Ruby Shadows (Born to Darkness #3)(128)

“We’ll see about that.” He tugged on Kurex’s bridle. “Come, we’re taking the accused to be tried before the Council of Elder Demons.”

Kurex tossed his head and let out a ringing neigh. Then he tried to pull back from the demon’s grip.

“Here—what’s got into you?” Yerx sounded both perplexed and angry. “Come, you big brute or you’ll feel my lash against your worthless hide.”

“You don’t dare touch him!” I bent down and put my arms around the big horse’s neck protectively. “Lord Laish will have you thrown into the Lake of Fire if you so much as look at him wrong, you nasty-ass demon!” It was an empty threat but Yerx didn’t know that—and I prayed I’d be gone before he found out.

Yerx looked from me to Kurex, frowning, as though he was trying to figure out what was going on.

Kurex snorted softly and turned his vast head to nuzzle my hand. His demon master still had his bridle, but it was clear he had ears only for me and my orders. As far as he was concerned, Yerx was a distant memory.

“I see,” the demon said at last, roughly. “It seems you have bewitched my horse, Mistress, but you’ll not find me quite so easy to bespell. I have orders to take you to the Citadel of Knowledge and that is where you must go.”

“As a matter of fact, that’s exactly where I was headed,” I said, straightening up and looking down my nose at him. It wasn’t easy since he was twelve feet high but I tried. “I need to speak to Belial—Lord Laish gave me a message for him. I refuse to speak to anyone else until I deliver it.”

Yerx nodded. “Very well—let’s go then.” He tugged at Kurex’s bridle but the big horse refused to move.

“It’s all right, Kurex,” I said, patting his neck. “We’re going back to the Citadel of Knowledge. You can go now.”

At once, the big horse started moving. I saw the angry look on Yerx’s face and hoped it didn’t spell trouble for the big Demon-steed later. But for now, it was enough that Kurex was standing by me.


I just hoped Belial would as well.

~ ~ ~

“I am afraid you are in grave trouble—very grave trouble indeed.” The ancient, hunchbacked demon paced back and forth in the library between the couch and the fireplace. I was sitting on the red leather couch, trying not to remember the tender scene that had taken place right there between Laish and myself just a few nights before.

“But how?” I argued. “I haven’t done anything. Haven’t taken anything from Druaga. I don’t even know what he’s talking about!”

“He will reveal it during the hearing,” Belial said, frowning.

“There shouldn’t even be a hearing—this is ridiculous!” I protested. “If Laish was here—”

“But he’s not, is he?” Belial snapped. “And where exactly is he, young lady?”

“He…he’s…” I could feel the tears building inside me but I held them back grimly. “He’s not here.”

“He’s gone, isn’t he? Into the Abyss, never to return.”

I opened my mouth to reply but he rounded on me, pointing a crooked finger in my face.

“Don’t bother to dissemble—the Mirror of the Eye showed me everything. He is gone.”

“Yes.” There was no point in lying. I could feel the tears coming and this time I couldn’t stop them. “Yes, he’s gone,” I admitted brokenly. “I tried to save him but there was nothing I could do. They dragged him down—the tentacles—they wrapped around him and pulled him down into the pit. They—”

“Enough.” He held up one wrinkled hand to stop me. “You don’t have to explain—I saw it all. The slumber of the Ancient Ones was disturbed and they demanded a sacrifice. They wanted you but Lord Laish got in the way. He gave himself that you might live.”

“I know that,” I whispered, barely able to get the words out. “I don’t…don’t know why he did it.”

“Nor do I,” Belial said grimly. “Do you know what Lord Laish was? What he gave up to save you?”

“A fallen angel—he was a fallen angel, right?” I wiped at my wet eyes with the sleeve of my gray cloak.

“Not just any fallen angel. He was one of the Da`evas—the small group of Archangels that chose to go with Lucifer during the uprising in Heaven. In the ensuing battle, they were cast from Heaven down to Hell. Though some were destroyed in the fall, others gained even more power from being cast down. Laish, himself, fell into the Lake of Fire.” Belial glared at me. “Do you have any conception of what that means? The Lake of Fire is death, even to demons. It is the final place prepared by the Creator for those of us who oppose him.”

“I know that,” I whispered numbly. I remember what Laish had said about the Lake of Fire and shivered. So he had fallen into it when he was cast out of Heaven. And there he absorbed its energy and dark power, becoming what I had seen when he cast off his human form. A being who was burning from the inside out—burning but never consumed because he contained the power of the fire within himself.

“Baptism in the Lake of Fire would have killed a lesser being but not Lord Laish—he absorbed its energy and dark power to become one of the greatest of our kind,” Belial said heavily. “Truly, he was a Prince of Night and Shadows and he gave all that up—immortality, almost limitless power, wisdom beyond measure—for you, Gwendolyn. For an insignificant mortal.”