“Come on,” Vicus said. “We spent the day traveling inward. There’s nothing out here. No souls, no other demons.”
“So you say,” Caera said, slowly prowling toward the front door. A big wooden door, made of more of the black trees. It’d probably shatter like glass if someone hit it hard enough.
“Clear!” Lasca yelled. Everyone hissed; too loud. She squatted in an empty window, tail swaying behind her. Apparently she’d seen the scrying pool enough to know about the word ‘clear’, but not about the Necronomicon. Disappointing.
Vicus nodded, made a small, sarcastic bow, and pushed open the door. It turned on hinges. Hell had grown hinges?
“Oh,” David said once the inside came into view. “Yeah, church.”
Church it was. There were pews inside, made of more of the black wood; he didn’t need to sit to know they’d be uncomfortable as hell, in Hell. There was a pulpit at the end of the room, same material, and skull lanterns dangled from black rafters, fire burning in their eyes. It wouldn’t have been able to fit more than a hundred people, but that was plenty for them.
Lasca was right. It was empty.
“There a lower floor?” Caera asked.
Vicus shook his head and stepped behind the large pulpit.
“No. If we’re attacked, it’s not exactly easy to defend this place.” He gestured to the windowless windows. “But we’re out of the way, here, still close to Death’s Grip, and a decent way closer to the river Styx. Souls rarely get dropped off here, so demons and hellbeasts don’t come here often.”
Nodding, Caera walked down the aisle between the pews, up to the pulpit, and leaned over a front pew. David took it, and groaned as his heavy body sank onto the hard, flat wood. Uncomfortable was fine when every finger weighed a hundred kilos.
“We need more than sleep,” she said. “We need food.”
David raised a hand. “I… think I need food, too. A lot… lot of food.”
Caera prowled up to him and pushed up between his legs, kinda like a dog that was the size of the biggest Siberian tiger. She set her head on his lap against his stomach, turned her head enough to aim her good eye up at him, and nudged her horns into his bare chest. Without his breastplate, she had to be gentle, and with a little work, she used a horn and pushed his hand until it was on her head.
He smiled down at her and combed her thick dreadlocks.
“You saved us,” she said.
“Saved us!” Laara said, hopping from pew to pew, perching on their backs and gripping them with claws and talons.
“Saved us!” Lasca joined her.
Latia and Laria had hooves and couldn’t balance on the backs of pews very well, but they tried, and giggled when they slipped and fell. Some giggles turned to sniffles though as Laara slipped as well, spread her wings wide, and fell on the pew beside David. Little whines filled the silence as she held out her wing to David and Caera again, little drops of blood lining the large tear in the red membrane.
“I’m sorry,” David said, and he stroked her wing’s arm with one hand, the other still combing Caera’s dreadlocks. “The rider is after me. Maybe you should have stayed back in your mountain, with Greg dead, and the other imps and grems alive and well.”
Gasping like he’d backhanded her, Laara snuggled into his side and rubbed her forehead against his shoulder.
“David doesn’t want Laara around anymore?”
“What? I didn’t–”
“David mean!” Lasca said, sitting beside Laara. “Cruel!”
“Cruel and mean!” Laria said, coming up around the pew and standing beside Caera.
“Mean and cruel!” Latia stood behind David’s pew and set her chin on his shoulder opposite Laara. “Why would David abandon us?”
Oh shit. David looked down at Caera for help, but she just smiled at him and let him stew in guilt he shouldn’t have been feeling.
“Sorry! I’m sorry. I don’t want to leave you.”
Laara beamed up at him and hugged him as best she could with the pew in the way and Caera’s head still on his lap. But it didn’t last, and the little lady squeaked and held her side where she’d been stabbed.
“Bloodgrip is nicer,” she said.
“Nicer.”
“Nicer!”
The Las chatted between themselves, all gathering on David’s pew but sitting beside him so they could chat with each other. Talk of bloodgrip vines, different caves they knew, different tunnels, and different imps and grems were the topic, and they spoke high speed, complete with lots of clicks. It wasn’t long before they sat in a circle on the stone floor, each facing each other’s backs so they could clean each other’s dreadlocks and damaged wings of a black wood shards.
He refrained from making any comment about them being a bunch of girly girls. Jeskura would have ripped his head off.
Jeskura and Dao were with Vicus, talking about the area, potential nearby threats, and Vicus was doing his best to convince them it was safe. They weren’t convinced. Acelina stood by the front door, giant axe still in hand.
In the peaceful moment, David took a deep breath, ignored the hunger in his guts, and smiled down at the wonderful tiger lady still resting her demon head on his lap. She had small cuts all over her, little things that must have bled, but small enough they healed quick, and Hell whisked away blood in a few hours. Still, she looked rough, and he stroked her horns and massaged her scalp, as if he could somehow soothe her wounds.
“You destroyed miles of the dead forest,” she said.
“Kilometers.”
“Whatever. Canadian.”
He smiled. “I… I saw you girls getting hurt by the forest, you know? It was… bad.” He gestured to the Las, and his voice dropped to a whisper. “They were really terrified, you know? I’ve never seen demons scared.”
“Imps and grems don’t normally get scared. Demons don’t, in general. We get caught up in the violence, and just give ourselves to it. But… something about the rider, his aura, the… presence.” Caera shivered. “We resisted him because he was at a distance, and being on the edge of that aura was… terrifying. If he got close, it’d pull us in. It’d be… just like with those hellhounds. We’d throw ourselves at him, and die.” She lifted her head, brought it close, and kissed him. “And I think some of us are a little more attached to living than some other demons. Maybe that’s why they… why we got scared.”
“I’m glad you are. I mean, about getting attached to living.”