by Sam Cheever
As if reading my mind my father gave my arm a squeeze. “We all make our own choices, Astra. This was his cross to bear. Your involvement didn’t change his fate.”
Emo approached my father. “Sir, the demons are whispering about a coup your wife is planning. If it’s true it would be world shattering. We need to take steps to stop her if we can.”
My eyes flew to my partner. “You mean about her planning to chain Enoch?”
Myra gasped and my father jerked as if he’d been jolted. “Absurd!”
I shook my head. “Raoul went deep under cover in the coven and discovered her plans. That’s why he came here with us today. He knew we’d need the king and the Royal Court behind us to defeat mother and Enoch’s dark army.”
My father looked as if he’d been struck. “It’s not possible. How can she think she’ll succeed? He took a step back and for a moment I thought he would fall. I reached out a hand but he shook himself and his eyes focused on Myra. “This will seal her fate, sister. I cannot save her from this.”
Myra’s eyes shimmered with tears for my father’s pain. She nodded and reached for his hand. “If it’s true.”
Emo nodded. “I believe that it is. The demons are in a state of great excitement because they believe they’ll rule the dark world under Danika. They will be allowed to have their own Court. In fact,” he glanced at me, “that’s why I was looking for Astra, apparently Alcott is so giddy he’s lost his mind. Some of the demons have gone out into public and are showing their true faces. Humans are panicking and some have been hurt. I came to get Astra. We need to go kick some demon ass.” He grinned at me and then it seemed to sink in who he was speaking to and I watched the color leach from his face. “Umm, sorry sir, ma’am, it’s just an expression.”
I snorted, “A very accurate one.”
My father looked at Myra and said, “You must go to Him and tell Him what transpires.”
Myra frowned, “And what of you?”
“I must find Enoch and try to speak reason to him.”
I could tell she didn’t like that but she finally nodded and turned to me. “Go, child, deal with the demons who torment the humans. But watch your back. I’ll be busy elsewhere and won’t be able to save your butt if you get it into a fling.”
I laughed, “You mean sling?”
“Whatever.” She frowned and disappeared with a pop.
My father leaned down to kiss my cheek. “Go with His love and protection, Astra.”
“Blessed be, Father.”
And he was gone too.
I turned around and realized for the first time that Dialle the First and Second had disappeared too. Apparently they were anxious to get their own house in order.
Emo touched my arm. “The demons have returned to the Court. The king and Dialle were needed there.”
I nodded and looked into my partner’s beautiful black eyes. “I guess it’s just you and me then, partner. Care to kick some demon ass?”
He favored me with a slow, sensual smile that made me tingly in all the right—I mean wrong—places. “I’m always ready, boss.”
He offered me a hand and I reached toward it, “Let’s party.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Time to Shop
The demon sauntered down the aisle, selecting carefully,
His purchases were made of flesh and screamed quite frantically.
We landed in the Sky Mall, in the middle of complete chaos.
Clothing and shoes and various items of human beauty were strewn around the floor, spilling from dropped bags and hanging from toppled racks that had been ripped off walls and dragged out of stores into the middle of the mall.
The sound of screaming pinged off my ears and bounced around the mall, changing volume and octave as it came to us from several different directions.
Emo and I stood in the midst of the mess, taking in the pandemonium. We didn’t know where to start.
A woman came shrieking out of a nearby store, partially dressed and falling over her jeans, which were halfway down her legs as if she’d been trying to pull them on or off before she was rousted out by the maggoty demon that was hot on her trail.
Emo pointed down the mall, where another demon had a shrieking woman by the back of her coat and was holding her up in the air, chewing on her short, curly blonde hair as if it was the finest gourmet meal. “I’ll get that one. You can have this one.”
I nodded and started after the quickly retreating pair at a run. The woman had apparently given up on trying to pull her jeans back up and had discarded them, taking off at a full out run down the mall in her lacy pink underwear. The demon easily caught her a few stores down. I caught up with them just as the demon grabbed her around the waist and hauled her up against his scaly body. He grabbed her wildly swinging legs with his other arm and held her so she couldn’t move, rubbing himself against her. The supra demons on his head caressed her horrified face, seeking entrance through any available orifice. I threw a power jolt at the very tip of one writhing supra demon to get its attention.
The thing shrieked like a banshee and flung itself off the demon’s head, crashing to the floor. It lay writhing there until I zapped it again just for fun.
Disgusting things.
The demon host dropped the woman and turned toward me. “Mx. Phelps, come to join in the fun?” he asked me in his gravelly demon voice.
I shrugged. “Only one of us is gonna have fun here maggot boy and it isn’t you.”
He laughed, apparently he’d already assumed the mantle of power my mother’s expected coup promised. He probably figured since she was my mother I’d buy into the power shift.
Silly demon.
Unfortunately for him politics didn’t enter into my daily calculations. I tend to function under a few very simple concepts. Like a pre-school reader for little demon slayers.
See demon.
See demon run.
Zap demon’s ass.
Move on to next demon.
I gave him a shot of everything I had right between the eyes.
The laugh died on his scabby lips as he started to pitch forward.
“To Hades with you fool, for God hath tired of you.”
As he fell all of the supra demons on his disgusting head shrieked like tiny little star coaster riders. Just for fun, I took a couple of minutes to zap them too before I moved on.
The next demon held an old man by one ankle over the railing that overlooked a laser skate rink below. The man’s age-shrunken wife was banging the demon on one of his green, tree-like legs with her purse and screaming at him.
I felt a deep respect for the woman’s pluck, particularly considering her size and age. But I cast my eyes worriedly at her husband, who was trying to hold very still and yelling at his wife to get back. If I zapped the demon he’d drop the old man onto the slate floor below. That would not be a good result.
The demon put a huge hand on the woman’s head and pushed her backward so her arms swung feebly and she could no longer reach him with the purse.
I approached carefully from behind the demon and the old woman saw me coming. She opened her mouth to speak but I held a finger to my lips and motioned her with my hand to continue swinging at the demon so he wouldn’t know I was there. She was a sharp old bird and she quickly picked up what I wanted. In fact, since her arms couldn’t reach the demon she reached out and bashed him on the shin with her foot, then proceeded to stomp on his toes.
The demon barely felt her assault but it kept his attention on her and not on me.
I walked directly up behind him and, reaching between his legs from the back, I grabbed the family set and gave it just enough of a twist to catch his attention.
He grunted and swung around, the old man swinging back over the railing as the demon turned. Keeping hold of my disgusting treasure, I moved with the demon until the old man was clear of the railing and then gave the set a nice twist that made him howl.
“Put the old man down now, very gently, or I�
��m gonna add a jolt of power to this nice twist I’ve got goin’ on and cut down your family tree before it grows, wart boy.”
The demon bent its green, scaly head toward me and opened wide lips to show me a set of black, chipped teeth. He squinted through the pain. “Phelps?”
I felt a certain discomfort. Why did everybody know my name? It was almost like they’d known I was coming...
Holy shit!
I gave the demon a jolt between the eyes and grabbed the old man’s arm to pull him out of the way before the demon fell.
Emo! We’ve been had. This was a diversion. We need to find my father. Now!
We can’t just leave these demons here. They’re gonna kill somebody.
Shit! He was right.
Dammit! Okay, move faster. Let’s clean this place up and get the hell out of here.
Emo thought a salute at me. Yessir!
It took us another twenty minutes to find the last of the demons in the mall. They left a lot of human angst and physical devastation behind that we couldn’t do anything about. It was hard to walk away from the tear stained faces and wails of pain and fear, but I knew I had to.
As I jogged toward the spot where Emo and I had shifted into the mall I contacted my favorite devil.
Dialle? I need your help.
Astra.
I think your demon infestation at Court and my excursion into shopping hell were orchestrated by my dear old mother. I need you to meet Emo and me at the clearing in the wildlife refuge.
A long silence told me he was digesting the news.
Finally he said, I’ll bring troops. The demons we’re torturing have told us what your mother is up to. We’ll need backup.
Emo ran up to me and grabbed my hand. “Where?”
“Clearing, wildlife preserve.”
And we were off.
We landed amid a cacophony of sound and smoke and screaming that made what Emo and I had just experienced at the mall seem like a day at a Venus beach sipping frosted rum drinks with the cute little umbrella sticking out of the glass. I particularly like the pink ones but the green ones are nice too. Sometimes I liked to get the little sword with cherries on it... Oh... Sorry.
We’d landed just at the edge of the woods and hadn’t been seen yet. We were frozen into immobility by the scene in front of us.
Angel fought angel in the sky above our heads. The two sides looked exactly the same, making it impossible to differentiate between the dark angels and the light.
On the ground demons and gargoyles, which by themselves would never be able to best an angel, attacked in such numbers that there were angels lying around on the ground with missing limbs. One was even missing a head.
The angels, it appeared, were vastly outnumbered. I wondered why the Big Guy hadn’t sent more help.
Witches in long, dark robes were on their knees around the altar, hands joined and heads lowered. Beneath the horrendous noise of fighting and death the steady drone of chanting rumbled with menace.
I strained to see who was on the altar but the air above the dark celebrants was filled with smoke and bubbled with power and it was impossible to see anything beyond a vague shape.
There was a change in the air of the clearing and one of the spike covered demons from the fires of Hell popped into view. He immediately spread his knobby lips, spewing a wave of fire into the air. An angel turned just in time to stop the fire with a wall of magic but as she did, two other demons jumped her from behind.
She went down under the demons and their ’goyles and the last thing I saw was a bloody leg flailing around.
I ran toward the pile of demons, forgetting for a moment about the fire breathing monster a few feet away.
Emo threw a wall of power up between me and the spiky demon just before it could turn me into a halfling toasty. Yelling thanks, I flung out my hands and blasted the nearest ’goyle in the pile. He flew up into the air when my power hit him and landed about ten feet away with a fist sized hole smoldering in the center of his chest.
Apparently I was running on a pretty strong cocktail of adrenaline.
I blasted the nearest demon and then finished off the rest of them covering the angel. She looked up at me from a blood covered face and tried to smile. The holes in her chest and arms and throat were terrifying. I didn’t think, I just reacted. Kneeling down beside her I put my hands on the largest wound first and focused my power into her.
She jerked under the energy, her green eyes widening as my power coursed through her body, searching for damage and repairing it in a not so gentle way. I moved to her shoulder next, which was ripped so deeply the arm was almost dislocated from her slender body.
Emo’s shout from behind had me whipping around without even standing up and I shot everything I had into a tree sized demon and his pet gargoyle, which was about to take a bite out of me.
They didn’t go down with smoldering holes. They went down in smoking pieces.
I turned back around and the angel was trying to get to her feet.
I helped her stand. “Why aren’t there more of you? You need help.”
She shrugged. “We expected Myra to be here by now, your father said she’d bring help.”
My heart sped up at this. “My father? He’s here?”
She nodded, pushing a wave of chestnut curls off her freshly healed shoulder. To my everlasting surprise, the angel placed a soft hand on my cheek and gave me an angelic peck on my forehead. “Go with His blessing and under His care, Astra Q Phelps. And...” she brushed a tear off her cheek, “Thanks, for saving me.”
I flushed, feeling embarrassed. Mostly I just blew stuff up. I wasn’t used to dealing with mushy feelings like gratitude.
I wasn’t sure I liked it.
Stuttering something incoherent, I turned away to find Emo battling the fire demon. I added a good sized jolt of my power to his. The demon screamed that eardrum shattering scream and I refocused my power to its mouth. The horrifying noise cut off immediately and he went down.
He exploded into fire as he died.
Emo ran to me. “Do you think it had time to call more?”
I shrugged. “If it did we’ll just have to deal with them.” I looked around. “Where the hell’s Dialle?”
“Right behind you.”
I swung around with a gasp. “Holy shit! Why are you always sneaking up on me?”
He shrugged, grinning. Despite the chaos around us, I couldn’t help noticing that he looked tall, dark and yummy. “I don’t sneak, Astra. You’re just always distracted by some sort of calamity.”
What could I say? He had a point.
“I have to find my father, he’s here somewhere. Can you take care of them?” I motioned toward the witches, who were busily cooking up mischief around the altar. “They’ve already called one of those fire demons and I think they’re trying to summon up another one.”
Dialle motioned to Gerch.
“Don’t kill them.” I told Dialle’s captain of the guard.
He cracked his wide craggy lips and saluted me. “Yes, my princess.” And he turned away.
“Don’t call me that, dammit!” I screamed after him.
He either didn’t hear me or chose to ignore me. I was betting on the latter.
I turned back around and found myself mere inches from Dialle. He dragged my body fully against his and slanted his head so his lips could consume mine.
I struggled for a second or two and then felt myself getting pulled into it, completely forgetting whatever sense of urgency I’d been laboring under since arriving in the clearing.
Emo yelled out and Dialle jerked his lips from mine and shot a powerful jolt over my shoulder. Something behind me screeched.
I blasted a gargoyle behind Dialle and it flew backward and took out a demon. The two of them went down and the angel I’d just saved finished them off.
She gave me a thumbs up.
Dialle and I grinned at each other.
“I insist on a date later,” h
e told me.
I nodded. “As soon as we finish saving the world.”
He lifted both hands over my shoulders. Two more screams erupted behind me and something slimy and dense hit the back of my leg.
I turned and looked down. “Shit! Why do they always bleed on my boots?”
King Dialle sauntered up with a royal she-devil on each arm. He looked like he was attending a ball, all spiffy and elegant. Around him chaos reigned but you’d never know it to look at him.
I grinned. “Your Highness.”
He lowered his head a fraction to acknowledge my greeting. “Mx. Phelps. I see you have things well in hand.”
We all looked around together. It was definitely a soap opera moment.
My gaze took in the piles of dead demons, gargoyles, ghouls and goblins and various dark disgustables I hadn’t even noticed were present. Here and there an angelic robe shimmered from a crumpled pile and my heart jumped in my chest.
Power jolts fired past us, blasting chunks out of trees and nearby rocks.
One jolt landed in the middle of the chanting witches, narrowly missing one of my Dialle’s guards as they ripped the dark celebrants, one by one, from the circle and knocked them unconscious with rock like fists.
High above our heads a black dragon fought a red dragon with blasts of fire and ripping claws and teeth.
And sprinkled amidst the mess, fairies darted here and there, hitting their prey so fast the victims didn’t even notice they’d been hit until the fairy was long gone and the blood started flowing from the mangled flesh the fairy magic left behind.
The air was filled with the sound of screaming and growling and blood curdling shrieks. It smelled a bit like a butcher shop.
“I have a little work to do yet,” I told the king.
He nodded.
A ghoul grabbed one of the king’s lovely ladies on her slender, silk-clad shoulder and she raised an elbow, drove it into the ghoul’s throat and then blasted him into pieces when he let go of her to grab his crushed throat.
I spit ghoul dust out of my mouth and turned to find Emo.
He was standing in the middle of a growing pile of carnage. He caught me looking at him and nodded, grinning widely. Then he raised a finger and blew on the tip.