Fallen Reign (Sins of the Father 1)

I grimaced, baring my teeth, and made my voice as gravelly as I could, pretending in my heart of hearts that I was an action star.

“Go to hell.”

I thrust my palm forward, rushing straight for Spike’s chest, slamming my hand there like I was shoving him. A golden sword launched from the palm of my hand, summoned from the Vestments. Spike’s eyes went wide as the sword speared him from sternum to spine. He gurgled as blood welled up in his throat and spilled in trickles down his chin. I grasped for the sword’s hilt, pulling it out of the demon’s chest even as I stomped my foot firmly in his stomach. He staggered backwards, shoes scraping over the gritty pavement as he stumbled, then fell.

The other demons hissed, their eyes flashing momentarily red as they backed away. See, now they were scared. Strength in numbers, sure, but once you start whittling away at them, that’s where you separate the cowards from the killers.

The stocky man wasn’t one of them. He stared at me with his mouth pulsing as the two women circled. What the hell was he so afraid of? These husks the demons wore were temporary, and it felt to me like they could get as many of them as they liked, probably stored up in some disgusting subterranean armory. Maybe dying really, really hurt for them. But more likely, he was terrified of going home to report to their boss about how they couldn’t beat up and restrain a single itty-bitty nephilim.

I danced away as the woman thrust her knife at me, entering way-too-close quarters so I couldn’t maneuver as well with my sword. I recognized her favored weapon, a balisong, a Filipino butterfly knife, the kind that folded. Probably poisoned with some toxin or another, too, knowing demons. I grimaced as it glanced off my leather jacket, cutting a shallow gash into the shoulder. I was being too confident, I thought, clenching my teeth. That knife had come too close.

And so did the dart of flame that flew past my ear. Thank God that other lady had such shitty aim. I dodged farther back, grabbing the best thing I could find for protection: the lid of a garbage can. The knife-woman screeched as she launched another attack.

“That’s cheating,” she said, thrusting, then slashing. “Dirty nephilim bastards, bringing a garbage can to a knife fight, you can’t – ”

The lid wasn’t for the knife. I dodged as she came in for an especially deep lunge, then smashed the lid directly into her face. The sounds were a combined clang of metal and the crack of what might have been her nose. I didn’t stop to check, spinning from my hip and slicing my sword straight through her neck. Her knife clattered to the ground, its tip leaving a greasy black smear of something terrible and poisonous on the cement. Her head went flying, bouncing against an exposed brick wall and thumping, quite conveniently, into a dumpster.

The same one that the fire-woman’s first missile had slammed into. I turned to face her, loo

king like some bedraggled excuse for a hero, gleaming divine sword in one hand, dented face-smashing trash can lid in the other. She gritted her teeth, then flicked her wrist at me, a last ditch effort.

A dart of flame fired from each of her fingers, easy enough to absorb with my improvised barrier. Five ineffectual pings sounded as the missiles struck the garbage shield, warming the metal but doing very little else. I braced myself, gripping my sword tighter as I anticipated her next attack, thinking it was a buildup to a bigger projectile – but she turned tail and ran. Just beat ass all the way out of the alley, her heels clicking double time.

Well, shit. I should have closed in and killed her when I had the chance. That was going to bite me in the ass, I was sure of it. I turned my head, locking eyes with the last of their group, the stocky one with the mouth, who had spent the entire fight watching and trembling on his own.

I wasn’t going to make the same mistake twice.

2

I dived for the demon, charging with the garbage lid and smashing it full into his chest. “Oof,” he gasped as I slammed against him, his breath smelling of onions, the stench of fear-sweat wafting from his clothes as he flew off his feet. I sighed with grim satisfaction as he landed on his back, thudding bodily against the cement.

“Please,” the demon blubbered, holding his hands out for mercy. “Please, I was only doing what I was told. I won’t hurt you. Let me go.”

I planted one foot on his chest, just in case he had ideas about running off like his lady friend. “No can do, buster. You guys threatened me. Four against one? That’s hardly fair. Now, who would want me so badly that they’d send so many worthless mooks to corner me in an alley – in broad daylight, I have to reiterate. You idiots really pulled out all the stops here.” I tilted my head, restraining a smile as I pushed my foot deeper against his chest, as he wheezed in fright. “You must be desperate. Your employer’s clearly pissed about all the other times your friends tried and failed to catch me.”

The man’s eyes darted to either side of me, his face gleaming with sweat as he gawped like a fish out of water. “I – we – no, I swear. I’m not going to be a problem for you anymore. Just let me go. Please.”

I smushed my sneaker even deeper into his body – come on, it didn’t hurt that much – leaning forward and resting my elbow on my thigh for good measure, putting more weight into the pose as I brought our faces progressively closer. “Listen,” I said quietly. “Between you and me, your master is going to be extra pissed about you defecting like that. I know how the princes work. You’re not just going AWOL. You’ll be deserting. And the princes, they’ve got ways of tracking down bad eggs. Surely you know that. You’re not new to the system, are you?”

He blinked hard. Poor guy. I could hear the gears turning in his head as he considered the consequences. “What will they do if they catch me? No, they won’t find me. I could hide. And keep hiding, up here among the normals. They won’t find me then.”

I leaned in even closer, grinning. “So. A prince did send you after all.”

His mouth snapped shut immediately.

“Which one of them was it?” I said.

Silence. His eyes darted frantically, reflecting the light of the sun. I took some satisfaction in knowing that he wouldn’t be coming up to the surface again any time soon, not if he was reporting yet another failure to an actual demon prince. Stabbing him through the heart was going to hurt, but whatever punishment awaited him was going to be so, so much worse.

“Listen,” I said, reaching down to pat him on the chest, just by where my foot was resting. “You should just tell me, really. It’s going to be the same shit either way. Your master’s probably ultra pissed at this point. You’re going to get snuffed out regardless.”

He shook his head.

I shook mine, too, and sighed heavily. “It’s your funeral. Welp. Nice knowing you, I guess. Send my regards to your master. Tell them to stop fucking bugging me already.”

The man said nothing more, even when I ran my sword straight into his chest and pierced his heart, even as the light left his eyes. He thrashed and cried out, sure, but that was part of the demonic husk’s natural response to, well, being killed. I pulled my sword out and backed away, holding my hand up to my nose, because the next bit was always the worst.

Within the expanding pool of his own blood, the man’s corpse twitched and shuddered as it began its process of literally returning to hell. I don’t know what kind of sick demon scientist decided that this was the best way to recycle their resources, but it was how things worked for them. Demon husks decomposed as soon as they died, doing exactly as this guy’s host body was doing: skin and muscles sloughing off, bones charring in flames and melting into nothing, blood and internal organs disintegrating.