Silence stretched between us, humming. Japhrimel was tight as a coiled spring next to me, and I felt a little worm of traitorous relief inside my chest. As long as he was on my side, I might conceivably get out of this alive.

Still, I wished I could talk to him. I wished I could turn and look at him. My curse—I was so fucking needy. I wanted constant reassurance. My big flaw when it came to relationships—questioning the loyalty of anyone crazy enough to date me. After all, I was damaged goods. Had always been damaged goods.

You’re being ridiculous, Danny. Keep your wits about you. This is Lucifer you’re dealing with. You show any weakness, and he’ll eat you alive.

I concentrated on staying quiet.

Lucifer said nothing. I’ll be damned if I give the Devil the first word. I tightened my left hand around the reinforced scabbard.

Power blurred, singing in the air, a physical weight against heart and throat and eye. The demon part of me wanted to drop to my knees; the human part of me screamed silently, resisting with every single fiber of stubbornness I could manage to dredge up from my stubborn, painful life.

I suppose I should have been grateful I’d had practice in enduring the unendurable.

It was close. Very close. I had no time to worry how Japhrimel was staying upright, I was too busy keeping my own knees locked, mentally digging my teeth in, resisting. My rings spat golden sparks, defiant.

Finally, the Prince of Hell spoke.

“First point to you, Dante Valentine.” The voice of the Devil, stroking, easing along every exposed inch of skin, a flame so cold it burned. “I have left Hell, I have come alone, and now you force me to greet you. You must be certain of yourself.”

Irritation rasped under my breastbone, lifesaving irritation. It broke the spell of his eyes and bolstered my knees. “Goddammit,” I rasped, my voice as hoarse as if he’d just tried to strangle me again. “I don’t play your little games. I didn’t even know you wanted me until today.” I met his eyes, then, something inside my chest cracking as their deep glow burned against my face. “Just get to the point, Prince. Use small words, and can the goddamn sarcasm. What do you want?”

Lucifer regarded me for a hair-raising moment, during which I had time to curse my big fat mouth.

Then he tipped his head back and laughed, a sound of genuine goodwill raising my hackles. My right hand closed around my swordhilt, Japhrimel’s hand came down on mine, jamming the sword back into the sheath, stinging me. His hand vanished as Lucifer looked back down, and all of a sudden I was glad, deeply glad, that I hadn’t drawn steel. The thought of trying to cut him, this being so much older and more powerful than anything short of a god… no. No.

“I think I have missed your unique charm, Dante.” He sounded almost as if he meant it. “I want your service, Necromance, and I am prepared to pay any price necessary.”

Go fuck yourself. I don’t work for the Devil. I learned my lesson last time. My mouth was dry as a barrel of reactive. “What do you want me to do?”

“You are most honored among humans, Necromance,” Lucifer said slowly, his mouth stretching in a shark’s grin. “I need another Right Hand.”

I blinked. I couldn’t help myself—I glanced down at the end of his right arm and counted his fingers. Five. Just like a human. Or four fingers and one thumb if you wanted to get really technical.

“You seem to still have yours,” I cracked, and the smile fell from Lucifer’s face so fast I was surprised it didn’t shatter on the stone floor. The cathedral rang with soft sound—whispers, mutters, laughter. Nasty laughter, the type of laughter you hear in nightmares.

“Do not taunt me, Valentine.” The emerald in his forehead sparkled, a gleam that reminded me of Japhrimel’s eyes back when I had first met him. The meaning caught up with me—Japhrimel had been Lucifer’s Right Hand. His eldest son, trusted lieutenant—and assassin.

Right Hand? What the hell? I can’t live in Hell. A fine edge of panic began curling up behind my thoughts.

Then someone laughed.

I almost didn’t recognize Japhrimel’s voice. It boomed and caromed through the entire cathedral. Dust pattered down from the roof, I heard stone groaning. One of the pews rocked back slightly, wood squealing under the lash of sound. The mark on my shoulder blazed with fierce hurtful pleasure, as if his hand was digging into my flesh, keeping me still as his voice tore the air.

I froze, keeping Lucifer in my sights. The Devil looked past me to his former assassin, and the snarl that crossed his features was enough to almost send me to my knees. “You find this funny, A’nankhimel?” His voice scraped through the air, cutting across Japhrimel’s laughter.

I found my own voice again. “Leave him alone,” I snapped. “You’re bargaining with me.”

He could turn on a red credit’s thin edge. The snarl was gone, his eyes so bright they all but cast shadows on the floor. “So we’re bargaining now?” His sculpted lips curled up in a half-smile. He was so goddamn beautiful it hurt to look at him, actually hurt the eyes, like looking into a coremelt, stinging and blinking against the glow humans were never meant to see.

I tore my eyes away from him. Looked over at Japhrimel, who had stopped laughing. Funny, but he didn’t look amused. Instead, his eyebrows were drawn together, examining Lucifer as if a new kind of bug had scuttled out from underneath something and Japh wanted to give it his entire attention.

Then Japhrimel’s eyes slowly, so slowly, flowed over to meet mine. The mark on my shoulder eased, sending a wave of heat down my body.

Relief and fresh faith burst inside my chest. Japh was with me. What could Lucifer do, with his assassin on my side?

Oh, be careful, Danny. He could still do plenty. You know he can.

Japhrimel’s gaze held mine.

I quirked my eyebrows slightly, a silent question.

He gave an evocative shrug, little more than a fraction of a millimeter’s lifting of one shoulder. He couldn’t tell me or he didn’t care, either way. Then he tipped his head back slightly, raising his chin. I am with you, Dante. His mental tone was gentle, laid in my brain like one of my own thoughts.

Had he always been able to do that? Given the depth of the bond between us, it wasn’t unlikely. The mark on my shoulder pulsed insistently, a taut line stretched between us. At the moment, it was a good thing, a way to confer with him without Lucifer hearing.

Or at least, I hoped Lucifer couldn’t hear him.

I swallowed and looked back at Lucifer, who watched this exchange with a great deal of interest.

“What do you need an assassin for, Prince?” My tone came out flat, not as powerful as his or Japhrimel’s, but still something to reckon with. The Hegemony sun-disk ran with a sudden random reflection of light.

He doesn’t own me. Anubis owns me; the Devil can’t do anything but kill me. The thought wasn’t as comforting as it could have been. Death never is, even if you’re a Necromance.

“Four demons have escaped Hell. The others I can deal with, but these are of the Greater Flight, and I wish their capture or execution to be both swift and… public. It will go a long way toward easing the… unrest… in my domain. Who better to hunt my subjects than my former Right Hand and the woman who killed Vardimal and returned my daughter to me?”

That did it. My temper snapped. For him to claim my murdered lover’s daughter, to act like he hadn’t half-strangled me and left me to deal with the fallout after playing his little game and getting control of the Egg and Hell back in one neat stroke—fury smashed through the fear, a familiar anger at injustice, held back and choked for most of my life.