Page 84 of As Darkness Fall
“Very well,” Abaddon said, and without waiting for permission, he reached down. His clawed hands dug into the dirt, and he scooped us up in one massive palm.
We whined nervously, but our companions made no move to resist, and so we didn’t either.
I tore my mind free of the meld and, despite my wolf’s reluctance, pushed her back inside me. Grimacing, I pushed through the pain of the shift, feeling the wounds on my side and leg anew as the skin stretched and pulled taut in new directions.
“Damn, that always sucks,” I grunted as the transition finished, leaving me crouching naked in the palm of a demon king as his wings drove us higher and higher into the air.
Just where I always wanted to be. In the hands of the beast.
The slow metronome beats of the giant wings were almost enough to put me to sleep. Determined not to do that, I shuffled slightly so I could peer through the fingers. My eyes squinted against the moving air as we flew through the sky, and I looked ahead of us to see where we were going.
The ground was rocky and blasted, sloping downward tow–
“Good Lord,” I whispered, stunned at what I saw.
The skin of Abbadon’s fingers near my mouth turned black, the color spreading several feet in every direction. Behind me, my companions gasped.
“I would take it as a favor,” Abaddon said, his voice filtering through the grip of his hands as he spoke to me directly, “if you would not use his name.”
Me. He was speaking tome. Personally.
“Um, okay,” I squeaked, knowing full well he couldn’t hear me. “Yup. Okay. Sure. No problem. I can do that. Yep. You got it!”
Nearby, Fred laughed.
I turned a glare on him, the harshest I could muster given the situation, but Fred just laughed it off. I’m sure the fact that I was crouching naked, using a knee to shield my tits from his view, didn’t exactly help my intimidation level.
Fred just laughed harder.
“I hate you,” I muttered, but there was no heat to my words.
Turning back to the “window” between fingers, I stared in shock at our apparent destination.
The Pits of Tartarus.
A single pathway led down from the rocky landscape that surrounded them, a corridor of rock that led to a giant circular column a mile or more wide rising from the pits themselves. On that flat bit of rock, a gargantuan castle stood, towering over the landscape around it. The scope defied belief. At the center was a spire that stretched hundreds upon hundreds of feet into the air.
I stared, noting that the very top of the spire was adorned by a single chair, allowing whomever sat there the ability to look out over the pits and the lands around for miles unobstructed.
Hades’s throne. It must be. I could think of no other thing.
My eyes were then dragged toward the pits themselves. A writhing, heaving mass of movement that surrounded the rock column, brilliantly lit by what appeared to be flowing magma below it. I stared, trying to make sense of what I was seeing.
Something blocked my view.
“Don’t stare too long,” Vir said, his hand cupping my chin, turning my head away. “It’s not great for your soul.”
I shivered, wondering what would have happened if Vir hadn’t torn me away. It had been like standing at the edge of a steep drop, where that tiny part of your mind wondered what it would be like to jump.
We descended toward the castle, its walls taller than most skyscrapers and thicker than an aircraft carrier was long. They were made of solid black rock and appeared to be one single piece of stone. I could make out no seams whatsoever.
Landing in the courtyard, Abaddon set us down with unexpected gentleness, the rocks spilling out from his grip as he released them. We stood. I hated the fact that I was naked.
“Here,” Fred said, removing his shirt and tossing it to me.
“Thanks,” I muttered, pulling the black cotton over my head. He was larger than I was, and while it didn’t quite cover my crotch, it hid the ladies from casual view, and that was going to have to be good enough for now because a second demon was approaching, and we didn’t have time to play dress-up.
“Follow Azazel,” Abaddon rumbled.
