Tear Down Heaven: Urban Fantasy Action with Witches and Demons, page 24
He poked through his roots for a moment before shaking his head. “Not yet, but they can be.”
“Great,” Bex said. “Wake them up and tell them to change into me. Don’t let them actually do anything. Just pretend like I’m injured and falling back. We want Gilgamesh to think he’s winning.”
“But that will make all of our people think we’re losing,” Iggs argued.
“Only for a few minutes,” Bex promised. “As soon as you’re back on Earth, you can tell everyone the truth. The important thing is to make Gilgamesh believe his plan worked. If he thinks he’s a genius who successfully manipulated his enemies into falling back, he’ll lower his guard, which will make the actual assault easier when Adrian, Nemini, Leander, and I hit him from behind.”
“I see,” Iggs said thoughtfully. “That’ll be a nice fake-out if he falls for it, but can the four of you actually beat him?”
“If we can’t, then keeping the army here won’t change that,” Bex argued, reaching up to touch her new horns. “The whole point of putting on these antennas was so that I’d be strong enough to toe-to-toe it with the Traitor King, but I can’t focus on winning if I’m constantly worried about the rest of you. That’s why I’m sending you to a place Gilgamesh doesn’t control. I also really want to save the Blackwood. It’s the least we can do after all their help, so think of this as two birds with one stone.”
Iggs’s growl was rumbling over the speaker by the time she finished. He obviously didn’t like that plan one bit, but he’d always been the most obedient of Bex’s soldiers, so all he actually said was “Yes, my queen.”
Bex smiled in relief. “Thanks, Iggs.”
“Just make sure you beat him, okay?” the demon grumbled. “I’d hate to have come all this way for nothing.”
“It definitely wasn’t for nothing,” Bex said. “We destroyed the Hells and freed our people. No matter what happens from here, nothing can ever take that victory from us. That’s why I need you to make sure everyone we saved makes it over the finish line.” She bowed her horns. “I’m trusting you to take care of our people, Iggerux.”
“I will,” he promised with a bow Adrian swore he could hear over the comm’s speaker. “I’ll protect them all until you return to us. May Ishtar guide your sword and grant you victory, my queen.”
Bex’s whole body stiffened at Ishtar’s name, but her voice was as steady as ever when she replied. “I pray for your success as well. We’re going silent now. Good luck.”
“Good luck,” he replied as the comm cut off, leaving them standing in silence around the dead prince and his dropped sword.
“Well,” Leander said when the quiet had stretched to an uncomfortable length. “I only heard half of that, but I assume we’re continuing the assault on our own.”
“That’s the plan,” Bex said, unzipping her poor tattered bomber jacket and dropping it on the ground so she was left in her short-sleeved—but still intact—T-shirt. “I realize neither of you take orders from me, so I’m asking this next part as a personal favor. Will you come with me to kill Gilgamesh and put an end to this forever?”
“Of course,” Adrian said at once. “But how are we doing it? Even if you succeed in convincing Gilgamesh that you’re retreating, we still don’t know where he’s hiding.”
“The Morrigan said to follow the chains,” Bex reminded him. “And this is the place where all the chains connect. It’s also the only room inside the palace that was being guarded by a prince, so I’m guessing the entrance to Gilgamesh’s bunker is somewhere around here.”
That struck Adrian as sound logic, but Leander was shaking his head.
“My father would never hide anywhere so accessible,” he informed them in a haughty voice. “Also, this is just where the general public enters the bridges to Earth. The chains themselves are hidden in yet another of Gilgamesh’s private areas so that he doesn’t have to compromise the aesthetics of his palace with giant ugly chains that are constantly flaking sin iron. Fortunately for us, we’ve already secured the key.”
He pointed at the Prince of Envy’s sword, and Adrian’s eyes lit up.
“We might have done better than that,” he said excitedly, using his coat to protect his hand this time as he grabbed the white blade off the ground where he’d dropped it when Bex appeared. “Envy’s sword is connected to all of Gilgamesh’s secret places, right? Doesn’t that mean we can use it to cut straight to him?”
Leander scowled. “I can’t imagine that actually working, but I suppose it’s worth a try.”
It absolutely was. Adrian was already swinging the sword, actually, keeping his focus on the gnawing blade as he ordered, “Open the way to Gilgamesh.”
The command was simpler than the one he’d used to bring back Bex, except this time, nothing happened. The white sword just sliced through the air like any normal piece of metal. Adrian tried the order two more times with different wordings before dropping the blade with a disgusted huff.
“Useless hunk of junk.”
“Let’s not be so hasty,” Leander said. “Just because Gilgamesh took the extremely simple precaution of not leaving his door unlocked doesn’t mean he’s unreachable. I’ve never dealt with the Morrigan personally, but even I know she’s famous for not giving clues unless they’re important. If she said ‘follow the chains,’ that is likely the way, so why don’t you try asking the Blade of Envy for those instead?”
Adrian didn’t want to touch the bitey sword again if he could help it. His hands were already covered in enough cuts, but Leander looked dead serious about never using any sword other than Mara, so he sucked it up and bent down to grab the white hilt one more time, gritting his teeth against the pain as he ordered, “Take us to the chains.”
The moment the words left his mouth, the needle-shaped sword slashed the air open in front of him. The space beyond the cut looked as black as the void between worlds, but when Adrian leaned closer for a better look, he saw that was just an optical illusion. The other side of the cut was actually quite brightly lit. He was just staring directly into a rope made of twisted chains.
“Whoa,” Bex said, her already pale face turning the color of paper as she peered through the hole. “That’s high.”
She was right. The place Envy’s blade had cut into looked like what would happen if all of Heaven was invisible. If he looked down on this side, Adrian saw the cracked marble floor beneath his feet like always. When he looked through the hole, though, he could see all the way down to the bright-blue water of the living world far, far, faaaar below.
They were so high up that the islands of the Anchors looked like tiny specks. The Rivers of Death that rose from them were little more than blue flashes, while the chains were even smaller. They didn’t even look golden from this angle. They were more like black threads that followed the blue lines of the rivers to a point where the water suddenly vanished.
Even compared to Gilgamesh’s other artificial spaces like Limbo and the black desert, it was super weird. The raging Rivers of Death literally disappeared into thin air about a mile below. Adrian supposed that must be where they flowed into the Hells, but seeing all that rushing water simply cease to exist hurt his brain. The inner workings of the gods were famously beyond mortal comprehension, though, so he supposed that was what he got for poking his head behind the curtain.
He was far more concerned with the fact that he didn’t see anything above them but chains vanishing into blackness. That didn’t seem right, but the rest was exactly what he’d asked for. The Morrigan had said “follow the chains,” and those were definitely chains. They were even twisted together in a way that made the giant links of smooth black metal actually climbable. Bex was already leaning through the hole to grab the closest one, sliding her fingers over the sin iron until she found a good handhold.
“This is it,” she said, turning around to grin at the others. “Come on! The sin iron’s corroded in places, so there are plenty of pits to dig your fingers into. Just be careful not to jostle the chains too much. We don’t want Gilgamesh to feel us coming.”
Adrian worried that was inevitable. He liked Bex’s idea of pretending to retreat, but he secretly suspected it was more about keeping her demons out of harm’s way than tricking Gilgamesh. From what he’d seen of Heaven so far, his father seemed aware of everything that happened here. Adrian was certain that Gilgamesh already knew they were coming, but he was also certain that Iggs would never have obeyed an order to retreat if Bex hadn’t phrased it as part of a military strategy.
Whether she’d been telling the whole truth or not, they were in the thick of it now. Nemini had already started scaling the chain after Bex, and even Leander was bracing his bare feet against the sin iron to haul himself up. That left Adrian as the last one through. He wasn’t leaving without his partner, though, so Adrian waited at the threshold until he heard the familiar patter of cat feet racing across the stone floor.
“I’m back!” Boston cried as he galloped down the stairs. “The bull is delivered. What did I miss?”
“Nothing much,” Adrian joked, pointing the Blade of Envy at the hole he’d cut in the air.
“That doesn’t look safe,” Boston observed as he clambered up Adrian’s coat to his shoulder. “Are we really going in there?”
“I am,” Adrian said. “But you don’t have to. I’m sure you already heard Iggs yelling about it, but Bex is sending all her demons back to Earth to defend the Blackwood. You’re free to go with them if you—”
His voice cut off as he felt the thump of Boston’s lashing tail hit this back.
“Adrian Blackwood,” his cat said stiffly, “I am your familiar. It is my sworn duty to assist you in your work no matter what. Also, as was just established five minutes ago, you’d be dead without me.”
“That I would,” Adrian agreed wholeheartedly. “But I still wanted to give you the option.”
“Your consideration is appreciated but unnecessary,” Boston assured him. “I already made my choice eighteen years ago when I became your cat. Now let’s get moving before the others leave us behind!”
He leaped off Adrian’s shoulder as he finished, landing on the chain with the flawless grace of a curious cat.
His witch wasn’t nearly so brave. Adrian took one look at that enormous drop and whistled for Bran. His broom appeared at once, shooting down the stairs from the room where he’d set it down to tend to Iggs.
He grabbed hold of the raven-carved broomstick the second it got close, but while Adrian was overwhelmingly relieved to have Bran back, he wasn’t sure he’d get to use him. The hole he’d cut made it look like the twisting chains were going up through empty space, but when Adrian poked his broomstick through to check the flight conditions, he discovered he’d cut into yet another illusion. There only appeared to be tons of room. In reality, though, Gilgamesh’s chains were tightly surrounded by an invisible wall, almost like they were running up the inside of a pipe.
That made a lot of sense, considering the entire purpose of this space was to run chains through the palace without being seen. They were basically crawling up the wiring on the inside of Gilgamesh’s walls. The unexpectedly tight quarters didn’t seem to bother the others, but it left Adrian with little room to fly. He’d been hoping he could take everyone up on Bran’s raven, but it looked like there wasn’t even enough space to fit his broom form without risking damage to his bristles.
That was bad news. Adrian was no slouch climber, but the chains were very tall, and the drop was definitely fatal. Climbing seemed to be the only way, though, so Adrian grabbed Bran’s leather strap out of his pocket and slid his broom onto his back with a sigh. He was about to hop through the hole and grab onto the chain like Bex had when he realized he was still holding the Blade of Envy.
That was an easy choice, at least. Adrian didn’t even hesitate before he dropped the white sword on the ground. Leaving the Blade of Envy behind was a risk, but whatever Leander said about rank, he was fed up with her constantly chewing on his hand. Bringing a princess who hated their guts on a secret mission sounded like a terrible idea in any case, so Adrian happily chucked her, taking a moment to wrap his bleeding palm with a handkerchief before he reached through the hole to grab the chain and start climbing after Bex and the others.
And behind him on the cracked floor of the arrivals room, unseen through the already closing cut in the world, a man’s scarred, olive-skinned hand reached out of nowhere to pick up the crying sword Adrian had left behind.
CHAPTER 14
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“SO, YOU’VE GOT THE powers of all nine queens now?” Adrian asked, looking up at Bex from his precarious hold on the chain several links below.
“That seems to be the case,” Bex replied, doing her best not to sound overconfident as she hauled herself up the gigantic ladder of twisted sin iron. “I can also use powers from normal demons. I’m pretty sure I could even grow wings like Lys’s if I tried.”
“Then why don’t you?” said Boston, hopping casually from link to link like they weren’t all dangling over a miles-high drop into a sea of souls. “I’m no expert on demon magic, but now seems like a good time to spontaneously develop flight.”
“I agree,” Bex said as she reached for the next handhold. “The problem is I don’t know how to use it. Lys makes flying look easy, but I’m pretty sure if I sprouted wings and tried to take off, I’d just end up plummeting to my death. Same goes for shapeshifting. Again, Lys makes it seem so simple, but spontaneously rearranging your organs doesn’t sound like the sort of thing that should be attempted without a lot of practice.”
“You probably should leave that one alone for now,” Adrian agreed, but his eyes still shone with excitement. “What about the others, though? Have you tried any of them?”
“Just Fear’s scales, Sorrow’s sorrow, and the Queen of Pride’s ability to make people kneel so far,” Bex reported. “I’m sure I can do more, but it’s hard to figure out what’s available, since I don’t feel any different than I did before War tore my horns off.”
“What do you mean ‘hard to figure out’?” Leander demanded from his safe perch on the inside of a giant link twenty feet above them. “You already know what powers each type of demon possesses. Can’t you just do that?”
“Can you do a card trick after only seeing it once?” Bex grumbled, focusing on her hands as she hauled herself up to the next ledge. “Just because I know something’s possible doesn’t mean I know how to do it. It’s not like these new horns came with a manual.”
The prince shook his head and made himself more comfortable on the link twenty feet above the one Bex was currently hauling herself over, which was just obnoxious. Bastard had been using his Fifty Steps of the Pilgrim spell to avoid climbing the slippery, poisonous sin iron. Bex respected the ingenuity, but it was super annoying that he could just sit up there acting all superior while the rest of them struggled.
She’d thought about asking Adrian if they could use his broom, but she figured the witch wouldn’t be climbing if flying was an option. Space was super tight in here. It might look like the chains were hanging in empty air, but every time Bex stuck her limbs out too far, she bumped an elbow or a knee against an invisible barrier that felt as hard as a steel pipe. It was like they were following the chains up a drain spout, and the higher they got, the more the walls closed in, leaving less and less room for Bex to squeeze her body through as she pulled herself into the seemingly-infinite dark.
“I hope it’s not too much farther,” Adrian panted below her. “All this sin iron is making Bran sick. I can feel him shaking through my back.”
“I’m not feeling so great myself,” Boston confessed, lifting his paw to examine his toe beans, which definitely looked darker than usual.
“I don’t understand,” the cat grumbled, glaring at his feet. “I’m a Blackwood just like Adrian, and I’ve endured all the same poison training. Why is he tolerant to sin iron and I’m not?”
“Because you’re not Agatha’s son,” Leander replied from above. “The Witch of the Present’s resistance to both sin iron and quintessence are the two main reasons Gilgamesh accepted such an obvious enemy into his bed.” He made a disgusted sound. “They bred us for our traits like dogs.”
“Well, I’m extraordinarily happy that princes are immune to sin iron right now,” Adrian said as he held out his arms for Boston, who for once didn’t gripe as he jumped down and wiggled into the protected, sin-iron-free safety of his witch’s coat. “This whole thing would be impossible if we weren’t.”
“I wish I was immune,” Bex muttered, shaking her stinging hands. “My regeneration is keeping up with the damage, but it still feels horrible.” She looked over at her sister. “How’re you keeping up, Nemini?”
“I’m still in existence,” came the exhausted-sounding reply. “I know time is an illusion, but I’d still like to know when this particular experience will be over.”
“Me too,” Bex said, craning her neck back to glare at Leander again. “Hey, show-off! Why don’t you teleport up a few more rungs and see how much more of this we’ve got to climb?”
Leander rolled his mirrored eyes but did as she requested, vanishing with a mutter of sorcery only to reappear a few seconds later.
“That was fast,” Bex said. “Were you even able to see anything?”
“No, because I didn’t make it,” Leander explained tersely. “There’s something blocking the way above us.”
“What is it?” Adrian asked.
“If I knew that, I would have said,” Leander snapped, gazing at the darkness over his head, which looked exactly the same as all the other darkness they’d been climbing through for the last twenty minutes. “Unfortunately, just like all the other walls in here, I can’t see what’s in the way. The chain keeps going, but I can no longer push my body into the empty space between the links. It’s like the chains are passing into a place where I can’t go,”
