Chapter 1

1

“You are a disgrace,” Cyril spat, his eyes blazing red with the fires of their home. “You have becomea laughing stock, a fool wandering blindly through the dark. You have let the others down, but even worse, you have let me down.”

Artem cowered on the ground, his black wings bent and broken, feathers falling into the snow where their touch sizzled and they melted through to the frozen ground. His arms were scratched, his body battered, and he suspected a crack ran through one of his horns. No doubt he made a pitiful sight, and now, to be before someone as great as Cyril, a demon with such respect, Artem’s pride took a considerable blow.

Somehow, he fought the urge to apologize, swallowing the I’m sorry before it could burst free and further humiliate him. Artem wisely remained quiet, his eyes trained on the ground. Cyril had managed to burn a circle around himself, his rage reducing the once pristine white blanket into a puddle, his spot resembling the hole of a moth eaten sweater.

“You have been granted one final chance to get things right. Should you screw it up this time you will be banished,” seethed Cyril, his clawed hands curled into fists, his own wings stretched proudly behind him, the dark feathers tinged with burnt red. “You will find a soul and corrupt it before midnight of Christmas Eve. You are to find someone pure of heart and bring them to us. Only then will yoube redeemed. Do you understand?”

Shaking, unable to hide his fear, Artem nodded his head. “Yes,” he managed to choke out.

“See that you do the job properly for once,” Cyril warned.

And then Cyril was gone, leaving Artem alone in the winter night, snowflakes swirling around him. He shivered, not from the bitter cold which failed to affect him, but because he knew there was no way to dowhat had been asked of him. He was, for lack of better phrasing, a joke, a miserable representation of a demon. No matter how much he tried he just couldn’t seem to tap into the dark core of his being.

Somehow he kept getting all his lessons wrong. He kept screwing up, and now Cyril, the one who forged him from the flames, was disappointed in him, ready to wash his hands clean. Artem hugged himself, knowing that the way he felt inside was wrong. He was always wrong. The others made it perfectly clear he wasn’t like them, laughing and making snide remarks at his expense.

He tried, of course, he constantly tried.

Looking at the empty park, Artem bit down on his bottom lip. Where did he start? How did he even attempt to do as he was asked when deep inside he felt so lost? When all he ever did was go from questioning why he was this way to wishing he could be like all the others?

Slowly he got to his feet, the clothes he wore definitely inadequate for the weather. This wasn’t his first trip to the mortal plane and he knew enough about them to get by; which is how he knew he should have been dressed in more than a pair of sneakers, navy sweatpants, and a long sleeved shirt. Like a drunkard, one of the favorite souls to toy with, Artem stumbled in no particular direction.

He was too disoriented, too confused to make any attempt of setting into motion what Cyril asked.

Finding a pure heart, an untainted soul, and on how many days? When was this Christmas Day Cyril spoke of? The only mortal holidays he personally knew of were Halloween when they could cavort freely amongsthumans without need for disguise, and on the eve of a New Year when people sought ways to better themselves; minds were weak then and easily manipulated.

It was getting harder, Artem knew, to find such purity, darkness having gained a foothold in the mortal world, digging its nasty little tendrils into every person it found cracked. Those who glowed faintly, though, they somehow managed to avoid this temptation, the whispers in the night that tried to drag them down, and finding one was always a true reward.

To tarnish something so perfect…

Artem closed his eyes and let out a slow breath, his wings fading as he concealed his demon half. The wounds, both external and internal, were too raw for him to concentrate on this night. He needed a quietplace to gather his thoughts, some time to formulate a plan. He couldn’t let Cyril down again, though he feared this mission, too, would be failed.

He followed the sidewalk, its gray appearance vanishing behind a fresh layer of snow. For the most part the city was silent, their ability to appear always easier around midnight. The streetlights created pools of illumination here and there, and it was in one such that Artem spied the dog. It glowed faintly as all dogs did for there was no creature on the mortal plane as pure as a dog, so called man’s best friend.