27
Belial
My paws sunk craters in glittering black sand as I followed the faint line of demarcation between the Starsea and the mountains.
If I kept going, I’d eventually hit the Styx. Out here in the wastes, the land was flat, but the sand concealed the danger of instability. One wrong step would ruin a warrior’s stance.
But I knew how to navigate it by heart. The terrain was my ally here, offering false comfort to the one I was prepared to call.
It was tempting to keep going, to see if I might find a hint of the way my angel had passed, but the thought of her was what kept me on course.
Physical pain lanced through my chest like a spear and I paused, switching my tail until it had passed. For her, the pain had been over quickly. She’d never accepted the mate bond for what it was.
For me, it was an omnipresent ache, sometimes growing so intense I could hardly breathe. I understood now why my fellow princes were so reluctant to create that sort of bond with someone. If the one they chose broke faith, the loss of the bond was agonizing to the creator.
I felt the agony in my bones. It lanced through me with every step, every breath.
It was worse when I was near her, accompanied by a sapping despair.
At first, the pain had sent me into a rage. I’d wanted to lash out at her, give her the same pain she gave me.
And I’d nearly succeeded in driving her away forever.
I growled as I walked, remembering the look on her face when I told her what I thought of her, the toxic lies I’d spit in her face. Never in all my eons had I regretted what my wrath would bring me.
Nothing. It brought me nothing but emptiness, a gaping hole in my chest where something had been ripped away and left a still-bleeding mess behind.
I’d re-evaluated the battlefield, examined my own weaknesses.
My first instinct was to strike back, exchange wound for wound. And all that had won me was an angel in tears, turning away from me.
If I accomplished what I planned now, she would see that my apologies weren’t hollow. I would never turn my rage on her again. She couldn’t have understood; she believed I was going to keep her caged forever.
Her strength was my weakness. I hadn’t thought she had it in her to pull a trick like that just to win her freedom; I’d mistakenly thought that once she fell for me, she understood she was already free. Pushing her into the arena had amused me at first, but the more I came to want her, the worse her enemies became, and for good reason.
If she could handle the worst I could throw at her, she’d be prepared to handle anything outside the arena walls. I wouldn’t need to fear for her life if she walked down a street in the open.
As furious as I was at the pain of a broken bond, I respected her cunning. She would make a fine demon herself.
I was nearly to the place I’d chosen when another spear of pain drove through me, the feeling of a dagger twisting in my chest. I shifted out of my leonine form, gripping my chest even though it was impossible to soothe the pain. All I could do was wait for it to pass.
If, after this, she didn’t want me, then there was nothing else I could do for it. I would give her everything she asked for as a token of my own. She didn’t want weapons, pretty clothes, or shiny rocks.
She wanted revenge.
I found the white rock that marked the place and pushed it aside, digging into the black sand beneath it. It poured over my hands like water, wanting to refill the hole, but I felt something solid and wrapped my fingers around it.
The black chains that had bound Yraceli burst through when I pulled. They puddled on the sand at my feet until I had the full length of it, almost invisible against the dark sand.
I made sure the links were loose, examining them closely for the flecks of ebonite mixed with the iron, ebonite that would hold any angel, devil, or the mixture of their blood, the Nephilim.
I strung the chain across the sand, making a large spiral, and then I tossed sand over it, burying it under an inch of glittering particles.
The wind quieted when I began drawing a large circle on the flat stretch where the chain was buried, using the point of my fiery sword to melt the glass, ensuring the circle would hold its shape.
I traced the angelic sigils, taking care to ensure every line was flawless.
It was impossible to summon an angel and bind it in the circle alone, but it would act as an amplifier, a line straight to Heaven. The sand shuddered in the circle, like it sensed its angelic nature and wanted to escape. Every grain of dirt in Hell loathed the divine.
All I needed was this amplifier, because my prey had one weakness he turned a blind eye to. When he heard me call, he’d answer.
I stepped out of the circle and smiled down at my creation. The sigils were the parts of Gabriel’s name. Linked together in the circle, they would call to him, and him alone.
If I was horrifically unfortunate, Raguel and Barachiel might answer too, but Gabriel liked to handle his matters with discretion.
I was counting on the prideful moron not bringing back-up.
I had the chains, the dagger, my sword. I removed a gauntlet, and with a neat flick of my wrist, I sent a small silver blade jutting from my bracer and cut my palm, healing almost instantly, but several droplets of blood spattered over the glass circle.
The droplets disappeared, soaking into the glass, and it began to shimmer
