(Title: Remnants of Hell

Disclaimer:  I don’t own The Coldfire Trilogy and this is in no way sanctioned by C.S. Friedman, who would probably freak out if she read this…

Warning:  Technically, it’s slash… though it could be argued otherwise.  What the hell.  If you’ve read the books you’ll get it.

Summary:  What kind of nightmares follow a trip to Hell?)

Who could he pray to, now?

Another night of waking up gasping, remembering a trip to Hell- a trip undertaken willingly, a trip he had had to fight for, for God’s sake!-  A trip, he had thought then, that was necessary and right.  He had thought it was only right that he go to save the Hunter.  A demon who had earned every single moment he had spent in the Hell of his own devising- indeed, had earned much more than what he had gone through.

He snorted, almost laughing in drunken despair.  Demon or man, the Hunter had earned Hell, had gotten Hell, and Damien had gone to drag him out again.  Oh, it was very well to say that it was because the Hunter was the only one to stop Calesta, but the truth- the first, final, irrefutable truth- was that Damien had thought not of the Hunter’s usefulness, but of Gerald Tarrant’s suffering.

Damien shuddered, not bothering to mask his feelings- there was no one here to see, no one to tell, no one to understand.  No one to reach in and delicately sift through the boiling, seething thoughts of his tortured mind and make some sense out of this.

God in Heaven, if he could only forget!  He prayed for nothing else.  Just to fall asleep one night and not dream the same dark sequence again and again.  He prayed to dream of the One Who Binds, the Undying Prince, Hesseth’s terrible death or Jenseny’s great sacrifice… anything but that trip into Hell.

It had done him no good at all.  The dreams were vivid and awful as ever, no matter how many prayers or curses he uttered.  Night after night, remembering not facing the Unnamed at last, not walking through a fire and redefining his body, but dreaming of running through an endless field of the Hunter’s victims.  Only, this time, he never pulled himself out of the Forest-spawn nightmares.

It wasn’t even the true fear, the real terror, even though in his dreams he was always alone.  No, even without Karril there to facilitate it, Damien dreamed the same heady, passionate embraces that had kept himself sane and Karril alive through Tarrant’s Hell.

With a soft curse, more of a deepening acceptance and despair than the initial fear, guilt, and anger, Damien closed his eyes again and took himself in hand, pumping quickly and hating himself more than he could ever say.  The images behind his eyes were of a sorcerer long dead and even forgotten by much of this new world.

It was an eternity before he found release, and he remained awake through much of the night, trying not to think or feel anything.

(I’ll go hide somewhere now…)