Fire

by Angelina J. Steffort

  My palm found its way up toward her chest without conscious directions. She was there, within reach, light ripe, ready to be harvested, ready to feed on.

  “Goodbye, Claire.” I heard my own voice like from a distance, drifting into a frenzy, and this time I had no intention of stopping myself.

  Just as I was searching for the strings on her soul, a scream, followed by an attack, stopped me.

  “NO!” The annoying guardian angel had his hands around my neck, attempting to wrestle me to the ground, or at least out of Claire’s reach.

  And he was strong. Now I understood what the others had meant with how dangerous angels were. Despite my extra energy, I didn’t have the strength to free myself. I hadn’t unleashed it yet, but I felt how my body was slowly nagging away at it as I kept fighting the angel’s hold.

  “Let go of him, angel, or I will kill you,” Volpert called, giving me hope. If nobody helped me, I’d die today—again.

  “No,” a pleading voice came from beside me. “Please, don’t... Don’t kill him.” Claire was in a panic, and as I managed to turn my head, I saw that her eyes were holding concern for both her pet-angel and me. I saw it, but I didn’t understand it.

  “Let him go, Jaden. He won’t hurt me,” she tried again, directing her order at the angel this time. However, what on Earth made her think I wouldn’t hurt her, was a mystery to me. That was exactly the reason I was here. To kill her, and worse, to hurt her in the process. Revenge had to be enjoyable or it wasn’t revenge. Her soul was still shining brightly, giving me doubts if I would be able to let her go slowly rather than just devour her energy in one large pull and be done with it.

  Jaden snorted behind me, tightening his iron grip. “He will suck your soul out.”

  He was right to accuse me because I was going to suck her soul out. One way or another.

  “He won’t.”

  Was the girl still arguing in my favor? What was wrong with her? Apparently, her guardian angel was asking himself the same question, for he was so absorbed by her stubborn wish to die that he didn’t notice how Volpert snuck up on him and loosened his grasp with a short, silver flash in his back before he pulled the angel into his own grip.

  I stumbled away and straightened up, recovering from the poison the abomination of light was.

  “How can you be so naive?” the angel complained, now he was struggling in Volpert’s arms.

  How right he was. Had I thought one moment ago the girl was intriguing? Her uninspired trust in me was sheer annoying. Who did she think I was? I wouldn’t stop for a plea. I was a demon. A weapon.

  While I was still convincing myself I was going to achieve my goal here between the cold graves, Volpert had started his own negotiations with the angel.

  “You know, first I wanted to kill you, but now I’m pretty sure I want to see you suffer a little before you die, and the best way to ensure your suffering, is making her suffer—” He lifted his chin at the girl whose unjustified hope was slowly crumbling at his icy voice. “—to let her die slowly, painfully. How many of your fosterlings have you lost by now?”

  As the demon ran his fingers over the angel's golden hair, the girl almost jumped at him, screaming. I could sense her fury, her wish to pounce at Volpert and tear his fingers off her pet-angel’s hair. I chuckled, thoroughly amused. Nothing she could say or do could change what was going to happen to her.

  “Such an unlucky guardian you are—never been able to protect the ones you should. One more or less won’t matter, will it?” The way Volpert was talking to the angel let me guess their history together was longer than this short instant here in the graveyard.

  Over the angel’s shoulder, he pierced the girl with his gaze, holding her in place. She was doomed, and she knew it.

  “Go ahead, son,” Volpert said to me and pulled the angel a safe distance away. He was going to make him watch how I destroyed his fosterling. Oh, the sweet irony.

  My hand found its way back toward the girl’s chest. It hovered there for a second or two as I waited for her panic to peak. Beyond all that terror in her eyes, the fear, the instinct to flee, or some reason which didn’t reveal itself to me, she kept looking at me as if she was expecting me to have a chat with her. I couldn’t have that. A demon didn’t show mercy or hesitate. Never.

  With a slow movement of my finger, I dug into her soul, pulling the strings toward me. Her light, her delicious light was mine, and there was nothing she could do to stop me.

  “Adam—” Her voice sounded exactly the same as in my vision—my dreams.

  Was she trying to change my mind? She sure didn’t understand who she was dealing with. I tightened my hold on her soul, pulling the strings slowly.

  “It’s me—Claire.”

  As if her name would change anything about what she’d done, who she was. The fault was in her blood, a sin she’d inherited. With a sneer, I felt how her soul had begun to detach itself. It would be only a matter of time—a very, very painful time for her. She moaned and groaned, writhing in pain, but my demon heart, cold as stone, didn’t melt at her torment, it found pleasure.

  “Adam,” she pleaded, toneless. “Adam—you’re hurting me.”

  Volpert laughed at the spectacle, obviously enjoying this moment even more than I was. I ripped on the strings, fueled by his bloodlust, and the girl’s light dimmed second by second. It was a delightful sensation, and with every little bit I sucked out of her, my hunger for more intensified. The girl—Claire—screamed, a piercing sound I easily ignored over the thrill of devouring her light.

  “Adam.” This time the angel addressed me, probably trying one more time to save her. “Do you remember, you were good once. You had wings—strong, white wings, just like me.”

  What was he saying? I hadn’t listened at first, but he knew something about my past. Had he just said wings? White wings?

  “Don’t listen to him, Adam,” Volpert negated the angel’s words. I refocused on the girl instantly, and I flicked my finger to accelerate the transfer of the girl’s soul, suddenly anxious I wouldn’t finish what I’d started.

  “Adam, listen to me—” As if he’d read my mind, the angel built on my moment of doubt. “There was a time before you became this dark creature.”

  Became this dark creature? Wasn’t this what I’d always been?

  “You loved a girl back then, remember?” the angel spoke as if he and I had all the time in the world, and there was nothing he’d rather do right now.

  For a brief second, I was tempted to listen to him, but I remembered something even more important. Something my own kind had taught me. That what he had just said was impossible.

  “I don’t know love,” I threw at him, not even bothering to smile as I mocked him with a dark chuckle.

  “Yes, you do.”

  Was the angel as stubborn as his fosterling? He probably had to be or he’d never stand a chance with her.

  “You loved a girl—”

  While I was still pulling on the strings in the girl’s body, she collapsed. The fun of inflicting pain was over. Now it was just about the kill. Revenge for Volpert’s father, revenge for my own death.

  “—a beautiful girl.” The angel didn’t give up. “Her name was Claire.”

  Did he mean I’d loved the girl-monster? How could I?

  “You.... don’t h..have..... to t..take... my... soul—” A flash of emotion hit me as the monster…the girl looked up at me, tears in her eyes, weak, barely able to breathe. “—it has a..always... been... yours.”

  I froze. She had feelings for me? Did we have a past together? She had been responsible for my death. She had betrayed me, betrayed us all. An emotion so strong, I couldn’t even tell if that was what it was—an emotion—and not an attack, ran through my chest.

  And as the girl was closing her eyes, she said the words I’d been fearing to hear. “I love you, Adam—” And she went silent.

  12

  Escape

  The sensation wasn’t at all fa
miliar, but it was strong, a force of nature. There was no escaping it, as she was about to take her last breath. She loved me…maybe not the me I was today, but someone I must have been in the past. And the feeling she was emitting, selflessly and innocently, it caught me completely off guard.

  My fingers weren’t strong enough to hold her strings anymore, instead, they gradually let go until I willingly gave them permission to release the girl. It was almost as if an echo of emotion was resonating inside my chest. Not my own feelings…demons didn’t feel such a thing as love.

  With slow steps, I carried myself toward her. The girl-monster, Claire, the victim of my demonic powers. The one who was responsible for my death, the one who deserved punishment for everything her family, her ancestors had inflicted on Volpert… I was split. Should I touch her? The power running through my body, springing from the symbol on my chest, pushed me to risk an encounter with the enemy. What was the worst that could happen? She was knocked out. Half-dead. And here I was, ready to snap her neck if needed.

  As I crouched down, reaching out my hand to touch her face, the girl moaned. The sound, mangled as it was, conjured relief in me.

  “What are you doing?” Volpert called for my attention. “You are supposed to kill her.” It was clear he was anything but happy about my decision to spare the girl.

  Just at that moment, when we were both distracted, the angel broke free from Volpert’s grasp and a flash of light flew through the air, aimed at my chest. I ducked to the side, dodging the attack. Rage was boiling in his glowing, golden eyes.

  “Abort,” Volpert commanded, and I was about to follow him toward the marble door, where the others had already slipped to safety, the angel came running at me, raising both his hands as he was preparing for the fatal blow.

  I wasn’t ready to die again. Not yet. Keeping one hand on the girl’s forehead, I raised the other, and with all the force I could find inside my demon body, I shot at him. Silver light erupted from my fingers and the pulsing energy under my skin, discharging from the scars on my chest, ran through my arm and hit the angel in a blinding strike.

  He was thrown through the air and eventually hit the cold ground a couple of feet away, behind the girl, where he lay motionless. And motionless was the girl, heartbeat weak, almost unnoticeable. Was it too late? Had I sentenced her to death? I knew it had been my task to kill her, execute her for her crimes against my clan, but for some reason, I didn’t have it in me anymore. The emotion I had felt had awakened something within me and now that she wasn’t looking at me with those grayish-blue eyes, speaking to me, saying my name, it was as if this new part of me was threatening to disappear again. Did I want it to? Would I be able to go back to the stone-cold demon I had been before?

  As I looked over my shoulder, verifying that the others had abandoned me, the girl coughed and I ignored Volpert’s disapproving glare as he gestured for me to follow.

  “Jaden?” she called to her angel.

  Why exactly was it bothering me that his name was the first she was speaking?

  She rolled to the side and blinked, face ashen and lips white. Honestly, she looked more dead than alive, but her stubborn heart kept beating, stuttering as she looked up at me, unseeing.

  “Jaden,” she whispered again, still blinking as if trying to see clearly.

  Her eyes, so deep with specs of gold in the center and an ocean of muddy waters around them, were gazing right at me. Her skin under my hand warmed up a bit as she stirred. Being so close reminded me of something, an echo of an emotion I had never felt…

  “No.” I didn’t like the feeling of disappointing her. She had been looking for her angel, but it was only me—demon Adam—who was hovering over her. Her executioner.

  Her eyes were focusing now, and recognition was there in them. There was no judgment behind the glazed blue. I wanted to speak to her, ask her questions, understand what had happened, but as my mouth opened, all the sound I got out was a low gust of air, probably inaudible to her, losing itself in the breeze.

  “Adam.” It wasn’t more than a breath, but it was my name. And it sounded like a melody coming from her lips.

  An emotion hit me, the same one as before, rolling off of her body, weaker than before, but it was there, a layer of comfort to me. Was that love? Was that what it felt like to value someone’s life above your own? As I realized just how strong her feelings for me were, doubt crept into the back of my mind once more. She would have sacrificed herself. Was this the profile of a monster? Of a person who would willingly send me to my death? Drawn by her strange pull on me, I bent down, examining her face more closely. The rosy color was returning to her lips, her light was glowing gently underneath her skin, like a subdued star, beautiful and pure. Her scent was like spring itself.

  “Claire.” As I said her name for the first time, it felt like a memory. Had I spoken it before? How many times? Had I yelled it in fury? Or murmured it in her ear in a whisper of affection?

  As I debated if it was even possible that I felt what I felt, an emotion I recognized hit me. It was desire, potent like Maureen’s when she’d attempted to seduce me, but different. It was a wave of clear water in a stream, rinsing the darkness from me for a brief moment. A moment long enough to allow myself a glimpse of what it might be like to respond to her emotion.

  At that exact moment, she looked away, eyes searching for something—or someone.

  “Jaden!” She screamed and rolled over, out of reach of my hand, panic returning to her system, leaving the brief moment we’d had to become a memory.

  She had spotted her guardian angel, still motionless, on the ground, and her emotions were in turmoil, torn. I could empathize—could demons do that?—I was as torn as she was. My debate was whether to stay or abandon her.

  Abandon it was. Without saying another word, I teleported back to the marble door, not at all ready to face Volpert’s wrath, and slipped into the darkness.

  Maureen’s eyes were the first thing I saw, then her hands grabbed me by the arm and towed me along into the tunnels.

  “Do you have a death wish?” she asked, her voice indicating both anger and concern. “You know he doesn’t like when people don’t play by his rules.”

  I was still too dazed to respond, so I simply let her drag me deeper into the cave network.

  “He said he didn’t care if the angel killed you after you took your hooks out of the girl’s soul. I mean, what were you thinking?” She stopped all of a sudden, letting go of my arm and blocking my path instead.

  We stared at each other for a moment before I realized this was my cue to say something.

  “I wasn’t thinking, I guess,” I realized.

  Maureen giggled nervously.

  “You realize he’s going to punish you, right?”

  As she said it, I knew it was true. I nodded. I would probably suffer the same pain the girl had. Volpert would take out all his frustration, his disappointment on me. Only I wasn’t sure if I deserved it. For the first time, I questioned the righteousness of Volpert’s case.

  “What am I going to do?” I wondered aloud. Going back to the others might just lead to the pain I really didn’t want to feel.

  Maureen tilted her head as if reminding me that she was still there.

  “Wait…why aren’t you with the others?”

  She pursed her lips, eyeing me with an accusing stare as if wanting to ask if I was really asking her that.

  “You abandoned the others?” I asked, incredulous.

  She bobbed her head, stress distorting her usually smooth features.

  “For me?”

  I wasn’t quite sure what had happened in the graveyard just a minute ago, but it had changed me. All of a sudden, I felt guilt.

  “I don’t want you to risk your position with Volpert just to help me,” I argued. “He isn’t upset with you. He doesn’t know yet that you left, does he?”

  She shook her head.

  “There's still time. You can go back and nobody will
notice you were gone.”

  “You really think I would abandon you?” She asked, her shaking voice proof of how upset she truly was.

  “You’re not the lost cause here; I am,” I argued. Why did I suddenly care what happened to her? Sure, she was family, but a demon didn’t have emotions like this. She had been the one to teach me that.

  “Not a chance in the world,” she shook her head at me, black hair moving over her shoulders. “Tell me what happened back there.”

  “The girl?” I tried to focus and understand, but there was simply no explanation.

  “Exactly.”

  “The angel said I’d been in love with her.” I knew what I’d heard, it just didn’t make any sense. The unfamiliar feeling—love. He had also said that there was a time when I’d been good, with wings… I didn’t repeat that part to Maureen. Either she’d heard it or not. I didn’t believe it either way. I didn’t even know what he’d meant with good? What was good?

  “Love,” Maureen sneered, “is something we don’t feel.”

  And still, there was something streaming toward me from her side. Affection? Admiration? Wasn’t the fact that she was here with me proof that demons did feel something besides rage, hate, and the urge to kill?

  “You can’t kill her,” she concluded.

  “I can,” I defended myself, “I will. I don’t know what happened to me. All of a sudden, I couldn’t…but it was just a moment of weakness…nothing to be worried about.”

  Maureen’s look suggested that worry was exactly what she was feeling.

  “I will kill her. I just need to do it,” I tried to convince myself, “and then I’ll return to Volpert and redeem myself. He won’t kill me if I fulfill my task. Even if it’s late, right?” I looked at her, hopeful.