Chapter 42
Malachi
The ink is still wet. No, not ink. My own arterial blood, mixed with pulverized celestial gold and the distinct, sulfurous spit of Satan herself.
The contract is sealed. The soul is leveraged. The job is mine.
Now, I just need a body.
I’m standing in the First Division, and it is aggressively, violently beautiful. It doesn’t look like the Ninth at all. It looks like the inside of a Faberge egg designed by a manic depressive architect with a gold fetish.
It’s disgusting. It’s perfect.
“Hold still, sir.”
The Flesh-Weaver is a fussbudget of a creature. He looks like a butler who swallowed a goat, complete with spiraled horns and a mustache waxed into points. He’s fluttering around me with a tape measure, tutting at my dimensions.
“We need to reduce the shoulder width,” he murmurs, pins clamped between his sharp teeth, pulling the sinew tight across my back. “Humans find this silhouette... aggressive. Intimidating. It suggests a history of violence.”
“I have a history of violence,” I snap, swatting a wandering caliper away. “Keep the width. She likes the width.”
The Weaver sighs. “Very well. Vanity it is. And the eyes. We’ll make them brown. A soft, non-threatening colour. Standard issue for the ‘friendly neighbor’ archetype.”
“Make them dark,” I correct him, staring at my own monstrous reflection in the gilded mirror. “And keep the height. If I have to be shoved into a meat-suit, I am not being a short human. I refuse to look up at anyone.”
“You are making this very difficult, Malachi,” the Weaver complains, sketching something on a pad of skin.
A middle-manager from Demon Resources materializes at my elbow holding a slab of obsidian. “Let the Weaver work. We have administrative matters to discuss.”
He thrusts the tablet at me.
“Your cover story,” he says, scrolling through the glowing red text. “Your name’s still Malachi. But we’ve had to scrub ‘Virezeal’. You are now Malachi... Blackwood. A bit on the nose, but it tested well with the focus groups.”
I snort. “Blackwood? You people have no imagination.”
“Occupation… Private Security Consultant,” he continues, ignoring me.
“It explains the muscle mass, and the general aura of impending homicide. Income source is secured. The First Division will funnel a generous salary into a Cayman account. You will not want for mortal currency. You can buy all the ‘kibble’ and ‘lattes’ you desire.”
“Oh, I’m sure he’ll positively gorge himself,” comes a bored, melodic voice from the corner of the suite. “He always did have the impulse control of a starving rodent.”
I groan loudly, not turning my head as the Weaver aggressively sandpapers a callus off my new heel. “Why are you still here?”
“Satan gave me two days of administrative leave in the First,” Veraxia says from where she’s draped across a fainting couch, looking entirely too comfortable.
She pops a glistening, black hors d'oeuvre into her mouth and chews thoughtfully.
“Best believe I am taking them. These tartlets are exquisite. You can taste the despair in the crust.”
I stare at her in the reflection of the gilt mirror.
My sister. The woman who, less than twenty-four hours ago, was personally overseeing the attempt to have me turned into a fine red mist. Seeing her face—pristine, smug, and unbruised—makes the bile rise in my fresh esophagus.
I want to reach across the room and introduce her perfect nose to the marble floor.
But then, the rage cools into something colder. Something sweeter.
She licks a crumb of crust from her thumb, oblivious. She thinks she’s won a reprieve. A vacation. But I see it for what it is: the prologue to her misery.
Let her eat her snacks. Let her enjoy the high-thread-count sheets. Because in twenty-four hours, she goes back to the Ninth. Back to the fluorescent lights that hum like dying insects. Back to the paperwork, the quotas, and the soul-crushing boredom of middle management.
She tried to liquidate me. She failed. And in her failure, she accidentally handed me the keys to the kingdom.
While she’s drowning in triplicate forms for the next millennium, she’ll have to live with the knowledge that the brother she tried to erase didn’t just survive—he got promoted. And I am out of her jurisdiction.
“Enjoy the leave, Veraxia,” I say, a slow grin stretching my new mortal-looking lips. “You look like you need the rest. Bureaucracy is so… draining for the unambitious.”
She pauses, a tartlet halfway to her mouth, her eyes narrowing.
“Don’t push it, Blackwood,” she sneers.
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I lie.
The middle-manager clears his throat and steps between us before I can escalate the sibling rivalry into structural damage. He extends a manicured hand. Sitting in his palm is a sleek, black rectangle.
“Your tether,” he announces.
It’s a standard mortal smartphone, just like Leo’s. My new human fingers close around the glass clumsily. The screen flares to life, bathing my unfamiliar face in a harsh, artificial blue glow.
“Heavily encrypted,” he drones, tapping his own tablet. “Untraceable by human agencies, government bodies, or lower-tier demons with a grudge. This is a direct line.”
“A direct line to whom?” I ask, looking for a weaponized app or a button that releases a plague. “Room service?”
“To Her,” he corrects sharply. “When a job requires your… specific talents, she will contact you via this device. You will receive coordinates. You will proceed to the location and handle the asset. And then you will disappear. No paperwork. No witnesses. You are a ghost, Malachi. A ghost with a data plan.”
I stare at the little black mirror. So this is it. The grand instrument of my servitude to the CEO of Hell is a gadget that teenagers use to film themselves dancing.
“Does it have games?” I ask.
He freezes, his left eye twitching. “...Excuse me?”
“Games,” I repeat, scrolling through the empty app drawer with a critical thumb. “Like that one where you crush candy? I require stimulation. I have a very active mind.”
From the couch, Veraxia snorts so hard she nearly chokes on a tartlet.
“It is a tool of cosmic enforcement,” he says, his voice straining like a cable about to snap. “Not a toy.”
“I’m not hearing a ‘no,’” I mutter.
“We will be in touch,” he clips, smoothing his jacket with a aggression that suggests he’s imagining it’s my neck. “Do not deviate. Do not improvise. And for the love of the Veil, do not mess this up.”
He turns on his heel and marches out, the heavy oak doors slamming shut behind him.
Silence returns to the suite, broken only by the wet shicking of the Weaver’s needle and Veraxia crunching loudly on a cracker.
I turn back to the mirror. The face staring back is almost complete. It’s human, yes. But it’s currently too… soft. Too safe. It looks like a man who pays his taxes on time and enjoys vanilla yogurt.
Unacceptable.
“Higher,” I instruct, tilting my chin up to catch the harsh light. “The cheekbones. Lift them about two millimeters. I want to look sharp enough to bleed on.”
The Flesh-Weaver pauses and lowers his needle.
“This is a tactical shell, not a runway look,” he sighs. “You are going to the Mortal Realm to hunt, not to model. The bone structure does not need to be aerodynamic.”
I ignore him, turning my head side to side, admiring the potential geometry.
He’s right, of course. Technically.
I am now Malachi, Headhunter of the First Division. My mandate is to track, locate, and execute Satan’s will with extreme prejudice. I am a weapon made of meat and magic, designed to move unseen through the shadows of the mortal world. Vanity is an inefficiency.
But I don’t care about efficiency.
I care about the look on Eden’s face when I walk through her door. I want my little summoner to take one look at this face and forget how to breathe. I want her to stammer. I want her to drool. I want to look like myself, but… human.
“Do it,” I command, chomping my new, perfectly straight teeth at my reflection. “And re-do my piercings while you’re at it. The classics never die.”
“Piercings,” he repeats. “You want me to puncture the fresh vessel? We just sealed the dermis.”
“I said what I said,” I snap. “At least twelve in each ear. And the septum. Just because I’m wearing a shell doesn’t mean I have to look like a choir boy. Put the metal back where it belongs.”
From the fainting couch, there’s a rustle of silk and the clink of a china plate being set down with finality.
“This has ceased to be entertaining,” Veraxia announces, swinging her legs off the velvet cushions. “Watching you preen like a mating peacock is tedious, and I have better things to do with my administrative leave.”
She smooths her blazer, checking her reflection in a silver platter.
“I’m going to the Obsidian Springs,” she says, a predatory smirk touching her lips. “I hear the new attendants are carved from living magma. Very hot. Very... pliable. I intend to spend the afternoon ruining them.”
She glides toward the door, her heels clicking on the marble—a metronome counting down the seconds until I never see her again.
She pauses at the threshold but doesn’t turn around.
“Don’t get liquidated, Malachi,” she deadpans. “It would be a bureaucratic nightmare to replace you.”
“Don’t drown in the sulfur, Veraxia,” I reply, matching her tone perfectly. “It would be a shame to ruin that blazer.”
“Fuck off,” she says, affectionately.
“Die screaming,” I return, warmly.
The door shuts. The latch clicks. And I stare at the wood for a second longer than necessary.
“Right,” I say, turning back to the Weaver, who’s holding a hollow needle with trembling fingers. “Stop stalling. Make me beautiful.”
I’m coming for you, baby girl, and you’re going to fucking love this.