Hellforged

A shape flashed out of the darkness, slamming into Cysgod so hard that the demon overstepped Daniel and staggered past him. Kane clung to Cysgod’s back, stabbing at its neck with his bronze blade. Cysgod twisted and shook and flapped its wings; Kane struggled to hang on. The demon reached over its shoulder, plucked Kane off, and tossed him aside. Kane rolled as he hit the ground and was back on his feet at once.

I’d closed the distance, coming up behind Cysgod, and I lunged, aiming to drive my sword into the demon’s back and up into its heart. But it heard me coming. At the last second, Cysgod twisted to the left, and my blade merely slashed its flank.

But the touch of bronze blazing with celestial fire had its effect. Energy flashed out, and Cysgod became Pryce again. Pryce bled in several places: red where Daniel’s bullet had hit his human form, and black where Kane and I had wounded the demon.

Pryce snarled at me, fury snapping in his eyes.

Then, something altered. A feeling in the air, a tremor in the ground—I couldn’t pinpoint what, exactly. But the world had changed.

Pryce smiled, and the expression was far more unnerving than his hate-filled glare.

Daniel fired again. In front of Pryce, a spark flared in midair. Pryce stood still, not even flinching. Daniel gasped, and the gun flew from his hand. Kane started forward, but something lifted him into the air and hurled him across the cemetery. He sailed over the gravestones and disappeared. A pain-filled howl, more animal than human, stopped my heart.

Before I could move, the same thing happened to Daniel. Pryce hadn’t budged; he just stared at me with that mocking smile. His black eyes were darker than the deepest pits of Hell.

Cysgod’s power had surged—that was the shift I’d felt. The Morfran had fed, strengthening all demons. I’d interrupted the feeding, so Cysgod wasn’t strong enough to materialize fully alongside Pryce in the Ordinary—Pryce still had to take one form or the other here. But his shadow demon was no longer a mere shadow. It had gained the strength to reach beyond the boundary of the demon plane and act in the human world.

How could I fight this new, more powerful demon? Because Cysgod wasn’t fully materialized, I couldn’t kill it in its current form, half in and half out of Uffern. After Difethwr’s threats and my experiences at the slate mine, nothing would tempt me into the demon plane. But if I could injure Pryce again, he’d be forced back into his demon shape. If I could kill him during the change, I’d kill them both.

I raised the Sword of Saint Michael and charged.

Something grabbed me around the waist and plucked me off the ground, as I’d seen happen to Kane and Daniel. Cysgod was going to throw me, too, keeping me away while Pryce released more Morfran—bringing Cysgod fully into the Ordinary. I struggled, trying to twist free. I slashed with my sword, but the blade sliced through nothing but air. Cysgod could reach into the Ordinary, but I couldn’t fight it here.

The demon didn’t throw me. Instead, hanging a dozen feet above the ground, I felt a freezing-fiery pressure against my body. The sensation flowed through my skin and seeped into my pores. I shivered and burned, like I was being boiled in ice. The pressure increased, squeezing me. I couldn’t breathe. A fist of ice and rock reached into my chest, grabbed my heart, and, with a violent wrench, turned me inside out.

Cysgod dropped me.

My knees and hips went soft when I hit the ground, and I somersaulted forward. My movements felt slow, like I was deep underwater. Like I was back in the black, endless void. As I struggled to my feet, everything looked smudged and dirty. Terrible sounds invaded my ears—shrieks and screams, insane laughter, the caws and shrieks of ravenous Morfran—and the air was rife with smells of blood, offal, and sulfur.

I was in Uffern. Not just open to it, but there. Cysgod had pulled me, body and soul, into the demon plane.

39

PRYCE STOOD IN FRONT OF ME. I COULD SEE BOTH HIS FORMS now: human and demon. The human Pryce waggled his fingers at me and walked to the place where he’d dropped the oak club, taking his time as if he were on an evening stroll. Moving with him, yet staying between us, loomed Cysgod, holding its own flaming sword, which burned with black, shadowy fire.

They’d forced me into Uffern, but here, I could kill them both. First Cysgod, then Pryce.

Pryce retrieved his club as I lunged for his demon half. But the underwater feeling persisted. The foul, oppressive night burdened my shoulders. My sword felt heavy, too heavy to lift, and Cysgod moved out of range before I was halfway to striking.

A rumbling laugh sounded behind me, and flames licked at my back. Difethwr. My demon mark flared, and my right arm dropped, weak and useless, to my side. Okay, I’d fight with my left. But the sword was so heavy, my movements so slow and clumsy, that I nearly dropped it as I changed hands.

“Greetings, former daughter of Ceridwen. At last our bond is fulfilled.”

I tried to turn around, but I could barely twist my head, so heavily did the Hellion weigh me down.

“Release me … Hellion … I … command it.” Even speaking required immense effort.

“No.” That single syllable of refusal rang with triumph. “We are part of thee, bound to thee by thine own words. And now we claim that bond.”

Something broke inside me, and I knew there was no escape. I’d been a fool, chasing after purity. Purity was lost to me, and it had been ever since I’d bound this Hellion to myself. No, earlier. Ever since the night it marked me. I could never be pure. I was tainted, corrupted, contaminated. Just like Pryce, I was part demon. I belonged in Hell.

From a goddess two lines diverged, but they are reunited in Victory.

So this was my destiny—bound forever to the Destroyer, subject to the demon I hated more than anything in any world.

I watched, helpless, as Pryce drew back his club and struck a slate gravestone. Black mist wafted upward, solidified, and flew cawing into the night.

Instinctively, I reached for Hellforged, but Difethwr’s arm came forward and plucked the dagger from my belt. “At last,” it said, “the blade we crafted returns to us. We have better uses for it than the crude one thou hast employed.”

Pryce came over and stood before me, the oak club dangling from his hand. Cysgod towered beside him. Pryce looked me over appraisingly, his gaze roaming over my face and body; my heaviness was so great I couldn’t look away. Lips pursed, he leaned forward, and I struggled to turn my head and avoid his kiss.

He spat in my face.

“Teach this bitch a lesson, Cysgod,” he said. “Hurt her as much as you like. But don’t kill her, and don’t injure her womb. She and I have a date later tonight.”

Cysgod’s sword flashed. I couldn’t raise my own in time to deflect the blow. The blade hacked into my arm, a slash of pain and fire that cut to the bone. Black flame burned me, eating at the edges of the wound.

As Pryce watched, Cysgod surged forward in a flurry of slashing cuts. Its sword bit my arms, my chest, my legs, my back, my face. Life-eating flame engulfed me, scorching, burning, consuming my flesh, my spirit. Difethwr’s crushing weight held me in place. Covered with blood, I collapsed to my knees, then fell onto my face. My left hand still grasped the Sword of Saint Michael, but the blade’s flames had died to a weak glow.

“Enough,” Pryce said. Immediately, Cysgod stopped. Pryce’s shiny black shoes appeared and stood beside Cysgod’s scaly, taloned foot. Together, they kicked dirt onto the blade of my sword. Its glow went out. Dirt got into my eyes and mouth. It tasted like death.

“Cysgod,” Pryce said. “I have an idea. Let’s see if there’s anything left of my cousin’s suitors. If they’re still alive, we’ll bring them back here for you and Difethwr to occupy yourselves with while I finish releasing the Morfran.” His voice took on a tone of playful warning. “No squabbling, though, over who gets the werewolf and who gets the human.”

No! I struggled to push myself up, but I couldn’t. I was merely a heap of burned and beaten flesh.

Pryce laughed, and the shoes moved away. Cysgod’s feet moved with them. As the shadow demon lifted its