It took longer this time, but finally everything around her disappeared, cutting off the voices and her awareness along with them.
* * *
***
* * *
Lily woke up surrounded by darkness. She sat up abruptly, her heart racing, but then forced herself to sit still and peer around at her surroundings that slowly took shape in the dim twilight. The layout of the room was vaguely familiar, but everything in it seemed to be covered in roots or vines, as if some giant plant had gone wild. Was that large shape over there the desk of her office? Lily leaned forward and squinted as a clammy feeling crept across her skin. Had she woken up for real this time? Or was this just another crazy dream?
Something cold and sticky curled around her wrist, and she screamed, jerking violently away and falling sideways. But instead of hitting the hard floor, an uneven, squishy surface cushioned her fall. The surface writhed beneath her, and she thrashed in panic and kept rolling as everything she touched came to life under her hands and tried to grab her.
Half blind and close to hyperventilating, Lily somehow managed to get to her feet and bolted, barely avoiding stumbling over one of her visitor chairs on her way to the office door. She tore at the door handle, her slime-covered hands slipping over the smooth metal several times before she could get a grip. It took a mighty heave to wrench the door open, but she was finally able to stumble into the dark hall. She fled down the corridor, bouncing off walls and tripping over who knew what in the dark.
Even though Lily could have navigated McCain Library blindfolded, in her panic she must have gotten turned around because she found herself fleeing past shelves and shelves of vine-covered books instead of toward the front doors and escape. Her breath tore through her lungs as she tried desperately to draw in the thick heavy air, but no matter how hard she breathed she couldn’t get enough oxygen. For what seemed to be a terror-filled eternity she kept running, spinning and bumping between shelves and tearing away from sticky tendrils that reached for her as she passed by.
Just when she thought she might collapse, barely able to breathe past the sticky numbness filling her chest, she spotted light up ahead. It wasn’t even proper light as from a lamp, but it was the first illumination of any kind she had seen, and so she rushed toward it like a moth to a flame.
The dark corridor spilled her out into a massive, empty space, and she belatedly realized she was in McCain Library’s grand reading room. Murky gray light filtered in through its tall, gothic windows, casting a deathly pallor over the space and giving Lily a good look at the horror it contained. Disintegrating piles of moldy books were heaped around the edges of the room, interspersed with pieces of smashed bookshelves and reading tables. The entire room was covered in black tendrils that had grown over every surface and were now pushing through cracks and twining around objects like invasive roots. But these belonged to no plant. They slowly pulsed and shifted with malevolent life, like the tentacles of a giant beast. A putrid miasma of rotting things hung in the air, like a cloud of death that tried to suffocate her.
But none of that was the worst part.
The worst part was the four bodies lying on the floor in the middle of the room, their eyes closed and their skin sickly gray in the dim light. They were arranged in a circle as if lying on the points of a compass with their heads pointing inward. Oozing black tendrils covered them and wrapped around every limb, binding them down fast. Lily tried to look away, tried to tell herself they weren’t real. But the squishy, uneven ground beneath her feet felt real. Her aching, burning lungs felt real. Her terror felt real.
“Hello, Lilith.”
Lily stumbled back and swallowed a scream. She caught her balance and straightened, clinging to composure as she gritted her teeth to keep from showing her fear.
In the center of the circle, the epicenter of the rotting tendrils, was exactly the person—thing, really—she had expected, but had hoped would not appear.
Roger’s demon—not that Roger seemed to have any true control over him—stood perfectly relaxed, powerful arms crossed in front of him. He was clad in his customary black, its shade so deep it seemed to swallow even the shadows around him until nothing besides his bone-white hair and crimson eyes were easily visible in the grey light.
“Apologies, I did not mean to startle you. I would have thought my presence here would be no surprise.”
Lily didn’t respond, just kept her jaw clenched and her eyes fixed on his chin—in case meeting his gaze directly wasn’t safe. It hadn’t affected her before because of her ward bracelet, but there was no sense in tempting fate. Maybe if she didn’t interact with this demon, he would go away too.
“I do not believe we have been formally acquainted. I know you quite well, of course, but I was understandably distracted at our last meeting, so I hope you can forgive me for not properly introducing myself. My name is Afnergu’alak, though most humans seem to have trouble pronouncing that, so you may simply call me Nergal.”
Shock prompted Lily to speak. “Nergal? As in the ancient Mesopotamian god of death, war, and destruction?”
“Very good, Ms. LeFay!” the demon exclaimed, wicked delight making his red eyes flare briefly in the darkness. “He said you were clever, and I must admit I underestimated you the first time we played our little games. You can be sure I will not do so again.”
Lily wanted desperately to ask who “he” was, but a more pressing question was forefront in her mind. “Sebastian said that knowing a demon’s true name gives you power over them. So why did you just tell me yours?” Sebastian hadn’t exactly said that, but he’d implied it and it was a common motif throughout mundane myths. She’d been repeating the demon’s name silently to herself ever since he’d said it, to be sure she remembered it precisely as he had pronounced it, just in case.
Nergal chuckled, and the sound made Lily shiver. “Ah, slippery young Sebastian. Did you know, I once almost convinced him to sell me half his soul? His bargain was vastly amusing—as if there is any difference between half his soul and all of it.” The demon chuckled again, seeming to savor the memory. Then the amusement vanished and his eyes narrowed. “I was very disappointed when dear old Ethel interrupted us. Very disappointed indeed.”
“You haven’t answered my question,” Lily said, suppressing another shiver under the scrutiny of his hellish gaze.
And just like that, the sardonic grin was back on Nergal’s face. “Why yes, yes it does...if you invoke the name of a weak, insignificant lesser demon. Otherwise, you simply draw the demon’s attention and invite his interference, like a rabbit parading in front of a hungry lion.”
The taunt in the demon’s voice made Lily’s eyes narrow. “You still haven’t answered my question,” she repeated—anything to keep her distracted from the bodies on the floor. “Why did you tell me your name?”
Nergal shrugged, his wide shoulders rising and falling without any other part of him moving. “It seemed only polite.”
Lily thought carefully about that. The demon’s words were casual, but the smile never left his face and his glittering eyes were intent. It was almost as if he wanted her to use it. For that reason alone, she was wary, though she wasn’t sure how invoking his name could invite any more of his interference than she was already getting.
The demon did not interrupt her wandering thoughts. He simply stood, at ease but watchful. Lily considered turning and running for the doors, but what would that accomplish? Judging by the weak, gray light coming through the windows, she doubted the outdoors would look much better than this. There was something she had to do here—she just didn’t know what it was.
“Why am I here?” she finally asked.
Nergal’s eyes widened in feigned innocence. “It is your dream, Ms. LeFay. You tell me.”
That seemed like too convenient an evasion, but Lily ran with it anyway, and she jutted out her chin as she spoke. “If this is just a dream, then I’m in control and I don’t have to be afraid of you.”
“Is that truly what you think, little human? My, my. Perhaps you are not as clever as you seem.”
He began to stalk toward her, his steps slow and deliberate, as if he were relishing each one. Lily tried to back up, but noticed too late the twisting tendrils that had crept sneakily up over her boots and around her calves, rooting her to the spot. She only barely kept from falling over onto her rump. Starting to feel desperate, she looked at her ward bracelet, but there was no white glow and she could feel no trace of the deep power that she had been able to harness in Melthalin. Fear spiked through her, and she tugged against the tangle holding her in place, trying to rip free. When that simply left her out of breath and shaking, she bent and attempted to pry the tendrils loose by hand, though she grimaced in disgust at their oily, squishy texture beneath her fingers. After a brief but futile effort, she gave up and straightened to fix her gaze on her enemy’s boots so at least she wouldn’t be blind to the oncoming danger.
As Nergal drew inexorably closer, Lily struggled to hold down her panic. She kept telling herself over and over that it was just a dream, that nothing bad could happen, and she would wake up at any moment.
Except, she didn’t.
Soon the demon was barely ten feet away. Then six feet. Then three. He stopped within arm’s reach and Lily’s body locked up in terror, the part of her brain screaming at her to run overcome by some primal instinct to stay still and not provoke the predator’s need to chase. For a long moment nothing happened and only Lily’s labored breathing broke the silence. Blood pounded loudly in her ears. She was sure Nergal could hear it, could feel and smell and taste her terror.
“Look at meee,” the demon crooned, his voice an excruciating caress.
Lily’s whole body began to tremble, but she resisted the terrible impulse to obey.
“Look at me!” Nergal repeated, his enraged command booming around her and making the lofty windows rattle.
Still, Lily kept her gaze locked on his boots. Her body longed to give in, and the effort of resisting that pull left her nauseous.
Without warning, the demon’s hand shot forward and he seized her under the chin, then wrenched her head up. At his touch, agony exploded through her body, engulfing every nerve in an inferno of pain that wiped out her ability to do anything but scream.
Her cry was abruptly cut off when something huge crashed into Nergal, the force of the collision wrenching the demon’s hand away. Lily sagged. The euphoria from the pain’s absence left her so dizzy the only thing she could do was fight to keep her balance as the sounds of a furious battle echoed around her.
By the time her head had stopped spinning and her vision was no longer clouded by black spots, the fighting had subsided and silence had returned. The dim light revealed Nergal, once again standing in the center of the four bodies Lily would not look at. When she dropped her eyes to her feet, there was Sir Kipling sitting by her boot, looking his usual sleek and unruffled self. As though he could feel her incredulous gaze upon him, he looked up at her with lazy eyes and gave his tail a twitch as if to say, “What are you staring at?”
“You know, it does not have to be this way,” Nergal said. His tone sounded bored, as if he hadn’t just been thwarted by a mere cat. Lily looked back up at him and noticed that his form-fitting clothes were torn in places, though the tears looked far bigger than what a “mere cat” could have inflicted.
Lily swallowed her fear and asked in the most casual voice she could manage, “What way?”
“Why, this way,” Nergal repeated, lifting his hands to encompass everything around them.
When Lily didn’t react or even shoot a glance at the rotting destruction all around her, a predatory smile crossed the demon’s face and his red eyes flashed. In one smooth, unbroken movement Nergal reached upward, closed his fingers on open air, and drove his fists downward, as if grabbing the sky itself and ripping it from the heavens.
Thunder exploded overhead, and with a crack that rent the air, the ceiling split in two. Giant chunks of stone and wood crashed to the floor, making Lily scream and crouch down with her arms over her head. Destruction rained down around them and the ground shook. Lily expected to be crushed at any moment. But whether through luck, or the demon’s design, when the quaking ceased and Lily cautiously lowered her arms and stood, there was a large oval of clear ground surrounding her. The other end encircled Nergal and his macabre collection of bodies that she dared not look at.
Her precious library, however, had not fared so well.
Not one wall remained standing. Not a single bookshelf had survived. The entire building lay in flattened ruins around her—and not just the library, but every single building of Agnes Scott campus, from the gorgeous red-stone gothic halls to the newer dormitories and fine arts center. All of them, destroyed.
The sight pierced her to the core.
Tears trembled in the corners of her eyes, and she raised a hand to swipe them away, angry at herself for showing weakness. She didn’t dare spare a thought for the grim landscape beyond the destroyed college: dark, smoke-filled skies, burning buildings, and the half visible ruins of downtown Atlanta in the distance.
It was just a dream, right? Nergal had said so. If she didn’t respond, if she just ignored him, he would eventually go away. He couldn’t hurt her with Sir Kipling at her side.
She glanced down, suddenly terrified her cat might have vanished again. But there he sat, prim and silent, tail curled around his paws and attention focused on the smirking demon.
When Lily gave no further reaction to Nergal’s show of power—simply fixed her eyes on his chin again and waited—he didn’t glower or pout as she’d expected. Instead he shrugged and picked up their conversation again.
“I have no particular wish to harm you or your friends. True, you have vexed me rather greatly, with your interfering and scuttling about. But I am a patient man, so to speak.” He smiled at her, showing off razor-sharp teeth in a face that was most decidedly not that of a man.
Lily bit her lip to hold back the tirade she longed to throw at him. She knew he was trying to provoke her.
“But,” the demon said, enunciating the word in a suddenly sharp tone. “Something that belongs to me has been taken, and I will have it back. If you stand in my way, I swear on my true name that I will rain destruction down upon you, and upon all you hold dear.” An unholy crimson light shone from Nergal’s eyes as he slowly raised his hands, palms upward, and the pulsing tendrils around him responded to his call. They wriggled and writhed like snakes, raising and shifting the four bodies up until they all hung in a row, suspended in the air and facing Lily so that she could no longer keep her eyes off them.
Sebastian. Ethel. Her mother. Jamie. All four hung limply, their bodies lifeless and their skin ashen gray. Mercifully, their heads were all slumped forward onto their chests, so Lily didn’t have to see their empty eyes.
In her peripheral vision, Lily noticed Nergal watching her intently, obviously enjoying himself. She kept her eyes unfocused and tried not to react. But she couldn’t keep her pulse from quickening or her breath from coming in short, shallow gasps as the demon stepped up to the bodies. With his eyes locked on her, he grabbed the one that looked like Sebastian by the shoulder and held up his other hand for her to see as his long, black fingers elongated into vicious points. Then, without warning, he stabbed Sebastian in the side. Black claws sank deep into flesh, and, to Lily’s horror, the body jerked.
He wasn’t dead.
Sebastian’s head shot up and his eyes flew open, wide and bloodshot as he screamed in agony and writhed against the dark tendrils holding him fast.
“Stop!” Lily screamed before her brain could remind her that the body wasn’t really Sebastian.
The demon released his hold and raised his hand to his lips as crimson blood dripped
down his fingers and over his palm. Holding Lily’s horror-struck gaze, he slowly licked each finger, satisfaction burning in his eyes. Sebastian’s quiet sobs of pain were the only noise to be heard beyond the blood pounding in Lily’s ears. Bile rose in her throat, but she swallowed it down and clenched her hands until her nails dug painfully into her palms.
“If you stand in my way, Lilith LeFay, I will make your loved ones suffer far, far more than you could ever imagine. Sebastian Blackwell, Madam Ethel Barrington, Freda LeFay, Jamie Singer, Tom Singer, Sally—”
He continued slowly, purposefully, painting a blazing target on every person in her life that she cared about, listing them all by name—family, friends, coworkers. How could he know? Where had he gotten their names? Dread seeped through her body, turning her limbs to ice.
“What will you do, little human? Will you defy me and watch them suffer?” Nergal asked. “I will win either way, of course. Even if all your plans succeed, the most you can do is delay the inevitable.”
“Please, don’t hurt them.” The words slipped out before she could stop them, barely a whisper of sound. But she knew Nergal heard it, because savage delight lit up his face.
“Kneel. Beg for mercy on your knees like the worm you are, and I will consider your plea.”
The demon’s imperious demand made Lily’s temper flare. She gritted her teeth and locked her knees, her stubborn nature reacting on instinct before her rational mind could kick in and send her to the floor. She would happily sacrifice her pride if it meant she never had to hear Sebastian scream like that again.
But some instinct told her it wasn’t that simple.
Lily took a deep breath, keeping her legs stiff even as her heart cried and begged to surrender. Then she met the demon’s gaze head-on in defiance.
Nergal’s face twisted in an ugly sneer. “So be it.”
With that, he rounded on Sebastian and raked his razor-sharp claws slowly, vindictively down her friend’s chest. Sebastian thrashed and screamed, but he was unable to escape the torment. For the first time, he spoke, sobbing Lily’s name and begging for her help.
Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus Identity Page 21