Dark Gods Rising (7 page)

Stifling a cry, Larson vowed he wouldn’t scream like a woman. By the goddess, he was a knight of the Order of the Sword and the Staff. He would not dishonor Anothosia in such a base and cowardly way.

Something crunched.

Larson tensed.

“Mm— delicious,” a husky voice murmured. “Never knew a knight could be so tasty. I wonder if your soul will be as good.”

Squinting toward the voice, Larson had to focus his blurred vision. A squat, man-shaped thing, naked and covered in blood, hunkered by the wall, casually chewing as it pulled at the sinewy remains of Larson’s arm. Bile rose in Larson’s throat when he saw shreds of his charred flesh caught between the hellborn’s long teeth.

“Truthfully, I would’ve preferred your flesh raw instead of cooked, but we can’t have everything, can we?”

Stomach lurching, Larson vomited.

“My, my— how the mighty have fallen,” a woman’s soft voice chuckled.

Jerking his head around, made the room spin. Sulya leaned against the stone wall near the hellhole, smirking. Her long, black tresses had been pulled back into a top knot. Her visible skin had changed to a strange puce. Instead of Anothosia’s shining armor, she wore black, spiked armor with a cat of nine tales insignia inlaid in its breastplate. Zorce’s mark.

“So tell me, Larson, do you like my new pet? Bent, come say hello to your dinner.”

Growling, the devil lumbered forward. “Your pet, Sulya? I ain’t your pet. If you ever address me so again I’ll drag you down to Hell and show you the true meaning of pain.”

Sulya’s smirk widened into a feral grin. Her color darkened into a putrid orange that seeped and oozed like slime over her exposed skin. It pulsed with a life of its own, almost as if it could crawl off her body and become a separate creature.

Larson tried to move, tried to inch away from her, but his remaining limbs had become leaden. He had no feeling from his knees down.

“Bent, you will be anything I wish you to be,” Sulya told the hellborn. “If I tell you to bugger yourself, you will do so.” She pushed away from the wall. “Now step off and stay the hell out of my way until I
tell you
to move!”

Snarling, Bent leaped across Larson to land in front of Sulya.

Sulya struck as soon as he landed. Orange light exploded from her hand, crashed into the devil, sent it cartwheeling back across the room. When it hit the wall with a solid thunk, Bent screeched and fell into a wiggling mass. Composure lost, it reverted back to its true shape of scales, horns and claws.

“Bitch,” Bent growled. “You’ll pay for that!”

Eyes gleaming, Sulya laughed. “Really? I belong to Zorce. To offend me is too offend him. Shall I tell him you challenged his general?”

Snarling, Bent picked himself up from the floor, but said nothing more.

“I didn’t think so.” Sulya looked smug, victorious.

Zorce’s general? Larson’s throat seized. Calto was in greater danger with this woman than he had suspected. His brother had to be warned, but how?

Larson struggled to make his body move, but the numbness spread rapidly. Thoughts of his unfulfilled mission swam in his head, drowning him in regret. He would never hold his wife or daughter again. He wouldn’t be around to protect the two beings capable of saving the world. Would Zorce’s minions go after them next? Did Sulya know the secret? He didn’t think so, but was unsure. What if Calto had revealed it to her? What if there were demons at his home right now defiling his wife and child?

“Now, where was I?”

Sulya came closer and stood beside him, smiling while her gaze roamed up and down his broken body. “What a waste.” Tsking, she rolled Larson to his side.

Sweet goddess, what was she going to do to him now?

Releasing her hold, Sulya allowed his body to roll onto its back. “Where is it?”

Larson coughed. The bitter taste of metal filled his mouth. “Where is what?” he managed.

“The sword. That damned blessed sword of your bitch goddess.” She didn’t give him time to answer. Instead she grabbed the lantern and furiously searched first the ground, and then between and on top of the liquor crates.

After long minutes of searching, she came back and glared at him. “Where. Is. It.” She punctuated each word with a vicious kick to his ribs. Larson heard them breaking but felt nothing.

“Fuck you,” Larson muttered. “D’you think I snuck around and hid it while you stood over me?” Weary and exhausted, he sighed. He wanted to get up and run her through with his belt knife, wanted to make her pay for her betrayal, but the numbness tugging at his brain made him too lethargic to move.

Eyes narrowing, Sulya’s gaze slid slowly to the devil. Following her gaze, Larson saw the beast had almost finished eating Larson’s arm. “You!” She turned to face Bent fully, her orange skin glowing brighter.

Dropping the arm’s remnants, the devil backed against the wall.

“I can't touch the blade. It’s goddess blessed.” Bent tried to restore its human features. They wavered into focus like a mirage, only to fade again. “Though I did see something glow and then disappear when the lamp was lit.”

Sulya stepped forward in a blur. Bent’s face seemed to explode in a spray of bloody fire as her fist struck its jaw. Howling, the beast reached for her, but when its hands made contact they too burned. Its scream sounded like that of a thousand damned souls. Arms flailing, he flung himself away from her.

Cursing, Sulya rounded on Larson. He cringed but to no avail. She kicked his body and face, sending him rolling across the floor with the force of her blows. Larson tried to cry out, tried to beg her to stop, but his head was cracked and bleeding, and his mouth was full of broken teeth. Finally, energy spent, she stood above him, chest heaving and eyes closed.

His vision wavering, Larson felt no pain. He heard a distant wind gently blowing through trees and smelled lilacs as a blanket of peace settled over him. Before him, Sulya’s face faded away, and her voice grew distant. For a moment, his vision cleared, allowing him to see her eyes open. Looking much calmer, she laughed. “Damn. Didn't mean to fuck you up that badly. Zorce’s poison is potent. Made me go berserk.”

Vision once again fading, Larson became a thing of air as the room grew bright. Sulya’s faint form disappeared. In her place stood a woman of gold and white, her smile welcoming, appearing more beautiful than even his glorious Ani. One hand reached out, beckoned, and Larson followed.

* * * *

In his family’s main home, located in Grace, Calto sat in his chair beside his bed. During the first half of the night, he had worked furiously to calm Queen Elise and squelch rumors that he, the High Priest of Anothosia, had become corrupt. Somehow, a rumor had spread that he caused the queen’s male children to die shortly after birth, though how he could be at fault when he had never been in attendance was not explained.

The other half of the evening had been just as bad. Somewhere in Grace a hellhole had opened and be damned if he could find it. After sending knights and guards to all the likely locations, he had run out of places to look. Worse, Larson had not yet checked in through their shared link created by Anothosia’s magic. Because of petulance, most likely. Larson had not been happy when Calto forced Sulya on him as a condition of Calto’s promise to be kinder to Simta. Still, it was slightly possible his brother had run into more trouble than expected.

Weary, eyes drooping, and his mind drifting, Calto called for Goron, his servant. As bad as this day had already been, the last thing he wanted was to fall asleep in his armor.

“Master,” Goron said upon entering the room.”

“Remove my armor,” Calto ordered. “Then fetch me a warm brandy and let me know if Larson sends word through his link with another knight. I’ll have his head for keeping me up with worry.”

Hours later three empty glasses sat by his right hand. Calto’s mind wrapped itself in cottony folds of near sleep while the morning sun was a gradual lightening on the horizon. His eyes slipped closed. When he opened them again his bedroom was filled with soft light. Sitting up, he rubbed his eyes with one hand.

Had Goron left him to sleep when he knew Calto waited for Larson? Growling low, Calto stood up. The fool should have wakened him.

Calto

Calto froze. His mind came fully alert as he cast nervous glances around the room. The light, he saw, did not come from his window. Instead it came from the other side of his bedroom.

Grabbing his staff, Calto walked quiet and cautious across the room, wondering who dared to enter his private chambers unannounced. Drawing close to his dressing table, he halted in surprise. The light shone from something on the table. Frowning, he leaned closer for a better look and cursed.

Larson’s sword!

A slow shock overtook him. There before him, glowing in a soft, pure white, thrumming in time with his staff, lay the sword given to his brother by the goddess herself.

How in the two hells had it gotten there? He moved a step closer to the table, scanning the room around him before reaching out to pick up the sword. When his hand grasped the warm hilt the light died, and the voice came to him again.

Calto

Raising his eyes to the mirror, he started. A reflection that was him and yet not him stared back from a nimbus of white. Calto broke out into a cold sweet despite the cool, morning air.

“Larson?” He reached out to his only sibling with a shaking hand. “Brother?”

Larson reached back, his clear blue eyes sad, regretful. He said only one word before fading from the mirror’s golden circle, leaving Calto behind.

Sulya

For long moments, Calto stood in front of the mirror, staring at his lonely, ragged reflection. An anguished keening sounded, and Calto realized it was his own voice raised in despair. Tears slid from his eyes. Emptiness entered his heart.

Larson was dead.

* * * *

Trying not to cringe as the junior god of Hell bellowed above her, Sulya knelt in front of Athos’s throne while a pale spawn hovered near his side.. The dark god’s roar rose in volume, becoming a crashing boom that shook lose precious stones and bits of rock from the walls and ceiling. His thick, barbed tale whipped around, striking his demon attendant, smashing it into the wall. The hellborn made a sick, squelching sound as it fell to the floor. Broken black bone stuck through its red scales. A dark, sticky spot marred the wall where its body had struck. Swallowing, Sulya hoped Athos dared not vent his anger upon her, not when his father, Zorce, the creator of all evil, favored her. If Sulya died, the dark god would punish his son horribly for harming his general.

Athos roared again, making Sulya’s battle armor rattle. He turned eyes the color of molten lava upon her. She swallowed again and refused to drop her gaze. Any show of fear would be seen as weakness— and showing weakness, before the father or the son, was fatal.

Taking two thunderous steps, Athos bridged the ten feet between them with ease while the cowering spawn scuttled away to press against a cavern wall. Diamonds popped beneath the god’s large, taloned feet, spraying her with debris. Snatching her by the topknot, Athos lifted her into the air until their faces were mere inches apart.

Sulya relaxed in his grip. Fighting would only get her dead.

“Tell me again what you did.” Athos’s voice grated out between teeth as long Sulya’s fingers and ten times as many. His lips pulled back from his gums in a blackened snarl. She tried not to breathe in his breath’s stench, but the vapors were too much. Gagging, tears ran down her face, and her skin’s color shifted to mottled lavender.

“I did as I was asked. The sword disappeared of its own accord. It must have been charmed. As for Larson, his dying was an accident. I didn’t mean to break his neck.”

Sulya gasped in pain as Athos’s grip tightened. “Stupid whore! I wanted him alive! He knew things— important things.” Throwing his horned head back, the god roared. The sound shocked through her body like a jolt of lightning. He shook her hard.

Sulya feared he would lose control and snap her neck. Athos had never been a stable god.

“I do not take failure lightly. You know…” Pausing, he drew her closer. “It might take months before my father finds out who killed his trained pet, and by then he will no longer care.”

He flexed his hand, and Sulya could not stop a ragged whimper from escaping. The tip of one dark talon pierced her neck’s delicate skin. Athos’s tongue flicked against her cheek, then stroked her throat. Two of the protruding spikes upon his tongue scraped through flesh and lapped at her blood. Sulya shivered. Hellkind found similians a treat, their blood an aphrodisiac.

Growling, Athos pulled her closer to his body and wrapped his grotesquely muscled arm around her butt. Throbbing, his barbed member pressed between her legs. Sulya thanked the gods she still wore armor.

“Before I make you disappear,” he said, “let’s have a little fun.”

“Harm her and I'll torture you myself.” A voice, colder and darker than any pit in Hell, slithered around the room.