the liquid elegance of the waltz. A surging of strings touched her, the sound waves tangible against her skin like they were engaged in foreplay.
“You look stunning tonight.” Jerry leaned in as he inhaled deeply. “And you smell... sinfully delicious. I could eat you right here.”
“Don’t make any promises you don’t intend to keep, Jer,” she returned, feeling her temples and cheeks flush. “What’s with the fancy get-up and all these people? Why are we here?”
He pulled back and eyed her incredulously. “Don’t be silly, witch.”
“I’m not being silly.”
Something began to come across as wrong with the whole picture. Jerry? Wait, didn’t Jerry and she break up? Her movements slowed as she became aware of something on her head. A hat? She wasn’t really into hats, and why would she wear one with a dress this nice and naughtily cut? She wished she had a mirror. Her hands reached up and pulled a mass of scratchy, red mesh material from the top of her dome.
A veil. A blood-red veil.
His coy laugh made her shudder. “It’s our wedding, darling. Don’t you remember? An altar? A sacrifice? Something borrowed, something blue? Something bloody, something new?”
Her feet stopped on the spot. “Wedding? Our wedding? No, that can’t be. I’m a Pure Soul, and you’re a demon.”
Jerry’s arms crossed over his chest when she backed away, his expression filling with concern. “Riona, are you feeling okay? Don’t you remember? You were a Pure Soul, but you fell. You betrayed your purpose to save Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumb, and agreed to sacrifice your soul for theirs. Don’t act like this is all news to you. It was all your decision. More than that, it was your destiny.”
“No, it’s not. And you’re lying. I would never do that.”
Someone must have set the room on “turntable;” everything around her was spinning. From all sides, bodies fell in on her, the faces of the other dancers coming into crystal clear focus. Every manner of demon, goblin, and underworld cast members jeered. It was almost as bad as being at Disneyland.
She turned, looking for the exit, a way out. At the far side of the room, another man stared with concern her way. Unlike the sea of scary around her, his face held goodness and compassion in its features. His back straightened when her eyes met his, as Riona felt a wave of unfounded familiarity run down her. He began to move, first in her direction, before gnashing his teeth and balling his hands. Looking angry at himself, he instead pivoted and disappeared into a new wave of demonkind entering from the perimeter of the room.
Jerry trailed slowly behind Riona’s futile attempts to break through the crowd. From the corner of her eye, she detected his glamour slipping away, his skin greening and bubbling. “Shall we leave, Ree? After all, we’ll have the honeymoon suite all to ourselves, and it has been awhile. I’ve never taken you with demon flesh and bone before. You’d be surprised of the advantages…” His smile parted as he slowly, teasingly licked his lips. “… of having a forked tongue in the bedroom.”
Ignoring him, Riona pushed forward. “Dee? Marcello? Ramiel? Anyone!”
“They’re not here, witch.”
She turned and all but spat at him. “I don’t believe you. I wouldn’t marry you. I don’t love you. I’m not meant for you.”
The corner of his mouth rose. “Keep telling yourself that, sugar.”
“And I would never betray Dee and Marc!” she further insisted, planting her hands on his chest and pushing him away as he gained on her.
“You loved me once, and sooner or later, you’ll realize you love me again.” His knowing grin put an exclamation point on the statement.
“I do not! Get… Get away from me. All of you!” Pushing the others didn’t accomplish much, but she’d be damned if she was going to stop. “Marcello! Marc, please!”
A thickly-braided mass of muscles in the form of arms caged around her defensively. Riona knew it was Marcello — not only by his smell, an odd combination of Old Spice and communion wafers, but by the feeling of safety that flooded her.
“Back off, demon!” he bellowed, pressing her tighter against his chest. “The Keystone comes with me.”
To her surprise, Jerry’s hands rose up in surrender as he began to do the white man’s moonwalk. “If that’s the way you want it, Father, take the witch. Ain’t worth us pulling rank on this.”
The sense of foreboding drifted away with the crowd as something — a wormhole perhaps?— sucked Marc