by Larissa_Ion
Again, assuming that Flail hadn’t lied.
Flail moved closer, and Lilliana instinctively reached for her power. Of course, it wasn’t accessible, and the only thing the attempt accomplished was making her wing anchors throb. Her pulse picked up with every step Flail took. Casually, she gathered her legs beneath her and stood, trying to appear as if she was curious about the activity surrounding them when, in reality, she was madly plotting a way to fight back.
She could use her restraints as weapons. The chain would wrap around Flail’s slender neck nicely. But Flail also had fallen angel powers at her disposal, while Lilliana was as helpless as a human. She’d have to act fast to grab what she was pretty confident was an aural beneath Flail’s cloak.
“Flail?”
Flail looked around, her expression contemplative. “Hmm?”
“Moloch’s going to kill me, isn’t he?”
“No,” she said, but Lilliana’s relief only lasted a heartbeat. “I am.” Flail didn’t look at her as she unhooked the chain that connected Lilliana to the throne and gave it a hard yank. “Come on.”
Lilliana didn’t budge, which made no sense. Flail could just as easily kill her here as someplace else. Maybe it was an instinct to not follow blindly to one’s death. Perhaps the known danger was better than the unknown. Whatever it was, Flail didn’t have the patience for it, and she yanked harder, dragging Lilliana off the platform.
“I have to film it, you stupid cow,” Flail snapped. “I thought maybe you’d like a little privacy, but if you would rather these lowlifes watch and participate, I can just as easily do it here.”
Oh, well, gee, wasn’t that thoughtful?
But privacy meant that Lilliana would have a better shot at talking Flail out of this. It wasn’t like Flail was reasonable or anything, but if she’d told the truth about the baby, maybe she had enough empathy to be swayed.
It was probably a foolish thing to think, but at this point, Lilliana was desperate.
“When you put it that way, I believe privacy would be lovely,” she said, grimly amused by Flail’s bewildered glance back. What? Lilliana wasn’t allowed to be sarcastic and polite in her final moments?
She allowed Flail to walk her like a dog on a leash until they reached some sort of garden. It was beautiful, in an eerie, creepy way. All the plants were either black or dangerous, from the night-blooming roses with their deep green stems and silky, midnight flowers to the brilliant blue irises that turned black when they were hungry for blood.
“Am I to be plant food?” Lilliana asked, completely serious. There were big pod-things here that could digest her whole.
Flail shrugged one slender shoulder. “Nah. I was just thinking, creatively, that if I have to take a video of me killing you, I might as well have a dramatic setting. The tragic splendor of slaughter in a beautiful garden and all that. A bunch of demons jacking off to your pain is kinda tacky, you know?”
“Sure, sure,” Lilliana said, her mind too busy working on a plot to truly listen. But she got the gist. Demons were disgusting, and Flail was a budding filmmaker. Neither of those things would get Lilliana out of her execution.
A shadow skirted one of the walls, moving so fast, Lilliana thought she might have imagined it. She mapped out the paths and doorways as they walked, and she noted the number of guards on the tops of the walls. There was a lot, but from the looks of things, she didn’t need to worry. Their attention was entirely focused on something outside the walls, and the gargoyles battling raptor horrors overhead.
She stopped, jerking Flail to a halt.
“What the f—?”
“Shh.” Lilliana smiled at the sound of the distant battle. “Do you hear that? Is that Azagoth?”
Flail dropped the chain. “Stay here.” She flashed herself to the top of the wall and shoved a guard aside.
Because Lilliana wasn’t an idiot, she tried to run. Unfortunately, Flail had tethered the chain to the ground, and she nearly dislocated her shoulders.
The shadow moved closer, fading out of view as Flail materialized and grabbed the chain, looking as rattled as the chain sounded.
“I don’t know if that army belongs to Azagoth or not, but it’s big. Really big. And corporeal.” She cursed, seemingly talking more to herself than to Lilliana. “Moloch wasn’t ready for this. He thought Azagoth would send souls. But there are millions of demons out there. Hundreds of millions.”
A deafening boom lit the sky a brilliant red and shook the ground so hard, Lilliana stumbled. Stones crashed down from the walls around them, crushing plants and smashing branches off of trees.
He’s here. Azagoth’s forces are here!
“This is bad,” Flail murmured as she looked up at the sky, which was sizzling with a webbing of lightning.
Another massive explosion sent a seismic jolt across the land, tossing Lilliana forward as Flail stepped backward. Without thinking, she shoved her hand beneath Flail’s cloak and seized the weapon concealed at the small of the female’s back.
Flail jammed her elbow back, catching Lilliana in the chin with a tooth-jarring blow. Lilliana wheeled backward into a potted spider plant, and she watched in horrified fascination as the pot crashed to the ground and hundreds of hand-sized spiders scurried toward her and Flail.
Flail hissed, kicking one and smashing another under her boot. And just as Lilliana scrambled away from one, its fangs dripping with flesh-dissolving poison, the entire bunch of them went up in smoke.
Flail lunged at Lilliana. “Give me the aural.”
Lilliana put a row of growling pod plants between them. “How stupid do you think I am?”
Flail raised her voice over the brutal noise of battle as it came closer. “I can kill you without it, you know.” To emphasize her point, she smiled, and Lilliana yelped in pain as her skin split in a dozen places, six-inch gashes opening as if she’d been struck with a lash. “It’ll just take longer.”
“Flail, please,” Lilliana said, giving reason one last, desperate shot. “Let me go. Moloch doesn’t have to know.”
“He’ll know because he ordered me to bring him your head.”
Lilliana shook her head, hopefully not for the last time. “It won’t matter. Moloch will be dead soon.”
“How do you figure?”
A dark sense of both satisfaction and vengefulness came over Lilliana, and she smiled over the top of one of the weird black pods.
“Because Azagoth won’t rest until he’s dead. I promise you that. Moloch is a dead man. He just doesn’t know it yet.”
Suddenly, Flail spun in a circle, her gaze narrowed and searching. “Something is in here with us.”
Okay, if Flail was worried, Lilliana should be, too. But for some reason, it really didn’t matter.
Probably because she was going to die, and it didn’t make a difference if it was by Flail’s hand or in the jaws of some evil monster.
A black blur streaked through the garden and slammed into Flail, spinning her into a barrel. She caught herself before she went down and sent a volley of lightning bombs after the streak, but it phased out, avoiding every missile. Then it was back, hitting Flail from behind. Blood splattered, and for a moment, Lilliana wasn’t sure where the blood had come from.
But as Flail rolled on the ground, her arm flopping at an unnatural angle, Lilliana realized that her hand was missing.
Red, glowing eyes watched from deep inside some sort of tentacled plant, and Lilliana couldn’t contain a gasp.
Hellhound.
She couldn’t tell if it was Maleficent or not, but it seemed to be on her side, and she took advantage. While Flail struggled to stand, Lilliana pounced.
Flail struck out with her stump, catching Lilliana in the face. The strike shattered the bones in her cheek, and she nearly passed out from the pain. Somehow, she managed to not drop to the ground like a sack of potatoes, and she returned the hit, swinging the chain in an arc that slammed the fallen angel bitch to the ground.
If Fl
ail got back up, Lilliana knew she was dead. With no powers, she was basically a bug, and Flail was a bug zapper.
She dove on top of the other female, taking a hard jolt to her shoulder when she hit the ground, but she managed to wrap the chain around Flail’s neck and pull it tight.
Flail snarled, and then Lilliana felt the fallen angel’s power as her blood lit on fire. Everything inside her burned, and she screamed as smoke poured out of her mouth and nose.
Blindly, she reached for the aural, which had clattered to the path. She found it at the same time Flail did, and they struggled, Lilliana feeling the blade bite deep into her palm. Mercifully, the fire inside her had died out, but she was tiring, in pain, and her vision had gone double. Maybe triple.
“Bitch!” she cried as she put all her strength and desperation into wrenching the weapon away from Flail.
Got it!
She didn’t hesitate. With a shout of determination, she plunged the aural into Flail’s throat and thrust upward with all her strength. Flail’s eyes shot wide in surprise, and she gasped, blood flecking her lips.
The merest hint of a smile curved her mouth. “Well done,” she said in a pained whisper.
“For what it’s worth,” Lilliana said, “I don’t enjoy this.”
“It’s okay…to…like it a little.” Flail’s breaths came in spurts as her body began to turn a sickly gray. “I did…fuck over…Cipher.”
True. “Okay, I’m enjoying it a little.”
Flail coughed sickly, the light in her eyes fading and, finally, extinguishing. If Lilliana were still pregnant, she’d have been able to see Flail’s soul drift out of her body, and a griminion arrive to take it to Azagoth. She almost felt sorry for Flail then because Azagoth wasn’t going to show mercy.
She slid the bloody aural free of Flail’s body and fell back in exhaustion.
Suddenly, there was a tongue slathering her face, and foul-smelling hellhound breath searing her nostrils.
“Mal,” she gasped as she dug her fingers into the beast’s thick ruff. “I’m so happy to see you.”
Mal had never been overly affectionate, and even now, she backed up and stood a few feet away, her tail wagging gently.
Bruised, bloody, and in excruciating pain, Lilliana considered her next move. First, she had to get rid of the nettle tunic that marked her as a prisoner. Flail’s armor would do nicely as a replacement, and with the hooded cloak, Lilliana might even be able to get out of the castle.
And probably die in the battle.
But, first things first.
As quickly as her injuries allowed, she stripped Flail and donned her leggings and sports bra, both of which were a little tight, but that turned out to be a good thing, putting pressure on her wounds. The armor fit perfectly. Even the boots were a good fit.
“Okay,” she said to Mal as she tucked the aural into the holster at the small of her back, “let’s get out of here. I have no idea where we’re going, but we’re going to get there or die trying.”
Chapter 39
Azagoth had never witnessed the devastation of an EF5 tornado in person. But he’d now seen what he could do with a cyclone that was definitely on the EF—Everyone’s Fucked—scale. The Revenant feather on his back tingled as if to say, “You’re welcome.”
He stood on the roof of the tallest of Moloch’s towers, his wings spread, his beast body dripping with gore, and looked down on the destruction he’d wrought. The five-mile-wide monster tornado he’d spun himself into had cut a path through Moloch’s forces, sucking up bodies and chopping them up like a giant blender.
So fucking cool. Epically cool, as Journey would say. Journey, who would never say anything again, thanks to Moloch.
“Moloch!” He shouted with his power, his voice booming through the valley, even over the sounds of battle. “Meet me, you coward.”
A sinister blast of heat singed Azagoth’s wings, and he wheeled around, sending a laser stream of compressed ice at the newcomer. The Reaver feather tingled, providing the juice and access to an angelic weapon that was devastating to evil beings, as Moloch’s scream of agony proved.
That, too, was epically cool. So was the way the laser had taken Moloch’s leg off at the knee.
“Who are you?” Moloch screamed as he flapped his wings in an effort to remain upright.
In his new, bigger, and improved beast form, Azagoth could swallow Moloch in two bites. Maybe one, if he made the other leg match the first.
Patience. Find Lilliana.
With a thought, he put away his inner demon. A heartbeat later, he stood before Moloch, clad in his charred leathers and cloak, his scythe burning in his hand.
“Who am I?” he asked, his voice dragging the very pits of Hell. “I’m death, and I’ve come for you, asshole.”
Moloch gasped and lost every drop of color in his face. “Azagoth. How—? How did you—? How are you—?”
Azagoth roared in fury and flashed to him, taking the bastard by the throat. “Where is Lilliana?” he snarled.
Terror made Moloch’s eyes bulge, but as he struggled in Azagoth’s grip, the terror receded, and a demented smile turned up his cruel mouth.
“She’s dead, you fuck,” he bit out. “Really, really dead.” He grinned, going completely still. “If you get off on snuff films, I’ll share the video with you.”
No!
He was too late. He was too late, and Lilliana had paid the price. Agony tore through him, mixing with rage and hatred and the need to destroy.
Azagoth lost his shit.
His heart screaming, and his blood boiling, he hurled Moloch off the tower and chased after him through the air, hacking at the fallen angel with his scythe as he tried desperately to escape. Azagoth listed the names of everyone Moloch had killed as he took small chunks out of him, tiny pieces from his legs, his back, his wings, until the guy looked like a blood-soaked, moth-eaten rag doll.
Moloch’s pained screams fed all the darkness in Azagoth’s soul, and when the fallen angel’s ruined wings would no longer support him, Azagoth laughed as he tumbled out of the air and crashed to the ground.
He landed in a foot-deep slurry of tornado grindings, and when Azagoth landed next to him, his face was etched with fear. But as Azagoth raised his scythe to make the final blow, Moloch got that shit-eating grin again, and a surge of power lifted him off his feet and healed him in an instant.
Son of a bitch. Azagoth sought the source of the power, but it cost him. Moloch hit him with a pain weapon, a massive wave of agony that made Azagoth vibrate to his marrow. How had he done all that?
Then he saw the figure on the hill, soot-black armor and hood concealing all but the shape of a male. A big one. And he seemed to be sending power to aid Moloch.
It wasn’t enough.
It was, however, enough to piss Azagoth off.
With a final, heaving roar, he pivoted around and punched two summoned daggers through Moloch’s eyes.
“Now,” he said, as the fallen angel cried out and stumbled back in a desperate scramble to get away, “your soul is mine.”
Azagoth swung his scythe and took Moloch’s head clean off his shoulders. The thing plunked into the demon McSlurry, and the bastard’s soul screeched as it turned to smoke and faded away into nothing.
Well, fuck.
Azagoth stared at his burning scythe and made a note to never behead anyone with it if he didn’t want to obliterate their soul. He’d really wanted to do horrible things to Moloch for a few centuries. He’d wanted to spend days at a time making him pay for destroying everything in Azagoth’s life.
He’d lost his realm, his mate, his children. And, once Heaven got ahold of him, he’d most likely lose his life.
Not that it mattered. But until then, he was going to rampage. He was going to take out every demon who had fought for Moloch, and he didn’t care if doing so would release millions of demon souls into Sheoul. With no Sheoul-gra and its Inner Sanctum, the souls would roam loose, wreaking havoc on ever
y corner of Hell.
And Azagoth no longer gave a shit. Balance? Fuck it. Fuck everyone. His mate was dead, and he was a monster.
A sudden change of atmospheric pressure alerted him to a new presence, and he put Moloch’s demise out of his mind. The bastard no longer deserved a single thought.
The figure he’d seen on the hilltop had moved closer, to within fifty yards. It flickered, and then was forty yards away. Thirty. Twenty. Ten.
Five.
Azagoth waited, his scythe’s blade burning angrily, wanting to rend another soul into an inky wisp.
“‘Sup, Azagoth.” The male reached up and pushed back his hood, revealing a face Azagoth knew, even though it was missing a lot of skin. “Or should I say, Father.”
Azagoth’s legs wobbled, but somehow, he kept his cool. Somehow, he shoved his shock right back down into his gut as he stared at one of his favorite sons.
“Ah, Maddox,” he growled, his disappointment veering quickly to soul-searing anger. “Come to Papa, boy. You’re in for one hell of a spanking.”
Chapter 40
Revenant stopped pounding his fist against the wall, a barrier he’d already gone over a thousand times in an attempt to find a weakness, as a strange tickling sensation curled in his spine.
“Holy shit,” he breathed. “I think someone is drawing energy from me.”
Blaspheme looked over at him, startled. She’d been on her hands and knees, going over the marshmallow floor again. “What are you talking about?”
He rolled his shoulders as if that would help. For the record, it didn’t. “It’s like a tiny trickle of power is leaking out of me.”
“Where’s it going?” She came to her feet a lot less awkwardly than he did whenever he tried. This place was weird. Just give him good old-fashioned filthy hellholes and shackles. “Why do you think it’s being channeled to someone?”
“I don’t know. I just do. It shouldn’t be possible, but it’s happening.” An electric sizzle suddenly charged the air, and he looked around as if it were visible. “Do you feel that?”