It was alarming how quickly one could go from being at the top of the world, to skulking around at the bottom of it. 

My office looked nothing like the Hell humans would have imagined. It was deep in the caverns away from the main cities of pain and torture, away from all the screams of desolation and suffering given to the souls who'd turned their backs on God. In fact you couldn't see or hear anything from the terrible outside, because the walls were sound proof and windowless. I knew my human half wouldn't have been able to take the constant sights and sounds from the dead, and there was a time long ago where I wouldn't have really liked to stomach them either.

But the softness of my heart was as dead as the souls out there.

The rest of my work place, despite its surroundings of scorching fire, was fairly unexceptional. The walls were a stone grey, lit by numerous blue flames in weathered torch-brackets that gave the room a general dull glow: perfect lighting for plotting things of an unspeakable nature. Opulence was also key here: the grand desk and my leather throne proudly dominated the room over the two small chairs, used for anyone unfortunate enough to visit me. Decanters of liquor were the only things that occupied my table space, other than the file that Dev was eyeing studiously in front of him. 

"Dev," I said, catching his attention and nodding at him.

He got up and immediately shook my hand. He was of an average size, about five foot ten with a bulky build, and had sandy, blonde hair accompanied by a pair of red eyes. The demons of Hell were set up in a hierarchy, and anyone that was deemed a lower class had these crimson orbs: it was seen as an honour to be able to infiltrate the human world with normal eyes. Only Satan himself could change the colour, and pretty soon Dev was being awarded with this well-deserved promotion. 

"We have a problem," he said simply as we both sat down, pushing the file he had been studying over to me. The cover of it had the bland title of a woman named Darcy Robbins, but she couldn't have been that boring because the file was stock full of paper.

I looked at Dev to elaborate in exasperation because this situation was bizarre enough: I rarely dealt with one single person anymore. 

Most recently I had been increasing our demonic strongholds over the L.A mafia, which hopefully meant more souls for the devil to collect. The fuller Hell was, the more powerful we became, and it wasn't exactly hard work. It was surprising how many humans were drawn in to the darkness of the mafia, but their complexity was built by God, not me, so who was I to argue?

Finally, Dev began to explain the situation, much to my relief. "Robbins has become a real problem in the last few months. She's made lots of initiatives to help prostitutes, drug addicts and other humans who would have been easily guided to Hell." 

"I'm guessing the fact she's a good person isn't the reason why you brought me down here." 

"No," he said, without a trace of his usual humour. "There's a bigger problem. She's a converter: there's been a total of roughly two hundred souls saved so far in the past three months, and that's a lot of power lost for us. Heaven's getting fuller by the second with her around." 

"So just get rid of her," I was getting slightly irritated. He knew the protocol here; he didn't need me to help him with every little thing. 

"We've already tried to. And after those attempts failed she started coming after us with some kind of success. The mafia isn't safe for us anymore." 

I had to admit, that was not the answer I was expecting. It was rare that Christians went on vendettas against us because they had no idea on who we actually were. The bible wasn't very descriptive on our kind because God didn't want to scare his people, and with good reason. If some of the Christians on Earth really knew the full extent of our power, I'd be pretty sure they would chicken out of doing anything useful in the world: too frightened of the potential danger we could bring.

In reality, Christians didn't really know anything about demons. They didn't know about the different types of demon, the rankings of demons and even what demons truly looked like when they weren't in human form. I of course always looked like a human, because of my dirty Hybrid blood, but I knew that if Dev lost his temper anytime soon, I would see the sickeningly terrifying demon form he hid behind human skin. It was an appearance horrifying enough to bring nightmares to Saints and angels a-like.

"How is she doing that?" I asked, concentrating fully now. I could see how this was becoming a problem I may need to intervene in, because I knew how much fear it would create in the underworld if everyone found out about a Christian purposefully going out of her way to attack them. 

When demons were sent away from Earth through prayer and the Holy Spirit, it was said to be one of the most painful experiences of a demon's life; something that many would do everything to avoid. It was the only thing that could really 'kill' demons, because it takes hundreds of years for them to recover, so it was something Lucifer told us to avoid. Ruin Christian lives yes, but don't allow them discover you and take you down. 

I'd been lucky enough to avoid that fate in my demonic career so far, but I was uncertain of my fate as a Hybrid: would my human half accompany me in the burning fires of Hell, or would it just be me?

"You won't like my answer." 

I huffed impatiently as a reply. 

"Fine then," Dev said simply, giving me a dark, foreboding look. "She has Il Libro Dei Demoni." 

That secured my attention. I took my gaze away from a flickering lamp and focused on Dev intently, folding my arms and giving him a look that clearly said: are you joking me?

My voice became icy. "That book was lost thousands of years ago." 

I knew that. He knew that. We shouldn't be having this conversation. Every demon in this universe knew about Il Libro Dei Demoni, or The Demon Book to the English tongue. It was a dangerous, detailed instruction manual left on Earth by The Holy Son and found by one of the early churches almost two thousand years ago. For a long time we demons lived in fear, for this indestructible book gave Christians instructions on how to kill us in more ways than prayer. After the worst Satan finally unleashed all of his power to send the book away from the church. It was never found again by the Christians and we took our revenge.

Until now, that is.

"Obviously it's been discovered," he replied, pursing his lips into a grimace.

I frowned at him, a question suddenly coming to me. "How did you find out about this?"

He paused for a moment and guilt flooded into his next words. "The Oracle." 

I let out a sharp intake of breath and gave him a scorching glare, pissed off at his reckless and stupid decision. What an idiot!

"May I remind you," I spoke through gritted teeth, my voice menacingly calm. "That The Oracle isn't demonic, and therefore, she isn't trustworthy."

She wasn't on Christ's side either. In fact she didn't belong to any side but her own. She lived in a place faraway from Earth, faraway from Hell, and faraway from Heaven; using her telepathic abilities to show random people dreams of possible future outcomes.

But most of the time her visions didn't even become true, and I held no trust or respect for her. She stood for nothing and wasted time and energy on predictions that only had about a two per cent chance of becoming true, and because of this I had demanded that Dev never took any notice of her. 

And he had just done that.

Fool.

"I know that she isn't a reliable source," he said, finally glancing up to meet my gaze. "But nevertheless I saw it, and even the smallest chance of it being true is a problem. It's why I went straight to you and haven't told anyone else: we don't want unnecessary widespread panic in the demonic community."

I sighed and glanced towards the folder sitting on my desk, holding information that, in the worst possible circumstance, could be the only weapon we had against our own destruction. We would lose so many demonic strongholds if she got anywhere near them; my mafia work would have been made completely useless; and worst of all, my human half would be happy.

I couldn't allow that to happen.

I nodded to Dev. "I suppose you have a point. Come by my apartment tomorrow night at eight, and do not tell anyone about this."

"Yes, Sir," he nodded back, handing me the Robbins folder as I prepared myself to leave.

"I'll see you tomorrow," I said darkly, glancing at him one last time before I took my leave and shifted back home, a particular thought grating on my mind.

If it had been discovered, Il Libro Dei Demoni was something my human half could never, ever, get his hands on.

Because I wasn't going to let him kill me.