I turned, almost dazed, and realized I was still holding Damien’s friend. I had paralyzed him. I released him, and he scrambled backward. His pants were wet. He hit the floor on his back but was immediately back up and took off for the exit.
“What just happened?” Damien stood, stepping back from the table. He moved to stand between his friend, who was out of the room by now, and me.
Shay groaned and snapped her fingers.
The smell of smoke mixed with my mist.
A moment later, someone yelled, “Fire!”
The alarm sounded.
It was only the three of us left, and for a beat, no one said a word.
I fought the rage, trying to suck the mist back inside me. But it lingered in the air.
“Wha—” Damien started to speak when the door opened behind him.
The alarm grew louder, and his friend—the one I had frozen—stepped back in the room. His face was set, guarded, his fists opening and closing at his side. Then, he lifted his head, his hands unfisted, and he strode back toward us.
Shay moved to stand between him and me.
I moved to the side so he could still see me, and his gaze never wavered.
A few yards away, he stopped and looked at Damien for a second. Then back to me.
“What just happened?” he asked.
I snorted, but Shay rounded on me, giving me her look of death.
I shut up.
“Crow—” Damien stepped toward him.
“No, dude.” He moved back a step, and Damien halted. He looked back at me. “I know something just happened, and I know you did it. I—” His throat moved up and down. He blinked a few times, rapidly, before his chest lifted and held. “I couldn’t move, and I knew you were going to kill me. I…” He edged back another step. “To tell the truth, I still feel like you’re going to kill me.”
He was right. I still wanted to.
The black mist thickened and swirled around in the room.
Crowman saw it and moved to the side.
“That’s smoke,” Shay said.
He turned to her and looked up.
The mist had engulfed the room’s sprinkler. Yet not one drop of water had come out of it.
“That’s not smoke.”
“Kellan.” A loud voice filled the space.
Shay sucked in her breath. Damien did too before both sets of eyes went to me.
“Who is that?” Damien asked.
I ignored him.
“What?” I asked impatiently
“You need to come to me, son.”
Like hell I would. “How are you reaching me?”
“I can always reach you. You need to come to me. I need to speak to you.”
“No—”
“It’s about your messenger—”
No! “NO!” Shay screamed that in my head and out loud, but I was gone.
Anything that had to do with her, I would always put her first—even if it was Satan himself calling to me.
KELLAN IN HELL NOW
It takes a while to get to hell, which I guess is kinda fitting, given the theme of it being hell. It’s not a short trip down or up. I knew my father could’ve been toying with me, baiting me by saying this was about Shay, but he’d never done that before.
If it was a lie, he was planning something else. What that was, who knew? But there would’ve been rumors. Other demons would’ve been skittish when they saw me. I would’ve felt the Earth rumbling—that actually happened sometimes. I would’ve smelled the deceit.
For us higher demons, that was a thing. Fear. Lies. Sexual arousal. Everything had a smell. Everything had its own energy. We could tap into all of it.
And truth also had its own feel, texture, smell.
I’d smelled truth from my father. Hence me coming down here.
Shay was pissed. I could feel it from her. We were still connected. We’d always be connected, but I’d put so many guards and walls around her now. I didn’t want her feeling and sensing everything alongside me once I did get through the barrier. And what would be worse was other demons picking up that I was bonded to a half-messenger.
I was sure they could feel her presence on me, so the more distance in our connection, the better.
Demons loved torturing messengers. Some would gladly die for one chance to unleash pain on a messenger. They didn’t care what kind of messenger—half, full, an asshole, or someone loved like Shay. They didn’t care. The hate went deep.
When I arrived at the barrier, I could feel the guards on the other side.
They never stopped anyone from coming down here. All were welcome. But once you got in, staying in one piece was another story.
I moved through the barrier, and immediately the guards corporealized and moved toward me.
I knew them. Both were higher demons, guards for my father.
“You knew I was coming,” I said.
Aardvin moved forward, his eyes gleaming.
Why wasn’t I surprised he’d picked a hideous body? There were boils on his skin, warts, and sores festering. He’d always been off in his tastes about who to torture.
“We’re here to escort you to your father,” he said. “He wants to make sure you arrive…alive. You’ve been above for so long, we thought you might’ve gone soft.” He hissed the last word, finding enjoyment in the insult.
This whole show was an insult, this thinking I wouldn’t be able to travel through the Underworld to my father.
I was already moving.
A scythe appeared before me, and I grabbed it, acting before either of them could react.
A slice to the left, a step forward, and another slice to the right. Since they had corporealized, their heads slid off, falling with a thud to the ground.
Their eyes rolled toward me, their mouths still in smirks.
They weren’t dead. The rules were different in the Underworld, but it’d be a bitch for them to reattach when I was done, and they needed to reattach before moving back to their non-corporeal forms.
I raised the scythe and went to work. “You got it all wrong,” I told them. “I’ve been resting. Now I’m all charged up.”
I didn’t leave them in pieces when I’d finished.
They were in slivers.
BLOODY KELLAN
They weren’t the last.
More demons met me on the path.
The scythe appeared each time.
It wasn’t mine. The scythe appeared for me. If I weren’t supposed to, it wouldn’t have shown itself. When they appeared, it was considered an honor in the Underworld.
As a result, when I got to my father’s residence, I was covered in blood. It dripped down my arms and fingers. My legs were soaked in it. I left bloody footprints behind me, all the blood of others.
It was glorious, and the demon in me writhed in pleasure.
On his front steps was a large podium, a hundred stairs leading up into the sky, up to where he looked down upon me.
That’s when I knew he loved this.
He loved what I had done.
I had fed my demon, and he knew it.
His nostrils flared, smelling the blood on me. I could sense his pride. “You are still my son.”
His words drifted down to me, on a breeze he had created for them.
I didn’t respond because I couldn’t deny it.
I was who he had borne.