Beyond the Iron Gate (The Faery Meadow Book 1)

Colt hovered just above the immeasurable amount of blood and bone meshed together beneath his feet. The odor was enough to knock out the faint of heart.

His demon wings flapped furiously, keeping him above the dangerous slop that was believed to have no start or finish. The demons above ground called it "the pit". There were many pits in hell. However, Colt was aware the one he happened to have the luxury of visiting was the deepest and most dreadful one around.

It was several levels deep kept. Each level grew in depth as one descended lower into the bottomless funnel-shaped void of black. Both young and ancient demons hung above him like bats, burning in a never-ending inferno. The chains wrapped around their bodies were laced with magic that lit the metal with a fire that would never die until the keeper of the pit ripped them apart.

"Stop pretending you can't hear me," Colt murmured while drifting around the corpse of the charred demon who hung at the very bottom of the pit.

Unlike the hanging demons above, there were no others circled around this particular prisoner.

Earning no response, Colt kicked the demon's face and listened to it crunch against the solid wall of the pit. The chain swung back, empty except for the soul kept inside. The demon's body had been completely burned and smashed-in. When it hit the hall, it simply shattered bone and all.

As much as he craved to, Colt wouldn't be able to extinguish the soul inside.

Colt couldn't see anything around him in the darkness, but he could hear. And his shadows could feel.

They moved over the demon's reforming body earning screams from the sinister soul locked within the chains that seared through mending skin and bone.

Colt laughed hearing his brethren's pain as the chains burned over the body of the man he came to have a chat with. It appeared there wouldn't be much talking today though.

It would take time for the demon's body to heal completely. It used to take months, but to some degree, it worried Colt that now that it only took days.

"I'll just keep doing this again and again until you confess your sins of wandering into places you aren't to go."

Colt started his journey upward, out of the pit. It would take several hours until he found his way out due to the great depth. He felt his trip had been wasted since he gained no new information.

He would come back in a few days to see if the demon would be more cooperative.