Pyro

Cat and mouse...and hellhound?

Pyro was up bright and early the next morning, whistling cheerily as he dug into his weetbix with glee. One thing he did miss about being topside was his weetbix in the mornings.

Hell, well Hell pretty much-ruined anything nice, that was the point of eternal punishment he guessed. But New Orleans in the morning? That was as close to heaven as the demon lord was likely to get.

Barghest was snoring with gusto, spread out on the balcony, huffing like a brute as he basked in the morning rays, looking for all the world like the pet he was disguised as. This morning Pyro couldn’t even get mad at that. What was wrong with him?

“I know what it is.”

"Shaetan’s s**t!” Pyro yelled, spinning around at the female voice right by his ear, “What are you doing here?”

Suryx smiled like a cat with the canary, using her sexuality to glide over to the spare chair, “Come on boss you didn’t expect me to stay behind and let you have all the fun now did you?”

The Demon lord shook his head slowly. marveling at Suryx sheer audacity to flout Shaetan’s orders so easily. If the High Lord of Hell found out his succubus was topside without permission she may well have orchestrated her doom.

“Well, would you like some weetbix?” Pyro asked with raised eyebrows, and Suryx fully relaxed, knowing that he was accepting her help even if he hadn’t asked for it.

“Weetbix?” She repeated with a wider grin if that were possible, noting the slushy mess that Pyro was devouring, and he grinned back, motioning towards the blue and red packet on the bench, “Help yourself.”

And that’s how it came to be that the Demon Lord and his A-team shared breakfast in the bustling city of New Orleans.

Marie woke up in a small single bed within the confines of her cabin with Bernard sitting wearily beside her. This teleportation had been a strong one, using all of her power just to wrench the demon away from Patricia, but she couldn’t bear to see the old woman’s death so Marie had acted out of sheer instinct. Now she was paying the price.

“What did you do?” Bernard asked gravely, handing her a glass of water.

“He had Patricia, I saw them while I was down at the creek in a vision, then Dad rode in and saved her for me.”

Bernard shook his head and sighed in defeat.

“Please tell me that your magic didn’t touch him at least?”

Marie couldn’t look the wizard in the eyes, if anything she seemed to pale as she whispered “I threw him off her with a spell so Dad could get to her.”

There was a moment of silence before the old wizard got up and began pacing in her room, she didn’t know what to say so she just stayed silent, waiting for words to form.

Bernard didn’t keep her waiting for long...

“There is nowhere left for us to run Marie, this is it and by using your magic on a demon you effectively sent him a GPS link on exactly where to find us! When did you do this, what time of the day?” He demanded.

“I guess maybe close to ten in the evening?” She guessed, beginning to scratch at herself uncomfortably, but she was unprepared for Bernard’s eyes to widen and begin cursing.

“That was hours ago! He’s probably halfway here by now, damn it all I didn’t find you until just past midnight you silly girl!”

Bernard quickly began gathering their objects, meager as they were, whizzing around the cabin, shoving belongings into his satchel while Marie sat there with her jaw hanging open,

"Hurry up girl...”

Knock knock knock...

“Little pig little pig let me in...”

Drawled a sinfully seductive voice from just outside the bedroom window. Bernard barely had time to look horrified before a large animal came crashing through showering both occupants in the glass. Saliva dripping teeth snapped and snarled as the monstrous beast stalked towards the small figure in her bed, it’s intent painfully clear in the blood-red eyes that were fixated on Marie’s every movement.

Following the hound was a siren of a woman, with her lethal blades drawn and a smile on her face, indicating how much she enjoyed her line of work.

“dormiți și încetați-vă vânătoarea!“(sleep and cease your hunt!) Bernard chanted, pushing force from his body towards the hell hound and its succubus. Surprisingly neither put up any resistance, falling to the floor where they landed, eyes closed.

Bernard couldn’t believe his luck. While it was unusual to send a succubus on a retrieval mission, no one wrote the book on how Shaetan made his decisions so who was he to judge.

“Yes Bernard..who indeed?” The same voice whispered.

Slowly Bernard turned back around and came face to face with his worst nightmare..Pyro Diego royal prince of darkness.

Bernard tried to move his arms, summon a spell, do anything to stop the man from noticing his niece, but it was no use, his limbs simply lost the desire to obey his commands. Knowing that his death was imminent he sent a final mind link to Marie who was trying her best to hide under the covers, just one word was all he managed, but it counted.

RUN!

Pyro was a master of his craft, and the mage was old, full of barely tapped power. It was a preemptive strike to render the old man speechless and take control of his limbs. After he took the bait of Barghest busting through the window and focused his energy on Suryx it was easy for Pyro to get under Bernard’s defenses and conjure a spell of his own unnoticed. Now he was literally a puppet in the demon lord’s hands.

The question was, did Pyro want to give him a quick death or did he want to play?