Rebel Angels: The Complete Series

by Rosemary A Johns

  I didn’t expect the Overseer’s huff of laughter. “So be it. Easy for you, hard for your…owner.”

  “Wait,” Mischief’s eyes widened, “I didn’t mean—”

  “Too late,” the Overseer taunted. When Mischief straightened, no longer affected by the drugged water, he shot me an apologetic glance. “The Abyss is opening: here captured Fallen are punished or discover redemption.” I tensed: was Ash in the black freeze? I couldn’t bear the thought of him alone down there. “One final fight for the Emperor’s glory. Then the winners will be free, and the losers become their spoils.”

  “How about a dramatic rock-paper-scissors tournament instead?” I forced myself onto my feet next to Mischief, even though I swayed. “Twister? Risk, but I’m holding Australia, bitches.”

  “A power mad empire builder…what a shock,” Mischief murmured, before holding up a finger. “However, I would slay all with my rock-paper-scissors moves: it’s all down to patterns and psychology.” His grin was sly. “I excel at reading both.”

  “Silence!” The Overseer boomed. “You speak in cursed riddles. There’s no game but battle in the Fire God’s Glory.”

  That didn’t sound like bastard Risk…

  When the Overseer’s lips faded, an explosion of smoke burst from the Abyss. I clutched the wall, peering through the haze.

  Two Fallen soared from the gloom, christened in ash and majesty, rather than crawling from the pit, as I’d always imagined. Here was judgment and death, shackled at the ankle like Mischief and me. The battle that Jahael had seeded in my mind all my life: angels vs vampires.

  Yet it was a battle that I no longer believed in. Hell, I loved a vampire. I loved…

  Ash…my vampire was free from the Abyss — safe.

  Black surged through me, howling to touch him, kiss him, taste him, until I knew that he was mine again. I was heady with the need for connection, after being blocked from my family in the Pleasure Pavilion. I bit my tongue, sucking on my own tangy copper, whilst struggling to calm my vampiric nature.

  I gasped, as Ash landed; his olive skin and sable tumble of hair was daubed with soot, like his black shirt and trousers, which hung in tatters. He still had his shooter strapped around his waist, at least. He quirked an eyebrow at me, with a twitch of his crotch. “I’ve missed you too, Violet, but my eyes are up here.”

  I laughed, as I circled my arms around his neck, laying my head against his shoulder; the steady beat of his heart soothed the storming black inside. His citrus and clove fragranced wings cocooned me: just for a moment, I was home. “All the better for checking out my biteable arse?”

  “You know it, babe.”

  I pinched the soft skin at the base of his wings, and he yelped. “Already you want to remind me of the butter knife deaths still owing? We’re already in the Running Man…”

  He kissed the top of my head. “Then I may as well go out swinging, my precious Monkey Muffins, Pikachu, Wookie—”

  I growled, and Ash dodged backwards, but not before I heard it: the giggle from behind Ash.

  Ash stilled, wetting his lips. “About that…” He jangled the shackle on his leg, dragging out a smaller vampire’s foot from where a vampire was hiding behind Ash. “I discovered family down there. They’ve been forcing us to fight together.”

  Family?

  My pulse pounded; my hands trembled.

  Had they pulled Harahel out of the Under World or Anarchy from the Pure…?

  Sighing, Ash turned, gripping the other vampire by the shoulders and hauling him in front of me.

  My breath hitched, as I flushed both hot and cold.

  Lucifer — my dad, who’d ruled as the tyrannical king of the Under World, until I’d betrayed him to the Matriarch, my mum — fidgeted, rubbing his foot backwards and forwards across the floor. His spiky ash blond hair was grimy, and he only wore a tiny pair of black leather shorts, rather than his terrifying flaming armor or horns. He looked even younger than me now: diminished. He rocked onto his heels, finally raising his gaze. “Honey, I’m home.”

  Slap — I slapped him across his cheek.

  All this time, I’d been devastated to imagine how the Matriarch was breaking Lucifer, even though he’d taken everything from Ash: even his little sisters.

  I hated Lucifer, and yet…I loved him too.

  And I hated him for that.

  Why did he have to love me?

  Lucifer’s eyes gleamed, but the tears didn’t fall. “Huh, we’ll agree that daddy deserved that.” He dug his fingers over the handprint, as if to bruise the pain deeper. “Didn’t I always promise that you’d be glorious? Look at you, my monstrous daughter, the golden girl of even the Seraphim. I wish…” He hesitated, glancing down. It was so unlike Lucifer’s towering power in the Under World that I shook: had the Matriarch broken him? His voice was soft and fragile, “…The Glories hurt and trap us. Everything’s pain. On my fangs, I only wanted to save the Wings and Fallen.”

  “Are we all done with the war crimes tribunal?” Mischief lips were tight, although he stroked the back of his hand down Lucifer’s crimson cheek.

  When Mischief twisted Lucifer’s head to the side, Lucifer stiffened but allowed it: ML was tattooed in angel blood at the base of his neck.

  Hell, no…

  My eyes widened. Lucifer had been Marked again, just as I’d Marked Rebel against his will, and Drake had been Marked as the Matriarch’s ever since he was young: a bed slave. This was why Lucifer had rebelled in the first place and Angel World had been divided into civil war.

  I noticed then the purpling around Lucifer’s eyes, and the way that the word FIRE, which had been branded across his chest between his pink nipples, looked livid and wrong, as if it’d been branded across a second time, then daubed with a paste that stopped it from healing.

  Lucifer’s Fire: The Matriarch had stolen it…was still stealing it… That was why Lucifer seemed so small: no fire lights or turning other angels to ash.

  He was powerless.

  Then why wasn’t I doing the happy dance? Why wasn’t Ash? Lucifer controlled — tamed — at last?

  Lucifer arched into Mischief’s hand like he hadn’t been touched gently in a long time. “I should be spanking cross with you, and we both know that’s our scene, for fighting for me and not running like I ordered when the others betrayed me.” My cheeks flushed: Lucifer didn’t know that Mischief, the angel he’d desired to bond with, had in fact been the spy who’d planned the entire rebellion against him. “Now look at all the trouble you’re in, my darling pet.”

  Mischief drew back; his gaze became hard. “I’m not your pet. I never was and…”

  “Not until the Sheriff of Nottingham takes on Robin Hood at a charity dance off will he ever be,” I smirked.

  Lucifer backed against Ash as if for reassurance. “There’s sassy and then there’s just plain rude.”

  Suddenly, my head became even woozier; I whined.

  Mischief gripped my elbow, holding me upright. “How many brownie points did I lose for leading you to drink poison?”

  “You drank?” Ash arched an unimpressed eyebrow.

  “You dare drug my daughter?” Lucifer howled up into the dark.

  I startled. Despite the loss of his powers, Lucifer still had the goosebump effect when he freaked out.

  The Overseer’s eyes blazed out of the black. “You should know about drugging, whore of the Matriarch,” the Overseer sneered, cold and cruel in a way that he’d never been when he’d spoken to me. “Your Marked Glory kept you in such a delirium, how long was it before you even noticed that you’d been snatched as our Emperor’s plaything, Star?” Lucifer winced at the Star, which the Matriarch had called him as well. No way would I ever call him that. “Now fight because every word that falls from your damned lips inspires me with the desire to skip to your punishment after you lose.”

  Hell, my dad might’ve been a psycho who deserved every punishment…but fam was fam, and no matter how much I wanted to kill the
kernel of love for him, I couldn’t. I’d thought that I’d never see him again, and now that he was here, I couldn’t fight or hurt him when he was defenseless.

  I met Ash’s gaze, and he nodded.

  Before I could tell the Overseer just how deep into the Abyss he could shove his command, Lucifer pouted. “Oh goodie, both a fight and a punishment…? Hmmm, I think I’ll pass. Hurt me if that’s what gets your rocks off, but the only thing I have left is my daughter. And she hates me.” I flinched. “I’d topple worlds just for her to allow me to battle by her side.”

  Why were my eyes burning, and my throat tight?

  Ash grinned, lounging against the wall next to Lucifer as he examined his nails. “When’s room service? I’m starving.”

  Mischief snorted. “You missed Happy Hour.”

  What had I promised myself about taunting the Overseer…?

  “If you do not complete the Angel Games,” the Overseer’s voice was dangerously low, “you’ll be immolated: offered up to the one who loves us all.”

  The ground began to shake, just as the diamonds on my top throbbed and squawked out a warning.

  I slapped my top into silence. “I asked for early warning, bitches.”

  A rumbling roar.

  The Overseer’s lips grew wider and wider, threatening to swallow us whole, as lava spewed from the ruby encrusted walls.

  Ash hollered, swiping at his singed wings. I fell onto my arse, whilst the world shook hellfire. Lucifer dived over me, covering my body with his wings: I stilled at the familiar scent and warmth of his feathers.

  Then the world burst to flames.

  3

  When the seven dragon brothers burst from the Serpent Chamber into the center of Court One — the glass gates melted into a pool by their flames — at the very moment that the Abyss choked smoke and the walls bled lava, I had two choices: kill the predators or tame them.

  The silver magics, which squirmed inside me and nipped at the same time as they caressed, murmured that I could tame them. The shadows fluttered inside, excited at the thought, whilst I shifted disquieted by it.

  Should such power be leashed?

  I’d been forced into a collar before and yanked around on a chain.

  It sucked.

  So, why did I now crave to be the one holding the leash?

  Clink — Ash hauled Lucifer away from me by his ankle.

  Lucifer yelped, stumbling to Ash’s side. Instantly, I missed the security of his wings, which had sheltered me.

  Ash pulled out a tiny fork from his jean’s pocket: Devil’s Trident. With a flick of his wrist, the fork twisted out until he was almost as tall as Ash; the weapon forged from living bone with three prongs, and a sharpened bottom, glistened with energy…and death.

  I bastard hungered for him.

  I licked my lips, edging closer on my knees. I could taste the trident’s charcoal musk and feel the ghost-like memory of his shaft in my hand, whilst he’d squirmed with bloodthirsty delight at my own dad’s attempted murder, even if it had been to stop an apocalypse.

  “It’s fight or die time.” Ash gripped Devil so tightly that his knuckles became white. “Like fight or shag, just not as fun.”

  “Yours, take me, win,” Devil whispered, insidious in my mind.

  Even our weapons couldn’t be trusted.

  I met Ash’s steady gaze: he knew Devil was attempting to worm his way back to me. Devil fed off desires and darkness, twisting them. I was enough of a monster already without the trident playing the One Ring temptation card. Yet when Ash had stood next to Lucifer as his Brigadier, Devil had been Ash’s weapon.

  Ash was a true soldier: he could control the darkness.

  Ash swung the trident away from me, shaking him for good measure, whilst he whined. “Sorry,” Ash didn’t look sorry, “dragons, lava, quake: surviving first, your weapon is bigger than my weapon showdown second.”

  I nodded. The poisoned rosewater cramped my stomach, blurring the world like I was underwater.

  But then, I’d already fought a battle under the ocean in Castle Drake. The Seraphim wanted to make this hard for me…? They had no idea what I’d already battled against.

  Screw them.

  When the dragons soared overhead in a flaming formation, Mischief grasped my hand, dragging me backwards, just as I surged forwards. We fell in a clanking tangle, hollering in unison at the jolt to our ankles.

  Nope, not missing the irony, when we couldn’t manage anything else in melodic harmony.

  “Together, you witless beast.” Mischief smacked his hand against the floor, then winced. “Or have you forgotten the purpose of this game?”

  I raised an eyebrow. “I thought I was your jewel?”

  “We shall all be nothing but ash if we don’t battle as one.”

  The dragons wheeled around, before tossing their heads; flares shot from their horns like rays from the sun. They snorted, soaring directly towards me.

  I froze, whilst Mischief’s wings wrapped around me, as if they could be any protection against the blazing nightmares.

  How much of this was Mischief desperate to show off his skills, just in case his dad was watching?

  The Fae Angel has a point, Violet-sweets.

  J…? Where the hell have you been…?

  You missed my fabulous self?

  My hands curled into fists to control my shaking. J had been in my head, even before I could understand words: a soothing presence, who’d explained the world to me when no one else had. Without J, I’d have been lost, abandoned amongst the humans, who I’d never understood: the freak.

  Yet I’d discovered since coming to this realm of the gods that J had never truly been mine. He was the seed of Jahael, making me the Emperor’s creation: a half angel, half vampire god. Jahael had seen everything that’d happened to me and had never stepped up to save me.

  Like the Seraphim at the games, he’d only watched my suffering.

  Was J anything more than a spy, no matter that I’d loved him?

  I hate you, J…for not telling me who you are. You get that, yeah?

  Silence.

  Even with the heat of the dragons and Mischief’s trembling wings around me, I felt the silence more intensely than the world around me falling apart.

  Hate me but listen to me. I’m the only one who knows the truth of this realm and I’ll always love you.

  Then why the disappearing act?

  That asshole Emperor listens and watches through me. If I hide behind the walls that you built in your mind, then you’re safe.

  But he’s you—

  I’m his seed, but I’ve grown alongside you. I’m no one but my glittery parade of hotness self.

  Did you expect that I’d be anything but a rebel now?

  I couldn’t help the smile: J wasn’t merely Jahael. He was my rebel lover.

  Then help me.

  In this Arabian dream, your perky ass will only survive by remembering your bonds: The Silver Angel became yours when you saved his magic from the spell casters.

  Mischief thinks that we’re bonded…?

  That’s because you are, Violet-oblivious.

  Act the divine by seizing the power. Plus, you’re welcome: no more drug trip for you.

  I blinked, and the Pleasure Pavilion drew back into focus, as the pins and needles faded: J had drained the poison from me.

  The Bitch of Utopia was back.

  Magic itched beneath my fingertips. I glanced at Mischief, before touching our palms together. He jumped, as my silver called to his. I stepped backwards, weaving the gossamer strands of our magic and uniting it between us.

  I laughed, soaring on the thrill, as shivers cascaded through me at the sensation of our sparking magic joining; it quested, stroking down my wings. I spun the strands into spinning disks.

  Mischief grinned. “I’ve always wanted to take a dragon for a walk.”

  Screech.

  The dragons swooped towards us like scorching death, but Mischief and I st
epped forward, shoulder to shoulder, arcing the disks out into seven sparkling leashes. I could sense each of Mischief’s movements before he made them: the throbbing of his blood and the thrumming of his magic.

  J had been right: we were bonded.

  Exhilarated with the rush of Mischief’s magic, I hurled the leashes at the dragon brothers, even as the heat of their flames seared my cheeks.

  I screamed as I was yanked off my feet in the wake of the dragons, dragged behind the leashes. Mischief held tight around my waist, however, flapping his wings and steering the dragons around.

  Hell, Mischief was taking them for a walk.

  I’d tamed the dragons, just like I’d known that I could. I hadn’t killed for the sport of the invisible Seraphim.

  That’s how we take them down, Hackney style.

  Mischief landed the dragons behind Ash and Lucifer, who turned with widened eyes, as the dragons huffed one final defiant breath, before crouching down on their front legs.

  They were bastard kneeling…

  I vibrated, burning with a god-like power. Was this why Seraphim played these games to experience such thrills?

  Mischief pressed the leashes into my hand, before kissing my knuckles. He sparked with dark splendor. “You may be rash, thoughtless, and domineering…”

  “You’re now into negative brownie points…”

  “But you’re also a miracle.” He scrutinized me in wonder at our new intimacy, whilst our silver tingled across each other for a final time, before mine snapped away from his and back inside.

  I was cold at the loss: I needed Mischief closer again. “Miracles are a con.”

  “But you, Dragon God, are not.”

  I jolted. Dragon God? The ancient powers inside me stirred, warming at the name.

  Ash pointed Devil at the kneeling dragons. “You win: your weapon is definitely bigger than mine.”

  Devil whined.

  “Yay for you: you’re quite the little dragon whisperer. What other talents are you hiding, missy?” Lucifer pouted. How painful was it to see my strength, after his own had been taken from him? “There still needs to be winners and losers, or you won’t escape here. So, control those creatures and burn me already.”