bedeviled & beyond 06 - bedeviled & befouled (8 page)

Just barely.

Gerch stared at me for a moment, his craggy face dark with anger.

“A little help here?” I gasped as those impossibly white teeth made headway toward my cringing flesh.

He reached down and grabbed the hellhound by the scruff of the neck, flinging it away. The thing landed with a yelp and the two hounds skulked away, tails tucked.

“How strange to see you here, my queen, since I told you to leave.”

I climbed to my feet and brushed rock dust off my ass. “And I told you I wasn’t leaving without Dialle.”

Gerch frowned, his small, black eyes nearly disappearing beneath a wide, red brow. “Well, since you’re here we might as well escort the king from this place together.”

I nodded and we turned. Horror knifed through me and I had to reach out and grab Gerch’s arm as dizziness made the world spin.

“Where is he, Astra?” Gerch spoke the question in a soft voice, his eyes sliding to mine.

“I...” The throne was empty. As was the throne room. Oh Good Him. Dialle had left without us.

~SC~

With the last of my quickly faltering power, I shifted Gerch to the office. The subterranean workplace was empty when we got there. Apparently Bob and Ralph were out on a job. We spent the next hour contacting everyone we could trust, asking them to come to my office for a confab on what to do next. Then Gerch and I settled into my office to wait for my friends and family to arrive. While waiting, I tried to fill Gerch in on what had happened before he arrived in the throne room. “I’m afraid Dialle’s going to hurt himself. You should have heard him.”

“What makes you think I haven’t?” He fixed me with an accusing look that made me bristle. But knowing the loyal Captain of Dialle’s guards had done his best in a terrible situation, and he’d remained loyal when everyone else had turned against us, I bit back my angry retort and said nothing.

Again with the maturity. Impressive, yes?

The air in front of my desk shimmered and Brina appeared, looking slightly the worse for wear. The skin under one of her eyes was puffy and bleeding, she had a long, healing wound down one slim arm, and blood caked her usually silky black hair. The feisty royal still held a bloody sword in one hand. “I tried to trace the king’s magic signature but lost it at the dimensional split. He’s definitely left this dimension.”

“The Shadows?” Gerch ventured.

The royal shook her head. “I can’t know for sure but I don’t think so.”

Slayer shimmered into the room and picked up the conversational thread. “Could he have gone to Olympus?”

We all looked at each other but Brina finally said. “It’s possible.”

My sister shimmered in next. She and Slayer shared a look that made me distinctly uncomfortable.

I inclined my head in her direction by way of a greeting and told my gathered friends what I knew. “He’s very depressed. I’d even say suicidal. He told me that he no longer belonged here.”

Slayer frowned. “If he doesn’t feel he belongs here he probably wouldn’t go to Olympus either.”

“Or any of the light dimensions,” Brina agreed.

“He could have gone to Hell.”

We all looked at Gerch. He met my gaze and I realized he’d been nursing that thought for a while but hadn’t wanted to voice it. “He’d feel more comfortable there,” I whispered.

Myra and my father shimmered into the room. When I looked at them I had to blink tears away. “What are the chances Dialle’s soul will survive a prolonged visit to Hades right now?”

The air beside my father flickered and Emo shifted into the room. My father turned an angry look toward my friend and partner but Emo just returned it with a stoic expression. I knew that look. He was dug in. Nobody would be altering his decision. Whatever that was. I smiled when he turned my way.

Myra touched my father’s hand as if to say “let it be” then answered my question. “If Dialle is in Hades that would be very bad. We need to get him out of there. As quickly as possible. He’ll not only lose his soul if he stays, he’ll most likely die. He’s not built for that kind of darkness anymore. Not after walking in the light for three years.” Her clear blue gaze held mine, carefully devoid of accusation. But she didn’t need to say or even think the words. They were in my mind anyway.

What she meant was, after two years of being tied to me. And now he was set adrift, an empty vessel with a hole in him the same size as the one I harbored inside me. By taking himself to Hades he’d made sure only one thing could fill that void.

Black, oily evil.

I shuddered. Every minute he spent there would take him further away from the man I knew and loved. Further from the hope of a future together. “We’ll leave as soon as I’ve recharged my power.”

Darma stepped forward, touching my arm. “Astra, you don’t have any powers. And we don’t even know if he’s there.”

I glanced at my aunt. No one had told Darma about my temporary fix. “You’ll be my power, Darma.” My sister looked at me as if I was mad. “Think of me as a battery you need to keep charged. I’ll explain while Myra gives me what I need to get started. And as for Dialle’s location, I know he’s there—in my heart—but even if he’s not, we have to check that off the list of possibilities first because it’s the most dire one. He’s in the greatest danger in Hades. So that’s where we’ll start our search.”

Gerch nodded. “I’ll return to the court and retrieve as many of my men as I can gather.”

“Thanks, Gerch.” I touched his arm. “It means a lot to me...and Dialle...that you stood by him despite everything.”

Gerch stared at me for a long moment, his craggy mouth thinning slightly. He looked as if he wanted to say something but he didn’t. He finally just nodded and stepped back.

Slayer’s voice pulled my thoughts away from Gerch. “Do you want me to go to Olympus and get dragons?”

I thought about this for a minute. It might come in handy to have them, but it would also make passage into the Hell dimensions more time consuming. “I don’t think—”

A horrendous crash sounded in the main part of the office and, in the blink of an eye, everyone in my office was in battle mode.

Brina and Slayer clutched their swords at the ready, Darma had a ball of energy fizzing in each pale palm, and my father and Myra were exponentially larger, their combined glow of power pulsing against my skin.

Gerch was already running for the door, his own sword clutched in his fist. I grabbed my knives and took off after him.

I stopped in the doorway and gave the place a quick scan. I didn’t see anybody in the main part of the office, but it appeared to be raining in the center. Below where the skylight used to be.

The window was currently lying in a shattered pile on the floor.

Sorry, mother halfling. My bad.

I rolled my eyes and turned to the assembly still behind me in my office. “Stand down, everybody. It’s just Glynus.” Walking toward the watery mess in the center of the office greeting area, I craned my head to look up. A huge, elegant snout filled the space. Glynus’ head was tilted so she could fix a bright-turquoise eye on me.

Why is part of the ceiling lying on the floor, Tadpole?

I was just trying to see inside but I might have accidently stepped on it.

She didn’t mean to do it, dragon fighter.

I smiled. Glynus’ new mate was with her.
Hello, Spence.

Greetings, dragon fighter.

I shook my head. I’d told the young dragon to call me Astra repeatedly but he insisted on the formal title.
Why are you two here?

I came to help you. You are upset and worried.

But I didn’t—

You didn’t guard your emotions, mother halfling. I sensed your turmoil and came right away.

Sighing, I realized she was right. I had assumed our connection would be broken with the loss of my power. But apparently my borrowed energy was enough to fuel it.
I’m fine, Tadpole. You and Spence can go on home.

You’re not fine and I’m not going home.
I clearly heard the new note of haughtiness in her tone. My Tadpole was quickly assuming the mantle of royalty she was destined for.

I glanced at Slayer. He’d spent a lot time around the dragons and knew their ways much better than I did. I knew he would have heard our telepathic conversation.

He shrugged. “They might as well come with us, Astra. They could be a big help.”

When I still hesitated, he added, “She’s not going to take no for an answer anyway. That dragon is more queen than her mother is.”

I knew he was right. “Shit.”

Mother halfling, do you still have the swear jar?

Glynus’ voice warbled with good humor and I smiled. No matter how regal my dragon got, some things would never change.
I got rid of the frunkin’ thing, it was sending me to the poorhouse.

Glynus giggled in my mind.

“All right, you can come with us,” I shouted up to the hole in the ceiling.

Snoopy’s coming too.

I expelled a frustrated breath.
You really shouldn’t call him that, Tadpole.

Spence’s elegant white head showed behind Glynus’ in the opening.
I don’t mind, dragon fighter. It’s a term of endearment.

Let’s see if you still feel that way when your enemies start calling you Snoopy.

I felt Glynus bristle in my mind.
They wouldn’t dare, mother halfling. If they did Snoopy and I would have to kick some major ass.

I laughed, shaking my head.
I’m sure you would. In the meantime, feel like returning to Dialle’s castle in Hell?

Glynus and I had spent some time there one Christmas, trying to find out how the green dragons were escaping Hell. She’d made some good friends among the greens while she was there.

I felt her frown in my mind.
Of course. What will we be doing there?

We need to find Dialle and bring him home.

It would be an honor to serve you, dragon fighter
, Spence told me in his usual stoic, careful tone.

Stop sucking up, Snoopy. She already loves you because of me. You don’t have to kiss her ass.

I grinned.
Now who needs the swear jar, Glynus?

It’s not my fault. The prophet told you not to swear in front of me when I was a baby.

Yeah, but she didn’t tell me why.

Well, now you know.

CHAPTER SIX

Oh, Hell no!

Into Hell young miss must go, to save the man she loves,

But stranger things than she could know, may bitch-slap her from above.

We entered the Hell dimension through a rift we’d discovered in the mountains that had once spilled green dragons into Olympus in huge numbers. The dragons had been trying to escape a steady buildup of sulfur in the air of Hell that was killing their young.

The result was that Olympus now had several new colonies of green dragons and Hell had lost most of its transport animals.

It sucketh to be them.

Slayer flew behind Glynus and me on a huge red dragon, compliments of Queen Persuis, the red queen. He’d been her dragon slayer for a couple of years and, as Glynus had informed me at the time, he had the queen wrapped. Apparently she’d still do anything for him because we currently had ten of her finest warriors flying with us.

Darma rode beside me on Spence and Emo rode an enormous red on Glynus’ other side.

Myra and my father would meet us inside the castle. They needed to speak to Hades Corporate before they could enter the Big Red Guy’s toasty environs, even on a rescue mission. The new regs had something to do with recent infighting between Heaven and Hell about porous borders.

Politics sucked.

I firmly shoved the niggle of guilt about the porous borders thing to the back of my mind. I might have had something to do with that.

Glynus headed toward the massive castle Dialle’s father had built on top of a craggy black mountain in the center of Hell. The castle seemed much the way it had when I’d been there before. I looked down and immediately regretted it. The ground beneath us boiled and smoked, like the inside of a volcano. The fiery liquid surface flowed around the wide, black mountains dotting its surface, which was where the wealthiest and most powerful inhabitants of Hell built their charred, soaring castles. Those who had come to Hell without power lived in caves, which were more like pockmarks on the sides of the mountains than actual caverns, and did their best not to go mad from the heat and the stench.

Glynus’ wide, black body swayed and dipped as she flew steadily forward. I felt the tingle of her protective magics as a constant force against my skin. Without it, I’d have burned to a pile of ashes within seconds of entering the place. Even
with
Glynus’ protective bubble of magic, the heat throbbed against me like a living thing, pulling moisture from my body like a succubus and leaving behind a shaky, husk-like feeling.

We couldn’t get to the castle fast enough for my comfort.

A distant shout brought my head snapping around and Glynus’ big body tightened with tension.
We have company, mother halfling
.

I sighed. Arrayed in an arrow formation, a small army of enormous, winged creatures flew toward us in the distance. They looked like some kind of dragon-gargoyle hybrid, with massive, brown bodies, wings that looked too small to be effective, and huge heads sporting oversized, tusk-like teeth. Each monster had a warrior devil riding its back. The red-and-orange flash of the fire below glinted off the long, deadly looking blades they held.
Oh yummy, gargoyle surprise. Let’s head them off. We aren’t going to be able to outrun them.

I glanced back at Slayer and he nodded, pulling his dragon up and turning it as Glynus veered off. Emo shouted back to Gerch, Brina slipped into place beside Spence, and our small rescue party turned in lumbering formation to meet what to all appearances was a hostile force.