Behind him the demon’s skull heads bit at the air. It was almost upon him.
“Croy! Kill it!” he screamed as he came around to the front of the house, where the rose window had fallen in a million shards of colored glass.
He took in the scene in an instant, though he liked little of it. Bikker looked dead, which was a good thing, and Croy was still holding his sword. The knight was sitting down in the grass, however, with his knees up to his chest, and he looked as pale as a sheet. Had the two fools killed each other?
Cythera and Hazoth were there, too. Both of them were staring at the pile of rubble that had been their home. They seemed too paralyzed by surprise to react.
“Demon!” Malden shouted, his feet slapping against the grass. “Croy!”
He raced up to the knight and then jumped over Croy’s head. The demon was right behind him, snatching at his heels with one clawed foot.
Ghostcutter was pointed at the sky, suddenly. Croy did not rise, or call out a threat, or even shift from where he sat, but his sword pointed upward. The demon couldn’t see it, having no eyes, and as the blade bit into its belly, at first it seemed not even to notice.
Then the cold iron blade pierced it through, and the point came out through the demon’s back. It fell on Croy hard enough to crush any man, and scratched at the ground with every one of its mismatched legs, but it couldn’t seem to get free.
Cythera shouted for Croy, but the knight was completely covered by the demon’s body. If he heard her, he could make no reply.
“Malden, he was already gravely wounded-if we don’t get him out of there soon he’ll smother,” she said, beseeching the thief.
Malden started to shrug. What could he do? His bodkin was useless against the thing. He was no Ancient Blade to fight a demon. But then He saw Acidtongue on the ground next to Bikker’s body. Like Ghostcutter, it was made for fighting demons. Malden grabbed it and found that he could barely lift it. He’d never used a sword in his life and realized instantly that it wasn’t just a matter of swinging it around like a stick.
But then drops of vitriol appeared along the blade’s length like sweat. Grabbing the hilt with both hands, Malden rushed toward the demon, holding the sword straight out from his body. He jabbed it into the demon’s back and leaned on the pommel until it sank deep into the demon’s vitals.
The skull heads reared up and screamed at the stars as the demon redoubled its thrashing. Malden let go of the sword’s hilt then and staggered back, trying to get clear of its flailing legs.
Eventually it died, and lay still. Its flesh fumed and liquefied until its bones stuck up through its raw musculature. Its claws curled and withered like paper in a fire. Soon it was no more than wisps of foul-smelling smoke and a pool of vile liquid. Underneath its remains, Croy struggled to pull Ghostcutter free of the infernal thing’s rib cage.
Malden stared at the beast in utter incomprehension. He couldn’t believe what he had just done. He had killed a demon. He-the puny thief, who had never even cut a human being before-had killed. Of course, it had been pinned and immobile, and- But he had killed it Malden started to whoop in joy. But then an invisible hand grasped his heart and began to squeeze.
“My son… my house,” Hazoth said. “You destroyed my house.”
Malden dropped to the ground, unable to move a muscle. The sorcerer leaned over him.
“I was going to allow you a quick death, rodent,” the sorcerer said. “No more.”
Chapter Ninety-Four
Malden rolled on the ground, his body coming to pieces from the inside out. Pain gripped him like iron tongs as Hazoth twisted one hand in the air, and his guts tied themselves in knots. He could barely see anything-his vision had turned the bright red of arterial blood.
Then it cleared, just enough for him to look up into Hazoth’s face. “I want you to see me while you suffer,” the sorcerer told him. “I want you to feel everything. The pain I’m about to inflict on you would normally drive a rodent unconscious. It might even kill one outright. Your primitive brain would rather die than live through this agony. But I won’t let it. You are going to suffer for what you’ve done to me. And I know more than anyone about what suffering means.”
Malden gasped for breath, but every ounce of air he inhaled felt like he was swallowing knives. His arms curled around his chest, constricted by pain, but still he could see the magician staring down into his eyes.
So he could see it very clearly when a red blotch appeared on Hazoth’s cheek and burst through the skin as an ugly boil.
It was such a surprise he almost forgot the pain. Almost.
“Your spells are… slipping,” he wheezed.
“You know nothing of magic. Save your breath for the screams you are about to utter,” Hazoth told him.
Yet even as the wizard spoke, pimples erupted near his hairline. Hazoth reached up to feel the bumpy skin there and something miraculous happened.
The expression on his face changed. He started to show real fear. He even cried out as one of his eyes grew thick with cataracts.
On the ground, Malden wanted to laugh. He wanted to crow for joy. The pain he’d felt disappeared as Hazoth reared back and clutched at his ear, which had begun to drip blood. “What is this?” Hazoth demanded. He turned to stare at Cythera.
“The link between us is fading, Father,” she said. The vines and flowers on her face writhed and bloomed wildly. “He did it. The thief did it-Coruth must be free. When the house came down it must have broken your magic circle. She has undone the connection she once made between you and I.” Cythera looked like she could hardly believe it herself. As if she didn’t dare believe what was happening.
But it was real. The curses Hazoth had avoided so long, the inimical magics cast on him by the demons of the pit in revenge for all he’d done to them, were getting through. Instead of being deposited on Cythera’s skin as painted flowers, they were appearing on his own skin as blossoms of blood and corruption.
“Damn that woman,” Hazoth said, his voice thick with phlegm. He shook himself and spoke a few words in some ancient language. Instantly, the sores on his face stopped weeping and closed again, until his countenance was as unblemished as before. “She’s weak, though. Too weak to resist. I’ll find her and prison her again.”
“No, I don’t think you will,” Cythera said.
Then she grabbed him by the arms and mashed her lips against his cheek in a brutal kiss. “Farewell, Father.”
Hazoth’s eyes went wide. Green sparks lit up his hair and his chest.
On Cythera’s left hand an oleander flower curled up and withered. A vine retracted around her wrist, shrinking back on itself.
“Malden,” Cythera said, quite calmly, “you should go now.”
The thief scrambled to his feet and ran. Behind him he heard Hazoth start to scream as the skin of his back split open and demonic arms reached out to grasp at him with shredding claws.
Every curse Cythera had stored on her skin for decades came loose at once, and they lashed out at Hazoth with interest. As the magician’s protective spells came apart, the demons he had exploited and enslaved sensed the release down in the pit, and sought every crack and crevice in the universe through which they could reach his side, intent on having their vengeance before the curses could undo Hazoth entirely. The people who lived on Ladypark Common closed their shutters and hid under their beds, but could not escape for the next three hours the screams of a dying sorcerer and the bellowing rage of the Bloodgod’s children, denied this prize for so long. They took their time destroying Hazoth. They savored it.
Chapter Ninety-Five
