A Third of the Moon and the Stars Struck

by Jade Brieanne

George deflated. He remembered Azrael showing up at his doorstep, Pythia Del in tow, defeated and angry. At the time George still harbored his own anger, his own resentment and welcomed Azrael’s, listening to his stories of what transpired in Caeli after he left.

  “The world is complicated, Azrael. Don’t you think I understand that Caeli can’t smell its own shit? That they think they are perfect when they are so unbearably flawed? Don’t you think I still feel the pain of my own son’s death?”

  Lucan's eyes flashed, red bleeding into them. “YET YOU FIGHT WITH THEM! AGAINST ME! YOUR OWN BLOOD,” he screamed, savagely beating his chest with a fist. He shoved Imane away from him and back into Pythia Del’s arms. “Enough talking,” he seethed. “You either fight me or I’ll make sure you never see her again.”

  George’s mind raced back and forth.

  You can’t lose Imane, she is your daughter. Fight!

  Don’t! Lucan is your grandson. He shares your blood. You cannot be the reason he gets to start his war!.

  Caeli betrayed you! Abandoned you! She is your family now!

  He is Azeal’s son! Your only reminder of him! Are you going to forget them for these people?

  Without them, you would have never learned personal salvation. Honor! Power! You feel power when you help people. Like you helped Imane, like you helped Zicon.

  I can’t put the people of Caeli through another war.

  “What am I supposed to do, Ayesha?” he prayed, thinking of his deceased mate.

  “Go, George.”

  The former leader of the Fallen turned and faced the source of the soft encouragement. It came from his friend, Hugo.

  “You’re on the same side of the treaty as Azrael. You’re not responsible for upholding it. We are. Go get your daughter.”

  They shifted and regrouped, their weapons at their side and their eyes locked on the other members of The Eleven.

  Resigned but determined, George pulled his newsboy out of his back pocket, slipped off his suit jacket and placed it on a pew, taking care not to wrinkle it. Without looking at anyone in particular, “Someone put a barrier up around Father Gutierrez’s.” Then he took off.

  Lucan stormed down the center aisle and George met him halfway.

  Lucan may have looked like Shemhazi but he fought like Aria, using his speed to deliver a flurry of punches and kicks meant to confuse his opponents, often moving quicker than they could defend and recovering faster than their attempts to launch an offensive. His punches hurt, too, striking George in vulnerable places such as pressure points along the small of his back and across his ribs and soft places such as his throat.

  It didn’t mean George was without his own brand of punishment. Where Lucan was fast and lethal, making him stagger back and defend himself, George was strong and perceptive. Lucan’s punches hurt but George’s blocks hurt as much, and his grappling ability allowed him to exert half the energy of Lucan’s crazed mechanisms.

  “I see you aren’t rusty for an old man who hasn’t done shit in an eon,” Lucan said as he maneuvered away from George’s standing leg sweep.

  “Shut your mouth and fight, boy.”

  Lucan attacked again, grabbing George by the shoulders and throwing his knees into his midsection. George let the hit land because it gave him leverage to grab his grandson around his waist. He twisted him around before he could recover, hauled him up and over his shoulder before falling back and slamming him into the hard marble floor.

  Some members of Lucan’s Eleven gasped as Lucan’s body lay on the floor in a heap. George stood and looked at him and Lucan returned the look, his eyes troubled, but resolved. George held his hand out to his grandson. “Get up, Azrael,” he said, his voice rough. “Don’t let your people see you down for long, son.”

  Lucan slapped his hand away. “I stand up on my own two,” he growled. “That’s one thing Dad taught…” he cut himself off. He winced as he rubbed his back. “I lost,” he admitted hoarsely. “Take your daughter.”

  George reached for her and Imane dashed across the berth between the two groups, running until she was safely behind her father.

  “Where’s Zicon,” she asked, damn near screamed, when Sissy patiently removed the gag in her mouth. “They grabbed me just as we were getting home from Pennsylvania. I haven’t seen him since.”

  Lucan shrugged. “Beats me. We didn’t hurt him.” He grinned. “Maybe you should try calling him.” Lucan handed her his phone. “Go on. Call him.”

  Imane looked at Lucan warily before glancing at her father.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “Find out where he is.” He shifted his attention back to Lucan. “Go home and think about why you’re really doing this. It isn’t to honor your mother, it isn’t to honor your father. It isn’t revenge on Aria and Yeong. Search deep. Find it.”

  Lucan glared. “Your time for giving me life lessons is over, Gramps, but this,” he said, motioning between the two of them, “isn’t.”

  “You’re nothing but talk. You couldn’t even beat me, what makes you think you can–” George was cut off by a loud gasp coming from his daughter. He turned to her only to see her eyes wide and her mouth hanging open.

  “You…beat him up?” Imane cried, her tone accusatory and disbelieving.

  Lucan shook his head. “No, angels don’t hurt humans. Shen on the other hand…”

  George saw Key and Jon’s head pop up at the mention of the name. “What about Shen,” Key asked, his brows dipped.

  “Only that after he paid Zicon a visit, he planned on paying another old friend a visit.”

  Imane gasped again and pushed the phone into George’s hands. “Jin Amaris? He said…Shen’s headed to Jin Amaris’s apartment?”

  Lucan’s laugh began quietly, capturing everyone’s attention until it crescendoed into rich echoing laughter. “Oh,” he said, holding his sides, “did you think you could keep her a secret from me? Have you ever been ever been able to? I’ll admit, Fox outwitted me, ruined my plans to keep my mother from being reborn but she still serves a purpose. Shen’s desire to kill her is the key to our success and…” Lucan paused to glance at George but his glare landed on Key and Jon. “There is nothing you can do to stop it.”

  Key jammed his finger into his wrist comm, frantically trying to get a hold of his subordinates. “There’s no answer,” he discovered, shocked. “We have to go. Now! She’s too weak to fight and Aiden has never been able to win against Shen.”

  “Let’s make room for you then,” Hugo said as he came to stand at George’s side.

  George nodded in response and rolled the sleeves of his shirt up. “Shamain Path, 2nd disciple,” he whispered, feeling the power begin to sing in his blood. It made him smile. “I command–”

  The sound of a bullet entering a chamber made his smile vanish. George twisted towards the sound and saw the muzzle flash, giving him just enough time to try and contort his body out of the bullet’s path. Sheeda. He wasn’t fast enough. The bullet grazed his neck and he grunted out in pain.

  He heard Pythia Del’s horror-filled scream and Lucan’s shout of dismay but neither of their leaders could stop the all-out frenzy that broke out. The LMs were the first to answer the call, followed in tandem by Cobra. Hugo looked on as the remnants of the treaty fell at their feet. George understood his hesitation.

  We are officially at war with The Eleven.

  Chance skid to a stop behind him and began dragging him out of the line of fire. He tried to drag him past the golden twin gates that led to the altar but George stopped him. “Not the sanctuary. Never the sanctuary.” Chance eyes jutted left and right. He pointed towards a small set of pews and dragged him over to them, ducking the bullets flying over his head. Chance laid him between the rows and yanked his pistol, a big shiny…thing, out of his holsters and began to guard over George.

  Imane, having followed them, hovered over him. “Dad!” she screamed, her face lined with worry, her hands pressing over his injury to try and stop the bleeding.


  George shook her concern away. “It’s just a flesh wounded,” he said, removing her hand and covering it with his own. He tried to sit up, but a heavy wave of dizziness hit him. “Oh,” he groaned before laying back down.

  He tried again, and again, and again to sit up until a burning feeling in his veins made him stop.

  George pulled his hand away and saw a blackish-gold residue mixed with blood glistening on his hands. Was the bullet tainted? Qeres?

  The top of the pew they were hiding behind exploded as a bullet ripped through it. Imane screamed and covered her head. “What’s,” he tried through labored breathing, “What’s happening, Chance?”

  The LM looked up, his gun trained towards the center of the church. “It’s a goddamn shootout!”

  “We have to get out of here,” George choked. “The bullets…they might be poisoned.” He showed Chance his hand. “Has anyone on our side been hit?”

  Chance shook his head. “No, everyone has receded back near the 50th street exit. The Eleven all amassed in the center aisle.”

  George nodded. If they could make it over to the other doors, they could exit. His plan, however, was interrupted when a blinding white light filtered through the windows and filled almost every corner of the church. Chance ducked below the pew to hide from it but stumbled back when the earth shook up under them. George grabbed Imane with one arm and wrapped another around the legs of a pew. The sound of glass breaking, stone falling to the ground and shrieks of surprise were only slightly louder than the grumbling sounds of the earthquake.

  While their group was surprised and taken off guard, it seemed The Eleven wasn’t. “That’s our cue! It’s happening!” Pythia Del yelled from the door. “Fall back!”

  George tried to blink through both his foggy vision and the incredibly bright light but the only thing he could hear were the sound of boots squeaking across the marble floors. By the time the light receded, The Eleven were gone. He closed his eyes and heaved a deep loud sigh.

  Hugo sprang into action. “Sissy, Chance, Marcus, and Spencer, follow them! Jerome, help me with George. Keane, go with Key. Report the moment you get there.” There was a collection of affirmations before the group split.

  Moments later, George felt another familiar essence hover over him. Hugo bent down and placed a hand against his head. “You are getting old. A bullet grazes you and you’re over here dying,” Hugo joked.

  “I might be?” George chuckled, opening his eyes. “I think the bullets are poisoned.” He showed him his hands just as he’d shown Chance.

  “Qeres?” That took the joke out of Hugo’s voice. George blinked and he knew Hugo could see the purple coloring his dark eyes.

  “I think it’s that super shit they came up with. I feel feverish.”

  “Then we need to get you out of here. There is only one place down here to get Qeres treatment. When’s the last time you visited Dr. Timoko?”

  George groaned and his head thudded against the floor.

  Jerome chuckled beside Hugo. “Stay alive, old man. I still have to show you how improved my cooking has gotten.”

  George could only laugh.

  CHAPTER

  ONE HUNDRED FOUR

  Spring Street

  Fifteen minutes ago…

  “Now, you have to roll a seven or eleven,” Rooke explained patiently. Tahir shook the dice in her hands. “And what if I don’t?”

  “It’s according to what you roll. A two or a three or twelve? You lose.”

  “Okay,” she said, trying to get the hang of it. “And if I roll something other than that?”

  “It officially becomes ‘the point.’ If that happens, then we have to see if you roll ‘the point’ before you roll a seven.” Rooke squatted back on a brick wall. “Okay, try again.”

  Tahir huffed. To pass time, they were playing a game Rooke called “Craps” outside of the small grocery mart that occupied the bottom floor of Aiden and Jin’s apartment. She was hoping she would receive a call soon that would tell them what was happening next. It would help if she could get a grip on what was happening.

  They’d actually brought Jin Amaris back from Discord. No one had ever done that. No one had ever attempted it because Discord greedily claimed ownership of souls that entered its realm. No one is sent to Discord on accident. Yet they had done it. Jin was upstairs, on this realm.

  Things were going to change and they were going to change in a major way. Tahir just didn’t know how.

  “Are you paying attention to me?”

  Tahir looked down and Rooke was glaring at her. “I’m trying to give you street cred and you’re wandering off into space.”

  She rolled her eyes. “It would take a lot more than a game of dice to give either of us street cred. I don’t think it’s possible for us to ever have street cred.” She dropped the dice and waited to see what number would roll, anyways. A two.

  “Snake eyes!” Rooke yelled as he scooped up the dice.

  “How do you even know how to play this?”

  “Remember, I’m a man of many identities. You may not be able to get street cred, but I got it already.”

  Tahir was busy looking at him like he was crazy when she heard a noise above them. Tahir looked up through the grating of the fire escape.

  “It’s a human,” Rooke whispered, squinting up in the same direction as her. “Did you hear a window open?”

  “No,” Rooke confirmed. “We both would have heard that.” Training kicked in and his hand dropped to his gun as Tahir began taking steps away from the store so she could get a better view. A face peeked over the railing, followed by another, both blinking down at them, their eyes wide.

  “RUN!” a woman screamed from across the street before she turned on her heels and began sprinting away from them.

  “Shit,” Tahir cursed. “You want the runner or the stairs?”

  Rooke sighed. “Stairs.” Without waiting for any further instructions, Rooke jumped hard and high, grabbing the bottom rung of the fire escape ladder, riding it up as it fell. His sneakers smacked against the metal grating as he raced up each level. Tahir watched him for a moment before she turned and began chasing after the woman.

  It didn’t take her long to catch up–the woman was trained but she wasn’t as trained as Tahir was. Plus, she was human, one hundred percent human. There was no way she was outrunning her.

  Besides the fact that Tahir could use vibrations in the grounds like a homing beacon, it wouldn’t have been hard to find her even if she had outrun her. Don’t they know that rebel outfit crap stands out?

  The woman scrambled up a fence surrounding a basketball court, halfway obscured by the trees lining the street. Tahir hopped it in one step and landed right behind her. Rolling her eyes, she extended her leg out and watched as the woman tripped over her foot, then her own feet as she crashed across the multicolored concrete.

  Tahir stood over her with her hands on her hips. “A couple of things,” she said. “One, you run like a chicken with your head cut off. Straight lines if you’re evading and are sure no one is going to shoot you. Save your energy and get further. Simple damn physics. Two, since you obviously know who we are, you know we weren’t going to shoot you.”

  “What?” the woman gasped, out of breath and having a hard time catching it.

  Tahir waved her hand dismissively, annoyed she had to chase the woman to begin with. “Who sent you? Why are you messing in our affairs? And I suggest you don’t lie.”

  “I’m not telling you shit!”

  Tahir sighed. “That’s a lie because you are going to tell me.” She placed a firm hand on the woman’s arm. “Look, I’m not going to kill you. I can hurt you a little but I’d rather not.”

  “I…” The woman lashed out and struck Tahir across the chin and Tahir staggered back more in shock than pain. The woman tried to take off again, but Tahir grabbed her shoulder before she could get to her feet and slammed her back to the ground, hard.

  “That was a mistak
e,” she growled before she wrapped a hand around her neck. “Tell me before I make it really, really hard for you to breathe.”

  The woman remained silent.

  “Fine.” Dragging her back the apartment and hanging her upside down by her feet and stuffing her in a closet was a good alternative to her talking for the moment. She began to lift the woman off the ground when her comm started to buzz. Tahir pressed the button and held it to her mouth. “Rooke, I got her. How are you–”

  “Tahir! It’s a diversion!”

  Tahir frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “They wanted us away from Jin! Shen’s inside the apartment now! It was a diversion! They tricked us!”

  Tahir cursed, looking down at the woman, who stared up at her with something akin to smugness. Tahir made the decision easily, although she would probably regret leaving the woman behind. Angry, because she’d been tricked, she snarled in the woman’s face. “You better hope I never see you ever again.”

  She released the woman, turned and raced back to the apartments.

  CHAPTER

  ONE HUNDRED FIVE

  “We might have to get takeout,” Aiden grimaced as he searched their old cabinets. “Predictably there is not an ounce of edible food.”

  Jin laid stretched across the bed like a cat, exhausted because Aiden had made it his mission to exhaust her, her shirt pulled up over her stomach, staring at it. It was her body. It looked just like her body. The scar from her appendectomy was there. She looked at her knee. The scar from when she fell over a hurdle at a track meet was there, the one that cost her a shot at regionals. Jin fingered right below her sternum. It was missing–the scar that would have been caused by Ahn’s sword. That’s the only thing that reminded her that everything Aiden had patiently explained to her was true. This was her body, but it wasn’t.