Say Your Prayers

1. Comfort Food

Deyva

S ex could be a comfort. It could also be a weapon.

When you’ve been feeding for as long as I have, it becomes easy to identify all the flavors that color the taste of sexual energy. I’ve tasted love, joy, and despair. Bitterness, anger, and longing.

Ever since Hell rose up from the bowels to become Earth’s overbearing next door neighbor, I’ve tasted the entire spectrum of human emotions in just a few short years. By far, the dominant flavor has been fear, with hearty undertones of loss, grief, and heartbreak.

Virgins were especially volatile, depending on the reasons why they hadn’t spent their sexual energy with another person before the apocalypse.

The one underneath me now, with his soft blond hair and pillowy lips, had the bite of shame in his taste.

That pretty brow furrowed, digging deep lines into his forehead, as deep as his fingers pressed into my hips as he bucked into me.

I dragged my blunt nails down his chest, over his nipples and watched the lines vanish with his surprise as his lips parted on a gasp and a whimper.

Pretty Zachariah, always shocked by what he was capable of, what he craved , a little self-disgust lacing the satisfaction I gave him.

I was perched on a ledge, overlooking the pits of agonized damned souls in the melee of pain below.

Zachariah was there, superimposed over the violence, his own face twisted, but only with pleasure.

I closed my eyes and Hell’s landscape fell away, leaving me in the quiet of the young man’s dream, our bodies colliding gently, reverently.

He caught his breath, a puzzled smile on his full lips, and then rolled us in the white sheets of the dream, pinning me down with his hips rocking into me.

In spite of his desperation, his endless craving for more, he still tasted mainly of confusion and discomfort.

He was delicious regardless, and not just in the energetic sense.

His mouth was made for kissing, mismatched eyes curious and watching as I devoured him.

He had a strong body, robust and young—early twenties by my estimate.

And such sensitive skin, warm and responsive to my indulgent licks of his untouched flesh.

The first time I’d claimed his dream, I tasted his embarrassment when he came quickly, then the shame and disgust that flooded him right afterward.

That confused me at first, until I tasted the sweet brightness of devotion, of complete trust and faith.

Not in any single person such as a partner, but something much bigger.

Just my luck that my sweet virgin meal was also a priest.

“Sssuccubus.”

I grimaced and left the dream, turning to face the interruption. A pain hellion, creeping closer, trying to smudge away the tenderness I’d just been enjoying.

“What do you want?” I snapped.

“New arrivalssss. At the gate.”

My jaw gritted, hands digging into the sharp stone of the ledge. This was my work. My duty to Hell. To welcome the damned souls that now flooded the bowels, to suck them dry and leave them compliant. And every last one of them was like drinking acid, leaving me weak and queasy, full of human pain.

“Fine,” I said. When the pain hellion hovered, its belly fat with all the good eating our realm gave it lately, I sat up straighter and glared, my eyes going yellow with warning. “Fuck off before I make you an appetizer.”

It skittered away, melting down a dark cavern.

I let out a long, weary sigh and returned to Zach, finishing him roughly.

I covered his mouth with mine, swallowing the silent cries of his release, and taking the sips of energy and pleasure that I’d been using all these weeks to sustain myself.

I released him with a grazing kiss to his cheek.

He would wake, full of sweet relief. To him, it was only a dream.

To me, it was the last thread of my sanity.

Once, before Hell’s Rising to Earth, sex had only been satisfying a craving.

A late-night raiding of the fridge while everyone else was asleep.

Now, these moments were the scraps I was holding myself together with.

Sex was not my weapon against him. At least, I didn’t intend to use it in such a way when I found him.

I thought he would be one sweet, selfish moment.

But I went back to him for seconds.

And then, thirds.

And then I found two more delicious priests—without the capriciousness of virgin energy, but full-bodied and complex all the same. These men weren’t merely junk food either. I found their flavors deep and rich, layered with complexities as one would find spices in a hearty broth.

After my virgin, I relished in one who had a flavor of sorrow, an eagerness to please tinged with self-loathing. He found comfort in me, soaking up tenderness and affection while holding nothing back. It was too bad he was a priest—his desire for women nearly overpowered that of his faith.

And with the third one, I almost didn’t come back for seconds.

But I couldn’t tear myself away from his unique flavor of sadness.

He had a sweet quality to him too, hidden under many layers of despair and loss.

While he found some physical comfort with me, my presence barely scratched the surface at easing his pain.

Maybe that was one reason why I kept coming back for more.

I related to their struggles, their tangled emotions.

We were all living out our versions of the loop-track of hell since the rising, but when I stole those moments in their dreams, I let myself pretend that I was free.

If nothing else, it was a break from the toxic flavours I’d been barely surviving on in the bowels.

I kept returning to feed from these men, neglecting my duties at Hell’s Mouth to indulge in them like a junkie.

The lines between comfort food and necessary fuel blurred until I couldn’t even bring myself to taste another damned soul.

My Fathers became my favorite and only food source, their untainted flavors just as refreshing as they were fulfilling.

I didn’t intend to dream-feed from three faith-filled men who’d taken vows of celibacy, it just happened that way.

Forgive me, Fathers, for I have sinned since long before your species walked the earth.

The same earth that was now scorched and blackened, an eerie likeness to the dark realm that had been my home for thousands of years. Hell’s royalty had watched and cheered as the human population was slashed to under one billion in a few short years. It was a grand victory for them.

“We have risen! Just like their precious fucking Christ,” Belial had cackled to his fellow kings.

Hell’s kings had been planning this overtaking for centuries, but to humanity, the apocalypse came out of nowhere.

Millions of people died unexpectedly and painfully.

My feeding on freshly acquired souls was just the first step in Hell’s welcome pamphlet.

I calmed them from the hysteria of recently dying, making them nice and compliant for further corruption.

In moderation, I didn’t mind the taste of fear, the anger, grief, and helplessness—but not even a succubus could withstand eating only such bitter flavors day in and day out. So could you blame a girl for skipping them in exchange for more…satisfying meals?

It was only a matter of time before I was caught, and then reprimanded for neglecting my duties.

So I spent an extra few hours with my virgin, knowing it could be the last time I savored such a flavorful meal.

I enjoyed his sated, human breaths and his tentative affection—soft caresses of my face and hair while ignoring my horns, naturally.

He seemed to feel better with the knowledge that I was just a dream, a fantasy he could partake in without turning his back on his vows. All humans saw me as just that—a fantasy. Something safe, a conjuration from their baser instincts to indulge in dark fantasies.

Completely unmotivated to feed on fear and terror again, I paused on my way to the new arrivals to sit on a ledge overlooking the barren, conquered earth.

“What would you do if you knew I was real?” My leg dangled over the opening of the cavern, toes wriggling a few thousand feet over my priests’ cathedral.

Behind me, Hell’s Mouth bustled with legions of demons preparing an onslaught of hellfire.

The legion commanders, marquis and presidents in the demon hierarchy, grumbled to each other about the resilience of humans.

They were easy enough to kill in large numbers, but small pockets of them adapted, persisted.

Even now, with the victory overwhelmingly in Hell’s hands, the demons had to spend precious resources to keep the pesky humans under their fists.

If they slacked off even a little, the humans would repopulate and adapt, much like cockroaches.

Privately, I was rooting for their success.

“Deyva.”

The sound of my own name crawled over my skin like claws, echoing off the vast caverns of Hell’s Mouth. I forced myself to not look at Kimaris standing behind me, knowing I had to conserve my energy for what would come later.

“You look well-fed,” he sneered, rank breath blowing over my shoulder. “And yet the fresh souls are less compliant than they should be. Why is that?”

I shrugged, keeping my eyes fixated on earth’s scorched surface down below. “Perhaps they’ve grown resistant to my feedings.”

Even a big, dumb demon like him wouldn’t buy it, but I had to say something to buy myself time. If he took me to Belial, I might not come back.

“In all your millennia as a succubus, they’ve just now learned to resist you? When they have nothing left to enjoy?” Kimaris barked out a cruel laugh. “Somehow I doubt that.”

“You know how they are with addictions,” I continued to stall. “Their tolerance just keeps getting higher the more they take.”

“So where are you getting your supply from? You look…” His voice took on a husky tone. “Exquisite. Like you haven’t skipped a single day. Are you projecting down there? Dream-feeding again?”

I bristled without giving him an answer.

King Belial tossed me to Kimaris and his legion as their reward for wiping out every influence of Christ in the South Pacific.

It was because of these lunkhead demons that I started dream-feeding with regularity, to recover from what these infernal brutes put me through.

The first time Kimaris caught me, I threw myself down at his gigantic hoofed feet and begged him not to tell the king. He delighted in using my secret feedings to blackmail me, to use me in replenishing his own power until I barely had the strength to lift my head up.

Living forever was tiring, so maybe I’d finally had enough. Despite Kimaris' threats, I kept sneaking visits to my priests in their dreams. Apparently I didn’t cover my tracks well enough. That, or I just didn’t care about getting caught anymore.

A massive hand, nearly as big as my head, wrapped around my upper arm. The contact immediately burned, pain shooting through the right side of my body. I hissed and fought against every instinct telling me to spend my energy to heal. I needed to conserve it.

“You spend so much time down there. You want so badly to join them?” Kimaris taunted in my ear. “To be a mortal human woman who loves, ages, and dies? Even for a succubus, you’re pathetic.”

“Pathetic enough for you to fuck,” I bit back. “No demoness in the hierarchy wants your stupid ass, so you settle for abusing me.”

His hand clamped down on me tighter, the burning pain shooting through my vision. A human woman’s bone would have crumbled to dust under that grip.

“You’re the only succubus with the privilege of being a king’s toy. You should be grateful to get fucked by anyone in the hierarchy at all. But you spend your feedings on dream-walking with humans, like a basic bitch with her lattes. You shame your brethren, Deyva.”

Biting down against the pain, I tilted my head up to stare into the churning ash-and-coal gaze of the demon towering over me, pupils like lightning strikes slashing across his irises.

His horns were long and corkscrewed, angling backward like an ibex.

Long, black claws decorated his hands, with pitch black skin traveling up his arms. His body was made of carved and twisted muscle, body extending forward in a constant leer, shoulders pushed back to the center of his spine.

He reminded me of some ancient beast, a dinosaur, bones protruding at odd angles and the hard shell of old callouses like shields over his chest and legs.

He was considered attractive by demon standards, and for the longest time I couldn’t understand why I felt sick every time I fed from him.

He always tasted awful. Rancid and rotten.

“I’m not your brethren.” How many centuries had passed wishing I could say that out loud? “I’ve never been anything like you.”

Kimaris' eyes flared the color of liquid fire, a burning red-orange. The pain extended down my side and to my legs now as his fury grew.

“I hate how you taste,” I went on, throwing gasoline on a pyre that was already sure to kill me. “Your flavor is bile and your offerings are pitiful and sluggish. I’ve never enjoyed feeding from you. King Belial, your legions, and the souls we’re accumulating? I hate how you all taste.”

Everything I’d been bottling up for centuries came pouring out. I might not survive Kimaris' wrath, but at least he couldn’t use sex as a weapon on me anymore, abuse me with the very gift I was created for.

“Hah! You’re willing to give up your seat at the Mouth because you’re suddenly a picky eater?” He sounded incredulous, but I didn’t miss the undertone of worry. The big idiot thought I was bluffing and was getting ready to call me out.

Good. Try me.

“I’m willing to take my chances among them,” I hissed, the pain now turning to numbness, “before spending another minute on your nasty demon dick.”

He laughed, but I’d spent enough years among his kind to know he was furious. All these demons were fucking ego-driven. Their sense of self-importance was all they truly had.

“Go then, little succubus. Let the humans get one look at those pretty horns and see how kindly they take to you.” He yanked me up by my arm, bringing his hot, slimy mouth next to my ear. “And when you come crawling back, I won’t feed you nicely.”

With that, he threw me violently. And not for the first time, I wished I’d been a fallen angel instead, with the ability to fly to my freedom.

I was no angel. I had no wings and I couldn’t tell which way was down or up.

But I was falling.