The Sinner

The room is dark but for a single black candle burning on an ornate table. Lush furniture in fraying velvet and antiques give it the appearance of a parlor in an old mansion. By the meager light, I make out my liege lord, Ashtaroth, Head of the Eighth Order, Prince of Accusers. He lounges on a settee, his black, webbed wings folded tight to him, the hooked tips gleaming behind his head of damp, tangled hair. He looks—and smells—like a corpse dragged out of a bog. It’s all I can do not to recoil at his breath that has filled the room like a vapor.

He strokes the head of his immense white serpent that coils around the settee, watching me with black eyes. Lesser servitors scuttle and whimper at the edges of the light like rats.

“Kneel.”

I obey and drop to my knees in the middle of the room.

“My demon prince,” Ashtaroth drawls, danger suffusing every syllable. “You are so beautiful and perfect in your malevolence…except when it comes to her.”

She is called Lucy this time…

I bury the tiny flicker of light that burns in my blackened heart. Even after centuries of ravaging the earth with my rage, that flame hasn’t yet guttered out. Lucy is just as bright and beautiful in this lifetime as she is in every other, but she’s alone. Always so alone. I dare wonder—hope—if somewhere in her soul she mourns me…

“She does not,” Ashtaroth snaps, crawling around in my thoughts. “No matter how many of her lifetimes you skulk about her like a mongrel, you are dead to her. Not even a memory. You know this is true.”

I know this is true. But I can’t leave her to that loneliness. I need to know she has found happiness at last.

Then I can say goodbye…

Ashtaroth sneers, his wings flaring wide, wafting his stench over me in fresh waves. “I see into your heart. I taste your pathetic hope. The lie you’ve laid at her feet about your redemption would amuse me if it weren’t so pitiful.”

“This time is mine,” I say, defiance in the tilt of my chin. “Eleven days. You swore to me…”

What is the word of a de

mon worth? Lucy asked. The answer, of course, is nothing.

Ashtaroth’s black lip curls. “What of your word? Your duty? While you waste time on This Side, your legions go without a commander on the Other.”

I say nothing. My course is clear, and I will not waver. A commander does not veer from his mission until victory is achieved.

Or until he’s dead.

Quickly, I banish the thought from my mind before he knows my intentions. I must’ve succeeded because Ashtaroth sighs with disappointment and unsheathes the huge sword strapped to his waist. It gleams dully in the flickering light of the candle.

“Come, then.”

I know what he expects—I alter myself into my frail human form, the body that had been scarred and broken so many years ago. Ashtaroth will scar me again to remind me of that frailty—remind me that while I wear the human skin, he can destroy me.

I’m counting on it…but not yet.

I approach, my head held high, unflinching. At either side of Ashtaroth, lesser servitors watch me, waiting for me to show weakness. Starved for a scrap of my fear. I show none. I could destroy the imps with a word or one swipe of my sword.

I bare my arm, offering it to Ashtaroth like a piece of sacrificial meat.

“You have spent one day. Ten remain. My gift to you.”

He draws his sword across the flesh above my wrist, and I hold my breath, wondering if he’ll hack my hand off. But he keeps the wound shallow. Red blood flows, black in the meager light. The pain is bright, but it’s nothing compared to the wounds I suffered in life centuries ago, when I was dragged to the bowels of the ziggurat and destroyed, body and soul…

My thoughts are wrenched from the bloodstained memories as Ashtaroth turns the flat of his blade onto the bleeding gash. Flesh sizzles; smoke curls up in tendrils. The pain sinks in deep. Layers of burning agony. The imps slaver and whine. Still, I don’t flinch. I hold steady and let Ashtaroth extract his payment.

When it’s over, I take my arm back and the pain with it. I relish it. So long as it belongs to me and not Lucy—never Lucy—I can bear it.

Ashtaroth’s wings sag with disappointment at my stoicism. His hunger is unsatisfied, but our pact is intact.

“Leave me,” he says, turning his back on me. “Go and play. Have your time.”

“Thank you, my lord.”