Give the Devil His Due (The Sanheim Chronicles, Book Three) (55 page)

*****

Quinn stared out across the battlefield, watching the tables turn in his favor.

“You outwitted me,” Sanheim said out loud.

Quinn’s decision to divide his army could easily have backfired. But, as at Chancellorsville, it had worked flawlessly.

Quinn watched as the Headless Horsemen decimated Sanheim’s forces. They cut their way through whole brigades, some even launching flaming pumpkins. Sanheim had lost.

“You have no idea what you’ve done,” Sanheim said. “The council… you don’t understand what they’re capable of. I was the only hope.”

“So quit now and help me deal with them,” Quinn said. “It’s not too late.”

“I will never surrender to you,” Sanheim shouted. “You are just a man. I am a god.”

Sanheim turned away from the battlefield and faced Quinn.

“You hurt me,” Sanheim said, “but I will destroy you. The Lord Sanheim rules forever!”

The man standing in front of Quinn seemed to be in pain for a moment before he grew several feet taller. The suit faded away, and became shiny reddish-green scales. Horns sprouted from Sanheim’s head and two massive wings unfurled behind him. The creature towered above Quinn, the same figure from his dream.

The creature’s red eyes glowed with fury. Sanheim looked like a true demon, the picture of Lucifer at the moment of the former angel’s fall. What stood before Quinn wasn’t a man, but the Devil himself.

“Oh my God,” Janus said, pushing Summer behind him.

“No,” Quinn said, “That’s definitely the wrong word.”

Sanheim stomped forward and a huge flaming sword appeared in his hand.

Quinn could hear the audience chamber brimming with panic as people started running.

But Quinn held his ground, looking small in the shadow of his opponent. He felt no trace of fear, only grim determination.

“Behold,” Sanheim yelled and his voice echoed throughout the hall. “Behold the dark god Crom Cruach. I have many names, child of Adam. I have been called Lucifer and Beelzebub. I have been known as Satan. You may call me Sanheim. Let it be the last word on your lips.”

Sanheim stepped forward, but Quinn didn’t move. A small smile appeared on his face.

“You mentioned all those names, but none of them are the right one,” Quinn said. “I’d rather call you by your real name — Robert.”

“That is not my name!” Sanheim bellowed, his voice rattling the window panes.

“Huh?” Janus said.

“You are Robert Crowley,” Quinn said. “Oh, you played it well, don’t get me wrong. The fake note from Lilith. ‘The Lord Sanheim rules forever.’ But it was a lie, all of it.”

“No,” Sanheim said, but he made no move to attack, as if transfixed on the spot.

“I’ll give you your due,” Quinn continued. “You had all of us believing you were some unstoppable god. But we should have realized that all of our information came from the same place. It’s what reporters call a one-source story. It was always Crowley or his minions — Camden or Lilith. They were the ones who insisted that the ‘god’ Sanheim ruled the underworld still. Crowley was the one who said the Princes had to fight Sanheim and claimed that all the previous attempts had failed. But they didn’t, did they? What I wonder is if there was ever a true Sanheim at all.”

“What are you talking about?” Janus asked. “We saw Crowley die in front of us.”

“We saw an old man die in front of us, but that wasn’t Crowley. For one, he had brown eyes, not blue. All Princes have blue eyes, including Robert,” Quinn gestured toward Sanheim. “Who was he really, Robert? Because I have a theory it was Horace Camden. Some reward you gave him. You locked him in a cell because he was the one person besides Lilith who knew the truth. I admit he had me fooled. He said he loved Lilith, but I bet that’s another reason you locked him away, isn’t it?

“You slaughtered everyone in this world who could have remembered that it was the Spider who ruled here when you arrived. I was so confused when his last
moidin
told me the truth that I actually tried to explain it away. Somehow the Spider must have opposed you in secret. But that wasn’t right. He was your predecessor. You just wanted to change the history so he never ruled at all. You wanted your legend to be pure. You had Lilith write her little note and ‘disappear’ back into this world. Was she Carman, Robert? Was that who your bride became?”

Sanheim stood stock still, staring at Quinn with hatred and malice.

“You left some clues behind though,” he said. “Crowley never said what his
cennad
was, he was careful to keep it secret. But he admitted that the one thing he was scared of — all his life — was Sanheim. His nursemaid told him stories when he was just a little boy. It frightened him to know that one day he would be the Prince of Sanheim and would have to fight this god himself. Well, you are what you fear, right, Robert? When you met Lilith and triggered the trial, it was Sanheim you had to defeat. So you took his mantle when you conquered him and then left us all false bread crumbs to cover your real tracks. You thought if we believed you were invincible, you really would be.”

Quinn looked at the flaming sword in Sanheim’s hand.

“You should have been more careful,” Quinn said. “You left several symbols of the ‘important’ Princes: the spider, the flute, which stood for Sawyer, the horse, which is mine, and the flaming sword, which is yours. So spare me your proclamations of how you’re the Devil. Stop shouting at me that you’re a god. Because in the end, you’re just a man like me. That’s all you ever were.”

For a moment, Quinn thought Sanheim had actually become a statue. His eyes were almost looking past Quinn.

Does he really not remember?
Quinn wondered.

“Uh, Quinn?” Janus said quietly behind him. “I think you broke him.”

A second later, Sanheim’s eyes snapped back to Quinn. He quickly crossed the room and hit Quinn with the back of his hand. The blow hit Quinn full force, knocking him high into the air. Quinn crashed through a stained glass window and out of the castle.

*****

Quinn heard screaming from inside the castle. It sounded like the people in the throne room were fleeing in droves, anxious to get away from the demon Sanheim had become.

Considering he just landed on a rocky outcropping dangerously close to the edge of a cliff, however, Quinn felt strangely intact.

Are you okay?
Kate demanded in his head.

Quinn heard a tremendous crash as Sanheim forced his way through a window, taking part of the stone wall with him. Quinn covered his face as glass and stones rained down around him.

Quinn slowly got to his feet, feeling a sharp pain in his left leg. Still, it could have been worse.

“I have to admit, I wasn’t expecting that,” Quinn said.

“That should have killed you,” Sanheim said.

“I’m tougher than I look,” he replied.

Sanheim stalked forward, his long wings extending out behind him. He flapped them once, lifted slightly into the air, and brought his sword down over Quinn.

Quinn didn’t yield or flee. Instead, he conjured a sword in his hand, dug in his feet and blocked the blow.

Sanheim came down on Quinn with all his strength, but Quinn only wobbled for a moment — and then counterattacked, unleashing a furious flurry of blows. Sanheim looked surprised and alarmed, and was barely able to block them.

He tried to take the offensive again, his flaming sword slicing at Quinn from all sides. But Quinn continued to parry the blows. Out of the corner of his eye, Quinn noticed Janus had come up behind them.

“Turn into the Horseman, mate,” Janus shouted.

But Quinn shook his head.

“Don’t need to,” he said.

Sanheim tried to sweep Quinn’s legs, but he jumped and countered with his sword, catching Sanheim on his arm. His red scales took the blow without harm.

“Why won’t you become your
cennad?
” Sanheim asked.

“I don’t have to be the Horseman to wield his power,” Quinn said. “You said earlier we should take off our masks. You were right. I’ve taken off mine, but you won’t take off yours. You believed your own lies. You’ve worn the mask so long you forgot it was a costume. But Halloween is just about over, Robert.”

Sanheim roared at him and came charging forward, but at the last moment Quinn darted to the side. Sanheim barely stopped in time before tumbling over the cliff ahead of him. He turned to find Quinn attacking him again, trying to push him off the edge.

Sanheim blocked the blows and swung back, forcing Quinn backwards. He pushed forward, attempting to press his advantage with a blow to Quinn’s head.

Quinn blocked him again and he could see in Sanheim’s eyes that he didn’t comprehend what was happening. Sanheim’s sword was larger than Quinn’s, and its flame was fierce. Sanheim should have been inflicting far more damage than he was. Instead, Quinn held steady and was apparently unharmed.

Quinn attacked three times in quick succession, trying to ram his sword through Sanheim’s heart. The first two attempts were blocked by Sanheim’s sword and the last bounced off his red scales. Sanheim slammed his hand down on the flat side of the blade, knocking it out of Quinn’s hand.

“Now do you see?” Sanheim said. “You cannot defeat me.”

But Quinn just smiled at him, that same grin he had given him when he had pretended to surrender. He reached down and pulled something out of a sheath on his belt and waved it in front of Sanheim.

“Remember this?” Quinn said.

Sanheim’s eyes widened as he looked at the knife he had given Kieran last year. Its red handle glowed even brighter than Sanheim’s own blade.

“You told Kieran this was special, didn’t you?” Quinn said. “Now we’ll find out just how special it is.”

Sanheim rose into the air again and swept forward on his wings, swinging with his long sword. But Quinn moved too fast, ducking beneath Sanheim’s outstretched blade and darting toward his opponent. Quinn buried the knife in Sanheim’s chest.

Sanheim staggered backward and looked down to see the knife in his heart.

“You never understood,” Quinn said. “All this power and you never really comprehended it. A man once told me that you must choose what you believe, and believe it with all your soul. You aren’t what you fear. You aren’t your past. You are what you choose to be.”

The demon began to shrink in front of Quinn, and in his place stood the man in the black suit who had taunted him for the past two years. That man also faded from view, replaced by another, roughly his own age, in a dark frock coat and silk vest. The only thing Quinn would remember later was the haunted, tired look in the man’s electric blue eyes. The man stared at the blood running down his chest, looked up in dull surprise at Quinn, and then fell backward.

Robert Crowley tumbled over the cliff’s edge, hitting several rocks before falling into the deep, black ocean.

*****

A loud boom echoed across the sky like a giant clap of thunder.

As Quinn stood watching Crowley’s body plunge into the waves, he suddenly felt a strong pulse in his chest and a slowly gathering heat. It should have frightened him, but it didn’t.

“Quinn? What the hell is happening?” Janus asked.

Quinn was consumed by a bright, white light that was slowly expanding. It was so blinding that he saw Janus shield his eyes. He watched Kate ride up on a horse, quickly jump off and run toward Quinn. Janus tried to stop her, warning her that whatever was happening to Quinn might be dangerous. But Kate stepped around him and ran into the blinding light without hesitation.

She hugged Quinn.

“I love you,” she said.

“I love you, too.”

They kissed as the light erupted in a cascading explosion around them.

A door opened in Quinn and Kate’s mind. Two years ago, Quinn had destroyed the Headless Horseman and taken his place. History was now repeating itself. Just as Crowley had shaped and created the world around them, he and Kate realized they could mold it to their own desires.

The wave of bright light rippled out beyond them, spreading across the landscape as far as the eye could see. It rolled over people untouched, but changed everything else. The red grass disappeared, leaving verdant valleys of deep green. The twisted trees were replaced by tall oaks and maples that reached to the sky. And the purple sky gave way to a cobalt blue without a cloud in sight. The castle vanished and Kyle’s cornfields were washed away.

In a matter of minutes, the hell that Crowley had created was gone. What was left looked lush and pristine, a world of unsurpassed beauty.

*****

When the light cleared, Summer ran up to Janus, who embraced her. He looked over at Quinn and Kate to see them gazing out over the landscape. Quinn stood behind Kate with his arms around her. They looked serene and content.

“Where are we?” Summer asked him. “Are we home?”

Janus shook his head, knowing that couldn’t be true. Quinn and Kate couldn’t take them home, but they had done the next best thing. He watched as they stepped apart and walked forward with their arms around each other’s waist.