Chapter 18 - Fallen's First

Saer squinted his eyes open, took in a deep breath, and immediately wished he hadn’t. A sharp and unforgiving pain flared in his ribs while an agonized grunt trembled along his throat, and he shut his eyes again. “Hells.”

The word stopped as a pair of gentle lips touched his and Saer’s growl of pain turned to one of delicate surprise. Neyu’s elegant hand rested on the side of his face as she pulled back, whispering, “Kalia’s outside. We weren’t certain when you’d wake up.”

Her voice made all the aches and pains feel like well-earned battle scars.

Saer blinked his eyes open, this time without the deep breath.

Neyu appeared radiant, healthy—not a mark on her pale throat. With detached acknowledgment, he realized he’d been moved back to his bed in his living quarters. Nighttime insects chirped outside the window, enough light filtering in to recognize it was either early evening or morning.

“How do you look perfect while I feel like I’ve been chewed up and spit out?” Saer’s voice left in a hoarse whisper.

Neyu’s half-smile reflected his own arrogance. “We’re not sure. Kalia and I suspect it has something to do with your shift back into your human skin. We apparently heal faster in our natural form.” She slid a finger along Saer’s jawline. “And thanks. A lady could get used to being called perfect.”

“Don’t let it go to your head.”

“Ironic, coming from you.”

Saer rolled his eyes and tried to sit, flinched, and changed his mind with a groan. “Frenzied Hellsfire.”

Neyu reached under Saer’s shoulders, lifting him to sitting while he hissed through the agony. Deep, albeit cleaned wounds and ugly bruises littered his pale chest and half of his abdomen where Ahraan had bit down, and he scowled. Someone covered his lower half in a pair of linen trousers, but he remained shirtless from the waist up.

He took shallow breaths to stave off the pain. “How long has it been?”

“A day. It’s early evening.”

Saer shook his head and tried to rise. Neyu growled and stood with a restraining hand on his shoulder.

“It’s already been too long, Neyu. We need to strike while it’s still fresh in their minds.”

Neyu raised her perfect, onyx eyebrows. “Our victory over Ahraan is not something I suspect they’ll readily forget.”

With the vaguest of flinches, Saer grasped her palm, lifted it, and rose. “Humans live in the moment. Trust me.”

The door to Saer’s hut slammed open and Neyu jerked her palm out of his grasp.

Kalia stood in the frame, her glance darting from where their hands had been. “You’re up.” Plucking a plain linen top from the floor, she tossed it at Saer. He snatched it out of the air and winced, grabbing at his side with his other arm. “They’ve gathered. They want to see you.”

“They?” His jaw tightened as he shrugged on the shirt with care.

Kalia nodded. “Representatives from the village. Your followers.” She glanced at Neyu. “The ones who lit fires for us to heal our wounds.” Back to Saer. “And most of yours.”

Saer made a noncommittal noise as he considered. “Tell them to call a gathering at sunrise. I’ll meet with the whole town next to the platform’s wreckage.”

“The whole town?”

Saer met Kalia’s stare. “If they don’t come, tell them their good standing is forfeit.” Kalia remained in place as her flitting gaze moved between Neyu, Saer, then back.

A pinch of irritation wrinkled Saer’s brow. “Anytime, Kaliaspher.”

Blinking hard, Sloth nodded and turned towards the door. She touched the handle, glanced once more at Neyu, then left.

Neyu let out a breath and slumped down onto the bed.

“What was that about?” Saer murmured.

“She knows, Saer.”

“Knows what?”

Neyu let the silence speak for her while Pride worked it out.

“She know—she knows?”

The demoness rubbed her forehead. “We haven’t discussed it. She hasn’t said anything to me. Not out loud.” Her voice dropped. “Not with words.”

Saer couldn’t help his voice raising. “What in the Hells is that supposed to mean?”

Neyu made an exasperated sound. “It’s a human thing she’s picked up. I can’t explain it.”

“Try.”

Elbow on one knee, her temple propped on her fingers, Neyu’s mouth turned at a slant. “I have an instinctual feeling your being male will get in the way of that.”

“Excuse me?”

Neyu sighed and rubbed at her eyelids. “I need to talk to Saer. Not Pride right now.”

The pain in his ribs proved easier to ignore when bemused. “If you know she knows, make a suggestion.”

“I wasn’t completely certain until a minute ago.” Neyu frowned. “What do we do?”

Saer opened his mouth, closed it, then sat next to her. “We worry about one thing at a time.”

“What if she tells him we harvested together? He—”

No. He wouldn’t let anything happen to her. The gears in his mind churned as their path forward clarified. More than anything, Lucifer wanted souls.

They’d be able to continue together, right under their maker’s nose.

“Once the village’s souls are brought back, our maker will see firsthand the success of our working together.” He angled his body so he could meet Neyu’s sapphire gaze, but she kept her eyes to the floor. Pride took her palm within his fingers and gave it a squeeze.

“Neyu.”

The demoness lifted her gaze to Saer’s.

“I’ll take care of it.” he whispered.

Neyu’s grim expression persisted. “How?”

“I’ll return with the spirits. Our maker won’t be able to argue with the bounty, or that we’ve brought more success as a team than alone. We can promise we mean to work together, nothing more.” He could convince Lucifer. He knew he could, and he let that assuredness sing clear and true in his declaration.

Neyu worried on her lower lip. “Let me.”

A soft rumble preempted Saer’s denial, but Neyu touched her fingers to his lips. “He’ll listen to me. I’ve seen his shift in moods since your absence—you haven’t. Your plan is a good one, but I know how to speak to him. I can do it.”

Saer frowned, unable to argue, but not liking where she led him.

“Let me, Saer.”

Not alone. He couldn’t let her face It alone. “We go together.”

She shook her head. “If we’re together, he’ll know.”

Saer had thought the same thing for years, that if Lucifer witnessed him next to Neyu, It would know the place Neyu held in his heart. It was why he’d stayed out of the Hells altogether. His jaw worked back and forth. “If anything happens to you—”

“It won’t.” Neyu’s ocean’s deep gaze carried a blazing fire in its core, and a warm wealth of pride swept off her. “I’ll promise him more large harvests. He won’t get them unless we perform them together, and he can’t come to the surface to see us together.”

What she said made sense. Still, Saer held his tongue, unwilling to acquiesce.

“I’ll talk to Kalia and let her know it’s okay to say we were together, but she’s not witnessed anything else directly—it would be easy to refute, even if she voiced it. And she won’t.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Have you known Kalia to say anything that creates more work for her?”

Saer ran his tongue over his teeth. They had been careful. Beyond a glance or a handhold, Kalia had nothing else to say to prove their relationship, and Neyu was right. Sloth wouldn’t volunteer the information.

“This is how we stay together. No more hiding,” Neyu whispered. “Please.”

The plea cut him to the quick, and Saer swallowed past a tightness in his throat.

The way she looked at him, gaze entreating, unraveled his resolve like snowflakes disintegrated on the tip of one’s tongue. He inhaled deeply.

The one time he’d denied her, he’d been separated from his love for decades.

He couldn’t refuse her.

Saer offered a stiff nod and her shoulders slumped with relief. Hand lifting, he curled one of his fingers around Neyu’s right silver crescent, tugging gently down to its tip.

She allowed a soft growl to escape, warm rather than angry. Her eyes fluttered shut, frown deepening. “Stop that.”

“No.” The word he wanted to say in response to her returning on her own, but he repurposed it. His fingers slid along Neyu’s collarbone and to the back of her neck. She shivered against him, and it sped his heart as he slid his other hand behind her waist. Pulling her around, he half-lifted, half turned her until she sat with her thighs straddling his lap.

“Your wounds…”

He shook his head and touched a finger to her lips, tilting his head to her face. Opening his palm to curl it against her cheek, Saer coaxed her to lean down to him, to meet him halfway.

She didn’t resist.

* * *

Sunrise came, and Saer waited until its warmth wiped away the chill of night before making his move.

His ebony form soared several feet over the tallest head of the villagers gathered around the decrepit platform. Half-burnt and collapsed, only a corner remained untouched.

The chill of the desert night persuaded villagers to don extra layers for the meeting with their reestablished leader. Women clutched woven shawls around their shoulders while most men donned their long-sleeved linen shirts. Hundreds of humans, each ensouled body of the settlement, gathered to surround the broken stage, and Saer took them all in as he circled around.

Passing over the stage then curving back with an effortless angle of his wings and shift in weight, Saer landed on hoofed hind legs and one flat palm to balance his forward momentum on the last sturdy piece of the stage. Silver horns, claws, and hooves caught the light of the sun, reflecting gleaming white and rich ochre. He exhaled, stood to his full height, and scrutinized the humans staring with a mix of awe, respect, and fear. Baring his maw of razor-sharp teeth at the villagers provoked a collective tremble.

No one pointed out Neyu’s presence until she stood next to Saer, still in her human form and dressed in a flowing but simple gown befitting the first lady of the Hells. She touched her pale hand to his elbow. A dark robe lined with silver thread draped over the bend in her other arm. The demon’s head jerked down, but he hid his teeth and growled questionably to his female counterpart. She smiled in turn, and though her lower face remained veiled, it reached her eyes for the audience to see.

The crowd didn’t make a sound.

A sighing growl left Saer as his coal-colored flesh faded to alabaster, wings melting into his back. By the end of it, Saer’s naked body stood before all of them, and Neyu wrapped the robe about his shoulders. The demon-turned-human shrugged into it with ease, unharmed and healthy.

Securing the robe around his waist, Saer beckoned to the opposite side of the stage. Kalia, dressed just as lovely as Neyu, stepped onto the charred platform to join them. Saer took a turn looking at each demoness, then faced forward.

“Where is your god?”

Thunderous silence met his inquiry.

“Where is this Grandfather that Ahraan spoke of? Where?” Saer lifted his arms and gestured. “Did your god save you when Ahraan showed his true colors? Did the Grandfather come to your rescue when your loved ones were at the mercy of a great golden beast? Where was your god when its wicked teeth intended to rip your flesh from your bones?”

No voice rose to answer.

Arms falling to his side, Saer’s voice lowered. “The Grandfather isn’t here, because that god doesn’t exist.” He touched his chest. “Yet, I do.” He motioned to the two demonesses at his sides. “We do.” The declaration stretched through the townsfolk. “You’ve seen what we three can do. Because we embrace the godliness within ourselves. Because we aren’t blinded. It’s also what each and every one of you are capable of!”

Saer paused once more for good measure, assessing the silence, pleased with it. With his words, he weaved tendrils of pride through and around the villagers. Tugging with delicate intent, he forced them to feel his given sin with increasing intensity. “Do you wish to join us?”

Another short pause settled over the crowd before quiet assents spread throughout. Saer increased his pull on their pride, twisting as he brought it forth.

“Do you wish to join us?” Saer shouted over them all, raising his arms high, this time wrenching on the sin of his making.

The audience shouted back this time in full agreement and Saer smiled for the first time.

They were his.

He lowered his arms and nodded once, a slow incline of his head. “You’ve seen what we can do. You’ve come together as one, uniting with us, ready to join rather than oppose us. Listen closely, for I’m prepared to reveal this difficult secret not because you’ve all gathered today, but because of the statement this gathering makes. If any still harbor doubts, speak now.”

He allowed ten full breaths to pass.

As predicted, not a word rose against him.

Saer inhaled, long and slow. “This next truth isn’t an easy one to bear, and your minds will reject it. But know it is the truth. Know it’s how we three”—he gestured again to either side of him—“came into being. Know this is how you become gods among men.” Still tethered, he pulled on the innate pride within each and every one of them, noting how the crowd stood taller.

“The first step is mortal death.”

Quiet whimpers escaped a handful of throats, and Saer leapt atop the sliver of doubt, his shout smothering would-be protestors. “Did you not witness Neyu’s death and rebirth last night?”

Silence fell once more. The villagers glanced at Neyu with newfound awe. One by one, heads began to nod.

Saer’s voice quieted with reverence. “Then you know I speak the truth.”

With an encompassing gesture, he motioned them closer and the crowd obediently drew nearer to the remains of the stage. With one hand, he motioned Neyu to attend one side of the group, and Kalia the other. Once they’d moved, his voice rose again. “I need you all to make a promise to me, lest we become separated in the afterlife. Together, you must promise to follow me, Neyu, and Kalia when your time has come to separate from your mortal body. Do you all understand?”

Some hesitant nods all around, but most were strong and sure. Pride rode them all like a strong wind in a ship’s sail.

“I need to hear your voices! Trust us to guide you to greatness! Will you join us?”

The unified holler of assent from the crowd came punctuated with several fists in the air.

“Do you swear to follow us in death and beyond?”

The cheer rose again.

“Do you promise your afterlife to us so that we might show you the way?”

A final roar, louder even than before, swept through the villagers.

Saer waited for the noise to taper, smiling at the end.

His voice lowered to a pleasing hum. “Your dedication speaks volumes, your courage boundless.”

Head jerking to the left, Saer lifted that arm. “Neyuukhan!” Then the same motion towards the right. “Kaliaspher!”

The demonesses lifted their hands, having formed a perfect triangle around the villagers.

Saer tilted his head back, nostrils flaring with a sharp inhale.

Flames erupted from the three demons’ outstretched arms, arcing, connecting the First, Second, and Seventh with white-hot, blazing cords. The heat choked those in the crowd who stood closest. Those who could, screamed.

And burned.

They burned as the demons filled the space with conflagration which was, mercifully, the hottest fire imaginable. They died, all of them, within seconds.

Brittle silence fell.

Once over, only withered, black remains occupied the triangle between the Daemoenica. Residual crackling and the smell of burnt flesh, hair, and clothing wafted through the atmosphere. Kalia’s eyes widened, and Neyu averted her gaze with a set jaw, gestures that stirred the first inklings of unease in Saer’s stomach.

None had taken part of a collection so large, and he’d been prepared to compartmentalize it as all the others—as he’d done for each harvest since Ruki. He was a weapon. They all were.

So, why did Neyu’s expression of distaste and Kalia’s shock spark disquiet in his otherwise collected mind?

Their hush settled while life transitioned to afterlife, from flesh to spirit alone.

A shimmering collection of individual souls floated from the bodies, dazed and trembling—invisible to mortal eyes but apparent to the Daemoenica. None made a sound as Saer motioned half of them to Neyu’s resigned form, the other half to a stunned Kalia. Saer would stay behind as he always had. He wouldn’t risk Lucifer seeing him and Neyu together. Not when they’d just found one another again.

Not one soul questioned where they were sent as quiet acceptance shone on each glimmering former-villager’s face. Like children waking from a long dream.

Neyu and Kalia shed their human skins, shifting to their full Daemoenic forms. Only then did a handful of the spirits show panic and cry out. Apprehension resurged, churning in Saer’s stomach.

Why was this time different? Because Neyu was here? Because he knew the task she had ahead of her when she returned?

Bound, the souls couldn’t stray from the guardians they’d dedicated their souls to. Lust and Sloth gather their charges near.

They had been created for this. This was the purpose they served. His maker would be pleased and Neyu would return to him; that’s what mattered.

A blinding inferno engulfed each grouping, and Neyu caught Saer’s gaze with a meaningful look just before they all disappeared—souls and Daemoenica alike.

Saer stared at the charred circles left behind, anxiety stirring in his guts. He blinked, made a soft noise in the back of his throat, then walked back to his hut.