From Hell with Love Read Free

other edge of the roof.
    The son of the Devil looked down to find Niccolo holding a twisted, black bow in his diseased hand.  And, after looking at the wrist that had recently been inside Fafnir’s throat, Mammon finally realized what Niccolo had done and heat flared out from his demonic eyes.
    “You… YOU’RE DEAD!” Mammon screamed as he jumped down from the roof and landed with force into the dirt of the courtyard, his right hand slamming through the tiles.  He snarled as his hand found purchase and then lifted an object out of the ground, which was a bright-red cylinder that Mammon had crafted from the rock.  The end of the weapon started to ebb flame and magma before taking the shape of a shifting blade.
    Niccolo whipped his gnarled, black bow around his back and set it back in its mooring before grabbing at the air with his demonic hand.  From the scars and boils of his palm a rigid handle started to form, but he did not wait for it to finish before he ran toward his enemy, who was already scrabbling along the floor and waving his burning sword.  Niccolo swung his monstrous arm with a flourish, which caused a wicked, green blade to bubble forth from the newly-made handle.  Longer than Mammon’s brand, it was about the length of a bastard sword, but Niccolo would not underestimate the Hellborn.
    As the Horseman advanced toward his ravenous enemy, he thought about his chances.  He had plenty of training, both in his life and after that, but Mammon had been around for ten thousand years.  Niccolo readied his blade for a powerful, two-handed diagonal strike, but before they were within four yards of each other, a strange weapon crashed into the ground between them.  Niccolo was almost not able to react as he recognized the weapon of his fellow Horseman, an ornate scythe with a razor-sharp edge and a skull etched into the crest of the blade.  Both combatants skidded to a halt once they recognized another Horseman had arrived, each of them looking toward the soft footsteps approaching from the road.  There was a tense silence as Niccolo held his blade brimming with death, as Mammon’s fiery brand crackled in the hellish air.
    “Why, exactly, do I have to interrupt this feud yet again?” the cloaked figure asked as he walked up to his weapon buried halfway in the stonework, extending a lightly-armored hand to loose it from its mooring.  After reclaiming his scythe, the Horseman stood up and his cloak settled back to show the light leather armor covering the man’s body.  Niccolo was still trying to claim the words at the tip of his tongue as the grey specter raised his hand to his hood and drew it back, exposing the very human face beneath.  The thin, pale face looking right at him was accented by a short crop of light-brown hair, and, as usual, his expression was one of disappointment.
    “Cadmus…”
    “I’m waiting for an explanation, Nico.  You know better.  Actually,” Cadmus said as he used his scythe to point at his friend, “never mind.  Whatever excuses you have don’t matter.  And you,” he said before turning to the yellow demon still heaving behind him, “what would your father say?”
    “He wouldn’t say a damn thing!” Mammon shouted, but Cadmus merely gave a wry smile at that.
    “And doesn’t that just hurt the most?  The two of you,” he said before pointing at each of them with his blade, “are acting like children.  This is Hell, not a playground.”
    “He killed Fafnir, Cadmus,” Niccolo said, gripping his handle tighter.  The reaper turned to his friend and sighed.
    “I know,” Cadmus said with a touch of sympathy.  “I assume you’ve already talked to Lucifer,” he said, which forced a nod from Niccolo.
    “He said that if he punished demons for killing animals that he might as well prepare for another insurrection,” Niccolo admitted, lowering his blade as the fight emptied out of him.
    “That’s the truth of it, Nico.  This is just something