~~Day 146~~

~~David~~

The Red Pits continued on, flat as Saskatchewan. With thousands of demons surrounding him, all devoted to Khazeer, who also walked with them, David and the crew had no worries about being attacked. Endless red dirt and stone. Pits, full of dying remnants. Anthills, filled with dying remnants. Hole in the ground that gushed up geysers of blood, from dying remnants.

David barely noticed. He kept on walking. Just one step in front of the other.

It wasn't like he didn't know about grief. Mia took her interest in psychology seriously, and while he'd often regaled her with lore dumps about fictional settings, about how technology worked, or other random topics, she'd talked about psychology with him with the same interest. And Mia had talked about how important it was to process grief so you could get over it. But processing took time.

Thankfully, he had no smartphone to distract him, or liquor to drown his sorrows. Walking, and walking, and more walking, meant he had plenty of time to process, no matter how much he wanted the walk to distract him. It didn't.

They walked past a red pit, full of screaming remnants, and David waved his hand. A hundred little spikes sprouted in the pit, summoned like a small forest, and they tore through the damned. They walked past another pit, and David did the same, killing a hundred of the poor, dying sods with a splash.

"David?" Tsila asked, walking next to him. No longer in her leather wraps, her white wings fluttered, and she set one along his shoulders for a moment; she trusted the angel Keziah a lot to believe her and not wear the leather anymore.

"Just practicing," he said.

"You're killing remnants."

"The Red Pits was already doing that. I was just doing it faster. And they appreciate it."

The gabriem shook her head. "You're angry."

He snapped his head toward her, half expecting her to jump back. She didn't.

Daoka came up behind him, offering a few soft clicks, but Tsila shook her head again and gestured her back. Whatever Daoka said, she let it go, nodding and joining Jes in the back of the group with Pegasus. Beside the growing, winged horse, Acelina walked, occasionally reaching down to brush a hand along Pegasus's head or wings in some mystical, perfect way that had him nudging against her side.

"I am angry," he said to Tsila. "Can you blame me?"

"No, not at all. And I am not suggesting you suppress it either. In fact, I suspect, in life, you were the sort of soul who kept their anger bottled away where no one would find it, and you only let it out when alone."

"Your point?"

"My point is that I want you to realize you are physically striking out at your environment. You are a powerful being, David, and are surrounded by people who wish to help you. I'm sure that sounds like some derivative therapy-talk you've heard before, but it's true. Feeling anger is good, but when it passes, please don't throw yourself back into it. I have seen many lose themselves to their rage until it has consumed them and left nothing but ashes."

"Okay, Mia."

Tsila smiled. "Was she wrong?"

If it were anyone else, David would have either snapped like a twig and thrown a punch, or closed in on himself like he'd done so many times before. But Tsila was an angel who'd helped thousands of people, maybe millions. She knew what she was talking about. And much as David was so fucking sick and tired of thinking logically about something, and wanted nothing more than to devolve into an angry pile of pure wanton rage, his stupid analytical brain demanded he listen to what she said. Listen, analyze, and accept the cold, hard truth. A bitter pill to swallow.

He had to let the anger go.

Later.

"Okay," he said. "Okay. I'll... be careful."

"Good." She nodded, almost a bow, and slowed until she joined the others.

David walked alone. Laoko and Sazillia walked ahead of him, and the new tetrad looked back at him more than a few times, trying to read him. For all the shit that'd run David over lately, Sazillia and even Khazeer were breaths of fresh air. He was brutal but honest, and Sazillia might as well have been a Viking warrior woman from Hollywood; all she was missing was her mug of ale. She grinned back at him and swished her tail. Laoko did the same, but she didn't have a tail, happy to give her huge ass a small shake instead.

What were those two talking about?

Pegasus trotted up to David's side, and Lasca and Laara both sat on his back. Not a problem for Pegasus anymore. The red goblin girls easily fit on his growing back, and they smiled at David as Pegasus nudged his head into David's arm.

"Pegasus big!" they said.

David nodded. "Yeah, he is. Growing ridiculously fast. Only, what, thirty days old?"

"Thirty-six," Acelina said, walking with the others in the back.

David raised a brow back at Acelina. He hadn't asked her to track that.

In thirty-six days, Pegasus had gone from the size of a baby horse, to a full-grown average horse. Maybe slightly smaller. The recent growth spurt meant he was always hungry, too, and David had kept him well-fed. He was big enough for David to ride, if he wanted, but without a saddle? Yikes.

Pegasus pushed the side of his head into David's shoulder, and David had to brace himself to keep from falling over.

"I'm fine," he said, and he pressed his forehead into Pegasus's thick, warm neck. No fur, but the leathery skin was still pleasant to the touch, and Pegasus seemed to enjoy the head-to-head contact. "I'm fine, really."

"Pegasus big and strong," Lasca said. "Fly?"

"I doubt it. Only angels can fly. Seems to be an unbreakable rule."

"Fly to False Gate?"

"Can't," he said. "You heard Keziah. Angels are patrolling False Gate and the Forgotten Place." He pointed right, toward the center of Hell. Hell being a flat plane meant they could all see out to the River Styx and the giant storm that surrounded the Forgotten Place in its center, black clouds that looked impenetrable. All a blur from a distance, and way too far for anyone to see if there were any angels patrolling it. But Moriah and Tsila believed Keziah, and that was good enough for him.

"David can fight angels," Lasca said, and she leaned forward over Pegasus's head and gave his neck spikes some scratches. She was far rougher than David, using her claws and her muscles, but Pegasus seemed to like it.

"I can't. If I play music loudly, it'll summon the aliens."

"But David can transform! Big. Scary. Killed many aliens."

He sighed and looked at his palm. Damn heavy compared to just a couple of weeks ago, and he struggled to keep it up as he stared at the natural creases in his skin.

"It's not that simple," he said.

Laara peeked over her fellow impa. "Why not?"

To demonstrate, David sliced his arm through the air in front of him. Nothing happened.

"I'm telling my arm to grow," he said. And he tried again. Still nothing. "See?"

The two little ladies squinted their big eyes and copied the motion.

"Is hard," Laara said. "Arm no grow."

David rolled his eyes, but couldn't help but laugh. "Yeah, it is hard. I'm guessing it's like when I change during sex. I can't just make it happen. I have to align with the intent, emotionally."

Lasca tilted her head. "How... emotalign with it last time?"

David slowed for a second, eyes falling to the red dirt of the flat ground. Eyes closed, his mind drifted down into deep, dark places, pulled down by claws. Not Caera's. His own.

He shook his head, knocked his brain around in his skull, got a headache, and resumed the march.

"I had to be angry," he said. "Really angry."

"Really really really angry?" Laara asked.

"Yes."

He waited for the question. What had gotten him so angry? But the red goblins, tiny and silly as they were, were adults. They lowered their eyes and made little whimpering sounds, and Laara hugged her leader from behind and buried her face against her neck.

One step in front of the other, David. Give it time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"There it is," Khazeer said, and he pointed his blade out toward the army in the distance.

Thousands of demons were in retreat, tiny red blurs weaving between black shapes. The Navameere Fields looked like an endless slope, not a mountain of rock, but a slow-rise hill of ground covered in vast patches of black foliage. Many hills, actually, rising and falling until they crested far in the distance toward a tiny black line. The spire. Barely more than a speck of dust from this distance.

"I figured they'd try and stop us?" David asked Khazeer.

The tetrad stood beside him near the front of the army, his forces dispersed to let them see out to the neighboring province.

"Morgana is a coward," he said. "She hides in her tower, sends her demons to die, and the moment she loses her tool, she withdraws the army as well."

"Her spire aura," Laoko said, gesturing out to the distant land. "She uses it frequently?"

Khazeer nodded. "Yes. You will have to resist it. She is... better at using the aura than I."

David looked around. Every demon had a seal, a burn mark on their body that let a specific spire aura from a specific spire last longer than the spire's aura itself. A sort of extended brainwashing. Khazeer had marked his forces with one before David had shown up. Morgana had probably done the same with hers.

"I'm confused," David said. "Will she have to re-mark her demons? Re-burn them with that seal?"

"Eventually. Using a spire aura is not... science, I believe is the word? It is art. A seal resonates with the spire aura, and fades with time. Her demons will obey her spire aura, and she can replenish the aura the seals contain by using the spire aura again. The seal fades separately with time, usually."

"Usually?"

"False Gate is unique. The demons there are bound by the endless seal, Belor's curse. But you will have to travel there to learn more than that."

David sighed and ran his fingers down his face. The spire aura issue was a real thorn in the side.

"I'll suppress the spire aura," he said.

Khazeer tilted his head. "You can do that?"

"Yes, but it'll block me from doing anything else."

Khazeer paced, aera armor glinting in the firelight from above. "If you can suppress her spire aura, my troops can push deeper into her province than usual. We can make ground, distract her, and you will have an easier time pushing past her."

"What if I wasn't here?" David asked. "How would you normally do this?"

"My demons are still armed with my seal. I can activate the aura now, and fill them with the desire to fight Morgana and resist her aura. We would attack. But over weeks, usually two, the seal would weaken and empty. And then Morgana would unleash her own spire aura, affecting my troops."

No wonder the two provinces had been fighting each for so long. It wasn't simply a case of two forces crashing into each other. The moment one got into the other's province, they had to contend with a spire aura if they didn't win the war in a matter of weeks. No extended sieges here. The defender had an obvious, massive advantage.

"So I have a week or two," David said, "before Morgana hits her province with an aura that'll screw with your troops?"

"Yes, unmarked. And yours."

David threw up his hands. "No fucking wonder your wars last thousands of years! The moment anyone makes ground, the spire ruler can shut you down."

Khazeer chuckled. "An endless clash. Only demons who can resist spire auras can push forward." With a squinting eye, Khazeer looked at Moriah and Tsila. "And angels."

It wasn't long before David was pacing, too, and he counted off on his fingers.

"You're on a time limit each time you push into a province. You use your aura, recharge the seal on your demons like they're fucking batteries, send them in, and when the aura fades, your demons will lose the desire--"

"They are my demons!" Khazeer yelled, flaring his wings. "They are not enslaved by my auras! They will not lose their desire to win this war. They fight willingly. But when they are no longer protected by my seal and the aura it contains, they will not be able to resist the spire aura of Navameere Fields."

"Alright. They fight willingly. But the seal gives them protection from Morgana's aura, like you said. You push into her province, try as hard as you can to reach her, and fail every time?"

"It was not so, hundreds of thousands of years ago. Once, we tetrads poured over battlefields, and no spire aura could sway us. We--"

David put up a hand. "You're a republican, I get it. Glory days and whatnot. So you're thinking you use your spire aura now, charge up those seals, and it'll give you how long of immunity? Two weeks?"

Khazeer glared at him, but there was the tiniest sliver of a smile there, too. Maybe the spire ruler liked David being a bit of a jackass.

"Two weeks," he said. "Enough time to reach a spire. Rarely enough time to defeat it."

"Alright then," David said. "Then update the plan. You send your troops in. If Morgana uses her auras, I will squash it; no way I'm crossing the whole province in two weeks, so I'll be around. You might even reach the spire this time."

Khazeer tapped his chin. "You wish for me to commit my forces even more than before?"

"Up to you, Khazeer. You're never going to get another chance like this. I need to get through this province and reach False Gate. I'm not going to let Morgana hit my girls with a spire aura. I've squashed one before, for several days straight. I'll do it again. So if there was ever a time you could push in on her and not have to worry about the aura... as much, then this is it."

Khazeer looked around at his closest demons, especially his bailiffs Sazillia and Zaavras.

"Zaavras?" Khazeer asked.

The tetrad Zaavras nodded and thudded his chest once. "I will lead the way. Sazillia will defend the unmarked on his journey. I would prefer to have her with me, but this is important. The Great Tower matters more."

David sighed with relief. The Red Pits were a pleasant surprise compared to the Scar. But the Scar was his now. When he got back someday, he was going to fix it, even more than his orders to Septima would.

"You will do well, Zaavras," Khazeer said.

David spun. "Wait, Zaavras is going to lead this army into the Navameere Fields alone?"

With a deep, heavy breath all too similar to David's, Khazeer squatted down in front of him and held his gaze.

"A deep strike into another province's territory is almost always a death sentence for the demons sent. And I crave to join my soldiers in the slaughter. But spire auras have turned battles into endless skirmishes and border wars for millennia now, as you said. And if I die, there is nothing to stop Morgana's forces from reaching the spire." And just like that, Khazeer stood back up and thudded his chest like Zaavras had. "Make no mistake, unmarked. Demons are not humans. I want to fight. To die in battle? In a glorious wave of chaos? We crave such an end. Surely your tregeera lover--"

David waved a hand at Khazeer, and summoned a slab of rock from the ground, fast. A giant hunk of it, not sharp, but a flat platform of rock that crashed into the huge tetrad's chest and sent the beast back ten meters. He crashed and rolled, gasping, wind knocked out of him.

Thousands of demons stood and stared. No one moved.

David walked over to Khazeer, stood over him, and glared.

"Caera was not some violence junky, you fucking warmonger. Not all demons are addicted to this... this... fucking insanity!" He spun again and faced the onlookers. Even the remnants sounded quiet. "All of you! Every last fucking one of you! You're all so fucking convinced that this is all there is! I saw the battle. I was in the fucking middle of it. You all just gave into your violence auras like it was something you had to do! Like that was the whole point of this afterlife! Lucifer's children, right? This is why he, they, IT, made you? To be soldiers in a war that ended billions of years ago!"

He summoned a rock platform and raised himself high into the air. If there weren't any patrolling angels for him to worry about, there was no reason to hide. He summoned his armor and staff and slammed the weapon's base into the rock.

"But I've seen it! I've seen demons find other reasons to enjoy life! But you, you're obsessed. You're all fucking obsessed, and stupid. You could grow past this. You could find other ways to exist, instead of this carousel of murder and war! You are not bound to this fate, but you keep choosing it anyway! Fuck you!" David held his hand, grabbed the air, and with a clenched fist, shook the ground. The hellquake tore rocks apart, splintered the stone beneath their claws and hooves, and knocked over thousands of demons. "You could be better than you are! But none of you have even fucking tried! Caera was an explorer! She wanted to learn about history, about all the secrets Hell has to offer. But I bet not one of you even read what I wrote on her tombstone. You're all weak. Every. Last. One of you."

Half the demons stirred and got to their feet. The other half stayed on their asses, staring at him. And David returned their stares, body trembling with rage that'd shot up through his spine and into his limbs. He could feel his heartbeat in his face and through his chest.

"David," Jes said. She stood at the base of his rock platform, looking up at him, face pained. "They get it. We get it."

David met her gaze. "I wasn't talking about you girls. I was... I was..."

Tsila was right. All it'd taken was a small poke from Khazeer, and here he was, ready to kill, ready to throw himself back into that fury. He could almost feel his bones grow.

Arms dangling at his sides, David sank his rock platform back into the ground. Khazeer had already gotten up, favoring a shoulder, and he glared at David with a mix of anger and respect typical for a brute who valued violence. Maybe if David dropped a fucking boulder on his head, he'd knock some sense into him.

"Unmarked," Khazeer said. "I--"

David shook his head. "Let's just get this over with. I'll stay closer to the River Styx. You send your forces straight toward the spire." David didn't bother looking back. He marched forward, and a thousand demons stepped aside, some scampering out of his way as he crossed the border from red dirt and whirlpools of dying remnants, into the black foliage of Navameere Fields.

The girls joined him, Laoko and Sazillia taking the lead. Sazillia knew the province better than any of them, and she gestured to a path ahead toward what looked like a giant black forest.

Pegasus trotted up to David's side and nudged into him again. Like someone had loosed the noose around his throat, relief washed over him, and he petted the small horse's neck. If Pegasus were a different creature, he'd probably be afraid of David by now, but Pegasus could hear the music. The ramifications of that, David had no idea, but it seemed like Pegasus wasn't bothered by it.

"David," Jes said. She came up to his side, Daoka on his other side. "You just knocked over a few thousand demons."

"Thanks for that," Sazillia said, looking back with a playful smile.

David nodded. "Sorry."

Daoka clicked, mirrored the nod, and touched his shoulder.

Jes translated. "She's worried you're going to summon the aliens."

"Yeah," David said. "I'm getting better with the music, and I'm getting better at finding that line. I know how hard I can push it without drawing Hell's attention." Which wasn't a nice feeling. The ocean of song was inviting, and Hell's presence within it called to him, like a mother happy to embrace her child. And he had to walk away from her every time he refused to play the music loudly.

He wanted to hold her. Mother Hell. He wanted to drift into her warm embrace, and feel... welcome. Feel like he was home. A feeling he'd never had before, him or Mia.

"Getting pretty damn good at it, then," Jes said. "Scary stuff."

"Yeah, it is."

"Scary is good!" Sazillia said. "I understand you have a point to make, David, and I think you made it, but scary is useful."

David looked back. Khazeer's army no longer watched him, moving in an almost parallel direction toward the center of the enemy's province. A few demons glanced his way and looked away quickly. They were scared of him. Demons, scared of him. Or scared of what he could transform into.

"I understand," David said. "I just... It sickens me, when demons say all demons are nothing but violence machines. That's wrong. Caera proved that wrong. And you girls here prove it wrong, too."

Daoka smiled and nodded, chirping away and gesturing back to Acelina and the Las.

"There is truth in that," Acelina said. "My zotiva sisters and I craved violence as much as the next demon, but we spent many days enjoying other things. There was a certain... joy, to be found in ensuring a particular egg grew well enough to be hatched."

Laoko spoke up with a flick of one of her many wrists. "My time with Galon and his friends was spent not indulging in violence. We talked. I enjoyed our discussions about the nature of the Great Tower, and even about the 'human condition.'" She air-quoted 'human condition' with all four hands. "Gabriem do oh so love to talk about souls."

Tsila chuckled. Moriah looked down, glaring at nothing. Right, Galon, the angel she'd killed. The first angel-on-angel murder since the First War, supposedly. And judging from the slight smile from the curvy tetrad, she'd brought him up on purpose to give Moriah a jab.

David opened his mouth, and closed it. The fuck could he tell Laoko? Let it go?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Navameere Fields greeted them with blade and thorn. Tacharius had been right. The whole damn province was hostile in a way you couldn't appreciate until you were in the thick of it. Like a jungle, ominous but ultimately not exactly scary-looking from the outside, but the moment you were inside it, the sheer dread of it was all-too apparent.

Sazillia took them through a forest of black, sharp trees, each an array of giant thorns, but no branches. They stood as tall as the tetrad herself, and had no canopy. More like the group was walking through dense, barbed grass. Laoko, Sazillia, and Moriah pushed through, chopping the foliage down with their swords, Moriah in her armor. David could move the foliage with a song, but doing that all day would drain him pretty fast.

David yelped and jumped back when something touched his foot. A spider-like creature, not even a foot long, but it was thick, powerful for a little bug, and it had mandibles too big for its body. Yet another kind of Hell spider. Maybe it was blind, because the creature touched David once before turning, facing him, and lunging at his shin. Just like finding a bug in the middle of the night in a jungle.

Jes kicked it off him, and Daoka squashed it under a hoof.

"This," David said, grumbling, "is going to be a pain to get through."

"It will," Sazillia said. "These fields are deadly, and filled with many hellbeasts who've learned to live in them."

"Is the entire province covered in this?" David asked.

"Nah. There are paths, and we're heading toward one now. But there are plenty of spots where we have to cut our way through. It's shallow in places, but more dense. In some places, it's all beachgrass, and the ground turns to sand."

David winced. "Beachgrass? Like, American beachgrass?" Assuming Sazillia knew what that was. "That shit is sharp."

"And here," Sazillia said with a chuckle, "it is beyond sharp. Misstep and it will cut through a human's skin easily enough to reach bone. You will bleed, and bleed."

"I--" A sharp pain cut through David's ankle, and he froze. Hellbeast? Some deadly insect with a nasty venom? Nope, just a random thorn from the remains of a giant black stalk, cut down by the girls ahead of him, but still a sharp, spiky mess. "I could use my batlam rune, for the armor. But I don't know if I can trek across this province wearing that. I mean, I could--"

Acelina picked him up and set him on Pegasus's back.

"Whoa!" David panicked, flailing for a moment before he grabbed the only thing he could think to grab: some of Pegasus's neck spikes. They weren't as hard as a horn, with a bit of give to them, bending just enough that they tilted in his grip when he held on.

Pegasus looked up and back at him, and made a strange, rumbling purring sound, mixed with a horse's neigh. And he didn't freak out, or thrash, or try to buck him off. Maybe the Las had prepared him for what being ridden would be like.

"Acelina!" David yelled, looking back. "You could have startled him! He'd have run right into those stalks"--he gestured to the wall of tall, black, spiky grass surrounding them--"and skewered himself to death!"

"Nonsense. You would have been skewered to death, perhaps, but Pegasus would have lived." Her grin was positively evil.

"And you could have crushed my balls."

Acelina laughed, exposing more of her shark teeth. "Yes, that is true. But as long as Pegasus does not gallop, you should be fine, yes?"

"I mean... I guess. But what about his legs?"

Jeskura matched the spire mother's laugh and gestured down at Pegasus's ankles. David leaned over and watched the small horse crush thorns under his hooves, and what thorns brushed against his skin, Pegasus somehow either avoided getting stabbed by, or the thorn only scratched his leathery skin and didn't cut.

David looked down at his own ankle. The thin skin was bleeding, dripping bits of crimson. And scarab-like hellbeasts crawled up from the soft ground and swarmed over it.

"Okay," David said. "Yeah, okay, it's probably best I don't walk through this. I am too soft."

"Far too soft," Acelina said. "There is a reason our skin is usually dark." With an almost theatrical flair, she threw a hoof down and crushed one of those cut-down stalks, sending shards of thorns scattering, and they bounced off the dark skin of her legs harmlessly.

Pegasus's skin was dark red in most places, too. He seemed perfectly comfortable. And as long as he didn't jump around or gallop, hopefully David's testicles would be fine, too.

"A saddle," Moriah said. "We will find some leather, or perhaps we kill some hellbeasts and make some leather ourselves? And then we could create a saddle for you."

"I mean, maybe?" David said. "It's not that easy to just make a saddle."

"We'll figure something out," Jes said. "Maybe Caera can--"

Jes stopped, stared at David while the rest of the crew came to a slow stop too, and lowered her head. She looked back the way they'd come, over the destroyed black, branchless trees, and her tail slumped down to join the mess.

"Sorry," she said.

Daoka was at her side in an instant, chirping and clicking at her, and the two leaned in to each other and pressed their foreheads together. Jes clicked a couple of times, too, and no one bothered to translate as the two resumed the walk.

Moriah and Tsila stared at the two demons before looking at David, confused. After all this time, they still didn't get that demons were capable of the same emotions they were, and that he was. Even after hopping onto a rock and yelling at the top of his lungs at an entire army, they still weren't entirely convinced.

The angry gargoyle saying 'sorry' put a bigger dent into their beliefs than David's rant had.

David looked down at Pegasus's neck. Not the same, but not all that far off either from Caera's back, either. Dark red skin, big spikes, and him holding onto them to keep from falling off. Just like old times.

Except in a black forest of sharp thorns. Wings up and in, Acelina hissed and stomped a few thorns out of spite as they scraped along her membranes. The Las navigated the destruction easily, having grown up in Death's Grips tunnels, full of bloodgrip, but Acelina again hissed and stomped a hoof.

"Is the entire province like this?" she asked.

"No," Sazillia said, chopping down stalks with practiced ease. She'd done this before. "But like I said, these are the Navameere Fields, zotiva. We have to cut through this for a while before we work our way toward the coast."

"The coast," Laoko said, looking back, "will be more dangerous. Hellbeasts you cannot imagine lurk in those waters. Many sit on the shore. I believe some of them, the surface would call... octopuses?"

Sazillia nodded. "Krakens."

David's gut clenched. "Sounds wonderful."

Daoka raised a hand and chirped something.

"No idea," Sazillia said. "Navameere was an angel, and he or she did something during the First War. That's all anyone knows."

David tilted his head and looked at Daoka, and she returned his look with an eyeless smile. Filling in for Caera, perhaps. He'd have hugged her if he wasn't on a horse.

"I would like to know," Moriah said. "Precious little is known of the First War."

"Debrief us," David said. "I mean, why don't angels know more about the First War?"

"Our great libraries are filled with books, everything ever written by souls. And there are books written by angels, but few were written during the First War. And few of those are public to us."

Jes held up a hand. "Language existed two billion years ago?"

Moriah shrugged. "Estian has always existed. Don't interrupt. Now, the council has long decreed that books written by the first angels, by themselves, and by the archangels, were not for our eyes. They do not want information that could lead to another great betrayal to happen again."

Jes didn't interrupt, but Sazillia did, with a chuckle that sounded borderline manic.

"The council doesn't trust its own forces?"

But Moriah didn't take the bait. She rolled her eyes as she joined the two tetrads again, chopping down trees for the group, and maybe doing a better job for Acelina, too, swinging wide. Or maybe just frustrated that Sazillia was right.

"Lucifer, the first of the archangels, is a being beyond our understanding, demon. They, he, it, was one of the great watchers. The Great Tower was theirs to bend to their will, and only the surface was beyond their reach. What horrible knowledge could turn one of them against his three brothers, and their father? Or maybe it is as simple as the pride of a nigh-deity refusing to dedicate their existence to helping meager souls. I do not fault the council for sealing away the possibilities."

Laoko and Sazillia both chuckled, quiet, sinister sounds, not unlike mean high school girls, just with huskier voices.

"Navameere," Moriah continued, "is an unknown angel. No one knows who they were or what they did."

David spoke up. "I see in the runes in my mind that the real name of this province is Navameere Fields. And, far as I can tell, the only people creating runes were God, and possibly the archangels. So, whoever they were, they did something big enough for God or the archangels to literally write their name down in an ancient language that is, far as I can tell, the language of existence."

"Only them?" Jes asked.

"Basically. I can see God and the four archangels. The nine Old Ones are in there, too, but their names are... minor? Like, footnotes? And I can see the nine provinces and their real names. I see Navameere Fields, but no Navameere."

Jes shook her head. "Does Navameere even need to be a person? An angel who did something? Why not just a... a name? Death's Grip has Adam's Back and the Gorzen Eye and Gorzen Mountain and--"

"Nah, not the same. Those are names demons gave to those areas. I don't see those names in the runes Mia put in my head. Navameere Fields is the real name of that province, while none of the other provinces have names like that. So whoever Navameere was, they were damn special."

"A mystery," Laoko said. "We know of God and the archangels. We know of the Old Ones. We know of Cain, Lilith, and the second war they stirred. But no one knows anything about this Navameere?"

"Not just them," Jes said. "The rider, and that woman in the aera armor, too. They're special, and fucking immortal--or at least the rider is. Where do they fit into any of this?"

David closed his eyes. This was a perfect conversation for Caera. She'd have bounced from side to side, getting more and more excited at the idea of delving into old tombs or finding ancient temples to answer these questions. Pegasus would have joined her and jumped from side to side too, the only two with four legs. She'd have mentioned something about some old writing she'd found, something in Estian that mentioned an old temple in Navameere Fields, or something like that.

A remnant, half crawling out of the ground, screamed at David as he trotted by. The poor bastard was bleeding from a million cuts, each drawing a single drop of blood so every inch of him was covered in crimson.

David waved a hand at him, and summoned a small spike through his head. Just a little thing, ending the man's pain. Tsila looked at him quizzically, and he gave her a small nod. No anger left in him, for the moment at least.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Come the night, the crew went through the usual process. Back when he'd traveled with Queen Almighty Tatiana the succubus, he'd made two caves, one for his group and the other for hers. But now the only stranger in their group was Sazillia, and the tetrad radiated honesty out of every pore. It was fine for her to sleep with them.

He made the cave nice and wide. He had to. Pegasus wanted to trot around for a while, walk in a circle, stretch his wings where they wouldn't get cut up. The occasional whinny or neigh, mixed with weird little rumbling sounds, seemed cheerful; hellbeast body language and sounds were an interesting language to decipher.

Soon, everyone was asleep except for David, Acelina, and Sazillia. Acelina sat near David, while Sazillia sat opposite them, tilting her head as she looked at them.

"So what's your story?" Sazillia asked, and she gestured to the two of them.

"Me?" David asked.

"Later. It's the zotiva I'm curious about right now." And like she was with friends, Sazillia crawled over and sat in front of them. Both she, Laoko, and Acelina wore the fancy new aera armor, and it looked great, despite its morbid origins. Bronze and red with gold accents, and Sazillia had looked happier the moment she'd gotten hers back.

Acelina shrugged. "Why should I explain myself to you?"

"No reason, princess. Just curious. You're the only zotiva anyone's ever seen walking around outside her spire, and you came from Death's Grip. That is a long way from home."

If she'd had eyes, Acelina would have been rolling them

"If you must know, I was the prized zotiva of Death's Grip, but when David and his sister came into proximity, the results were destructive. The province ripped in half, from inner to outer edge, and the spire nearly toppled into oblivion. And through it all, the rider came for the two unmarked. I..."

"It's okay, Acelina," David said. "We should tell them all tomorrow anyway."

With a heavy sigh, Acelina let her wings slump, but only for a moment. No way the spire mother would let herself look weak in front of a stranger.

"David and Jeskura stumbled upon me, fleeing for my life, but in truth, I had been hoping to find them, or at least one of the unmarked. David's sister killed Zelandariel, and I planned revenge."

Sazillia blinked, frozen for a moment, and ran a claw along the huge scar on her neck.

"You were going to kill David's sister?"

"Yes. That was my original plan, tetrad. I feigned ignorance, and David -- and Jeskura, Daoka, and... Caera -- took me with them because I am useful. But as the months went by, I... felt differently. Hindsight makes fools of us all. Zelandariel was as power-hungry a demon as Azailia is, and Tarkissa was. We are better off for her death. And David has proven to me that he is worthy of consideration. He vouches for his sister, and I am inclined to believe him."

It was quite the confession, and Sazillia stared at her as if Acelina had just bopped her on the head.

"You were playing the long game," Sazillia said.

"Yes, I was. But..." Another heavy sigh. Whatever thoughts Acelina was struggling with, they were heavy, and she aimed her eyeless gaze down at the floor and David's legs as her tail grew still. "Perhaps David is correct about us demons. I do not know. But I no longer desire to see Mia dead, and I wish to aid the boy on this journey."

"Saving the Great Tower?"

"Among other things. I plan to have power too, someday."

"Oh ho ho." Like a naughty Santa Claus, Sazillia chuckled warmly and leaned in. "Lasca told me you really like it when you're the center of attention. Something about having half a dozen sets of lips on your body?"

Acelina rustled her wings and slipped one behind David's back. He hadn't expected that. The long membrane rested across his back, and her wing's thumb claw grazed along his neck, almost like she was holding him... protectively?

"Lasca should learn to watch her words," Acelina said. "I will punish her tomorrow."

Sazillia laughed and shook her head. "Don't. I was pushing her. I got the impression you all had an active sex life together, before the battle happened. I was testing the waters."

Arms draped across his knees, David shook his head. "Don't think you're crossing a line?"

"No, I don't." Mouth open, Sazillia paused and looked down, thinking. "It's weird to me to treat death like this. For us in the Red Pits, a battle won usually leads to sex, and a lot of it. The fewer who survive, the more excited we were for surviving. I'm not used to seeing anyone treat a demon's death with such... reverence."

"Humans aren't like that," David said. "I mean, usually. I suppose some cultures might have been different. Some use sex to remind themselves they're alive, and--well, ask Mia when we find her. But me? No. I'm sorry if you thought joining the group meant orgies every night, but I'm not there yet."

And that sucked. He missed holding Jes and Daoka to his body. He missed disappearing into Acelina's breasts. He missed the way Moriah was always stubborn about joining them, and the way Tsila had basically wormed her way into their group. He missed the way the Las were so delightfully simple, they embraced sex like a game. He even missed Laoko, trying to manipulate everyone into positions she preferred.

He missed Caera's tongue licking his neck and cheek.

"Well," Sazillia said, shrugging, "when you're feeling better, let me know?" And with a playful grin, she winked at him, walked back to her side of the cave.

Acelina's wing arm pulled David a little closer to her side, and he obliged, letting her half-hide his body under her wing. Protecting him from Sazillia? It didn't seem like that. More like, she was... being nice.

He liked it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~Day 134~~

~~Mia~~

A day since they'd escaped Molech's great forge, and so far, so good. Apparently, a single day was enough for most demons to recover from the fallout of losing their seal, Belor's curse. Instead of a province of madness, of violent and bloodthirsty demons pouring over the buildings to kill Mia and the crew, they found demons sitting around, exhausted, covered in fresh scars, and trembling.

Belor had offered the first few groups some words of encouragement, like a king raising his knights to action. Most were unresponsive. He gave up by the fifth group.

"Molech will pay," he said, and he gestured out at the streets ahead of them, weaving around the various buildings of wood, stone, and clay. "In my day, demons marched the damned in line, chains around their necks, and we brought them to gatherings to be feasted upon." Slowly, the old tyrant's anger faded. The longer Belor talked, the less serious he sounded, and the more over-the-top and declamatory he became. Defense mechanism, maybe? To not let the seriousness of the situation depress him? "In my day, every demon was armed with sword and armor, and they stood ready, waiting for orders! In my day--"

"Okay, boomer," Mia said.

Belor tilted his head, waiting.

Laughing, Mia gestured up at the titan. "It just means you're old, and dumb."

"Hey, that's not nice."

She almost tripped as she laughed louder. But the laughter faded as they passed a group of demons huddled together in a ruined building, wall gone and most of the ceiling, too. Demons of all kinds, shoulder to shoulder, shaking, surrounded by dead demons, killed yesterday. The group didn't look Mia's way as the crew walked on by, but Belor looked at them, his smile morphing back into a frown.

"I could give them an order," he said. "A true order, from the spire."

"You can use a spire aura already?" Mia said.

"A small one, maybe."

Julisa looked back at them and smirked. "You can barely walk, child of Abaddon."

Belor matched the smirk. "Good thing Mia's given you those protective runes, or I'd have all of you dancing to my tune."

Mia rolled her eyes. Figuring Belor out was actually proving to be pretty easy. Sure, he had lofty goals and an inflated view of himself, but he was also playful and fun, and was more than happy to engage in some silly banter. He was so... so... comfortable with himself. Most demons seemed to be, but Belor was comfortable with himself in a human-like way, like a confident person who just radiated charm. It was like someone had taken an incubus and put him in a twelve-foot-tall titan's body.

"The province," Mia said. "What are you going to do about it?" She gestured to another group of demons sitting around, shaking, blood trickling from recent gashes.

"You need to reach the Forgotten Place, right? When you let me go, I'll head back to the spire and get to work on fixing this place. I will take back the spire. I will watch the eggs and pick zotivas to be my new spire mothers. I will pick new bailiffs. And slowly, I'll reestablish complete control of the province."

Vinicius looked back with a growl. "Why wait?"

Hand up, Belor didn't take the bait. "Even if I could beat all of you in a fight and secure my freedom, Vinny, something tells me this little girl would kill me. She's a lot scarier than the rest of you."

Mia beamed up at the old tyrant, chuckling. Damn it, stop laughing! She frowned at herself, looked down, and watched Belor's hooves for a while instead. He was the only demon with hooves in the immediate crew, and they were so damn big, they were as big as elephant feet, if not bigger.

Cerberus pressed up against her leg, and she gave him a few good back scratches.

"I don't condone tyranny," Mia said. "But this is Hell, and it's not fair for me to judge how demons do things. I don't like you killing angels, though. Yes, I know, it's not as simple as you being the bad guy, and them being the good guys, but that's part of the deal! Angels are going to leave demons alone, and demons are going to leave angels alone from now on. No more trying to somehow obtain the devil's power and take over the Great Tower. No more trying to defeat Heaven or somehow reach the surface and feast on all the still-living souls."

"But Mom!"

Don't smile. Don't smile.

How did this old demon know how to talk with modern mannerisms? Or maybe, kids had been saying that since forever.

"I'm serious, Belor," she said. "I'm busting my ass to save the Great Tower. There's going to be changes." She started counting on her fingers. "First, stop an alien force from destroying the Great Tower. Second, stop the civil war in Heaven. Third, find a better way to deal with this great cycle, because holy fuck, remnants do not deserve this, not all of them."

Adron glanced back, and she lifted her head long enough to meet his eyes. His smile made her ache.

But Belor's was outright playful, and he flapped a giant wing behind her, membrane healed.

"Not very big goals, Mia," the titan said. "I could do that before breakfast."

She rolled her eyes again. "I won't stop demons from fighting each other. I want to, but like you said, demons want to fight each other. You want to fight in general. So I guess I should let that be."

Kas, walked directly behind Belor, snarled. "I'd prefer to change that, too."

Belor looked back with a shrug. "Think what you want, sarkarin. We demons love to fight and kill, and that includes you."

But Kas shook his head. "Then I will rebuild the Damall, and we will strike you down."

Romakus matched his old boss's laugh. "I like Kasimiro! Sure, you can join." As if Romakus was in a position to be picky.

"I'll figure something out," Mia said. "So, uh, fourth thing on the list: figure out a better way to keep demons happy. Because, like you said, Belor, Lucifer created you this way, and then you all got shafted, left behind with no goal, once Satan was locked away. That is a giant existential conversation -- should you be changed or embrace your nature? -- that I am not equipped to answer. But I can still work toward that goal, because Kas has a point. Demons don't need to be slaughtering each other the way they do. There has to be a better way."

As she talked, Belor's smile faded, replaced with a quizzical and scrutinizing look aimed straight at her, never deviating.

"Tell me, Mia," the titan said, "how old are you?"

"Nineteen."

"I haven't seen a scrying pool in two thousand years, but I assume souls on the surface still kill each other?"

Her smile vanished, and she glared up at the child of the Old Ones. "Yes. But that's not--"

"And animals? Does the wolf still hunt the deer?"

The conversation was quickly nosediving in a direction that made her squirm, and she looked away.

"That's... not the same. That's--"

"Interesting. So... if I gave you a magic spell to change the surface world in whatever way you wanted, would you throw Mother Nature aside, dismiss her entirely because she is cruel, and come up with a better system?"

She froze, and only a gentle nudge from Kas got her walking again.

"Um, I... I don't know. I--"

"And souls? Would you change the surface world so that humans never attacked each other ever again? Even knowing full well how much human civilization owes its existence to violent beginnings?"

"That's not the same! I mean--"

"We demons are the only beings in all of existence that God did not create, except for maybe these aliens. But I wouldn't be so quick to think I can rewrite the rulebook on how life and the afterlife work, Mia. At a certain point, you learn to accept what the universe gives you, and go with the flow. I think I heard that idea from the Chinese during the Spires War."

She stared up at the old tyrant, blinking. "You remember... learning about Taoism?"

He grinned down at her and tapped his temple. "A few things stick out, too important to forget. Hell isn't the surface, but that doesn't mean there isn't wisdom to be gained from it."

Belor liked to joke, but he wasn't a clown. He was smart. Mia gulped and rubbed her arm as she lowered her eyes before slowly looking ahead to the rest of the group. Romakus grinned back at her, while Noah and Azreal glared, not happy the old tyrant was in the group at all. And right then, she didn't blame them. Belor was scary.

"Well fuck that," Mia said. "Like you said, demons weren't created by God. So forgive me if I think maybe Lucifer kinda fucked up, and maybe I can do better."

"Ha! Well, if you can pull it off, then by all means, give it a go, Mia."

Again, she squinted up at Belor. No one else used her name so casually.

"And for the record," she said, "just because humans used violence to get civilization going at the start, doesn't mean it's the best way to keep it going! Gene Roddenberry would have a few words to share with you!"

"A philosopher?"

"Sort of." Satisfied with her answer, she nodded and walked proudly, refusing to elaborate. "And--"

Noah, Azreal, and Yosepha spun, each staring up at the sky. Everyone turned and did the same, but they all knew what was coming.

Even from a distance, they saw the oncoming swarm, white wings that blocked out the sky, hiding the flowing flames behind feathers and gold streaks.

"Get down!" Noah yelled. "Hide!"

Mia was already on it. She held up her hands and tore open the ground of a nearby building. Stone walls trembled as she displaced rock and pushed it aside, ripping open the floor.

"Faster," Adron said.

"Working on it."

"Faster faster."

"I'm working on it!"

Cerberus, bless his heart, dug at the hard soil, paws tearing at the rock as Mia displaced the ground from underneath him.

Trumpets. The Unholy Lands filled with a triumphant song, as if ten thousand soldiers were riding into battle on horses, with a hundred bards following them, unleashing pure glory through pure sound. And the sound crashed upon False Gate like thunder until the stones vibrated.

The thunder was more than music. It was detonations. Mia had seen many war movies, and even war documentaries, because David had some kind of masochistic side that felt they both needed to suffer. She knew what explosions sounded like.

She poked her head around the ruins, and her jaw dropped as a golden wall of destruction ripped across the ground. A thousand beams of golden energy descended from the sky, landing in a scattered pattern. They weren't aiming directly at Mia. They were aiming at everything. And as the number of wings in the sky grew, more beams joined them. And then arrows. Gold dots blotted out the clouds of flame above, shining arrows that turned the sky into a flowing ocean of gold needles.

Azreal ran up to Mia's side. "Do I--"

"No! Don't give up our position! I got this! I got this, I got this. I got--get in!"

The crew threw themselves into the hole in the ground, and Mia, on her back in the center of the hole, pointed her arms up and brought in rock and pieces of the building itself that were still attached to Hell. Wood beams, boulders, rock she bent into pillars, she warped them all into structure with one hand, a complicated melody, while her other hand played the heavy chords that sank their cave deeper into the ground.

She sealed the cave above them, three meters of the hardest material she could find.

And the destruction found them. Mia screamed. She couldn't help it. She rolled onto her knees and clutched her palms to her ears, blocking out as much of the sound as she could. But the sound was too heavy, too thick, and it pushed through her hands into her skull. Cerberus was whining. Cerberus never whined.

Something huge grabbed her, and her eyes snapped open as her inner fingers grabbed the strings, ready to skewer someone on a spike. Vin? Sat against the wall of the cave, the titan pulled her in close and sat her beside him. He pressed her head to his side with an arm, covering both sides of her head with chest and arm. With her hands still covering her tears, the two layers worked well enough to bring the sound down to only thunder levels, and she forced in some desperate breaths.

She'd made a hole in the rock, the tiniest little thing, just enough to let air come and go through the thick ceiling. Any smaller and it'd be useless. Any bigger and it'd let the explosions crack the cave open like a lobster claw.

Between waves of destruction, she found room to talk. Her ears were ringing.

"They're bombing the whole province?" Mia asked.

"Doubtful," Noah said. "They will start from the spire, work outward, and fire upon any group they find."

She threw up her hands. "I thought you said Heaven was in a civil war! Not only a civil war, but that angels were getting... weaker! Weaker because of the dread! How are they coordinating--"

Another bombardment tore through the area, heavy explosions that sent kinetic waves through the rock and into their bodies. They shuddered with the vibrations, and soon it wasn't only Mia doing everything she could to cover her ears. The angels started yelling at each other to push through the sound, maybe making battle plans or something, but Mia gave up listening. She kept her head snugly between Vin's arm and side, blocking the sound as much as possible, and reached out with her sixth sense. Mistake. Like staring into the sun or listening to a jet engine from point-blank range without earmuffs, her sixth sense ached with the destruction of the terrain, chunks of rock sent flying, buildings collapsing, crosses scattered like trees in the wake of a nuclear explosion.

She closed off the sense as tight as she could, only for a pair of hands to grab her shoulders and pull her out from Vin's protection. Adron. He was yelling at her, and she couldn't hear him.

The cave was cracking.

Mia summoned her batlam rune, pointed her staff up at the ceiling, and welded it shut. No more air hole, but they'd be fine for now. She summoned more rock, pulling the room's walls in tighter, and melding more blackstone into the ceiling. The song was loud, a lot louder than she wanted. She summoned more rock, merged it, compressed it, and each note pulled her deeper into the flowing ocean.

And the black eye beneath the ocean looked up.

Mia cut off the song. It would have to do.

A golden burst lit up the room. Azreal stood in his armor, leather tossed aside, and the enormous shield in hand. He got to a knee, put the shield over his head, and yelled. Mia didn't hear, but when Vinicius lay as flat as he could, she got the message and lay down with Cerberus.

Azreal's shield erupted with light, and the cave ceiling drowned in gold. He pressed the colossal wave of gold and metal against the rock above, and as if someone had given Mia earplugs, the sound deadened. The angel barrier was blocking some of the sound, too. But more vibrations pushed through the gold wall, and cracks in the ceiling sent boulders falling directly onto the barrier.

"Azreal!" she yelled. She could barely hear herself.

Whatever Azreal said, she couldn't hear, but the angel's shoulders sank an inch under the weight.

She joined the angel, knelt beside him, and held up her staff. For all her power, she couldn't summon anything from herself. Angels could create shields, laser beams, empower arrows to explode, or give themselves super-flight. Mia couldn't do shit, except manipulate Hell. Good enough for now. She waved her staff up at the ceiling and merged rock again, pressing them together and resealing cracks as they formed.

It wasn't a prolonged mortar bombardment. It was a carpet bombing. Waves of tightly bound explosions brought the cave down on their heads several times, and each time, Azreal stopped the rock from crushing them all to death. And Mia pressed the rocks together; easier said than done, since each rock that broke off was a rock she lost control of, like trying to control a finger that'd been chopped off.

The bombing passed. Distant sounds, unending vibrations like a hellquake pulsing through layers of stone and lava, but like thunder on the other side of a city, it faded.

Mia collapsed onto her back, let batlam go, and stared up at the gold ceiling as she panted. A bell rang in her ears, and it was minutes before it died down.

"Azreal," she said. "You can let it go."

Azreal dismissed his gold wall, but still on his knee and beside her with his greatshield aimed up, he waited. But no rocks fell. She'd compressed the walls nice and tight into the ceiling, like an arch bridge.

Azreal dismissed his own batlam rune and sat beside her, sweat dripping down his body.

"Heavy?" she asked, smiling up at him.

He looked down at her, squinting for a moment until his face softened. "Yes, it was."

After a few more needed breaths, she sat up and gestured to Belor. "You fought the angels in the Spires War, right? How'd you deal with this?"

"Angels didn't interfere until the end, Mia, and they won. We spent a lot of our time hiding in the tunnels below, only fighting the angels when they thought they could come in and get us. We made them pay."

"What about the spire?"

"The spire," Belor said, "can't be destroyed, even by an angel bombardment."

Mia tilted her head. "Really?"

"Really. They tried, thousands of angels, tens of thousands, burying the spire is gold destruction. But as long as we stayed within its walls, we were fine."

"Belor is correct," Noah said, eyeing Belor for a moment. "The spires cannot be destroyed, or Heaven would have long ago."

"That makes me wonder," Mia said. "The Old Ones are attached to the spires in a strange way, right? And if the spires are indestructible, I wonder if there's a connection."

The angels nodded. Belor grinned, again looking at Mia with an intrigued expression he made no attempt to hide.

"I'd love to know," the old tyrant said, and he gently flicked the small amber horn on top of his demon-y, dragon-y head. "I would absolutely love to know."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~Day 137~~

Things had changed. Whatever the angels were up to, they'd decided to go full-on aggressive and bury False Gate in death. They bombarded it every day. If a battalion were a thousand angels, there had to be a hundred battalions, each a small white cloud against the burning sky. Now that the crew knew what to look for, it was easy to see them coming.

Yosepha said the Heavenly Islands had a million angels each. They far outnumbered and outmatched the demons. But Noah and Azreal were convinced those numbers were wrong, and Heaven's angels had both dwindled in number and in strength over time. If that was true, the fuck was the First War like?

The crew crept along, seconds dragging by as they snuck, crawled, and ducked around ruins or hid out in forests of crosses. And more than a few times, a battalion flew overhead, playing their trumpets before drowning the area in gold death.

For the moment, though, the crew walked along, weaving between crosses. Mia did her best to ignore the remnants, but the remnants didn't return the favor, and they stared at her, gargling on blood and spit. Some spoke, simple words, begging for death or hurling insults. No Hannah.

"Do they always have to play their trumpets?" Mia asked, and she pointed behind them.

Traveling was slow, but they'd put a decent distance between them and the spire. And near the spire, a tiny white cloud was hovering around. Only tiny because of the distance. The white cloud was a thousand angels unleashing merciless death on any demons, like lightning.

"The trumpets," Yosepha said, "are empowering. The gabriem play them, and unleash an aura that helps us focus. All within it can use their abilities to a greater effect and for a prolonged time."

"Oooh," Mia said. "I might be able to craft an aura like that."

Belor, walking ahead with Vin, slowed until he walked beside Mia. "Tell me more about these auras."

She scrunched up her nose at the huge titan; enough signal for Cerb to growl at him.

"No."

"Oh come on. You don't trust me?"

"Nope."

Belor clutched his head and took a step back. "You wound me, Mia! I'm just a humble demon, trying to make my way in life."

"You're the most famous child of the Old Ones! I'd heard your name a hundred times before I even got to False Gate!" She elbowed him in the leg, which naturally did nothing except make him chuckle. "But you already know I can make auras. So, yes, I can make auras."

"Any aura?"

She shook her head. "Not that simple. I--"

"The unmarked," Julisa said, grinning over her shoulder, "seems to require her mind to be aligned with her aura. And to our little volara here, that is almost always an aura of arousal."

If looks could kill, Mia would have incinerated Julisa on the spot. Play a song? Kill her with a spike? Maybe dump her in a lava bath? Would anyone mind?

Belor chuckled, and the merry sound evolved into a hungry, rumbling purr as he looked down at Mia again.

"Really now?"

The damn sensation of warmth pulsing in Mia's cheeks told her she was blushing, which only made her blush even more. The curse of her ginger heritage.

"I refuse," she said, pointing an accusing finger up at the tyrant, "to be embarrassed because of my sex drive! You are all worse, at the very least." She glared at each demon in turn, angels too, daring them to respond. "I mean, except maybe Azreal and Noah."

Julisa cackled. "Only because you haven't seduced them, yet. But give it time. I'm sure both men will be inside you soon enough."

Skin on fire, Mia clenched her fists and shook her head, avoiding Azreal and Noah's eyes.

"Leave her be," Noah said. "And Heaven overflows with sexuality, constantly, tetrad. You should not shame people for a love of sex."

Belor nodded. "The angel makes a good point."

Apparently Belor said something funny, because Romakus laughed and poked Mia from behind with a wing.

"Belor," Romakus said, "last child of Abaddon, spire ruler of False Gate, was a sex fiend. The number of times I found him sitting on his throne, having sex with a dozen demons?" Eyes almost rolling out of his sockets, Romakus leaned down over Yosepha and gave her a quick kiss on the head. "Not me. I'm a one-woman gentleman."

Belor matched his old bailiff's laugh. "Apparently."

The conversation had an edge to it, something in the body language and tone that didn't sit quite right with Mia. After spending four months with Romakus, she was getting a feel for his mannerisms, and this wasn't exactly his norm. Maybe he was trying to keep the conversation light? Maybe he was worried about something, like Belor might bring up his past.

Romakus was nervous.

And because Mia was such an awesome person, she kept the topic going, to give him a break.

"What sort of kinks does an old tyrant who went to war with all of Heaven and Hell have? I bet you just had a line of girls all giving you blowjobs all day, you dick."

Belor's chuckle erupted into an outright laugh, and with his bassy voice full of gravel, it was an alluring sound. And for just a moment, she could almost see the man sitting on stage in a jazz club, playing bass and some blues while smoking a cigar and drinking hard liquor.

"I'll have you know, I indulged in many kinks. But I think my favorite was having the girl do all the work. I'd sit back on my throne, and a volara would sit on my lap and dance until twilight. And a dozen ladies would watch, waiting for their turn." The old tyrant sighed wistfully, eyes drifting up as he swam through memories. "Funny, what memories stick with you through the millennia."

"Making the girl do the work?" Mia said, grumbling.

But it was an erotic thought, to be sure. A demon girl, trying to sit comfortably on a titan as big as Belor, and literally dance on his penis while people watched? Mia most definitely did not have the stamina for that.

Not that it mattered! Because she had no plans to sleep with Belor, obviously. None whatsoever. He was a tyrant king, a murderer, and a warmonger.

Yeesh. How fucked up had her tastes in men become over the past hundred and thirty-seven days, almost all of them spent down here? Hell was doing a number on her noggin.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~Day 137~~

~~Unknown~~

A battle. Demons everywhere, slaughtering each other.

The woman stared at the body of a dead spider so gargantuan, Mia could scarcely believe its size. Dead; head ripped open.

She stared through a dozen eyes as her body grew, transforming into a weird, fleshy mass of limbs, not unlike the dead spider itself. A dozen gazes mixing, overlapping, like a kaleidoscope.

Through a dozen images, a small boy, a ginger wearing black armor and wielding a black staff, looked down at the dead tregeera at his feet, eyes wide with shock, disbelief, and rage. His armor shattered. His staff shattered. And he transformed. He stepped over the dead demon girl and grew. And grew.

That was David! And the dead tiger. That... That was the tiger Mia met! When demons brought her to Diogo on her first day in Hell.

And David was...

It was abhorrent. A centipede thing, its long body covered in ten thousand screaming faces, each glaring straight at her. Limbs grew from it, more and more, arms and legs and wings and mandibles and things that made no sense. It curved as it came to her, body bending in the strange ways a centipede did, as it grew human-like arms from one of its ends, and brought them down on her body.

All her size and strength meant nothing compared to the ginger boy who'd grown into this creature. Pain ravaged her, blinding her to anything but agony, and the monster rained hammer blows down on her, until a million things inside her shattered.

Everything went red, blood coating her gaze. Then black, death pulling her down and down. She kept her gaze on the monster until the darkness took her, a couple dozen eyes staring up at thousands of eyes, each staring death into her, each screaming, each drowning the battlefield in a chorus of pain and misery. The faces weren't just screaming. They were crying.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~Day 138~~

~~Mia~~

She woke up screaming.

Cerberus was on his feet immediately, spinning around as all three heads half roared, half barked at the cave walls. Everyone else was up a second later, eyes wide, scanning. Adron and Kas were at her side in a second, claws out, backs hunched like cats.

But it was Azreal who got to her first. He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, staring into her eyes, and the intense, cutting depth of his purple amethyst gaze shattered her scream.

"Mia?" he asked. "Mia, what's wrong?"

Slowly, Mia looked from the man holding her to the others. Kas and Adron were with her. Vin and Belor, caught halfway between getting up and kneeling to fit in the cave. Romakus and Julisa, utterly confused. Yosepha and Noah were only a moment behind reaching her before Azreal did. Angel reflexes were something else.

"W-What... time is it?" she asked.

The angels looked at each other, eyebrows raised.

"Morning has just arrived," Yosepha said. "We all awoke as is normal, save for Adron and Kasimiro who were already awake and doing their shift. But you were screaming."

"You stirred," Kas said, sliding in closer beside her, "while you slept. Strange. I thought about waking you, but..."

She stirred? People didn't stir in their sleep in Hell. They slept like the dead. No dreams.

Mia shook her head and buried her face in her hands. Sweat dripped down her body, and her muscles ached from trembling. She'd been doing more than stirring. The only time she'd ever woken up feeling like this was when she'd been young and had seen a very scary movie about a spaceship accidentally entering Hell. She'd had nightmares all night long and kept waking up sore and sweating.

It wasn't a movie this time. It was David.

"I had... another vision," she said.

Noah let out a slow sigh and came closer, kneeling beside Azreal. "David? Is he--"

Mia shook her head. "He's alive."

The three angels let out relieved sighs, and Mia peeked her head up long enough to look at them. Behind them, Romakus and Julisa watched her, waiting for an explanation. Vinicius waited, too, and for the first time in a while, he kept his eyes on her without the typical crocodile hunger she was used to seeing in them. And Belor just looked confused.

"What happened?" Adron asked. "What'd you see?"

But all Mia could do was gulp down the lump in her throat. "Give me... a second."

The seconds dragged on while she tried to process. She opened her mouth, gave up, and let her head sink into her hands again.

That'd been Caera, it had to be. Caera, missing an eye? Caera with David? And the look on David's face when he stepped over her corpse... She'd seen that look before.

Belor gave his wings a flap. "Someone want to tell me what's going on?"

"Mia," Julisa said, "has dreams, when another unmarked dies. She sees their final moments."

"Really?" Belor tilted his head as he stared at Mia and slid in a little closer in their little cave. "How many more surprises do you hold?"

"I don't like this surprise," she said. "I mean, I do. I... I saw David. He's alive." Her next deep breath should have felt nice, relieving, the weight of not knowing what was happening to her brother lifted from her shoulders. It didn't. "More than alive."

"More?" Noah asked.

"He..." She hugged her arms, palms to her shoulders, and leaned her forearms on her knees. "He was with a bunch of demons. They were fighting another unmarked. The vision was through her eyes. I saw David... He stepped over a dead demon, a demon I knew. A... A nice demon, and... and..."

"Mia," Noah said. "It's okay. Take your time."

Mia raised her eyes and blinked at Noah. The intensity was gone from his voice, and his eyes, silver mixed with lines of white and black, looked at her with concern.

Maybe Cerb had a bit of therapy dog in him, because he pushed past the others and pressed up against her side. Dopey-head took her lap, and now he was so big, there wasn't much room for any of his other heads. Automatically, Mia put her hands on his head and rubbed his horns, scratched around his eyebrow ridges, and petted him. Right on cue, her heart rate settled, and the tremors passed.

Mia nodded and forced down a few more breaths. "I saw a battle. Demons, fighting other demons. Thousands of them. David was wearing the batlam rune, and I saw a couple of angels. Maybe they were helping him? I don't know, it was all chaos. The other unmarked was fighting. Her pet -- I think it was her pet -- had died, a giant spider."

"A fassila spider?" Adron asked.

"I don't know. How big does a fassila spider get?"

"About as big as Vin or Belor, with longer legs."

She shook her head. "Can't be that, then. This spider was big enough for Vin or Belor to ride. Or maybe..." She looked down at the big cannam on his belly. He was so big now. Big as the biggest tiger she'd ever seen. Bigger, even. "Her pet was dead. David killed it, maybe, I don't know. But... But the unmarked I was in, the vision, her body..."

No one prompted her to continue. Julisa looked like she wanted to, and even opened her mouth to do so, but Romakus covered her mouth. Mia laughed, but it sounded weak and shaky. Something warm dripped from her chin. Oh, she'd been crying.

"The unmarked the vision was from, she... transformed her body. Like, she changed into some kind of weird... fleshy... spider."

"A spider?" Adron asked. "Like her pet?"

"No. It was more like she just had... flesh... mass? Like, her body was getting bigger, and it didn't know how to do that, so it just grew randomly. She was naked, and new legs came out of her, and..." The vision had been cruel. It'd done more than just let her see. It'd let her feel. She forced down another breath and made sure to pet serious-head and boss-head, too. "She'd grown into this huge thing. This gross, huge thing, as big as her pet! And then David, he..."

Another breath, shakier again. "David, he transformed, too. His armor and staff, they shattered, and he... transformed. He..." What words could she use? The memory was far too vivid; every sensation, every sound and sight and smell and even the taste of blood and burnt flesh in the air lingered. "David's body changed. He got bigger. And bigger. And bigger. Legs came out of him. His body was covered in faces, hundreds of them! And they were all screaming and... and..." Crying. She clenched her eyes shut, but the memory of screams cut through her, a knife through her guts. David's screams, numbering in the hundreds. And then, thousands. And then more.

"He beat the unmarked girl into a pulp. It was awful. He was so big, bigger than even that mutated lizard the rider used in Angel's Spine. He beat her to death."

Everyone looked at each other, confused.

"David transformed as well?" Azreal asked.

"Yes! He transformed into this big thing. Flesh was just growing out of him. More and more, arms and legs and faces! It was like... like for a second, he looked like some kind of giant centipede thing? It was so weird! The flesh coming out of him didn't make any sense, just limbs emerging from this growing mass of... rage."

No one said a thing. The silence dragged on, and only Cerb's occasional whiny rumbles and little growls filled the silence.

"Flesh," Yosepha said, "growing from flesh?"

"Yes! It didn't make any sense. One minute he was standing there, wearing his batlam rune, same as mine. But then it shattered. He didn't dismiss it. It shattered! It came off him in pieces before poofing away. And this... flesh came growing out of him, like a--"

She froze. Everyone froze.

And out of everyone, it was Vinicius who spoke next.

"Like an archangel."

The demon might as well have commanded the room with a conductor's baton with the way he had everyone gawking. Even Belor looked amazed.

"Archangels," Yosepha said, "were said to alter their bodies in ways similar to what you just described, Mia. They were said to be embodiments of alteration. They could bend the Great Tower to their will, and their own bodies. But how they did that, they did not share. Or it is written in the old books we do not have access to."

Belor held up a hand. "From what you've told me, Mia is one of the nine unmarked souls. Six--well, five are left. You all died the same day on the surface, and when you crossed over and went to the gates of Heaven, you were sucked away by Hell's mouth, bypassing the gates of Hell entirely. You can play the 'music', this thing none of us have ever heard of before now. You can use the runes. You can create auras, with far more power and nuance than a demon or angel aura. I'm sure there's other things you haven't even told me, but now you're saying you saw two other unmarked morphing their bodies like an archangel could?" The old tyrant shrugged and gestured to her. "There's only one archangel left, Mia, and I spent thousands of years trying to reach him. The angels stopped me. The angels are trying to stop you. There's a connection."

They hadn't told Belor everything, but that didn't stop him from making deductions. He was too smart.

Mia shook her head frantically. "I am not the daughter of Satan! Or the devil, or Lucifer, or any of that shit! I am a nice person!"

Belor shrugged. "Do you see a different explanation?"

She got up and glared at him. Cerb was at her side instantly, growling at Belor for her.

"There are lots of things we don't understand! I don't know what Ramiel did with that amber egg!"

"Ramiel?"

"I don't know why I can read the ancient language!"

"Wait, you can--"

"I don't know why I absorb horrible memories from hearts!"

"Memories? I don't--"

She marched up to Belor and screamed down at him, tears in her eyes. "I don't know why any of this is happening to me. I don't know why any of that is true! I just know that I am a kind person who wants to help people! I don't deserve to be here. I don't deserve to be in Hell! I don't..."

Her arms fell limp at her sides as Belor stared at her, head pulled back. Her words died on her lips. Sighing, she wiped her tears away and sat in the middle of the cave. Cerb was on her immediately, rubbing his faces into her hands, and she obliged him.

"I need to find David," she said.

"Find David?" Romakus asked. "We're kind of in the middle of something, Mia."

"I need to find him! I... need to get to him. You don't understand David like I do. He holds onto things for years, never lets them go, and they eat him up from the inside out. And if... if that form he took, if it's..." Caera's corpse, at his feet. David's hard face. Then, hundreds of screaming, crying faces. There had to be a connection. "If he transformed because of what he's... I don't know, feeling? If that's what happened, he might never go back to normal!"

Yosepha shook her head and placed a hand on Mia's shoulder. "We will find him, Mia, we will, but not yet. We are less than ten days away from the shore. And from there, you will find us way across the River Styx. It is our only option. We must learn what Lucifer can do for us."

"If," Belor said, "that's what you're going there for."

"What do you mean?" Adron asked.

Belor gave his wings a flap. "You're going to the Forgotten Place, right? That's what Lilith told you? But you don't know why. For all you know, you're going there to eat Lucifer, like Molech wanted."

Mia wanted to shoot that idea down, but it wasn't as if she hadn't thought of it before. The Old Ones had talked about absorbing her so they could unlock the ability to play songs with Mother Hell. Maybe Lilith wanted her to literally eat the devil? But Raphael's corpse had been absurd, both in scale and in power. And that was a corpse!

"I think," Mia said, "that there's going to be special runes or something in the Forgotten Place. Maybe runes Lucifer created? I don't know. But using runes makes more sense than me trying to absorb an archangel's power. Maybe runes only Hell can play? I can see that. I can play a specific song, Hell will join in, and it'll be super powerful and awesome and wrap the Great Tower in a nice protective bubble or something."

Belor chuckled and nodded. "Maybe. Maybe." He didn't sound convinced.

Mia wanted to continue the conversation, but a bitter truth danced up her spine and dragged her eyes down.

If David could transform into something that... grotesque, she could too.