Revenant

Yeah, Satan was drooling. “Where is he?”

“The Temple of Gog.”

The Prince of Lies nodded in approval. “Nice. His power will be limited there. Not that it matters, of course. I can kill him with my pinky.”

“I’d like to see that, my lord,” Revenant said. He’d pay to see that.

Satan narrowed his eyes. “Then why did you attack me?”

“Because,” Revenant said. “You questioned my loyalty. Don’t fucking do that again.”

Now Rev waited. The demon would either respect what Revenant had done… or he’d fry him. Probably literally, given that one of Satan’s favorite torture methods involved a giant iron skillet and rendered Gargantua lard.

Finally, just as Revenant was contemplating the spices that would go best with Shadow Angel stir-fry, Satan’s black eyes locked onto him.

“You have balls made of brimstone, Revenant.” He bared fangs as sharp as blades. “But do it again and I’ll cut those balls off and feed them to Blaspheme. Understood?”

Rev inclined his head in the shallowest nod he could get away with and still appear respectful.

“Good. Now who is this archangel?”

“His name is Raphael.”

A slow, malevolent smile spread across Satan’s face, and his eyes glowed with unholy excitement. “I can’t wait to break him,” he said almost breathlessly. “Let’s go.”

Revenant and Satan materialized inside the Temple of Gog at the same time. In the next heartbeat, Reaver was there, snapping a Tal around the demon’s throat. Revenant leaped away as Satan roared in fury, his body contorting and expanding, growing taller and wider and fuck, this wasn’t going to be good. Rev hadn’t expected the Tal to work, and sure enough, they might as well have collared the demon with a silk ribbon.

“Now!” he shouted. “Hurry!”

Reaver didn’t have a chance to carry out the next phase of their plan. Satan’s snarl became a physical thing, a wall of hellfire that shot from him in a 360-degree shock wave of pain.

Revenant heard Reaver’s scream of agony even over his own hoarse cry. His skin blistered and peeled, layer upon layer, until he could see his own bones peeking out from charred muscle.

The Dark Lord’s giant fist, now the size of a Volkswagen, swiped Revenant aside as if he were a mere fly. He sailed through the air, striking the Gog statue with a crash of broken bones and marble.

Reaver must have gotten the same treatment, his muffled grunt joining the sound of stone collapsing around them.

Revenant’s body felt as if it were caving in on itself, but somehow he managed to draw in power, taking it from the very air around him. His wounds began to knit together as he sought a bigger, more powerful form.

“You traitor!” Satan’s voice, deep, guttural, was a weapon in itself, shattering Revenant’s eardrums.

The surge of pain triggered a chain reaction inside him. Anger seared him more intensely than Satan’s fire had. This bastard had been the source of all of his pain. All his mother’s pain. He had to pay.

Leaping to his feet, which were now clawed, huge to match the monstrous form he’d shifted into, he blasted Satan with every weapon in his arsenal. All of them. At once.

The demon screamed and fell back, blood, limbs, teeth, horns… it all burst into the air in a gory mist as Satan’s body exploded. The temple, painted in dripping crimson and internal organs, shuddered, as if it knew something terrible had just happened.

And was going to happen again.

“Reaver!”

Revenant’s twin was a mangled, twisted mess, but with Satan out of commission, he could —

“You fucking cunt!” Satan materialized in front of Rev with a giant sword of lava in his clawed hand. Oh, fuck —

Revenant dove, rolling as he hit the ground. The edge of the blade caught him in the ribs, opening his chest down to the bone and turning his blood to ash. Pain blurred his vision, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw Reaver, nearly regenerated, limping toward the pentagram he’d drawn with Gethel’s blood in the center of the room.

Satan’s head swiveled toward Reaver.

Keep his attention!

“Fucker.” Revenant staggered to his feet, resisting the urge to wrap his arm around his rib cage. The bleeding, charred flesh wasn’t healing like it should. “You twisted son of a bitch. Did you really think I’d sit by and let Lucifer take what should be mine?” Throwing out his hand, he sent a focused beam of angelic radiation at the demon, severing the bastard’s left arm at the elbow. The sword clattered to the ground, a hand still wrapped around the hilt.

He paid for that with a fist to the gut. No, through the gut. Revenant’s jaw locked in agony as Satan’s fist did a through-and-through, punching out of his back.

“I should have ripped your wings off and shoved them up your ass a long time ago.” Steam bellowed from Satan’s nostrils, and hate glowed in his crimson eyes as he jerked his bloody hand free of Rev’s body. His mouth stretched into a hideous, sharp-toothed smile as he leaned in close enough for Rev to smell his fetid breath. “But no time like the present. Bend over, you stinking piece of offal.”

In a blur of motion, the demon clamped his hand down on Revenant’s skull and spun him, face-first, into the ground. Revenant screamed as he felt one wing rip away from his shoulders. Fuck, this was going to hurt —

The glint of metal flashed in the torchlit temple. Still pinned to the ground, Revenant caught a glimpse of Reaver slashing his palm with a dagger. The pentagram flared to life, pulsing and glowing as if hungry for the blood that ran down Reaver’s arm in a thick rivulet. Even as Satan roared a curse, Reaver dropped to one knee and slapped his hand in the center of the pentagram.