Devil Ash Deceit (Devil Ash Saga) (30 page)

“I wish Wilhelm would take the throne back from that slob, Al,” the men continued chatting.

“Did you hear about how he won his wife?”

“Do tell!”

“Shakti never wanted to marry Al. Who would? It was her parents that offered her hand in marriage when the King happened to spot her in the courtyard one day. He fell in love at first sight, and her parents were willing to offer their only daughter to get into the Royal family.”

“That’s a real shame.”

“A shame that Al’s bloodline won’t end with him!”

“You can already tell that child is going to end up just like his
idiot
father.”

Darko could take no more and leapt out from the bushes. He landed on top of one of the men and started biting his ear. The man screamed, and his companion helped pull the young Prince off. Royal Guards moved in and helped contain the young biting Prince.

After a lengthy lecture (and another good slap upside his head) from his mother, Darko was sent to bed early with no supper. That night he twisted and turned in bed, stewing in paranoia. That was the first time he ever heard anyone speak ill of his father. He didn’t even know people
could
talk about the King like that. He fantasized about being King and how he would handle people who spoke about him in such a way. He dreamed about torturing the men violently until they died a very slow and painful death.

His thoughts turned to his new sibling. His mother confirmed it in her lecture, citing her hesitation to tell him as reasoning behind Darko’s sudden outbursts. When Darko asked if they knew if the baby would be a boy or a girl, Shakti shook her head. She told him there was no way to know until the baby comes in a few months. Staring at his mother, Darko couldn’t help but remember something the men had been saying.

Shakti never wanted to Marry Al
!

Darko realized he only saw his parents together when it was for some special event. Only when they were in front of the crowds did they appear affectionate towards each other. Behind the scenes, in the privacy of their family life, the vibe was totally different. His mother would always stand so far away from him... Darko didn’t yet know how parents made babies, but he imagined it couldn’t of been much fun for mommy if she didn’t like daddy.

That baby presented another problem. What if what the men were saying was true? What if the people end up liking the new Prince more, and people wanted him to be the King next instead? Darko knew that would mean being cast aside. He grew fearful that a future son would replace him by the people’s demand.

The next day, Darko launched a new initiative: to change people’s minds about how they viewed the Prince. He wandered the halls in the early hours when the Royal Guard members were changing shifts. The young Prince would pat each of them on the back and say pleasant things like “good work out there boys” and “the future King of Hell appreciates your hard work!”

He moved on to another part of the castle where a group of servants were walking. The Prince started running towards them, but the adults caught on and sped away. He called out that he only wanted to help them, but they didn’t even turn around to look at him. His next attempt at helping someone would be his last.

He saw a Royal Guard drop his sword and bend over in pain. Darko took the opportunity to rush over and pick up the sword, handing it back to the guard. “Here you go!” Darko said, forcing a childish smile. The soldier locked eyes with the Prince, and the boy realized he knew this man. The hundreds of tiny cuts on the man’s face were what gave it away. It was the Prince’s sharp sand victim from the other day.

“
Little demon
!” he shouted, snatching his sword from the Prince. The soldier leaned in close to Darko and whispered. “
I hope they have a new Prince to replace you
.” He forced himself to stand up and storm away, leaving Darko on the verge of tears.

The Prince spent the next few hours in his room crying. It was then that he was struck with a genius idea.
If another boy is born, all I have to do is kill him while he’s still a baby! If he never grows up, they won’t like him better than me!

Darko harbored these feelings for the remaining months of his mother’s pregnancy. At last, the day came when he was informed: his mother went into labor in the middle of the night. His new sibling had been born! All those feelings of paranoia and hatred came rushing back to him, and Darko remembered his vow to kill the baby if it turned out to be a boy.

The King and Queen kept the gender of the baby a tight-lipped secret in those first few hours. Only two servants and the King were allowed in the room during the birth, and those two servants were sworn to secrecy under penalty of death. The only way Darko was going to figure out the gender was by going straight to the source. He took off towards the private birthing room to find out if he would have to murder his new brother.

A lone servant stood outside the room, keeping anyone who would try to peek in and get a glimpse of the new royalty out. He was told to allow Darko to enter, however, and the boy slipped right past him. In the dim room, his mom lay on a small bed, covered up to her waist with blankets. Cradled in her arms was the tiny new sibling.

So small,
Darko thought.
So weak!

Shakti told her son to enter and sit on the bed with her. The boy crawled up next to his mom and hugged her, staring down at the new baby. He hadn’t seen many babies before, and could not tell by the face if it were a boy or girl.

“What is it?” he asked, confused. “Boy or girl?”

“I can’t tell you, sweetie,” Shakti said. “When people find out, it’s going to cause a commotion. I’m not ready to deal with that just yet. But I will tell you your new sibling’s name if you promise not to repeat it to anyone.”

“I promise! Please tell me!”

“
Shiva
,” Shakti said, her voice full of love as she stared down at the red-haired baby cradled in her arms.

* * * *

Darko had no idea what gender the name Shiva belonged to. He went to bed that night still wondering, hoping it wouldn’t take long to find out. While he was in bed pondering it over, a different sort of evil was making its way undetected through the castle halls. The creature in question climbed along the walls and ceiling, avoiding any guards positioned on the ground.

How did such an odd sight pass by hundreds of guards undetected? There was no sight to be seen. The demon was equipped with a unique ability called camouflage. It could change the colors of its body to blend in with anything, even the walls and ceiling. This sneaky demon made its way toward the private birthing room, where it could smell the delicious scent of newborn devil. The creature’s forked tongue flicked out of its mouth, tasting the late night air. Its tongue was the only thing that wasn’t camouflaged, and could be seen if anyone were around to see it.

Darko decided he could wait no longer to find out the baby’s gender. The thoughts of murder were eating away at him now, and he just had to go peek in on his mom and the new baby. He hoped he could catch them while they slept. The Prince got out of bed and left his room, trembling with nervous excitement.

On the opposite side of the castle, outside the Queen’s private room, a pair of toothy jaws appeared floating above the lone servant standing there. The servant was beginning to nod off, completely unaware as the jaws clamped down around his head. He struggled, but made no sounds besides stomping his feet. His body was pulled up and disappeared into thin air.

Darko walked through the castle lobby, noticing the guards posted there looked tired and groggy. He walked around the staircase to the unguarded pedestal were Infernos was displayed. With a wicked smile, Darko repeated his plan to pull the sword out. Stepping on the base of the pedestal gave him an extra inch of height, and he managed to slide the sword out with no problems…almost.

The sword was heavy, and would have crashed to the floor and created a racket if not for Darko’s quick thinking. The Prince gripped the hilt as tight as he could and fell back with it. His body absorbed all the force of the fall, and the blade didn’t crash down on the floor or make a single sound. The boy counted his luck as a positive sign and continued to creep silently towards his mother’s room, struggling to carry with him the giant weapon.

There was no longer anyone standing watch in front of the Queen’s room. The demon snuck in through the door completely unnoticed as the Queen slept. The baby cradled in her arms was silently sleeping as well. It was almost too easy. The pair of jaws became visible, opening right next to the little baby’s head. The demon was only seconds away from biting down on the child, but a sound coming from the hallway gave it pause.

It sounded like metal being dragged across stone. The demon froze in place as the sound came nearer. It was right outside the room when it stopped. A second later, the door creaked open and little Darko’s head popped into the room. In the dim light, the little boy saw the large set of jaws hovering close to his mom. The Prince paused.

“
Teeth
?” he said, confused.

Before the boy could make any more noise to ruin the moment, the demon sprang forward. All Darko saw was an open mouth flying at him, with rows of sharp teeth about to bite down. That didn’t happen, as the demon was blasted from behind with a fireball. The demon fell to the stone floor in front of Darko, it’s camouflage ability turning off to reveal the monster.

The creature looked like an enormous lizard, but its head resembled a snake. Darko turned his attention to his mom, the one who threw the fireball. She cradled baby Shiva in her arms, who was beginning to stir and whine.

“Darko, run!” Shakti shouted. But the boy was frozen in terror. He’d never seen a demon up close before. The creature shot back up on its feet and evaluated the situation. The boy was nothing more than a pest, it decided. It would need to deal with the mother, who acted as the protector and only true threat.

The demon flipped around and faced Shakti. She readied another fireball in her hands. “Go, now!” she shouted at her son. Darko heeded her call and closed the door. Shakti lobbed fireballs at the creature, but once it activated its camouflage again she lost sight of it. Still in bed gripping baby Shiva, who was now crying, Shakti tossed flames all over the room looking to get a lucky hit on the invisible demon.

In the hall, Darko panicked. He managed to calm himself down and think. This could work out perfectly for him if his new brother died in a demon attack… And he could bust in just in time to help save his mom! He’d be a hero! Everyone would love him! It was a crazy, terrible plan but it worked in his childish mind. Gripping the massive sword that he couldn’t even properly lift, Darko flung the door open and entered the room again.

What he saw didn’t make any sense. His mother sat in bed peacefully, still gripping his shrieking sibling. Half of her head was missing though. Everything above her mouth appeared to have turned invisible. Streams of blood trickled down her cheeks and mixed with tears. She could no longer move her body.

“
Darko, is that you
…?” Shakti asked, her voice only a dying whisper.

“It’s me mom!” Darko shouted. “Don’t die!”

“You have to be strong, Darko,” Shakti whispered. The demon chomped down further on her, and her mouth disappeared before leaving one last cryptic message. “Become strong enough to…-” her words ended there as her entire head disappeared. Shakti’s body went limp, and the crying baby in her arms fell to the stone floor.

The demon let go of the woman. Now dead, she would cause no more problems. The baby was noisy, but he would take care of the boy first. If he ran, he might cause problems. The baby would have to wait to be eaten in a minute.

The Prince felt a jolt of something he had never felt before. It was a stabbing sharp pain to his heart, similar to how he felt when those men had talked about his father. It was the pain of witnessing his mother die right in front of him, her last words burned into his mind. Somewhere in his subconscious, his body tapped into the hidden power of the Satan bloodline.

Those with Satan blood flowing through them are always mighty warriors, even from birth. For King Al Satan, that power had never awoken. But for Darko, that time came now. With the hero’s sword in his hands, the boy overflowed with wild soul power. As the demon lunged forward, the boy swung the sword with all his might. He kept his eyes closed the whole time, and when next he opened them he saw the demon impaled on the end of his blade.

It appeared dead for a moment, and then sprang back to life snarling at the Prince and trying to grab him with its long claws. Another ability of Darko’s activated abruptly, and a huge burst of flames escaped from Darko’s hands. The flame was channeled through the tiny holes in the hilt of Infernos, through the sword and out several vents along the edge of the blade. The demon burned alive from the inside out.

The young Prince’s soul power vanished in an instant and he dropped the heavy blade. Everything was eerily quiet, save for the sound of the baby crying and several voices from far off outside the room. Darko wiped the tears from his face and tried not to look at his mother’s unmoving body.

The boy could no longer ignore the horrid sounds coming from the crying baby on the floor. It was that sound that snapped him back into reality. At once, he remembered his plan. Now might be his only shot at eliminating the newborn Prince that would replace him. He had to move quickly and carry out his plan.