness rolled in, grabbed me with cold fingers, and sucked me down into a hole that had suddenly opened up in the earth.
Terror clamped my throat shut. My skin was on fire. I burned and tried to scream, but nothing came out. I lifted a hand, but saw only white bone. I looked at the rest of me, and I was nothing but skeleton. Then my flesh reformed, and the fire ate it again. It happened over and over.
I flapped my arms, trying to grab hold of something, but there was only a seemingly empty tunnel of black. I could see nothing beyond myself.
Then hands tore at me. Moans shrieked in my ears. “No,” they wailed. “Please, we’ll be good.” The ghostly whisperings made me shiver.
Then I saw light. Blinding orange light. And I could see the end of the tunnel. See the rocky ground that loomed larger and larger as my speed continued to pick up.
Hands still grabbed at me. “Please, take us out of here. We’ll never do it again...” Unknown and haunting voices that I knew I’d always remember in my worst nightmares.
I couldn’t save myself, much less anybody else. Terror wedged tight in my throat so that I couldn’t speak. Could barely breathe.
Molten lava bubbled in shallow pools filled with writhing, bodiless souls.
I was in Hell.
Literally.
I had barely enough time to cover my face with my hands before I slammed into the ground. I landed on spires of razor-sharp rock. I was flesh again, and the rock pierced me. It cut through organs. Muscle. Tissue.
I screamed as my skin began to melt from the heat. I was bone again and free of the rock.
I trembled and tried to stand but then fell to my knees and clutched my ribs that were flesh and then bone, flesh and then bone. Every time the skin melted, it was a brand new agony, growing worse and worse each cycle.
The clang of metal drew my attention. Billy and Chaos and the other LCDs that had attacked me were to my far left. They were swarming him. Stabbing him. He was a blur of moving shadow as he fought back.
An LCD hopped toward me, leering with a face half-eaten by maggots.
“Leave her. She belongs to the Master.” Chaos pointed to the tiny furry demon.
“Ya-el.” The booming voice cut through the madness of voices and battle and made my heart stutter. It was the monster of night, death, and vengeance. It was the demon Wrath.