“Calm down. They will come for us.”
“Who will? Nefertari fucking Maat? I heard that when you got lost in Heaven, she returned to the Academy without you, no problem. She won’t come looking for us.”
“Domina lied to her. I don’t know what she told her…”
“Wait a minute? Domina broke your arm?”
“Yeah. She pushed me off the observatory atop Hotel Fortitude.”
“And how are you still alive?!”
“It doesn’t matter. I am. And this won’t be the end of us. If Professor Maat doesn’t come, someone else will. Davien. Seth.” I wanted to say Adrian, but then Valac would’ve just started with the questions. And seeing how I was trapped in here with him, I wouldn’t be able to evade them. “We just have to sit tight and wait.”
“Well, it’s not like we can do much else.” He sat on the floor, back against the wall.
I looked at the dead demoness in her stone coffin.
“I don’t know why I thought demons don’t decompose once they’re dead.”
“You’re confusing us with the creatures of Heaven. Saints and angels don’t rot. They’re so special, am I right?” He laughed.
I studied her picture. She was beautiful when she was alive. Breathtaking. Her jealous lover had killed her because she’d been unfaithful, had buried her with so much expensive jewelry, and then had designed a trap for those who would’ve attempted to rob her grave. But why would anyone do that when the bloody grave was unmarked?! If he’d really loved her, he should’ve marked her grave, not built a stone box.
“Let’s play something, pass the time,” Valac suggested. “If only he’d made this stupid grave more entertaining.”
“I don’t think that was the point.”
Corri curled up in a corner, near a candle, and started crying silently.
“Hey, come on. It’s going to be okay.”
I scooped her up in my hand and stroked her brown, disheveled hair with the tip of my finger. She was so tiny, and I’d never seen her as vulnerable and broken as she was now. Her hazmat suit had vanished the second the curse was activated. Her face was dirty, and her coat must have gotten caught in something because it was torn almost completely.
“It’s not that,” she sniffed. “I can’t do magic. I’m useless. I can’t help you!” And she started crying harder.
“No, no…”
“Seriously? Now I have to listen to her cry? Let’s play something already!”
“Valac! You’re such a jerk!”
“What? It will distract her!”
We ended up playing 20 Questions, then a bit of Story until Valac went off the rails and turned it into something lecherous and offensive. He was the worst person to get stuck with for hours. When he proposed a threesome, making Corri gag and me see red, I thought he was soon going to join Kore the demoness in her coffin. Time moved slowly. I fell asleep at some point, and when I woke up and couldn’t remember having dreamed anything, I knew my dream jumping powers had been canceled too. We were all hungry and thirsty. But the worst of all was that we all needed to use the bathroom, and we just couldn’t. There was no way. When Valac stopped making stupid jokes and proposals, I knew Belphegor’s curse and the stone box had worn him out. By the time we heard something move on the surface, we were all entirely focused on convincing our bodies that no, we didn’t have to pee.
The ceiling lifted, and crimson, crepuscular light rained down upon us. I covered my eyes with my arm.
“Yoli! Jesus Christ, you gave me such a fright!” Davien’s voice.
I could have laughed, but I was afraid I might pee my pants.
“You can teleport now,” Professor Maat said. “The curse has been lifted.”
“How?”
Valac teleported first, but I was too confused to react. Corri started flying around aimlessly. She let out a cry of joy, flew to the surface, then seeing that I was still in the underground grave, came back for me.
“Should I teleport you, Mistress? I’ll teleport you.”
She didn’t wait for an answer. In the blink of an eye, I was back in the cemetery, with solid ground under my feet, looking down into the dark hole below.
“I don’t know what happened,” I mumbled.
“Of course you don’t know what happened!” Professor Maat was furious. “What in the name of all that’s holy were you thinking? Aleksiev, you cause constant trouble. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
I clenched my jaw. Well, I couldn’t argue with that. Since I’d started studying at Grim Reaper Academy, I had indeed ended up in situations that were more than troubling or a little uncomfortable. I didn’t cause trouble, in fact. That was the wrong word. I seemed to cause pure disaster.
“How did you find me?”
“You can thank Mr. Krause. We realized you two were missing, we managed to track you down, but we couldn’t have broken the spell without him.”
The whole MDC was there, looking at me, Corri, and Valac like we were the idiots of the century. It was beyond embarrassing.
I turned to Davien. “I don’t understand.”
“I felt that you were in trouble.” He stepped closer and wrapped his arms around my waist. As he pulled me in, he snuck a hand between us and touched my belly. “You could say that… we have a special connection now. I found everyone in the cemetery, desperate that they couldn’t get you out. All I had to do was talk to the right demon.”
“The right demon?”
“Yeah. Someone who knew Belphegor and how he liked to curse his concubines’ graves.” He motioned at the tombstones around us. “Most of these graves are unmarked. Belphegor had many lovers, and he never married any of them. He cared about his women in his way, I guess. That’s why he wanted to protect their remains.” He turned back to me and kissed my forehead. “You just… chose the wrong cemetery.”
“It was the closest cemetery!”
“There’s literally another one across the street,” he chuckled.
“Oh my God, this is insane.”
“But you got the horn, right?” he whispered so softly that I could barely hear him.
“Yes.”
“Dude,” Valac pulled at his arm. “Dude, who did you go to for help? Belphegor is ancient! He must have died thousands of years ago. There’s no way there’s any demon alive who knew him.”
“There is one.”
“What’s his name?”
Davien never got to answer Valac’s question. The earth started shaking once more, and we all moved away from the grave as quickly as we could. It was still open, and no one wanted to fall inside. The MDC scattered, and I heard Nefertari Maat yell at them to calm down and stay with the group. I turned toward the open gate of the graveyard, and when I saw what was fast approaching, my eyes went wide and my whole body froze. Valac ran back to the MDC, so only Davien, Corri and I remained to face the horde that was now moving through the tall gates. Hundreds of demons of all sizes – big, small, beautiful, crooked. With tails, wings, two horns, six horns, no tails, no wings, with scales on their bodies, hooved feet, human feet, with animal heads, human heads, animal bodies. Their leader was the most terrifying of all, though. He was a giant dressed in a long, yellow robe, with a gold crown upon his head. To look at him, I had to crane my neck until it hurt. He carried a scepter in his right hand, and with the other, he pointed at me.