by Elicia Hyder
I took a step back, stunned, as she pulled him to us and gently laid him at our feet. My mouth fell open. “Why the hell didn’t we think of that earlier?”
She smiled and knelt down next to the wounded angel. “When have we ever had critically wounded angels to deal with before?”
Good point. Still…
“God, you’re brilliant,” I said, amazed as I went back to digging for another body. “Wait.” I stopped digging and aimed my hand at the pile.
The body of another Claymore soldier rose through the rubble. I deposited him on top of the heap with ease.
Iliana chuckled as she opened the angel’s mouth. “You’re learning.”
I pulled out another soldier.
And another.
And another, until finally, there were no more bodies buried under the building. “They aren’t here!” I called to where Iliana was using her power to remove pieces from near the bunker entrance.
“I hear something over here!” she yelled back.
I flew over to join her, stopping midway because of the sound of a helicopter. I looked up and saw Anya on the outboard. She sent a shock wave of power down to the line of troops in the woods.
Behind the aircraft was a swarm of guardians. Suspended in their center, being toted in chains, was the Morning Star. With them, Reuel carried Azrael, whose body was limp in his arms.
Between the shots of the assault rifles, I heard what Iliana was talking about. Screaming inside the stairwell that led down below.
My whole body exhaled. “They’re safe.”
Iliana’s face went slack. “We’ve been here for less than ten minutes. If you hadn’t broken the elevator, they would have been in here when that rocket hit.”
My stomach lurched. She was probably right.
Her ear turned toward the sky. “Do you hear—”
“Get down!” I screamed, diving over her.
Boom!
The ground shook with all the force of a ten-magnitude earthquake. The back wall completely collapsed, and more debris rained down on top of us.
But the explosion was far from a direct hit.
I sat up and looked back.
Azrael’s hands were aimed at the sky behind the building.
When his eyes fell on me, he smiled.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Heat and smoke flooded the building as Iliana and I climbed out of the wreckage.
Azrael dropped his arms. “Didn’t think I’d let you have all the fun, did you?”
I ran across the rocks, jumped over the wall, and hugged him.
He grasped a handful of the back of my shirt as his strong arms tightened around me. When I pulled back, tears sparkled in his eyes.
“Man, am I glad to see you,” I said with a laugh.
“Looks like I got here just in time.” He pointed over my shoulder.
I turned. The mountain was on fire.
“Fighter jet?” I asked.
“Coming to finish the job, looks like.” He nodded toward the remnants of Echo-5. “Anybody hurt?”
“Nobody we know.”
His crinkled eyes narrowed. “Is that…?” He was staring at Iliana, who was carefully picking her way across the wreckage. She could have flown, but I imagined she was giving us a moment to ourselves.
“That’s your granddaughter.”
“God, she looks like Sloan.”
“Right? She’s amazing.”
“She comes from good stock,” he said with a grin.
I smirked. “Yeah. Yours.”
“Exactly.” He grabbed my shoulder. “Damn, it’s good to have you back.”
Our reunion ended as a group of soldiers climbed over the broken back wall. Azrael instinctively pulled me behind him before aiming his powerful hand at the men.
He blinked. “Claymore.” General mode switched on. “Claymore, hold your fire!” Azrael climbed up on top of the broken wall.
Immediately, everything stopped. The men, and the angels, all stood at attention.
Well, almost all the men.
One who’d climbed over the back wall was still advancing. He had an angry sneer on a lopsided face. It was swollen and bruised, and his lips were the size of small continents. His mismatched eyes were narrowed, angry, and glued to me.
Thacker.
His commitment was impressive, and twisted. Especially considering the man he was so blindly devoted to had the power to heal him and didn’t. His proximity to the Morning Star was probably the only reason he was vertical, as the reconstructive surgery alone would have been enough to level most mortals. This one, however, was still out for blood. My blood.
“Soldier, stand down!” Azrael boomed.
Thacker didn’t listen. Moving his mouth as little as possible, he spoke calmly and quietly into his radio. “Red and green, you are clear to fire.”
I should have known this asshole would be leading an attack.
Using my power, I thrust the barrel of his rifle up, smacking him in the already-messed-up face. He shrieked in pain through clenched teeth. Doubling over, he gave me enough time to rush in and tackle him.
“Incoming!” Azrael bellowed, searching the sky.
The soldiers following his orders dove under whatever they could find as mortars sailed through the air. One after another, Azrael and the other Angels of Death lobbed them back into the woods.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
“Iliana, we’re going to need more rain!” I yelled as I yanked the rifle from Thacker’s hands and slammed its stock into his wired-shut jaw.
Blood sprayed my face as I grabbed him by the throat and stood. I dangled him a foot off the ground.
Pow!
Thacker’s head exploded. Something clinked around my feet as I dropped his body. His headless torso slumped sideways over what used to be the kitchen island. Laying at his feet was a knife.
I turned to look, and Fury raised up from behind her rifle, hidden by the half wall. I pointed at her. “I fucking love you, woman!”
“Warren, look out!” she screamed.
A mortar shell landed right behind me, catapulting me through the air and into the remains of the aboveground elevator shaft.
Dazed, I pulled myself from the rubble.
The blast had blown open the top of the bunker stairs. Iliana had fallen beside it. Above her, demons were descending from the sky.
Hundreds of them.
“Illy, you OK?” I called.
Suddenly alert, she patted her pockets. “I dropped it!” she shrieked. “I dropped the crystal water!” She crawled across the debris, frantically searching through the mess.
Orin landed hard on the debris in front of me.
“Oh, here we go.” I pulled out my sword. “You tried to kill my daughter.”
His smile was yellow. “And today, I won’t fail.” He pulled the final missing sword from a scabbard at his side.
Shit.
In Nulterra, I’d been able to channel my killing power through my sword, killing demons without even getting close. But my only sword-fighting skill was worthless here. Too many innocents were fighting close by.
Orin swung, and my helkrymite clashed with his.
I sliced low, and he jumped.
He jabbed. I slammed his blade sideways.
I swung at his head. He ducked.
He countered with his backhand. I dodged.
For all of about thirty seconds, I went straight Inigo Montoya on his ass. But it didn’t last. The tip of Orin’s sword sliced across my abdomen. It wasn’t a fatal blow, but it shattered my focus.
Orin advanced. I backed up.
He swung. I jumped back.
He sliced. I retreated and tripped over something.
With a laugh, he swung with both hands, right at my face.
I ducked, dropped my sword, and grabbed Thacker’s rifle at my feet. Flipping it over with all the showmanship of a Silent Drill Marine, I shot Orin in the stomach at an angle
straight through his heart.
His body collapsed like it no longer had bones.
I picked up my sword and sheathed it. “I’ve always been better with a gun anyway.” Then I picked up Orin’s sword and stepped over his rotting corpse.
The Father crawled out of the bunker hole. “Iliana!” he shouted, barely audible over the noise. She didn’t hear him. She was battling a group of demons with Jett.
I shot four more angels out of the sky as I ran to him. “What’s wrong?”
He grabbed my arm. “It’s Adrianne. She heard Azrael’s voice and was trying to get out when the bomb hit.”
The bunker entrance was little more than a huge hole in the ground now. I brightened my wings to send light into the abyss.
Luca was standing closest to the top, but on the first landing below, Sloan was cradling Adrianne’s bloody head in her lap. Sloan’s healing light barely visible.
I touched my ear and turned away from the hole. “Iliana, Adrianne’s going to die if you don’t get over here.”
Iliana’s face whipped toward me, and she launched into the air in a perfect spiral that sent the two demons she was fighting onto their asses. When she reached us, she climbed down into the hole. I leaned inside again. “Everybody else OK?”
“We’re fine,” Sloan said, looking up at me.
I grabbed the blade of the sword I took from Orin and offered its hilt to Luca. “You know how to use one of these things?”
His eyes widened. “No.”
“Me either.” I leaned closer. “Just don’t stick anybody we like.”
He smiled. “Yes, sir.”
Nathan ran over, panting. When I looked behind him, I saw a Claymore SUV with the driver’s side door standing open. “Is Iliana in there?”
“Yeah, what’s wrong?” I asked.
“We need crystal water.”
I looked back down the hole. “Illy, did you find the vial?”
Light shined all around her. “Yes. It shattered.”
I turned to Nathan. “It’s gone.”
He swore and threw his hands in the air.
“Who needs it?”
“Come on,” he said and started back across the rubble.
We fought our way back to the vehicle parked on the lawn. When we jumped over the broken wall, I saw a fluff of white hair inside the car.
My stomach collapsed. “Oh no.”
I hadn’t even realized I’d frozen until Nathan pulled me forward. He ran around to the passenger’s side of the car and opened the door.
He pulled Ionis out and laid him on the ground. “We were ambushed coming up the road. They got him through the windshield.”
Black sludge oozed from Ionis’s left lung. He was gasping and sputtering blood. His whole body was trembling.
I bent over him, and he lifted his hand. I wrapped mine around it and squeezed. His fingernails were a glittery royal blue.
He was trying to talk, but I couldn’t understand him through the choking.
“Try to breathe, Ionis,” I said.
“What’s happening?” my father asked behind me.
“Az,” Ionis gurgled.
Azrael dropped to the ground beside me and touched the messenger’s cheek. The veins in Ionis’s eye darkened as he fought to hang on.
Azrael spoke soft words of comfort in Katavukai, something I never dreamed in a million years I’d see.
With one more wet hiccup, Ionis’s body went still. His hand released mine. And black trickled from the corners of his eyes as they stared lifelessly at the sky.
Rage pulsed through me.
The Father slowly approached Ionis’s feet. “Oh no.” His hands were over his heart.
Azrael touched two fingers to the black foam around the bullet hole. He rubbed it between his fingertips. “This is what we created.”
“This is what he created.” I whirled around.
A female prophet was using a keystone to release the Morning Star’s cuffs while a pack of demons attacked Reuel like dogs.
Jumping to my feet, I threw everything I had at them. A wave of energy crashed like a tsunami, bowling the whole group over onto the grass.
But I was too late.
The Morning Star countered, blasting me backward into my father. Azrael pushed me forward, and we both advanced, side by side, as the demons regrouped. I tossed him my sword and shouldered my rifle.
Reuel grabbed two demons and slammed their skulls together with an audible crack! Azrael swung my sword and lopped off the head of a third. And I picked off the others, one by one, with my rifle.
Suddenly, a white fireball burst around the Morning Star, consuming his body as he rose into the sky. Stunned, I froze and looked up, having never seen anything like it before.
Against the blue sky, it was clear why he was called the light of Eden. He looked exactly like his Eden sun. Hell, maybe this was his Eden sun.
Azrael drove my blade through the chest of the demon who’d freed the Morning Star. Then he, too, looked up as the surging white ball of energy sailed straight over our heads.
The light collided with the Father, a spectacular starburst of light and color. The two rolled across the ground as the light fizzled out, and when they stopped, the Morning Star held a dagger to the Father’s throat.
I started forward, but Azrael’s arm clotheslined my chest to stop me. “That knife is made of helkrymite.”
“Impossible. Torman told us there were only seven swords.”
“A demon lied? Noooo.”
“Cassiel verified he was telling the truth.”
“Maybe he was. Does that look like a sword to you?”
Damn it.
The Morning Star dragged the Father back a few steps as everyone halted. “That’s right. Now, maybe you listen to reason!”
All the fighting around Echo-5 slowly petered out. Cassiel, who’d been dragging injured angels out of the crossfire, sidestepped slowly over to stand beside me.
“Do you know what happens if I slit his throat?” the Morning Star asked, his eyes flickering with red.
“No. What happens?” I whispered toward Cassiel.
“The fabric of the universe unravels.” Her breathing was shallow and quick, and her words were laced with panic. “We all disappear.”
“If I don’t walk out of here, none of us will. I’d rather be blinked out of existence than spend one more day in this mire of inferiority. And if I go, I’m taking every single being in Eden and on Earth with me.”
He grabbed a fistful of the Father’s white hair, yanking his head back. “So give me the Vitamorte, or I end everything now.”
I looked toward the bunker. Iliana was climbing out. She held up her hands. “I’m here. I’m right here!”
Nathan’s knees faltered. “No!” Reuel grabbed him to hold him up, and probably to hold him back.
With her hands raised high in the air, Iliana carefully crossed the rubble. No one else dared to move. Not even the demons to subdue her. The Morning Star was holding us all hostage now. Angels, humans, and the fallen alike.
“Please put the dagger down.” Her voice was steady and calm as she climbed up on the broken wall. “Let this be over. I’ll go with you, or you can kill me right here. No one else has to die.”
“Get on your knees,” he hissed.
Her hands still raised in surrender, Iliana slowly sank to her knees on the grass.
“Iliana, no!” Nathan cried.
She looked at him. “Dad, it’s going to be OK.”
Tears streamed down his face as he struggled against Reuel’s hold.
The Morning Star’s voice deepened. “Archangel, bring your sword.”
At first, my ears didn’t register that he was talking to me. I was the Archangel. But in that second, my only title that mattered was Appa.
When I didn’t immediately move, he pressed the blade harder against the Father’s throat.
Iliana turned to me. “Appa, it’s okay. I’m ready.”
I looked to the Father for help, but he only gave a slight nod.
Taking the sword from Azrael, I walked slowly toward my daughter with every intention of somehow driving the blade through the Morning Star’s face. I stopped just behind her.
He cut his eyes at me. “I gave you the opportunity to join me, and now you’ll forever wish you had listened.”
“No!” voices screamed behind us.
Kane was holding Sloan.
Rogan was barely able to contain Jett.
“You should consider this a kindness, Archangel.” The Morning Star raised his voice and swept his glowing eyes over the grounds. “May everyone say today that I am a benevolent god!”
No one clapped.
Or moved.
Or breathed.
Least of all me.
His eyes narrowed. “Or would you rather she be tortured?”
My hands were shaking uncontrollably.
“Warren,” the Father said evenly.
I met his eyes, and peace washed over me.
Then he looked at Iliana. He held her gaze for a long moment before he finally said, “You know what you must do.”
She bowed her head.
“What will it be, Warren?” the Morning Star asked.
The blade weighed a million pounds. I raised it, silently calculating if I could hurl it with enough precision to not kill us all by destroying the Father myself.
Then light exploded from Iliana. A searing beam across the lawn, straight through the Father’s heart.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The most brilliant light I’d ever seen on Earth or in Eden ruptured in the center of the field like a supernova. The detonation blew me backward off my feet, and I scrambled against the powerful wind to right myself. Shielding my eyes against the blinding rays, I clawed my way across the grass back to Iliana.
When I reached her, I saw it. The light was bridged between Iliana and the center of the energy mass. Her feet were inches off the ground, her arms were outstretched, and her face was toward the sky, with her hair whipping in the wind.
Looking around, even Cassiel looked stunned, a miracle all by itself.
With a rumble that vibrated the ground, the light shot straight toward the sky, rippling the air in every direction as far as I could see.