Raphael knelt beside Rouge's bed where Marie had treated her infected wounds and inserted a tube in her arm to give her fluids. The she-wolf had said something about dehydration and infection but the vampire had only half heard. His demon had still been screaming in his head and the fae blood thundering through his veins. He was finally regaining control of himself and realising his Rouge was safely back in his arms.

“She should be ok Raphael.” He looked up at the doctor and let her words actually sink into his blood-addled brain. It was worse than trying to listen to Duncan's mother after half a dozen bottles of whiskey and drunken naked campfire dancing. Which he was sure he and Duncan had done at least once.

“Why isn’t she awake?” He asked as he brushed his fingers down the side of her face. She was always pale but now her skin looked translucent.

“She had blood poisoning from the infected wounds on her arms. I’ve cleaned and dressed them and those are a new thing called antibiotics as well as painkillers I’m giving her. The painkillers will make her sleep and give her body a chance to recover. She's immortal so she should recover from this.”  The she-wolf placed her hand on his shoulder. She'd told him several times but she could see he still wasn't really listening to her. But at least now he was speaking to her. He'd terrified her when he'd first brought the witch to her but the girl needed her and that came first.
“I need to tend to the other girl. Rouge will be asleep for hours yet. Go to the house, shower and get changed. I’ll come and get you if she wakes before you return.” He didn’t move, just stayed staring at his witch.
“Raphael!” Marie raised her voice then lowered it again when he looked up at her. “It won’t do either of you any good for you to sit there in dirty blood-drenched clothes. Go and shower and I will come to get you if she wakes before you return.” He looked up at the diminutive-looking wolf and couldn't help but give her a half-smile.
“You're just like his mother.” She frowned at him as he got up and left without another word. Although he stopped in the doorway to look back at his witch. "She'll still be here when you return."

Puzzling at the vampire's odd comment Marie went to her office that had once been the pantry and tapped on the door.
“I’m going to open the door. There will be some light for a moment until I close the door.”
“Ok,” Came the girl's voice. It had taken Marie several attempts to speak to the girl. It seemed she only knew what Duncan called the language of the Gods.  Inside her office, the skeletal girl sat on the sofa against the wall wearing a nightgown that swamped her tiny frame. Cassiel had turned on Marie's desk lamp and turned it to the wall so only the smallest amount of light was cast about the room. Marie didn’t know how anyone so emaciated could actually be alive let alone conscious and sitting up. She'd seen such horrors, before she became a wolf, during the war. But all those patients died on her. The girl was ashen and looked like an animated corpse.

“Did you manage to eat any of it?” She asked, indicating the bowl of porridge and glass of milk Winston had brought from the house.

“A little, I drank all the milk but the porridge was very filling.”

“Is this light level still hurting your eyes?”

“I am adjusting to it. It's nice to be able to see things again and to be warm. I forgot what warmth felt like.” If the girl thought this barely lit room was bright, what kind of conditions was she used to and how long had she been in them to be so wasted away. Marie’s heart was breaking looking at her, she knew the girl would not be the late teens she appeared, she'd learnt enough of this odd world to know that, but it broke her to see the girl so starved.

“I’m Marie. I spoke to you when you first arrived."

“I’m Kaia.”

“That's a very pretty name, Kaia.”

“Thank you.”

“Would you mind if I examined you? I want to make sure you're not hurt and see if I can do anything to help you. I'm a doctor. We help people.”

“I am not ill like Rouge.” Kaia watched the small woman in her white flowery blouse and brown trousers and marvelled at how odd everything looked. Not just the room she was in with the odd fire that was lighting the room but not burning its wall. But the clothes they wore and the way they talked. What had happened to the world?

“I know, but I would like to make sure you are as well as possible. I might be able to help you.”

“If it pleases you, but, can I ask for something?” Marie smiled at her warmly.

“Of course my dear.”

“Is there a lake nearby? It has been so long since I bathed. I've dreamt so many times of feeling clean once more.” Marie looked at her matted hair and grey dirt-encrusted skin and smiled at her.

“I think I can do a lot better than a lake. Let me have a look at you and then I will run you a bath.”

Gabriel walked into the gatehouse cottage and looked about.

“Marie?” She came down the stairs and smiled at him. “How is Rouge? I heard we brought a guest back with us too?”

“Rouge is sleeping in the ward upstairs, Raphael is with her. Our new guest is revelling in the invention of the bathtub right now.” smiled the she-wolf.

“Who is she?”

“I am still learning but if what she, Cassiel and Duncan are saying is right. Her name is Kaia and she is the last Golden Hind.”

“Golden Hind? They're extinct.” Marie smiled patiently.

“That's what Duncan and Cassiel said and why I said the last.” 

“Are you sure?” she shrugged.

“Well as I said, I’m still learning about this world. But from what I know of Greek mythology hinds had golden antlers and brass hooves. I’ve only seen her as a girl, but she tells me she can turn herself into a deer, and she has small golden horns and what looks like brass fingers and toenails. I also don’t think she has a reason to lie. It sounds like she was locked in that hole for thousands of years. Poor creature’s skeletal and can’t handle more than the barest amount of light due to being in darkness for so long.”

“You don’t think she’s a threat?” The French wolf laughed, it was the lightest sound Gabriel had heard in weeks and he found himself feeling lifted by the noise.

“She's almost blind and 6 stone underweight by my guess. She’d struggle to harm a newborn even if she was dangerous.” Gabriel sniffed at the air and nodded distractedly.

“What's that smell?”

“Smell?” The she-wolf smelled the air, “disinfectant? Soap? Bubble bath? That's all I can smell.” she looked at him questioningly. He frowned and blushed.

“It's nothing, I’m probably tired. You said she's in the bath?”

“Yes, she was amazed by the bath, and the taps and that we have hot water in the taps. It's going to take her time to adjust. I’ve set her up in the small bedroom in the loft. It's quiet and the windows are tiny and easy to cover over. But I want you to give her time before you start asking her questions. I know you're the constabulary here. But I'm the doctor and she's my patient until I say she's healthy." Gabriel studied the small woman for a moment then smiled at her.

“You're a good woman Marie.” Chuckled the vampire.

“She’s the best there is.” Duncan walked past Gabriel to put his arm around his tiny mate's waist. The vampire gave him a small smile and nodding to Marie, did as she asked and left their guest in her care and headed back to the main house via the kitchen door. The guest was a worry, she could be planted by Mab for all he knew. But if she was as delicate as Marie claimed she would wait. The gods help anyone that threatened Duncan's mate he mused to himself.

“Winston?”

“Master Gabriel?” The butler stood up from his armchair and put his book down.

“Have you been baking apple pie?”

“No?" Said the dwarf slowly in confusion. "But I can make you one if you want one Sir.” He glanced to his pantry wondering if he had apples or any of the ingredients for a pie, he might have to venture to Zeus square on a shopping trip.

“No. Thank you, Winston. I just could have sworn I smelt cinnamon-like when you make pies during the winter solstice. It's the only time I ever smell it.” Shaking his head he sighed “It's been a long couple of weeks, I think I need an early night.”

*** 

Lucius shut the door to his huge penthouse suit on the roof of his club and dropped to his knees. The pike was ripping apart his insides, he'd barely thought he'd make it to his room before his legs gave out. Reaching round he grasped what was left of the wooden shaft and tried to pull it out. Gasping in pain he fell forward catching himself on his hands and watched as thick black blood dripped and pooled onto the black marble floor below him.

"Poor little Lucius. All alone with no one to help." The demon looked up slowly to lock hate-filled eyes on his father who was lounging across his favourite armchair a few meters away from him.

"What honours me with your presence in my humble abode father?" Lucifer rose to his feet and strode across the room to where his son was bleeding on the floor. Looking down on him he reached down and yanked the pike head from out of his back.

Blood gushed from his lips as Lucius used every ounce of strength he still had not to scream in pain as the brutal weapon tore a huge hole in his back. Blood showered the floor below him. With a clatter the pike fell onto the floor next to him, lumps of his flesh still caught in its barbs.
Before Lucius could compose himself his father's hand wrapped around his throat and he was lifted off the ground and slammed hard into the cool marble wall. At well over six feet in height not many people dwarfed Lucius, but his father's eight feet of height meant his feet dangled helplessly above the ground as he pulled at the devil's hand holding him to the wall as he gasped for air.

"How cliche." Said Lucifer as he gestured around the room. "Black marble floors, black marble walls. Black marble furniture. Red velvet upholstery. Were you going for a tacky human idea of the devil? Or did you miss the gloom of hell?"

Still trying to fight in a breath Lucius said nothing as he doubled his efforts to get his father's hand away from his neck.

"Oh and the girl?" Lucifer gestured to where a pair of red velvet curtains had been pulled aside to reveal a white marble statue of a beautiful woman. Her blank gaze stared out serenely, unseeingly into the darkly opulent room. At her feet were vases full of white lilies. The only light thing in the entire suit. "Not as beautiful as your mother, but a beautiful woman nonetheless. Care to explain why my son has a shrine to some mongrel whore? Have you turned even softer than you already were?" At seeing his secret revealed Lucius redoubled his efforts, ignoring the large puddle of blood-forming below his feet and snarled.

"What do you want, you bastard?"

"Hmm?" Lucifer finally looked back at his son, a look of pure evil on his face as he used his free hand to conjure a large black stone blade. "Oh yes. The purpose of my visit." He sunk the blade deep into Lucius' stomach and twisted it. The demon could no longer contain himself as a low gasp of pain escaped his lips.

"You ever interfere in my plans again boy and my son or not I will torture you, I will make your life a living hell. Then I will gut you and feed you your own insides as you die." His hand released his son's neck and he dropped to the floor in a heap, the hilt of the blade still sticking out of his belly. Lucifer drew back a foot and kicked him hard in the face, the force sent him sliding across the floor into the main of the room stopping at the pedestal of the statue. A streak of thick black blood left a track behind him. Stalking across the room Lucifer bellowed at his helpless son.

"Mab and my plans for her are nothing to do with you. Interfere again and I will kill you in ways only I can envisage." He reached up and pulled the statue down on top of Lucius, trapping him and snapping the fine, delicate neck of the girl. Lucius let out a scream of anguish his father had never heard from him before. Not even when he'd been tortured as a child for being too kind and gentle. A cruel smile spread across his soul destroyingly handsome face.

"But first she'll die brutally in front of you." Lucius mustered all his strength to spit his blood on his father's shoes.

"Good luck. She's probably already dead." Lucifer laughed, a joyless, echoing sound.

"No, she's not." With that, he vanished in a puff of smoke.

"No! Lucifer? Father? Where is she? Where is she?" Howled the helpless, trapped demon. He bellowed and called to anyone who might hear until his eyes rolled back in his skull and he passed out from blood loss.