Ruby Shadows Read online

  I conjured a lightweight, white cloth for Gwendolyn and tried to hand it to her.

  “Here. Throw this over your head and shoulders. It will deflect some of the sunlight.”

  She shook her head.

  “I don’t want it,” she said in a low voice. “I don’t want anything from you.”

  “Fine.” I shrugged my shoulders nonchalantly, though my heart was sore at her refusal. “Burn then, for all I care.”

  She flinched but rallied enough to shake her head.

  “I have kind of a natural tan—or didn’t you notice?”

  “Your skin is flawless as I have seen for myself firsthand,” I said, taking Kurex’s bridle and beginning to lead him across the sand. “But despite your lovely creamy brown tone, you will burn in Minauros without protection. Everything burns here.”

  “Stop saying that—stop talking about burning.” She leaned down from the horse and snatched the wrap from me. Throwing it over her head and shoulders, she looked straight ahead. Well, at least she was protected from the sun. The wrap was one I’d had made for her especially to withstand the Desert of Death as Minauros is often called.

  We walked in silence for a long time, Gwendolyn occasionally sipping from her water bottle and Kurex plodding patiently under the blazing sun. There was a hand-shaped mark—a white spot on his black haunch that showed the clear outline of a palm and fingers where I had slapped him. I was sorry for that—though he was a dumb beast he had more than proven his worth. Gwendolyn could not have ridden safely on my back as she could on his, as we ran through the maze beneath the Hotel Infernal to the barrier. My skin is much too hot when I am a dragon—or a wyrm as the ancient texts call it.

  At last, after an hour of the plodding pace, she spoke.

  “You didn’t tell me you were a fire demon.” Her voice was soft but filled with tension though she still looked straight ahead into the shifting sands and not at me as she spoke. “You said you were a demon of lust.”

  “And so I am,” I answered, wondering again why this distinction was important to her. “I am a demon of fire by nature—I can bend it to my will and it is a part of me—will always be a part of me.”

  That was because when I was first cast down and out of the heavenly realm I had landed in the Lake of Fire and it had infused me with its power. But I saw no need to tell her the details.

  “My skill is lust—my area of expertise, you may say,” I continued. “So you see, I am both.”

  “You didn’t tell me that when I first called you.” She looked back at me briefly. “You should have told me.”

  “Why?” I frowned at her, wondering at the pain and fear in her eyes. Of course, the things I’d had to do to get us out of the Hotel Infernal and into the third circle were not pleasant but they had been necessary and for her benefit. But she was evasive.

  “You just…should have told me. I would have sent you back.”

  “You lost that ability the moment I first laid eyes on you, mon ange,” I murmured. “I could not have turned away from you for any reason from the first sight I had of you.”

  “Don’t call me that.” She looked away again. “No more nicknames—no more anything. Let’s just…just go. Just get there and close the door. I just want to get home.”

  “I am deeply sorry that my other form frightened you so much,” I said, tugging on Kurex’s bridle to move him past a sand pit—they were everywhere in the shifting dunes of Minauros. Some led to pits lined with stakes and damned souls being slowly impaled for all eternity—others to tributaries of the River of Fire which fed the Lake where I had had my second baptism and emerged forever changed. “But I could not help what I became. It was instinct to take the most threatening form I possessed when I felt you were threatened.”

  “But he couldn’t have really sucked out my soul, could he?” she asked, casting a sidelong glance at me. “I mean…you wouldn’t have let him. You could have beaten him in your regular form—didn’t you say you could flay people alive with a word?”

  “I did and I can.” I nodded.

  “So why turn into that…that beast?” she demanded. “Why start spraying fire and brimstone everywhere? And…and burning everything and everyone?”

  “I was enraged at Druaga’s suggestion that he be allowed to sample your soul. In my rage, I lost control and became what you saw,” I admitted.

  “You lost control?” She raised an eyebrow, clearly skeptical. “But you never lose control. You’re always calm and collected. In fact, the only time I’ve ever seen you really upset before this was when you came over and told me off for opening that doorway into the Abyss in the first place.”

  “I was upset then because I perceived you were in danger. I became upset this morning for the same reason. And…” I hesitated. “I was also incensed at the insult Druaga offered you.”

  “Insult?” She frowned.

  “The taking of a soul or part of a soul is a very…intimate thing,” I said. “Even sexual.”

  “Ugh!” She shivered. “And I thought that hook thing he was waving at me was bad! But now you’re saying Druaga asking to, uh, sample my soul was like asking me for a handjob right in front of you?”

  “Essentially,” I said tightly. “Although your example perhaps does not go far enough.”

  “But what would make him bold enough to even ask that?” Gwendolyn mused. “I mean, aren’t you way above him in the hierarchy or caste system or whatever it is you have going on here? Wouldn’t it be like the office manager asking to sleep with the CEO’s wife? Not that I’m your wife or anything,” she added hurriedly.

  “I understand your meaning.” I nodded. “And to answer, I believe that his greed for the sweet taste of innocence is what overcame his better judgment. Druaga has always lusted for it—I have even heard him brag that he managed to snare one of the lesser angels out of Heaven and bind it to him somehow—although I’m certain that was just a lie on his part.”

  “How awful for the poor thing if that was true!” Gwendolyn shivered. “To go from living in light and beauty to having to be with him.”

  “Yes, moving from Heaven to Hell can be quite a shock,” I murmured. “And with it the loss of innocence and purity.” I sighed. “Doubtless it was your purity and his greed for it that made Druaga bold enough to try and get a taste of your soul.”

  “My purity? Could he sense that I was…you know, that I’ve never had sex?” Her cheeks flushed.

  “I think not,” I said shortly. “When I say purity I am referring to the state of your soul—the fact that it is not stained with sin. Any demon will be able to sense that—they will smell it if they get close enough to scent you.”

  “He was certainly close enough after he chased off the devilkins.” She shivered. “He kept trying to put his big hairy hands on me and saying I needed to get undressed so he could examine me. Disgusting!”

  I felt a low growl rise in my throat and Gwendolyn looked at me, clearly alarmed.

  “Hey—are you all right? Your eyes look like they’re on fire.” Her voice was frightened and her eyes were wide.

  I made an effort to calm myself.

  “Forgive me. I had no idea when I interrupted the scene exactly what he was doing. If I had, I might have been angry enough to lose my human form sooner rather than later.”

  “Because you want to protect your property.” She gave me a sharp look. “As if I belonged to you or something.”

  “One might as well say I belong to you,” I remarked lightly. “I am, after all, your own personal demon whom you called to do your bidding. And here I am, still doing it.”

  “Whatever.” She looked away. “I wasn’t trying to call a fire demon.”

  I spread my hands. “I cannot help my nature. And why is it so important to you what sort of demon I am, anyway?”

  “Never mind, it doesn’t matter.” She looked down at her hands resting lightly on Kurex’s saddle.

  “But I do mind, mon ange. Do you now blame me for show