I’d be her only woe and torment. And as the god of this plane, I’d be her sole salvation.
I shoved the knife into my cloak. “Remember this. In the dark hours of the night, after I’ve crawled under that delectable skin of yours, invaded your every cell, peeled back your layers, and branded myself onto every bone of your body, know that you brought this on yourself.”
With a flourish of my hand, the skull amulet I’d given Catherine all those years ago appeared in mid-air. I took it, running a finger delicately over the familiar pendant, and walked over to the nearest cell. Reaching through the bars, I grabbed a collar around one of the corpse’s necks and yanked, ripping it through the dead body’s neck, and shaking off any scraps of withered skin still attached.
Fixing the amulet to the front of the collar with a bit of dark magic, I returned to the human still standing in the middle of the hall. She hadn’t made another break for it. Smart on her part. Maybe she was learning her place after all.
Stopping in front of her, I stared down into her dark, wide eyes and held up the bejeweled circlet of metal.
“You robbed the wrong body, little thief. You didn’t just steal a necklace. You stole her whole curse.”
Her dark lashes batted, knocking a tear loose. As I watched it streak down her cheek, it took everything in me to keep myself from dragging her little body against mine and running my tongue over her face so I could taste her misery upon my tongue.
Instead, I slipped the collar around her neck and locked it into place. She might have escaped the first one easily enough, but this one she would wear until her body turned to dust. If I ever let it.
It was a symbol of ownership, a daily reminder that she would belong to me forevermore.
“What curse is that?” she whispered.
I laughed, the sound deep and grating. “Me.”
* * *
I should have punishedmy little thief for her attempted escape. I should have made her bleed, extracted every drop of fear I could until she was a beautiful, whimpering mess.
Yet something held me back.
There was no urgency for me to inflict torture. I had every second of eternity for that.
Was it the whisper of a conscience stirred to life by Catherine’s memory that swayed my actions? Or the bruises on the little thief’s thighs that were burned into my brain?
Had I been any of my brothers, she wouldn’t have received a reprieve. She would have been tortured to the brink of insanity, most likely killed like the woman I watched Asmodeus murder.
Instead, I chained her up again. This time in a much more secure room, one that would be impossible for her to break free from. I wouldn’t make the mistake of underestimating her again.
I’d stood at the door for several minutes, admiring the way her pale flesh looked against the silky black sheets, reveling in the sweetness of her racing heartbeat before heading to the Library of Souls. Content as I was to listen to the little thief’s plight, the eager desperation in her tone as she begged me to set her free, there was an urgent matter of business to attend to.
Holga.
As promised, Asmodeus had sent her soul back to me, and it was time to bestow her newest responsibility upon her. Not to mention see what haggard state my brother had left her in, if there was much left of her at all.
She was waiting for me in the wide entryway of the library wearing the same floor-length dress she’d died in centuries ago. Only now it was shredded in some places, revealing bare bones underneath. Flowing silver hair fell from her skull, patchy in some places, but still gleaming in the dull lighting. Her empty sockets stared in my direction as I approached, and I could feel the contempt seeping out of her bones.
She wasn’t happy to see me, but she couldn’t deny that being here in my castle was better than being in the lower levels of Hell. It looked like Asmodeus had stripped every inch of skin from her corpse, leaving her nothing but a walking, talking skeleton.
“Holga,” I said, stopping a few feet away from her and nodding my acknowledgement.
“Lord Belial.” Her voice was sharp and strained. “Why have you summoned me again after all this time? Didn’t you get to make me suffer enough the first time I was in this realm?”
Snarky, the way she always had been. If I hadn’t needed her help so badly, I might have sent her straight back to Asmodeus and come up with another plan. But I couldn’t. My little thief needed an attendant, and only Holga would do.
“I have a job for you,” I continued, ignoring her impertinence.
Her head tilted to the side, her empty sockets staring at me, void of any expression. The last time I’d seen her, she’d looked more like Cecil, but it was clear Asmodeus had enjoyed tearing into her once she’d arrived. Shredding her of any hint of life, leaving her hollow and empty aside from her soul. I’m surprised she had much of a body left at all.
“A job? Like the last one you left me in charge of, taking care of that poor human girl you locked up like a dog?”
A twinge of regret formed at the mention of Catherine, but I shook it off. Thoughts of her were becoming more difficult to recall and even harder to dwell on as my little thief occupied more and more of my mind.
