"We call them devils. I mean, Dad calls them devils—this is what we're facing on Antioch."[1]
Devils are malicious spirits that attack and possess human beings and corpses. Their possession is a form of revenant magic.
History[]
Little is known of the devils, their creation, or their motivations. They seem to be unfamiliar to most House citizens, and the Cohort is initially unable to identify them. A few characters appear to have some prior knowledge of their existence, including Teacher, who bids Silas Octakiseron to not empty anyone’s soul in the Facility “lest they become a nest for something else!”[2] Likewise, it might be assumed that the Eighth House soul siphoners have some experience with devils, as Silas testifies that during the process of soul siphoning Colum Asht “has never once let his body become corrupted.”[3] This might imply that other Eighth House cavaliers have not been quite as lucky and have been corrupted.
Gideon the Ninth[]
“Silas Octakiseron’s poor bastard cavalier. Colum Asht. I didn’t understand then…”[1]
After Ianthe Tridentarius ascends to Lyctorhood, Silas Octakiseron and his cavalier, Colum Asht, attempt to kill her. To gain power, Silas siphons Colum—sending his soul away from his body. During this banishment of Colum’s soul, his body is possessed by the devils. Using Colum’s body, the devils attack Ianthe, hitting her with Colum’s shield and cutting her with his sword. Upon realizing that Colum has been corrupted, Harrowhark Nonagesimus attempts to cage him in bone, but he kicks through this calcium prison indifferently. Silas begins to calmly bid Colum to return. The devils raise Colum’s sword and drive it through Silas’s neck, killing him. Gideon Nav attacks Colum’s body with her rapier, but the devils use Colum’s shield to hit her with supernatural strength. She shatters Colum’s wrist with her sword, but this has no effect on the devils, and they wrap Colum’s elongated tongue around her throat. Ianthe breaks Colum’s neck, then sinks her fingers into his skin, and after a moment, the creatures shrill and the tongue drops away from Gideon’s neck. The writhing tongues that replaced Colum’s eyeballs dissolve, and the body becomes Colum again, though his dead body still bears the horrific injuries from the fight.
Nona the Ninth[]
Before Day One[]
There is an infestation of devils on Antioch, a planet under the Emperor’s stewardship. Initially, the Cohort suspects that the possessed people merely had a strange disease. Once they realize what the devils are, they engage in conflict with the creatures. The fight is ongoing and has already spanned three to four months. The Emperor assures Kiriona Gaia that the devils cannot travel and are confined to Antioch.
Day Five (Twenty-Four Hours Until the Tomb Opens)[]
Through unknown means, the devils infiltrate the Ninth House. Thrown into chaos by the rioting devils, the citizens of the Ninth House fight back by locking possessed people in their cells or pushing the corrupted bodies over the rail to the bottom of the tiers. Some of the nuns (Aisamorta and Lachrimorta) use necromancy against the devils, with some limited success. By the time Nona’s shuttle arrives, one day after the initial assault, over two hundred people have been infected and more than a hundred people have died. The survivors barricade themselves behind the Anastasian monument on a lower level.
When Paul, Pyrrha Dve, Nona, and Kiriona Gaia arrive on the Ninth House, Kiriona hears a suspicious noise and walks ahead of the group. When the other three catch up to her, she has killed seven of the possessed humans, with the help of an injured Crux. Kiriona instructs Paul to not heal Crux, informing them that the devils are merely waiting for Crux to either be healed or die. Nona informs the group that there are more of the devil-ridden corpses in the archway of the room, and Pyrrha hustles the group onto the elevator and away from the creatures.
Characteristics[]
Physical Appearance[]
When a devil possesses a human being, that person’s appearance changes. Their eyes become a liquid black, and their tongue grey. Then their eyeballs disappear entirely and leave only rows of dark purple pinpricks above and below the eyelids. The empty eye sockets become “mouths ringed with teeth, with little tongues slithering out of them.”[4] While the tongues that protrude from the eye sockets are red and wet, the tongue in the original mouth lengthens significantly and becomes pointed and triangular. Once killed, the devil’s eye-mouths dissolve into brackish fluid and their tongue becomes a deep blue color.
“He now moved like there were six people inside him, and none of those six people had ever been inside a human being before.”[4]
Once possessed by a devil, a person’s movement noticeably changes. They become heavy-footed and rock from side to side. Their skin pulsates with the motion of something slithering along their muscles. The devils move the body in unnatural ways with no regard for the original body, such as rotating the head one hundred and eighty degrees, breaking the neck in the process.
Abilities[]
"Their touch consumes...they hunger for the youngest of us."[1]
The devils take control of bodies—dead and alive, though possessed corpses are weaker than possessed humans. This possession is initiated through touch or bite, and their presence can remain in a wound indefinitely before they move to possess the body. Once they occupy a body, they gain supernatural strength and become impervious to injury or pain. Despite this obliviousness to bodily harm, injured or damaged live bodies are undesirable to them. Likewise, they do not possess skeletons, only live humans or fleshed corpses.
People can be warded against the devils, through powerful necromancy, but once a living body has been possessed, there is no way to cure the possession or exorcise the devils. The only way to end the possession is to chop up the body and burn the pieces.
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Nona the Ninth Day Five, Ch. 31
- ↑ Gideon the Ninth Act III, Ch. 17
- ↑ Gideon the Ninth Act III, Ch. 18
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Gideon the Ninth Act IV, Ch. 34