Angelbound (3 page)

Raising his hand, Armageddon quiets the crowd. “Today’s soul was a favorite of mine on earth. Unbelievable strength. No capacity for conscience. Pure
untainted evil. When he wins this battle—which he will, make no mistake—then we’ll finally have one of our own inside the gates of Heaven.” The dark seats howl with glee while the angels collectively shiver. Grinning, Armageddon retakes his seat.

All faces turn to the Angel Verus. She slowly rises to her feet, her white wings spreading regally behind her. She shouts one word: “NEVER!” The force of her yell sets columns rattling and rubble tumbling to the ground. Her gaze turns to me, eyes flashing bright. Armageddon follows suit, his irises glowing red as he scans me from head to toe. A satisfied smirk winds the corner of his mouth. I’ve seen that look on other faces; it’s the one that says ‘
that
little girl? Maybe she’s won before, but against
this
opponent? Are you serious?’

Which pisses me off, big time.

Sharkie thumps his staff again; a human soul appears nearby. In life, this ghost was a man about six feet tall with broad shoulders and two-hundred fifty pounds of solid muscle beneath them. Now he appears as a spectral version of his mortal self: a ghostly hulk whose pale body looks ready to burst from his faded jeans and dirty white t-shirt.

Sharkie addresses the spirit. “Vincent Francis Morris, you’ve chosen trial by combat, is this true?”

“The Choker. My name’s…The Choker.” Squinting his piggish eyes, the ghost flicks a fat tongue over his full lips.

“I will ask again.” Sharkie’s irises flare bright red. “Have you chosen trial by combat?”

The ghost curls his hands into fists. “Yes, combat.”

“Select your opponent.” Sharkie grins, his knife-like teeth glimmer in the pale light. “First, we offer XP-22.”

The Choker eyes our ‘fighting ghoul.’ With barely-there skin and the muscle tone of toilet paper, anyone could crush XP-22. In fact, the Choker would probably snap him in three seconds or less, but I don’t think he’ll choose to. Ghouls look mighty terrifying, even the weak ones. Most humans avoid them.

The Choker is no different. “I’ll pass.”

Sharkie moves his thin arm to the next figure in line. “Second, we offer Sheila, the Limus demon.”

Sheila’s fourteen red eyes whip about her upper body, finally stopping to glare at the ghostly human. She stretches wide the black hole that serves as her mouth, letting out a gurgling roar. When that girl puts her game on, she’s terrifying.

“Hmm.” The Choker’s beady eyes give Sheila a long stare; the entire Arena seems to hold its breath.

I glance at Sheila and shake my head. Limus demons are almost as easy to kill as XP-22. The trick is, they’re super-flammable. One match and you turn a six-foot monster into a puddle of harmless goo. But like XP-22, they look worse than they actually fight.

The Choker frowns. “Nope.”

“And third, we offer the quasi-demon, Myla.”

The Choker’s eyes slowly scan me from head to toe, his creepy gaze
lingering on the curves under my t-shirt and sweats. Rage shoots up my spine. What a scumbag. If he stopped thinking with his pants for two seconds, he’d notice my demon tail instead of my boobs and butt. Some quasis get stuck with pig- or bunny-bottoms, but I hit the jackpot: the long and thin variety with an arrowhead end. Even better, it’s coated in dragon scales, so the thing’s nearly impossible to block or cut.

But the Choker isn’t being smart. He stares into my big watery brown eyes and long lashes; I shamelessly blink in fake-terror. For trial by combat to be valid, the soul must have a chance at winning. They get three options, two of which are relatively easy to defeat. Then, there’s me, the one nobody should pick. Except they always do.

“I choose her.” His thick mouth stretches into a vicious smile. “I’ll fight Myla.” In a low voice, he adds: “You’ll find out why they call me the Choker.”

I jam my hands in my pockets and fake-shiver.
And you’ll find out why they called me to fight you, dickhead.

Sharkie thumps his staff on the ground again, and the ghostly Choker turns into two-hundred fifty pounds of real human. “So be it.”

“Here are the rules,” announces Sharkie. “Upon the count of three, you shall battle onto the death. If the Choker loses, he goes to Hell.” The angels look at me with encouraging glances. “If the Choker wins, he goes to Heaven.” The demons let out a deafening roar.

I watch the demons cheer, my hands balling into fists. Those freakies would love for a purely evil soul to enter Heaven. If a spirit has even a smidgeon of
good in it, they ‘go angel’ once they cross the pearly gates. A purely evil soul could cause no end of trouble for the angels, and demons love trouble.

The crowd quiets into a nervous hush. Sharkie waves his hand; Sheila, Walker, and XP-22 make a hasty exit into an obliging archway. I hop from foot to foot and crack my neck. This will be a hoot.

Sharkie raises his arms. “The battle begins in 3, 2, 1!”

If your nickname is ‘the Choker,’ it doesn’t take a genius in battle strategy to predict your first move in a fight.

“I kiiiiiiiiiiiiiill you!” Sure enough, the Choker lunges for me with both hands outstretched, aiming directly for my throat.

That gets my demon up. Anger spikes along my spine as my attacker speeds toward me. Each step goes in what feels like slow motion. I look around helplessly as if I’m cornered instead of surrounded by an empty arena the size of a football field.

The Choker’s fingers brush my neck. My rage boils over. Jumping super-high, I haul up my knees, then kick my opponent squarely in the chest with both feet. The Choker falls flat on his back with a satisfying thud. Meanwhile, I use the momentum from my chest-kick to flip backwards into a somersault, landing right by his head.

Twisting my hips, I send my tail whipping toward my attacker’s boots, careful to loop the length around his ankles. Stepping backwards, I tighten my tail around the Choker’s feet and haul them up to his waist-level. The movement makes him curl his body so his hands rest right beside his ankles, which is
exactly where I want them.

Shaking my hips again, I loop my tail around the Choker’s wrists, cinching together his ankles and hands.

I grin.
This scumbag’s now hogtied.

The Choker’s face flushes red as he rocks on his back, trying to wriggle free from my tail’s grip. Not going to happen, buddy.

Tapping his boot with one finger, I whisper: “I beeeeeeeeeeat you.”

The Choker struggles in a losing battle against my tail. Sharkie raises his bony arms. “The human loses!”

The angels cheer while the demons act like someone knocked their collective ice cream cones on the pavement. Boos and hisses erupt from the dark seats. Turning to the angelic side of the stadium, I wave to my cheering fans.

Sharkie glares at me, his eyes flaring red. “How many times do I have to tell you? Don’t dawdle.”

Sharkie hates it when I get any positive attention, so I always drag my winning cheers out as long as possible. The emcee keeps glaring at me, his eyes glowing ever brighter. Meanwhile, I scratch my neck as the Choker struggles with my tail. I’m not ending this for another minute, minimum. Sharkie can kiss my butt.

Raising his staff, Sharkie brings the long handle down on the Choker’s chest, spiking it straight through his heart. The human twitches, then falls slack. A ghostly version of the Choker appears above his lifeless body.

Sharkie turns to me, his beady black eyes flaring bright red. “Next time, my staff skewers
your
heart, too.”

I open my yap, ready to tell Sharkie exactly what he can do with his staff, when the hairs on my neck prickle. Raising my head, I scan the stadium. Every face is focused on me. Verus’s eyes glow bright turquoise while a satisfied smile tugs at the corner of her mouth. Armageddon watches me with a curious interest, his right eyebrow cocked.

Time to vamoose. I don’t need any attention from those two.

“Excuse me. It’s time to call the Great Scala.” I bow low, turn on my heel, and jog into a nearby archway.

Walker waits there for me in the shadows. “Nice work.” He winks. “Hogtied is new.”

I bow slightly. “I’m trying to mix it up a bit.”

“On behalf of your audience, I appreciate the creativity.” He rubs his hands together. “Shall we depart?”

“Hmm.” Right now, I fall into the category of ‘incredibly late for school.’ I might as well make it count. “Nah.” I peep around the edge of the stone archway. “I want to see the Scala move a soul.” We don’t get monster truck rallies or boy band tours in Purgatory, so this is the closest to a spectacle that I ever get. No way am I missing it.

A muscle twitches along Walker’s jaw. “I promised to keep you out of danger.”

I roll my eyes. “Every time I finish a fight, you pull out the old ‘I promised your Mom I’d keep you safe’ speech, and try to talk me into going home. And every freaking time I talk
you
into letting me stay.” I elbow him in the arm. “You need some new shtick, my friend.”

Walker chuckles. “I’ll take it under advisement.”

Sharkie’s staff thuds on the ground, the noise echoing through the stadium. I peek toward the Arena floor. Sharkie stands alone on the grounds, his gray-skinned head bowed. “Bring him out.” In this case, ‘him’ is the Scala, the only creature that can permanently move a soul to Heaven or Hell. Otherwise, they can (and mostly do) escape.

The Arena falls silent, the air thickening with anticipation. My heart rate quickens. We’ve had the same Scala for hundreds of years now. He’s like the human’s Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and Tooth Fairy all rolled into one. Seeing him is a
huge
deal. Picture the oldest, most wrinkly guy possible, then add a hundred years, a white robe and mind-boggling levels of power. That’s the Scala.

The sandy floor trembles beneath my feet. In the center of the Arena, a group of eight ghouls appear through a large portal, carrying an old man on what’s basically a fancy stretcher. The dude is ancient, crinkly, and only five feet tall. His white beard winds around his entire body.

Armageddon leans back into his dark throne, his eyes narrowing. Pure hatred rolls off him in waves. The King of Hell fathered the Scala, but the child chose to embrace his mother’s heritage as a thrax demon fighter. Armageddon never got over it.

Bit by bit, the Scala opens his eyes. Angels and demons alike fall silent. In a reedy voice that somehow carries throughout the stadium, the Scala asks in Latin: “Qui turbat Scala?”

A ghoul beside the Scala translates: “Who disturbs the Scala?”

The ghostly Choker looks still and disinterested, although beads of sweat glisten on his spectral cheek.

Sharkie bows low. “This soul has been defeated in a fair fight.” He gestures to the Choker. “We ask he be sentenced to Hell.”

The handler translates the response. The Scala nods feebly, raising his hand. Small bolts of lightning dance about his three-knuckled fingers.

“Parare ad ad infernum,” whispers the Scala.

“Prepare for Hell,” comes the translation.

Dozens of tiny lightning bolts whirl about the Scala’s withered hand.
Igni.
Miniscule elements of power that only he can summon.

So. Badass.

I lean against the stonewall and hug my elbows. “I love this bit.”

A smile sounds in Walker’s voice. “Me too.”

More igni appear, whirling about into a shaft of light about two feet high. A soul column. The pillar of brightness slides off the Scala’s stretcher, growing wider as it spins across the Arena floor.

The soul column surrounds the Choker’s ghostly legs. The spirit stands stunned as igni slowly climb up his body, each tiny lightning bolt swirling and diving around its neighbors like so many silver fish. For a moment the igni flare bright about the Choker’s body, then they all disappear. The damned soul vanishes to Hell.

I brush-slap my hands together in a gesture that says ‘my work here is done.’

Walker taps my shoulder. I turn my attention away from the Arena floor.

“Time to get you home, Myla.”

“Not so fast, mister.”

Walker grins. “Is this the part where you won’t leave until I agree to sneak you in to see some matches?”

He’s got me there. “Why, yes it is.” I purse my lips. My encyclopedic knowledge of demons and the Arena comes in super-handy during conversations like this one. “Some Cellula demons are being brought to the Arena next week. Suuuuuper-rare. They’re supposed to be semi-transparent and lit from within.” I twiddle my fingers on my belly as a visual aid. Walker’s a really good artist. Sometimes, he lets me keep his demon sketches too.

“Cellula, you say?”

Pay dirt. He must never have drawn these before. “Yup.”

“Deal.” He offers me his hand. “Now, I should get you to school.”

“I need to go home, actually. I still have to change and grab my stuff.” Which means I have more time-suck to enjoy before I actually have to get to class. Nice.

Walker lets out a dramatic sigh. “I’ll get an earful about you and the Tardy List.”

“You and me both.” I take his hand. “Let’s hit it.”

Walker bows his head, creating a portal nearby. My stomach turns queasy just looking at it. Together, we leave the Arena’s dirt floor, tumble through the portal’s darkness and then land on the ratty carpet in my living room. I stifle my puke reflex. Stupid portals.

Walker leans over, examining my face. “Are you alright, Myla?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” I take a few deep breaths and clear my head. “Thanks.”

“Until next time.” He turns toward the open portal; I grab his sleeve.

“What?” My mouth winds with a crafty smile. “You won’t hang out with me and Mom while we discuss my awesome morning in the Arena?”

He shoots me a level stare. “Ah, no.”

“Chicken.”

“And proud.” He steps back through the opened portal and disappears.

I wish I could escape so easily. Straightening my shoulders, I prepare myself for the maternal inquisition, part deux. Usually, this flavor of interrogation starts with rapid-fire questions followed by slow hugs, sloppy tears, and loud exclamations of ‘I almost lost you, baby.’ If I’m lucky, I get homemade brownies out of it, too.