Lilith Saintcrow - The Devil's Right Hand

I nodded, my head moving against the chair’s headrest. Thought about it. Decided. It was only fair, after all.

“If you want to go on your way, I won’t blame you. You stood up to the Devil for me.” Gave him a bit of trouble, too. We might almost have had a chance.

Not really. Not without Japhrimel.

He gave another one of those terrible, dry, husking laughs. He certainly seemed to find me amusing nowadays.

“Shitfire,” he finally wheezed. “This’s the most interesting thing I seen in years. Ain’t gonna stop now. Four demons, eyes an’ ears. Until the fourth demon’s dead, chica , I’m your man.”

I nodded. Braced myself. It was always best to pay debts before the interest mounted, and I owed him. If not for him, Lucifer would have killed me before Japhrimel could reach me. “I told you the pay’s negotiable. What do you want?”

“Your demon boyfriend paid me, Valentine. Consider yourself lucky.”

Well, it was certainly a day for surprises. I shifted uneasily in the seat, then rested my head against the seat’s high back.

“Do you think she was telling the truth?” I meant Eve. He’d been in the room, after all.

“Don’t know. I ain’t no Magi.” He shifted a little in the chair, as if he hurt. “Explains a helluva lot.”

“Are you all right?” It was a stupid question. We’d both gotten off lightly, for tangling with Lucifer.

“Devil damn near pulled my spleen out through my nose. It hurt.” Lucas sighed. He sounded disappointed. “Guess even he can’t kill me.”

“Give him time.” I didn’t mean for it to sound flippant. Then I leaned forward, running my hand back through my hair. “Lucas, do you have any friends? I mean, real friends?”

An evocative shrug. His yellow eyes fastened on me.

“If you had a friend,” I persisted, “and he lied to you but it was for a good reason, what would you do?”

Silence. Lucas studied me.

The hover began a stomach-jolting descent then rose again, probably to avoid a traffic stream. I folded my left arm across my belly; it wasn’t tender, but I was still cautious.

Finally, Lucas hauled himself upright, leaned forward. Rested his elbows on his knees. “You askin’ me for advice, chica . Dangerous.” He rasped in a breath. “I seen a lot of shit on the face of the earth. Most of it pointless. The only thing I can tell you is—take what you can get.”

I weighed the statement, wondering if it was any good. Take what you can get. Was that even honorable? “So you don’t have any friends?”

He shrugged again.

I closed my eyes, leaning back into the chair’s embrace. “You do now, Lucas.” I paused, let the fact sink in. “You do now.”

After all, he’d shot the Devil. For me. Who cared if it was just a job to him?

Take what you can get.

Eve wanted her freedom. Lucifer wanted her dead or captured—most likely captured, since he had used me as bait to draw her out. Lucifer also wanted me kept so busy with “hunting” down his escaped children that I didn’t have time to find out it was Eve he was really after. Japhrimel probably wanted to keep us both alive long enough to figure out which was the winning side, and I didn’t blame him. Lucas was curious, and he might have thought Lucifer could finally kill him.

Take what you can get.

What did I want out of this? I didn’t even know yet.

We were going to land in Giza, meet Leander, and figure out what course to follow next. I had to decide if I was going to hunt down Doreen’s daughter for Lucifer, or if I was going to risk my life—and Japhrimel’s too—taking on the Prince of Hell.

Who was I fooling? I already knew what I was going to do.

The trouble would be talking both myself and Japhrimel into it.

A’nankhimel: ( demon term ) 1. A Fallen demon. 2. A demon who has tied himself to a human mate. Note: As with all demon words, there are several layers of meaning to this term, depending on context and pronunciation. The meanings, from most common to least, are as follows: descent from a great height, chained, shield, a guttering flame, a fallen statue.

Androgyne:1. A transsexual, cross-dressing, or androgynous human. 2. ( demon term ) A Greater Flight demon capable of reproduction.

Animone:An accredited psion with the ability to telepathically connect with and heal animals, generally employed as veterinarians.

Anubis et’her ka : Egyptianica term, sometimes used as an expletive; loosely translated, “Anubis protect me/us.”

Awakening, the:The exponential increase in psionic and sorcerous ability, academically defined as from just before the fall of the Republic of Gilead to the culmination of the Parapsychic and Paranormal Species Acts proposed and brokered by the alternately vilified and worshipped Senator Adrien Ferrimen. Note: After the culmination of the Parapsychic Act, the Awakening was said to have finished and the proportion of psionics to normals in the human population stabilized, though fluctuations occur in seventy-year cycles to this day.

Ceremonial:1. An accredited psion whose talent lies in working with traditional sorcery, accumulating Power and “spending” it in controlled bursts. 2. Ceremonial magick, otherwise known as sorcery instead of the more organic witchery. 3. ( slang ) Any Greater Work of magick.

Clormen-13:( Slang: Chill, ice, rock, smack, dust ) Addictive alkaloid drug. Note: Chill is high-profit for the big pharmaceutical companies as well as the Mob, being instantly addictive. There is no cure for Chill addiction.

Deadhead:1. Necromance. 2. Normal human without psionic abilities.

Demon:1. Any sentient, alien intelligence, either corporeal or noncorporeal, that interacts with humans. 2. Denizen of Hell, of a type often mistaken for gods or Novo Christer evil spirits, actually a sentient nonhuman species with technology and psionic and magical ability much exceeding humanity’s. 3. ( slang ) A particularly bad physiological addiction.

Evangelicals of Gilead:1. Messianic Old Christer and Judic cult started by Kochba bar Gilead and led by him until the signing of the Gilead Charter, when power was seized by a cabal of military brass just prior to bar Gilead’s assassination. 2. Members of said cult. 3. ( academic ) The followers of bar Gilead before the signing of the Gilead Charter. See Republic of Gilead.

Feeder:1. A psion who has lost the ability to process ambient Power and depends on “jolts” of vital energy stolen from other human beings, psions, or normals. 2. ( psion slang ) A fair-weather friend.

Flight:A class or social rank of demons. Note: There are, strictly speaking, three classes of demons: the Low, Lesser, and Greater. Magi most often deal with the higher echelons of the Low Flight and the lower echelons of the Lesser Flight. Greater Flight demons are almost impossible to control and very dangerous.

Freetown:An autonomous enclave under a charter, neither Hegemony nor Putchkin but often allied to one or the other for economic reasons.

Hedaira : ( demon term ) 1. An endearment. 2. A human woman tied to a Fallen ( A’nankhimel ) demon. Note: There are several layers of meaning, depending on context and pronunciation. The meanings, from most common to least, are as follows: beloved, companion, vessel, starlight, sweet fruit, small precious trinket, an easily crushed bauble. The most uncommon and complex meaning can be roughly translated as “slave (thing of pleasure) who rules the master.”