Technically I’m supposed to be in ritual drag too but I have a hard time picturing Samael dressed up like a Brooks Brothers Pied Piper, so I follow his example and skip the wardrobe call.
There’s a silver circle in the center of the table. Lines radiate out to the edges, cutting the table into twelve sections. Each trick-or-treater steps up and sets down a different ceremonial object. The junk looks like leftovers from a Goth-club garage sale.
Obyzuth sets down a green rock, like a Templar meditation stone. The Hellion next to her sets down an athame knife that cuts through ignorance or butters magic toast or something. Buer drops a snake carved from the leg bone of a fallen Hellion warrior. It goes on and on like that. I’m supposed to light a red candle at the end of the ritual but things are going too slow. I fire it up now and light a Malediction off it.
“Don’t take it personally, but if I have to sit through one more of these meetings, I’m going to gut every one of you like catfish, shit in your skulls, and mail them to your families. This isn’t Hell. It’s a PTA meeting. Maybe all we need to save Hell is a bake sale.”
I flick my ashes over the candle.
“Here’s how it is from now on. Do your projects any way you want. Fuck the budgets. Fuck the schedules. When it’s done, you get one minute to tell me about it.”
The room is silent. It’s not like regular silence. More like the kind you get with a concussion.
“In case anyone thinks letting you off the leash is a license to steal or stab me in the back, let me introduce the newest member of our team.”
I go to the doors and open them. A hellhound clanks in on its big metal claws and looks over the room. The hound is bigger than a dire wolf, a clockwork killing machine run by a Hellion brain suspended in a glass globe where its head should be. They’re terrifying on a battlefield but in an enclosed space like this, the whirs and clicks of its mechanics, its razor teeth and pink, exposed brain, are enough to give a tyrannosaurus a heart attack.
The hound follows me around the table, folds up its legs, and settles down on the floor next to me. A dutiful guard dog.
“This is Ms. 45. The new head of HR. Any of you upstanding citizens that do less than your best work, conspire against me, or sell supplies to the black market can explain it to her. She works nights, weekends, and holidays, and if she’s indisposed, Ms. 45 has a few hundred colleagues downstairs. In fact, the hounds now have the run of the palace, so watch your step. I hear stainless-steel turds stain bad.”
No one says anything. Besides the hellhound, the only sound is people restlessly moving their feet.
“Now get to work and leave me the fuck alone.”
All twelve of them file out, right into the other two hounds I stationed outside. It would have been a hoot programming them to eat each Council member as they left. A little counterproductive, though. I need them to do the work I’m sure not going to do. But if I can’t have a little fun being the Devil, why bother?
Now I can get back to figuring out the rest of Lucifer’s power so I can get the hell out of here.
I’ve made circuit after circuit of the empty parts of the hotel. I know Lucifer won’t leave me hanging on half power forever. He likes games. I know there are clues for me around somewhere. But I don’t know all the rules of the game, so I might
