The Devil's Right Hand

Chapter 39

I had a few seconds to decide what to do as the second hellhound crashed through the wall, bricks flying. The first hound was busy with four werecain who had unluckily been in its way, and the howling spitting mess crashed into the bar. Plasglass tinkled. Lucas grabbed my shoulder and hauled me back as the second hellhound bulleted forward.

These two were different from the others. Their eyes were green, a fierce glowing green instead of crimson. Heat shimmered and warped away from them all the way across the dance floor.

Lust vanished. Survival took its place, chill fury rising under my skin. The cuff on my wrist made a thin humming sound, like crystal stroked just right.

My sword finished ringing free of the sheath as the second hellhound snarled, a low, vicious sound tearing at the air. The music had halted, but a rising crescendo of screams took its place. Three Nichtvren burned like fatty candles, screeching as the hellhound brushed past them, hair and preternatural skin igniting. Paranormal creatures scrambled for the door, the crowd acting very human for all its Power and inherent danger.

Lucas fired at the hellhound streaking for me. A crimson streak of plasbolt clove the air, smashing into the beast, which snarled and shook its head, crashing to the floor. It literally shook the building. Dust pattered down, I heard the singing whimper of plasteel support struts flexing.

Sekhmet sa’es. It must be dense to rock the building like that. The dragging feeling of being trapped in a nightmare, arms and legs weighted down with sleep while a beast lunges for you, paralyzed me.

“Go!” Lucas screamed in his high whistling voice. Paralysis broke.

I backed up, unwilling to turn away from the things. A shattering squealing roar rose from the battle near the bar. Bottles exploded, glass and plasglass flying through the air with little deadly sounds. Alcohol and other fluids ignited, bursts of blue and red flame. Stasis cabinets shattered, and the stink of frying Nichtvren and frying blood filled the air. A line of fire swiped across my forehead, flying plasglass shards, black blood dripped into my eyes. The slice sealed itself before I could even flinch.

The mark on my left shoulder gave one livid burst of pain that almost drove me to my knees. The air was hot and still, popping sounds beginning as the wooden bar caught fire.

Lucas backed up. “I ain’t gonna tell you again, Valen—” he began.

Then he was flung back as the second hellhound reached its feet and launched itself at him. It moved so quickly it seemed to simply flash through the intervening space.

“Lucas!” I screamed, and flung myself after it. My sword blazed blue-white, a rising song of bloodlust caroling out from the steel. My feet ground in broken glass, shattered brick, and other debris.

Then things began to get really goddamn interesting.

I reached the hellhound just as fresh screams started from the door and the air pressure changed. A wave of sickening Power roiled through the air as I chopped down, my kia taking on sharp physical weight.

The hellhound’s head jerked up and it screamed as my blade, livid with Power, carved deeply into its back. Black blood boiled up, steaming as the glow of my blade made the acid drops sizzle and spatter like hot oil. Oh, my gods, I actually cut it!

It turned back on itself with a crackle of flexible bones, and I dropped flat as it flew over me, its momentum making it overshoot. It landed amid a pile of Nichtvren, who tangled and screamed as flame burst through them. Coiled itself, claws raking flesh and flooring both, and I found myself on my feet, the sword slicing down and around as I made sure I had free play in my right hand. It was a swordsman’s move, easy and habitual, and the entire world narrowed as the hellhound snarled and launched itself at me again.

It didn’t reach me.

A wall of huge Power crashed into my side and I flew sideways, my fingers torn from the hilt. Wha—

The hellhound squealed, a sound of glassy frustrated rage. I hit the wall, stone and brick shattering with an almost musical crash. Before I hit the floor he was on me, elegant golden fingers sinking into my throat and the entire world thrumming with the fury of the Prince of Hell.

“Where is she?” Lucifer demanded, his eyes glowing so brightly they cast shadows under his flawless cheekbones. His hair glowed too, a furnace of gold like the sun’s own flame.

I couldn’t have answered even if I wanted to. His fingers tightened, curling almost all the way around my neck. I heard something crackle in my throat—it sounded like a small bone—and did the only thing I could. I kicked, hard, and smashed at him with all the Power I could reach.

His head snapped aside, a thin line of black blood tracing up his beautiful cheek. The emerald set in his forehead spat one single, terrible spark of green so dark it was bloody.

The air chilled as I struggled. His fingers didn’t give. Steam drifted up from his skin and mine in thin twisted coils. His hand was so tight I couldn’t even tuck my chin to look down at him, instead I saw a rapidly darkening slice of the shattered burning bar opposite. The four-armed kobolding lay twisted and broken like a rag doll in the debris, its body smoking.

“You have meddled for the last time, Necromance,” he spat, and I could feel it gathering, breathless electricity. Pain rolled down my skin, vicious little teeth nipping at me, darkness clouding the edges of my vision, struggling to breathe.

Oh, gods. I’m dead, I’m dead. I struggled even harder, achieved exactly nothing, darkness closing over my vision, no blue flame though. Lungs burning, burning, heart pounding, my eyes bulging, as if I was in a depressurized cabin and thrashing, struggling, dying to breathe.

Had Death forsaken me too?

No. My god would never forsake me.

Crimson light splashed against him, and he dropped me. I collapsed, too weak even to cough, my lungs burning. Whooped in a long gasping breath full of smoke and an awful crisped stench. Paranormal flesh burning: Nichtvren, kobolding, werecain. Ugh.

“You must be the Devil,” Lucas wheezed. “Pleasetameetcha. Can you guess m’name?”

I coughed again, hacked, made a low, wounded noise. Frantically scrabbled in the wreckage and dust. My sword, where’s my sword, gods above and below give me my sword, I need my sword—

“Deathless.” Lucifer’s golden voice stroked the word. I heard a hellhound snarl. A massive impact against my belly—Lucifer had kicked me, an afterthought. I was flung back, hit the wall, a short gasping sound jerked out of me. More plaster and stone shattered, dust poofing out. “You may leave. I have no quarrel with you.”

I never thought I’d feel grateful to hear Lucas’s grating laugh. There was a gritting sound—he had stepped forward, kicking something out of the way. “She’s my client, El Diablo. Can’t let you kill ’er.”

The air chilled even more. Lucifer’s attention shifted like a shark swimming through cold water. Brick and plasteel groaned, plaster dust filled the air.

The Devil spoke again. His voice tore the air, left it bleeding, and hurt me. “Leave now, or die.”

Lucas seemed to find this incredibly funny. At least, he laughed—and fired at the Devil again. The world turned red and I heard the whine of a plasbolt; Lucifer’s feet made a light sound as if stroking the surface of a drum.

I moaned. Made it up to hands and knees, coughing. My belly ran with razor fire. The sound of the rest of the world came back in a high towering wave, smashed into my sensitive ears. Crashing. Screaming, deep groaning coughs of werecain in distress. High chilling crystal screams from Nichtvren bleeding or burning.

I scrabbled away from the wall, coughing at plaster dust stuck in my nose. Had to hunch, it felt like Lucifer’s kick had ruptured something and my belly ran with lava. My sword, my sword—My entire world narrowed to finding my sword. I was in shock, the world graying out, my left arm singing with agony and my throat burning.

More crashes, unearthly screams, and Lucas’s laugh again. He was giving the Devil a run for his money, it seemed.

I don’t care who hired him. My sword. I need my sword, if Lucifer’s going to kill me, I want to die with my sword.

Then, like a gift, I spotted a black-wrapped hilt. My fingers closed on it just as Lucifer’s hand sank into my hair and he pulled my head up. I managed to get my feet underneath me, but my spine curved as he yanked my head back, exposing my throat as my knees folded. I crouched, dangling from his hand. My choked cry slammed shut midway, a spear of pain rammed through my stomach.

“I will tear the secret of your talent for inspiring such loyalty from your screaming ghost,” he said meditatively in my ear, broken plasglass and plaster grinding as he shifted his weight. Was the Devil crouching over me? “I will only ask once more, human whore. Where is she?”

I won’t tell you. I will never tell you. Do your goddamn worst, you sonovabitch. I coughed as if choking. I probably was. I couldn’t seem to get enough air in.

“Where is she?” He shook me.

I took a harsh tortured sip of air. Struggled to speak, to say what I had to.

I managed it. Two little words. “Fuck… you.”

He made a sound like the earth itself ripping in half. The sword thrummed in my grasp. Hair tore out of my scalp as he hauled on me again, this time hissing in his demonic language. I’d driven the Devil to a sputtering fit of rage.

Huzzah. Lucky, talented me.

I had only one clear, crystalline thought. Now or never.

I stamped my feet under me, dug in, and pushed with all the strength in my legs, his hand pulling terribly one last time at my hair. Power sparked, flooded up my left arm, my sword burning white as I twisted, the sharp edge of the katana facing out and the blunt edge along my forearm. As I turned I flexed my wrist, dragging my sword’s edge across the Devil’s belly.

I felt the blade Fudoshin bite deep.

A tremendous sound, like every key on an ancient pipe organ hit at once and fed through feedback-laced speakers, slammed over the abused air. I fell over backward, my head hitting a pile of bricks and plaster with stunning force. Pain tore through me, something ripping loose inside my abused belly. But I kept my sword, heard metal chime against debris. My fingers were locked around the hilt.

Then I heard something I never thought I’d be so happy to hear again.

“Touch her again, Prince,” Japhrimel said coldly, a pall of freezing closing over the demolished interior, “and it will be your last act on Earth.”

Silence like a nuclear winter. Ticking of time and plaster dust both falling through empty space. Lucifer spoke again, his voice killing-cold as a nuclear winter. “Did you just threaten me, Fallen?”

“No,” Japhrimel said quietly. “I simply inform you of a consequence. It is not fit to treat your Right Hand so.”

I dragged in a deep heaving breath, flinched as my gut clenched and broke open with hideous pain. I wanted to close my eyes and curl into a ball, let the world go on without me. So tired, so very tired. Exhaustion dragging down every nerve.

I braced my left hand against the floor. Pushed myself up. It took two tries before I could get to my knees, my left arm braced across my abused stomach. My sword dragged against metal and bricks, too heavy to lift. I coughed, rackingly. Spat black blood. My throat burned as if another reactive fire had been set off inside it to match the one in my middle, below my ribs.

“She was here,” Lucifer snarled. He sounded almost speechless with rage, and for once his voice wasn’t beautiful. “She—”

“She is your servant, wearing your trinket, and has already suffered violence because of it. Including attack from the other hunters you have sent.” Japhrimel’s tone was eminently reasonable, and colder than anything earthly. “Are you relieving us of the burden of your service, Prince? I can think of no other reason for such treachery.”

Oh, gods above, Japhrimel, what are you saying? I raised my head, muscles in my neck shrieking. It seemed to take forever.

Japhrimel stood in the middle of the wrack and ruin of the Haunt Tais-toi, his long wet-dark coat lying on his shoulders like night itself. Lucifer faced him, the Prince of Hell’s lovely face twisted with fury, suffused with a darkness more than physical. Japhrimel’s hand closed around Lucifer’s right wrist, muscle standing out under Lucifer’s shirt and Japhrimel’s coat as the Devil surged forward—and Japhrimel pushed him back.

If I hadn’t seen it, I would never have believed it possible. But Japh’s entire body tensed, and he forced Lucifer back on his heels.

The Devil stepped mincingly away, twisting his wrist free of Japhrimel’s hand. Retreated, only two steps. But it was enough.

Lucifer’s aura flamed with blackness, a warping in the fabric of the world. They looked at each other, twin green gazes locked as if the words they exchanged were only window-dressing for the real combat, fought by the glowing spears of their eyes. The two hellhounds wove around them, low fluid shapes. Lucifer’s indigo silk shirt was torn, gaping, across his midriff, showing a slice of golden skin—and as I watched, a single drop of black blood dripped from one torn edge. More spots of dark blood smoked on the silken pants he wore.

I’d cut the Devil.

One dazed thought sparked inside my aching head. Jado must’ve given me a hell of a good blade.

Then another thought, ridiculous in its intensity. Here. Japh’s here. Everything will be all right now.

Childish faith, maybe, but I’d take it. If it was a choice between my Fallen and getting killed right this moment, I’d settle for Japhrimel, no matter how much of a bastard he’d been recently. Funny how almost getting killed radically changed my notions of just how much I could forgive.

Japhrimel’s eyes didn’t flick over to check me, but the mark on my shoulder came to agonized life again, Power flooding me, exploding in my belly. White-hot pokers jerked in my viscera. My scalp twinged, I tasted blood and burning. My sword rang softly, the core of the blade burning white, blue runic patterns slipping through keen edge and painting the air. I managed to lift it, the blade a bar between me and the Devil facing his eldest son.

The red lights were still flickering, sweeping over the entire building in their complicated patterns, eerie because there were no dancers. “You would have me believe—” Lucifer started. Stone and plaster shattered at the sound of his voice, dust pattering to the wracked floor.

Japhrimel interrupted him again. I felt only a weary wonder that he was still standing there, apparently untouched, his long black coat moving gently on the hot fire-breeze. “We were told by the Master of this city—your ally and Hellesvront agent—that you wished to meet Dante here alone. Did you lure your Right Hand here to kill her, Prince? Breaking your word, given on your ineffable Name? Such would conclude our alliance in a most unsatisfactory fashion.”

I could swear that Lucifer’s face went through surprise, disgust, and finally settled on wariness. He studied Japhrimel for a long, tense thirty seconds, during which my throat burned and tickled but I didn’t dare to cough.

Japh clasped his hands behind his back. He looked relaxed, almost bored. Except for the burning murderous light of his eyes, matching Lucifer’s shade for shade.

I stayed very still, my left arm cramping as my belly ran with pain and my right trembling as I held my sword. A small part of me wondered where Lucas was. The rest of me stared at Japhrimel with open wonderment.

If I survive this, I’m going to kiss him. Right after I punch the shit out of him for lying to me. If he lets me. The nastiness of the thought made me suddenly, deeply ashamed of myself. He was here, and he was facing Lucifer. For me.

He had given up Hell. He had also taken me to Toscano and let me heal from the psychic rape of Mirovitch’s ka, protecting me from dangers I hadn’t had the faintest idea existed. He was loyal to me after all.

In his own fashion.

Lucifer finally seemed to decide. The flames among the shattered wreckage twisted into angular shapes as some essential tension leached out of him. “I rue the day I set you to watch over her, Eldest.” The darkness in his face didn’t fade, however—it intensified, a psychic miasma.

The tickling in my throat reached a feverish pitch. I had to cough, shoved the urge down, prayed for strength. Anubis, please don’t let me attract their attention. Both of them look too dangerous right now.

Japhrimel shrugged. “What is done, is done.” His voice pitched a little higher, as if he imitated Lucifer. Or was quoting him.

The Prince of Hell set his jaw. One elegant hand curled into a fist, and perhaps the other one was a fist too, but I couldn’t see it. I think it was the first time I saw the Devil speechless, and my jaw would have dropped if I hadn’t clenched it, trying not to cough. I took a fresh grip on my belly, trying not to hunch over. I wanted to see, needed to see. My sword held steady even though my hand was shaking, the blade singing a thin comforting song as its heart glowed white.

He finally seemed to regain himself. “You deserve each other,” he hissed. “May you have joy of it. Bring me back my possession and eliminate those who would keep it from me, Tierce Japhrimel, or I will kill both of you. I swear it.”

Japhrimel’s eyes flared. “That was not our bargain, my lord.”

Lucifer twitched. Japhrimel didn’t move, but the mark twisted white-hot fire into my shoulder, a final burst of Power. The urge to cough mercifully retreated a little. I blinked drying demon blood out of my eyes. I wanted to look for Lucas.

I couldn’t look away from my Fallen. He stood tense and ready, in front of the Devil.

“I am the Prince of Hell,” Lucifer said coldly.

“And I was your Eldest.” Japhrimel held Lucifer’s eyes as the air itself cried out, a long gasping howl of a breeze coming from them, blowing my hair back. I felt the stiffness—blood and dust matted in my hair. I was filthy, and I ached. I stayed where I was. “I was the Kinslayer. Thus you made me, and you cast me away. I am yours no longer.”

“I made you.” The air itself screamed as the Prince of Hell’s voice tore at it. “Your allegiance is mine.”

“My allegiance,” Japhrimel returned, inexorably quiet, “is my own. I Fell. I am Fallen. I am not your son.”

One last burst of soft killing silence. I struggled to stay still.

Lucifer turned on his heel. The world snapped back into normalcy. He strode for the gaping hole torn in the front of the nightclub. Red neon reflected wetly off the street outside. A flick of his golden fingers, and the hellhounds loped gracefully after him, one stopping to snarl back over its shoulder at me.

Well, now I can guess who sent the hellhounds. Probably Lucifer himself, to make sure I fulfilled my intended role as bait. You bastard. You filthy bastard. I sagged. My sword dipped, and the urge to cough rose again. It felt like a plasgun core had been dropped into my gut.

The Prince stopped, turned his head so I could see his profile. “Japhrimel.” His voice was back to silk and honey, terrible in its beauty. “I give you a promise, my Eldest. One day, I will kill her.”

Lucifer disappeared. Vanished. The air tried to heal itself, closing over the space where he had been, and failed. He left a scorch on the very fabric of existence.

Japhrimel was silent for a moment, his eyes fixed forward. He didn’t look at me. I was glad, because his face was full of something terrible, irrevocable, and devouring.

“Not while I watch over her,” he said softly.