The Repentant Demon Trilogy Book 1: The Demon Calumnius by Samantha Johns Read Free Book Online

always tried to respect the culture while on digs before in the area, though she drew the line at wearing a burka.  And she spoke Arabic moderately well.
    The demon Calumnius was not happy that Abigail was no longer having budget concerns.  This was not going the direction he had hoped.  That night he watched Miss Abigail happily preparing for her trip, and he devised a new strategy, one that included sexual seduction.  It would be very hot in Iraq for humans such as she.  There would be some opportunity for the two to be alone in scant dress.  Knowing the male of the species quite well, he need only work on preparing Miss Abigail for the advance Doug Anderson would surely make.
    Abigail packed a little prematurely in anticipation of a departure for the following mid-week.  She was a planner, a list-maker, efficient in everything she did.  After her shower, she looked long into the mirror at her image, holding her hair over her head as if considering a new style.
    It wasn't like her to regard her appearance.  Perhaps she was having womanly feelings. Calumnius pondered this, standing behind her and viewing his own reflection—such an immense contrast in species presented a remarkable vision.

Chapter 4.  The Demon in the Mirror
    T here were no mirrors in hell.  They would not survive the heat, which would crack the glass and melt the silvering behind it.  There was no need, as they could see themselves in each other, despite their differences—which were considerable.  As angels boasted nine Orders, so the demons are categorized into five groups by function.  And none of them remotely resembled the red creature with horns, a spiky tail, and flowing cape as depicted in the human media. 
    Calumnius laughed when he came across those creative depictions of devils in human art and more recently on the Internet.  Humans create anthropomorphous characterizations out of some need to see their own image everywhere in their world.  They dress their animals and give them human names, and try to do the same with devils—not to make them endearing so much as to comprehend them at all.  How unable they are, in their arrogance, to imagine as real creatures unlike themselves.  So they place my kind into science fiction.  Hah!   Some of their ideas were not far from the truth, perhaps because a rare sampling of humans had actually witnessed demons and had lived long enough to describe them.
    Calumnius belonged to the Order of the Mullin.  These were the most varied of all demonology, incorporating different animal-like features into their anatomy.  Some, like himself, had bull-like horns, wolf claws, and hairy bodies.  He was an especially large one, but others were small with fur, and some had batlike wings they could fold around their bodies.  Some looked mildly reptilian, but were not to be confused with the Serpentines.
    The Urian Order dealt through magic with humans—the conjurers, witches, and wizards of the earth.  They could appear in any form imaginable, even as attractive humans, but their natural form was a dense, shapeless mist.  They came when summoned by humans and pretended to do their bidding for a while, deceiving them until the time was ripe for them to devour their souls and torment them forever.
    The Naman were the workers who were never seen by humans until after death, if they had lived so on earth as to deserve eternity in hell.  They tended to administrative needs from keeping records to middle-management tasks like supervising the toiling human souls who kept the fires burning by shoveling fuel, pumping billows, and removing tons of ash by the cartload.  The Naman were the chief tormentors after death—the ones who gnashed their terrible teeth and performed physical forms of torture.
    The lowest forms of demon, without much intelligence at all, were the Serpentine and the Imps. The Serpentine were of a class that included all dragons, sea-serpents, snakes, and lizards that had once