Prologue #2
I flinched. The image of Dragontails—whips intricately made from the skin of dragons, woven with talons, glass, and skin-shredding shrapnel—sinking into my flesh and ripping it clean off my bones, made me shudder.
I raced through any possibility of how in the rot I was going to escape, coming up short.
“No, you do not, Hèlslord Zemshazrayèl the Cruel.”
Time.
I needed to buy myself time.
I feigned a wheeze as I took in the endless rows of demons. The hèlborns blotted out every inch of escape, encircling me in front and behind.
I was in so much colossal rot.
“Well, well. He finally calls me Hèlslord. It only took you five hundred wingyears. I wonder how else you will address me in another five hundred.”
Zemshaza smiled. For a moment, the sight bowed my shoulders with fear. This demonic king had no knowledge of kindness. Mercy. Out of all his brothers, he was the most patient. Which made him dangerous.
Zemshaza kept a comfortable posture beneath his velvet, obsidian robes, and the gleaming, onyx crown perched on his braided calf-length, raven hair.
Like everything in the Underrealm that was dead and rotted, his dark brown skin lacked luster.
Life. He watched me like prey, calculating his attack.
His eyes swam to the portal, before sliding back to me.
“So you’re ready to cross through the portal.” A serpentine grin crawled across his face. “Very, well. I’m inclined to join you.”
He smiled. All six of my hearts sank.
I wasn’t prepared to face a bloodbath.
“You’re not coming to Sorellien, Zemshaza.”
The words left my mouth in a whisper.
They landed like a roar.
The hèlborns were unleashed before the words fully left my mouth.
I dove into the smokey, haze below to cloak myself from the demons.
I drew on ethèr—my innate, angelic power.
Soul Bending flooded my veins like rivers of fire.
Snarls followed me, gnashing my bare heels.
A clawed hand swiped across my calves, drawing blood.
So used I was to physical pain, I didn’t even flinch.
The hot ichor poured down my legs, sending the hèlborns into a frenzy.
Blood of the Hallowed was their only meal and I was losing enough to turn them wild.
Shrouded by smoke and ash, I turned at an angle and began to sing. An eery melody broke through my chapped lips. My tone was unsteady. My voice cracked several times. But the melody still sounded.
Soft. Alluring.
A trap woven into a lullaby.
The hèlborns became unnaturally still. Their heads jerked towards me all at once. The droves of demons looked at me with coffins for eyes and fangs for teeth. I tried not to let the nightmarish sight break me. I continued to sing as I watched them shudder beneath the lull.
The demons were completely powerless, lost to the thrall of my voice.
I sang a morbid song of isolation. Brokenness. Abandonment. I overrode their desires with mine. I couldn’t grip their spirit nor their souls because they lacked both. So I settled for their bodies. I sang a final note before settling into an eery hum that made the hairs on my arms stand.
The demons contorted. Shrieked.
Then they fell silent.
Every hèlborns under my spell jerked, standing upright, bowing their heads to me.
And for the first time in centuries, I grinned.
“My Slave,” Zemshaza purred. “What are you doing down there with my pets?”
I didn’t answer. Instead, I whispered to the hèlborns.
Then I unleashed them.
Like savage monsters, the horde of demons pushed up through the haze, flooding the open chamber above.
They moved like a disturbing, coordinated, unit.
Snarling, they burst through, rushing Zemshaza all at once.
The Fallen King growled like a beast, exploding into battle.
Obsidian explosions burst overhead as black blood began oozing from wounded hèlborns.
It was utter and complete chaos. Pandemonium unfolded with the constant screams of the unholy creatures. I opened my mouth to sing again.
Then Zemshaza spoke.
“Enough.”
He was still in the chamber above, fighting the horde singlehandedly.
But I heard him as if he were right next to me.
Before I could take a breath, my body jerked.
I was snapped to an angle, before being wrenched from my hidden place in the haze, and dragged before Zemshaza.
When I came to a stop before him, the remaining hèlborns froze on a command I hadn’t given them.
I felt the fiery sting against my cheek, heard the ringing in my ears, before registering the Fallen King had lifted his hand to backhand me. Hard.
“What in the?—”
“Shut your mouth, Slave,” Zemshaza hissed.
I looked at the Fallen High King through blurry vision, and trembled.
Profound hatred pooled from his lightless eyes.
The darkness in that gaze made me instantaneously nauseous.
He was deformed. Grotesque. An eternal horror.
Zemshaza clamped a hand around my neck, his long, thick claws digging into my skin.
“You will go through the portal and bring me with you.”
He foamed at the mouth. Steam slithered out of his broken ears. His long, limp hair slipped forward, tumbling over my face. It smelled like decay and rot. My stomach churned at the stench.
“No,” I wheezed. “I won’t.”
“I have clearly been too kind,” Zemshaza snarled. “You still have yet to learn what it is to truly be unmade.”
He leaned in, eyes boring into mine. As fear fought for prominence in my chest, something else rose beyond it.
Audacity.
Zemshaza would not keep me in the Six Hèls any longer.
“My brothers and I have been chained to this infernal realm longer than your planet has been alive. Sorellien, the entire Ouanaviel Empyrean, your foolish, stupid, Farasee Order.” The Fallen snarled in my face.
I nearly choked on the breath that violated my nostrils.
I gagged, still thrashing in his grip. “Every last one of those twelve islands, and their power-hungry order of priests, belong to us. We will have it through. Your. Blood.”
Boldness surged through me. Summoning the might of my physical strength, amplified by my Soul Bending, I jerked my head back, then slammed my forehead into the Fallen’s. A resounding crack popped in the air. Darkness swam in my vision but I shook it off.
Zemshaza roared.
Then the Fallen King began to shift into his true, hèllish form.
His wings enlarged. Several sets of horns protruded from his skull. One eye remained like midnight while the other became like blood. His back contorted like a four-legged beast. He transformed from a broken, deformed angel to living, breathing, monster.
Before he finished transforming, I lunged.
My fist collided into his jaw. I whipped around and swiped my wings once, twice, three times into his chest with my talons. The gaping wound at the center of his chest didn’t release blood. It instead poured out ash.
Zemshaza launched a swirling bolt of darkness at my chest. I dodged, whipped around, and thrust out a vortex of gnashing souls that tore across his face.
Then I unleashed a torrent of physical violence on the Fallen Angel, brutalizing him by sheer force.
I was too exhausted to use anymore ethèr, so I defaulted to beating the living rot out of him.
Zemshaza was strong.
Even in my weakest state, I was stronger.
Zemshaza finally yielded. He bent over, panting, holding the gaping, bleeding wounds on both of his sides. Without a moments hesitation, I jerked away, and raced for the Realm Portal. As I neared the opening, his large, monstrous hand, grabbed onto my ankle and held firm.
“I curse you, Tassarion Celèstian Everthorn. I curse your blood and your bones. I curse your spirit, your soul, and your mind. You will be a monster among angels. A devil among the Hallowed. You will be hated and rejected. You will never be loved nor tolerated. All who come before you will be terrified of you. You will never be free of this curse. You will never be free of me. Only the blood and bond of a Nebulari will set you free. An impossibility that will plague you across eternity. You’re mine, Slave. And I will ruin you, forever.”
Then Zemshaza released my ankle, shoving me through the Realm Portal.
A present, living darkness surfaced in front of me, before fusing into my body, blending into my blood and veins.
A dead, unnatural, unholy thing stirred inside of me.
Then my will, my mind, my soul, was possessed and shackled from within by the vile, wicked curse of the Fallen King.