Page 37 of Hell Hath No Fury (Tear Down Heaven #4)
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A DRIAN’S TRIP INTO THE Hells was not going as planned.
He’d thought he was finally making progress when Prince Demetrios led him out of the war-demon-only Upper Hells into a white tower at the center of a gigantic cavern.
The Hell of War had felt more like the Holy City’s basement with all its loyal demons toiling away without even a warlock to oversee them. This, though, this was the real deal.
Adrian had noted the security bells and armed war-demon guards the moment they’d stepped out of the connecting tunnel onto the white platform of the tower’s top floor observation room.
The air down here was even smokier than it was upstairs, but unlike the forge-warmed Hell of War, the Middle Hells were as cold and damp as a winter well.
He could see why, too, when he looked through the observation room’s big glass windows.
The floor of the giant Middle Hells cavern was covered in half a foot of standing water.
It looked like a giant rice paddy filled with chained slaves kneeling in rows, running their hands through the dark, stagnant water like they were searching for frogs.
“What are they doing?”
“Collecting humanity’s sins,” Prince Demetrios answered in a disgusted voice. “Heavenly King, did they teach you nothing in the Blackwood?”
Not about this. Even the demons didn’t talk about the Hells if they could avoid it, but Adrian had never been more excited to be in such a terrible place.
It was obvious that they’d just entered the heart of Gilgamesh’s demon exploitation machine.
If the Queen of Pride—and more importantly, Bex—was imprisoned anywhere, it would be somewhere like this.
The cat-shaped finding spell was going nuts in his pocket, too, which meant he had to be getting close.
He just needed to ditch his escort so he could follow the signal, but before Adrian could launch into his prepared speech about how boring this next part was about to be and how the Prince of Hate really didn’t need to stick around, he’d been bowled over by an eager crowd of smiling men in stuffy white robes.
He’d been trapped ever since. Apparently, princes who weren’t in disgrace never came to the Hells. This meant the warlocks working down here never got the chance to suck up, and these men weren’t about to let an opportunity like Adrian pass them by.
They’d been lining up to shake his hand for the last fifteen minutes.
He’d thought the actual Prince of the Hells would put a stop to it since all the brown-nosing was slowing them down, but Demetrios had just leaned against the wall to enjoy the show like a bully watching a hazing.
Even the princesses kept their distance.
Hate was straining at the end of her chain like always, but the fake Bex was beaming with pride at the sight of Adrian finally getting the attention a son of Gilgamesh deserved.
It was hell. Every time Adrian finished shaking one batch of hands, another group of warlocks ran up the steps to accost him.
He’d done his best to stay polite—not because slavers deserved politeness but because he was on a mission that was going to get even harder if he pissed off the local security—but Adrian was rapidly losing his patience.
It didn’t help that the finding spell was kicking him constantly in his chest, urging him to action he couldn’t take.
He was about to give up and play the “I’m a super-important son of Heaven, don’t touch me” card when Demetrios suddenly bolted out of his slouch like he’d been stung.
A heartbeat later, Adrian saw why. Prince Demetrios had lost his grip on the chained Princess of Hate.
She raced down the spiral staircase with a screech, bowling over warlocks to reach the tower’s open center.
The moment she had open air in front of her, she jumped, falling the final five floors down the middle of the spiral stairs to land at the bottom of the tower like a princess-shaped sack of bricks.
The crash when she hit shook the entire tower, but the chained Princess of Hate didn’t even seem to notice.
She just started punching the floor, kicking the elegant white security desk—along with the warlock who’d been sitting at it—out of the way so she’d have more room to work.
Her prince was racing down the stairs to get her back under control when the whole bottom level of the security tower exploded in a storm of raging magic.
Extremely familiar magic.
It rushed over Adrian like the wind before a thunderstorm, filling his lungs with the cool, wet, woodsy smell of the forest. Warlocks were screaming all around him about the hole the explosion had just blown through the bottom of their tower, but Adrian could barely hear them through the sudden, bittersweet wave of homesickness.
For one glorious second, it truly felt as if he was back in his own Blackwood with the soft loam under his boots and the rustle of leaves in his ears.
The feeling was so vivid, his hands went up of their own accord to touch the branches he could almost see waving above his head.
He was still reaching in vain when something real and hard slammed into his palms instead, and Adrian snapped out of his haze to see he was clutching a broomstick topped with the carved likeness of a raven.
“Bran?” he said, blinking his mirrored eyes rapidly. “Is that—”
The broom yanked him off his feet before he could finish asking such a stupid question.
Also just in time to avoid the Princess of Wrath, who was leaping down the stairs to grab him from behind.
Her white fingers actually brushed the hem of Adrian’s coat before Bran snatched him high into the air.
Much higher than was necessary, Adrian thought, until he heard a new voice shouting words through the chaos.
It sounded like Ancient Sumerian. That wasn’t unusual in Gilgamesh’s domain, but Adrian didn’t understand enough of the language to know what was being said or who was saying it.
His best guess was that one of the overseers was throwing out some magic of their own, but this turned out to be only half correct.
The words were sorcery, but they hadn’t come from Gilgamesh’s people.
This ringing voice was speaking from inside the hole the explosion of witchcraft had just put in the tower’s foundation, which wasn’t actually a foundation at all.
It was the sealed-off entrance to another flight of stairs.
A detail Adrian could now see clearly from his new position high in the air as the incantation reached its completion, and a giant bull made from smoke and sorcery bashed its way through what was left of the floor to trample the chained princess.
The entire tower dissolved into chaos after that. Dangling from his broom’s handle, Adrian had a perfect view as all the white-robed warlocks who’d swarmed him earlier started to flee. The sorcerous bull charged after them, galloping up the spiral staircase and breaking everything in its path.
The flying pieces of desks, chairs, and filing cabinets would have gone through Adrian like shrapnel if Bran hadn’t jerked him out of the way.
The broom did a barrel roll next, flipping himself over so that Adrian ended up sitting in his normal position on the back of the broomstick.
He was still catching his balance when Bran suddenly dove for the ground, swooping like a falcon through the clouds of dust to pick up the fluffy black cat who’d just climbed out of the broken floor.
“Boston?” Adrian said, releasing his death grip on the broom’s handle to rub his eyes and make sure he wasn’t dreaming. “Is that really you?”
“Who else would it be?” the cat replied smugly, puffing out his chest as he hopped into his usual position on Bran’s handle. “Surely you don’t think a little thing like death could prevent a familiar of the Blackwood from finding his way back to his witch?”
He sounded insufferably pleased with himself. For once, though, Adrian didn’t mind at all. “ I’m so happy to see you! ” he cried, lurching forward to pull Boston into a hug. “But what are you doing in the Hells?”
“Looking for you,” Boston said, rubbing his head against the underside of Adrian’s chin. “This is a rescue! Now let’s get out of the way and give our allies some room.”
Adrian’s hopes had never risen so far so fast. He actually felt physically dizzy as he signaled Bran to whisk them back up to the top of the security tower’s spiral stairwell.
They’d just made it to what Adrian considered the minimum safe distance when Iggs stepped out of the dusty chasm left by the sorcerous bull.
It really shouldn’t have been a surprise.
If Boston had come for him, of course Bex’s demons would be here to save her.
Knowing that didn’t stop Adrian’s heart from hammering below its tree, though, especially when he saw the chained Princess of Hate emerge from the pile of rubble the magical bull had left behind.
“ Iggs! ” he shouted through the dusty air. “ Watch out! She’s…”
His voice trailed off in shock as Iggs reached into the ancient-looking knapsack he was wearing on his shoulder and pulled out the biggest gun Adrian had ever seen.
It looked like the sort of thing that was normally bolted onto helicopters, not carried by people, but Iggs was no ordinary person.
He was a demon of Wrath, and he looked every inch the part as he planted his boots on the rubble-strewn ground and began unloading the machine gun’s belt into the charging Princess of Hate