Demon Bound

from a maelstrom of wings, and chilling, high-pitched shrieks.
    They were still ringing in Alice’s ears as she walked through the bathing chamber, holding her sketchbook. She didn’t call in a pencil. The silk soles of her boots muffled her heavy steps.
    It was not so difficult to see into the future. She only had to look around. This was what awaited her if she chose to safeguard her soul by imprisoning herself. This . . . but without the company of a hellhound, or a door, or any event she could look forward to with hope.
    She emerged from the chamber to the sound of a soft warning growl from the hellhound, who still lay across the entrance to the opposite room. Jake paused in his slow approach, and his frustrated sigh pulled a smile from her.
    No, he could not stop himself from wondering about that chamber any more than she could. But neither of them was willing to challenge a hellhound to look.
    “Damn.” He turned toward her, his expression rueful. He pushed his hands deep in his pockets. “So . . . whaddaya think?”
    Alice placed her sketchbook on the table. In truth, she did not know what to think. She was completely uncertain—about what was truth and lies, how they would escape Belial again, whether Khavi could be trusted, and if what they’d learned here had any significance at all.
    She only had one certainty: how very glad she was that Jake had not been separated from her. That she could rely on his integrity—and that she could test her instincts against his, without having to maneuver through motives and half truths.
    And she would do so now. Alice leafed through the sketches until she found Zakril’s skeleton and the symbols written above. She’d debated showing it to Khavi, but refrained—uncertain, again, as to the other woman’s reaction.
    “ ‘She waits below,’ ” Alice recited. “Michael said this referred to the woman who had betrayed them.”
    “Yeah.” Jake joined her at the table. His leg brushed her skirts, and she wanted to lean against him. Not for support; just to feel his warmth and strength. “But that’s not Khavi. Anaria’s the one who betrayed them.”
    Alice looked at the statue’s head, lying on its cheek, then up at Jake. “Why do you suppose?”
    “Why she betrayed them or why I think it’s Anaria?”
    “The second.”
    “Good, because I have no clue about the first. As for the second, here—” He flipped to a drawing of the statue in Tunisia. “And outside. You have any brothers, sisters?”
    “No.”
    “Me neither. Okay, let’s use Drifter then. Say you saw a statue with him kneeling in front of this woman, looking like Zakril did outside. Obviously defeated, forced to submit, and hating it—even though he loved her. What would you do?”
    Her chest tightened. Put that way, the woman’s—Anaria’s—serenity and benevolence were an insult. “Destroy it, or take it somewhere Anaria could never see, so she could never take pleasure in it. But I am not Khavi.”
    “No, neither am I.” He flipped back to the skeleton, the symbols. “Michael said they were divided—that the others wanted to put a Guardian on the throne in Hell. And he said that Zakril wasn’t one of them. So, two questions: If the betrayal was Khavi’s, why would she stick his bones on a wall, and then bring his statue down here—removing evidence of his defeat? Evidence that no one would have seen anyway, until you came along?”
    “Guilt? Perhaps she was torn between ambition and loyalty. Or perhaps she brought it with her so that she could always look upon his humiliation.”
    “But it’s Anaria’s head she beats up? Yeah, right.”
    She smiled slightly. “And the second question?”
    “Why would Zakril be bowing down to Anaria? Can you ever— ever —imagine Michael forcing anyone to bow to him? Even with Lucifer, he wouldn’t bother with the whole debasing routine; he’d just chop off his head.”
    That was true. “Yet Khavi admitted that she had hidden from Michael.”
    “Yeah, and that’s the part I can’t work out yet. But she loves Anaria, too—she made it sound like they were quite the tight little group, didn’t she?—so I’m guessing whatever her reason for hiding, that has more to do with guilt and conflicted loyalties.”
    “Yes,” Alice murmured.
    Jake’s eyes narrowed on her face before he said, “You didn’t think it was Khavi who betrayed them.”
    “No. But I feared I pitied her too much”—and saw too many parallels in their