Addison closed her eyes before they rolled in front of those less tolerant of human annoyance. A small breath in and she opened them again, hoping to keep an eye on the expressions and movements of the two beasts in the room with her.

“Can you at least ask him why we are in the workshop?” she asked, and pulled her arms to her chest, hugging her elbows.

It wasn’t cold, it wasn’t hot either despite all appearances, but she just wanted to find some comfort and space of her own. She also assumed that the third demon would be arriving eventually, and he was the least aware of personal bubbles.

“You think mister hellfire and handcuffs over there answers to me? If he did we wouldn’t be here, Addison.” Rikas leaned back against a far wall, glancing around the room periodically.

She chose to keep her lips together, not asking more questions that didn’t get her answers. She had gotten more than enough useless and empty information by now. She wanted out of the room and time to think about her situation and the future.

She wanted to be out on the crossroads if she was being honest with herself for a moment. It gave her space, and it let her be close to the human realm yet away from the old witch. But before her thoughts could wander any further, a vibration ran across her back. It went under her feet, and after a moment she heard a series of thuds.

The ambient light of hell was ever moving and seemed to change its source depending on its mood day by day. Sometimes it was light bulbs and lamps, and others it was fire and walls red enough to scour the eyes of lesser folk. Wherever it came from, it vanished for several moments when Josefel appeared.

An echoing grumble escaped his body, and the room filled with smoke.

Addison wondered, this time like every time if the theatrics were necessary. She wondered, as she coughed up and filled her nostrils with sulfur, if he did this into every single nook and cranny- or if it was just for her benefit. In all her years she had never seen him enter a room any other way, despite him having a form that was capable of moving about like a normal beast.

She coughed until he had found his nearly-human form, looking very close to a stereotypical version of Satan. Her eyes stung, and when she finally caught her breath again, she could hear Abbadon laughing.

The room was cramped, despite the spacious nature of the realm, and the gigantic cave directly next to her. A series of noises filtered into the silence- bangs, distance screams, and a snort that she couldn’t place an owner to.

“Someone,” Josefel began speaking. His voice hit her ears at a level she was had never grown comfortable with. It seemed to come from inside but vibrated on the way in. Addison had never properly been able to describe the sensation. “Has been asking questions.”

He only said one sentence and looked directly at Addison. She pulled her elbows in closer to herself, putting uncomfortable pressure on her ribs and forcing herself to inhale more smoke/sulfuric air.

“Someone was also thrown onto the ground, with no task,” Rikas said.

It sounded as if he were coming to her side, but she knew better. She may be at the center, but he was starting another argument. She knew enough to know their battles, and they were about to wage another one.

“Someone should be earning her keep, and being useful,” Rikas said again. As if to prove her point, it seemed.

She wanted to shimmy back into the darkness that was behind her, but she also knew that she would need to stand tall eventually. If the winged queen was telling the truth, she would eventually have to announce her decision. She would have to stand in front of all three demons that had no respect for life or humanity, the witch who needed her for souls and ingredients, and the fay who she knew used her as a source of power and gathering.

“Someone is listening to us talk. Did we come to bicker, or did we come to make a deal?” Abbadon spoke a full sentence at last. It was in contrast to his hammering and laughing of the moments before.

The words didn’t sound like him. If she didn’t know any better at all, she would have thought they came from the one across from her. The one who traded in deals as a matter of course, rather than for slave labor every few centuries.

Addison opened her mouth, ready to answer them all despite knowing better when she was interrupted.

“You two don’t go anywhere to make deals. You go to beat and bloody and make hell hellish. I make deals, and I know better than to make them with you two where we all lose.” Rikas pushed himself away from the wall and stretched his long arms above his head. “We are here to make a decision. My guess is that goes to the brute of us all.”

He looked at Addison and winked.

As if they were in one some joke that she was going to laugh about very soon. She doubted that. She doubted that very much.