by Lisa Hughey
If he could only get Remiel to surrender. To give in. But he didn’t really believe that was Remiel’s end goal anyway.
The Fallen was up to something. Zach just wasn’t sure what.
He kept an eye on the writhing body of water beyond the shore. The sea frothed and bubbled like a cauldron as the water continued to recede, and Zach wondered if he was out of time.
“Why would you think I would help you?” He couldn’t appear too eager. His reputation was well known even in the Banished Realm.
“You know my pain,” Remiel said fiercely. “You have lived my pain.”
Zach shook his head. The banished angel was insane. “Surrender to the Archangels, to the Angelic Realm, and I’ll see what I can do.”
He had to try to negotiate with Remiel. Had to attempt to diffuse this situation. Perhaps he wouldn’t even need to use Shasa to stop the tsunami if only he could talk Remiel off this proverbial cliff. If nothing else he needed to try to convince Remiel to stop this disaster, to distract the Fallen from their evil plans to harm the humans.
But the earth rumbled beneath their feet, and the sea grew angrier with every second.
“Don’t do this,” Zach growled.
“Do what?” Remiel mocked.
“Harm the humans. What have they ever done to you?”
“The humans ruined everything,” Remiel shouted. “We had power, beauty, glorious life. We had run of the Earth, the Realm, the Universe was ours. Then suddenly our hybrid offspring are evil demons and we must be punished.”
He could see Remiel’s point. “What do you want?” Zach asked. Because it seemed as if Remiel wanted more than forgiveness.
“We want everything you stole from the Fallen and more. Every blade of grass, every soul to cherish, every heart to love, every measure of peace.”
“Absolution.” His specialty. And if granting forgiveness would change what he feared was going to be the outcome for today, he would consider granting it.
“You’d like that,” Remiel sneered. “Wouldn’t you, Zachariel?”
Zach didn’t understand.
“Because if you forgive us, you’d have to grant forgiveness for yourself.”
“What does that mean?” But Zach was afraid he understood what Remiel meant. Afraid that the Grigori somehow knew his secret.
“The lust in your heart.” Remiel demanded, “Was it wrong? Evil? Impure?”
“No!” Zach burst out. His heart thundered with the need to halt Remiel’s words before Shasa figured out what the banished Angel was talking about.
“Exactly. And yet, we are still being punished for the same thing. We did nothing wrong.” Remiel bellowed, “Nothing!”
Zach hoped Shasa didn’t understand what Remiel meant. And he prayed that in his rage Remiel had forgotten all about Shasa.
Behind him Shasa shifted. Dammit, he needed her to stay quiet. But with one small move she’d brought attention to herself.
“So precious.” Remiel jeered and it was clear he meant Shasa.
“Leave her be.”
“I would never take her.” Remiel’s voice was colored with amusement. “The far more delicious punishment is for you to live without her, knowing she is alive and yet you are unable to be with her. Again.”
Zach’s heart clenched. His punishment was set.
Shasa’s confusion radiated from her like a sound wave.
“So now it is the humans’ time.” Remiel was deadly serious. “They took from us so we will take from them.”
“But that’s not really what this is about.” Zach refused to let Remiel get away with this fiction. “Because some humans knew what you were planning. Some Nephilim were aware of the plot, aware of their need to flee ahead of time, so they wouldn’t be trapped in the coming disaster.”
Remiel’s laughter was tinged with evil. “So clever, aren’t you? Yes, some are aware. Those loyal to their ancestors will be spared. For now.”
For now, Remiel had said. Did that mean they were only using the Nephilim? Remiel’s hatred pulsed in the air surrounding them. Zach forced himself to keep one eye on the receding wave. There would be little time once the water started its rush back toward the shore. And if Zach were correct, that event would start soon.
Zach willed Shasa to stay silent. But as if she heard his unspoken please, she said, “Why would you punish the citizens of San Francisco with your anger?”
Her edgy tenseness as she eyed the wild sea wasn’t lost on Zach. He may have begun the process of acclimating her to large bodies of water again, but she was far from terror free.
Zach had a sudden premonition that her calm was a façade. That beneath the bravado her heart beat in fear and her subconscious mind wrestled with the terror that she’d felt since her youth.
As far as Zach knew, Remiel had no higher power over water but he’d hate to be dead wrong. They didn’t have much more time. The temperature had dropped in the last half hour. He’d kept one eye on the massive hundreds of miles long wave that had turned and was about to start rushing back to shore. And fuck, in order to most effectively block the water from the shoreline, they were going to have to get closer to push it back.
Zach decided directness was the right approach. Because he didn’t really think Remiel was here just to taunt him. Distract him maybe. And he was definitely doing that. Zach abandoned subtlety. “So what are you really doing here, Remiel?”
“Join us,” Remiel whispered.
“What?” He certainly hadn’t seen that coming. Shasa put her hand on Zach’s forearm, her palm was solid, comforting, real against his skin.
“You cannot have been happy, when they struck without informing you,” Remiel said softly. “What are the odds that they didn’t know about your affair?”
Zach remembered Michael’s admission in the Realm when he’d asked if Shasa was the one. He’d known. The Council had known, all this time, he’d believed the timing of the quake and tsunami in Jamaica was sheer accident. But if Remiel were correct that meant….
“Yes,” Remiel hissed.
Shasa was behind him. “Whatever this angel wants, don’t let them win.” She whispered, “This is a ploy to stop you, us.”
“But I….” He was at a loss for words. On one side lay betrayal. On the other lay redemption. But one thing kept circling in his mind…the Council knew. They had killed his love.
“Don’t listen.” Shasa urged. She waved her arm toward the shore where the Embarcadero was still stalled in gridlock. “Whatever, whoever he is referring to is one soul, one mistake. If you take their path, you will have thousands of souls on your conscience.”
“I cannot find forgiveness in my heart,” Zach said.
“They would forgive you. I know this.”
Zach’s heart was cracking. She was the one who needed to forgive him but she didn’t remember and he hoped she never did. That didn’t mean he would forsake his duty to the Realm.
Zach shook his head as if coming out of a trance. Why had he even considered Remiel’s offer? Normally he wouldn’t even have given the Fallen a chance to speak. But he’d let this Angel go on for far too long.
Suddenly Zach knew what Remiel’s power was. Remiel was able to garner influence…not just on humans but even on Archangels. Was that how they had held Uri? Was that how they had managed to block Uri’s memory and take his knowledge of self away?
Zach wasn’t even friends with Uri and he knew the Archangel would be furious at the loss of his memory, at the loss of his self, at the change in his very personality.
Shasa’s fingers dug into his shoulders, her front pressed against his back as she held strong against Remiel’s persuasion. “Don’t listen, Zach.”
She was right. He couldn’t listen. Couldn’t let this Fallen sway him any further. Zach tried one more time. “Drop this vendetta against the humans.”
“You have made your choice,” Remiel roared.
His presence had throbbed in the air around them and now there was a void. An ab
sence so quiet and profound that Zach held very still and waited to see if anything else was coming. But the atmosphere stayed silent.
Remiel was gone.
Seventeen
Shasa’s heart boomed against her ribcage. She trembled with rage at Remiel’s attempt to turn Zach against the Realm. She felt as if they had been touched by evil.
“We have to get closer,” Zach ground out.
Shasa nodded.
He translocated them to the shore of the San Francisco Bay. Cupid’s Span, the oversize bow and arrow sculpture, rose behind them. A loud sucking noise pulled the pressure from her ears, and the water continued to recede at an alarming rate.
The expression on Zach’s face was fierce as he scooped her up. “We need to stop this.”
“How?”
Her thoughts were frantic, wild, out of control. There was something about the way the water was moving. A frothing, angry mass. A vicious whirlpool of fury and might. Zach ran to meet the wave, out toward the middle of the ocean. Debris and flotsam littered the exposed floor of the bay. Wind whipped around them as the ocean roared.
Finally they stood miles from the shore, and she could feel the incredible crazy pull of gravity as the world seemed to tremble on the precipice. “What’s going to happen next?”
But she knew. She knew with a terror that was not unfounded that within a few minutes, the water was going to speed back toward the Embarcadero. A place normally populated with thousands of tourists wandering the piers and admiring the local sea life. Typically this time of day, the financial district bustled with men and women in their power suits, and further inland the retail enclave of Powell Street and Union Square was crowded with shoppers.
Zach said calmly, “We stop what we can.”
“All those people would have perished.” If he hadn’t been holding her up, her knees would have dipped.
“Gabriel was successful in convincing his media contacts to declare a state of emergency.” His voice was grim. “They are leaving as fast as possible.”
The new Bay Bridge was gridlocked with cars. And Highway 101 to the south was equally impacted as the citizens tried desperately to get out of the danger zone. Even though the shore was deserted, there were still way too many people in the path if they couldn’t stop the wave.
“Will they get out in time?”
“I don’t know.” Zach said, “It’s coming soon.”
The noise from the swirling mass of water was so loud, Shasa could barely hear him. “We have to get closer?”
He was still taking them out to the middle of the barren bay. “We need to be close enough to slow the coming wall of water and yet far enough away from the shore to minimize its impact.”
“How do we do that Zach?” She couldn’t do this. She’d only just been able to dip her toes in a placid pool. She stood on the rocky, sandy floor underneath the Golden Gate Bridge in a spot that used to be three hundred feet below the surface of the bay. She could barely see the edge of the horizon but the atmosphere changed, the pressure had thudded with a sudden drop.
Zach jammed his mouth over hers and devoured her in a desperate kiss. Then he moved to stand behind her. They faced the coming wall of water together. “Whatever happens, I’ve got you.” His words were a promise and a pledge. “I’ve got you.”
He twined their fingers together and braced his feet. His thighs were like the solid girders of the bridge behind her and his chest supported her back. Zach pressed a gentle kiss to her temple. “Remember when you pulled the water from below the surface?”
“Yes.”
“Now you need to push it away, push it back out to sea. Out to the depths where the deep ocean’s mass will absorb the force of the water.”
“Okay.” It had to be okay, didn’t it?
Zach pressed their linked fingers over her belly, directly on top of the mark.
As Shasa watched the towering wall of water speed toward them, she wondered how it would ever be enough. How they would ever be enough. But she didn’t back down. Instead she imagined shoving the wall of water back out to sea.
Four magical hands against the might of nature.
“You have made your choice!” Over the roar of the water, maniacal laughter echoed in the sky and shook the ground like the earthquake that had triggered this disaster. “You will not succeed.”
Remiel.
That bastard. Shasa redoubled her efforts.
Wind, debris, sound blasted her with the centrifugal force of an otherworldly storm. The energy pushed her back against the unmoving mass of Zach’s body as he held strong against the coming wall of water.
Remiel was gone. The sea’s angry might exploded, fierce, relentless.
It rose up over them, a towering wall of water, nearly a mile in height, it’s power immense, terrifying, mesmerizing. Shasa stared, so freaked out, she was frozen.
“Shasa,” Zach shouted in her ear.
She jerked out of her stupor. The killing mass of water bearing down on her should have had her screaming but a strange calm settled over Shasa.
“Concentrate.”
She nodded. She could do this. She had to do this. She wondered for a moment if her whole life had been leading to this moment in time. Even a day ago, she couldn’t have imagined she would be here. She would have done anything to get out of the expectation and obligation.
Instead, she finally felt as if she had found her purpose, as if she found what she’d been meant to achieve.
“No more hiding,” she shouted euphorically.
Together they lifted their palms in a classic stop gesture, but their stature was puny compared to the horrific might of the water.
“Imagine pushing it back, turning it away, thrusting it back out to sea.”
There was no way they could triumph against this massive display, a combination of mother nature’s fury and supernatural power. But she wasn’t about to back down and she’d never been more sure of anything in her life.
Shasa kept her eyes open and her mind focused on the destruction headed toward them. As the water came closer, Shasa’s resolve wavered. “Zach.” She wanted to back up but Zach was behind her holding strong.
“I won’t let anything happen to you,” he said fiercely. “Just keep picturing the water slowing.”
The water wasn’t moving as fast as a freight train any longer, she could see its velocity diminishing but not enough to stop from crashing into them, not enough to keep the water from destroying the coastline. Within seconds, the angry sea slammed into them, lifted them off their feet. Battered and tossed by the waves, Shasa closed her eyes and held her breath.
Only Zach kept her from descending into complete terror. His arms were tight around her waist as he kicked them to the surface. They both gasped for air. “We’re slowing it down.”
But debris, wood, pieces of metal, swirled around them, the tide dragged them under again. Shasa had devolved from terror to a fatalistic acceptance. She was going to die.
“Hold your breath,” Zach commanded before the wave swept over their heads again. The best she could do was trust Zach and hope that together they could at least minimize the devastation to the coast and the people.
The pull of the tide was merciless, dragging her down and under. Her lungs burned as the carbon dioxide built, she tried to release the air from her lungs in slow sips, mentally pushing back at the rush of water toward the shore. They were being carried like a surfer on a giant wave.
She came up sputtering and coughing from the stringent sea water in her lungs.
“I’ve got you.” Zach was a solid, constant presence holding on to her.
“It’s not going to be enough,” she croaked.
As if there were a push back from another source, the waves seemed to slow exponentially. The water was still going to hit the shore but the mass had slowed enough that the bridges should hold.
But the danger to Shasa and Zach wasn’t over. The presence could be felt all around them. Shasa’s atte
ntion was split for a moment because the energy felt almost like Remiel the asshole. But it couldn’t be him. He wanted to destroy the people and the city.
A fleeting warmth flowed over Shasa before another blast of water ripped her focus back to their problems.
“Keep trying.” Zach’s voice was strained from the effort to minimize the damage.
The Bow and Arrow sculpture on the Embarcadero was swallowed by the rush of water onto land. Justin Hermann Plaza flooded as the water blasted through in a heartbeat and raged further into the financial district.
Warehouses and expensive restaurants on the piers were swept back out to sea as the force of the tide shifting sucked the water back out. Zach translocated them out of the danger zone.
The city would need rebuilding but luckily the streets and buildings were deserted, evacuated before the loss of life could be tragic.
There was no question that the warm presence she’d felt had actually made the difference between catastrophic damage and this major damage. But the danger wasn’t over yet.
The frantic water battered and bashed at her body. Everything hurt as she held her hands to the water with all her might and continued to push back against the force.
A rogue wave came up, lifting above the main wave and carrying a trolley shelter toward them. Zach twisted quickly, trying to protect Shasa as the structure bore down on them. “Duck,” Zach roared. But it was too late, and the metal and glass structure crashed over their heads.
Everything went black.
Eighteen
Jamaica
June 7, 1692
Shasa scurried toward the beach with her luncheon basket and hoped that her lover, her lover!, would meet her. Shasa stopped, twirled around with her arms spread wide and her face tilted up to the sun.
She had a lover. And it was fantastic. Beautiful, wonderful, life-changing.
She finally understood what the maids giggled about when they found a skillful lover who satisfied them. Zach had shown her ecstasy and the very height of passion. Their joining was no brutal rut in the bar storeroom or rough tumble in the barn lacking in pleasure.