by SM Reine
The instant James reappeared, he vomited across the dusty stone floor of the Night Hag’s cavern. There wasn’t much left in his stomach. Two short heaves, and he was done.
The underground chamber was too dark after the brilliance of the angelic city. He blinked green shapes out of his eyes as he tried to make sense of his surroundings. Anthony was sprawled a few feet away, unconscious but breathing. Beyond him, Betty’s body was still resting—paler than the last time he saw her, but untouched.
Where was Elise?
He stood and spun, searching for any sign of her between the silent gate and the spider’s body, but all he found were pages from his Book of Shadows scattered across the floor.
A sigh whispered through the room. James looked up.
Thom drifted from the top of the cavern, black wings spread wide. The span was so great that they brushed the distant walls. Elise was curled in his arms with her head tucked under his chin. She was still unconscious. It was the only time she could look so unguarded and innocent. James felt nothing from her—no dreams or emotions—but as Thom grew closer, he saw the rise and fall of Elise’s chest.
His bare feet touched the dais. He settled to the earth, and his wings folded behind him. They vanished. The glow of his skin faded. “I see your apprehension,” Thom said to James. “Don’t worry. She only sleeps.”
James took an unsteady step toward the dais, stretching out his arms. “Give her to me.”
“You want her now? You, who was so eager to hand her to her greatest enemy just moments ago?”
“She was dying.”
“And now she is healed without a mark of blood on her body. You are welcome for the favor, and to make it better, I will do another—I will retrieve her falchions and return them. But later. Even I must rest when traveling between dimensions.” Thom raised an eyebrow. “So. You attempted to surrender your kopis to a mad god. I don’t know her as well as you do, so perhaps I am wrong, but tell me what she would choose if she were conscious: life in His garden, driven to madness, or the peaceful void of death?”
“Elise doesn’t always know what’s best for her.”
“How fortunate that you do.”
He hesitated. “When she wakes up… will she remember…?”
“Nothing. She will have no clue you tried to surrender her unless you share that fact, which I don’t recommend if you treasure your relationship with her.”
James tried not to look relieved. “Give her to me now.”
Thom stroked the hair back from Elise’s face. “There are many great mysteries in this world, James Faulkner, but few of them puzzle me after thousands of years. Yet when a deity chooses to elevate one of mankind above the rest, I can only marvel at such a decision. What makes this one special? Why should any of you be special when your lives are as short as a beat of my black heart?”
Thousands of years? He struggled to think of a response.
“Elise is certainly unique,” he said cautiously.
“Unique is inadequate. She has been touched by God and bears two marks. Why?”
“Do you expect me to have an answer for that?”
“Perhaps not. You are only human.” Thom knelt and rested Elise on top of the dais. James crouched over her in some semblance of protection, though he was very sure that anything that could drive a god back to his kingdom would not be impressed by the mightiest of his spells.
“Are we safe? Is He gone?”
“He’s not on Earth, if that’s what you’re asking,” Thom said. “The angels whose minds have been destroyed by Mr. Black are contained as well, but they live. Safety is subjective.”
He sat beside James, completely human in appearance once more. His brown skin had pores, the light touched his hair, and the hand reaching for Elise’s cheek had manicured fingernails. “Don’t touch her,” James said.
Thom ignored his protestation and stroked her hair. “No matter the why, she is the Godslayer. Watch her well, James Faulkner, because she is mine. I will be back for her.”
“What the hell are you?” he whispered. “Some kind of fallen angel?”
“Oh, no.” Thom smirked. “I’m something much worse.”
He vanished without another word.
When Elise and Anthony woke up an hour later, night had fallen. She carried Betty’s body out of the Warrens to the hospital. It was only a few blocks away. She refused to let anyone help her.
What happened after that was a blur. They didn’t admit Betty because there was no treatment to be done for a dead body. Stephanie cried when she saw the wound, and James comforted her. Elise didn’t stick around to watch.
Time passed. Things happened. Elise watched as if from a distance, going through the motions of filling out paperwork and giving them the phone number of Betty’s parents and sitting in a waiting room.
Somehow, she found herself sitting with Betty’s body. They had put her somewhere quiet and dark with only a single light to illuminate the bed. Her skin was the same color as the white sheet tucked under her arms. Elise stared at her, disconnected from herself, and thought that Betty would probably want to put on some kind of makeup before anybody else saw her. She hated to be seen without makeup. The pale lips and mascara-free lashes looked unnatural.
Anthony knelt at her bedside as tears cascaded down his cheeks. He had started screaming again, after Stephanie told them they could take their time saying goodbye before she was transported to the morgue, but he had been quiet for almost fifteen minutes.
“Do you want to say something?” he asked.
Elise folded her arms across her chest tightly. Say what? Goodbye? “Sorry my enemy shot you?” No good words came to mind, so she just shook her head.
He reached out to touch her hand. “I killed him,” he said thickly. “That guy is dead, and it’s not good enough. She’s still…” Anthony dropped his forehead to the bed. His fingers tightened on her wrist. “I don’t blame you.”
“What?”
“I know this isn’t your fault. Betty was too eager. She didn’t…” He sucked in a shuddering breath. “She knew this could happen. So I don’t blame you. I thought you should know.”
The idea of it hadn’t even occurred to her.
Elise got up and stood by Betty’s head. She gazed down at her friend, knowing it would be the last time, and tried to see past the bullet wound. That wasn’t how Betty would want to be remembered. Elise’s eyes roved over her plump cheeks, her freckled shoulders, the curve of her body under the blanket. She wanted so desperately to feel a connection between herself and Betty, something that would give her what Stephanie called “closure,” but she didn’t feel anything at all.
That wasn’t her friend. It was a body. The chance for goodbyes had long since passed.
“I’ll be outside,” Elise said.
She went into the hall and leaned back, gently bumping her head against the wall. The curtain wasn’t enough to separate her from Anthony’s grief. His renewed sobs echoed through the hallway.
Once she was away from the body, she couldn’t tune out James’s thoughts anymore. With nothing to look at but a blank wall, her mind filled in with what he saw instead. He was in the lobby. There was an older woman with him, and although Elise had never seen a picture of Betty’s mother, she had been told about all the bangles she liked to wear and the horrible perm. The woman was sobbing. James held her hand.
Shock had wiped his mind almost as blank as Elise’s. Small mercy. She didn’t want to have to hear her own thoughts, much less his.
A figure moved at the end of the hallway. Wearing a plain t-shirt and jeans, Nukha’il looked nothing like the angel that had attacked Mr. Black in the city. It seemed he had gone shopping at a thrift store. His wings weren’t substantiated, but there was no hiding the subtle, shifting light that followed him.
Elise welcomed the distraction of his presence. “I didn’t think I would see you again.”
“Itra’il has gone mad,” he said. “She is not the woman I
knew. But with time…” He trailed off. “She won’t be a danger to anyone. I’ll keep a tight hold on her.”
“Good. I don’t want to kill anything else.”
The angel didn’t react to her threat. He stood beside her and faced the window into the room. The mini-blinds were mostly closed, but Elise could see Betty through the slits. Anthony had his hands folded at the side of the bed. His entire body shook with sobs.
“You lost your friend in this fight. Didn’t you?” Nukha’il asked.
Elise nodded, lips sealed tight.
He crossed himself, bowed his head, and whispered a prayer. When he lifted his head, tears gleamed on his cheeks.
“I will carry the pain of your grief in my heart. For your friend, and for everyone else who lost their lives to this fight. But she is in a place without suffering now. You should take comfort in that.”
His words didn’t warm her. Betty might have been in a place with no pain, but she was also in a place where she wouldn’t get to sunbathe, either. She would never sexually harass another colleague in good humor, or finish her research at the university. She would never feel the sun on her face again.
“It’s a black place,” Elise said dully. “A place with no light.”
“Don’t you believe in Heaven?”
“I’ve been to the ethereal and infernal planes, and there are no human souls there. When we die… that’s it.”
Nukha’il gave her a sad look. “Nobody knows what waits for mortals on the other side. Not even we do.” He watched Anthony for a moment without speaking. Elise turned away. “I hope you and your loved ones find peace. I’ll pray for you.”
She shook her head. “Don’t do that.”
He briefly laid his hand on her shoulder before leaving. It didn’t sting to be touched on her shoulder blade anymore. The Night Hag’s mark had faded with her death.
Elise felt a presence at the opposite end of the hall and realized that James was approaching with Betty’s mother. There would be more tears. More questions. The same lies she had written on the police reports about gang violence. More grief.
She left before they came around the corner.
James didn’t think he would ever sleep again. Yet when he climbed into the bed he shared with Stephanie, he passed out immediately and didn’t wake up for a long time.
The sleep wasn’t restful. He awoke feeling like he hadn’t slept at all.
He waited a day before seeking out Elise. He could tell by the tumult of emotions through their bond that he wasn’t welcome. But when night fell again, and a new morning dawned, he couldn’t stay away any longer. He didn’t have to search. He only needed to close his eyes to see familiar couches, the late-afternoon haze glimmering on dust motes, and the window-mounted air conditioner.
He knocked lightly before entering the apartment above the dance studio.
Elise knelt between two boxes on the living room floor. She didn’t look up when he came to stand beside her.
She had a white photo album spread across her legs and stared at the pictures with no expression. Her gaze was unusually opaque, even for her, but the bond had opened an entirely new dimension to him. What he felt staggered him. Grief and rage and regret roiled through her like an angry wound.
He had to brace himself with a hand on the back of the couch. “Elise,” James said, voice ragged.
“Betty had her wedding album in the fire safe. She didn’t have her social security card there, or her passport, but she had her photos.”
“Whose wedding photos?”
“Betty’s. She got married at eighteen. When we met at college, she was going through a divorce.” Elise ran a hand down the page and rested a fingertip on one of the pictures. “I met her ex-husband once. He wasn’t a bad guy. They just… grew up. Grew apart. People change. He wanted kids and she didn’t.”
James swallowed a lump in his throat. “I had no idea.”
“There’s a lot people don’t know about Betty. Even Anthony doesn’t know…” She pulled a photo out of the plastic sheet. “Well. It doesn’t matter now.”
Elise handed the picture to him. It was a solo shot of Betty in front of a trellis of roses with her train stretched across the grass and flowers in her hair. She beamed with none of her usual mischief.
“She looks so young.”
“Betty would have been twenty-eight next month. She was young. What was I thinking? I never should have let her come.”
“Elise…”
She put the picture back and snapped the album shut. Her face was red when she finally looked at him. “I wish I had died.”
“Don’t say that.”
“I killed Betty. There are insane angels running loose in a parallel dimension that could break out at any time. And He knows where I am now, so sooner or later, He will come for me. You should have left me there to die!”
He refused to match her fury. He knelt at her side and stroked a hand down her healed shoulder, brushing the hair behind her neck. “I will always bring you back, Elise,” he said, echoing what she had told him just days before. He traced his thumb along her jaw. It made her grow still like a hawk that had been masked. “Always.”
She pushed his arm away. “Don’t use that on me, not when—”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? For what?”
He rested back on his heels with a sigh. There were so many things he wanted to tell her. Things that a thousand apologies couldn’t amend. “For everything.”
“It’s too late for that.” She stuffed the album back in the box and closed it. “Anthony wants to go through what’s left of Betty’s belongings. I should get her purse from Stephanie’s house.” Barely-restrained tears made her voice thick.
“Betty was your best friend. You can cry for your friends.”
“No. I can’t.” He tried to wrap his arms around her, but she shoved him away. “Don’t touch me.” Her chin trembled. She took a deep breath and furrowed her brow as she concentrated on the wall. He could feel her fighting to hold onto her composure.
“It’s okay.”
James embraced her again. Her attempts to fend him off were much feebler the second time. She finally buried her face in his neck.
The pain poured out of her. The fear of being found. The horror of what Mr. Black had done. The loss of Betty.
Her thoughts faded and out of his mind.
Why Betty? Alain didn’t feel enough pain when he died… I hate this… hate everything…
He thought Elise would feel better once she cried, but he was wrong. Instead, her sorrow reached new depths to fill every crevice of her heart and mind. It was almost too much for him to take.
He pressed his lips to her brow. “It will be okay,” he murmured against her forehead.
Elise thought that his breath was too warm in the summer air. The angry murmur of her thoughts latched onto it, seeking something she could control. He heard it, and she knew he heard it. James also knew the question she would ask a moment before she said it.
“What is this? What happened to us?”
He had been wondering the same thing since they returned from the city. None of his books talked about such a phenomenon, but he had a theory.
“When I died and you resurrected me, I think it… changed us. We’re somehow trapped in an active bond—a permanent piggyback. I’ve tried to end it several times, but it’s like we’re stuck.”
“Great. Just fucking great. Betty’s death is my fault. Your death was my fault. This… thing… is my fault.” Her mind had gone distant, retreating into a dark recess of memory. “I pushed Anthony away when I saw the gun. Alain wasn’t even aiming at him, but I moved to save my boyfriend instead of Betty. If I had gone for her…”
“Then Anthony might have been the one to die.”
“I should get away from him. I’ll kill him next.”
“You didn’t kill Betty,” James said, smoothing a hand down the back of her neck. Her skin was feverish from crying.
“Listen to me. You didn’t kill Betty.”
Her chin trembled. “I might as well have.” She drew her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. “God, it hurts. How do you feel like this all the time? How do you handle so much emotion?”
“What?”
“This is yours,” she said with a hard sniffle. “This… crying thing. All this grief. This is your weakness, not mine.”
He took her hand, and he could feel it from her perspective as well as his own. James didn’t just feel the supple leather of Elise’s gloves. He felt the roughness of his skin, too. “Have you considered that you might not be getting it from me? You loved Betty. It’s natural—not weak—to grieve for those we love.”
Elise dropped his hand. “This isn’t me. It’s not.” She swiped the tears off of her face and straightened her back. “I’m going to help Anthony make arrangements. Betty wanted to be cremated, so there’s…” She swallowed. “And I’m going to Craven’s. They need help, now that the owner is gone.”
“What’s going to happen to the city without the Night Hag?”
“Reno survived without an overlord’s help for years. But the threat of her presence kept challengers out, and I killed the only person who might have taken up the line of succession. Now it’s going to get messy. There will be territory battles.”
“You can take time to grieve,” he said.
Elise stood and hugged the box to her chest. There was one other box, too. That was all that remained of Betty’s life—two banker’s boxes in a half-empty apartment.
He followed her to the front door.
“I don’t need time,” she said. Her voice was dead again. The tears were gone. “What would I do with time? Wait for Him to find me? Throw myself on the floor and cry? Waste my time wishing that Betty hadn’t…”
Her lips sealed shut before the last word could emerge.
James reached for her again, but she pushed away from him, opened the front door, and stepped onto the stairs.
She glared at the horizon. The tops of the casinos downtown were visible just over the trees. There was no sign of the city mirrored above—not so much as a waver in the air.