Darren Shan - Demon Thief

The demon stops squealing and glares at me. He looks like he plans to attack, but then, surprising me, he takes a step back—on to the river of lava. Steam rises from the demon’s feet, and seconds later they burst into flames. But the hell-child only laughs and blows on them, extinguishing the fire. With a grin at me, he skips across the forty or fifty feet width of the river, jumping off at the other side, only the top of his head visible now.

I stop at the lava’s edge. The heat is incredible. I feel my skin redden. I use magic to cool it, but even with the help of magic it’s hard to bear. I stare at the lava uncertainly. If the hell-child was able to skip across, I probably can too. But what if I can’t? What if my magic fails me? If I venture out on to the lava, and things take a turn for the worse, I’m finished. This body will rot away and Lord Loss will imprison my soul.

Trying to work up the courage to test the lava. I look left and right, in case there’s some other way to cross, like a bridge or tunnel—but there’s nothing. The river stretches as far as I can see in both directions.

As I’m looking around, my eyes flick up to see what the sky is like. But instead of a sky, I find myself gazing at the hideous face of Lord Loss! It’s huge, filling my entire field of vision. He’s laughing, though I can’t hear him. I freeze, horrified by his immense red eyes, the pores and cracks in his skin, which look like moon craters and valleys when magnified to this extent. Then he pulls back and Beranabus replaces him. He’s almost as ugly when seen from this perspective.

The magician is shouting at me, pointing with a finger the size of a battering ram. It takes me a few seconds to realise he’s gesturing to a spot behind me—trying to warn me! I whirl defensively, but too late. I catch sight of a winged demon with a red, lumpy body, hurtling at me through the air. I duck instantly, but the demon has judged its flight perfectly. It hits me hard in the chest, driving me off my feet, backwards—into the river of molten lava.

Searing heat. I scream and thrash, splashing lava up into the air. I go under, immersed in the fiery liquid, feeling it fill my mouth, nose, ears, burning away the soft flesh of my lips and ear lobes, destroying my eyelids, setting to work on the jelly-like globes of my eyes.

I come up. Spit out lava. Scream again, tongue crackling, throat pinched tight, sizzling eyes wide with terror. I don’t try using magic to protect myself. Panic has taken over. I’m helpless. Caught by the river. Lost.

I start to sink. My legs kick out automatically, like when I’m swimming, to keep my head up. Gasping for air. I feel my toes burning away, and the acid of the lava eats its way through the wall of my stomach. A few more seconds and it’ll all be over. I’ll just be scraps of flesh and bone smeared across the surface of the river—then nothing.

I hear a shout to my left, but I’m not able to look round. I’m going under. No lower legs left to kick with. Bones are showing through the flesh of my fingers. The skin of my throat is peeling back like burning paper.

Then hands snake around the remains of my chest and I’m hauled out of the lava. My lidless eyes focus blearily. It’s a woman, her face contorted by my ruined eyes. She’s yelling, but my ears are full of lava. I can’t hear what she’s saying.

The woman pulls what’s left of me free of the river and races with me to the bank, dumping me on hard, cold land. Falls beside me, her feet and shins on fire. She slaps at the flames, then stops, stares, quenches them with magic.

I’m bubbling away to nothing beside her, covered with lava that’s still eating through my flesh. When the woman has put out her own flames, she turns her attention to me. Shouts the words of a spell and waves a hand over me. The lava explodes off me in splatters, out of my nose, mouth and ears. I take an unbelievably welcome breath of air, then cry out my agony to the world.

“Kernel!” the woman yells. “You have to help me! The damage is too great—I can’t repair it by myself.”

I’m gasping like a dying fish, unable to respond. I never thought there could be so much pain this side of death. The woman casts another spell. A cool wave washes through me, numbing me to the worst of the torment. I draw back from the brink of pain-fuelled insanity. Lay my head down, moaning weakly instead of screaming madly.

“Use magic,” the woman urges me. “Help yourself. Restore the flesh that’s been burnt away. It’ll hurt like hell, but you have to do it.”

I want to say that I can’t, I’m too weary and don’t know the spells. But my incinerated vocal cords and lips won’t let me form the words. Annoyed, I try to fix the damage, so I can tell the woman I’m finished. Magic flows to the areas which I’ve targeted and cells knit together in response to my command. As my lips return, bloody and stinging, but workable, I start to complain. Then I realise—the fact I can complain proves I have the power to heal myself. So instead of whinging, I set to work on the rest of my wrecked body.

It takes several minutes, and is every bit as painful as the woman predicted, but eventually, I’m almost whole again, scorched and blackened from the heat, pink new flesh glistening sorely in the yellow light, scarred around the places where I’ve had to create fresh flesh and bones, tender as… well, as somebody who’d been dunked in a river of lava! But I’m alive and mostly in one piece.

Smiling painfully, I lift my face to thank the woman who came to my rescue. I’m expecting Sharmila—I figure she couldn’t stand by and watch me die, so she entered the Board to save me—but the face my new eyes fix on is much younger and paler than the Indian lady’s. But just as familiar.

“ Nadia!” I gasp.

She stares at me with an angry but wary expression. “You should have been prepared for an attack. You fell too easily. It would have served you right if I’d left you.”

“But you’re dead!” I cry.

She laughs. “Then you have a ghost to thank.” She stands and looks into the distance. “Dervish is on his way. I was leading him to you when I sensed you fall into the lava.” She starts to walk away.

“Wait! I don’t understand! I saw you die. How can you be here?”

She hesitates and looks up. Following the direction of her gaze, I see that the sky is hazy now, cutting off my view of Lord Loss and Beranabus. “You must not tell him,” Nadia says quietly.

“Tell who what?” I frown.

“Beranabus. That I’m alive.” She faces me and now she wears a cool, flat look. “I had enough of it, Kernel. He treated me like scum, using me any way he wished. I had no freedom or say over my life. So I decided to trade allegiances and go where I’d be appreciated and rewarded.”

“You mean…?” I can’t bring myself to say it.

“I joined Lord Loss,” she whispers. “I spoke to him secretly when we arrived at his castle. Told him of my gift. Promised to serve him if he’d allow me a few simple pleasures and some time to myself.”

“But he’s a demon!” I shout. “They kill humans!”

“Yes,” she answers smoothly.

I gawp at her, unable to believe it. She shifts uneasily and looks away. “Beranabus can’t see us now. He’ll never know I’m alive. Unless you tell him.”

“But Lord Loss is our enemy. You—”

“I saved your life!” she snaps. “I didn’t have to. I could have left you to sink.”

“Why did you save me?” I ask softly.

“Because I like you.” She laughs and there are tears in her eyes. “I like all of you—except Beranabus. I hate him, with good reason. But I don’t wish harm to anyone else. I came here to hide. Lord Loss separated my soul before destroying my body—or most of it. He kept my brain and heart whole. He can put my flesh and bones back together around them later, and restore my soul from here. When I felt you and the others enter the Board, I asked Lord Loss if I could help you. He said I could, but only once. So this is it. You’re on your own now.”