The Devil's Banshee Read online

  THE

  DEVIL’S BANSHEE

  The Devil’s Intern Series

  BOOK III

  Donna Hosie

  Holiday House / New York

  For Kathleen Welch

  Text copyright © 2016 by Donna Hosie

  All Rights Reserved

  HOLIDAY HOUSE is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

  www.holidayhouse.com

  ISBN 978-0-8234-3718-4 (ebook)w

  ISBN 978-0-8234-3719-1 (ebook)r

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Hosie, Donna, author.

  Title: The Devil’s banshee / by Donna Hosie.

  Description: First edition. | New York : Holiday House, [2016] | Sequel to: The Devil’s dreamcatcher. | Summary: Team DEVIL is back—this time, led by the indomitable Viking prince Alfarin to wrest a banshee from her hiding place in the Nine Circles of Hell.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016001254 | ISBN 9780823436507 (hardcover)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Hell—Fiction. | Future life—Fiction. | Death—Fiction.

  | Vikings—Fiction. | Banshees—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.H79325 Dam 2015 | DDC [Fic]—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016001254

  THE DEVIL’S INTERN SERIES

  by Donna Hosie

  BOOK I The Devil’s Intern

  BOOK II The Devil’s Dreamcatcher

  BOOK III The Devil’s Banshee

  CONTENTS

  Ein

  1. Bót

  Tveir

  2. Into Battle

  Prír

  3. The Devil’s Farewell

  Fjórir

  4. Swagger and Secrets

  Fimm

  5. Plan B

  Sex

  6. Virgil

  Sjau

  7. Love and Treachery

  Átta

  8. The Ninth Circle

  Nĭu

  9. Malevolence on the Wind

  Tíu

  10. The Eighth Circle

  Ellifu

  11. Looking Without Seeing

  Tólf

  12. Geryon

  Prettán

  13. Monster of the Labyrinth

  Fjórtán

  14. Valhalla

  Fimtán

  15. Elinor’s Bane

  Sextán

  16. Face of Evil

  Sjaután

  17. Four of Nine

  Átján

  18. Plan C

  Nítján

  19. A Future Foretold

  Tuttugu

  20. The Way Out

  Tuttugu ok Ein

  21. Anger Unleashed

  Tuttugu ok Tveir

  22. Mitchell’s Woe

  Tuttugu ok Prír

  23. The Fourth Circle

  Tuttugu ok Fjórir

  24. Following Orders

  Tuttugu ok Fimm

  25. Leave No Man Behind

  Tuttugu ok Sex

  26. A Leap of Faith

  Tuttugu ok Sjau

  27. Question Time

  Tuttugu ok Átta

  28. Cerberus

  Tuttugu ok Nĭu

  29. The Second Circle

  Prír Tigir

  30. Weapons of War

  Prír Tigir Ein

  31. Perfidius’s Threat

  Prír Tigir Treir

  32. Limbo

  Prír Tigir Prír

  33. Ragnarök

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I’ve always wanted to incorporate elements of the imaginative Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri into a manuscript. With The Devil’s Banshee, I finally have my chance.

  I relied on the Oxford University Press edition of his work, translated by C. H. Sisson, to guide me through the Nine Circles of my version of Hell. Variances from the original are intentional. The Divine Comedy is a joy to read but even more fun to study, and I am indebted to those who have spent years examining and interpreting the text for future generations of readers and scholars.

  Much love and thanks also go to the following:

  Kelly Loughman, editor and Alfarin fanatic: Thank you for making me laugh all the way through the months of editing by constantly proclaiming your love for my bighearted Viking.

  Beth Phelan, agent and Team DEVIL’s first advocate. Thank you for your ever-present critical eye and hard work.

  Aubrey Churchward, publicist and fellow Raven Boys fan: Thank you for the Maggie Stiefvater photo. And the publicity stuff. But mainly that photo!

  Sabrina Abballe, coconspirator on the photo mentioned above and so much more: Once Team DEVIL, always Team DEVIL.

  Everyone at Holiday House, publisher: They also have cake!

  Harry, my dog(!): Why am I thanking my dog? Because I left him out of the acknowledgments for books one and two and my kids have given me so much grief I was made to promise to dedicate book three to him! The dedication is going to my beloved Granma, but Harry is mentioned now. Look, kids, he’s getting more lines than my editor!

  Steve, my husband: Stop telling me I got Septimus’s accent wrong. He isn’t Idris Elba!

  Emily, Daniel, Joshua, my kids: The best teens EVER. Love you.

  Reviewers, bloggers, friends and Team DEVIL readers who review and share the love: You rock. Our Circle of Hell has Mars bars, books and air-conditioning!

  From a little spark may burst a flame.

  —Dante Alighieri

  Ein

  Alfarin and Elinor

  “How did ye die?”

  It was the way she asked the question that caught my attention. As if she already knew me. The strange girl was like a floating, ghostly goddess, dressed in a long white gown with cotton slippers on her feet. Her red hair flamed, as if Lord Loki himself had chosen her to be his angel of fire in Hell. Her almond-shaped eyes were dark pink. A maiden who had been dead for at least a century, I surmised.

  And the expression on her beautiful face as she looked at me was so glorious; it was as if she had been waiting her entire existence to find me.

  My stomach felt strange. Had I accidentally eaten some of Cousin Loof’s nut roast? That always disagreed with my manly constitution. My insides felt as if a den of snakes were slithering where my intestines should be.

  I had seen intestines before, spilling from the gut of a wolfhound. It was one of the last earthly images I remembered, before the great Odin claimed me for Valhalla. . . .

  But no. This was not the time to think upon my death—and captivating as this lovely maiden was, I had more important matters to attend to than impressing her with the details of my demise. “Out of my way, wench!” I cried. “I do not have time to dally with women. I have Saxon skulls to pulverize. Go find a kitchen and make yourself useful.”

  Saxons were my quarry this day. In Hell, fighting was glorious sport, and Saxons’ dead blood was especially thick and lumpy. When we Vikings fought them, we sprayed the halls of Valhalla crimson with it.

  But the beautiful-yet-troublesome wench refused to move, and at my words, her demeanor quickly changed from delight to annoyance.

  “I will go find a kitchen—then a mallet to hit you over the head with!” retorted the red-haired goddess. “Ye big oaf.”

  She glanced disparagingly at the two Saxons I held by the scruff of their necks. I clunked their heads together and they dropped to the ground. My Viking kin and I had been ambushed by their clan in the corridors of Hell as we were on our way to my cousin’s watering hole. Normally, Saxons were no contest for strong Vikings with eager fists and a thirst for ale, but if I wasn’t careful, this ghostly girl was going to throw me off my game.

  “What do you want with me, woman?” I roared. “Can you not see I am in the midst of battle?”

  �
��This is not a battle, Alfarin, son of Hlif, son of Dobin,” she replied. “This is five ugly brutes against five even uglier ones. And my name is Elinor Powell, so ye can stop calling me woman right this instant.”

  She knew my name. This pleased me. My reputation was spreading across the abyss of Hell.

  “Alfarin has got himself a wench,” sang my father brother Magnus. He had a Saxon held high above his head and was twirling him around and around. “About time. And she’s a beauty for sure. Although not much of a rump on her to slap.”

  “Ye slap my rump and I will play marbles with yer balls,” replied the maiden called Elinor Powell. My kin laughed. This woman was not of the Valkyries, but she had a fire in her soul that matched the color of her hair.

  A wily Saxon had procured a length of wood whilst I was distracted. My legs gave way as he smacked it against my calves.

  “Leave me be, woman!” I cried, embarrassed to have fallen in front of my kin. “Go and plague another.” I punched the wily Saxon in the nose. The pain in my knuckles was magnificent, and I immediately felt better.

  Elinor Powell sighed. She seemed disappointed.

  “I have been searching for ye for a hundred years. So when ye are ready to be the devil I know ye will one day become, Alfarin, son of Hlif, son of Dobin, ye come and find me,” she said. And without so much as a backward glance, Elinor Powell disappeared into the shadows.

  My intestines were still squirming.

  It took me a further three hundred years to realize just how special a day that had been. For Elinor Powell would become my closest woman companion, in heart and mind and soul.

  But then she was taken from me. Ripped from the heart of Team DEVIL by the Overlord of Hell himself. He took her to be his Dreamcatcher. To stand at his bedside and filter his most ghastly thoughts as he slept. It was a torturous ordeal, and I do not know if my princess will ever fully recover.

  The Devil eventually allowed her release, on the condition that Team DEVIL complete a near-impossible task.

  As I sit here now, I know that by Thor’s fury, The Devil will not be getting her back.

  But I also know that I may meet my true and final end in ensuring that.

  So that is why I am writing down our story in this diary. To make certain that whatever happens to me, wherever I am cast by The Devil when this is all over, there will be a record, somewhere, of my love for Elinor Powell, who has made my dead heart feel more alive than it ever did in life.

  1. Bót

  My name is Alfarin, son of Hlif, son of Dobin. I have been dead for over one thousand years, and Hell is the domain where I have dwelled during that time. Up There and Hell are not the places the living imagine. The living foolishly believe that their eternal existence is determined by the way they choose to live their lives while their hearts still beat. The living are so very wrong. The eternal domains are governed, and a person’s final destination is determined by a simple checkmark in a box on a piece of paper—and the whim of the Grim Reaper who wields the pen like a weapon.

  This is but one thing that most of the newly dead will find unfair in the Afterlife.

  Not me. I always knew Valhalla was my final destination, and I found it in the dark, hot, crowded confines of Hell.

  Here, I am many things to many people. A Viking. A man. A devil. The possessor of great hair. A friend.

  And of all those parts of my identity, I now value being a friend above all else.

  Elinor was my first true friend in the Afterlife. Mitchell Johnson and Medusa Pallister are my other best friends, though I met them much later. Mitchell has been dead for less than a decade. It was Elinor who found him. She said we needed another companion. At first, her choice made me jealous. Was I not man enough for my princess? Yet Elinor treated Mitchell like a brother and nothing else. I quickly came to respect his friendship, his honesty and work ethic. It is because of Mitchell that Elinor found me in Hell, and I will never forget the sacrifice he made to bring us together.

  If Mitchell is a brother-in-arms to me, then Medusa is like a sister to Elinor. She came to us only recently, rounding out the group as if she had always been there. At times, when I am on the cusp of slipping into the dreams of the mighty Norse god Hoth, I see Medusa in memories that I know were accidentally erased when we played with time. She’s with us now—and then. A shadow in thoughts past.

  The four of us, Elinor, Mitchell, Medusa and I, are Team DEVIL.

  Lately, Team DEVIL has been pushed to its limits. We have traveled through the fabric of time itself. We have been ripped apart physically and mentally, and still we endure.

  Now we have a new test. We must venture into the darkest pits of Hell. The Nine Circles. The dwelling of the Skin-Walkers. For there, hidden among the very worst of the Underworld, hides the original Dreamcatcher of The Devil, a Banshee by the name of Beatrice Morrigan. She is The Devil’s wife. Returning her to him is the only way to save our Elinor from a permanent horror that even my learned mind cannot fully understand.

  We do not have long before we must leave for our perilous journey. While Elinor rests after her ordeal of filtering the dreams of The Devil, and Mitchell and Medusa make preparations for the test to come, it is to Hell’s library that I have retreated. Recently I have spent every waking moment—and even those moments of half-sleep, when I’m not quite aware of who or what I am—here, in this mausoleum where everything but learning is dead.

  I’m relying on this place to help me in my quest to find out anything and everything I can about The Devil’s Banshee. So today I am reading in the bowels of the library, away from the hive of activity by the main entrance. The air in these dark, dank aisles swirls with decay and dust. Very few of the librarians come down this far. It scares them. They say there are creatures here, watching in the impenetrable darkness. I understand their fear, for I have seen the most fearsome of these beings. She is Fabulara, the Higher who controls Hell. Her head sits on an elongated neck that stems from the shoulders of a grotesque statue. Six other heads sit beside hers, but they are dormant, for Hell is Fabulara’s domain. Her yellow eyes blink as she watches over the realm from behind the shelves of cracked spines and aging parchment. She reeks of death, and her shadow alone would cause most devils to quail in their boots.

  But not I. I am afraid of nothing—except losing Team DEVIL to those whose nefarious ways are beyond the comprehension of most of the dead.

  They should be thankful for that ignorance.

  The only devil I have seen down this way is the buxom wench Patricia Lloyd. I dare not say it aloud, but I have been grateful for her company—though it is sometimes distracting. Patricia likes walking up and down the aisles, moving in a manner I am unaccustomed to. Is she hurt? It is as if her hips have dislocated from her spine. Her strange stride makes her rear end protrude and swish from left to right to left, like a pair of melons wrapped in a muslin hammock, rocking to and fro in the breeze. I try not to observe, but my eyes are drawn to her in the same manner that they are drawn to my second cousin Odd whenever he leans down to speak to his wife. The sight is grotesque, yet amusing—and therefore, impossible to avoid watching.

  Odd is married to a banana. We do not talk of it.

  Patricia is doing that walk now. It looks painful. Often, when we encounter each other, Patricia will ask me if her bottom looks big in whatever cloth she is wearing. I say no, because it is the truth, and because I sense this is the answer that will satisfy her. But the question perplexes me. It seems that some women, like Patricia Lloyd, prefer having a small rump. Yet other women want their rears to be big enough to place a tankard on. Viking women certainly do. So Mitchell and I get very confused. We wish to compliment the fairer sex, but we always say the wrong words. My father has no such problems with women. He would spank any rear within a longship’s distance, but I know better. Women no longer expect their rears to be slapped as a sign of courtship. I learned that from Elinor Powell, and had that knowledge reinforced in the great city of New York not lo
ng ago when Team DEVIL ventured back to the land of the living.

  “Alfarin, I’ve found another book on Banshee countermeasures,” calls Patricia. I snap out of my reverie of rump-slapping and behold her wardrobe selection of the day. She is wearing tight red pants that Medusa calls skinny jeans, and a piece of elastic cloth over her upper body that is no bigger than the dish towel I use to wipe the glasses in Thomason’s, my kin’s watering hole.

  How can Patricia move in such constricting garments? It’s just as well she doesn’t need to breathe in Hell. In the land of the living, she would not be able to do so.

  “I am thankful for your help, Patricia Lloyd,” I reply. “But I do not need to know how to scare Banshees away. I wish to know how to get one to accompany me. You need not trouble yourself looking through the books here. I still haven’t found what I am looking for, but I will know it when I do.”

  “That’s the title of a song, you know,” replies Patricia. “Or close to it. Speaking of, I can’t wait for Bono to get down here. You know they’re creating a special suite for him? It’ll play ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’ on a loop twenty-four seven for the rest of eternity.” At this, Patricia smirks, but my eyebrows knit, betraying my confusion. Patricia looks frustrated. “You know . . . he recorded it with a bunch of other musicians a million years ago? They used to play it on the radio nonstop?” She searches my eyes for a hint of recognition. When she finds none, she leans over and starts twirling a wisp of my beard around her finger. “So I’m thinking I should wear my sexy Santa costume when I meet him. The pants are kind of like the ones I’m wearing now, except—”

  “I am a Viking prince,” I interrupt, shutting a heavy tome titled The Origins of Hell. “We do not understand Santa.”

  Now it is Patricia who is confused. I remove her finger from my beard and explain.

  “If a fat stranger with a long white beard were to enter earthly dwellings, uninvited, on any day other than the twenty-fourth of December, people would call the law enforcers. If such a man came to my hearth, I would run him through with my axe.”