Dance of Wings (Curse of the Guardians #7)

5. Lucifer

Chapter 5

Lucifer

“ A re you sure about this?” Kyra asked, the moon behind giving her an almost ethereal glow. “I specialise in ghosts, and he’s been in the ground for almost two years.” She poured the salt, teasing the granules into shape on the unmarked grave.

“Daemons don’t decompose that fast.” Lucifer shrugged, because he had no fucking idea how fast Daemons decomposed. He’d never stuck around to check.

“That’s if there’s anything left,” Xander added with a smirk, standing behind his mate like some creepy bodyguard. “His presence is gone.”

Unlike Kyra, who could only communicate with the dead when she called them, Xander could see ghosts at all times. It was probably why his eyes were downcast, pinned to the scorched grass.

Apparently ghosts were right pricks, and if you were unlucky enough to get the attention of one, they may never leave you alone. Not many Breeds could communicate with the spectral undead, and for that Lucy was grateful. He didn’t need the thousands of souls he’d fucked over bitching at him for eternity.

Standing back, he stretched his awareness to look out for any threats. He felt nothing other than them three, the building that Kyra had once been trapped in no longer standing.

Her soft voice filled the silence, much too delicate for the situation as she spoke softly in Latin. He knew the incantation, having spent a chunk of his existence studying the witches’ grimoires that had summoned him. But being born a druid and not a witch, he lacked the specialised enzyme to activate the spell.

“I think this is the angle you should be selling black magic,” he said, cocking his head as Kyra finally finished the salt circle. “This is environmentally sustainable magic.”

She blinked up at him with a frown.

Xander muttered beneath his breath, pulling out a cigarette and placing it between his lips.

Lucifer kicked at the ground. “All I’m saying is she’s using both blood magic, and necromancy. That’s the whole body. Honestly, it’s like advanced recycling.”

Kyra shook her head, the spell coming to the end when she produced a small knife from her bag.

“Hmm,” Xander hummed with a nod. “Reduce. Reuse. Reanimate.”

Lucifer burst into laughter, grinning like a maniac. “See? Your mate gets it.”

“If you’re both quite finished, we don’t have long before the salt’s absorbed into the soil,” Kyra said, fighting a smile. “You ready?” Without waiting for a response she cut a thin line down her arm. Xander’s irises immediately shifted, the pale blue swirling liquid silver as his beast reacted to the scent.

Kyra handed Lucy the knife, and he mirrored the exact same line on his own arm. Blood pooled, and before the wound could close he clasped Kyra’s arm. Magic, thick and dark oozed from where their combined blood soaked the dirt. Kyra’s lips moved, her words barely audible above the hum that increased in pitch with every drop onto the grave. The soil blackened, blood moving, merging until a shadow of a deformed body echoed.

Stepping back as the earth sunk, he released her arm just as a hand pierced through the grass, clawing to the surface.

Lucifer chuckled to himself. Guess Daemons did decompose.

Xander quickly pulled Kyra to his side as the Daemon, Dirk, pulled himself onto the surface. The smell was fucking vile. Which wasn’t surprising considering his arms barely held any flesh, Kyra’s magic shaping and creating tissue from somewhere to fill him out slowly. Clothes hung from his frame, the fabric torn and partly covering a sizeable hole in his chest, large enough Lucifer kneeled, and waved at Kyra.

Which apparently was inappropriate, if he went by Xander’s expression. Kyra didn’t seem to care that he’d waved at her through a corpse.

“There’s a reason I don’t like to do this,” she said, her voice strained as her eyes darkened, pupils swelling until her gaze held nothing but black.

Lucifer waited, the dark magic teasing his chi. His instinct was to wrap himself in the thick tendrils, and take it as his own. To steal Kyra’s very soul, and power, for himself.

But that was him before, when he lived in a place that lacked civility and light. Now he was the new, improved version of himself. One who didn’t go around collecting people’s souls like a psychotic kleptomaniac.

“Kyra… I don’t want to sound like an ungrateful arsehole. But where the fuck is his head?”

Dirk fell to his knees, skeletal hands reaching up to where his head was supposed to be. It would be comical if they weren’t on a timer. Kyra was powerful, but her chi wasn’t bottomless. She would run out, or the effluence of using such dangerous magic would take its toll and knock her out.

Kyra let out a frustrated sound. “It’s not my fault.”

“How can he answer my questions without a fucking mouth?” Lucifer groaned, nudging Dirk’s partially rotting corpse to the side so he could dig with his hands.

Dirk flailed his arms, smacking away anything he could.

A flash of light, and Lucy looked up to find Xander smirking with his phone pointed directly at them. “Smile batboy.”

Dirk’s fist caught him in the jaw hard enough Lucy tasted blood. “Fuck sake.” Blasting the earth with arcane, he finally found the missing head.

Dirk spluttered, more bone than flesh as Lucifer pulled him free from the dirt.

“Ah, there you are, mate.” Tossing the head to the body, Lucy grinned as he watched Dirk fumble before steadying himself. Kyra’s magic had a chance to fill the body out, the view not so grotesque.

Shame he still smelled like shit.

“Well if it isn’t the little black witch,” Dirk said, the sound strange considering he didn’t have a throat. Or a tongue. Or vocal cords. Lucy was trying not to think too much about the logistics of it, because, well, magic.

Xander growled, the sounds reverberating up through his chest. He moved to stand in front of his mate, his beast present in his features.

“Don’t look at her, look at me,” Lucy demanded, moving to stand in Dirk’s eyeline.

Dirk sneered, well, as much as he could without lips. “How dare you summon me, Xahen.”

Lucifer grinned, even as he internally cringed at the use of his shortened summoning name. “Don’t get all pissy, you should be thanking me for giving you a break from the afterlife.” He had to look down to meet Dirk’s white eyes.

Dirk gnashed his teeth, his head held tightly in his hands. “What do you want?”

“Well, firstly I want to know why you chose ‘Dirk’ as your new name? It’s stupid.”

“Luce, get to the point,” Xander snarled, his beast becoming more and more present in his tone.

“Alright, don’t get your knickers in a twist.”

“How does it feel to betray your own kin? To become nothing but a glorified pet.” Dirk spat, or, at least that was what he tried to do. “You may no longer be chained to the Nether, but you are still bound to those who would rather see you dead.”

“Sure mate. Look how chained I am, standing beneath the stars while you’re six foot under.” Lucifer kneeled, making their heads the same height. “Now, you’re going to answer all my fucking questions like a good boy, and maybe I won’t piss all over your grave.”

Dirk hissed, grey flesh slowly crawling across his cheeks to shape his lips. “Tell me, has Zurz succeeded in destroying you all?”

Lucifer snorted. “He goes by Gideon now. You see, Gideon is an appropriate , normal name, unlike Dirk.”

“Lucy!” Xander snapped.

“Yeah yeah, I’ve got this.” Lucifer cleared his throat. “Dirk, you were working with Zurz, now known as Gideon.”

The new skin had started to settle on Dirk’s face, giving him more expression. “That’s not a question.”

Lucifer balled his fists, looking back over his shoulder at Kyra. He may have told Dirk he was the one that summoned him, but it was Kyra’s magic. Which meant Dirk was compelled to answer her questions. Not his, technically.

“Dirk, were you working with Gideon?” she asked, stepping forward. Power electrified the air around her, and from the tension along Xander’s shoulders, it was calling to the dead. “Why?”

“Yes.” The word seemed to be pulled from Dirk’s deformed lips. “Because I believed in the cause. I was to create Daemons, and recruit others if I failed.”

“The cause?” Lucifer asked, only for Kyra to have to repeat the question.

“To strengthen our numbers, so we could master the realm up here in the light just as Zurz ruled below.”

Lucifer nodded, already knowing Gideon wanted control. He was the king below because he held the most power excluding Hadriel, and he wanted the same now he was free.

“Tell me the names of every Daemon who refused to join your cause.”

Kyra reworded it into a question, and Dirk was forced to reveal five names in total. Lucifer cringed as he heard their full summoning names, rather than their moniker. Apparently the binding of tongues finished when dead.

Lucifer sighed, unfastening his jeans. “How did Gideon find them?”

“A Fae Lord sold him details in exchange for memories.” Dirk’s head was almost entirely whole, his pale eyes dipping. “What are you doing?”

With a grin Lucy pulled out his cock, and made sure to piss on Dirk’s feet. “You can send him back now, Kyra.”

“You snivelling little cun –” Dirk’s body collapsed into a heap, the ground moving to swallow him back whole.

Lucifer laughed, putting his cock away before turning. “I think that went quite well.”

“Really?” Xander said dryly. “You just had to piss on him.”

Lucifer shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a man of my word.”

“What do you want to do with the names?” Kyra asked.

“Can’t we use them to summon?” Xander added.

Lucy shook his head. “If we summon them, no fucking way will they agree to help. Until you go through it, you wouldn’t understand. Also, those names aren’t going to help us considering they’re all dead.”

“So this was pointless?” Xander growled.

“No, because now we know how Gideon got those names in the first place. Come on Xee, keep up.”

Xander growled, and Lucifer laughed before a tickle caught in his throat, the sensation moving down until it felt like something pierced into his chest.

“Hey, are you okay?” Kyra went to reach out. “You don’t look so good.”

Lucy felt a tug, his head jerking up when the pain beneath his ribs intensified. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”