Chaol #2
Chaol ignored him, but it was for a good cause.
They needed to know why the gates were closed.
The gates were never closed. Guarded by behemoths, of course, and difficult to pass through, certainly.
But the gates had never been simultaneously shut for as long as he’d been alive.
Something must have happened, and if there was a threat on the horizon, they needed to know.
He came out of the forest onto a nearby road, cobbled with bone, where a handful of demons sat around a small fire geyser positioned just off the path. The area around it was worn down, with stone and rock seating carved out around it for traveling demons to rest.
One of the demons here now was a rybboc, his wide form seated on a log.
Flat brown eyes with horizontal pupils turned toward Chaol as he approached.
Rybbocs were gluttonous creatures, known for their greed and hoarding tendencies.
They craved everything from currency to food.
A cart sat nearby, laden with gear that was covered by a leather sheet.
A single beast was harnessed to the front of the cart—an arronid, eight-legged demons with twisted faces that resembled human children.
Like the other beasts from the Pit, they were no more than animals.
It seemed the rybboc had captured this one to use as a workhorse.
There was an empty space on either side of it, spare harnesses tucked into the front of the cart.
The other demon had ink black skin, wings, and large, talon-like feet. Her long black hair spilled in wild waves to the small of her back.
“Kalmach,” she greeted, wings twitching.
“Estrith,” he replied. “Rybboc.”
“Don’t see many of your kind these days, kalmach,” the rybboc said. His bulging body rippled as he turned. “Come for a rest by the fire?”
“Indeed. Nights are cold this far from Pandemonium.” He sat on a flat rock and stretched his legs out, crossing them at the ankle. “What’s this I hear about a breach? Did I miss some excitement?”
The small geyser burped, and a fresh gush of hellfire billowed from the hole in the ground.
The estrith’s horned head turned toward the forest, blood red eyes searching in the direction he’d come from. She could hear even better than him with her large, sharply pointed ears, and he hoped Daniel was staying very still and quiet.
“Yes, could barely believe it,” the rybboc said. “The southern gate was breached by an angel.”
That drew him up short. “Wait, what? You’re not serious.”
“Deadly serious, I’m afraid,” the estrith said, stretching her talons across the ground and leaving gouges behind with her terrible claws.
Chaol tried not to think about what those talons could do to Daniel’s delicate skin.
“I was there when he appeared, golden-eyed and vicious. He started laying waste to everything around him, but not just to kill. He kept sucking this red shit out of every demon he killed, like he was drinking some kind of energy from them. None of us stood a chance. He cut one of my arms off before I managed to fly away. Luckily for me, Hell provides.” She lifted her hand, rolling her wrist to show that she was newly healed.
Demons rarely died in Hell. Being here sustained them. It was one of the few perks of staying.
“I lost two perfectly good cart-pullers before we got away and nearly lost my cart, too,” the rybboc said. “One arronid isn’t strong enough to get me anywhere fast. It’ll take weeks to reach Pandemonium at this rate.”
Chaol glanced over at the remaining arronid. It was lying on its stomach, legs curled under it and its strangely human-shaped head lax. It looked very much like a dead spider, and only the faint rise and fall of its back revealed that it was still breathing.
“Why the fuck would an angel come down here?” Chaol asked. “If they wanted to kill demons, there are plenty on the surface that aren’t supposed to be there.”
“Don’t ask me,” the rybboc said. “I plan to get back to Pandemonium and stay there until this blows over.”
“So, what happened?” Chaol asked. “Did they deploy any of the upper level demons to fight off the angel? Is he still down here?”
“We don’t know,” the estrith said. “If he shows up again, I won’t be stupid enough to try fighting him off. I suggest you do the same.”
Chaol hummed. “Good to know.” He stood. “I think I’ll head to Pandemonium myself. There’s safety in numbers, after all.”
“I don’t suppose I could convince either of you to carry my cart to the city’s edge, could I?” the rybboc asked, eyeing them both—particularly the estrith, who was the larger of the two of them. She stood and stretched her wings.
“Not on your life,” she replied.
“I’m no damn cart puller,” Chaol agreed. “If you have the supplies on that cart of yours, wander into the forest and set up a couple of traps. Arronids are stupid; it shouldn’t be hard to catch a few more.”
The rybboc rubbed his jowls thoughtfully. “That’s not a bad idea. If I catch any extra, I could always use their meat for a nice travel snack.”
Chaol inclined his head. The estrith took flight, buffeting them with wind from her wings, and Chaol left the way he’d come, walking down the road until he was out of sight and then disappearing into the shadows of the forest.
But when he got back to the tree where he’d left Daniel, his human was nowhere in sight.
“Danny? Darkling, where’d you go?” he called softly, mindful of how close he still was to the rybboc’s resting place.
He caught the human’s sunshine scent, leading deeper into the forest, and rushed after it. Goddammit, he’d told him to wait. Why would Daniel have run off?
The path twisted through the trees, seemingly going in no logical direction.
Chaol’s heart thundered as he followed, straining his ears for any nearby sound.
He couldn’t have gone far, surely. Chaol wasn’t gone long.
And he’d told him to scream. Why hadn’t Daniel made some kind of noise to let Chaol know he was in danger?
He understood why when Daniel’s scent soured with fear. Bright red, human blood speckled the path of his scent, and fear squeezed Chaol’s heart. Daniel was hurt and scared. Maybe he wasn’t thinking clearly. Maybe he couldn’t scream for Chaol.
He broke into a run. He had to find him.