by Lizzy Ford
Nathan assessed the area. No bloody footprints led to the door or were present in the hallway. Which likely meant Eddy and Kaylee hadn’t left this room.
Nathan looked up at the exposed metal beams and ducts of the ceiling. The dust hadn’t been disturbed in quite some time, and no blood was visible.
“They went down,” he murmured and squatted near the point where Eddy’s blood trail went cold.
The cement was solid and smooth beneath his palm. It didn’t seem possible that there was a trap door present. The cement had been poured in a single slab; there were no seams at all in this room.
How did anyone leave this room, if not through the only door?
Nathan examined the walls and corners without finding any other explanation of what had happened. He couldn’t figure out how, but he knew this locker was the key. If there were tunnels or sub-basements, the blueprints Zyra obtained would show them.
Unless the Satanists created them after the warehouse was built and its blueprints filed with the county. After seeing the luxurious bunker they raided two nights before, Nathan didn’t put it past the Satanist crew to create an elaborate tunnel system beneath this building. This was one of many backup sites; had they put as much effort into this location as they did their headquarters?
The vacant storage area revealed none of its secrets. It was rare when he was vexed by something, even rarer when desperation crept into him.
He stood and went to the door.
“What’re you doing here?” Henry’s terse voice came from the hallway.
“Trying to figure out what happened after I blacked out,” Nathan replied casually.
“We’ve been over every inch of every locker in this hallway. You think you can find something the rest of us missed?”
Nathan faced the resentful spirit guide and smiled. “Yeah. I’m that good, Henry.” Without waiting for a response, he struck off down the hall to find his dinner.
“I know you’re up to something. I’m going to prove it!” Henry called after him.
“You think you’re the first person Zyra has fucked and left hanging?” Nathan replied, unfazed. “Welcome to the party, Henry.”
Henry muttered what Nathan assumed were probably curses. Satisfied to get a rise out of the clingy second in command, he continued through the hallways.
The locker, and Kaylee’s disappearance, tickled his instincts, left him with the feeling he was missing something important. Or perhaps, he was feeling her presence in that space. He didn’t know if a soul mate could feel another, after her lingering energy had had the time to disperse. His gut told him Kaylee hadn’t left the building, and the secret to her location had something to do with that locker.
One of the 3G members motioned him over as he entered the operations center they’d set up near the main entrance. “You definitely live up to your reputation.”
“Of being a cocky bastard?” Nathan asked with a smile.
“Killing.”
Nathan kept his smile in place. He hadn’t expected to be known as a killer, unless their information came from Zyra, who had known him in a different time. He hadn’t murdered as many people in the past three millennia as he did a two-year stretch fighting for Rome.
He killed when necessary, when angels or humans were cornered by demons. When Pedro’s secret entrance to the Other Side was compromised. When he needed to convince Zyra of his loyalty.
“You took out how many with your hands?” another guide he recognized as Ricky asked, joining the two of them. Ricky handed Nathan an MRE.
“We’re really eating this shit?” Nathan asked with a scowl.
“It’s not like we have funding from the Other Side,” Ricky replied with a grin. “These aren’t so bad.”
“No, they’re terrible,” Nathan said before tearing open the plastic bag. He needed food to heal, and he was starving after a day of obeying Zyra’s every order and whim. “The answer to your question is five.”
Ricky glanced at the other guide in appraisal. “You’re the oldest spirit guide in the corps, aren’t you?”
“Third oldest. My mentor is still alive, and Zyra is second oldest,” Nathan responded.
“I’m Vic, by the way,” the first guide told him. “You need no introduction.”
Nathan didn’t doubt everyone knew his name, if not his face. He didn’t bother to learn the names of the newbies after the first thousand years in the corps. Most newbies fell out within a few hundred years, usually because they were worn down by the often soul-crushing duty. He understood how 3G had gained traction rapidly among the disenchanted guides who felt powerless to stop evil when forced to follow Pedro’s restrictive rules.
When Zyra left Nathan thousands of years ago, he had also learned never to drop his guard and never to allow his emotions to compromise him again. He’d been successful, until Kaylee. He told himself the attraction to Kaylee was as much from divine intervention as his own emotions.
Not that it mattered. She had pierced the walls he built around his heart in a matter of seconds.
The three of them ate in silence. Ricky passed him a canteen.
Aware of Henry’s glare on him anytime they were in the same room, Nathan glanced discreetly towards Zyra’s right hand.
“He’s a lovesick fool,” he said and shook his head. “I almost pity him. It’ll end badly for him.”
“The rest of us already knew not to sleep with the person in charge,” Vic said quietly. “But Henry … he’s stupid and loyal.”
“And dangerous,” Ricky added. “If he doesn’t like someone, he’ll tell Zyra and she’ll get rid of them in a heartbeat.”
Except me. “You guys are afraid of him?” Nathan asked curiously.
“Not him. Her,” Vic answered. “This crusade is personal to her.”
Nathan hadn’t considered why Zyra was driven to shun the spirit guide corps and angels. He had assumed it was the 3G doctrine of preventing or combating evil. His interest piqued. What other reason did Zyra have for breaking away from the corps?
“She tried to revive the archdemon’s host,” Ricky whispered.
“She shot me to get to the host,” Nathan replied. “But why?”
“None of us know. No one expected it,” Ricky answered. “She failed. The Satanists grabbed the host before she could do anything else. Trust us. She surprised all of us with that move.”
Nathan finished his meal. The dread he’d experienced since submitting himself to the mercy of his ex was transforming into full on doom.
Zyra claimed she wanted Kaylee dead. If true, she wouldn’t have tried to revive the host after Nathan murdered her. Wouldn’t keeping Kaylee alive go against everything 3G stood for?
“Interesting,” Nathan said, unable to explain what Zyra was doing. He hadn’t expected this assignment to be anything but black and white. He was wading deeper into a mystery instead.
“Nathan,” Henry called from the opposite side of the large locker. “Your turn cleaning up the bodies.”
“My pleasure,” Nathan replied smoothly, suspecting the second in command was trying to punish or provoke him. “Where do I start?”
Henry scowled. “Wherever you see bodies,” he snapped.
“Sounds great.” Nathan stood and left the room. Henry didn’t know it, but he was doing Nathan a favor. Unsupervised, he would have more time to figure out how Kaylee and Eddy had disappeared.
Nathan began the gruesome duty of dragging or carrying dead Satanists out of the bunker to an existing pile of corpses located outside, near the main entrance. He paused after depositing the first body.
3G had no respect for the dead. He disagreed with this position as well. Bodies were vehicles for souls, and they deserved to be treated as if they had protected and hosted the lives they did. Respect for the deceased was one of the few rules Nathan had followed.
But that wasn’t his fight this day. When this was over, he’d have some explaining to do to Pedro.
Turning his back on th
e dead, Nathan returned to the bunker and began searching for more.
His gruesome duty was completed before dawn. A few 3G members were awake and patrolling the forest around the compound while the remainder of Zyra’s followers slept.
Nathan checked in on Zyra, who slumbered deeply. He changed clothes and returned to the room where he had last seen Kaylee.
“I know you’re here,” he whispered and knelt in the doorway.
He closed his eyes and drew off the energy of the Other Side, evaluating the locker with senses humans didn’t possess. The strongest of the guides, he often saw what other guides could not.
The image in his head was one of energy rather than form – shifting smoke of different colors highlighting the different energies in the space. The most activity came from the corner where Eddy’s blood trail disappeared. It wasn’t just the energy of the room and those who had been present within the last twelve hours. Something more was present. Something … different. He recognized the dark taint of Shadowman and the flicker of Kaylee’s energy hovering in the corner.
The third energy was dark, faint and elusive.
Nathan opened his eyes and went to the space again. Until that moment, he hadn’t considered the idea Eddy had the ability to tap into the kind of energy needed to mask a hiding place from everyone, including the guides searching the bunker.
If he had that kind of power, Eddy couldn’t have been an incarnated second gen angel, as Maggy had claimed. Nor was he human. His energy was unlike anything Nathan had crossed in all his time. Eddy wasn’t an angel, demon, or human. He definitely wasn’t an incarnated angel. It was possible he was an incarnated demon, one who had taken form in a similar fashion to incarnated angels. Nathan couldn’t recall the last time he’d heard of anyone running across an incarnated demon, though. Possessed human? It happened all the time. It was the easy route for a demon to become corporeal instead of energy.
Not for the first time since joining 3G, Nathan had the urge to track down Pedro for some real answers.
Later, he promised himself. Nothing could interfere with his current mission: finding Kaylee.
Footfalls came from down the hallway outside the locker. Nathan shifted away from the corner and went to the door, pressing his back to the side. If anyone witnessed him returning to this spot over and over, he’d inadvertently alert Henry or Zyra to something he didn’t want them to know.
He waited until the footsteps passed and faded before leaving the locker. He did one more sweep of the bunker for bodies before returning to the operations center.
He’d have to wait until the others were gone or sleeping to test the theory forming in his mind.
NINE
SHANTI OPENED the car door and climbed out. She let her senses assess her surroundings. A few seconds later, she nodded in satisfaction.
Close enough, she thought. The stone’s pull was stronger. Both it and her former guide had wanted her to travel in this direction. Julie had told her to head to DC and find the conclave of spirit guides gathered there, if anything happened to her.
Shanti had a phone number for the spirit guides in DC, but her plan was not the one Julie intended. She was going to find the other gatekeepers. The three of them had a better chance of surviving if they were all together. Perhaps, one of the other key holders would understand what was going on. The events predicted at Creation had unfolded, but the knowledge of what exactly was supposed to happen, and when, had long since been lost.
“We’re here. Do I get the handcuff key now?” Todd asked from his position inside the car. “I haven’t peed in hours.”
Shanti would never accuse her companion of being pleasant, but she didn’t want him pissing himself either, even if it meant he ran off when she freed him.
“There’s a gas station on the corner,” she said and pointed.
“How … never mind. Just give me the damn key.”
Shanti tossed it to him.
Todd moved quickly, freeing himself. He slammed the car door and jogged across the street.
“Stay put, bitch!” he shouted as he left.
Shanti leaned back against the car. She needed to be on the north side of DC but hadn’t been willing to reveal her exact destination to someone whose interests ran counter to hers. She couldn’t trust him with any information, even how she knew to go where she was headed. He had brought her this far north but sooner or later, he was going to turn on her. Shanti had no doubt about his loyalty being elsewhere.
She needed a new ride.
She’d stolen all the cash from Todd’s wallet. Apparently, being a Satanist didn’t pay well, because she’d felt the security strips running down two of the bills – probably twenties – and none on the other five bills. Todd seemed like the kind who went to stripper bars with handfuls of one-dollar bills, not someone who could afford to tip tens and fives. It was safe to assume she had forty-five dollars to her name, maybe more, if any of the other bills was a five or ten instead of a one.
She could always play up her disability and take advantage of human kindness to catch a ride north, but she hated doing that. Hated being pitied. Hated playing the damsel in distress when she was the mistress of her fate.
That’s pride. It’s a sin, she reminded herself. She had to do whatever it took to reach her destination and achieve her goal, even if she didn’t like doing it.
The pre-dawn air was chilly and carried the scents of the Potomac, rubber, pollution, sewage, fresh cement, and gasoline. Todd had brought her to the southeastern side of DC where area gentrification attempts had recently run out of funding and been all-but-abandoned for the local gangs and criminals to take over. She had heard about the budget cuts on the news. Judging from the lack of traffic, he’d stopped off the main road. He was probably from a place like this, but she wasn’t. Worse, on the surface, she was a little more vulnerable than the meathead. She could handle herself, but not if she ran across an entire gang or people with guns.
A fifth gen, Shanti tried hard not to pass judgment on others. It became more difficult with each generation, as she became less angelic, more human. But she couldn’t help drawing the conclusion Todd was a total dick for stopping in a part of town where a blind woman in her early twenties definitely drew attention to herself.
She scanned the street around her for the telltale signs of energy belonging to humans. A thatch of trees was off to her right. Anything living, including trees and animals, emitted an energy signature. Her greatest challenge when it came to parks was determining what was a tree and what was a human.
At the moment, five signatures moved towards her. Since trees didn’t generally walk, she shifted her weight and prepared to face the people headed directly towards her.
“What’s a pretty girl like you doing in this part of town alone?” said the first man to reach her.
Shanti cocked her head to the side, assessing. One, possibly more, held a gun, judging by the smell of oil. The fact she could smell gunpowder meant he’d fired it recently. These weren’t stupid teens playing the part of thugs; these were hardened criminals, probably gang members, given the location.
Shanti moved away from the vehicle to give herself room to move.
“Mind if we take your ride?” one asked sarcastically.
She snapped out her guide stick and faced them. Rather, she faced just to the left of them, wanting to convince them she was harmless.
One of them laughed. “What’s a blind bitch doing with a car?”
“Obviously not driving,” she replied.
“You got company?”
She shook her head.
“How did you get here?”
Shanti didn’t answer.
“Grab her purse,” one of them ordered. “Cooperate and we might let you live.”
Shanti’s grip tightened on the satchel she carried. The stones were inside. After a split second of rapid thought, she pretended to trip and dropped the bag a few feet from her. The thug coming for her belongings went for th
e bag rather than her.
She smashed the guide stick into his throat. He gasped and dropped to his knees. Without waiting for him to recover, Shanti kicked him in the side of the head then smashed the metal guide stick across his nose.
Adrenaline bolted through her. She had participated in simulated attacks but never fought off anyone before Todd.
The others began to react. One grabbed her arm and punched her. Shanti fell, senses scrambled. She managed to avoid a kick, rolled until her back hit the car tire, and smashed her heel into the knee of one thug. He cursed and stumbled away. She lashed out again and missed hitting anyone, tilted her head to listen, and saw the energy of the third attacker too late to react. She covered her face with her arms, the way she’d been taught by her boxing instructor. The thug was slow. After the first blow, she caught his foot, twisted, and smashed her heel into his shin.
“Shoot the blind bitch!” one of them shouted.
Bounding to her feet, she heard the cocking of the gun, dropped and whirled, catching the potential shooter behind the ankle and sweeping his feet from beneath him.
Another of them pressed the cold muzzle of a weapon into the back of her skull.
Shanti went perfectly still. Without guns, she stood a chance. With them … no one was fast enough to outrun a bullet.
The man behind her kicked her in the knees. She dropped and knelt. The muzzle remained pressed to the back of her skull.
“That’s some Daredevil shit,” one of the thugs muttered, his voice edged in pain.
“Grab her purse and the car,” their leader ordered. “I’ll finish this.”
Shanti cursed herself for not being more on her game, for recovering too slowly from the blow that muddled her senses. She read the energy of those around her with ease, but energy couldn’t always tell her what they were doing. Her senses filled in the blanks, which made them often more important than knowing where someone was located.
She waited for the bullet that would end her life. Her last thoughts were of the stones and how – ironically – they were probably safer with a bunch of thugs who had no idea what they were than they’d ever be with her, since she was being actively hunted.