Barlowe, Wayne - God's Demon

name, and that was now lost.

After the Fall and after Lucifer's disappearance, Beelzebub, in a hate-filled rage, had crushed those original motes that were himself into rapacious flies. Upon them he impressed grotesque caricatures of the faces of those seraphim still in the Above. His transformation was a grand gesture of self-mutilation, an event so incomprehensible that Demons Major still spoke of it with whispered awe.

This was all nearly forgotten history to Adramalik. His thoughts were almost always of the here and now and rarely of those chaotic days immediately after the Fall.

Above the persistent buzzing he heard the faint delicate splash of Lilith's footsteps as she crossed the final few puddles of blood. She stopped at the base of the throne, head down.

Above her the flies swarmed, winged atoms of her master's body. From what court-spies had related, he was sure that she wished she could tread upon each one, crushing them until he no longer existed. He was also sure that she would willingly sacrifice nearly everything just to accomplish this.

When he spoke it was in the Voice of the flies, a layered and droning Voice that emanated from a thousand tiny throats.

'Fleurety tells me of a growing cult among the souls. A cult of ... you?' The ambient Voice paused, but a buzzing wheeze continued for a moment. 'What do you know of this, dear Lilith?'

Adramalik thought, from where he stood, that he saw Lilith wince when her name was pronounced.

'I have heard rumors, but nothing more, my Prince,' she said, still looking down. Her voice was strong, husky. And not particularly contrite.

'You are mine, Consort. Not Hell's at large. I would find it most distressing if Fleurety's tales about you proved true. He is convinced that you are, in some way, fostering these cults. Just as you once did with the living humans.'

'The Duke has his own designs, my Prince,' she said plainly. 'Perhaps you might ask him why he takes any interest in me at all.'

'I have. For once, his suspicions outweigh his obvious urges toward you.'

The Chancellor General reflected on that with mild amusement. Duke Fleurety's carnal interests were extraordinary, his imagination nearly unmatched, his resources boundless. He must be very sure indeed, thought Adramalik.

Lilith tilted her head up.

'He suggested that I have Lord Agaliarept minister to you—that, perhaps, only he is capable of gaining the truth from you. I found that suggestion ... disagreeable. What are your feelings about this?'

That had an effect, thought Adramalik, pleased. Her slight movement backward had been unmistakable. She was too proud, too unaffected by the Prince's presence.

Ten thousand faceted eyes were fixed upon her.

'My feelings?' Her voice broke ever so slightly. 'I ... I have done nothing.' Adramalik saw a tear well up and glisten down her ivory cheek. It stopped for a moment on her jaw and then dropped onto her clawed foot where a few black and green flies had gathered. One sizzled briefly from the moisture and vanished, and Adramalik could not be sure that he had heard a momentary sigh mingled with the low buzz of Beelzebub's breath.

'Nothing. That is good, Lilith,' the Voice buzzed with no inflection. 'I will not share you, not with Fleurety, not with Agaliarept, and certainly not with the dirt of humanity.'

There it is again, thought Adramalik, that incredible possessiveness. And who can blame him?

'Thank you, my Prince,' Lilith said quietly.

'And keep that handmaiden of yours at heel. Her many trips away are at an end.' His Voice trailed off into a prolonged buzz, losing all semblance to language. The faintest whirring of wings could be heard from atop the throne, growing in volume as more and more of the flies of his body grew agitated. Lilith stood her ground, her red eyes focused somewhere beyond him, somewhere in the dark recesses of the dome, searching the gloom above for the first signs of movement.

The buzzing increased and Lilith's eyes betrayed her. The Chancellor General could see the weight of her resignation in how she held her head, the way her hands hung by her sides.

Adramalik always wondered if when Beelzebub broke apart or came together it started with a single fly, one who gathered all the rest about himself. One with that particular spark that was Beelzebub. He would never know. As the Prince took wing, his garments tumbled and floated toward the ground and Adramalik caught them with practiced hands.

He watched, fascinated, every time his master approached. The already-thick air around the throne grew dense with a shimmering cloud of flies, each trailing a tiny flame of green. They circled the dome's interior, fading in and out of the murky light, growing in numbers and density until it seemed that an almost solid, fluid body twisted between the hanging skins. After a few sinuous, blurred revolutions the swarm finally coalesced yards from Lilith into a dark, roughly humanoid shape. There, a few feet from the ground, it floated, its surface alive with the settling movement of the flies. Suddenly each fly purposefully inlaid itself like a tiny fierce tile in some living mosaic resolving its form, smoothing itself, and when it finally extended a taloned foot to step upon the floor it was transformed into the Prince of Hell.

Adramalik hastened forward to help drape the fine skin tunic, the sumptuous crimson and gold cloak, and then the heavy necklaces of state upon his Prince's form. He took special care, as he did so, not to touch the huge iridescent wings that hung, trembling ever so slightly, from Beelzebub's back. As the Chancellor General stepped back, Beelzebub's ornate sigils flared to life upon his chest, fiery filigrees that cast a dull light upon the Fly's face.

Unincorporated flies still swarmed, like the eager pets they were, around him and then made their way to Lilith. She ignored them, staring fixedly at the charnel-house floor.

Adramalik stepped a few paces back. He took a deep breath and looked, once again, with pleased reverence upon his Prince's face. It had been weeks since he had been in the Rotunda.