Cut To The Bone

Chapter Two

The blue flames kissed the cloudless afternoon sky, and the stark visual contrast made Azima sick to her stomach.

She had lost sight of Chey the moment he entered and her calls to him were drowned out by the roar of the demon fire. She needed to go in after him. Her face smudged with soot and her eyes burning from the falling ash, she saw the door of the cabin give way, either from the blaze's destruction or an unseen force inside the building. Hesitating only long enough to wrap her braid around itself and pulling her shirt up to cover her face, she lunged through the opened doorway with her sword in hand...

And was immediately overcome by the unnatural heat inside.

She could feel the hairs on her forearms singe as she made her way through the conflagration, hunched over to better protect herself from the falling debris.

She called again for Chey. A part of her ached for his well-being—she tried to brush it off, that deep-rooted familial sentiment so often frowned upon by her kind, but she knew she would miss him if he was gone.

If for no other reason than to scream at him for charging headfirst towards his death.

All her forced humor faded when she reached the bottom of the stairs that led up to the second floor. The railing was hot to the touch, but the stairs themselves refused to burn. Azima took care as she proceeded step by step. Off the landing were two small bedrooms—one was hers, and the other Chey had claimed for his own after her mother was killed.

Chey and her mother had been close, but their relationship was always professional, so far as she was aware. His room had been in the root cellar while she and her mother were comfortable inside the cottage. But when her mother died, he insisted that he take the room across from hers, if only to better protect her until she was of age. At sixteen, it was in her nature to argue, to challenge him, but she was grateful for his presence, if only because she was so used to knowing her mother was only a room away.

But her mother had died, and Chey was all she had left now.

Azima halted before that bedroom door, where a wall of flames kept her from proceeding any further. Instead, the inferno created an untouched pathway, clear of debris and desolation, that led directly to her own bedroom.

With her sword ready, she slowly walked down the hallway. This was not her first confrontation with a demon. She had been training since she was old enough to hold a blade and killed her first at sixteen... it was the least she could do to avenge her mother. But this was the first time any had dared come so close to their home, let alone actually infiltrate it.

The sinking feeling in her stomach reminded her there was a chance this wasn't just any demon.

There was clearly a method behind this. Reason.

And all was clarified the moment she stepped through the door into her bedroom.

The room itself was untouched, but in the very same corner that called to her in her dream now crouched a krampu, a red-skinned imp who currently had the claws of one hand pierced through Chey's thigh, pinning him to the blood-soaked floor.

The Imerman was conscious, though obviously in pain as his eyes screwed shut and his teeth clenched at the demon's poison that was surely running through his veins.

"Venandi," the hellspawn hissed as she approached, and Chey's eyes sprung open as he realized she had arrived.

"Azima, don't—" But his words were cut off with a growl as the krampu applied pressure to the wound in his leg.

"What do you want?" Azima demanded, averting her eyes from the Imerman—the less affection she showed for him, the higher the chances the demon would kill him in front of her, despite the poison that must already be coursing through him.

"It is not what I want, Venandi, but who wants you." Its snarl felt like spiders walking along Azima's spine.

"So deliver your message and be gone, unless you want to return to your Maker even sooner." The steadiness in her voice surprised even her as she planted her feet, sword at the ready. With their cottage burning around them and a krampu demon having infiltrated their supposedly impenetrable wards, Azima's sole focus now was ridding the world of one less demon and saving the only family she had left.

The yellow teeth filling the krampu's devious grin made her stomach churn. Its green snakelike eyes roamed over her as if it was contemplating its next meal or mating ritual - neither an ideal prospect for her.

"Demon Prince Malecoda demands your presence, Venandi, and the prince is not one to be denied."

"Your prince is delusional if he thinks-"

"The dawn. The dusk. Heaven. Hell. The forest. The seas. He awaits you beyond, Venandi."

Everything in Azima stilled.

The darkness didn't scare her, but for a demon to know about her dreams...

"Azima!"

Chey calling her name snapped her out of her reverie, and just in time as the krampu removed his now-bloodied claw from the Imerman's leg and lunged towards her throat.

The wards inscribed into the hilt burned her palms as she raised the sword up to her shoulder, and with a smooth thrust forward, the blessed blade ran clean through the krampu's throat. With a shriek, the demon exploded into a gust of ash.

The moment the demon's remains touched the floor, the fire subsided as if it never existed. Azima rushed to Chey's side, her attention immediately turning to his injured leg.

He hissed as she poked and prodded, and she threw him a glare that silently instructed him to not be such a child.

"What in hell happened?" she whispered as she turned the wounded leg over to better examine it.

"Ambush," the Imerman whispered, sweat dotting his brow. "It was waiting..."

"For you?"

"For you," he breathed. "It was a trap. And it waited..."

"Shut up," she chastised, realizing the more energy he exerted, the more the wound bled. "We need to get you help."

"Azima," he started, but she whipped her head up to meet his gaze and cut him off before he could say another word of protest.

"Can you ride?"

"What- where are we going?" he inquired as he winced, easing himself up on one elbow.

"You are going to the Parish," she said calmly, though her heart pounded beneath her shirt. The same shirt whose hem she now tugged between her hands and tore into strips to create a makeshift bandage. "They'll heal your leg, take care of the poison before addiction takes root-"

"And where do you think you'll be going?" The color was draining from his face as he asked, and Azima knew she was on borrowed time.

"You heard it, Chey," she said quietly as she applied pressure to his leg, ignoring his groans of pain. "The dawn. The dusk. Heaven. Hell. The forest. The seas... It was in my dream. It means something."

"It was just trying to get into your head."

"It worked." She began to wrap the bandage tightly around his leg. "Whoever this prince is, he apparently knows who I am, and that's already too much."

"It's a trap - you've been alive long enough to know that."

"Of course I know that," she snapped, looking back to him. His dark eyes reflected true concern, which surprised her, and she quickly looked away. "But I need to know why. And I won't allow more of his mindless minions to come that close again. He overstepped a line, whoever he is, and he's going to see what happens when facing a Rousseau."

"You're a fool," he murmured.

"Aren't we all?"