Remiel starts to chant in a language that Xane recognizes but doesn’t understand. Dragon.
He slices a gash in Xander’s arm right above the mark and mutters words that Xane will remember in case Remiel is pulling a fast one.
“Gavali, tui et te me prost.”
They all watch as Remiel slaps the blood-covered athame against the mark and Xander screams out in pain. Xane shoves Xanthe back as she goes towards him and stands in her way. He doesn’t want anything fucking this up. Fortunately, everyone else seems happy to let Remiel continue. Devon and Constantine are watching this closely, standing side by side.
With a cry of triumph, Remiel slices open his own wrist and places it against the mark and that’s when all Hell breaks loose.
Xander’s eyes roll back into his head as he shudders violently and drops to the floor in a heap, Xanthe rushes forward with a shriek of anguish and drops to her knees, cradling Xander’s lolling head in her lap, and Xane aims straight for Remiel.
“You fucker!” he shouts with his hands out but stops dead when Remiel throws up a force field he can’t get around. “You said it couldn’t be transferred.”
“I lied,” Remiel says and holds up his wrist to admire his brand-new Demon mark. “She is now almost completely mine.”
Constantine growls at him but he has nowhere to go either. “She will never love you,” he says, clearly holding onto his temper. “You can form a thousand bonds with her, and she will still hate you for what you have done to her.” He turns his back and with a deep breath it appears that he lets this go.
Xane on the other hand is beyond furious. He is barely holding it together in his grief and anger as it is, but now this is about to tip him over the edge.
“You killed him!” Xanthe shrieks, still holding Xander carefully on the floor. “You didn’t have to kill him.”
“You knew the bond could only be destroyed with death. I just gave the mark somewhere to go,” Remiel says.
“You really have no shame, do you?” Devon asks.
“No,” Remiel says. “What is the point in having all of this power and not using it to my advantage?” he asks, sounding almost perplexed that they don’t understand.
Xanthe’s loud sobs echo around the room and then she Astraports off with her dead son in her arms.
Xane stares at where they were, and he feels no grief. Xander had it coming to him. If he had just been willing, his mother would have ensured his safety.
He brings his eyes back up to Remiel. “I will fucking kill you, make no mistake about that.”
“You don’t have it in you,” Remiel says and, in a show of lack of concern, he drops the shield. “There is only one weapon that can harm me, and you, my boy, do not even have access to it, let alone have the capabilities to wield such a weapon.”
“Hmm, yes. The Sword of Hellfire,” Xane says. “Which I do believe is made out of Hell’s fire.” He holds out his hand and, in his palm, a ball of Hell fire starts to form, growing bigger and bigger as everyone stares at it. “As Ruler of Hell, I do have unfettered access to the very thing that the sword is made out of.”
“Xane, don’t. He is Aefre’s sire,” Devon says.
“I think she would thank me for getting rid of him,” Xane replies and bounces the still expanding ball.
“We might still need him,” Devon says.
“He has shown he doesn’t have what it takes to reach her. We will find another way.” And with that he lobs the now enormous ball of Hell fire at Remiel.
They all see the slight look of fear on the beast’s face and with a sudden whisk of his hand, that blows all the papers off the desk, Remiel Astrals out and the Hell fire ball lands on an end table, lighting it up and causing a small inferno. Devon curses at it and holds his hand out to douse it.
“Since when did you get so good at magick?” Xane asks him curiously, disappointed his ball didn’t connect.
“Always was a
quick study,” Devon says. “He was afraid,” he adds.
“Yes,” Xane says. He has no doubt that the ball wouldn’t have killed Remiel, but it might have put a dent in him for long enough to try again.
“Nice one,” Devon says with a small smile in his direction.
“So much for ‘don’t, he’s Aefre’s sire,’” Xane says with a frown.