He was on her in seconds, too strong and too fast for her to resist. He put one hand around her throat and began to choke the life out of her. She didn't need to breathe, Laurel reminded herself. She coughed up some of her blood, which splattered and sizzled against his face. He recoiled and she tried to press her advantage. When she pounced on him, however, she found only an illusory shadow, as he shifted position at blinding speed. He came up from behind her and pinned her to the ground, keeping her mouth away from his flesh. He tried with all his might to choke her out and she let herself go limp. As he maintained his grip, either not believing or not caring that she'd apparently fallen unconscious, she carved an opening into her palm and let a thin tendril of blood creep out. Slowly but surely, it worked its way around her body, staying out of sight until it coiled around his neck.

  Her grand-sire screamed in shock and pain before tearing the blood trail away at great cost to the flesh on his hands. When she turned to face him, she saw something close to panic in his eyes but, within an instant, he was gone. He pushed through the thick dark shadow and fled into the moonlit woods. She pursued him as best she could but eventually realised that she would need a new strategy to find and catch up to him. With great mental effort, she was able to send tiny droplets of blood in all different directions. When one of them hit him, the rest returned and she flew towards him. He tried to clobber her when she arrived, extending his arm, and she let him think she hadn't noticed. Just as his arm was about to make contact with her neck, she tore her own head free, scarring his arm so badly with her blood that it was reduced to bone at the elbow.

  She reattached herself seconds later as he howled in pain. Before she could resume the fight, he regained his composure and attempted to parlay. 'You've learned a lot in my absence, I see. I underestimated you, I see that now. But there's still so much I can teach you. About your powers, about your mother.' She refused to let his words get to her, however, and replied in the form of a whip, made from her blood, and struck hard against his chest, burning a great bloody gash. After letting out another howl, he covered the area in thick black darkness and closed his eyes to hide their light. Hundreds of others appeared just as quickly, as he psychically commanded all the nearby nightmares to attack her. That bought him time to flee as she carved her way through goblins and gremlins and many other creatures.

  Once she was clear of them, however, she exploded into a tidal wave of blood. Once she'd found him, she wrapped herself around him. The heat and fire was almost impossible to bear but she kept in mind that she was a pool of blood with no nerve endings. It was all in her mind. Within minutes, her grand-sire crumbled into ash and dust. She was free to reconstitute herself. Except for her lack of hair and clothes, she managed to perfectly replicate her old flesh, though it took several hours. In one sense, she felt free. In another, she felt as though her last vestiges of humanity had been stripped away from her and that she had condemned herself more than ever to a monstrous life. 'You're not a monster,' she repeated her mother's words to herself, only half-believing them, 'and you're not a weapon. You are a person.'

  That spurred her, at least, back to her old master's lair to see if he really had been holding more of her affects. She found the devil woman waiting for her at the cave entrance or, rather, waiting for her master to return. 'You killed him?' she asked, her tone startled and disbelieving.

  'Hopefully,' Laurel replied, as she walked past. 'I should do the world a favour and kill you too.' It was not much of a threat, since she didn't even bother to stay, instead heading straight into the cave.

  The devil also seemed to think little of it as she began to follow her. 'Your master kept his possessions in the locked door at the end of the hall.'

  Laurel didn't even bother to correct her use of the title and simply raced towards the door. She didn't need a key, simply unlocking it with tiny tendrils of blood. Ripping through his things and destroying anything that wasn't what she was looking for, she found nothing. 'You lied to me.'

  'I just told you what he told me,' she pleaded. 'Perhaps there are things in other rooms.' It was a faint hope but one she had to take seriously, so she resumed her search. By dawn, she had scoured every inch of the place and come up with nothing. 'You could tell me what she looked like,' she offered, 'and I could play her for you.'

  Laurel hated the part of her that wanted that. 'Get lost,' she simply said.

  'But I belong to you now, since my lord has died and you were his heir.'

  'A servant?' The words escaped her lips involuntarily.

  'Yes,' the devil smiled, 'I'm your servant.'

  'Tell me your name then,' she said, once again hating herself just a little.

  'My dreamer called me Zelliana, but you can call me whatever you like.'

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  'How about Liana?'

  'Liana it is.' The devil let her tail swoosh around happily and, though she found it vaguely endearing, Laurel managed to remain impassive.

  'Your first orders are to help me smash this shithole to pieces.' Her devilish servant consented and they spent the day tearing it down brick by brick. What little remained by the end was burned in a great pyre, all except for the letter from her mother, whether real or fake, that she could not bear to part with.

  'So, what now?'

  'I don't know. I don't know what to do or where to go.'

  'You can do anything, go anywhere.'

  'That makes it harder, not easier,' Laurel thought for a while, as they stared into the burning pyre, 'first things first, let's get dinner.' Liana's face lit up at the mention and they flew to the nearest farmstead. 'You know the rules,' she said, forcefully.

  'No killing,' Liana said, obligingly. With the preconditions clear, they descended on the home of young couple and terrified them with bangs and bumps. They scraped on the outside walls, pulled doors and windows ajar and Laurel herself infiltrated the house. When the young man went out to investigate and receive a good scare from Liana, she approached the bed that the young woman was too afraid to leave and bit her neck. Her victim passed out but she still managed to restrain herself and leave without doing permanent damage. Exhilarated, the pair fled into the wounds.

  Liana giggled herself mad and Laurel even found herself able to smile. In the moonlight, her devilish servant's thorny skin did not look too gruesome and she allowed herself to feel comfortable in her presence. They spent their days and nights in like fashion and, soon enough, Laurel could not keep her lingering mistrust from melting away as her yearning for companionship grew. They became friends, in an awkward sense, and even lovers, in time.

  At a certain point, they realised that they'd been unconsciously making their way towards the capital. 'Do you want to go there?'

  'I don't know,' Laurel said. 'Part of me wants to see my old family, just see them, from the shadows if need be, but another part of me wants to flee.'

  'And yet another part,' Liana dared to suggest, 'wants to hurt them.'

  Laurel's face became twisted with anguish upon hearing the suggestion. 'Yes,' she admitted.

  'They hurt you,' the devil insisted, 'it would only be fair to return the favour.' Her tone was low and hungry.

  Laurel dismissed the idea, 'I can't. It wouldn't be right.'

  'Think of all the innocent people you've hurt, some you've killed. Why should they be spared? Don't you want that awful step-mother of yours to pay for how she treated you?'

  Laurel let her anger and bloodthirst speak for you. 'I want to kill her. I want to rip out her throat and drink her blood!' She could feel her eyes glowing with power and she had to stop herself from baring her fangs. 'But what I want isn't what really matters.'

  'Of course it is,' Liana pushed, 'all that matters is want and hunger.'

  She hated how true that seemed. 'No, there must be something more. I need to be something more.'

  'You are something more. You are the strongest nightmare I've ever met.'

  'I'm a person, with thoughts and feelings.' She didn't know whether she was trying to convince Liana or herself. 'I used to imagine myself as a hero, out beyond the wall.'

  'Do you want to run away?' Liana asked, her tone strange and taunting. 'Does your family frighten you?' Laurel didn't know why she was acting this way. 'I've been out beyond the wall, I could be your guide. You could chase fairies and swordfight with elves.' She giggled, darkly.

  'I can face my family,' Laurel said, masking her sadness, 'but I won't hurt them.'

  'We'll see.'

  Once the arrived, they didn't head to the royal palace immediately. Instead, Laurel retraced her steps from the very first time she'd explored the city. She went in and out of the shops and travelled through the open markets, always unseen. A lot had changed since then, and not just for her. She could see it in people's faces, they seemed sadder, there were bags under their eyes and they seemed to regard one another with suspicion. Bounties could be seen all over the city and the amounts being offered were much greater than they had been. Of course, one of them was hers. But for her hair, which hadn't fully grown back, the artist had captured her likeness extraordinarily well. It was hard to imagine how her father must've felt when he learned that she'd gone bad but very easy to imagine the Queen's reaction to being proved right.

  She and Liana first fed from a single mother and her children. Laurel took a small amount of blood from the woman, whilst Liana frightened the woman's son with strange illusions. It had been fun at the time but she felt bad afterwards and left the woman, who she presumed was a widow, some money the following day. 'You're so soft,' Liana teased.

  'No more children,' Laurel said, feeling miserable, 'they're off-limits from now on.'

  'Kids dream up worse things than any of my minor illusions all the time.'

  'I don't care. As long as you're with me, you'll do as I say.'

  They had to be more discerning for their next meal and, as they searched the streets, they honed in on a powerful nexus of fear. It was so extreme that they could've sated themselves just by standing outside the house, where something truly horrible must've been happening. Curious, they entered the property and found a demon inside. Foul-smelling and ugly beyond belief, the horrible bloated monster that seemed half-rotten, and tied up a family and forced them to watch in horrified silence as it ate their father. He was beyond saving but Laurel leapt into action to rescue the others, capturing the disgusting monster and forcing herself to wolf down its putrid black blood. Whilst she succeeded in killing it, she had to vomit the liquid back up the moment she left. Telling herself that the sickness and nausea were illusions didn't help much and she groaned from the discomfort. 'How's the hero thing working out for you?' Liana quipped.

  'Shut up,' she spat, stumbling across the pavement. 'I feel weak. I need to eat.' She barely even knew what she was saying.

  'Time to meet the family?' Liana asked, with a fiendish smile, looking out in the direction of the royal palace.