by Slade, Jessa
“You could’ve stayed with me,” Jackson said.
She grimaced. She hadn’t moved in with her brothers even after the car accident. She loved them, but their mother’s fate had left them with an aggressive head-in-the-sand philosophy of life. Their father’s decline had focused them even more myopically on their ambitious careers, vigorous social climbing, and high-profile philanthropic projects. She was proud of them, and they drove her nuts with their single-minded attention to mundane matters.
“I told you it was a bad neighborhood,” her brother fretted. “Break-ins. Arson.”
Her world spun again. “Arson?”
Archer tapped the screen over the words “possible arson.”
“At least you’re safe.” Jackson paused. “Where did you say you’re staying now?”
“With a friend.”
“That Betsy has just been trouble, getting you that job—”
“Not Betsy,” she said. “No one you know.”
“Well, bring her over for dinner, as thanks for saving you.”
She slanted a glance at Archer. “I don’t think he’s ready for dinner with the family yet.”
Jackson was quiet. “He?”
“My sometime lover, Jackson.” She rubbed her forehead at the sputtering she heard on the other end of the phone. The room on her end was deathly silent. “I can put him on the phone if you want to thank him now.”
Archer backed away.
She imagined Jackson doing much the same. “Geez, Ser, some stuff I’m still too young to know.”
“Prude.” Affection for her brother welled up, as if the images of fire had burned a hole through a lifetime of daily dross to pure emotion underneath.
“Nut. If you need anything . . .”
“I know.” Her gaze strayed to Archer, who stood looking out the window, legs braced, arms crossed.
A hundred and fifty years since he’d heard the voices of his family. No wonder he hadn’t let himself care for anyone since, knowing the people he came to love would die while he went on.
Assuming she survived so long, would she be the same? Were the mysteries that the demon had promised to reveal as important as seeing her father through his last days, as watching her nieces and nephews grow up?
For once, the answer didn’t matter. How could she willfully narrow her worldview again to birthdays and Christmasses, even the solemn rites of deathbed vigils, knowing a war raged in the shadows without her?
“I love you, Jackson,” she said softly. “Talk to you later.”
“Yeah. Sera, would Dad have liked him?”
She closed her eyes,Archer’s silhouette etched starkly on the back of her eyelids. “Probably. Before.”
Before her father lost his mind. Before Archer’s possession.
Jackson sighed. “Just keep being safe, okay?”
A little late for that. “Okay.”
As she disconnected, an updated photo showed blackened stalagmites, all that was left of the building. She could almost smell the sour stench of burned insulation and electrical wiring. The article said no definitive cause for the deadly blaze had been found.
The chill that had briefly left as she talked to her brother crept in again. “What are you thinking?”
Archer turned from the window. “That it’s a good thing you were here.”
“Was it my fault?”
“Did you set the fire?”
She pushed herself up from the desk. “You know what I mean.”
“It’s a long step from breaking and entering to fatal arson.” He hesitated. “Unless you’re a djinn-man. Then it’s as easy as breathing. The pattern of the fire in the photo isn’t natural.”
“Seven people,” she whispered.
“I’m concerned about the security hardware we installed in your unit.”
She looked up in horror. “You think it short-circuited and started the fire?”
“No, but it should have triggered an alarm here.” He ran a hand over his head. “Something else to talk to Bookie about.”
“I should have called the police about the break-in.” She rose to pace.
He watched her, expression shuttered. “There’s nothing they could do against a djinni.”
“What can we do? We have to stop him. How can we—?” She raised her head. “What’s that smell?”
He shook his head. “You’re just . . .” Then he sniffed and must have caught the same drifting scent of smoke. “Fuck.”
He raced to the door and threw it open without checking the handle for heat. The demon’s healing powers gave him leeway, but she couldn’t help thinking of the people in her building who hadn’t had that luxury.
She followed him into the hall just as he slammed the glass on the fire alarm. At the piercing shriek, she clamped her palms over her ears.
He grabbed her wrist and hauled her toward the stairs. He flung open the door and shoved her in. “Go. Get out of the building.”
She clung to the railing and whirled around when he started up the stairs. “Where are you going?”
“Remember that picture of the fire? The flames dripped down. I need to check the roof.”
“You think he’s still up there?” Without another word, she started up the stairs, three at a time.
He jumped half the flight above her, eyes whirling violet with his ascendant demon. “No heroic-buddy-movie-of-the-week shit.”
“Heroic, my ass. First my apartment. Now here.” She passed him. “It’s only paranoia if someone isn’t after you.”
They raced for the roof. Archer burst through the access door with a squeal of torn hinges.
The vast roof was an asphalt wasteland broken only by knee-high vents. One, missing its cover, sent up a curl of yellowish smoke.
Sera’s gaze skipped across the surface, drawn by another movement. “There. Behind the AC unit.”
Archer bolted across the roof, leaving her heart in a tailspin. They’d been sparring unarmed; she knew he didn’t have his axe.
A commotion arose farther down the stairwell as the other talyan reacted to the alarm. She shouted back through the doorway, “Up here.”
Archer was halfway across the roof, in pursuit of a figure clad in charcoal gray, almost invisible against the asphalt.
The gothic crenellations that decorated the roofline were only steps away.
The intruder reached the edge and clambered into the open space between the merlons—and jumped.
Sera gasped as the intruder disappeared from sight. It was a certain death fall. Even with a demon, she’d known that last night standing on the penthouse balcony.
Archer must have known the same. He skidded to a halt at the edge and peered down.
Just as two winged ferales burst over the crenellations.
The demons were smaller than the ones she and Archer had faced in the oak glade, with atrophied, catlike lower bodies and skeletal arms, but their wings were fully functional. The intruder dangled below the ferales, clinging to a chain that harnessed the winged monsters together, part aerial chariot, part demonic attack helicopter.
The ferales screeched in frenzy as they struggled to escape the vertical pull of air alongside the building. The stench of filthy feathers reached Sera.
The intruder hung a dozen feet out from the side of the building, exposed on the chain.
“Archer, no.” She read in the set of his shoulders the moment he made his decision.
He jumped after the intruder—they slammed together in midair.
The added weight was too much for the ferales. They plummeted out of sight, screaming.
As Sera leaned over the edge, horror choked her.
Just below and to one side, the ferales beat the air with their wings, thrashing to regain altitude. Between the flailing feathers, Sera caught a glimpse of Archer and the intruder grappling. Neither seemed to have the upper hand, or much effect at all, in their precarious position tangled in the chain.
If only she could get Archer a weapon. A s
cuffle behind her made her straighten. “Tell me you brought a gun—”
She turned to face a half dozen more flight-ready ferales. End to end, they were eerily similar down to the snubbed fleshy beaks in their otherwise humanoid faces. They spread their wings, and stinking feathers blocked what was left of the sun.
Over the hiss of their breathing, she heard a shout from the access door. A few of the ferales turned to face the new threat of arriving talyan fighters, but the remainder advanced on her.
“See what happens when you aren’t paranoid enough?” she muttered.
No league brothers, no weapon, no Archer. And the hellfire glint in the ferales’ eyes vowed payback.
She wedged herself between the merlons, fingers scrabbling at the molded cement. The wind whistling up the building traced a frigid finger along her spine. The ferales crept closer. Once they were done with her, Archer wouldn’t have a chance against their united effort.
She had only one shot. And she had it only with him.
Without looking around, she threw herself backward. The muscles in her thighs burned with sudden desperate strength. She twisted through the thin air, calling on the demon’s sinuous power.
She collided hard with Archer and the intruder. But she knew instantly the broad chest under her grasping hands, and all her senses flared with awareness. The struggling ferales shrieked as the pendulum momentum of her leap swung them wide away from the building.
“On the arc back, let go,” she cried.
She couldn’t see; she could only cling to Archer. Her stomach churned as they reached the apogee and started to swing back. The ferales fought to hold their position. And then she was in free fall, Archer’s arms tight around her.
They hit the side of the building and skidded down the concrete. She reached out blindly with one hand, still clutching him with the other. A railing slammed against her forearm, and she screamed.
But they wrenched to a halt. She focused her wind-and tear-blurred eyes. Archer had grabbed the railing. They hung thirty stories above the street. The black lines of his reven writhed in the clenched muscles of his arm.
His face stark with the strain of stopping their fall, he peered upward at the leashed ferales hovering several stories up. “You know how much I hate letting go.”
“Well, don’t do it again, really.” She grimaced at the grinding agony in her arm. “I don’t think I can reach over.”
He flexed, pulling them up. Violet sparks raced along the reven, skin lucent with the ascendance of his demon. He hauled them over the railing onto the balcony, where they collapsed in a sprawl.
“We have to get back up there,” she said. “Talyan are pinned down by the ferales.”
A rattle of gunfire interrupted her, and a half dozen dark shapes launched from the roof. They circled around the demonborne intruder, riding the high-rise updrafts.
“Flying monkeys,” Archer growled. “I hate flying monkeys.”
“They were after me.” Sera pulled herself upright. “I saw it in their beady little eyes. You told me ferales don’t pack.”
“Must be they’re stupid and didn’t read the handbook.” His gaze followed the ferales with furious intensity. “Either that, or somebody—say a djinn-man with evil on his mind—brought them together. Did you notice the structural similarities? Those weren’t back-alley ferales forming off scrap flesh. Those were bred and fed to a purpose.”
She shuddered. “They had human faces.”
“They could’ve plucked you right off the streets when we left the building. But we surprised the djinn-man.”
“Yeah, I bet he was way surprised when you jumped him.”
Archer bent his gimlet stare from the retreating intruder to her. “Not as surprised as when you did it.” He pushed open the balcony door into an empty suite. “Get inside.”
He stripped off his shirt and made a rough sling. She winced as he cradled her arm.
“Broken,” he said. “Give the demon a few hours before your next crazy stunt.”
“Oh, it’s crazy when I do it.”
“I had him in my fist.” Archer’s violet-shot eyes closed to slits. “He was after you. He won’t get his way.”
Bruises blossomed and faded on his bare torso—his teshuva dealing with the damage. She brushed her fingers along the clear mark of a large hand spanning his neck, with a darker imprint where a band like a ring had scored his skin.
He shuddered and closed his eyes.
“You are not to die for me,” she said softly.
When he opened his eyes again, only tarnished bronze remained. “Not your call.”
He wheeled away, leaving her to follow.
The hotel lobby swarmed with agitated talyan in various states of undress and even more varied states of armament. No one was leaving despite the thickening stink of sulfurous smoke.
“Where’s the fire department?” The image of her burned-out apartment flashed through Sera’s mind.
“I pulled an internal alarm,” Archer said. “The authorities won’t be alerted unless absolutely necessary.”
She eyed him. “There’s a fine line between secret society and mass delusional psychosis.”
“How convenient that talyan make excellent tight-rope walkers.” He waited until Liam was free, then slipped in among the gathered talyan. “Sera’s apartment building was torched late last night. Looks like we’re the djinn-man’s second hit.”
Liam spiked his fingers through his hair. “Haji found birnenston leaked down from the roof. We stopped it in the vents. For now.”
Archer’s expression turned grimmer yet. “Who’s trying to douse it?”
“Perrin and Lex have the knack, but this might be more than they can handle. I gave them ten minutes. Then I’m calling the fire department.”
“Won’t help,” Archer warned.
“They’ll keep secondary fires from spreading to the neighbors.” Liam ran a hand through his hair. “This djinn-man leached out enough birnenston to poison two buildings in less than twenty-four hours. He might be more than all of us can handle.”
A talya ran up, gesturing for Liam. They left together. The rest waited tensely, poised to escape with the league’s treasures.
She caught Archer’s eye. “Birnenston?”
“An incendiary substance left behind in tenebrae lairs. They foul a place just by existing in this realm. Chemically, it’s hydrofluoric acid with an etheric mutation. The more potent the demonic emanations, the nas tier the birnenston.”
“I had a hospice patient who died after an industrial acid accident.” She shuddered at the memory of the fatal blistering.
“Hydrofluoric acid is the worst. It seeps into the body without surface burns and melts the victim from the inside. Birnenston is literally burn-stone, but the stone is human bone. And with the etheric mutation, the damage can go soul deep.”
“Birnenston.” She rolled the word on her tongue. “Brimstone? As in ‘fire and . . .’?”
He nodded. “Impossible to extinguish through mortal means. Only a bane-class teshuva can burn it out.”
Ten minutes passed, although to Sera’s mind, it felt more like hours. Liam returned, looking grim. He commanded attention without a word, the talyan radiating out from him like a wheel.
“The birnenston is contained.” His low voice carried in the still room. “But it exceeds the definition of unholy mess. Judging from the virulence, we’re dealing with one tough djinni. And now he’s targeting us.”
“Let’s make that mutual,” Ecco growled.
Liam kept talking. “We need time to isolate and extinguish the birnenston. Until then, I’m closing the building.”
Archer leaned close to her ear. “Birnenston acts like a slow poison. It doesn’t kill, but it saps demonic power. Bookkeepers think chronic birnenston toxicity helps contain demons in hell. Out here, it weakens our teshuva, which can get us killed by the next feralis we take on.”
“Demons have kryptonite,” she murmured. “T
he more you know.”
Liam continued. “Zane has the list of safe houses and will be assigning teams. Take charge of your inventory and let’s get going.”
Archer took her arm as if she were part of his inventory. “We move on when our cover is compromised among the human population. Doesn’t happen often, especially in a city this size. We’ve never been forced out by djinn.” He scowled. “They haven’t cared enough about us to bother.”
“One cares now,” she said.
As if he’d overheard them, Ecco pressed his point. “The djinn-man. What are we going to do about him?”
Liam shook his head. “Once we’re secure—”
“I smell defense,” Ecco said. “I hate playing defense.”
“We need a base of operations,” Liam said.
“For what? Screwing with malice?” Ecco paced around the outer edges of the crowd. “Time’s past for that.”
A few murmured as the agitated talya passed them—whether in agreement or annoyance, Sera couldn’t tell.
“That’s our calling,” Liam said. “We—the teshuva—fight against the tenebraeternum for our souls.”
“Djinn are eternally shadowed too,” Ecco pointed out.
Sera glanced up at Archer’s expressionless face.
“That’s for the angelic—,” someone started.
“Fuck the angels,” Ecco growled. “They haven’t gotten anywhere in two thousand years. It’s our turn.”
“That’s not the way it’s done,” Zane said.
Ecco spun to face him. “Things are different now.” He pointed across the room at Sera. “I saw her extinguish a demon. Not just bleed it off. Destroy it.”
She stiffened as every eye turned to her.
Ecco pressed his point. “She wasn’t taking out the trash just to do it again tomorrow. She snatched that malice out of the ether and sent it back to oblivion where it belonged.” He grinned toothily at Sera. “Who puts the repo back in repentin’?”
Archer stirred. “You’re a poet, Ecco. But we’re not sure what she did, or how.”
She wanted to elbow him, but her broken arm refused to twitch. It hadn’t been her alone. Only together had they banished the malice and the two ferales. Was he so determined to keep her at a distance that he’d deny what they’d done?