Hell's Ascendant (Mantles of Power Book 3) Read online

  Hell’s Ascendant

  Benjamin Medrano

  Contents

  The Story So Far

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Epilogue

  Sting & Song Preview

  Hell’s Ascendant by Benjamin Medrano

  © 2019 Benjamin Medrano. All rights reserved.

  Contact the author at [email protected]

  Visit the author’s website at benjaminmedrano.com

  Sign up for the author’s mailing list at http://eepurl.com/cGPT-b

  Editing by Picky Cat Proofreading

  Cover Art by Nguyen Uy Vu

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  To my alpha readers, my editors, and my beloved, thank you.

  The Story So Far

  Violently betrayed and stripped of her wings, the angel Isalla was cast down into the hells by Haral, a woman she’d believed was a friend. Isalla was saved from death by Kanae, a demoness and healer in the hells, who nursed the injured angel back to health and taught her about the hells, which was a different place than Isalla had imagined. Many demons in the hells lived normal lives, though it was still a dark and dangerous place.

  Over time the two women grew close, then their relationship blossomed into a hesitant romance over the course of weeks, at which point Isalla confided in Kanae that she’d been betrayed because she’d found signs of a conspiracy in the heavens, one that seemed to have designs on overthrowing the current ruling council. Concerned about the plans of the conspirators, and the likelihood that a radical faction would destroy the fragile peace between the heavens and hells, Kanae agreed to help Isalla contact her old commander and lover, an angel named Roselynn who Isalla had informed of her investigation.

  Unfortunately, Haral had learned that Roselynn was making inquiries of her own after Isalla vanished, and the angel had acted swiftly and ruthlessly, drawing Roselynn into an ambush by demons, who then sent Roselynn into the hells for interrogation. Roselynn woke in the comfortable Spire of Confession, and the unwitting angel was slowly, gently brainwashed by another angel and two succubi into effectively abandoning the heavens and making herself more beautiful. A visit by the demon queen Estalia caused Roselynn, now going by Rose, to fall almost entirely.

  Meanwhile, Haral had sent assassins to finish off Isalla, as she had learned that the angel had somehow managed to survive the fall. As Kanae brought word that Roselynn had been captured in a demon raid, one of the assassins attempted to kill Isalla. The attempt failed, but the assassin perished as she tried to flee, leaving the two with unanswered questions. With few other choices available, the two women chose to seek out Roselynn and attempt to rescue her, despite Kanae’s deep fear of Queen Estalia.

  Their rescue attempt brought them near the Spire of Confession, where they waited to strike once Roselynn was being taken to the capital of Estalia. Their attempt worked nearly flawlessly, despite one of Rose’s guards managing to break free of the hypnosis that Kanae had inflicted on them. Kanae teleported the three of them to near her home, and her explanations managed to raise questions in Rose’s mind, and also prompted her to guess that Kanae was Queen Estalia’s lost daughter. While Kanae didn’t confirm her guess, her lack of response told Rose that she was correct.

  Kanae distanced herself as Isalla and Rose rekindled their relationship, the demoness avoiding being drawn in, due to worrying that any relationship couldn’t last, and believing that soon Estalia would come for her. Unfortunately for Kanae, Estalia had already known that she lived, and immediately set out to meet the three at Kanae’s home.

  Estalia’s arrival threw all Kanae’s plans into disarray, as the queen revealed that Kanae’s true name was Kitania, and the two managed to somewhat reconcile, though Kanae revealed that Estalia’s goal was to end the war by manipulating angels and demons alike into worshiping her. Estalia soon departed for her palace, leaving behind both armor and Ember, the legendary weapon that belonged to Rose, as well as a few guards to keep the angels safe while the plot in the heavens was unraveled.

  Before the group of women could come to a final decision on what to do, and even as Kanae was disposing of the last of her things, Haral’s third attempt on Isalla’s life arrived, an attempt which was also intended to kill Rose and even Estalia if she was in the way. A group of angels attacked Kanae’s home, and the demoness fought a delaying action as the guards left by Estalia and the angels alike prepared themselves for battle. Just as Isalla and Rose came to her aid, the attackers shot Kanae with an arrow that had been intended for Estalia. The arrow teleported her to a fortress in the mortal world, where Kanae was torn apart by a hail of magical arrows.

  Enraged by the apparent death of Kanae, Isalla and Rose fought desperately, heavily injuring several of the attackers, but would have lost if Estalia’s guards hadn’t reached them in time. Their grieving was interrupted by the information that Kanae had been teleported, and the guards took custody of the assassins and transported all the angels to Estalia’s palace, where the two angels hoped to learn what had become of Kanae.

  In the palace, Estalia informed the two that Kanae doubtlessly lived, for Kanae was truly immortal, capable of regenerating from any known attack. Bolstered by the knowledge that even an archangel couldn’t kill Kanae, the two angels vowed to rescue her and drag the conspiracy that had been trying to kill them into the light.

  Far away, Kanae woke in a cell, chained to a wall, and with the transmutation that had disguised her for centuries broken, revealing her original body. With an elven guard nearby, she decided that it wasn’t worth hiding who she was anymore and introduced herself as Kitania. Kitania soon learned that she was in the palace of the goddess Alserah, an elven goddess known as the Divine Archer, and one who terrified Kitania, at least at first.

  Within the walls of the goddess’s palace, Kitania was protected from all attempts to magically locate her by Estalia’s servants, so Isalla and Rose were forced to wait for new information. The angel Eziel was mentally dominated by Estalia and gave additional information to Isalla and Rose, as well as giving additional hope that Kitania was safe. Estalia chose to retaliate for the attack within her borders and conquere
d the angelic outpost of Firewatch, taking all the angels within prisoner.

  Kitania was soon allowed to move about the elven palace, though she was subject to a good deal of suspicion. This grew worse when an elven princess, Niadra Sellis, invited her to a ball and the two were drugged. When Alserah confronted the two women, Kitania realized that the goddess was infected by a horrible parasite from the hells known as a dream spider and afterward helped Alserah remove it from her head, though Kitania was heavily injured in the process.

  In the aftermath, Kitania was given still more freedom, and Alserah chose to abandon her ransom demand for Kitania. As the demoness began breaking down due to her worries about what Isalla and Rose thought of her, Alserah gave permission for Niadra to associate with Kitania and expressed some interest in the demoness herself.

  Meanwhile, Alserah’s emissary reached Estalia and informed her of Kitania’s presence in the Forest of Sighs. After a short time, Estalia dispatched Isalla, Rose, and Vinara, the succubus who’d been teaching Isalla magic, to retrieve Kitania and begin investigating the angelic conspiracy, known as the Society of Golden Dawn. Along with them was Eziel, who Estalia was sending as a servant for Kitania. During their journey there was an attempt to poison them, but it was foiled.

  Haral once more acted herself, wishing to learn what Kitania knew and to punish Niadra for growing close to a demon. She ambushed their carriage and kidnapped the two, as well as Niadra’s maid, beheaded Kitania with a soul-stealing blade, then had her servants torture Niadra and her maid while Haral left. Kitania resisted the blade’s magic and killed the angels left behind, then returned Niadra to the palace.

  The reunion between Isalla, Rose, and Kitania was awkward, especially when Vinara revealed that she’d once been one of Kitania’s lovers and demanded an apology for Kitania faking her death ages before. Alserah asked for more details on how Isalla had been betrayed, and they began closing in on who Haral was, as well as her plots, but they were a little too late.

  Haral and her companions unleashed twenty titanic monsters on the Forest of Sighs in the middle of the night, consisting of ten hellfire worms and an equal number of storm phoenixes. These creatures were scattered across the country, and any one of them could devastate cities, while Alserah could only be in one place at a time.

  Vinara helped track down where Haral was controlling them from, and the group dealt with three of the creatures on their way to intercept the angels, then engaged them in a short, brutal battle. The angels had laid a trap for Alserah, twisting her power to imprison her briefly, and they had an arrow like the one which had nearly killed Kitania. Kitania ripped the arrow away from an angel just in time and managed to severely injure Haral as she took the bracelet controlling the monsters from the angel. Haral managed to escape by using a teleportation charm, but the monsters were quickly killed in the aftermath.

  Once things had calmed down, the group returned to the palace, where some discussion of who might get to keep Kitania occurred, and Rose revealed that Isalla had slept with Estalia. However, everyone knew that it was just the calm before the storm, and that far more dangerous times were on the horizon.

  And now their story continues.

  Prologue

  Coral stepped into the room, not even pausing as she began speaking. “Lady Anna, I think that Reath needs some personal attention with how her attitude has been of late, and…”

  The succubus’s voice trailed off as she realized that Anna wasn’t in her usual chair, and the room was otherwise empty. Several documents sat on the polished top of the desk, weighed down by a paperweight, while paintings adorned the white marble walls. Even so, Anna going missing was a bit perplexing, and after a moment Coral put her hands on her hips, looking around in annoyance.

  “Now where did she get off to? And right when I needed her, too?” Coral asked aloud, then let out a soft sigh of annoyance. Anna didn’t vanish often, and when she did it was always for a good reason, so she abandoned the hope of getting help from her superior and chose a different strategy, murmuring. “Maybe I can get some help from Irak…”

  She left the room behind, all the while wondering what Anna was doing. The angel had been acting oddly ever since she’d gotten the most recent dispatches from Estalia.

  The room should have been dark, with as dark as the stone it’d been carved from was. It wasn’t, but that was due to the glowing crystals which dotted the walls and hung in lanterns. The room was a shallow dome, with polished walls and crystalline lanterns hanging here and there. Only the glowing portal set into one wall allowed entry, and Anna brushed her fingers over the runes carved into the doorway for the moment, admiring them instead of what was in the center of the room. It didn’t help, not really, but she treasured the moments of peace that it brought her. When she closed her eyes, though… then she remembered the incredibly short message she’d been sent by Estalia, the words seared into her mind.

  Things may be worse than I feared in the heavens. I’m afraid that I may have need of you. Kitania may have need of you. I’m sorry, dear one.

  “You shouldn’t be sorry, my beloved goddess. We both knew the time would come when I could no longer hide,” Anna spoke at last, her quiet words echoing in the musty confines of the chamber. A part of her was grieving for what might happen soon, but at the same time another part of her was awakening after a long slumber. So, she took a deep breath and turned to the center of the room, looking at the items resting there.

  A potion rested in an ornate vial-holder on a pillar to one side of the room’s center, its contents shedding a radiant blue light. The sight of the potion caused Anna’s pulse to quicken, but her gaze rested on it for only a moment. Instead she looked at the armor resting on its rack and the cloudpiercer laying lengthwise on display in front of it.

  The armor was for an angel, which was just as it should have been. Unlike almost every suit of plate Anna had seen for a high-ranking angel, this suit wasn’t ornate and beautiful. Nor had it been forged of mithral… no, it was made of fine, gleaming steel without ornate patterns or engravings. Only the runes which powered its magic shone, and even those were hidden, as if to heighten the apparent simplicity of the armor, from the boots and greaves to the helm and plates designed to guard her forewings. The armor brought back memories, and few of them were good… but even they paled beside the emotions inspired by the cloudpiercer.

  Anna’s gaze fell to the cloudpiercer, and she felt herself shudder. She took a step closer, then another, feeling her legs almost quivering beneath her. The cloudpiercer was almost as simple as the armor, with a shaft forged of steel wrapped in black leather, right up until one looked at the blade. The blade burned with power, blazing gold runes seared into the silver-blue metal. Power greater than any other weapon she’d wielded surged through the blade, and Anna let out a soft sigh as she closed her eyes. Memories of the wars she’d fought in rushed through her head, each of them with the cloudpiercer in hand. There were few things she wanted less than to take it up again, and yet… a part of her lived for it. She didn’t like to think about it, but not all the trembling in her hand was of reluctance.

  “For our daughter. For us,” Anna murmured.

  Reaching out, she picked up Infinity’s Edge, and the weapon surged with power, almost joyfully welcoming her grasp. Anna couldn’t help a smile at the reaction, closing her eyes and basking in the sensation, reveling in how… right it felt in her hand.

  “Everything has to end, one day,” Anna said softly, running a finger over one of the runes, the power within it burning at her finger. “However… that doesn’t mean we have to simply accept it.”

  No one answered, but Anna realized her fingers had ceased trembling, and she smiled.

  Chapter 1

  Kitania slammed the butt of her cloudpiercer against the ground and grunted as it suddenly extended, launching her upward suddenly, but she wasn’t done. It wasn’t nearly as smooth as she’d prefer, but she channeled mana into her armor and wings snapped i
nto existence behind her, translucent, black-feathered wings that took her soaring upward in seconds, well outside Isalla’s reach.

  The blonde angel stared up at Kitania for a moment, then lowered her practice sword as she glowered at the demoness, speaking in palpable annoyance. “Okay, I see what you mean about your acrobatics. Tears of heaven, how do you do that?”

  “Practice, really, though I couldn’t do the flying bit until I had this armor,” Kitania replied, grinning as she stabilized, then slowly descended again. She was quite pleased with how her practicing had paid off so far. “I didn’t have the extending cloudpiercer, either, so had to pole vault instead. I’m just glad I watched Anna’s training so much; otherwise I wouldn’t know how to use it while flying. I still need to practice more to get used to it, but it is more effective.”

  “To be fair, I’m pretty sure that Anna must be far better with a cloudpiercer than I thought she was,” Rose chimed in. The red-haired angel wasn’t in practice gear; instead she was wearing a deep blue dress that contrasted nicely with her pale skin and vivid hair, and the rose-shaped hair clasp kept the hair out of Rose’s eyes. She’d been watching them, and Kitania thought that she saw a little shock in Rose’s eyes. Eventually the angel continued. “I’ve seen some angels use them before, and they’re… well, you have to be careful about your wings with them, and they aren’t good when you’re trying to keep a tight formation.”