Ruby Shadows (28 page)

“
My purity? Could he sense
that I was…you know, that I’ve never had sex?” Her cheeks
flushed.

“
I think not,” I said
shortly. “When I say purity I am referring to the state of your
soul—the fact that it is not stained with sin. Any demon will be
able to sense that—they will smell it if they get close enough to
scent you.”

“
He was certainly close
enough after he chased off the devilkins.” She shivered. “He kept
trying to put his big hairy hands on me and saying I needed to get
undressed so he could
examine
me. Disgusting!”

I felt a low growl rise in my throat and
Gwendolyn looked at me, clearly alarmed.

“
Hey—are you all right?
Your eyes look like they’re on fire.” Her voice was frightened and
her eyes were wide.

I made an effort to calm myself.

“
Forgive me. I had no idea
when I interrupted the scene exactly what he was doing. If I had, I
might have been angry enough to lose my human form sooner rather
than later.”

“
Because you want to
protect your
property.”
She gave me a sharp look. “As if I belonged to
you or something.”

“
One might as well
say
I
belong
to
you,”
I
remarked lightly. “I am, after all, your own personal demon whom
you called to do your bidding. And here I am, still doing
it.”

“
Whatever.” She looked
away. “I wasn’t trying to call a fire demon.”

I spread my hands. “I cannot help my nature.
And why is it so important to you what sort of demon I am,
anyway?”

“
Never mind, it doesn’t
matter.” She looked down at her hands resting lightly on Kurex’s
saddle.

“
But I
do
mind,
mon ange.
Do you now blame me for
showing you what I am? Or part of what I am even though we were in
danger?”

“
We wouldn’t have
been
in danger if you
hadn’t lost your temper,” she reminded me tightly. “But I guess I
should’ve known better than to expect anything else from a
demon.”

“
I am not
just
a demon,” I said,
frowning.

“
No—you’re also a huge-ass
dragon-snake thing, apparently.” She rounded on me. “Is that what
you were talking about? What you didn’t want to show me—your true
form?”

“
It is not,” I said
coldly, letting a little of the irritation I was feeling creep into
my voice. “It is simply one of my many guises but it is not the
truth of me—the heart of my nature.”

She shivered. “If your true form is worse
than that one, I don’t know that I want to see it.”

“
Don’t worry, Gwendolyn,”
I said softly. “After seeing how you reacted to my dragon form, I
would not presume to reveal my true self to you. I do not wish to
make you fear or hate me anymore than you already do.”

She looked suddenly stricken.

“
It’s not that I
hate
you—”

“
I know. You just
don’t
like
me
very much,” I finished, throwing her own words back at
her.

It was clear she didn’t know what to say.
Her cheeks flushed and she shook her head, looking away.

“
I’m sorry,” she said in a
low voice. “Sorry I can’t help my reaction to what I saw—what you
became.”

“
I am sorry too.” I sighed
wearily, rubbing my hand over my face. All the hard work of earning
her trust had been wasted—shattered in an instant the moment she
saw me change. But why? I had told her I had other forms. Was the
sight of me in that particular one so horrible? And how would she
ever be able to face any of my other forms—especially my true one?
I could not answer the question—I was beginning to think there was
no answer, that my quest to win her affections was utterly
hopeless.

But why should I care? She was only a
mortal, I told myself. Only a little human with a life as brief as
the butterfly I had compared her with. Why should I wish so
desperately for her to care for me? I wished I knew and that I
could rip that part out of me but somehow I could not. Even now, I
could not.

“
Tell me something—why
wasn’t Kurex scared of you in that…that form?” Gwendolyn asked,
pulling me out of my miserable thoughts. “I mean, I don’t know a
lot about horses but I bet it would have scared most of them to
death. Is it because he’s from here—because he’s a Hell horse or a
Demon-steed or whatever?”

“
Kurex was not spooked by
my form because he had seen it often during the Celestial wars,” I
explained. “I used it when I went into battle—the better to destroy
and despoil the enemy.”

“
Oh.” She frowned. “But
weren’t you the general? I thought they were supposed to stay on
the sidelines and just give the orders.”

“
I was not that kind of
general,” I said. “I always took part in the battle.”

“
I see.” Gwendolyn looked
away.

“
So now you know why Kurex
didn’t fear me—tell me why
you
did. Aside from the obvious,” I said. “Yes, I
know it is a terrible and frightening form but there is something
else—something you’re not telling me. What is it?”

“
I…” She looked away
evasively. “I don’t want to talk about it. It’s
private.”

“
Very well,” I said,
leading Kurex around another sand pit. “I will let you keep your
secret for now. But sooner or later I expect to be told the reason
for your extreme distress.” I reached up and took her hand. “Until
you tell me what I’ve done wrong, I cannot make it right,
Gwendolyn.”

She slipped her hand away from mine
quickly.

“
Let’s talk about
something else. Tell me about this desert. How big is it? And how
long are we going to be in it—it’s freaking
hot
out here.”

“
Minauros—the Great Desert
or the Desert of Death as some call it, stretches for a thousand
leagues in every direction,” I said.

Her eyes widened.
“A
thousand
leagues? How long is a league?”

“
A league is three of your
miles or four kilometers,” I said.

“
What?
How are we
ever
going to get to the other side of it going at this rate?” she
demanded motioning down at Kurex who was still clopping slowly
along through the sands.

“
Easily. We did not appear
in at the middle of Minauros when we crossed into this circle. The
barrier between it and Baator is only about a day’s journey from
the barrier to Stygia, the fourth circle of Hell.”

“
Oh…well, then.” Gwendolyn
looked vastly relieved. “What’s that like then? More
dessert?”

“
Hardly. It is the
complete opposite of Minauros. Stygia is a frozen waste—as cold as
Minauros is hot. The two regions were once ruled over jointly by a
pair of Great Demons who loved each other—or what passes for love
with our kind. They are Magda, She of the Bloody Hands and Moloch
the Inimitable. That’s a tribute to Moloch there.” I nodded at the
vast obsidian pyramid that still rose in the distance on our
left.

We were a little closer to it now and the
workers that toiled on it could be seen—a vast bastion of lost
souls presided over by a small army of Minotaurs wielding
whips.

“
Are they still building
it?” asked Gwendolyn, squinting to make out the scene in the
blinding sunlight. “In
this
heat?”

“
They must,” I said. “For
every night the minions of Magda come to tear it down again…and
tear out the hearts of any workers caught too close to
it.”

“
So I take it they broke
up? Magda and Moloch?” Gwendolyn said dryly.

“
They did, many millennia
ago,” I said. “And their hatred now burns as fiercely as their love
once did. They continuously send raiding parties to attack each
other through the Jealous Heart.”

“
I’m sorry—the
what?”

“
The Jealous Heart,” I
repeated. “It is the passageway between Minauros and Stygia—and it
also contains the barrier between the two. The demons of both
circles are able to pass back and forth through it because the two
realms used to be one.”

“
And what kinds of people
are punished here?” Gwendolyn sounded interested despite
herself.

“
Minauros is for rapists
and Stygia is for murderers—specifically those who killed in cold
blood,” I told her. “They are punished in many ways which I will
not go into now…unless you wish me to?”

“
No. No, please don’t.”
She shook her head quickly. “I don’t want to know any
more.”

“
Oh? I thought you might
like to know the eventual fate of the one you were plotting revenge
upon.” I could see by her wide eyes that she’d forgotten I knew
about the vengeance spell she planned to cast. “Tell me Gwendolyn,”
I said. “Who was he and what did he do to you?”

She frowned. “It wasn’t
what he did to
me
. It was what he did to—” She stopped abruptly. “Never
mind.”

“
I’ll find out eventually,
you know,” I remarked. “And when I do, your tormentor will be
relegated to the proper section of Hell—perhaps sooner rather than
later.”

“
No!” She glared at me.
“Stay out of it, Laish! I want to take care of this on my
own.”

I shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

But I swore silently to myself that whoever
had hurt her would pay. I might not be able to win back her trust
but I could protect her while we were in my realm and I could
avenge whatever wrongs had been visited upon her.

That much I could do, even if I was never
destined to see my little witch again after this quest was
over.

* * * * *

Gwendolyn

The trip across the desert
seemed to take
forever.
I supposed it could have been worse though. If
we’d been plunked down in the middle of Minauros we would have had
a minimum of three thousand miles to get through—compared to that a
single day didn’t sound so bad.

It might not have sounded
bad but it
felt
bad and not just because of the relentless heat, and the
bright, piercing light stabbing down out of the sky. It also felt
bad because Laish and I were fighting—though I didn’t want to admit
it, even to myself.

I knew I was being unfair
to him—he’d only been protecting me and defending my honor when he
turned into that giant beast. But I couldn’t forgive him for what
he was—for being a fire demon. How had I never noticed anything
that might have hinted of what he was before? Well, maybe because
I’d never seen him turn into a huge-ass dragon before.
That
was entirely
possible.

Of course he
did
have those glowing,
ruby red eyes—that should have been a clue. But I had been too busy
drowning in those eyes to wonder about the reason for their color.
I saw that now—saw that I had been falling for Laish while
pretending to myself that I wasn’t. And for the first time I
acknowledged how very close to the edge I’d allowed myself to
get.

I thought about the way
I’d acted the night before. Letting him kiss me and touch
me…letting him make me come. What was wrong with me acting like
that? Somehow he’d gotten under my radar. I’d been prepared for him
to demand sexual favors as payment for his help in this quest. What
I
hadn’t
been
prepared for was a slow, gentle seduction. And I also hadn’t
expected to start having feelings for him.

Well that stops
now,
I told myself firmly. It was true
that we still had to pay the Sin Tax as we went through the
different circles of Hell but that was just too bad. I would have
to find another way to pay the tax—how, I didn’t know but I wasn’t
getting close to Laish again. It was too damn dangerous.

We stopped in the shadow of a vast,
spreading tree after a few hours to rest. Laish probably could have
kept going forever—the heat didn’t bother him a bit, not surprising
considering his nature. But it wasn’t fair to Kurex to ask him to
keep going on and on with no rest. I was drooping too, even though
I was riding instead of walking.

The heat was really getting to me and I had
to admit I was glad of the white wrap Laish had given me to wear.
It seemed to reflect some of the merciless sunlight which beat down
on my head like a golden hammer, blow after silent blow.

“
Oh, I’m so stiff!” I
moaned as I swung myself down from Kurex’s saddle. Laish didn’t
hold out a hand to help me—maybe he knew I would refuse his offer.
He simply sat down on a low rock in the shade of the
tree.

The tree was dead black with large, black
waxy leaves that looked like sleeping bats—or maybe that was just
glaring sun making things look strange. It grew at the center of an
oasis of sorts—though not a very nice one. A pool filled with
black, sluggish water that looked a lot like the water of the river
Styx was surrounded by flat gray rocks. These made natural seats
and after I had walked around some, I came and sat on one that was
deep in shadow.