by Cate Corvin
It was impossible to not perk up at that. “What ring?”
Lucifer slid an arm around my shoulder and pulled me along, with Azazel sandwiching me on the other side. “The Consortium. Fortunately, both Morningstar and I have long-standing open invitations.”
We walked through a dusting of still-luminescent petals raining from a massive willow draped above us. “You’re just trying to distract me.”
“Is it working?” Lucifer asked, his arm tightening. My hand brushed Azazel’s, and my heart lightened a little when the Watcher didn’t pull away.
So I hadn’t completely scared him away with my half-baked plan to save his soul.
“Maybe a little,” I allowed.
We took winding streets and alleys, and cut through a garden with creatures lurking in the dark corners that never quite resolved into shape outside the corners of my eye. All I got was the distinct impression of many teeth.
Like the streets of the Brightside, the Nightside was also packed with demons, but they were all creatures of the twilight. I saw fins, scales, luminescent body parts, glowing appendages, and I was still dazzled by the time an enormous obsidian tower loomed into sight.
Its crenellations were draped with softly-glowing lanterns, and the doorway was set with gilt scrollwork.
A demon wearing a leather suit cut in sharp lines guarded the door, but he blinked all six eyes when he saw Lucifer and Azazel. “Prince Morningstar, Master Grigori. Mister Celamentum and Madame Silenda will be pleased to hear you’re joining us tonight. Your guest is…?”
The way he looked at me made it clear he knew exactly who I was, but there seemed to be some social conventions here I wasn’t privy to.
Azazel gave him a tight smile. “The Lady of Wrath, Melisande.”
The demon bowed from the waist and opened the door with gloved hands. “My Lady. Come forth and be welcome.”
I only had a moment to hesitate before Lucifer nudged me, and I followed Azazel into the dim interior of the Consortium.
My heart jumped right into my throat as the doorman pulled the door shut behind us, locking us inside. This place was nothing like Belial’s loud, raucous arena, or my own quiet home.
A dining room extended for several stories overhead, with ivy-dripping balconies looking over the main floor. Shades roved between the tables as silent waiters, some carrying flutes of bubbling, glowing drinks, others holding goblets filled with a thick scarlet liquid I was sure was blood.
“This isn’t what we’re here for,” Azazel said quietly.
I tried not to gawk as a woman in a tight snakeskin dress at the table closest to us opened her painted mouth, and an imp climbing on her shoulder lifted a fork to her lips. She had no arms at her shoulders, only thrashing tentacles that whipped at the table setting.
Lucifer led me through a short hall, where another doorman, this one crowned with horns, waited in front of a red door. He bowed at the sight of Lucifer’s wings and opened it, his gaze crawling over each one of us as we passed.
Lucifer and Azazel led me down a flight of stairs, traveling below the street-level of Wrath, and the light grew even dimmer. Smoke spiraled through the air like a living thing, redolent of spices and tobacco, and I caught sight of long couches piled with lazing demons.
They were smoking from hookahs, and when they exhaled, the smoke twisted into shapes that moved before dissipating.
“What is all this?” I whispered, taking Lucifer’s hand as he led me down yet another hall that curved like a maze.
“The Consortium is an elite club of sorts,” he said, wrapping his fingers around mine. “Invitation only, and you have to be in high places or have a massive pile of gold to your name to be asked in.”
“So we’re going further down?”
Azazel’s teeth were white in the darkness when he smiled. “It’s always further down.”
There was another door, this one glazed with pure gold, but the doorman was a tall man with piercing yellow eyes and a pair of pointed, black-tipped ears pointing out of the top of his russet hair. He wore a scarlet yukata, and several fox tails twitched at the sight of us.
“Morningstar.” His greeting was a touch cooler than the reverence of the other doormen.
Lucifer didn’t release my hand, even under the kitsune’s sharp gaze. “Haru.”
I found myself counting the waving fox tails. There were four, each luxurious with shiny red fur that faded to cream.
“Did you bring me a snack?” Haru smiled, showing pointed teeth. I felt like he could see right through me.
I narrowed my eyes in return. “I’ll-”
Lucifer squeezed my hand hard enough to stop me in my tracks. I glanced at him quizzically, but he just shrugged lazily at the fox demon. “She’s my snack, thank you. Last time I saw you, you were set on returning to Yomi.”
Haru’s smile grew sharper, like the blade of a knife. “I prefer Dis, for now. Less… strictures.”
“Mm. Interesting to hear.” Lucifer gestured at the door beyond. “We’re here for Mister Celamentum.”
Haru stroked the golden door with clawed fingers and it shimmered open. “Be our guest, Master Morningstar. As always.”
“Enjoy your stay in Dis, Haru Sakai. As always.”
The fox licked his teeth as we passed, amber eyes glinting.
We walked into a quiet vestibule. Like the door, the walls were burnished gold, shining with the faintest possible light.
I waited until the door closed again, but Lucifer leaned in before I could ask. “Do not ever go anywhere alone with Haru, unless you do want to end up as a snack.”
“I wasn’t planning on it. Why didn’t you let me speak?”
Azazel had taken on his shimmery half-form, where only bits and pieces of him were visible. “The highest law in the Consortium is that no words of violence will be spoken outside of this chamber. Not so much as an idle threat. The law applies to everyone.”
“What makes you think I was going to make a threat?” I asked indignantly.
Lucifer gave me a dry look. “You were going to threaten to beat his ass. No, don’t even try to deny it.”
I swallowed my denial.
“If Lucifer himself walked back out there and threatened Haru in any way, he would be banned from the Consortium forever. Or Haru would have the right to claim penance.”
“What does claiming penance involve?”
“He could… ask for a part of you relative to the strength of the threat. If I told him I would kill him, he could petition for one of my wings. The Master and Madame here would likely grant it.”
“How do they get away with that?” I demanded. Lucifer tugged my braid forward so his feather was clearly showing. “Doesn’t that supersede your rule here?”
Azazel shook his head. “Remember that talk we had about interdimensional deities? There are a few places in Hell that they’ve touched. Small places, like spiritual cold spots. Laws are… different here. The usual hierarchy doesn’t apply.”
“Let’s just say the Tower of the Consortium was already here when Satan built his kingdom,” Lucifer said grimly. “Parts of Dis were built around it.”
“And… now it’s a restaurant. Seems like a steep dive from being an interdimensional cold spot. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.”
Lucifer led me to another door past the interior vestibule. “The restaurant is a front to bring in money and keep Master and Madame rich and happy. This is where the true power of the Consortium lives.”
We were on a broad balcony overlooking a tiered Circle. Tables were clustered in private groups, small fighting arenas had been set up on the tiers, but at the very center, where an arena floor should be…
Instead of an obsidian floor, there was a giant eye.
10
Melisande
It was milky and sightless, gazing upwards. All the light in the room emanated from the pearl-and-snow striations in the iris.
I could hardly breathe from the enormity of it
.
“What the fuck is that?” I asked, ashamed to hear a small quiver in my voice.
As I watched, the eye rolled a little to the right, but the edges of the pupil, like a vast dark lake, didn’t move. It was so massive, I felt like I could jump inside that foggy center and keep falling forever.
“Remains,” Azazel said with a note of distaste. “Whatever touched this place left a little of itself behind.”
“And you know this how?”
He glanced at the eye again and looked away. “I spent quite a few years here after my sacrifice. When I was mad and unable to come back to myself.”
“A few years? Try a century.”
The new voice was deep and unctuous. I tore my gaze from the giant eye and looked up at a man in a plum pin-striped suit.
He was nearly as wide as he was tall, with a shaved head and little curling horns. A small button nose jarred incongruously against the rest of his broad facial features.
“Pleasure to see you, Mister Celamentum.” Azazel sounded like it was anything but.
“And what about me?” a breathy female voice asked. Mister Celamentum turned to the side, and a woman walked around him.
Or that’s what I thought at first. I realized they were walking in tandem, because Madame Silenda was fused to his side from hip to shoulder. His suit segued neatly into a shimmering satin gown in the same shade, but where his face seemed like a mish-mash of proportions, hers was flawless planes, like she’d been cut from a diamond.
“And even more of a pleasure to see you,” Azazel said politely, and Celamentum laughed.
“You always say the kindest things.” Silenda smiled, but even the warmest expression on a face that sharp would still look cold.
“What’s this?” Celamentum asked, and the two of them moved forward smoothly. Too late, I realized I was the target of his curiosity. “Ahhh, you have the angel. Must be nice, not being alone anymore, eh, Morningstar?” He looked me up and down greedily. “I would know.”
Lucifer kept his arm firmly around my shoulder. “She’s not for sale.”
I wasn’t ashamed to say I nestled myself a little closer than necessary, glad that Lucifer had pulled his token forward in my hair for all to see. The way Celamentum looked at me was the way a starving man looked at a steak.
“That’s too bad, too bad,” he murmured, stroking the belly of his suit.
Silenda reached around herself and slapped his hand. “Please. You have your choice of flesh.”
My stomach started churning. What the hell kind of place was this?
And I’d thought Belial’s arena was hard to adapt to.
“So if you’re not interested in selling, perhaps you’re here for entertainment?” Celamentum asked, tearing his eyes from me with an effort.
“There’s the rub, Mister Celamentum.” Lucifer’s smile was cold and haughty, the remote expression I’d seen on his face the first time I ever met him. To them, he wasn’t Lucifer. He was Prince Morningstar, as distant as another planet to them. “She is the entertainment.”
Madame Silenda’s cool eyes, one blue, one yellow, looked me over. “In bed or on the floor?”
The thought of being in bed with either of them- or I supposed both, since they were fused together- kicked the nausea into high-gear.
“On the floor.” Azazel shifted casually, but the tiny movement blocked most of me from view. “She’s my pupil, and I’m searching for the biggest, meanest motherfucker of a sorcerer you have here.”
Oh god, what was he getting me into?
Mister Celamentum’s smile widened. “Besides yourself?”
Azazel inclined his head ever so slightly.
“You always had a talent for finding the gifted ones first,” Celamentum said thoughtfully. “Some think it a little uncanny.”
“I’m a motivated teacher.” Azazel glanced down at me.
“Motivated… or opportunistic?” There was something a little too knowing in Madame Silenda’s mismatched eyes. I wondered how many people knew that Azazel would hunt down what he wanted, no matter the cost.
The Watcher just smiled thinly. “Opportunity is when Lady Luck knocks on the door of preparedness. I’m always ready to answer.”
Despite his light tone, his hand had crept to the small of my back, and his fingers pressed into my waist.
“We wouldn’t begrudge you what you’ve found.” Celamentum looked over me ruefully for a last time. “Though I wish our procurers had been a little faster.”
I sucked in a sharp breath. All those demons who had been racing out to the crater when I first fell… if Belial hadn’t taken me first, this is the kind of place I could’ve ended up in. Not as a fighter, but as a delicacy of flesh for warped demons like Celamentum and Silenda.
Not for the first time, I said a silent thank you to the prince who had saved me from that fate, pain stabbing my heart at the thought of him.
“Do you have a sorcerer here who fits our needs?” Lucifer asked, his tone light.
Mister Celamentum let out a deep belly-laugh, throwing his head back. “Do I? One of Azazel’s former pupils is here. Come.”
We followed him around the balcony and down a set of winding stairs. Despite their mixed bodies, Celamentum and Silenda moved smoothly, gracefully cutting through crowds and navigating the steps.
The entire time, I tried not to look at the massive eyeball rolling in the middle of the floor. Just because Azazel said it was remains didn’t bring me comfort. It didn’t look quite as dead as I usually liked remains to look, and the enormity of it gave me a headache.
We passed through a small lounge. Some of the demons watched us pass, their eyes gleaming with curiosity, but I forgot all about them when we reached a small fighting ring.
A gilt fence separated the ring from the lounge, and a long bar and polished stools lined the edges. Several identical demons in pure-white suits were already sitting there, silently drinking whiskey. A male with graying hair and scarred face watched from the opposite side with interest as we approached.
“So where’s this former pupil?” I asked Azazel, already rolling my shoulders in anticipation.
Celamentum opened the gate to the ring. “My dear angel, you’re standing right next to him.”
I glanced up at Lucifer in surprise. “I thought-”
Lucifer’s mouth flattened. “Clever.”
“Besides your former master, you would be the biggest, meanest motherfucker gracing my home at the moment.” Celamentum waved a hand, ushering us into the ring. “Don’t go easy on her. We do love a good show.”
I stepped into the ring, licking my lips with nervousness, and Lucifer followed me in. Celamentum closed the gate, and he and Silenda settled themselves on several barstools, accompanied by the ominous creaks of straining wood. “Have a seat, Azazel. Let us catch up on old times while your two protégées beat the piss out of each other.”
The Watcher settled next to them, his violet eyes burning. I doubt this is what he had intended, but… I did have yet to test myself against Lucifer, an idea that was a little too appealing for my own good.
Lucifer brushed back his hair and smiled at me.
“He’s right,” I said, flexing my hand in anticipation of my magic. “Don’t take it easy. That’s not what I came here for.”
“If you insist,” he murmured, and clenched his fists.
Brilliant light spilled between his fingers, like he held a dying sun cupped in each palm.
My own dark fire came roaring to life, prickling my skin as thorny whips spilled from my hands. I swallowed hard, hating the idea of hurting him, but if Lucifer could survive the might of the angels unscathed during the Apocalypse, well… I was likely to be about as deadly to him as a mouse to a cat.
I had all of two seconds to reconsider before his wings snapped out, blotting out the sight of Celamentum, Silenda, and Azazel, and he barreled forward.
The wind of his passage battered me as I ducked aside, just barely missing his fis
t. His light crashed into the bar outside the gate, splintering wood and sending out flares of light.
The man drinking alone was only inches from the destruction, but he raised his hands and clapped politely, picked a shard of wood out of his drink, and tossed the rest of it back.
“Oh, don’t hold back!” Silenda shouted, sounding enthralled.
Lucifer hadn’t held back, so neither would I.
I sent my thorns snaking after him. They wound up his arms and legs, digging into his wings, and I clapped my hands together, summoning an ebony spear.
This time it was longer, just a touch straighter. Belial would be proud.
Lucifer laughed and flexed his arms so his muscles popped, and the thorny vines dissipated and died under the light spilling off his skin.
I threw my spear. The second it left my palm I was summoning another, ripping it out of the aether of magic by sheer force.
Lucifer ducked easily, his smile becoming a grin. The spear sailed over the heads of the white-suited demons and dissolved in the air.
My second spear bolted right for his chest, but Lucifer just raised a hand, almost lazily, and disintegrated it in midair.
Back to vines it was, then. My magic flowed through me easily, the taste of petals in my mouth as they spilled from my hands and wove towards him. The dark fire in my veins warmed me, the prickling almost pleasant, and the thorns that sprouted from my vines were long and sharp.
Lucifer’s light increased, flaring so brightly that white spots bloomed in front of my eyes. My vines coiled towards him once more, determined to outlast the light.
I felt him on the other end of my magic. Like the white fire I kept locked away inside me, the dark magic recognized him. The vines weren’t curling around him with the intent to crush and choke, no matter how hard I pushed them.
They were joyful, touching every inch of him they could before dying in the light.
My own magic was a traitor to me.
“Fuck,” I whispered, shaking my hands and cutting off the connection. The last of my magic climbed over Lucifer in exhilaration before vanishing.