I looked up into its eyes. “Dantalion. . .is pleased?”
“It called for my attention the moment you pushed that little priest down onto his own altar. The pair of us watched you defile his innocence in a house of God. We watched you love him, and he love you. How could we not be pleased?”
I flushed with pride and embarrassment and lust so deep it pulled at my very essence.
I wanted—I wanted Asmodeus. I wanted everything that came with servicing a demon. I wanted the immortality of my pleasure, to shuck my human past entirely. To forsake God most ardently, and for always.
To be Asmodeus’—forever.
“Come to me. Come to me now,” Asmodeus cooed. Books flew from their place on the shelf, hurtling out to carve an arched doorway in the recess. Then a doorknob appeared, a snarled, angry silver thing, and the door was fully realised. A soft glow emanated from the cracks where it met the stone.
I felt a tug in my gut as if the anchor of my soul was caught on the sea floor. I knew that through those doors, Asmodeus waited.
It took its curled fingers and ghosted them over my cheeks. It leaned down and kissed me. Everything in me opened, a sluice gate of emotion and hope and desire. A certainty settled in me.
This was it.
And Asmodeus said, “Come and take your place as my immortal toy.”
I walked to the door and opened it, and before me wound a staircase, up and up into red and black clouds.
A throbbing in my temples, in my heart, in my flesh. An incessant drumbeat urging me forward. It was the end of one journey, and the beginning of another.
Alessandro, transformed.
END
