Demon Destiny Chapter 1

First glance of herione and hero, and bit about the Earth they live on.

Chapter 1

Not that long ago…

     “You little piece of worthless trash!” John screamed.

Spittle flew out of his mouth and landed on his pit stained t-shirt. Prudence felt the droplets land on her cheek. She reached up to wipe them off trying not to let her disgust show. If she let it out of its caged box, there would be no putting it back and disgust bred all sorts of ugly things.

“You think you can hide from me, Pru? Not tonight. Tonight, I will find you.”

Sure you will, big guy. Prudence stood directly in front of him, knowing that he saw straight through her to the ripped couch that sat in the center of the room. She had tried to make that couch more presentable by adding a blue crocheted blanket to the back, but the worn, grumpy looking thing was determined to make a room dreary.  Not that John cared about any of that. As long as he had his booze and his w****s, he left her alone. Getting a new couch would take away from that fund so it was in her best interest to leave well enough alone and maybe try for a bright yellow blanket next time. Yellow was a cheery color.

Tonight, however, leaving John to his own devices hadn’t worked in her favor since he was here, staring straight through her. This hadn’t happened in weeks, and Pru had hoped that he had given up on it.

As John’s eyes darted around the room trying to figure out where his wayward wife hid, Pru sighed and headed toward the one other room in the small rental. Creaking walls with peeling pink paint kept her company as she walked the few feet over. Normally, Pru would try not to draw the attention of her husband, making sure to open the bedroom door slowly. Tonight she walked straight in and left it ajar. He never had figured out whether she disappeared, became invisible or was, indeed, hiding. Though where he thought she would hide in the ten foot walkthrough was a mystery to her.

Pru needn’t have bothered acting stealthy during his previous bouts. If he couldn’t see her, then the drunken fool was past reason. It wasn’t his fault, she supposed. Well, yes, it was, but she didn’t know anyone else whose wife disappeared on them whenever they were in a particularly foul mood. But she also didn’t know anyone else with a Witchy best friend who could make that happen. If she was being honest with herself, Pru didn’t really know anyone up here in the mountains of California, Witchy friends had or not.

Isolation is one of the first steps in the long cycle to abuse. Let’s move up to my mother’s cabin, he said. It will give us a chance to make it on our own, he said. I will be good to you, he said.

He lied.

Boy, had he lied.

It had taken her a while to wise up. Longer than it should have. But almost a year ago she had had a rude awakening akin to being drenched in water from the North Pole after he cracked her so hard on the jaw that it fractured.

So while her broken mouth tried to sooth his anger and her frantic whispers tried to bring him down from whatever had him so riled, her brain worked frantically back through the six years of their marriage. She had known things weren’t right, deep down she had known. But she continued daily through life anyways ignoring the signs because they didn’t really affect her. Sure, he had cheated on her constantly, but she had fallen out of love with him within weeks of their vows. That was no cause for a divorce, according to her mama. They had gotten along fairly well since then. He lived his debauched life and Pru lived her quiet one. Quiet except for the few times her husband came home drunk and rearing to use her to take his anger out on.

In the moment right before the numbness spread, as her jaw hung slack with agony, Pru wondered how and why it had taken him so long to hit her. His temper controlled him most days. Whatever the reason, the storm was here now.

She had two options. She could kill him or she could leave him. Neither one sounded complementary. On the one hand, she might be caught. One the other, she would have to face the world. The unknown things outside her life made her palms sweat. She couldn’t remember when fear had started guiding her life, but it was a constant companion now. As much as she wanted to get up, walk out and live a happily ever after as the heroine of her own story, she knew that would never happen. Fear ruled her. Better a fear she knew than one she didn’t, though.

The morning after the hit, as John slept off his hangover lying in his vomit, Prudence came home from the hospital with an aching head and a decision made. She had chosen option three.

A quick called to her best friend Rhiannon allowed her to talk through everything that had happened. Not an easy feat with a busted jaw.

“Leave the b*****d, Pru-bear.”

Palms. Sweating.

“I can’t. My whole life is here.”

“Your whole life? Pru, what life? You are a punching bag. What kind of life is that?”

Ouch. Yeah. She was so right. And yet…

“I doubt it will happen again. I told him exactly what would happen if it did.”

“Mmhmm. And what exactly is going to happen, Pru?”

“I’m going to kill him.” Well, she hadn’t said those words per say, but she had thought them really hard in his direction.

“You’re go--? Jeez! Prudence freaking Miller, has the mountain air finally affected your oxygen intake? Come down to the city. Stay with me for awhile and we can straighten it out here. You don’t even have to leave my apartment.”

Sweaty, sweaty palms. And Rhiannon knew it. Her friend knew exactly how much the last six years had changed Prudence.

Rhiannon stayed silent a moment before letting out a sad sigh. “I have an idea.”

The spell was simple for Rhiannon. As a human, Pru could only accomplish so much, but her friend held mass amounts of power as the last in her family line.

It held the perfect solution. She could live her life, alone and content, while John gallivanted and drank himself to death. The spell was basic. When he worked himself into a rage that would end in violence aimed toward Prudence, she became unattainable to him.

That’s the way they had lived their lives for the past year. Was it everything Prudence had hoped?

Sure, it was.

Now, she laid down on the rumpled bed determined to wait out his tirade. He didn’t usually stagger in until after two a.m. but something had brought him home early this evening. He probably couldn’t get laid. The drunker he got the less his charm worked on those around him. That’s what had drawn her to him in high school, his never-ending charm. It should have been a clue. Charming men were liars.

She watched, blank eyed, as he tore through the rental for several more minutes before passing out on her blue crocheted blanket. The last thing she thought as she drifted off to sleep was that it would need washing tomorrow.

Prudence woke bleary eyed the next morning to the sound of pounding on the security door outside the rental. She glanced at the wall clock that read after eight o’clock. Maybe they would go away. She closed her eyes again, but jerked them open immediately when the pounding started up again.

Groaning in irritation, Pru got up and ran a hand through her long brown tresses. They were tangled to the extreme so she threw it all in a messy bun as she padded through the house and took a quick glance in a hand mirror to clear the sleepies out of her green eyes before opening the door. She still had on pajama pants and a tank top but she didn’t really care.

Standing amongst the dead grass of her front yard were two law enforcement officers. They stood several feet away and were looking around the front of the rental with rapt expressions, taking in every detail. Pru started to call out a greeting before remembering her deadbeat husband and walking out to them.

One of the officers looked too young to be wearing a uniform, which implied that he wasn’t human. Aging variations among the races made judging someone’s wrinkles impossible. The other was mustached, weather worn and obviously human. The partnership surprised Pru. Up in these mountains racism ran rampant and humans stuck with humans. They barely saw other races settle here because of the blatant discrimination. Here humans could get away with it. Pru had heard that in bigger cities things were more mixed and humans were kept in their proper place. The lowest class, the weakest race, the doormats.

The minute she stepped into an urban environment she wasn’t safe. Big business controlled ninety-eight percent of the world’s finances and one specific corporation controlled nine-five percent of the ninety-eight. And Trinity Corp. did not take kindly to humans. And she was supposed to want to leave here? Chyeah. Right.

Rhiannon had told her time and again that Pru had no clue what she was talking about. Trinity owned a large portion of the world, yes, but they didn’t bother with the everyday lives of humans. Logically, Pru knew that was true, but such a powerful entity gave her the willies. To live in a city where they were right next door and could potentially throw her into jail, or worse, with no questions asked because she was a lowly human? Gulp.

“Morning, Officers.” Pru greeted them with a smile she didn’t feel. “What can I do for you?”

“Mrs. Miller? My name is Officer Balton, and this is Officer Chang,” said the mustached cop. “I’m afraid we’re here with some news concerning your husband.”

Pru’s head tilted back to the house even as her eyes stayed on the two men. “He’s still asleep; can you speak with me about it?”

Both men froze while Officer Balton’s eyes widened fractionally before returning to an expressionless mask. Pru’s nerves started to fray as confusion set in. She had assumed this was regarding a fight in a bar or an angry husband avenging his wife.

“I’m sorry, what is this regarding?”

Both men glanced at the other before Balton answered, “We have reason to believe that a body we recovered this morning is that of your husband, John Miller.”

A tense pause permeated the group.

“But John is inside sleeping.”

Their expressions didn’t change.

“You don’t believe me? I saw him right before I wa-“

No, she hadn’t seen him. She had averted her eyes from the disgusting sight she knew would greet her. Without another word she turned on her heel and walked the short distance back to the rental.

Opening the door, both she and the officers who had dogged her step could see the entirety of the home including the door that stood open leading to the bedroom. John was not on the premises.

“How odd.”

Now their expressions did change. Both sets of eyebrows rose in question. Wonderful. Apparently, that was not the reaction they had been looking for.

“He came home last night and fell asleep before midnight. I must have slept through him leaving again.”

Officer Balton nodded. “Must have.”

Pru wanted to ask several questions at once, but none seemed to make it past her lips.

“We understand you might be in shock ma’am, and we hate to do this to you, but we need a few questions answered.”

“The body you found was John?”

Yes, they had already established that. No, she was not keeping up.

“We are confidant, due to the wallet we found on his person and a picture we have on file, that the body we recovered is your husband.”

“And…he’s dead?”

Officer Balton had a look of extreme patience while Officer Chang stood stoically next to him.

“I’m so sorry for you loss Mrs. Miller.”

Her loss. Right.

“What happened?”

“From what we can tell, he was attacked off the side of a private road at approximately three a.m. this morning. You were not aware he was out?”

Pru thought that was obvious but she answered anyways. “No, I had gone to bed shortly after he…fell asleep.”

“Was it normal for him to come and go like that? I only ask so we can get a read on his movements.” He added the last part in as if he knew he was invading her privacy and he was sorry for it, but it wasn’t going to stop him from doing it.

“Yes, it was normal for him. He typically stayed out the entire evening but sometimes he came home then left again.”

Officer Chang held a small notepad and wrote all her responses down. Pru’s brain was still catching up, but she had seen enough cop movies to know her next line.

“Am I a suspect?”

Balton smiled and it crinkled the skin around his eyes making him appear kind. “We will obviously look into every detail, but at this point the case is leading us in a different direction.”

“And what direction is that?” She asked when he didn’t say anything more.

Both men held silent, so Pru continued, “If I’m not a suspect you must have some other avenue you’re searching.”

“We think it may have been someone wanting revenge for an indiscretion. We are looking into it, ma’am.”

“Why would you think that?”

Officer Chang spoke up for the first time with a look of impatience he did little to hide. “His manner of death, Mrs. Miller.”

“How did he die?”

Chang looked straight into her eyes as he answered, “His head was cut off.”

Fear skittered up Pru’s spine. Who would do that? It seemed extreme for a scorned husband. Everyone knew to watch their wives when John came around.

“That is partially why we ruled you out as a suspect, the cut was done with a smaller knife and it would take a lot of stre-“

Officer Chang cut his explanation short after a sharp look from his partner.

The men stayed for another quarter of an hour asking various questions about John’s frequent haunts and habits. Pru focused on each question trying not to think too much about what this meant.

John was dead. Later, Pru sat on a small part of the couch that didn’t reek of John and acclimated herself to the death of her husband. She would be lying if she said she was sad. Stunned was more the right word. John had lost his head. It kind of made her want to throw up.

A tether she had known was there but had always ignored broke apart at the realization that she had nothing keeping her here. Perspiration beaded on her brow. There was nothing tying her to this out of the way mountain town. She had been so sure that she didn’t want to leave. Then John had lost his head.

Now she wasn’t so sure.

The next month was a blur of paperwork and interviews and while Prudence was there physically, her brain was constantly thinking through the turmoil that kept her in that rental. As time went by it made less and less sense to stay there.

She needed to get out of the mountains. At twenty-three she still had plenty of time to restart her life. Her gut clenched at the thought of going out into the world alone. But the fear wasn’t strong enough to hide the anticipation of seeing something new, or being someone new. Maybe this time she could do better. Yes, the world was scary, but she wasn’t totally alone in it. 

The first thing that needed help was her confidence. Pru wasn’t going to get anywhere with her spirit broken by years of verbal abuse. She needed to embark on a self journey to find the Prudence that was shoved under the rug. She needed to find the Prudence that was strong enough to survive in the world.

The call to the police informing them of a change of residence was easier than she expected. Pru wanted to be available should they find anything new on her husband’s case, which had yielded few results. She told them she was going to stay with her parents in Arizona. At the last minute she changed her plans and decided to throw herself into the life she planned to lead. Her parents would have to wait. 

Pru started her first To Do list that day which helped her survive through the whirlwind of the following year. Eventually she had sold every crocheted blanket she owned and passed the keys to the landlord who had already rented it out to another young couple. More luck to them.

She told the police she would visit periodically to check on things but she had lied. She had no intention of returning this town. Prudence Miller could finally admit that she hated it and she hated her dead husband. Good riddance. It was time for a new beginning.

 

###

One year later- Present Day

Lucas stepped inside the black glass lobby, his appearance causing a wave of unease to crawl through the inhabitants. Sleek rafters rose above the mass of people moving about the entry hall preceding the headquarters of the largest company in the known world. Trinity.

His boots squeaked against the waxed marble as he made his way forward through the beings bustling in and out of elevators and staircases on either side. Some gawked at him while others did their best to ignore his large frame. The Demon paid no attention to any of the ogles. He was here for a meeting and Trinity’s employees could shove his lack of professional courtesy up their asses.

     Amidst the sea of pinstriped suits and pressed button ups, his black jeans and leather jacket wasn’t easy to miss, especially as they covered a 6’4 frame that owned any room he walked through.

     Once he stood in front of a high desk, a small woman looked over at him with a smile already in place. When she caught sight of him the hundred watt smile slipped. Her wide eyes took in his jet black hair and irises so dark they couldn’t be distinguished from the pupil. Lucas tried to smile and show a modicum of politeness but from the stretched look on her face he hadn’t managed it.

     They stared at each other for a moment before the receptionist realized it was her job to sign him in for an appointment.

She shook her head as if to clear it and asked, “Name?”

     “Lucas.”

     The woman clicked a few times on her mouse and a consternated look crossed her features. “I’m sorry; I don’t have you down for an appointment. Which department do you need?”

     “I need the top floor.”

     The slight widening of her eyes was the only hint she gave that his request was abnormal. “You need an appointment for that, sir. If you give me your card I can spea-“

     “Can’t we work something out,” Lucas glanced over at her name card, “Judy?”

His tight smile turned into a grin and he let sex appeal pour off him. Toying with her was much easier than being nice. Dropping one hand down on her side of the desk he let his fingers graze over her stapler before moving slowly to her pen cup. Picking a ballpoint up, Lucas trailed it down her jaw.

“It’s important that I speak with them.”

“B-but no one can go up there without strict permission from…” She trailed off as the pen moved across her lips. Heat and fear blazed in her eyes and the aroma of her lust made a very real smile cross Lucas’s face. He didn’t want her, but that wasn’t the point.

When Judy leaned forward into his caress, a throat cleared from the side of the desk. The receptionist snapped away from Lucas like someone had slapped her.

     “Again, I apologize Mr. Lucas, but without an appointment-“

“That would be Leraje, Judy.”

She stared at him, not comprehending.

“My name. Leraje. Mr. Leraje if you like, though that sounds worse than Mr. Lucas.”

Judy glanced back, eyes darting to the form that watched the interaction closely. “But you said your name was Lucas.”

“And so it is.” Lucas knew he shouldn’t be enjoying himself, but for an employee of the corporation Trinity, this girl was gullible. Most of them he ran into had hardened skin and lying mouths.

A frustrated sigh sounded from beside him, “Are you done playing with our employees, Leraje.”

Lucas thought Judy might cry in another moment, and though he was a b*****d, he tried to behave himself these days. If he didn’t, his conscience would repay him in kind.

Giving her a salute and receiving a glare in return, he turned his attention to the woman standing beside him.

“Themis.”

“Lucas. You’re late.”

“Your point?”

The Ether Angel’s gaze held his for a moment and he felt a subtle shifting in his mind as if a butterfly’s wings fluttered for a single second against his thoughts.

“Naughty, Themis. Last I checked the privacy of one’s mind was in the Bill of Rights.” By the miniscule narrowing of her eyes Lucas figured she had just realized that she wasn’t getting near his thoughts. He hadn’t lived a thousand years without learning a few tricks along the way.

“Last time I checked, that only pertained to humans.”

Lucas shrugged, ready to move on to the meeting. Themis looked geared up to commit murder before her face smoothed into a calm façade. He wasn’t fooled. Her shredded wings spoke volumes over her facial expression. The climb up Trinity’s ladder had to have been a brutal one as the prerequisite to join the ranks was to bathe in the blood of innocents. Lucas wouldn’t want to stroll through her nightmares. He could barely handle his own. He looked at her black pantsuit that fit like a glove and thought that maybe they were her dreams instead.

“Come, Leraje. They’re expecting you.”

Flipping long white hair over her shoulder, Themis walked through a back hallway out of the entry room. They passed Fern plants littered along a pathway covered in the same black marble that encased the entrance.

When they reached a key coded door, Themis slid out her identification card and let them through. They didn’t enter a room but another hallway that led off to another and turned to another. If a person didn’t know their way through this maze, they might never find the exit without help. Knowing whom Trinity employed, Lucas knew help would never come. Well, maybe Judy. She seemed to have a little humanity left in her. Enough to be gullible.

The Ether Angel continued to lead him through the maze of halls and though Lucas had been here a few times before, he recognized none of it.

They passed few people on their way. A suited man led a middle aged woman by them. When the man met Themis’s gaze, he rolled his eyes and pulled the woman forward. She must have been beautiful at one time, but a huge white bandage covered her eyes now. Lucas smelled the blood before he saw it oozing out of the bottom section on the dressing. A quick look at her wrists showed bruises. She had been restrained while they had hurt her.

“Was she defective?” Lucas asked once they had walked past.

“She lost her foresight months ago. We have been trying to catch up on our workload.”

Law required all Seers to register at birth in Trinity’s archives. When they reached puberty, their foresight kicked in and Trinity would take them for their own uses.

“If she lost her foresight, why take her eyes?”

“Research, Demon.”

Lucas quelled the urge to tell Themis to cancel his meeting with her bosses. He had been out of the assassin business for over two decades but Trinity had sent summons after summons and one could only be so rude to the three beings that had the potential to destroy anything they thought required it.

Before his forced retirement, Trinity had been his favorite company to work with. The sick b******s weren’t opposed to the roughest kind of treatment for those they wished dead. The more blood, pain and torture, the more money you received as payment. Lucas was honed in those things so the arrangement had worked well for him.

Now, heading back into business with them, conscience raging, Lucas knew this was a bad idea. He had convinced himself that they would want some big shot VP from an opposing team killed or a suit that had betrayed them. He had convinced himself that he could handle that. He was an idiot.

The minute he had agreed to hear them out, he had signed a contract of the mind. He would take the job unless there were extraneous circumstances that made it impossible. If there weren’t and he refused, they could lawfully send someone after him to beat his a*s. If they happened to kill him? Sucked for him. No one would avenge him against Trinity. Their word was law.

Deep down Lucas hoped that he wouldn’t find what he had to do disgusting. He hoped that he reveled in it. A mere quarter of a century before he would have.

The duo passed no one else before Lucas looked up and saw two sleek elevators doors. Themis touched the single black button on the wall beside the entrance and stepped back when the doors slid open to allow him to enter ahead of her.

Lucas didn’t move. He had lived long enough to know never to let a female such as this stand at his back. She would stab him for fun as surely as she would for vengeance.

Raising one hand from his side he said, “Ladies, first.”

Her marked hesitation showed the lack of trust between the two beings and no one could blame them. Her bosses were about to get him to sign a blood contract to murder a potentially innocent being. Those that murdered for money were never to be trusted because they had no honor left. Lucas would know. His honor had been stripped from him like pieces of skin following each of his jobs.

On the flip side, he would never trust Trinity. Rumors abounded about the Three. Hideous rumors that people rarely spoke of for fear of reprisal. Lucas listened to everything said and made sure to store it away to use when necessary.

Once Themis had stepped into the elevator she raised a single eyebrow challenging him to enter the compact space with her. A light, shuffling sound made Lucas pause mid-step, instinct had his head turning to the right.

The conscience that the Demon Leraje hid from the world at all cost started to burn as a human child, a boy, no older that five was dragged around the corner by an indistinct suit. The shuffling Lucas had heard came from the rags covering the child’s feet as they slid against the marble floor trying to dig into to the smooth surface.

The burn turned into a wild fire as he saw the child’ mouth open in a scream but he heard nothing. A simple spell put in place so no one grew disturbed by the child’s cries.

Yeah right. I’m disturbed just by looking at the kid. Maybe they should take my eyes too. 

Tears streamed down the dirty face while he fought against the male taking him forward. When the small gaze met Lucas’s in the corridor they now shared, Lucas took a step in his direction. Hope flared in the youngling’s eyes before it occurred to Lucas that he had no power here. He couldn’t help this young human.

Themis’s sharp voice reached him from inside the elevator. “That, Demon, is not your concern.”

The boy and the suit passed next to him making no more sound than when they first appeared. If Lucas looked away he could almost imagine the child had never existed. Almost.

“Where is he going?”

Themis didn’t answer.

“Damn it, what are they doing with him?”

For the first time since arriving Themis met his gaze, confused by his response. He had played his part well the last two decades. No one had ever suspected that someone as powerful and heartless as Leraje had been brought to his knees by a guilty soul.

“Why do you care?” She asked, curiosity sparking in her eyes.

This time Lucas didn’t answer. He shouldn’t care. He had spent hundreds of years teaching himself not to care. And it had worked. He had become a bloodthirsty SOB.

Stepping into the elevator without a backward glance, Lucas refused to feel the frustration that had plagued him from his inability to find the source or catalyst of his conscience clicking back on. In a single moment he had gone from Leraje, feared by all and master of the art of killing to Lucas, the confused half human who did his best to survive through the guilt that ruled his life.

Such. A. P***y.

When the elevator eased to a stop on the top floor, Themis motioned him forward before heading back down the way they came.

Lucas grumbled as he walked out, not bothering to glance back at her. “Do you people support any enterprise but torture here?”

As the doors closed behind him Lucas tried to put the pseudo angel from his mind. She meant nothing and yet she had caught on so quickly to his humanity. A disease he had tried everything to eradicate. For all his attempts to return to the monster he had been only twenty-four years ago, it looked as if his humanity was there to stay and in one brief hesitation in the instance of a child, a human child at that, he had given himself away. Not that Themis would look too closely. Lucas was sure she had people to crush or babies to eat or something else as reprehensible.

Walking forward, Lucas catalogued all his surroundings. Old stone walls, dust entering his sinuses upon each inhale, a putrid scent that was covered by mass amounts of oils and incense, all these things told him various characteristics about the three beings he would see shortly.

The large wooden hinged door at the end of the hallway loomed but he didn’t hesitate to breeze through uninvited. His b*****d father had taught him one thing that had held true through the centuries. One didn’t actually need power, only the impression of power. Leraje had a bit of both in him.

Lucas halted as he walked into a circular stone cavern that held two of the three CEO’s of Trinity. Fine suits covered their humanoid bodies but their faces were grotesque. Large fangs peeked out from their thin lips, but it was their eyes that made people cower in fear of them, or the place where eyes should have sat. In their stead were black holes made misshapen by the shadows around them. The two beings sat at ease by a conference table that seemed out of place in such an impressive room.

Lucas moved forward with no obvious hesitation. He was, after all, here at the Three’s invitation.

“Welcome, Leraje.” The form in a black on black Armani ensemble had spoke. Dracul, Lucas remembered.

Both rose to greet him with smiles, if you could call them that. These men were two of the most powerful people on Earth, with a third roaming around somewhere doing damn knew what. They had named the company they created centuries ago Trinity, to signify the three reigning sovereigns of it. Though the corporation was vital to the interworking of the world’s economy it was only a front to these men. The Three. The Damned Ones. The Godkillers.

Lucas walked forward and met them head on, reaching out a hand to shake each of theirs. A chill spread from their fingers to his, and he suppressed a shudder knowing that if he wanted to live through this job he needed to figure his s**t out.

He was f*****g Leraje. Screw conscience. If he wanted to work with these guys he needed to drop the nun act and get back to his roots.

Forcing himself to remember the past he grasped the one image he knew would harden his heart to the world around him.

An invisible fist squeezed his throat. Laughter and chanting reverberated through his ears. He couldn’t hear anything else. His small fists clutched the fresh dirt underneath him as a wave of pain shot through his mind. His father’s hot breath in his ear. “Trapped.” The urge to run faded from his limbs. Trapped. He was trapped forever.

But it hadn’t been forever. Hundreds and hundreds of years, yes. But not forever. Not anymore.

With a renewed sense of self, Lucas smiled back at the beings in front of him. They gestured to the other side of the table and he walked forward and lounged back into the chair.

“Aren’t there three of you?”

Their shared look made Lucas’s skin crawl, as they didn’t have any eyes to speak of, but it only registered in a back portion of his mind. The Demon in him was at the forefront now, even if he still looked human in outward appearance. If asked, he would never claim multiple personalities, but damn if the shoe didn’t fit. Maybe if he had a better upbringing he wouldn’t be so fucked up. As it was, part of him still enjoyed the thrill of the kill, and that part was from his father’s side. His mother’s side provided him his humanity. Humanity he had tried desperately to kill, if only to survive in the nightmare he had been trapped in. He had killed repeatedly since his retirement, but they had all been the scum of society, and always he would wake up the next morning and feel like s**t for it.

Lucas tried to imagine living with the murder of another innocent. His first kill after his transformation to neutered Demon had been horrendous. As he pushed his knife through the skin and sinew of a father of three girls who had been pinned for a hit by rival company, his own heart had tripped and a wrenching agony tore through him. Not killing. Murdering.

“He is indisposed at present, but might join us before the meeting is out,” Dracul said. The other occupant, Sethos, remained silent, eyes and smile vacant. Creepy.

Silence reigned momentarily.

Lucas tilted his head in question. “First of all, I’m curious why I’m seeing you today. I would have thought that hiring an assassin to do your dirty work would have fallen to a minor employee. Second,” he continued without pause, “when I don’t answer a summons, it’s because I don’t want the job.”

It was a brazen statement that might get him killed but he didn’t rescind it. These beings would only tolerate strength, if he hadn’t been convinced by his father’s teaching, what he saw on the trip up would have made him a believer.

Neither of them paused at his censure. They expected rash, willful Leraje to respond the way he did. Lucas wanted to snort at the thought. If they only knew. Leraje rarely picked his excursions nowadays and that was who they wanted to complete their job, whatever it was. Sucked for them that conscience friendly Lucas was in total control for the duration, even as Leraje jumped in, like now, his guilt meter waved true.

“We are speaking with you directly because the information is somewhat,” Dracul paused and rubbed his tongue over his teeth, “delicate. As for the other, we needed you. No other option is suitable.”

“Why me?”

“You’re the oldest, therefore, the best.”

Lucas didn’t quite conceal his sigh of resignation. “What’s the job?”

Sethos’s head turned to his partner as if he still possessed eyes to see him, and gave a nod of consent. Both beings sat back in their conference chairs and settled in for the meeting. Had they expected him to defy them? Perhaps they had heard rumors regarding him and his sudden exit from the game.

He reached to a spot behind his elbow on the table and grabbed a simple manila folder. With one hand he placed the folder in the center of the table and sat back.

Dracul spoke. “This is the job.”

Lucas reached forward and grabbed his future.

 

Author's Note

I'm concerned about the first chapter being a little slow, but it introduces the entire rest of the novel. My writing tends to strengthen as I go, and as this is the beginning, it probably needs the most help. Thanks!

Reviews

[Jason van Dongen]

Wow. I am blown away by the power of Lucas' voice, and I like the conflict between his heartlessness and his humanity. You write extremely well. If you are as good at the large brush-strokes (the theme, the plot, and the structure of your novel) as you are at the fine ones (the characters, the action, the dialogue), then I believe you have what it takes to be a successful author.

[Valerie Rian]

Thank you so, so, so much for the encouraging review! I hope I don't disappoint with later chapters :)

[zainul]

I guess it is alright.
You can improve it later if you feel like so.

[Valerie Rian]

Any suggestions on improvements?

[zainul]

I am reading it carefully to make specific comment for improvement.