Good Intentions (The Road to Hell Series, Book 1) (30 page)

River

Over the next week, I spent what little spare time I had alone concentrating on drawing out and controlling the pull of life. I didn’t tell Kobal that I’d discovered intense emotion was the key to getting it to work. I was looking forward to surprising him with my ability to control it and use it as a weapon.

On the field, when it was only the two of us, I didn’t hide I was getting better with it from him, I just didn’t reveal to him
how
much better I’d gotten. I’d reveal it to him before we left, in five days. It was all going by so fast, but the fact we were leaving soon was the only reason I had as much alone time as I did. Kobal’s attention had become focused on working with Mac on selecting the soldiers who would be leaving with us.

Now, I sat and watched the rigorous training those soldiers endured on the hill, wincing when they were repeatedly taken down by the demons who held nothing back from them as they did with the volunteers. The soldiers weren’t allowed to use guns, not now, but they wielded swords, katanas, knives, and any other weapon they could against the demons.

They were allowed to go after anything except for heads when they attacked the demons. Apparently, demon heads were the only things that didn’t grow back when lopped off. The discovery was both a little disconcerting and fascinating. It took a demon anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days to regenerate the lost piece of themselves, depending on the size of the missing body part and the strength of the demon.

Few of the humans managed to succeed in freeing a demon of their hand, arm, foot, or leg. The ones who did were instantly separated into another group. I believed it meant they’d gotten an upgrade on their chances of getting a trip to Hell. I wasn’t so sure it was a good thing, but then, they knew what they were signing up for. It had not been kept from them.

The last thing Kobal wanted were humans who preferred not to be on the mission. I thought he’d had enough of that with my start here, and they didn’t have the time to work with these soldiers that he’d spent with me. I still missed my brothers dearly, but I’d come to accept my place here and what I was. I may not have liked it in the beginning, but was being able to throw fire and draw on the life of things around me really so bad?

It would have actually been pretty freaking fantastic, if it hadn’t made me the spawn of Lucifer and the main hope for demons and humans to somehow right the wrongs the angels had started six thousand years ago, and the humans had escalated thirteen years ago.

I tried not to let my anxiety show, but the closer it came to the day when we would be leaving, the more doubt and terror ate at me. What if I wasn’t able to do anything with the gate? What if I failed? What then? What was Lucifer, the fallen angel who had created my line, like?

I hated that I was curious about him, but I couldn’t help it. If I failed to close the gateway, would I be expected to enter Hell and take Lucifer himself on? The idea made my pulse race and my mouth go dry.

I would do anything I could to keep my brothers safe from the horrors lurking on this side of the wall, but I wasn’t ready to die. However, I didn’t think there was any way I
could
survive a fight with Lucifer when millennia plus, regenerating, immortal demons hadn’t been able to take him out in six thousand years.

I shut the thought down; giving into the uncertainty trying to swamp me would do
no
one any good, least of all me. We still had to make it to the gateway before anything else could be a concern. That had to be my main focus, getting strong enough to travel through areas devastated by demons and nukes. It should be a piece of cake.

As the day for departure drew closer, messages were sent to the other demons at the other bases around the country. They were also preparing themselves and gathering humans to head into the deadened interior of our country.

So many would die if I failed. I had to get back to practicing. Rising to my feet, I wiped my ass off as I watched a pretty soldier with black hair, almond-shaped eyes, and a creamy complexion being led toward another soldier who had recently been separated from the main group. The woman nodded to the man with close-cropped black hair and a deep olive complexion.

Earlier, I’d watched the man succeed in slicing an ear from one of the demons. Now, a demon walked past the two human soldiers, holding his stumpy wrist. I couldn’t help but smile when the woman with almond-shaped eyes and black hair smiled with pride at the scowling demon. Her blue eyes twinkled in the sunlight shining down on her as she exchanged a high-five with the man with a swarthy complexion, black hair, and brown eyes.

Longing spread through me as I watched the easy comradery they shared. I’d had that with Gage and Lisa; I’d been accepted and loved. I had Kobal now. It wasn’t the same, but my love for him was growing every day, and I’d discovered a happiness with him that I hadn’t expected to find when I’d first arrived here. I belonged with him, but I still missed the simplicity and acceptance of those lost days with my family and friends.

I shook my head to clear it of the melancholy reflections and turned away from the training. Most of the volunteers were in class, learning more about the demons. I already knew far more about the demons than they did. Besides, I had my own learning and training to do.

I didn’t glance back at Bale and Verin as they followed me toward the tents. They must hate being stuck on guard duty, but this close to leaving, Kobal had no choice but to hand some of my care over to the others. No matter how much I told him I didn’t require a guard dog, he wouldn’t listen.

I’d resigned myself to being under constant watch until all of this was over. I refused to think about the possibility it might never end; I’d go nuts if I did.

Slipping into the tent, I let the flap fall behind me before hurrying to the room I shared with Kobal. Peace stole through me when I entered and inhaled the lingering aroma of him within it. Taking some time to steady myself, I allowed his scent to fill me and fuel my emotions as I moved about the space.

When I felt more centered, I knelt to rest my hand on the ground. My fingers slipped through the loose dirt to feel the pulse of life in the earth beneath my fingers. I shut off all thoughts of anything else and focused on picturing Kobal. I felt the searing heat of his body moving over mine, possessing me.

My breathing sped up, but not from my blooming passion; instead, it was from the increase of the pulse beneath my fingertips. Warmth slid up my fingertips, into my arm, and across my chest until it was pulsing through my body with every beat of my heart.

Lifting my other hand, I held it before me as the sparks flickered to life and increased. It felt as if the cells of my body were spreading out, flowing down into the dirt to gather more power and drawing it into me like the roots of a tree feeding from the earth. Like those roots, the cells sought to stabilize and strengthen me against the hazards the world would throw at me.

The warmth faded away to be replaced with the fiery heat of life. The sparks at the ends of my fingers increased until they were a glowing energy swelling before me. The energy spun, rising up until it became a ball of golden-white light hovering above my palm. The power of those crackling sparks danced across my cheeks and caused my hair to wave about my face.

Awe slid through me. I didn’t think I’d ever get used to this feeling. There was something so freeing yet so connecting about this. It made me feel like I was a part of every living thing on this earth and beyond it.

Small sparks shot off the sides of the ball, but for the most part, I kept the flow of life confined within my grasp. Kobal had seen me get to this part. What I hadn’t let him see was the ball spinning before me when I moved my fingers of the palm it hovered above. He’d yet to see me pull my other hand away from the earth and still manage to keep the ball formed before me.

Lifting my hands, the ball rose up then fell back down when I lowered them again. Digging my fingers into the earth once more, I pulled the ball of energy back into myself, flooding it down into the fingers of my other hand and back into the earth before dragging it forth once more to form another ball.

Rising, I held the ball before me, bouncing it as a child would bounce a ball within their grasp. Lifting it higher, I switched my grasp on it and drove it straight into the ground, returning it to its rightful place in the earth. Joy and disbelief went through me when I spotted the charred spot it had left on the ground; I’d never done
that
before.

A dangerous weapon indeed. I stared at the charred spot before kicking dirt over it to cover it before Kobal returned. He’d definitely be astonished when I showed him what I could do with it now. It would be better if I could get outside and really see what it could do. I had a feeling leaving charred marks in the earth was only the tip of the iceberg. I’d have to tell Kobal soon if I was going to get any real practice in with it before we left the protection of the wall.

The rustle of the buttons on the outer tent pulling apart drew my attention away from the freshly kicked dirt. My heart sped up as I listened to the flap settle into place again. Walking forward, I stepped into the main part of the tent. The light of the lanterns danced over Kobal’s face, illuminating his chiseled features and bringing to life the shades of mahogany brown and black in his hair. Had I really not considered him gorgeous at one time? Now I found him the most stunning man on the planet.

His eyes raked over me as I tugged my shirt over my head. It had been hours since I’d last seen him, far too much time as far as I was concerned. We could talk later; right now, all I wanted was to be in his arms.

I stripped off my shorts as I walked toward him. Over the past week, I’d realized if I wanted to continue to have clothes to wear, it would be wiser if I took them off before he could get his hands on me as he had a habit of tearing them from me. I was already wet for him by the time I reached him.

His eyes were the color of golden amber when he swept me into his arms and lifted me off the ground. Sparks shot to life at the tips of my fingers when he set me on the table and pulled my ass toward the end of it.

His large hands were tender when they pushed my thighs apart. His hungry gaze latched onto me. I became wetter at the ravenous gleam in his eyes as he stared at my sex. He hastily tore at the button of his pants, jerking them open and shoving them over his hips. Longing spread through my body when his erection sprang free.

“Mine,” I whispered as I brushed my fingers over the pulsing head and smoothed the bead of liquid forming there. I licked my lips with the urge to taste him.

“Always, Mah Kush-la,” he breathed hoarsely in my ear before driving himself into me with a low groan.

My legs wrapped around his waist, and I lost all reason when his body took possession of mine.

River

“Well, aren’t you an interesting little tidbit.”

I frowned at the voice whispering at me from the darkness. Turning, I tried to find the source of that voice, but the cavern I stood in held only shadows and secrets. I sniffed the air as the scent of rocks and something more, fire perhaps, drifted to me. Where was I?

Certainly not in camp anymore. Was this another dream? It had to be, but it was unlike any I’d ever experienced before. I sensed it was a dream built on a connection, but those had always involved someone I knew or at least a place I knew. I had no idea who had spoken and I’d certainly never been here before.

Despite the shadows, heat pressed against me. Sweat trickled down my temples and cleaved my shirt to my body. It wasn’t unbearable, but it was still hotter than anything I’d ever encountered before.

Hotter than Hades. And then it hit me. I tried to show no reaction to my realization, but my fingers twitched involuntarily. I knew whose voice it had been, who was standing in the darkness. I could feel his eyes on me, burning into my flesh.

“I can’t say the same about you, since I can’t see you,” I said with far more bravado than I felt for someone standing within the Devil’s dream.

A chuckle emanated from my right. Turning, I watched as the shadows coalesced around the being stepping from them. The gloom hugged him within its grasp before reluctantly releasing him. I couldn’t stop my eyes from widening on the man who emerged.

He was nearly as tall as Kobal as his head almost brushed against the rocks above him. Black hair fell in waves to the collar of his shirt and about his face. Features chiseled into perfection kept me riveted upon a face so flawless it could only be the face of an angel.

I’d never seen anything as beautiful as this man, or so distantly cold. He robbed the breath from my chest as the heat encompassing the room faded away to become filled with the iciness radiating from him.

His black eyes surveyed me from head to toe and back again. “Daughter,” he greeted.

“Lucifer.”

A muscle twitched in his cheek, and his eyes narrowed subtly; apparently he really didn’t like his angelic name. Go figure the Devil would be pissy about a name when he had so many of them.

Something rippled behind him, drawing my gaze to the coal black wings I hadn’t noticed amongst the darkness embracing him. Sensing my attention to them, a smile curved his mouth before he unfurled his wings. I gasped when they spread around him, nearly brushing the walls on either side of him. Each of them had to span six feet off of his towering frame.

There was nothing angelic about these wings, from their black color to their almost bat-like form. Where were the feathers? These were more like scales. No, not scales; if there had ever been feathers on them, they were gone. Now all that remained was a leathery blackness, which I realized wasn’t solid as my gaze fell on the veins running beneath the flesh. Those veins pulsed black blood through them as I watched.

At the center of the top of each wing was a spiked, almost foot-long silver point, one I knew he could drive straight through my eye and out the other side of my head without so much as blinking. The bottom tip of each wing had another long point. When he took a step closer to me, those points clicked off the rock floor in a way that made the world lurch threateningly.

How could someone be so beautiful yet so twisted?

“What is your name, child?”

I didn’t respond; I far preferred it if he never knew my name. Thankfully, his attention was distracted when his gaze fell to my neck; an eyebrow rose as his head tilted to the side. “Who has marked you, child?” he inquired. “Who thinks to claim you without asking for your hand first?”

I took a step away from him as he drew closer. I didn’t know if I could die in these dreams, and I didn’t want to find out. “Demons are beneath us, daughter. You would do far better with one of
my
men than with one of
them
.”

“I’ll choose my own man, but thanks for the concern,” I replied.

I took a startled step back, turning to the side when one of those wings shot out. I felt the air of it against my skin as my hair blew in the breeze it had created. The rock beneath my feet cracked when the bottom tip embedded itself into the ground with a solid thud, effectively cutting me off from going that way. I didn’t think there was any chance of me going anywhere with him in this room with me.

“
Who
has marked you?” he hissed.

Everything in me screamed to keep it a secret, one I would take to my grave if it turned out he could kill me in these strange dreams. Kobal had said every demon would know I was his, but Lucifer wasn’t entirely a demon. Or maybe he did know and was just toying with me.

Leaning closer to me, I heard his sharp intake of breath as he inhaled deeply. I could feel the evil emanating from him in waves that beat against my skin and rattled my bones. Maybe Kobal didn’t think of good and evil as I’d always thought of them, but this man was evil incarnate. I had no idea if he’d been this way before he’d been thrown from Heaven, or if he’d become twisted and broken by his fall, but he was definitely evil now.

When he pulled away from me, a malicious smile curved his lips. His eyes sparkled in a way I hadn’t believed possible for one such as him. “Interesting,” he murmured and licked his lips. “I could not have
chosen
a finer daughter than you.”

I resisted the impulse to rub my hands over my chilled flesh.
He knows
. Perhaps there was more demon in him than any of us realized if he’d been able to sense it was Kobal’s mark on me.
This is bad, very, very bad.

He yanked the pointed tip from the earth and retreated a few steps. The wings folded behind his back once more so all that showed were those lethal, silver tips above his broad shoulders. Those icy black eyes surveyed me from head to toe again before he turned to retreat into the shadows.

“Wait!” I cried.

His head turned, and his gaze found me over his shoulder. “Yes, daughter.”

I shuddered at the realization this man saw me as his child as much as the demons did. I didn’t kid myself into thinking he wouldn’t kill me because of it; he may kill me just
because
of it.

“Why did you bring me here?” I demanded.

There was that smile again. “Oh,
my
child, in this it was
you
who finally sought to meet your creator.” He turned back to me and took a step forward. “Every child is curious about their father after all.”

Sickness twisted in my gut.
I
had brought
him
to me! I wanted to deny his words, but I couldn’t shake the certainty they were true. “You are not my father.”

“Am I not? You would not be standing here if not for me. The powers you possess were given to you through me. You are
my
offspring and, therefore, part of me resides in you. The more those powers grow, the more they will eat at you until one day it will be you standing within these cavern walls.”

“I will
never
be anything like you.”

“Will you not? You’re only beginning to tap the potential of your power.”

One wing flowed forward. The deadly point tapped against his temple much like a person would do with a finger. I realized those wings were as much an extension of him as my own hands were of me.

“The stronger your powers get, the more they will consume you, and when they do, they will take
him
too. There is finally one who can bring Kobal down, and it is
you
. I’ve seen glimpses of your future, child, and it is
interesting.
”

“You’re lying!” I accused.

“Like your powers, the stronger your bond becomes with him, the more it will threaten him. When those powers twist you, and they will, he will be dragged down with you. Angels and demons do not see the world in good and evil. I was born to set them free, and I will set them all free. I will show them they were wrong and you will be standing at my side when they learn of pure
evil
. What is inside of me is also inside of you.”

“No,” I choked out through the constriction in my chest. His words so closely echoed my own doubts and fears that no matter how much I tried to shake them off, they dug deeper into me. “No.”

“You will help me to take down the only one who has managed to elude me.”

“Lies, it’s all lies. You’re wrong. We’re stronger together.”

His smile grew, and the points of his wings tapped together when he ruffled them. “Are they lies? And are you stronger? Maybe if you were a demon, but you’re not. You are
my
child and the creatures from this abysmal place have no idea what to make of us, but they will. The apple does not fall from the tree, River, ask Eve. I will be sending you a gift, child, look for it.”

Before I could respond, the shadows enveloped him once more and he vanished from view.

***

Kobal

River bolted upright so fast in bed that she wrenched herself from my arms when she leapt to her feet. I shot up, tossing the covers aside while she spun in a circle around the tent. Her eyes frantically searched for something as sparks shot from her fingertips.

“What is it?” I demanded.

“Lucifer.”

Seizing her shoulders, I drew her flush against my chest as my fangs burst free and my claws extended. “Where?” I snarled. She trembled against me before shaking her head. “Where, River?”

“Dream, it was a dream,” she murmured as her head fell forward and she rubbed at her temples.

Keeping hold of her shoulders, I pulled her away from me a little to take her in. She looked hollower somehow as her freckles stood starkly out against her ashen complexion and shadows encircled her eyes.

“You dreamt of him?” I asked.

“Nearly as tall as you, black hair, black eyes, beautiful. Has black wings with spiked points in the middle and two more at the bottom tips. Thinks I’m his child too. If that’s him, then yes, I dreamt of him.”

My blood ran cold as she spoke, and my fingers dug deeper into her bare shoulders. I forced my claws to retract before I pierced her flesh. Brushing the hair back from her cheeks, I clasped them in my hands and lifted her face. Her lower lip quivered when her gaze met mine. The panic in her violet eyes unnerved me.

“What happened?” I asked as calmly as I could, sensing she required my composure more than anything right now. “Tell me everything.”

“He
knew
it was you who marked me!” she gushed out.

“Most likely,” I replied casually.

Inside, I felt anything but casual. The hounds stalked within me, demanding to be set free, to kill, rend, and tear apart any risk to her. They couldn’t know the threat had been her dream and there was nothing here for them to fight. If I set them free, they would rip through this town, shredding anyone who stepped in their path, much like I yearned to do. I didn’t care who it was, I had to feel their blood on my hands, had to kill something in order to unleash some of this savagery building within me.

Her hand on my cheek drew my attention to her. I didn’t realize my fangs and claws had extended again until her finger brushed over the tip of one of my upper fangs. My lips skimmed back, not in anger but with need. I could kill, or I could take
her
and ease what was inside of me.

“He’ll use me against you,” she whispered as she pressed her naked body closer to mine.

As my Chosen, she would sense what I needed most now, though there would be no denying it as my hardened shaft pressed against her belly.

“He’ll never get the chance to try,” I assured her as I guided her toward the bed.

“He saw evil in my future, and I don’t care what you say Kobal, that man is
evil
. He is everything humans ever believed him to be.”

“He lied.”

“But what if he didn’t?” she asked.

I froze before I could nudge her thighs apart. Her terror beat against me. River had
never
been scared of anything, not even when she should have been. She’d never feared me, but then she may have sensed from the beginning she was to be mine.

“Do not fear him.” It came out as more of a command than I’d intended.

“I’m not afraid of him,” she whispered. “I’m afraid he’s right. I am his offspring. You all claim he’s my father. He was once an angel, and now he’s a monster. I am no angel, Kobal. I’m no saint. What if my future is what he predicted? He said the more my powers grow, the more they’ll eat at me until I’m twisted like him, and then I would bring you down with me! He said the stronger the bond becomes between us, the more it will endanger you. Angels and demons don’t see the world in good and evil, and because of that, he said he was born to set you all free, and
I
will be standing at his side when it happens.”

“River—”