Brimstone Angels

Lorcan hesitated. “Fine. I promise I’ll help you get Havilar back safe. And the hospital if it’s convenient.” He scowled. “And I wouldn’t go back to my mother-giving her your silly plans isn’t going to make her want to kill me any less. I’d like to hear your plan for that.”

“We cannot fight them all,” she agreed, “so we deal with them each separately. The Ashmadai first, then the Sovereignty, then the erinyes.”

“Of course,” Lorcan said, “and afterward we bring down the demon princes. You cannot kill any of those!”

“We don’t need to kill them,” she said. “We just need to make them back down. By playing them off each other.”

“My enemies’ enemies are allies not-yet-confirmed,” Mehen quoted.

“Exactly,” Farideh said, turning to Lorcan. “Your mother will deal with Rohini handily enough, yes? So we lead the erinyes to Rohini and let them take care of things. You don’t get in the way when your enemies are willing to kill each other.” She looked to Mehen. “You’d better go. He’ll be between the shop we stopped at the first day and the House of Knowledge. He’ll want as many of the Ashmadai near before …” She swallowed. “Before he makes his point.”

Mehen seized her in a fierce embrace. She went stiff in his arms, as if she didn’t know what was happening. She reached an arm around Mehen and relaxed a little.

“For the love of all the planes, be careful,” he said. “We have too much to say to leave it here.” He squeezed her once and stepped back. He glowered at Lorcan. “And you …” He’d still have liked to punch the cambion right across the jaw, but not now. Not while Farideh needed him. “Prove your damn worth.” He spat.

“To you? I think I have,” the cambion said. “Twice now in fact.”

“Stop it,” Farideh snapped. “Mehen, go. Lorcan and Brin, we have to find where the erinyes’ portal opened.” They all started toward the end of the alley.

“How will you get rid of Invadiah once she’s finished?” he heard Lorcan ask. “And who will kill the Ashmadai? Not the erinyes-you can’t start a battle in the Hells.”

Farideh hesitated. “We don’t kill the Ashmadai,” she said. “We make them think they aren’t needed so they go away.”

Mehen eyed the empty street and turned toward the south.

“Are you going to burn down the House of Knowledge yourself?” he heard Lorcan ask.

Mehen almost wished he’d been too far to hear Farideh’s answer. “Not precisely,” she said. “I need you to set fire to me.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Farideh had no glass to tell the time, but surely by now the amulet’s power over Lorcan had faded, and she watched him with a fair amount of trepidation and more than a little respect. He meant what he’d promised, it seemed.

“The erinyes are heading this way out of the ruined district,” Brin reported back. He had run ahead and scaled the tallest building he could find. “They’re staying on the widest road, a straight shot for here. Torm knows what they’ll do when they reach the Wall. There’re at least ten of them.”

“Thirteen,” Lorcan said when he returned. “If there are only erinyes, then there will be thirteen. The praxidikai-a full ‘justice’ of erinyes for Rohini, because she broke her oath to an archdevil.” He shook his head again, but to his credit did not insist they should flee.

“The Ashmadai seem to have split themselves,” he reported, “but you were right. The larger group is headed to this intersection.” They stood at the plaza of the fountain, the spot where the Chasm wall dipped farthest into the city, and where the widest northern road met the main road.

“Tell me,” Lorcan said, “that you have given up this fool idea of setting yourself on fire.”

“A person on fire is going to catch their attention,” she said, tying the rags of her torn robes to the sleeves of her armor. “And if she is not screaming and trying to put out the flame, then they are really going to notice.”

“You are a tiefling,” Lorcan said, though he pinned the pair of charms that would keep her from catching fire too easily to her shoulders. “Not a shitting phoenix-the flames will burn you through eventually.”

“Which is why we must time everything right.”

Before long Farideh stood atop a crop of rock, Brin at the base, shrouded by Lorcan’s invisibility charm, and Lorcan behind her, muttering steadily about the futility of the plan and how he would take off with her the second the Ashmadai came too close.

“If you do,” she said, “I will kick you in the knees until you drop me. Stop complaining.” But for all her surety, the shadows crept out of her skin and swaddled them all.

Down the opposite road, the Ashmadai marched, their faces covered and hooded but the insignia of their alliance clear in the light of the flickering torches they carried. Those who did not hold torches carried bundles of kindling and glass bottles stuffed with rags and sloshing with accelerants. They made a poor pretense of quiet, too riled, it seemed, by the promise of impending havoc.

Behind her, beyond the Wall, she heard the terrible march of cloven feet.

“Go,” Farideh whispered, and she drew a deep breath to pull the shadows back into herself.

“Halt!” Brin cried, and his voice echoed and rebounded, loud enough to make the Ashmadai stop and not a few flinch back. Behind her, Lorcan whispered the spell that sent a gust of fire washing over her, igniting the shredded robes. He took a step back, less protected than he’d been before and spread his wings to good effect. Several of the more timid Ashmadai turned and fled.

But others were only emboldened. “Who are you to tell the servants of the Raging Fiend to halt?” one called, stepping forward.

Farideh did not answer at first, counting out the seconds in her head. Then a terrible clatter came from the Wall. She lifted her head slowly, dramatically, and cast her own curtain of flames at the surrounding cultists.

“I am the champion of Malbolge,” she said. She heard Brin draw his sword before scurrying into the nearest alleyway. “My lady knows your plans and orders you to cease … before you do anything foolish.” Again the sound of something heavy bashing into the aged wall, the clamor of an army, the crash of weapons.

The man who had stepped forward glanced back at his fellows as if he could not believe what he’d heard. “I think perhaps you are mistaken, girl. I think perhaps you are the warlock we’ve been warned of.”

The flames licked at her hair and cheeks now, but Farideh did not dare flinch. The shadows curled out from her to compensate, and she hoped dearly that it made a good effect. The stones around the fountain loosened and rattled to the ground.

“You speak of my sister-at-arms … a traitor to the … archduchess.” She stumbled as the fire grew hot enough to be felt through the charms, and briefly worried that was the wrong title. “We seek the same enemy,” she finished. She risked a glance back at the Wall. There were shadowy shapes clambering over the edges.

“Then let us have her and we will be done with this nonsense!”

“This is not a matter for the Ashmadai,” she said. “This is for Malbolge to address. If you deny my mistress her vengeance against the one who has broken her oath and given over her secrets to the monsters of the Chasm”-the fire started to smolder along the leather of her armor-“then you shall be the next to taste her wrath. Favored you might be among men, but you risk the wrath of Glasya.”

“Then she risks the wrath of Asmodeus!” the leader shouted, but his comrades were definitely backing away from Farideh, setting down their kindling, as if getting ready to fight or run. The shouts of erinyes accompanied the clatter of hooks on stone, the scramble of hooves against brick.

“What the ruler of Malbolge risks is not a mortal’s concern,” Farideh shouted quickly. “Consider then the rage of Asmodeus when he discovers your disobedience, that you have made yourselves an obstacle in Glasya’s retribution.

“Behold,” she shouted. “Her army approaches.”

Lorcan seized her then and pulled her off her perch, into the shadows of the alleyway. Either the Ashmadai had been convinced, or they would not be convinced, but she did not want the pradixikai’s