From Hell with Love (43 page)

As he watched the scene play out in front of him, Barbas knew that they were.

***

Niccolo let go of the string and saw the arrow strike the outer circle of the target, causing the archer to grimace.  If he could not reclaim his accuracy while Lucifer was watching, he did not have much hope to ever recover.  He shook his head, ignoring the negative thoughts in his mind, and drew another arrow from his quiver.

“You can do better, Niccolo,” Lü Bu said from a few yards away.  Niccolo turned to look at the man, seated atop his horse, and saw the sneer in his features.  The assassin had always hated Lü Bu, but for the last three weeks his behavior had gotten worse and worse.  As Niccolo turned back to look at his target, he reminded himself that it was likely warranted.  Although he had not picked any fights with the warrior, lately, Niccolo had become more antagonistic with his words.

“I can,” Niccolo said, “but I don’t want to make the other guys look bad.”

“So you make them look good in comparison?  I dare say that you have done that job well,” Lü Bu said with a laugh.  “How about you actually hit a bull’s eye for once?  That would be a nice change.”

“Like this?” Niccolo asked, loosing the arrow before turning to glare at the Horseman.  He could see the Lü Bu’s face twist in anger before crossing his arms and knew that he had hit his mark, so he instead turned his gaze toward the black horse.  From the wink of its green eye, Niccolo knew that Plague appreciated the gesture.

“A lucky shot, Niccolo.  Do it again,” he goaded, prompting Niccolo to turn around and try once more.  He drew another arrow from his quiver and nocked it against the string, breathing in deeply before pulling it back.  Just before he let go of the wooden shaft, he felt something strike the back of his knee, forcing him to fall into the mud and shoot the arrow deep into the Pestilence Quarter.

“Now you see, Niccolo!  It was just a
fluke
!” Lü Bu shouted after drawing back the handle of his spear, shoving his boot into Niccolo’s back and causing him to fume in anger.

“Get the fuck off me, you bastard!” Niccolo shouted, but the warrior continued to giggle while standing on his back.

“That is no way to talk to your superior officer, peasant!  Beg for your life,” he threatened with glee, but Niccolo was not going to entertain him any longer.  He reached behind him with his demonic arm and found the back of Lü Bu’s leg before digging his black nails into the man’s flesh.  His actions were met with a shrill scream and a sudden release of weight from his back, causing Niccolo to smile.  He turned over and picked himself up before seeing the warrior’s face filled with fury.

“I don’t care anymore, Niccolo.  I don’t care if you’re Barbas’ favorite. 
Now
you get to suffer,” he said before advancing on Niccolo’s position.

It only took a moment before Niccolo realized one of them was going to die that day.

***

“Stop, you two!” Barbas yelled from Lucifer’s side, but neither warrior was paying attention to their teacher.  On the field in front of them, Niccolo brought out the short blade out of his scabbard and dived out of the way of Lü Bu’s first thrust, a strike that would have sank into the meat of Niccolo’s chest.

“I said st-” Barbas started to yell, but he found a white arm stretched across his chest.  He looked to his right to find Lucifer looking at him with concern.

“Humans die, old friend.  Who are you to get in the way of it?” he asked, but that just caused Barbas' face to contort with anger.

“I don’t need to be lectured by the likes of you,
Scratch
.  This one is important to me and I don’t want him to die,” he explained, hearing the clash of steel in the background.  The Devil shrugged before looking toward the pair of humans engaged in violence.

“He’ll live if he’s meant to, Barbas,” he said, seemingly ending their conversation.  Barbas would have fought further, but when he heard a cry of pain, the old demon was filled with worry.  He turned quickly to see that Niccolo was kneeling, Lü Bu’s spear point sunk into the meat of Niccolo’s shoulder.  Lucifer sighed before lowering his arm.  “And perhaps he’s not meant to.”

“Niccolo,” Barbas said under his breath, lowering his gaze to the ground.  He had not thought it would end this way.  Then he heard a grunt from the field and a cry of surprise from Azazel.

“Whoa, that came out of nowhere!”

***

Niccolo felt the spear yank out of his shoulder before he realized what had happened.  Lü Bu had been standing over him, his spear having found its target easily, and was insulting his enemy.

“How easy this was, Niccolo.  I wanted more,” he had teased, but Lü Bu had not expected the horse hoof that rocketed into his ribcage.  Niccolo was dumbfounded by the event, he had thought he was about to die, but during Lü Bu’s jest, Plague had ran over, turned, and then threw his leg into his master, sending the man rolling into the mud.  When he finally absorbed what had happened, Niccolo turned to the horse in amazement.

“Why did you…” he started to ask, but the horse scoffed at the question.

“Felt like it.  Fucker deserved it,” he boomed, but he was interrupted by the angry yell of the Chinese warrior covered in mud.

“
What
have you done to my horse?” Lü Bu screamed, his eyes turned to slits.

“
You
did it, Lü Bu,” Plague shouted, causing the Horseman to stare at him in wonder.  “That’s for all the
goddamned
abuse.  You don’t need to kick my sides to make me move.  Shit hurts, motherfucker!”

“Are you talking to
me
?” Lü Bu asked, stalking toward the black horse.

“I think that’s pretty fucking obvious,” Plague said, the green fog pouring out of his eyes before he turned to Niccolo.  “He’s kinda dense, isn’t he?”

“You talk to that peasant, you give him your respect, but you don’t talk to
me
?” Lü Bu screamed, holding his spear with hands shaking in anger.  “The
impudence
!”

“Didn’t see the point in talking to
you
,” Plague teased, shaking its head from side to side and its mane falling to the left side of its neck.  “Not really worth my time.”

“You insult your master,” Lü Bu said as he started toward his horse, his grip so tight that the skin around his knuckles had turned white.  “And then you save
his
life!” he screamed before running at Plague, his spear held forward.  “I will kill you where you stand!”

Niccolo had watched as the Horseman and his horse bickered, but when Lü Bu broke into a run, he did not know how to react.  He kneeled there in the mud for a moment, the wound in his shoulder already healing, and watched the black horse standing there waiting.  Niccolo wordlessly urged the beast to move, to do something to avoid its fate, but Plague stood there, his hooves buried in the mud of the clearing.

Suddenly Niccolo could not take it.  He could not accept that this self-righteous warrior, who did not deserve his position in the first place, was about to kill a
mostly
innocent animal.  Niccolo would not let Plague die like that, would not let him die just because of Lü Bu’s arrogance.  His feet slipped in the mud as he started toward them, but eventually his boots found purchase and Niccolo was scrambling toward the resolute horse and the murderous warrior. 

He clenched his diseased fist and felt his anger pouring out of him, anger he had held back for years.  Anger for all of the events in Firenze, anger for all of the betrayals, anger for his misfortune.  He felt it all burning out of him through his palm and did not even notice that something had started to solidify underneath his fingers.  As he dove toward the empty space between Plague and Lü Bu, Niccolo tried to strike out with his demonic arm.

He was just as surprised as their demonic onlookers when the clash of metal against metal rang through the air, Lü Bu’s spear tumbling end over end before sinking point-first into the mud behind him.  Niccolo was still breathing hard, his anger still coursing through his veins, before he looked down to his arm and found a gleaming, green bastard sword held in his grip.

“What the hell,” he muttered, but his thoughts were interrupted by the smaller man who had been flung backward into the mud.

“Where did you get that, leper?” Lü Bu asked before pushing himself up to his feet, spitting up wet soil from his mouth.  “Funny trick.”

“I don’t know what…” Niccolo started before turning to Plague, who had approached him in his distraction.  He did not know why, but Niccolo felt like the horse was pleased.

“I told you, little man.  There’s more to you than you know,” the creature said with its version of a wink.  Niccolo almost laughed at that, though he did not have time to enjoy this new development, as Lü Bu had reclaimed his spear.

“No matter!  You’ll die the same!” he shouted behind them, causing Niccolo to turn around in panic.  He only just deflected the wild thrust toward his chest by throwing the blade across his body.  Although the spear sailed past his shoulder, Lü Bu used the opportunity to force his foot into Niccolo’s midsection, pushing him backward.

Instead of falling over, Niccolo adjusted his footing and slid along the ground, creating a wake of mud as he went.  With this new weapon came a surge of confidence, and instead of a nervous, young soul, Lü Bu was met with the fierce warrior who had been trained in Napoli.  When Lü Bu threw his arm forward, determined to impale Niccolo on his spear, the assassin grabbed the handle of his sword with both hands and swung upward, knocking the dangerous weapon toward the sky.  He then brought his new blade down and ran it along Lü Bu’s torso, using the Horseman’s own momentum against him and causing a deep gash in the man’s leather armor.

Niccolo smiled as he went to work, remembering his training and forgetting the difficulties he had encountered in the last five years.  He spun around quickly before aiming a horizontal slash at his enemy, but Lü Bu was not just another thug, the warrior had recovered from Niccolo’s blow quickly.  Lü Bu planted the end of his spear into the ground and used his own weight to stop Niccolo’s sword midway through its arc. 

Though stunned by the sudden reversal, Niccolo kept hold of his blade and gripped it tightly with his right hand as Lü Bu thrust his weapon forward with his left arm.  The point of the spear flew just past Niccolo’s left ear, but he kept his mind about him and reached forward with his left hand.  Though Lü Bu head-butted him in retaliation, breaking Niccolo’s nose in the process, the leper was exactly where he wanted to be.  He turned the nails of his demonic hand toward the inside of Lü Bu’s left arm, drawing it back to sickening effect.

Lü Bu screamed, the pain forcing him out of the battle.  Niccolo then swung his bastard sword down against the handle of the spear, easily knocking it out of the warrior’s wounded arm.  Only after he had disarmed the Horseman did Niccolo look down at his work, finding that his nails had been more effective than he thought they would ever be.

Not only had Lü Bu’s green bracer been torn off of his arm, blood gushed out of the deep lacerations that Niccolo had made into his flesh.  Pieces of bone had been torn out in the effort, almost making Niccolo sick to his stomach, but all thoughts of concern were pushed out of his mind when Lü Bu looked up at him, the rage making his entire body shake.

“You will pay, you fucking peasant!  I AM THE HORSEMAN OF PESTILENCE!” he shouted before reaching down with his right hand to find the knife on his belt.  Niccolo did not even have to think about what he needed to do; the dream which had haunted him came to his mind in an instant.

In an instant, the assassin threw his hand into Lü Bu’s chest, tearing through the man’s ribcage, and then squeezed.  After he was confident that he held the warrior’s heart in his hand, Niccolo looked past the man’s narrow eyes and straight into his soul.

“Not anymore,” he said before clenching his fist, feeling the soft muscle offer little resistance before popping, leaving Lü Bu to confront his terror.  Niccolo closed his eye before withdrawing his hand and standing, feeling like he had finally accomplished something.  He did not bother to look at the corpse before dropping the man’s heart into the mud, turning to Plague, whose eyes flared with approval.

“About time, Nico,” the creature said before slowly walking forward and lowering its neck, touching its forehead to Niccolo’s own.  The leper brought up his demonic arm and traced Plague’s skull with his claws before laughing.

“Did you know it was going to be me?” he said with a smile, drawing back from his new friend.  Plague’s laughter echoed in his mind.

“I don’t know what I would have done if it wasn’t.  If I had to live with that bastard another day, I probably would have killed myself,” his deep voice echoed before Plague raised his head and looked toward their onlookers.

“Nico,” Barbas said, causing the assassin to turn and find his mentor accompanied by two men he had never seen before that day.  He knew he should have recognized them, but his mind was addled by all of the recent events.

“Barbas…” Niccolo started to explain, but he was interrupted by the old man’s cane striking him in the stomach.

“You be that stupid again and see what happens!” Barbas shouted, but a gentle hand fell onto his old shoulder.  Niccolo recovered from his mentor knocking the air out of him to see the pale man scoffing at Barbas.

“He won, old friend, I wouldn’t necessarily call that stupid.”

“Scratch,” Barbas argued, “he got lucky.  The only reason he lived was because of Plague.”

“That’s not luck,” said as the demon with goat hooves approached them.  “There are only three other people in Hell who could pull off something like that.”

“Scratch?” Niccolo asked, confused by the name.  When the pale angel stepped closer to him, Niccolo suddenly remembered what was happening, suddenly remembered who was watching.

“Goddamnit, Barbas,” Lucifer said before turning slightly toward the old demon, “if this becomes a habit, I’m blaming you.”

“You love it,” Azazel added with a grin, causing Lucifer to groan in despair before looking down at Niccolo.