Cruel is the Light

God created man and demon.
Demon crucified God.
Man abandoned God.

And one more tenet only the Vatican knew:

Man harnessed demons’ unholy magic.

Selene Alleva ghosted her blade over the faint blue veins of her inner arm, lingering when she found the symbol carved into her bones. Devour. She hesitated. Her magic was the enemy, bleeding her with every exorcism. If it was only fear of pain that gave her pause, or some misplaced principle, then she could overcome it. Pain no longer frightened her—it had become familiar in the years of her Vatican training.

Dio Immortale, she swore. She’d made mistakes tonight. If she had done one thing differently, she wouldn’t be in this predicament now—poised to bleed herself for power as the scent of rot and mould encased her. The metallic tang of blood beneath it all. She should never have lowered her guard.

The threat of snow scented the air. Selene shivered, but not because the evening’s chill sliced knife-like up her spine. A rank wave of demonic magic ached through her eye teeth and into the depths of her skull.

That was more than one demon.

They tasted like violence. Like a split lip. Vaguely iron and putrid. ‘Captain Alleva?’

Selene silenced her subordinate with a look. Ambrose Zurzulo was not perceptive enough to feel the tainted magic, and Selene had no patience for his dearth of natural talent. She glanced at the rune-carved metal hugging his hands. Knuckledusters. Honestly. But he was too infatuated with his own magnificence to notice her disdain.

Why anyone would elect for extreme close-range combat, and willingly let a demon so damn near, she had no clue.

‘We’re close. Move.’ She led her team down a shallow flight of stairs, chasing the cold pull of demon magic to a crumbling stucco building at the end of the street. It looked abandoned—but wasn’t. Two. No, three. Maybe more. An infestation of this size was not unheard of in the heart of Rome, but it was unusual to find one so close to the Vatican.

She would reward them with steel for their trouble.

Selene skidded to a stop out of sight of the windows, flanked by Ambrose and Benedetta. Both were new to her team, and while Benedetta Fiore had been in Selene’s year at the Academy, they’d never been close. It wasn’t ideal that today was her first opportunity to see them in action.

Ambrose stretched his fingers, knuckles cracking. ‘I’ll take point,’ he said, starting to shadow-box.

Not ideal at all.

But she had little say in the matter. Her superiors had spoken, and if the Vatican was anything at all, it was a place of strict hierarchy.

‘I think not,’ Selene said, her voice dangerously soft. ‘Don’t even look a demon in the eye without my say-so.’ She counted on her fingers. ‘Obey. Impress me. Survive. In that order. Simple enough.’ Even for you.

She pinned Benedetta with her eyes. ‘Stay close to Zurzulo. He’ll protect you.’

Ambrose nodded his agreement, and the knot of worry in her chest loosened. Just a bit.

‘What about you?’ Benedetta asked.

Selene held her gaze. ‘I’ll protect you too.’

Benedetta blinked wide-eyed, and smiled a lightbulb smile. ‘Oh, I know that. I meant who’s going to protect you?’

Selene didn’t think that required an answer.

A tall figure rounded the corner. ‘O Captain, my Captain,’ Caterina Altamura drawled, flicking a still glowing cigarette into the dark. ‘Relax. The cavalry’s here.’

Selene finally let a small smile tip her lips.

A weapons artificer like Ambrose, Caterina was as skilful as she was insubordinate.

Then a second figure trailed Caterina out of the dark.

Lucia Scavo angled her pointed chin into the breeze, turning her pretty heart-shaped face as though scenting the air. Her sensitivity to demon magic was well known within the Vatican, and Selene trusted Lucia’s instincts nearly as much as her own.

Selene extended her senses too. Her power was always with her. In her blood. But it sang louder now in proximity to demons. She glanced at Lucia. ‘I don’t feel anything above a Level Two.’

The sister of medicine nodded, her cheeks whipped ruddy by the cold. ‘And no more than five. All low grade.’

The Vatican ranked demons on a six-point scale. Curses and Ghouls frequently broke through nowadays. Low level, low difficulty, but with high potential for collateral damage. Enough to force the Vatican to respond quickly. With extreme prejudice.

Ambrose flipped a hexagonal disc that glimmered in the weak lamplight, and Selene snatched it from the air.

She frowned. ‘Do you have any idea what this is?’

The brawler pushed his hands into his pockets. ‘Found it.’

‘Where?’

He shrugged.

Selene turned it between her fingers, inspecting it. It was stamped with the seal of the Deathless God. A ward coin. One of many hidden within statues around Rome, their powerful magic working together to ward off demons. Which begged the question, why did Ambrose have it?

Lucia’s voice broke into her thoughts, sounding uncharacteristically hesitant. ‘I sense . . . maybe a Fiend?’

Benedetta paled at that, touching her forehead, throat, and the middle of her chest in a quick prayer. As if Selene needed further confirmation Benedetta had no business facing demons in the field.

‘Save your prayers,’ Selene said coldly. ‘No need to call on God for a Level Three.’

Caterina smothered a smile, but Lucia smirked openly.

Ignoring them, Selene slipped the ward coin into her pocket and turned to the building. The chipped stucco facade appeared more orange than pink in the glow of the street lamps, but Selene was more focused on the presences beyond. They throbbed weakly, like butterflies in her fist. Soon she’d crush them just as easily. Despite that confidence, unease coiled in her ribcage. Something felt off.

Caterina sliced her thumb and pressed it against the seal on her gatling rifle. Bright threads of power raced along the gun’s six barrels, as her blood unlocked its full potential.

The five of them parted ways, silently sweeping the apartments on the ground floor before climbing the stairs to the next. Selene shadowed Ambrose and Benedetta, keeping them in her line of sight. She didn’t need to tell Caterina and Lucia what to do—they’d climbed the ranks two years ahead of her at the Academy and had been an effective team far longer than she’d been their commander. She respected their prowess. But she didn’t trust the other two.

She’d fought tooth and nail against having Benedetta on this mission, but, no. Two healers, they’d said. And so she obeyed her directive.

A smoky, vaguely reptilian Curse demon trickled from the shadows, stretching toward Ambrose. Level One. Selene cut through it before Ambrose even noticed, flicking clinging shadows off her blade. She turned in the centre of the room and then sheathed her sword.

Behind her came a clang as a Ghoul scrabbled its way out of a disused dumbwaiter, grinning rows of serrated teeth in a horrible wide mouth. Level Two. Distinguishable by the fact she felt barely a ripple of power from it. It had made its home in a corpse on the wrong side of decomposing, corrupting it with its magic. Benedetta shrank back, but Ambrose strode forward. His eyes gleamed with the fire of a subordinate desperate to prove his mettle.

Selene flung an arm out to stop him. ‘Wait!’

But Ambrose crowed a battle cry and wound up for a punch that would take the demon’s head off its shoulders.

The demon was deceptively fast. It opened its terrible maw, swallowing Ambrose’s arm to the elbow. His scream ricocheted around inside her ribs.

‘Captain!’ Ambrose pleaded, his arm and those damned knuckledusters buried in the demon’s gullet. Time slowed as she watched his eyes—black now from blown pupils and desperation. Save me, they said. Save me, please.

The arm was salvageable. His stupidity—terminal.

In a blink she had her knife poised over skin and bone—the cutting edge above the symbol for devour. She hesitated. Triggering her magic would devour another piece of her soul. If she wasn’t careful, soon she’d have nothing left. Cold fingers caressed her spine at the unwelcome thought. She moved the blade away from her skin.

Sorry, Ambrose.

Even a single drop of her magic was worth more than a limb. And so she sacrificed his arm on the altar of her ambition. There were other, far more powerful demons to kill, and she didn’t know how much soul she had left.

Flipping the knife, she sheathed it and drew the gun at her thigh in the same sinuous movement. Ambrose’s eyes widened as Selene chose, as so often, to fight and condemn with hot metal and blade. Her first bullet detached his arm at the shoulder. Selene strode closer, firing shot after shot until the demon went still. Nudging it with her boot, her nose wrinkled in distaste. Deader than dead. Still not dead enough.

Selene toyed with the idea of shooting it again.

Instead, she turned on her heel, blinking blood from her lashes. Benedetta knelt beside Ambrose, applying a tourniquet to his arm.

As Ambrose whimpered piteously, Selene thought about the final unspoken tenet of their religion. Man harnessed demons’ unholy magic.

A secret. Though perhaps not their most dangerous. One known only to the select few who graduated from the Vatican’s elite Military Academy. Demons had given them the means of fighting back. Unwillingly. Bitterly, perhaps.

At his continued whimpering, Selene indicated the brawler. ‘Silence him.’

Biting her lower lip, Benedetta touched his forehead with two fingers. His pain drained away. Silent now, Ambrose glared at Selene over Benedetta’s shoulder, hatred replacing agony.

Selene crouched in front of him. ‘We’ll get you another arm. One made of steel this time, like your little knuckledusters.’

Benedetta redirected her attention to the demon. Pushing her wispy blonde hair beneath her habit, she withdrew vials to collect blood and humours. She hesitated over the mess Selene had made of the demon’s skull before delicately extracting a tooth for later analysis.

Selene extended her senses as she circled the room, open to the slightest stirring of demon magic. Nothing. Satisfied, she followed the hum of voices down the hallway as Caterina and Lucia compared notes on their kills. She stepped into the doorway just in time to see Caterina level her secondary weapon, a shotgun, and blast a demon across the room. The bullet flared on impact.

As the imprint of the demon faded, she felt another.

Pivoting, she searched the dark corners. Somewhere nearby another demon waited. It plucked at her senses like a spider playing the threads of its own web—gleaning information from her. More than she was getting from it. Selene hissed, drawing her handgun. Too slow. A demon smashed through the lead-light transom window over the door on the other side of the hall. It had crawled into the body of a small girl. Bright doll-blue eyes glinted prettily through a fall of dark hair. Its elbows bent the wrong way as it skittered across the ceiling, disappearing into the hallway’s gloom.

A Level Four.

Caterina and Lucia were supposed to have cleared that end, but had evidently fucked it up. And she had lowered her guard. How had she not sensed a Noble? Plunging through milky spiderwebs, she arrived in the main room a split second after the demon. Borne by the essence of a child, it would burn out quickly. When its power started to wane, it would seek another body to consume from within. Parasite.

It already had Benedetta cornered.

Selene met the child’s blue eyes. No, damn it all, don’t lose focus. The child’s gone. The reminder rang hollow.

Projecting calm, Selene twitched a finger. Go.

Benedetta eased toward the closest doorway.

‘Well, hello,’ Selene said conversationally.

‘Exorcist,’ the creature hissed, tongue curling across its dead cheek.

She had to keep the demon’s attention on her. ‘I’m impressed you managed to penetrate this far into Rome undetected. Quite a feat. You must be powerful indeed.’

The demon preened. ‘More powerful with you. I shall enjoy possessing your body. My every whim will be at our fingertips.’ It curled its backward-jointed fingers, skin and tendons snapping.

Selene nodded sagely. ‘Ah yes. I, too, appreciate that mental imagery.’

The demon blinked double-lidded eyes, head tipping. ‘You do?’

Her brow inched higher. The Noble was a literalist, then.

Benedetta was almost clear when broken glass crunched beneath her boot. The demon’s head snapped in her direction. Selene raced to intercept as the demon went for Benedetta, but it was impossibly fast even as its skin split at the seams of those fingers. The demon’s jaw disengaged as it lunged, tearing its cheeks as it bit out Benedetta’s jugular.

No!

Benedetta’s body slumped to its knees.

Tumbling forward, Selene aimed and squeezed the trigger. Her bullets shattered a cobweb-draped chandelier as the demon skittered away, making a curious sound. Laughter.

It was laughing.

Propelled by cold rage, Selene followed, driving it back. Reaching for the sword slung across her back, she caught the demon the moment it failed to navigate the second chandelier, lopping off its legs at the knee.

An agonized shriek pierced her eardrums and the world rang with pure silence. Across the room, Ambrose pressed his remaining palm to a bleeding ear.

Selene ignored her own pain. ‘Get out!’

He obeyed as the creature landed scrabbling on the floor.

Selene pinned it with her sword, straddling it to hold down its clawing hands. It bucked its small, powerful body. It could crush a man’s skull between two overlong fingers, but her strength was greater. Selene leaned to look into those haunting blue eyes and bared her teeth.

She would make it suffer for Benedetta’s life.

It lunged, teeth clicking in front of her face. Selene punched it. Once, twice. It dodged her third, and her fist ruptured stone. Pain popped behind her eyes when she flexed her fingers.

The demon subsided and Selene drew her knife. Best to end this quickly. An exorcism, then, she thought, a familiar ache behind her ribs. Before anyone else dies.

And so, with the knife she hadn’t used to save Ambrose’s arm, she carved the symbols.

Devour. Return. Teeth. Burn.

When her blood hit the air, it smoked, coiling and lashing like a viper. The symbols she whittled into bone flared gold, as though filled by molten metal. Her magic could raze a city block if she wanted it to. Perhaps the whole of Rome.

And in that breath of misused magic, she’d be worse than dead and a monster in more ways than one.

Her hearing slammed back and her eyesight cleared so evening became a summer afternoon. Only the demon beneath her was shadowy. A writhing supernova of untamed energy. This was power.

She could feel everything that moved in the apartment building. Could even feel the skittering heartbeat of a mouse holding still in the walls.

As though time had slowed, she could count every eyelash and freckle on the demon’s stolen face as she laid a palm against its forehead. The creature lunged, teeth lengthening. Then it disappeared in a burst of light so intense it could blind.

Blinking the spots away, Selene approached Benedetta. Her blonde hair haloed her head, slowly soaking crimson. Horrific, even to the Macellaia di Roma. The Butcher of Rome.

‘I’m sorry,’ Selene breathed, closing the healer’s eyes.

A draught stirred up dust from the dull parquet floor, caressing Caterina’s dark hair over her cheek where silvery scar tissue devoured smooth skin on one side of her face. ‘That was a Level Four,’ Caterina said accusingly, setting her shotgun on her shoulder.

Selene waved Caterina off. ‘I know. I didn’t sense it.’ She turned to Lucia, whose white habit was now splattered with gore. ‘And neither did you. I thought you were meant to be good at this.’

Lucia shrugged. ‘We all make mistakes.’

Selene jabbed her finger to where Benedetta’s body lay. ‘Tell her that.’

Caterina stepped between them. ‘She said sorry.’

‘She did not,’ Selene drawled, circling the room. ‘And I shouldn’t need to point out that Lucia wasn’t the only one who made mistakes tonight.’

Caterina’s jaw worked but she didn’t argue.

‘The next regional assignment will be all yours. You two can get out of Rome for a while. Enjoy the quiet.’

Distantly Ave Maria, one of the Vatican’s six bells, rang out a fraction of a second ahead of the others. Angling her wrist, Selene glanced at her watch. Late. Damn.

Pivoting on her heel, she left them to the clean-up, her expression melting from angry to contemplative.

If she, alone, had made that mistake . . . well, that was one thing. But Lucia had also miscalculated the enemy’s strength and numbers. Unusual, because she was the most perceptive in all the Vatican. It made Selene’s stomach coil. Unusual was never good when it came to demons.

Unusual meant something had changed.

And death was sure to follow.