Infernal

He was beyond discourse. His body strained up for hers, for the hot slick haven that had been so abruptly and rudely denied him. His head flew side to side in denial, not of her and what she said but as a gesture of his own inability to resist her hellish charms.

"Someone's sorry to lose his warm hideaway." Varyka reached down and stroked him, just once but lingeringly, and Celestian nearly went mad. "Believe me, I'm sorry too. You're a magnificent creature and you promise to be a marvelous fuck. But …" and she sighed again, exaggeratedly, "If you're not willing …"

She got down from the marble slab, her dark eyes twinkling despite her expression of sorrow. As she walked away from him, hips and tail swinging, she paused and half-turned to afford him a view of one peaked breast. She snapped her fingers and the manacles on his wrists and ankles popped open.

"Been nice knowing you," she said, and blew him a kiss.

Celestian sprang from the makeshift altar. A blizzard of feathers blew around him from his wings, which had been damaged in his futile struggling. He bounded after Varyka, all reason abandoned and intent on one thing and one thing only. Her screech as he seized her around the waist was of victory and glee.

He whirled around with the demoness in his arms, hurled her flat on the marble, and pinned her there. His hair hung in his face in knotted blond tangles, furious white fire blazed from his eyes, and he rudely threw open her legs to sate the consuming urge that ruled him.

"Yessss," she hissed, lifting to him. "Yes, my angel, take me. Be rough!"

Rough? He could not imagine being anything else. It did not matter that they were being observed, would not have mattered if every eye in Hell and every host of Heaven was in attendance. He had to have her, would have her, and at last the consuming ache in his flesh would be relieved.

He drove into her fast and fierce, inflamed beyond measure, caring nothing for what feelings he might be bringing her but selfishly and insanely absorbed in sating his need. She was savage beneath him, meeting his every thrust while exhorting him to go harder and faster yet. Her claws carved furrows in his back, shredded feathers from his wings in a white storm.

The pain added to it, heightened it. Celestian could not hold back and did not even try. He poured forth into her, emptied himself, felt the world spin and turn inside-out and whirl and fragment in one endless galvanic eruption.

Varyka writhed with a banshee's shriek, dousing him with the scalding fluids of her orgasm. No sooner had one series of shuddering spasms subside than they rolled, and he pulled her atop him. The blackness of her hair shrouded his face as he looked up into the twin furnaces of her eyes.

"Now you," Celestian whispered hoarsely. "Now you take me."

Even as he said it, he let go and felt himself alter. That part of him within Varyka diminished and receded, while the planes of his torso softened and rose up into firm curves.

The demoness understood instantly and followed suit, changing back to the visage he'd worn when they first met. Celestina could feel the hard prod of him against her thigh and did not shy away from it but welcomed it.

"Here it is, my angel," Varyk said. "Is this what you want?"

"Yes, yes, now!"

"Say the word."

"Fuck me!" Celestina shouted, her lips blistering as the vulgarity passed them.

"Your wish is my command," he replied.

The last vestige of her purity was pierced with only the barest flicker of pain, and even that was swiftly lost in overwhelming pleasure. And while she as a male had been rough with him as a female, Varyk chose to have this time be the reverse and slid slowly, even gently, in and out of her with gliding but purposeful strokes. If anything, it only made Celestina wilder with passion. She came three times while Varyk kept up that slow, measured pace, and only then did he succumb to a rapid rocking that wrenched still another climax from the fallen angel.

**

Chapter Nine –

"We should go back," Gwen said. "I promised my Da that I wouldn't stay out so late with you."

"Go back?" groaned Jimmy. "We're not even to the river yet and I was hoping –"

"What?" she cut in when he faltered.

"To, well, have some time together."

She gave him an arch look that said she knew exactly what he was hoping and the more fool he for getting his hopes – not to mention anything else – up. Ahead of them, lost in the copse of woods near the bend in the river, Wulf barked excitedly.

"I'll at least walk to the bank with you," she said, relenting. "But we can only stay a moment. It's getting dark."

"That's never bothered you before."

"I know, but things are different now." She glanced north and then away almost as quickly, as if just the sight of the school brought a qualm to her marrow.

Jimmy knew what she was talking about. There had been strange talk about the students of Dame Agnes of the Hills, stranger than even the usual petty jealousies from the poor folk who resented rich girls squandering money on studies as if they thought themselves better than everyone else.

Strange talk. One of the teachers had been called away so suddenly that not even his wife knew where he'd gone or when he'd be back. Will Cooper, who ran the village store, swore up and down that after the headmistress had come shopping, all the milk jugs had curdled. Hannah Brewster had gone out to Dame Agnes and fallen ill the very next day. And the parsonage cat had whelped a litter of two-headed kittens, too malformed to live yet somehow clinging to life. Their mews, Jimmy had heard, sounded like the cries of dying babies.

He personally did not put much stock in it. Certainly not enough to be worried at walking by the river, which wasn't really all that close to the school anyway. But he could tell that Gwen had lost whatever flirtatiousness she'd had when he had gone calling at her door, and resigned himself to yet one more night of going to bed unfulfilled and wondering.

Wulf barked again, that particular agitated sound he made when he was about to have one of his randy fits. It disgusted Jimmy's mother no end, and she had told him straight to his face that the next time Wulf came sniffing around her lady-friends when it was her turn to host tea, poking his nose at their skirts or trying to mate with their legs, she would strangle him with a length of clothesline.

He believed her.

Gwen made a face, recognizing that bark too. "I don't want to go anywhere near that dog of yours if he's in that mood again," she said with a scowl. "He's worse than you are."

Jimmy sputtered indignantly, not sure whether to defend his dog first or the slander on himself. Before he could decide which, though, Gwen tilted her head to one side and her brows knit.

"Do you hear that?" she asked in a hushed tone that reminded him of church. "The music?"

He heard nothing but Wulf, and the wind in the trees, and the distant rush of the river. He said as much.

"Well, I hear it." She slipped her hand out of his and started forward.

"Where are you going?"

"To see where it's coming from. Isn't it the most beautiful music?"

A chill trickled down Jimmy's spine. "Gwen, stop it. There's nothing but the wind and the river." Which was true; Wulf had fallen silent.

"Wait here. I'll be right back."

"But I was –"

"Wait here, I said," she snapped, as stern as his mother so that he had no choice but to obey.

She hurried ahead, and vanished into the copse. He waited where she had told him to, shifting his weight from foot to foot, occasionally turning around to make sure nothing was creeping up behind him …

What in the world was that all about? He was perfectly safe. Barely a stone's throw from his own home. What had put such an idea into his head?

The night, quiet. No sign of Gwen. No sign of Wulf. The darkness spreading like an ink stain. And there, in the direction Gwen had gone, he just made out a pinprick of lights.

"Gwen?" He called more loudly than he meant to and was abashed at the nervousness he heard in his voice. "Wulf! Here, boy."

No response from either. He waited a while longer, and then decided that if Gwen wanted to be cross with him that was just too bloody bad, but he was going after her.

He followed the way Gwen had taken, and the closer he got to the copse the more sure he became that there were many small lights at its heart. Candles, perhaps. He entered the woods and made for them. And now he was aware of the music that had called Gwen. Except it wasn't music, not exactly, but singing. Chanting.

The branches clutched at him as if warning him not to go on. He brushed past them and saw a clearing ahead lit by the blaze of many tapers. They were set on stumps and logs, on rocks, embedded in holes dug in the soil. The pale, flickering light illuminated a scene that brought Jimmy to a dead halt, shock slapping the wits from him.

Gwen was there. Gwen as he had never seen her. Naked. The luscious big bubbies that he had managed on two occasions to feel through her blouse but had never seen were plainly visible now, caressed by the candlelight. Her hips, her legs, the dark triangle of hair … there she was, clad only in candlelight. And stretched out on a blanket so white it could have been woven from the stuff of the summer clouds.

His first wild thought was that she had planned this as a surprise for him, that she finally meant to give him what he'd been wanting for what seemed like ages. But the rest of it did not reconcile. The others. She wasn't alone.

The girls from Dame Agnes of the Hills surrounded her. Each wore a loose cowled robe of some dark cloth, unbelted and hanging open so that whenever they moved, Jimmy was afforded the glimpse of a breast, a leg, the low and sweet curve of a belly. They carried more candles as they walked in a stately processional around Gwen, weaving in a pattern as they went like Maypole dancers.

Two of them were otherwise occupied with Wulf. Jimmy's eyes widened until he feared they'd fall out. A brunette was reclined before the dog with her robe thrown open, holding Wulf by the collar as she coaxed his muzzle and readily-lapping tongue into the parting of her thighs. A second, her cowl thrown back to reveal chestnut curls and fresh-faced prettiness, was crouched beside Wulf and reaching under him to fondle the furred sheath and the glistening cock already stiffly protruding from it.

Jimmy could not move so much as an inch. He was sure that he was dreaming, hallucinating, that he'd fallen and struck his head, for nothing else could account for what he was seeing.

The girls moved around Gwen, and then some of them broke from their pattern, set aside their candles, and shed their robes. One knelt to Gwen's right side and another to her left and they began to play with and lick at and suckle her breasts. A third got between Gwen's legs and buried her face where Jimmy had countless times fantasized burying his. A fourth squatted over Gwen's face, reaching down to spread her labia as she lowered her cunny to Gwen's waiting mouth.

A fifth stood by, still in her robe with her hands folded into the voluminous sleeves. As Gwen, moving with the languid manner of one drugged or half-asleep, surrendered to the lewd touches and tongues of the girls, this fifth nodded imperiously to some of the others.

Four of them went to something heavy in the grass and struggled with it. The last two continued their weaving, chanting procession and finished up flanking the one who seemed to be in command.

Thirteen, Jimmy realized with a tingle of fright that permeated his stunned mind. He became aware that his head might not be able to understand what was going on, but his body was far ahead of him. His trousers strained with an uncomfortable tautness and his heart was pounding in his chest.

Thirteen. He thought it again, and wondered why that was important. Then it struck him.

The four girls managed to raise up the end of the heavy object they'd been struggling with, and braced it on a boulder not far from where Gwen gasped and moaned under the ministrations of their sisters. It was wooden, a clumsy cross, and they hoisted the base of it so that the top was slanted steeply toward the ground.

Some instinctive part of Jimmy knew what was going on but the rest of him could not credit it. Could not accept it.

At a signal from the leader, the other girls abandoned their tasks on Gwen. She made some wordless protest. The two who'd been busy with her breasts now held her by the wrists as the leader advanced.

She drew something from the sleeve of her robe and held it high. The girls murmured in a sing-song litany, their bodies swaying as if in homage to the ivory object.

It was a … a prick, Jimmy saw with renewed shock. A prick carved from ivory, almost glowing in the light of many candles.

The leader moved between Gwen's legs. Jimmy could not believe what she intended until it was too late, until the ivory prick disappeared all the way into the girl he'd planned to marry. Gwen screamed and her back arched from the quick, merciless defloration. The leader thrust with it a few times, miming copulation, then withdrew it and held it aloft again so that all could see how its whiteness was stained with red.

Belatedly, Jimmy burst through the concealing brush. "No!"

Gwen was unaware of him. The others reacted with the speed of snakes. They did not scatter and flee but raced at him, and for the precious moment that mattered he was too startled to run. When he did turn, they were already on him.

He fought them, everything he'd ever been told about not hitting girls absolutely forgotten, but they overpowered him as if he were no more than a child. They grappled him to the ground. They ripped his clothes from his thrashing limbs. They lifted him and carried him across the clearing, past Gwen as she lay there with her hands cupped protectively over her violated … no, she was rubbing herself and oblivious to his plight.

Jimmy opened his mouth to cry for help and one of the girls stuffed a wad of cloth into it, stifling him. He was lowered at an angle, felt the rough scrape of bark on his bare back, and fought harder as he understood they were putting him on their upended cross. It was no use. The girls bound his wrists with tight cords, secured his ankles, and stood around him with eyes that gleamed in the flat, inhuman hatred of reptiles.

From where he was, he had an upside-down and distorted view of Gwen. She did not so much as look his way, not even when the leader directed her to turn over, to kneel on the expanse of white cloth – stippled now with virginal blood – and stick her bottom in the air.

Wulf was led over by the other two girls. The dog's hindquarters were already twitching, hunching, humping at the air. Jimmy shut his eyes in horror but some evil force peeled the lids back and made him watch as the girls positioned the large dog behind Gwen.

He tried to get words past the gag but Wulf, no loyal pet now, ignored his bound and helpless master. All of the dog's attention was on Gwen, snuffling at her raised buttocks. Whining with eagerness, Wulf mounted her. His forepaws made muddy tracks on her back and his haunches moved in short, sharp jabs.

The leader of the girls, only a cruel smile showing beneath the hooded darkness of her cowl, made a gesture.

All at once, the dazed look cleared from Gwen's eyes. She was suddenly and vividly aware of where she was and what was happening to her, and Jimmy saw it break her mind with a clean kindling-wood snap. She screamed shrilly into the night as the dog went faster, as the girls around her laughed and chanted. Then Wulf swung his hind leg over and twisted his body around and they were locked backside to backside, his cock lodged and swollen inside her.

At that moment, one of the girls drove a spike through Wulf's skull with a hard blow from a mallet. The dog dropped instantly, dead, but still stuck within Gwen. Another girl seized Gwen's head in the crook of her arm and jerked-snapped. Gwen stiffened, eyes and mouth agape, and then all the life fled from her and she was a rag doll.

Jimmy was blinded by hysterical tears. Through that blurred veil, he saw the girls lifting the locked-together bodies of Gwen and Wulf, and bringing them toward him. They arranged Gwen over Jimmy's legs, the dead weight of her sprawled and still sickly warm across his thighs. Wulf rested on the rock, tongue lolling.

His skin and flesh recoiled, but he could not move Gwen off of him, could not get away. As a finishing touch, one of the girls tucked the fear-shrunken flaccid worm that was Jimmy's cock into Gwen's slack mouth.

A brief stinging pain touched his arms. Jimmy, teetering on the brink of madness and wishing for it because then nothing would matter, none of this would matter, he would descend into raving and never have to think about any of it, rolled his head and saw a dark flow running from a long gash in the tender meat of his inner forearm. He had been laid open wrist to elbow on both arms, and tilted as he was the life's blood was running freely out of him.

The girls stood in a circle, holding candles, chanting, and watching him die. It took a long time, for the same tilt that sped the flood out of his veins also pooled it in his head and kept him aware until the very end. Aware, with no refuge in madness.

The last thing he heard before death was a voice, one he knew had to belong to the leader. He heard the words, but they meant little to him.

"The final rite. Abigail will serve."

When the enveloping darkness closed in, Jimmy was glad.

**

Chapter Ten –

It became a blur to Celestina after that, all red-black-shifting-churning. How many times they changed genders and shapes, he … or was it she? … did not know.

The fallen angel remembered climaxes like earthquakes and apocalypses, remembered penetrating and being penetrated, and the demon lover doing such things with that supple tail that could barely be described.

There was a time when both of them assumed hermaphroditic forms and bent themselves around each other in ways that no mortal could ever contrive, writhing together to mutual ecstasy.

Feathers all around, the charred smell of them as they withered and turned black. Claws digging, and the battering of their violent sex, and skin darkening with bruises and blood.

At some point it seemed that she … or was it he? … had grown a tail, and claws, and that the denuded wings had turned leathery and batlike. And somehow, they had ceased being alone and were joined by others. The cat-demon, all sleek fur and wanton sensuality. Amorphous ghostly things that could assume whatever configuration would fit whatever orifices were available. He … or she … such things did not seem to matter now … was lost in an orgy of unending inventiveness.

Somewhere, as if from very far away, Celestina thought he heard someone calling out to her. Begging for his help. She ignored it, but it came back, persistent and underlaid with other sounds. Voices that chanted, and bells that tolled.

Varyk, male again at the moment and bent over a likewise-male Celestian from behind while vigorously sodomizing him – and sucking him at the same time with a toothless maw that had opened at the end of his tail – chuckled into his ear.

"We're being summoned. Shall we?"

**

Chapter Eleven –

"Deliver me, please, deliver me from evil, this I pray," Abigail said, clutching the statuette of the angel so tightly in her clasped hands that she could feel its lines impressing themselves in the skin of her palms.

She had been kneeling for hours in the posture of prayer, until her knees ached and her neck was sore from bowing her head and the hardwood of the floor felt more and more like stone. All around her, she could hear the noises of the house and did her best to unhear them.