“Issues?” Kostya eyed Constantine suspiciously. “What issues would you have with a demon lord?”

The urge to run was strong, but he knew that he could never again turn away from the responsibility that had plagued him for so long. He was silent for a few minutes, picking out what he wanted to say, grateful that Bee was giving him the opportunity to speak or not speak, as he chose.

“Bael is no ordinary demon lord,” he finally said.

“You can say that again,” Gary said with a little giggle. “Asmodeus was terrified of him, although he’d never let on to anyone. But oh, how he used to check that Bael was still in the Akasha, and not out where he could mess with him. Asmo, that is.”

“Who are you?” Aisling asked before shaking her head and answering herself. “No, never mind, I said I wasn’t going to go there, and I’m not. But I will say that we all know Bael isn’t a normal demon lord. For one, he’s a tricky bastard, and for another, he managed to place a curse on all of the dragons while he was still confined to the Akasha. You have to have some pretty big chops to pull off that sort of thing.”

“He does have big chops, as you call it,” Constantine answered her. The room was silent as he spoke the words that weighed so heavily on him. “As a son of the First Dragon, he was born with abilities beyond the understanding of most beings.”

Twelve

“Bael’s what?” Aisling exclaimed at the same time Kostya burst out with, “He’s another son? You are wrong. He can’t be.”

“Glorioski! That’s a plot twist I didn’t see coming,” Gary told Jim.

“Are you sure he’s one of the First Dragon’s sons?” Aisling asked, and although it took time they did not have, Constantine briefly recapped his history.

“For the fourth and final time, what did your demon find out about Bael’s location?” he asked when he finished.

Aisling looked like she wanted to say something else, but in the end, she waved a hand at Jim. “Go ahead. Tell Constantine what you overheard in Abaddon.”

Jim stood up and made a gesture with one paw that would have been a salute on any other being. “Aye aye, mon dragon capitain. At first, I didn’t think I was going to find out much about Bael. For one, no one seemed to know he’d been released by Eefies.”

“Unintentionally!” Aoife protested.

“Ha!” Bee said with a snort. “I’d say that was worse than being caught sneaking around Abaddon.”

“But then I caught wind that all of Asmodeus’s wrath demons were out of Abaddon, and in the mortal world hunting.”

“Hunting for what?” Kostya asked.

“Well, that’s the interesting part. Once I heard that all the wrathies were out in a hunting party, I figured they’d be looking for Bael, and they were, but it also turns out they were searching for some chick named Thala.”

“Who?” Bee asked.

Constantine’s gaze settled on Kostya. “Baltic’s Thala?”

Kostya looked thoughtful. “I assume so. You know why he’d seek her, yes?”

Cold, hard fear filled his stomach. “I do.”

“Well, we don’t, so enlighten us, please,” Bee said, glancing between Aisling and Aoife. “Who is Thala?”

“And why would Asmodeus want to find her?” Aisling asked.

“She holds a valuable weapon,” Constantine said, his mind assembling and then discarding any number of scenarios that would explain Bael’s actions. “A light sword. Baltic used to possess it, but it was stolen by Thala.”

“So you think that Asmodeus wants this sword? Why?”

“Not Asmodeus—Bael. With it, he’ll be able to remove Asmodeus from the throne of Abaddon.”

“That makes sense,” Bee admitted. “But that’s not going to help us find out where Bael is and where he is living. We still need to get some kind of talisman from him to break the curse.”

Constantine looked pointedly at the demon dog. “Did you find out where Asmodeus’s demons were searching?”

“Yup, that and a whole lot more. One of the gatekeepers in Asmo’s palace says that he heard that three of the demons went to England, to a small town called Piddlington-on-the-Weld where Bael has set up camp, while the others were sent off to scour Paris for Thala.”

“She’s here?” Aisling asked.

Jim’s lips curled. “According to my gatekeeper buddy, they tracked her from Asia to Italy and then to Paris, but they lost her a few weeks ago. That’s what some of the lesser demons are saying, but I wouldn’t like to vouch for how accurate it is. You know how it is with those junior demons.”

“No, how is it?” Gary asked, donning a fascinated expression.

Jim cocked a knowing eyebrow. “They love to gossip, and if they don’t have anything to gossip about, they’ll make stuff up.”

“Really? No one but Asmodeus’s wrath demons were allowed into his private chamber where I lived, but they were always very factual. Sometimes too factual, if you get my drift.”

“Nothing a wrathie likes more than to talk torture methods,” Jim agreed, nodding. “What were your demons’ faves?”

“Oh, it was ghastly, simply ghastly!” Gary said with great relish. “They loved to take a traffic cone, you know, one of those orange and white plastic things, and then grease it up really well—”

“And that’s about enough,” Bee interrupted with a fierce look at Gary.

“You can tell me later,” Jim told the head sotto voce. “And I’ll tell you what Ash does when she gets PMSy. Bet you my tales beat the pants off of yours.”

“I don’t know,” Gary said hesitantly. “It’s pretty bad if someone inserts a greasy traffic cone into—”

“Right, that’s the end of my patience,” Bee said, picking up the hamster ball and sending it rolling out of the room and into the hallway. Gary’s screams followed.

“Where were we?” Bee asked. Everyone stared at the doorway with a shared shock expression.

“I am not a bowling ball!” came an objection from the hall. “Great, now I have a nosebleed.”

Bee closed the door. “Constantine?” she asked, appealing to him for help.