by N. D. Jones
“No! You can’t. My flames will teach you.”
O’Leary lifted both hands, releasing a hysterically sobbing Lisa, who wasn’t too distraught to recognize an advantage. She took it, O’Leary’s human shield no more, and ran, kicking off the red hooker heels in exchange for speed and freedom. Never once looking back, the girl bolted out of the alley and away from all the ugliness, an innocent soul hidden beneath the brutal lessons of the street.
Issa returned his attention to O’Leary, the bastard making it rain fire. The eatery and salon were ablaze, providing the neglected neighborhood with light aplenty. The demon guffawed, enjoying his destruction, literally glowing with a crimson haze.
With sirens wailing in the background and locals spilling out into the street, Issa had to move fast or lose his chance. Arms and wings at his side, Issa flew like a Bullet Train through the flames, his trajectory slamming him into an unprepared O’Leary.
Crashing to the ground, wing hitting and denting an overflowing dumpster, Issa landed on top of the pissed-off demon.
“I’m going to fry your ass then every building on this worthless block.” O’Leary tried to raise his hands to do just that, but Issa trapped them at the wrist, holding both long arms tight in his strong grip.
“I won’t let you hurt anyone else.”
The sounds of the fire trucks drew closer, and so had the locals. Issa looked up, catching a glimpse of one, two, three people ambling to the mouth of the no longer darkened alley. Their eyes, like Lisa’s earlier, went wide with astonishment. Fingers pointed, lips moved, and cell phones out.
Damn.
Hunter Angels didn’t work like this. They didn’t get caught meting out the ultimate punishment. Issa would be damned if he ended up on YouTube, his Sword of Judgment firmly embedded in Ethan O’Leary’s dead, pyromaniac body.
Harnessing his powers, Issa sent out a blanket of gray mists. It began where he held O’Leary, then slowly grew, spreading like a living, breathing, ravenous fog. It ate, devouring flames as it crawled up the buildings, consuming all in its mystical path.
Issa drew O’Leary to his feet, his Sword of Judgment in his hand.
“No,” the fire demon screamed. “You can’t do this.”
“You’re wrong. I can do whatever I want to you. My mists protect me. They shield me from humans and your fire.” Issa pushed the demon against a wall, the stench from the dumpster intrusive and strong. “You don’t deserve mercy, Demon, but I’ll give it to you. I’ll make this quick, so I can go home to my wife. Let her know she and the human realm are free of you.”
Issa frowned, wanting nothing more than to dissect the demon one malignant organ at a time. But he had no more time, the human first responders were only minutes from the scene, and Issa didn’t want this to become a spectacle. Humans knew only of angels like Serwa, who were sweet, kind, and healed them. They were not, according to Nathaniel, ready to accept what else angels did to protect them. Meaning, no public battles with demons, no mid-air chases, and most importantly, no public executions.
The Sword of Judgment began to hum, its hunger growing, needing to be fed. Issa would serve it—O’Leary’s soul the singular item on tonight’s menu.
Issa gripped the handle of his blade tighter, feeling the familiar weight, pleased to end this, ready to reclaim his life and his wife. Then the bastard began to glow and laugh. And glow and laugh.
Issa released the inferno O’Leary was morphing into, the demon’s red hair ablaze, skin hot to the touch. O’Leary’s fire raged anew, struggling to free itself of Issa’s magical mists. Issa gritted his teeth, fighting the urge to turn away from the blistering flames. Instead, Issa struck. The Sword of Judgment barreled forward, seeking its meal and plunging into…brick.
Issa roared, his fury cracking the wall where Ethan O’Leary had been.
The demon was gone. Issa had taken too long, giving the demon enough time to harness his power and teleport away.
“Goddammit.” Issa withdrew the blade from the wall, wanting to plunge it into his own stupid heart. How in the hell had he let him get away? “I had him. Now he’s gone. Fuck!”
Issa touched the scorched mark on the wall, the burn an outline of the demon’s body. He opened his third eye, concentrated, and scented Ethan O’Leary. Now he had him. The smell of his soul was stronger here, where the demon had cast off his human shell. Yes, much stronger, more discernible than the scent at the mosque where he’d attacked Serwa, or at his mother’s home, or even at his condo where Issa had been only two hours earlier.
All beings, mortal and immortal, had a unique soul scent. But not all of God’s creations could “smell” the soul of another. Only angels had this power. Hunter Angels, being the best bounty hunters of them all, were best at detecting soul scents. But others, like Guardian Angels, were also quite skilled at using their third eye to scent and track souls—even the soul of a vanishing, cowardly demon like Ethan O’Leary.
“Hickory smoke.” Issa slammed his fist against the brick wall. “Got you.”
He lifted into the starry night sky. Gray mists veiled his exit. Issa glanced down. The buildings emitted smoke into the already polluted air, but the fire was out and the buildings—for what they were worth—still stood.
Tonight was a bust. It would take Issa days to catch back up to Ethan O’Leary, and the demon would be on high alert. Issa swore again, his gut clenching, aching to rid his own soul of the heavy plague of revenge weighing it down.
Disgusted with himself, Issa swung north, following Lisa’s periwinkle-scented soul. He may not have succeeded in capturing Ethan O’Leary and sending him to his final judgment, but he could do one thing right tonight. The excruciating pain in his leg and wing, well, that was the price a man paid for failure.
June 2012
Northern Araceli
“Burn, bitch, burn.”
Serwa closed her eyes against the unwanted memory. The demon’s parting words had found permanent residence in her mind. She shook her head as if to dislodge them, a tide of black hair falling from a loose bun the only effect.
She tightened her eyes even more, visualizing taking a blackboard eraser to her mind. The memory nothing more than colored chalk she desperately needed to wipe clean. But the blackboard never stayed clean long. The lesson plan of that day was written and rewritten in neat, evil script, she the perpetual, unwilling student, the demon an uncertified and utterly certifiable teacher.
Yet Serwa focused, scrubbing the board with her eraser until it was spotless. Not a speck of chalk dust lingered when she’d finished. She sighed and opened her eyes, quelling the fury that always arose when she thought about what Ethan O’Leary had done to her.
But that was only the rogue demon’s human name. No one, not even Nathaniel, knew his true name. Such knowledge would give the possessor power over the demon. No, that most precious of motherly gifts was uttered only upon birth. A sacred name that was never voiced again except during death, the last breath of a dying soul, the first gasp into the hereafter.
“Ethan O’Leary.” Serwa said his name as she so often did when she was alone, fighting the fear the inelegant name evoked, his demonic fire having left its mark more on her mind than on her body. “Ethan O’Leary,” she repeated, stripping each vowel and consonant of its acrid flavor, the filthy sound scratchy and unwanted on her tongue.
“Ethan O’Leary!” Serwa yelled the name, flinging it from her body, a poltergeist she was exorcising. Shackled Healer fury bolted to her soul, rampaging through her skull and out her mouth. “Ethan O’Leary,” she screamed even louder. Eyes flickered with angelic magic, body levitated off the bed, magical obsidian vapors surrounded her. Her eyes were open reliving the attack, hands thrust in front of her, palms up in a defensive posture.
“Ethan O’Leary.” The name exploded against the ceiling and walls, cracking them. Magical vapors dove in and out of the scarred infrastructure like wraiths on the hunt. And still she fought, the bindings that held her fury in check
creaking with effort, the proverbial weak link slowly being pulled from its moorings.
The obsidian vapors attacked. Chairs, dressers, nightstands, lamps, all were upended and tossed about the room. Leather and finished wood were torn to pieces, a mauling of furniture without the aid of claws or teeth. Shards of glass from the destroyed mirror bolted through the space like arrows, embedding themselves in the closet doors, the force from the contact popping knobs and exploding hinges.
The foul stench of sickness and death clogged the air, flowing in heavy rivulets out of Serwa. A pot left too long to boil. And boil she did, obsidian vapors of cancer, AIDS, polio, smallpox, cholera, ebola, rushed forth in a whirlwind of barely contained fury. It struck all in its path, protecting its mistress, her magic as deadly as the diseases she healed.
The house on the secluded hill shook to its rocky foundation but held firm, an unlikely sithen of Healer fury, a cage of corrosive Healer magic, a tomb of weakening Healer control. But it was more than Healer magic Serwa fought to contain. It was her other Hand of Power, the complementary magic that lived within Serwa. Magic many Heaven-born angels envied and feared.
An unknown amount of time later, when the hurricane of Healer destruction was over, Serwa calmed enough to conjure a new bed, settling it in the middle of the madness she’d sowed. Spent, she settled on the bare bed, closed her eyes, and wondered when she’d ever feel normal again. When the urge to kill Ethan O’Leary would be but an unpleasant memory buried deep in her tortured soul.
Knowing that day wouldn’t be today, Serwa began to clear her mind, push back thoughts of fury, retribution, and blood. With effort, she slowed her breathing, controlled her tempestuous heart, and envisioned happier times. Meditation and prayer, one had to work. Neither had thus far. But still…
Two hours later, Serwa opened her eyes, sensing Issa’s approach. His swift wings were silent against the gentle air currents, yet the erratic pulse of his heart echoed loudly in her soul, the mate bond an eternal tether between them.
The ceiling of their bedchamber magically parted, and Issa floated down, sparkling green and ivory wings fully expanded—flat, moderately long and narrow, triangular in form for high-speed flight and swift maneuverability. Like most small-to-medium birds of prey, his wings swept backward like a jet fighter ready for rapid flight.
Guardian Angel’s wings, she thought, not wings of a Hunter Angel. No, such wings resembled those of the soaring birds like ravens or condors, not the shorebirds and swallows Guardian Angels’ wings were often compared to. Hunters’ wings were broad, the arrangement of the slotted primary feathers making it easier for them to soar over large and seemingly endless landmasses, each primary feather used as a separate airfoil.
Despite her husband’s protestations to the contrary and his recent all-consuming mission, Issa was still a Guardian Angel in his very stubborn heart.
Sword of Judgment in hand, sweat-streaked arms and bare, rippling chest, face set in a hard, frustrated line, Serwa knew his hunt had been unsuccessful. Again. And she didn’t even want to know what had happened to his shirt, shoes, and belt, for he wore none.
Knees tucked under her chin, black wings limp, Serwa wondered how she appeared to her husband. Lonely? Frightened? Fragile? Did Issa know how he appeared to her? Driven. Wild. Lost. Did he even care anymore?
“He got away.” Issa dropped the sword on the remnants of a burgundy and black wingback chair. Eyes coal black from the confrontation, their eyes met, Issa’s breathing too fast but beginning to slow. Denim pants hung low on toned, muscular hips. Feet hardened from rugged use sank into lush carpet.
Serwa nodded. The evidence of his failure clearly etched in every tortured line of his face, the tense set of his shoulders, the grim shadow plaguing his soul. But the outing wasn’t truly a failure, the faint residue of demon blood on his sword evidence to that fact. Yet Serwa knew her husband viewed it otherwise. No matter how many rogue demons Issa brought to justice while in search of her attacker, the one he yearned to cleave in two was the only demon whose blood he wanted on the tip of his angelically sharp blade.
“It’s late. I thought you would be asleep by now.” Issa waded through the debris that was their bedchamber, ignoring the aftermath of her raging tempest as if the broken bits were nothing more than dirty clothes carelessly dropped and left.
His hands slid into warm water, the floating marble basin appearing then disappearing once the cleansing routine was complete. He turned back to her and the upturned room, face impassive. With a wave of one nonchalant hand, Issa made the mess disappear, leaving only the bed on which she sat, a lopsided ceiling fan with one remaining blade and an intermittently blinking bulb, and four gouged out walls. He would return the room to its immaculate state in the morning, the way he always did when grief and anger cornered Serwa, goading her to fight or submit. She refused to submit but didn’t know the best way to fight.
Sleep eluded Serwa. The times her exhausted body betrayed her, compelling Serwa to sleep, they weren’t welcome respites. Her mind would replay her ordeal with the demon, her sense of helplessness, her impotent outrage. Then there was the pain. As an angel, she’d healed at an extraordinary rate. Blackened flesh and melted organs reformed, taking on the original appearance and function in a matter of days.
Serwa tested her wings, suppressing a wince when the slight forward motion she’d attempted nearly brought tears to her eyes. While Healer wings were crafted for fast takeoff and dodging—short but broad and cupped with flexible tips—they did not heal as swiftly as other parts of the body. Serwa theorized that her wings were healing at a tortoise pace because she wasn’t Heaven-born, the wings not an original part of her anatomy.
For the Chosen, the acquisition of wings was like slapping a jet engine onto a kite, evolution occurring in a blink of a season instead of over hundreds of years. It took her nearly a decade to grow them to full maturity. The wings had developed in time with her angelic training.
Serwa watched as Issa undressed, his faded blue jeans falling to the floor then disappearing in a gray mist. Not comfortable with the trappings of modern underwear, Issa wore nothing underneath, which suited Serwa just fine.
She smiled in appreciation before straightening her legs and conjuring the bedclothes she hadn’t bothered with earlier. Making an offer for her husband to join her, she reached to turn back the burgundy comforter with an embroidered leaf design. She inwardly sighed. He’s finally home. But for how long?
“I couldn’t sleep,” she admitted when her husband joined her in bed. He tucked his wings in, shrinking, and attaching them to his wide, muscular back. Her eyes swept over his impressive naked form, the sight never failing to arouse. “I wasn’t sure if you would return tonight. I hoped you would. It’s been two weeks.” Serwa lifted her eyes to meet Issa’s, praying for a calm she couldn’t claim.
“I didn’t mean to be gone so long. I was on his trail. I almost had him in Saudi Arabia, but he teleported before I could strike.”
Issa’s tale. A never-ending B-rated movie with the same cast of characters and abysmal reviews. Demons could teleport. Angels could merely fly. A simple yet complicated plot.
“Maybe you should ask—”
“I don’t need anyone’s help. Not even Nathaniel’s,” he snapped, his voice a menacing growl. “I can do this on my own. It’s just taking longer than anticipated.” He turned more fully to face her, tone softening. “Don’t you trust me to avenge you? To capture the filthy bastard who hurt you, made you afraid to leave this realm, afraid to do what you most love?”
It was true. She hadn’t left Araceli since she’d returned from the human realm, their two-story house the only place she felt safe. Although her wings weren’t completely healed, she could travel beyond her self-imposed confines, the realm incontrovertibly safe, inaccessible to outsiders.
But it wasn’t true that she no longer trusted her husband. How could she not? The attack was no more his fault than it was her own. Yet Issa persisted
in blaming himself, erecting painful barriers between them, plotting an emotionally destructive course, a course that could lead to his permanent death.
And while her sense of security was sadly predicated on the capture or death of the rogue demon, Serwa would gladly relinquish such a dream for her husband’s well-being. His sanity. But Issa would never accept such a one-sided bargain, his honor and pride a boon and a weakness.
She raised her hand and caressed his rugged jaw. His handsome visage relaxed under her warm touch. “I trust you, husband, above all others. You own my heart, so you know I speak the truth.”
Issa nodded, and her hand crept from his face to his wonderfully coarse hair—long, thick, and utterly masculine. A length the warrior in him abhorred, a gift forged in guilt, a chieftain’s attempt at amends. But no amends were required between them then, and none required now. He was no more responsible for the raid on their village than he was for O’Leary’s demonic assault.
“Stay, Issa,” Serwa said, a soft plea to his battered pride. “Allow me to heal you.”
“I am unharmed. The rogue demon I settled for tonight was vicious but young. I handled him easily.”
Serwa almost smiled at her husband’s deliberate misunderstanding of her words.
“You know what I mean. In here.” She touched the side of his head at the temple. “And in here.” Her hand moved to his chest, covering his beating heart, the pulse strong and sure.
Issa lifted her hand from his chest and kissed the palm. He slid his tongue from the center of her palm to her wrist and back up before taking her index finger into his mouth and sucking. Midnight eyes raged with predatory hunger, and Serwa shivered at Issa’s blatant attempt to distract her.
“Let me heal you, take away your pain, fight for you, just this once. Let me.”