Hell Sucks: A Reverse Harem Urban Fantasy (Selena Pierce Book 2) Page 6

  He didn’t go down without a fight. Blinking dully, he shot out an arc of electricity strong enough to make me gasp. But I had some of Damen’s powers in me still, and I managed to take enough of the charge to stay lucid, even as my skull vibrated and my teeth clenched together.

  For a moment I almost thought I wouldn’t be able to do it, and then I felt the last of the golem’s borrowed energy sink into me. Without Damen’s magic to animate its flesh, it crumbled back into the clay it came from. And now I had that same power inside me.

  I hadn’t even been sure that it would work. Now that it had, though, I knew I’d never get a chance like this again. As soon as my mother found out I’d gotten strong enough to disable Damen’s simulacrums she would find someone else to guard my door—or worse, hand me off to Beelzebub immediately and let him deal with me.

  This was my final escape attempt. Now or never.

  The twisting hallways seemed to have multiplied or lengthened since I’d walked down them. I knew it was only my nervousness taking over, but it felt like it took longer than it should have to make my way back to the hallway I sought. For a moment I was afraid that I’d remembered the directions wrong, but then I saw a familiar twist up ahead and was able to breathe again.

  I rounded the last corner and there it was: the hallway with the torches and extra guards. Licking my lips, I stood just outside the exit and tried to figure out a strategy.

  There were five guards in the tunnel and hallway combined. I couldn’t take them all out at once, even lesser demons like these. So I studied their movements, trying to figure out if there was a rhyme or reason to them. What I saw only made me even more suspicious that my mother was up to something—and that she kept much more secret from her husband than just my existence.

  They were coming out of the long, dark tunnel with pails full of something heavy. What it was I couldn’t see, because the pails had lids. Each had to be carried by two demons, despite their considerable physical strength.

  Like clockwork, two would go into the tunnel, with a third in the rear. The other two would stand guard outside the tunnel; more than once I had to quietly move around to avoid bumping into them. My shadow form made me invisible, but that was it.

  After a few minutes the two in the tunnel would come out with a full pails, the third taking up the rear again, this time facing towards the end of the tunnel like it expected to be followed. Once the pail had been taken into a room on the other side of the hallway, the demons would switch up who went into the tunnel and who stood guard outside it.

  I considered going into the room to figure out what they were hauling in there, but it didn’t matter when it came to my ultimate mission: escape. Time was ticking, and I had to put a plan into motion fast before I was discovered.

  I saw my opportunity when the next set of bucket-haulers walked out of the tunnel with an unusually heavy load. They grumbled to each other, words coarse in a language I hadn’t bothered to learn. As they headed towards the door across from them, I put my foot out and they tripped forward, the door falling open beneath their weight. Strange and glowing rocks spilled out and all over the hallway; I pressed my back against the wall, trying to stay out of the way. The two got up and bickered at each other, before together with the rear guard they bent down to put the rocks into the bucket. This time, instead of carrying them all at once, the third demon hauled some in his arms. They all three went into the mysterious room together.

  As soon as they did, I leapt across the hallway to close the door on them and slid the bolt home. The demon guards standing outside the tunnel roused at the sight of me; now that I’d made noise they could hear, the shadow form was no longer active and they could see me again. Though I’d locked three of the demons in the room, I’d have to take care of these two myself.

  One was what I liked to call a “teeth demon.” It had a giant, circular mouth with fangs pointing out of every inch of it. They’d given me nightmares when I first wound up down here, but not anymore.

  “Eat a dick, toothy,” I told him. “I’m the one who feeds today.”

  He made a terrible buzzsaw-like growl with his mouth. The other one, a run-of-the-mill strongman, clenched his hands into fists and roared.

  In response I just raised my hands in front of me, gathering power into my body. I felt the hungry thing inside me rise up; it’d been so long since I got to feed her with a demon’s flimsy excuse for a spirit. Baring my teeth at the two in front of me, I let my hunger pulse out of me and grab hold of their energy.

  I dragged them to me so easily that their powers smacked into me all at once. Neither was very powerful, but I could feel their demonic energy inside me. Taking it left their bodies empty shells, and they both crumbled to the ground.

  From experience, I knew that I could hold the demonic spirits inside me for only half an hour or so before they returned to their physical form. In the meantime they crawled beneath my skin, all primal anger and desire. When I looked down at my hands I saw blackness swirling around me, like smoke, as dark as the dead of night.

  I’d never taken two at once before. Now that I had them in me, their perverse desires tried to drag me down, baser instincts wanting to take over. I resisted, as I always had, but I wondered how much of their evil taint they would leave behind in my body. Maybe this was how I lost my soul.

  “Fuck it,” I muttered. “When in Rome, do as the Romans do. And when in the Underworld…” I looked up towards the tunnel, my demon-energy eyes able to penetrate the darkness more thoroughly, the shadows no longer secret. “Do as the demons do.”

  I stepped over the demon dust to go into the tunnel. Before I could make it in, though, a sound to my left caught my attention.

  Further down the hallway guards were pouring my way. Among them were my mother and Beelzebub.

  That was when I realized the pounding from the room where I’d locked the three guards had stopped; they must have found some other way out and alerted my mother to my escape. Eyes wide, breath coming fast, I realized that this was about to be my last stand.

  After this any hope of freedom I had would be gone forever.

  So be it. I gathered all the borrowed powers and succubus energy I possessed, ready to throw it at every single thing standing between me and my freedom. Me and returning home. Me and the people I cared about—and the ones I’d only begun to get to know before being torn into Hell.

  Just as I was getting ready to attack them and make a run for it, my hair stood on end. I smelled ozone. And little flickers of electricity danced along the walls.

  I looked over my shoulder and saw him: Damen. He’d called all his power to him, his eyes glowing with blue-white light. My heart sank; if he attacked me with the full force of his thunder, I had no chance in Hell. Literally.

  Settling into his stance, he threw a bolt of lightning down the hallway—right past me, and towards the guards coming my way. I stared at him, stunned.

  “Selena.” His voice was snappy, irritated. “Run!”

  What I’d thought for a moment really was true. Damen was helping me. And he was willing to defy my mother to do it.

  I glanced back again: the guards were mostly laid out, and my mother and Beelzebub had been thrown back considerably, struggling to get to their feet again. Taking the precious few seconds I had left, I ran to Damen and threw my arms around him, heedless of the buzz of electricity along his skin.

  He blinked at me, eyes glowing with electric power. And he pressed his mouth against mine in a kiss that scorched every inch of me. All the heat, all the energy of his demigod body pressed against my chest as he put his arms on my waist and tugged me close.

  I moaned against him, tasting ozone and power beyond all means, a power capable not only of standing up to me—but putting me in my place. It wasn’t our first kiss, but it was the first one that felt real, like it meant something. Like it was wanted.

  Then Damen pushed me away from him, panting sharply. “Run goddamnit!”

  I saw
the fear in his eyes. Nodding sharply, I raced towards the dark tunnel, feeling heat at my back. There was a great boom as Damen’s thunderbolts arced through the air and struck the others; I glanced back and saw only white-hot light. Praying that Persephone wouldn’t kill him, I launched myself towards the end of the tunnel.

  My instincts had been right. There was a glow coming from the wall at the dead end of the tunnel, and what had been a crack was now a gaping wound at the edge of Hell. The demon guards must’ve been taking those glowing stones out of the rock wall, because there were picks and buckets on the ground.

  “I hope this works.”

  Reaching out, I put my hands against the glowing stone, hoping that it would do… something. Anything.

  It was warm to the touch. Like before, I felt a buzzing beneath my hands, and Vincent’s amulet seemed to buzz as well. There was also a strange smell in the air; not ozone, or demonic energy, but something… new. And almost familiar.

  A roar echoed off the walls behind me. Looking over my shoulder, I saw Beelzebub approaching, his wings scraping off the walls on either side of him.

  “Shit shit fuck fuck.” I reached into my shirt to pull out Vincent’s amulet. “Vincent, Vincent, Vincent.”

  I watched in terror as Beelzebub neared. Then—a bright light, a loud boom. One of Damen’s lightning bolts took the demigod down, for a moment.

  Floating in the air was a familiar and warm voice, like seduction and silk sheets. “Selena, is that you?”

  Vincent.

  “Yes!” The dark demigod was getting up, his eyes black, his mouth opened in a snarl. I could see Damen’s glowing eyes behind him; this fight was about to get brutal. “Vincent, I need your help.”

  “They’ve been looking for you, you know,” he said. “Your… friends. If that’s what they are. Do succubi have sexy friends?”

  “Vincent!” I snapped at him. “I’m stuck in the Underworld, being attacked by a demigod. How do I get out?”

  There was a long pause. Beelzebub stood up, and I pulled my hand from the wall so I could throw my own meager, borrowed thunderbolt at him. It buzzed along his skin, soon joined by Damen’s larger power, but even as he sank to his knees I knew this couldn’t last long.

  “You’re the Lightblood, Selena. Or so I’ve heard.” Vincent’s words were far from comforting. “A realm walker. Get yourself out. I certainly don’t have any advice.”

  “Great, thanks,” I muttered sarcastically, dropping the amulet. I’d been a fool to think that he could help me; I was on my own in this.

  Taking a deep breath, I pressed both my hands to the wall and felt the strange energy of it course through me. Beelzebub roared behind me, but I ignored him; there was nothing I could do to defend myself if he attacked again, except try to escape first.

  “Dad, whoever you are,” I murmured, “it’d be nice if you took this moment to help me out.”

  When I closed my eyes, I didn’t see the mysterious Lightblood fae who I knew had to be my father. I saw Jake Pierce, the man who raised me, who was quick to smile and quicker to laugh. I felt his warm strong arms, and I ached to speak to him one last time, to ask him all the questions I knew I would never have answered.

  The wall vibrated beneath my touch. I felt… strange. Opening my eyes, I saw something besides the glow on the other side: another world, and a light at the edges of a closed door.

  It was the only bit of hope I had.

  So I stepped forward.

  Behind me, I heard Damen’s voice. “Selena!”

  I looked over my shoulder. He was standing right behind me, panic in his eyes as Beelzebub cornered him, those vicious wings and claws reaching for his exposed throat. His powers were struggling to force back the dark demigod.

  “Damen!”

  I reached out to take his hand—and fell forward, through the wall, before my fingers could even skim his.

  The last thing I saw was his terrified face.

  7

  Selena

  I was thrown into an in-between place, like the times Petyr brought me places with his ring. But I wasn’t alone. There were things here, dark and terrible things, faceless and evil. They were grabbing at me, trying to kill me. Their voices were whispers and screams; their hands scratched and pulled. I pushed them away, screaming soundlessly into the void that surrounded me. More kept coming by the second, multiplying.

  “Stop!” I heard my voice and its echo in the darkness. “Let go of me!”

  There were chuckles. Demonic words. I grabbed the power from the demons I’d drained, dark and living, and let it out. It pulsed from my fingers, wrapping around the faceless things like black smoke. They stopped laughing as it pulled them away.

  Forcing myself to move, I walked forward. Towards the distant light, and the door that had to go somewhere.

  Behind me, there was no sign of Damen. I told myself that his absence could mean anything; maybe he’d gotten away. Or maybe he was dead because of me.

  “Don’t think about it,” I said aloud, trying to comfort myself. “Just keep going. Get out of there.”

  Out of the Underworld, and towards… something, hopefully. A door. And on the other side?

  “I hope you go somewhere.” Reaching out, I grabbed the doorknob; it felt real, solid. “Don’t let there be nothing on the other side.”

  The last thing I wanted was to be stuck here forever, with the memory of Damen’s face… I hoped that he was alive. I didn’t know what I would do if he wasn’t.

  I turned the doorknob and stepped past it. There were no more demonic things, thankfully; when I closed the door I left them all behind me. I appeared to be underground again, which made me grimace; hopefully this wasn’t more of the Underworld.

  “Where am I?”

  Looking around, I let my eyes adjust to the dim light and abruptly figured out where I was all at once.

  I was surrounded by the dead.

  More accurately, their entombed bodies. This was a mausoleum of some sort, set half-buried in the ground. Narrow windows near the ceiling let in a little light, while a carved marble staircase up ahead of me led to door that hopefully opened out into a graveyard.

  It wasn’t a regular mausoleum, though. As I walked among the names of the entombed bodies, I saw various plaques and statues devoted to the Greek gods and goddesses, and their myths. There was one of Artemis, of Hercules, of Hades… and of Demetri and her daughter Persephone.

  Of course I’d left the Underworld only to wind up here. I didn’t know why my mother had a tunnel that led here with demons carving into the wall, but I could guess. She was trying to get out of Hell, clearly. Which couldn’t be good for any of us.

  I stared at the statue of Persephone for a few moments, wondering how they could’ve gotten it all so wrong. I was about to head towards the stairs and make my way out when I heard the door I’d walked through slam behind me.

  “Who’s there?” My eyes searched the dimness, but I didn’t see anyone. “Damen? Is that you?” Or, worse… “Persephone?”

  I could’ve sworn that I’d closed the door. Maybe I had; maybe I was just hearing things. I tried to relax, even as my instincts screamed at me. I was all out of thunderbolts and demonic energy, which left just my own powers if something attacked me.

  But I didn’t spy anyone in the darkness.

  For a moment I thought I truly was alone in the mausoleum.

  And then I saw it.

  Naomi

  I hated this kind of bullshit. “Are we really doing this?” I muttered to Leon, glancing over at him. “Like, seriously… a seer?”

  We were standing in Petyr’s office, waiting for the esteemed guest to arrive with the ambassador. But I wasn’t sure if we were waiting for the real thing, or just sitting around cooling our heels so we could get played.

  Seeing the future? That meant prophecies. And there was nothing I hated more than those.

  Leon grimaced at me. “You haven’t come up with any better ideas, so get over it an
d let her do her work. Or are you going to slow down this part of our investigation, too?”

  I didn’t respond to that, though I would’ve liked to stab him right in the chest. He was testy these days, and I got it—I was feeling the pressure of everything going on, too. But that didn’t mean he got to snap at his partner.

  It wasn’t my fault the Elders decided we all had to work together until all this hinky stuff in Baton Rouge was taken care of. Leon and I normally worked with our new respective partners, but most of the time we were a group of four, and the two of us always wound up as leads. No matter what we were stuck together.

  It also wasn’t my fault that Selena was still missing.

  Dead. My hand tightened at my side, and I tried not to think about it too deeply. But we were all feeling her loss; the brief weeks she’d spent with us, followed by her abrupt disappearance, left a bad taste in my mouth. Leon seemed to have taken it harder than the rest of us, but he wasn’t alone in his feelings.

  She was meant to be here. I could feel it. And without her, we were missing something we hadn’t known we needed until it was too late.

  All of a sudden there was a pressure in the air, like when a plane abruptly loses altitude. “He’s coming,” I said, glancing at the spot in the middle of the room. “You ever think we’ll get one of those rings?”

  “Petyr let me borrow one to look for Selena,” Leon said, his voice oddly hollow. “I still have it somewhere.”

  Softly, I told him, “Don’t give up, big guy.”

  He grunted. I was worried about him; walker fae weren’t known for their bonding skills. Once they and their double picked someone to get close to, they tended to hang on. And Selena had been his apprentice. He seemed to hold himself responsible for what happened to her.