“Hey. You’re not blameless here either, partner.” Despite her words, Zoe reaches up to touch Sin’s cheek. My heart aches at the simple, tender gesture.
“Partner? I am much more than your partner.” He puffs out his chest, a hint of his power swirling around the room.
“I love you too,” she says.
Willow dashes a few tears from her eyes. “You’re really going to Hell? How is that even possible?”
I drop to one knee next to her. “I am going to Hell’s gates. Lucifer can come to me.”
“But…if you get trapped there?—”
I squeeze her hand, then rise to meet Sinclair’s frosty gaze. “If I am not back by sunset, call Azrael. He canretrieveme.”
“I am not waiting until sunset,” Sin says. “Five hours in the earthen realm is a quarter century in the Underworld. You have ninety minutes. Use it wisely.”
The Underworld has a smell.It seeps into my clothes. Into my lungs. The last time I made this trip and found out the Devil hadlostThorn and his concubine, I could not rid myself of the gritty, burnt stench for two days.
My wings still reek of it. It is the scent of decay. Of endless torment and despair.
“Lucifer, you pompous twat, show yourself!”
I pace the rocks outside the black gates, waiting for Beelzebub to grace me with his presence. He owes me for his carelessness.
“If you force me to break in, you will not like the consequences!”
A great rumble starts beneath my feet. The oppressive darkness, broken only by the glow of the flames from the other side of the gates, lifts, and Lucifer appears before me.
Hell’s Keeper is not the monster those in the earthen realm imagine him to be. After all, he is—or was—an angel until the Almighty cast him out and shackled him to the Underworld. Black hair, a chiseled jaw, and piercing green eyes give him a magnetism few humans can ignore. At least until they are trapped in his domain and suffering for all eternity.
“Gabriel. To what do I owe the displeasure?” His silken voice twists my frustration and rage into something softer. Until I shake off the glamour he is so fond of using and step back.
“You owe me for your carelessness with the demon, Thorn. I have come to collect on that debt.”
Lucifer chuckles. “I have paid in full, brother. Or did you forget while your wings were burning? The daughter of Seraphim and her lover are free, and Thorn has gone mad from some of my more…creativemethods of torment.”
I grab the lapels of his bespoke black suit jacket and haul him up to his toes. “You have not even begun to clear your ledger. The demon killed close to a hundred after youlet him go.If it were not for Sinclair and Zoe, he would still be killing. You are skilled in torture, Samael, but not evenyouare as cruel as he was to his victims.”
“I take that as an insult.” Despite his words, a hint of fear churns in his eyes.
Ash floats through the air, staining my white shirt. Rude.
“Take it however you like. I don’t give a fuck.”
The devil waves his hand, and I fly back, landing on my ass so hard, the breath I’d drawn leaves my lungs in awhoosh.
“This is my realm, Gabriel. Or have you forgotten? And I did not let the demon and his concubine go. I do not let anyone go. Especially not two souls with their particular brand of sins.” His eyes flicker with an emotion I do not believe I have ever seen before—and cannot name—and the arrogance ingrained in his very being disappears in an instant. “What do you want?”
“A weapon. One forged in the fires of Hell and capable of destroying a blade crafted when magic began.”
The Devil laughs in my face.
I lunge for him once more, slamming him against the supposedly impenetrable gates of his domain. With a great metallic screech, the lock shatters.
We tumble into the oppressive heat, but this close to the entrance, the flames are nothing more than an illusion. Lucifer does not fight me. Not even when I land a punch that snaps his head to the side and splits his lip.
“Do you think I am joking? That I would willingly come down here and banter with you?” Another punch, and his right eye starts to swell. “Give me what I need, or I will tell the Almighty about your little securityproblem.” I get to my feet and stalk back through the gates. The flames may not be real, but my memories are. My wings demand to be set free. I dig my nails into my palms, wrestling for control. For a moment, I think I have won, but pure agony forces a scream from my lips. Half-burned feathers flutter to the rocks at my feet.
“Gabriel.” The Devil stares at me, all hubris gone from his tone. “You are not healing.”
