These rich and powerful demons were nothing like their inferiors. Outside, hideous beasts, creepers and crawlers, the slithering and the slimy abounded, but within the pavilion, only if one knew precisely what to watch for would one see the nostrils gaping uncommonly wide, the implausible amount of wrinkles, the ears too large or eyes too far apart.

With a shock, Bluma heard a sharp, familiar peal of laughter stabbing up into the fragrant air.

The smarmy demon: Belial.

As Bluma made her way across the luxuriant scarlet carpeting laid down between the gravestones, Belial’s voice grew more and more distinct, like an unpleasantly sweet aroma carried in on the wind. “Of course not,” he said to the adoring knot of demons around him. “You don’t imagine Lord Azazel would be so gauche as to arrive on time to his own party.”

“Of course not!” agreed one of his clique. “How absurd.”

“Perhaps,” said Belial, “he is hunting the Bluma, like the rest of the rabble out there. I don’t know whom I pity more tonight—Lilith, or all the poor devils foolish enough to try her.”

At this, the clique gave a shimmering giggle.

“Oh, Lord Belial, Lord Belial!” said a preening young demon, cutting in. “Have you heard the rumor?”

Belial smiled an acrid smile. “I have heard every rumor.”

At this, the knot about him gave a knowing little titter.

“They say,” said the preening young demon, “that Lord Mammon has come to the cemetery.”

Now Belial laughed alone, sharp and small, like the cold point of an icy knife. “If Lord Mammon had chosen to inflict his presence upon us, I assure you, we would know.”

Belial’s clique giggled at this unkindness.

With effort, Bluma pushed her way into the small knot of demons attending Belial, and immediately she thought she had made a terrible mistake. Every single one of them in their turn took special notice of her—her dull, ragged clothing, her wild, untamed hair.

But they were just like the rest of the demons. As soon as their eyes slipped away from her, she might as well have been nothing.

“Besides,” said Belial, “I can’t imagine what Mammon would want here. Lord Azazel has the clear advantage, and Mammon doesn’t tend to play unless he can win.”

“But it’s true, my lord!” said one of Belial’s fawning attendants. “He’s been seen! He arrived in the outskirts not long ago, pushed along in a little wheelchair.”

“Ha!” said Belial. “I don’t doubt that someone saw something that looked like Lord Mammon, but the last time he traveled away from his Treasure House, Mammon went in a carriage the size of a castle, drawn by a team of elephants. He is not, let me tell you, one for subtlety.”

Scarcely had the dripping contempt of this last word died away when the great braying voice of the ogre at the door shook through the pavilion.