The Devil's Assistant (Watty Awards Finalist 2011)

Devil's Assistant Prologue.

Cover work -> courtesy of Juviblack as part of the Christmas Exchange.

Prologue

Canary Wharf was unusually dark for nine o'clock on a Saturday night. The streetlights had been extinguished forming a barrier between the metropolis and the impenetrable shadows of the Satani Media skyscraper. No human dared to breach the barrier. It was some unwritten rule, or perhaps the instinctive part of their brains that warned them away. For anyone that neared, before their feet could even cross into the shadows, they turned around.

It was there, under the cloak of darkness that two figures met. For a moment, neither said a word. They merely watched the other while the distant chatter of the city filled the void of their silence. Two sets of hellish red eyes shone like beacons in the darkness.

"Do you have it?" A timbre voice growled.

His informant clenched his fists and blew air through his nose as he tried to remain calm. When he finally broke the tense silence, he spoke in hushed tones.

"It's..." His voice broke causing a slight squeak to escape. He paused, clearing his throat, his eyes darting, ever searching the darkness for a spy. "It's one of the most closely guarded secrets in heaven and hell combined. What do you thin..."

The quivering man's speech was cut short when his employer stepped forward, wrapped a cold clammy hand around his throat and glared at him with eyes that burned with the fires of hell itself. Windows to the coldest and blackest soul, even the Devil didn't have eyes like these.

Beating his fists against his attacker, the man gasped as his feet scrabbled to gain leverage.

"Please... stop...can't ...breathe."

A sigh puffed out in a white cloud.

"Disgusting," the cold eyed man muttered as he tossed the body to the floor before wiping his hands on his clothes with a grimace.

"So you know nothing?" He finally questioned the quivering man on the floor.

The man, chest heaving with unsteady breaths, rolled up onto his hands and knees. "I didn't say that," His voice cracked as he spoke. Clearing his throat, the man winced and rubbed at the raw skin of his neck. "The book of Eve exists, that is certain. But one loose lipped demon told me that the last time it was seen was two thousand years ago and in the possession of the Devil himself. Only the upper levels will know its location. That's all I know."

Red eyes glared down at him, flashing brighter with each word that he had spoken. The man on the floor squeaked and crawled backwards but those eyes did not leave him for a second. The fury burned bright and the coldness that had iced over those fiery pits only seconds before had the man shaking in his boots.

The stillness was unbearable, causing an almost tangible tension to fall over the pair, just waiting for the first to break. There was barely a whisper in the wind as the man delivered a swift kick into the abdomen of the cowering wreck on the floor. Groaning and moaning ensued but it was silenced by the ring of steel grating upon steel.

"So you don't know anything?"

The voice chilled the very air around the imposing figure as he held his unsheathed sword aloft. He swished the sword through the air, the whistle of it singing on the breeze before the blubbering demon let out a gasp. His fingers rose to his cheek and he dabbed experimentally, the tips coming away with spots of black oily blood.

Beelzebub gulped, his Adam's apple working hard to clear the dryness in his throat while his eyes remained trained on the deadly piece of metal still careening through the air in elegant arches and deadly jabs. He could only watch.

"Do you know what words I live by Beelzebub?" The voice taunted from above.

In the blink of an eye, the two red orbs floating above him disappeared leaving Beelzebub sitting eerily alone in the dark. If he had had a living beating heart, it would have been thundering inside his chest. His own glowing eyes swept side to side as they peered into the blackness, his breathing speeding up when his gaze passed over nothing but empty shadows.

Then, he grunted.

His red eyes went wide at the sudden sting in his chest. Dropping his gaze down to the burning source of pain, Beelzebub's mouth opened and closed repeatedly as he stared at the hilt sticking out of his chest. He started to smile, his hands going to grasp the blade when the blue light started to shine from within the wound and grew brighter with each second.

"Never trust a demon," his tormentor instructed, his hand appearing around the hilt of the sword while he threw the cowered wreck a smile. It sent tremors through the demon whose entire body was trembling under the power of the sword. His head threw itself back, cracking against the floor while the veins on his neck bulged under the strain.

"Angel blade," Beelzebub forced through a clenched jaw while his eyes found the orbs which were now the most startling and cold blue colour he had ever seen. They actually twinkled at the dying man through the darkness.

"Of course."

A single drop of black blood leaked from the corner of Beelzebub's mouth as he gasped through the blood now filling his lungs. The sword was wrenched from his chest with a slurping squelch. Left in its wake was a gaping hole that spilled out thick black blood that quickly became more viscous and moved over the demon's clothes like rapidly cooling tar.

His attacker gave him a grin. It only grew in size and brightness as he pulled a can from the darkness. Turning his head to the side, Beelzebub chastised his self for being so careless. He could already smell the fumes on the air which burned at the back of his throat when his former employer jerked the can causing cold liquid to soak into his clothing.

The dying demon closed his eyes tightly and his entire body slumped into the ground even as his body struggled to regenerate his torn heart. It was pointless; the angel blade had done its damage. His life was already slipping away as the haunting eyes bored into him.

Then, without any word of warning, the man stepped forward so he towered over the pitiful specimen on the floor. He positively glowed as he pulled out a solitary match from the pocket of his jeans and drew it across the length of his stubbly chin. It ignited, a small flame bursting into life. For a moment he held it between his fingers and waved it through the air and just as the flame threatened to die out, he released the burning twig so that it dropped down onto the corpse.

"Say hi to daddy for me." He muttered vindictively.

Immediately the liquid was set aflame, bright red lighting up the sky. But the man did not stay to see his handy work, nor did he stay to listen to the screams that rent the air. He spun on his heel and quickly dissolved into the blackness leaving the burning corpse behind him.

A minute had barely passed when the lights flickered on once. No one would know what had happened there. Only black dust remained but a sharp wind kicked up off of the Thames and swept all traces of the demon's remains away.

(This chapter has been edited but if you find any typos or mistakes then please let me know)