Chapter II

  Unbreakable Chains

  Aiyana awoke to find herself lying on her side and bound in black chains. The metal links wrapped around her legs, hugging them tightly as they spiraled upward around her body, ending in shackles that secured her wrists behind her back. Every inch of her ached, especially her fractured nose, which throbbed incessantly, stubbornly refusing to perform the simple task of drawing in air.

  The last thing she remembered was a demon’s fist barreling into her face, followed by a flash of pain, and then nothing. It was impossible to guess how long she had been unconscious, but judging by the distant sounds of the ongoing battle, she could not have been out for long.

  Dried filth made Aiyana’s blonde hair stick to her face, and the unpleasant taste of rust drew her attention; the blood that had once streamed from her nose now caked her cracked lips.

  Her throat felt as dry as the coarse dirt beneath her. She could not remember the last time she had experienced such thirst and hoped water would not be a necessity the demons withheld from their prisoners. However, there was no limit to the cruelty her captors were capable of.

  Aiyana knew she needed to try healing herself so she could fight when the time came. She pressed her palms against her lower back, praying that if she poured everything into the spell, it would at least reduce the swelling and pain throughout her body. Hopefully, it would mend her fractured nose enough to breathe through it again.

  As she focused, bright red runes blazed to life along the black chains, and her spell failed. She realized her weakness stemmed not only from the battle, but a dark magic suppressing her. A chilling helplessness enveloped her; she was at the mercy of captors who viewed compassion as a failing found in the weak.

  Now fully aware of how dire her situation had become, Aiyana cautiously assessed her surroundings. She was one of roughly twenty soldiers who lay constrained. Two men (senior to her in rank by the markings on their armor) were unconscious ten paces away.

  Additional paladins of various classes littered the surrounding area. Some had been gagged with flat metal rings latched around their lower faces, while others remained silent by choice. The site of these metallic gags made her grateful to be spared this bondage. With her broken nose, she would have surely suffocated. She shuddered at the thought of such a pathetic death, and her desire to remain unnoticed grew.

  Only one other woman was within Aiyana’s vicinity, a paladin who was bound and gagged in the same manner as the others. She struggled and murmured inaudibly, acknowledging Aiyana’s attention, yet her muffled words yielded nothing in the way of communication. Soon, the young woman gave up, and tears of hopelessness streamed down her cheeks.

  Aiyana heard cries of pain behind her. She rolled over and saw the outskirts of a demon camp. The depressing gray hillside was dotted with rows of shabby tents hastily constructed from tattered cloth and crude leather patches, the latter appearing to be crafted from Enochian skin. An assortment of demons were scattered about. Many stared into the distance or meandered aimlessly, presumably bored by the uneventful nature of their assignment.

  The anguished cries turned into groans as two demons emerged from a large tent, each carrying an Enochian prisoner slumped over their shoulder. The demon on the left was oily and green, with four glowing yellow eyes upon its tall forehead and a cluster of tendrils hanging where a mouth should have been. The demon on the right was of a shorter stature, scaly and brown, with a circular mouth wreathed in fangs. Barbs protruded from its hands and she wondered if it was the one who had knocked her unconscious. She deemed it unwise to ask.

  They dumped the two prisoners nearby and wandered off. One of the captives rolled over and stared at Aiyana while the other remained motionless. The scaly demon unhooked a flat ring from its belt and placed it around the unconscious prisoner’s head before lumbering away. The ring magically positioned itself over his mouth before shrinking, perfectly contouring to his lower face.

  Aiyana observed her new companions; their muscular builds indicated they were paladins. Both men had been stripped bare, with deep cuts littering their bodies. She surveyed the ungagged man, assessing the extent of his injuries; she was relieved that despite his many wounds, his body remained intact. He lay on the cold ground, bound and shivering, with his glazed eyes fixed on hers.

  “Where are we in relation to our army, and has anyone managed to send word of our capture?” she asked, but to no avail. Although their eyes locked, Aiyana sensed he had barely registered she was there. He simply trembled, laboring to breathe, and she wondered what they had done to this man to have left him in such a broken state.

  Her gaze shifted to the person who had remained motionless. Even though he had fewer lacerations, they were deeper and afflicted with greater savagery. His eyes were shut, and all color had drained from his face. A dark pool of blood expanded beneath him, soaking into the dirt. Aiyana had seen enough death to be certain he had experienced his final waking moments within that tent. Why his captor had chosen to gag a dying man unable to cry out was a mystery. But from her experience, the answer likely centered around the creature’s apathy or stupidity.

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  As her attention lingered on his motionless body, she thought about the fate of his soul. Despite being immortal, Enochians were not invincible, and they believed that upon death, their souls rejoined the Divine Light and would someday be reborn into paradise.

  Yet out here in the void between realms, she contemplated if one’s soul could ever hope to find its way back to the Light. Or were the countless Enochians who had perished in battle doomed to an eternity trapped within this horrible Abyss? Formless and driven mad from the unending years of solitude as their spirits and consciousness drifted through the vast expanse.

  She shuddered. How much agony would she endure before finding the answer to this terrifying question?

  In the distance, Aiyana listened to the sounds of the ongoing battle. Knowing her people were so close taunted her with hopes of rescue. Yet she knew the fight was going poorly and she may as well be worlds away from any chance at salvation. Still, she struggled to position herself so she could look toward the conflict.

  Aiyana furrowed her brow as she gazed at the valley’s eastern mountains. A vast storm was approaching, and its scale and intensity were unlike anything she had ever seen. The storm billowed forth as if driven by some unknown purpose, mesmerizing her with its dark, swirling clouds and bolts of multicolored lightning.

  But Aiyana’s attention was pulled away by a sudden and terrible noise that could be described as the brutal violation of existence itself. Within the demonic camp, a jagged tear formed in the fabric of reality. Two giant red hands emerged, each tipped with black nails extending like curved knives.

  Every demon within the camp gathered around the tear. They dropped to their hands and knees and pressed their faces into the dirt as they waited in anticipation. The hands forced the portal to expand until it was large enough for an immense figure to emerge. A singular hoofed leg stepped through, followed by the tips of two horns. Aiyana’s eyes widened as the colossal form of an archdevil emerged. She had only seen this mythic foe in ancient books held deep within the Great Archives of Palondia, but no depiction could ever capture this being’s true horrific presence.

  The archdevil was now before them, towering and terrible in stature. He stood upright, much like a man, but of a height dwarfing even the tallest demon. Two mighty black horns protruded from the sides of his head; they curved forward, ending in points as sharp as the tip of a spear. He wore black armor over his broad chest and abdomen, imbued with occult symbols and imagery depicting death.

  A skirt composed of strips of black studded leather hung nearly to his knees and was littered with hooks even sharper than the tips of his horns. Aiyana’s focus lingered on his belt. Fastened to it was an assortment of hanging skulls serving as macabre decorations; some appeared Enochian, while others were of creatures unknown to her.

  The devil’s red skin and fanged mouth made him look foreign to all that was good, but it was his eyes that filled her with dread. To call them black was an understatement. Their depths swirled with living smoke, and if eyes were the windows to one’s soul, then the darkness Aiyana beheld embodied an evil vaster and colder than anything she had ever imagined.

  As the archdevil surveyed this alien world, an ominous shadow grew before him. It moved across the ground as if it had a mind of its own, causing every groveling demon it enveloped to shriek and collapse in writhing agony. Despite the panic overwhelming the untouched minions, they dared not move as he strode past them.

  As the devil approached the prisoners, his shadow fell across a bound Enochian man who convulsed and vomited blood on his chest. The shadow passed over him, and the man’s body went limp. His once golden irises were extinguished, replaced by a vacant white.

  The archdevil walked through the captives and looked toward the battle. Aiyana studied the monster, sensing the ongoing conflict held little interest for him; his attention seemed transfixed by the encroaching storm.

  With a newfound urgency, the archdevil turned and moved toward Aiyana with a terrible purpose. As he advanced, he stepped on a captive paladin. His massive hoof crushed the soldier’s rib cage and abdomen, grinding his victim’s midsection into a gory paste while leaving little more than the head and legs intact. The devil did so without malice or sadistic joy but with the cold indifference some might feel stepping on an insect.

  Aiyana’s heart raced as his shadow neared, gliding closer to her with every step. The archdevil stopped right before it fell upon her, yet to her despair, the shadow lightly brushed her leg. With this subtle touch, the pain of a thousand burning needles consumed her. Aiyana’s eyes rolled back as a barrage of painful memories flooded her mind. She was utterly overwhelmed, trapped in a seemingly endless loop of time, forced to relive every horror she had ever experienced.

  The archdevil watched with a look of annoyance. He reached out, drawing the shadow into his grasp, and condensed it into a black sphere. He closed his fist, slowly crushing his writhing shadow as it fought with desperate fervor to free itself of its master’s unbreakable grip. The archdevil smiled with grim satisfaction as black wisps seeped through his clenched fingers, his disobedient former shadow dissipating into nothingness.

  He now stood shadowless. As a child of the lightless horrors that dwelt beneath the Infernal Realm, the very essence of darkness bent to his whims. He would never allow it to defy him.

  Aiyana’s senses returned, and she saw the archdevil towering over her. He was statuesque in his posture as he studied her with his blackened, billowing eyes. He leaned in, grabbing her with a hand that engulfed much of her body.

  With his prize secured, the archdevil strode toward the spatial tear, stepping over or upon the bodies of captives and servants alike. Aiyana’s eyes were wild with panic, darting around the landscape, frantically searching for anyone or anything that would help her avoid this fate. Yet, no hope of rescue could be found, just the approaching storm drowning out the sounds of the all-too-distant battle.

  In her last desperate act, Aiyana screamed for help. She cried out to anyone who could hear her, pleading to her fellow captives and even the Divine Light itself. Yet the archdevil’s massive strides covered the distance quickly, and before she could fully grasp her fate, they were already through the tear. Her anguished cries traveled through the ragged portal as it closed, drifting across the demonic camp until the final moment when the fabric of reality sealed, and she was truly lost.