Dante Valentine Book 5

To Hell and Back


Lilith Saintcrow

Copyright © 2008


For Nicholas Deangelo. Peace. Another charm's wound up.

Tempt not a desperate man.

-Shakespeare,

Romeo & Juliet

I was a-trembling because I'd got to decide forever betwixt two things, and I
knowed it. I studied for a minute, sort of holding my breath, and then says to
myself, "All right, then, I'll go to hell."

-Mark Twain,

Huckleberry Finn


Prologue

"There is more than one way to break a human," he said, softly. "Especially
a human woman."

I hung between sky and ground, the constellations of Hell overhead and
sterile rock underneath, the icy inhuman heat of a place far removed from my own
world lapping at my skin. I had come looking for my own clean death in battle,
and found this instead. This indignity.

The Devil doesn't believe in killing you, if you can be made to serve.

I will not scream. The world narrowed, became a single point of light as the
writhing claws slipped below my flesh and the wet sounds of the thing that would
break me to his will echoed against stone walls. I will not scream. I will not give in.

I did scream. I screamed until my voice broke itself again as the scar on my
shoulder woke with frigid hot pain, my body healing even as he tore at me. I
fought as hard as I could. I am no stranger to fighting, I have fought all my life.

None of it mattered. Nothing mattered.

I died there. In Hell.

It was the only way to escape something worse.


1


Darkness closed velvet over me, broken only by the flame of a scar burning,
burning, against my shoulder. I do not know how I wrenched myself free, I only
know that I did, before the last and worst could be done to me. But not soon
enough.

I heard myself scream, one last cry that shattered into pieces before I escaped
to the only place left to me, welcome unconsciousness.

As I fell.

Cold. Wherever I was, it was cold. Hardness underneath me. I heard a low
buzzing sound and passed out again, sliding away from consciousness like a marble
on a reactive-greased slope. The buzzing followed, became a horde of angry bees
inside my head, a deep and awful rattling whirr shaking my teeth loose, splitting my
bones with hot lead.

I moaned.

The buzzing faded, receding bit by bit like waves sliding away from a rocky
shore. I moaned again, rolled over.

My cheek pressed chill hardness. Tears trickled hot out of my eyes. My
shields shivered, rent and useless, a flooding tide of sensation and thought from the
outside world roaring through my brain as I convulsed, instinct pulling my tissue-thin
defenses together, drowning in the current. Where was I?

I had no prayers left.

Even if I'd had one, there would be no answer. The ultimate lesson of a life
spent on the edge of Power and violence-when the chips are down, sunshine,
you're on your own.

Slowly, so slowly, I regained my balance. A flood of human thought smashed
rank and foul against my broken shields, roaring through my head, and I pushed it
away with a supreme effort, trying to think. I made my eyes open. Dark shapes
swirled, coalesced. I heard more, a low noise of crowds and hovertraffic, formless,
splashing like the sea. Felt a tingle and trickle of Power against my skin.

h, gods. Remind me not to do that again. Whatever it was. The thought
sounded like me, the tough, rational, practical me, over a deep screaming well of
panic.

What happened to me?

Am I hungover?

That made me laugh. It was unsteady, hitching, tired hilarity edged with
broken glass, but I welcomed it. If I was laughing, I was okay.

Not really. I would never be okay again. My mind shuddered, flinching away
from ... something. Something terrible. Something I could not think about if I wanted
to keep the fragile barrier between myself and a screaming tide of insanity.

I pushed it away. Wrestled it into a dark corner and closed the door.


That made it possible to think a little more clearly.

I blinked. Shapes became recognizable, the stink of dying human cells filling
my nose again. Wet warmth trickled down my cheeks, painted my upper lip. I tasted
spoiled fruit and sweetness when I licked my lips.

Blood. I had a face covered in blood, and my clothes were no better than
rags, if I retained them at all. My bag clinked as I shifted, its broken strap reknotted