Turning my foot sideways, I drove a thrust kick into his knee. It buckled, and he bent forward, my own feet at last touching the ground.
The woman threw her dagger. I ducked my head, still held fast in the demon’s sinister embrace.
The knife struck him in the eye with a sickening Splutch! All his weight suddenly went slack. The smug grin vanished from the woman’s face, replaced by shock.
“Shit, Kelly!” Mr. Punk Rock said, sounding stunned. “You killed him!”
I didn’t have time to celebrate. The dead demon collapsed on top of me, pushing me to the ground. A second later, I was pinned underneath him with no leverage to escape.
Fortunately, the two humans started arguing about what to do. I still had a chance to get out of this.
I pushed and heaved, but the giant, infernal asshole on top of me was not going anywhere. He was too large for me to move, and I was on my stomach, so I couldn’t use my legs to shove him off.
Kelly started walking towards us. I could see those sexy, black boots headed my way, clicking slowly on the pavement. Damn it, I could not die at the hands of a woman wearing better clothes than me. That would not be fair.
But before the assassin could reach me, a black van roared around the corner and screeched to a stop. The side door flew open, and three guys wearing black, molded armor and helmets that masked their faces leaped out wielding swords. One of them raced towards the man and the other two came for the woman.
Kelly unwrapped the sword tattoo from her stomach, turned, and started fighting the two newcomers – sword in one hand, dagger in the other. I had no idea what the hell was happening. My street had suddenly turned into some urban fantasy battleground.
Two more guys jumped out of the van and ran over to me. One of them rolled the deceased demon off, and the other helped me to my feet.
“Come with me if you want to live,” he said.
His helmet had a silver mask that covered his entire face, and his voice had an autotuner quality. I cocked my head at him.
“Seriously?” I said. “You’re gonna lead with that? The line from The Terminator? What, have you been waiting your whole life to say that?”
He stared at me in confusion. At least I think he was staring at me. The faceless helmet made it impossible to tell for sure.
“I . . .” he said.
“Come on!” his partner shouted.
I had no desire to go anywhere with these people. But they had just rescued me, and the demon had been right. Going back home had been stupid. I had no idea what my next move was, but I couldn’t make it here.
“If you boys are planning to rape me, you’d better make other arrangements,” I said. “I will rip the arm off the first person who touches me. Understand?”
“Yes, let’s go!” the first guy said.
Before I could convince myself this was a really stupid idea, I followed them into their van. It roared away before they even got the door shut.
“Wait, what about your friends?” I said.
“We’ve got a second vehicle for them,” Reese from The Terminator said.
The van went around a corner at high speed. How the driver didn’t roll it, I don’t know, but I was thrown into the wall.
“Ow!” I shouted. “God damn it, watch the road!”
“Sit down and buckle up,” he replied.
I did my best to comply, but the dude was driving so fast, the seatbelt kept locking up before I could fasten it.
“Mason, slow down,” Reese said. “We’re already several blocks away. We don’t want to attract police attention.”
“Yeah, good luck with that,” I said.
The driver eased off the gas, and I finally got buckled in. I turned and looked at Reese.
“All right, somebody tell me what the fuck is going on,” I said.
“You’ve been targeted for assassination by The Guild of the Blade,” he said.
He started unbuckling his helmet.
“The who?” I asked.
“The Guild of the Blade,” he repeated. “They’re a secret society of magical assassins.”
Before I could ask what exactly that meant, he pulled off his helmet, and oh, my. Possibly the most beautiful man in the history of ever was under it. He was of Middle Eastern descent, with dark skin, jet-black hair, and glittering black eyes. He was rocking the sexiest five o’clock shadow I’d ever seen. It was the Platonic ideal of five o’clock shadow.
My loins ached at the sight of this guy. I would seriously have to change my panties when we got wherever we were going.
“Why . . .” I began, but my mouth was suddenly dry. I had to swallow several times before I could continue. “Why are they trying to kill me?”
He frowned. God, even that was mesmerizing. I had no idea what came over me. I mean, I like guys as much as girls. But I couldn’t ever remember one turning me to jelly like this.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Kincaide,” he said. “I don’t know how much I’m allowed to tell you. We’re taking you to a safe place, where everything will be explained.”
And just like that, he broke the spell. Whatever magic he had to make me all hot and ready vanished as soon as he said they were taking me somewhere secret.
“Uh-uh,” I said. “I’m not being whisked off to some secluded locale where no one can find me. You can ‘explain everything’ now. Start talking, pal, or I’m out of here, even if I have to smash in that perfect face.”
He stared at me for several seconds, those glittering eyes sparkling like a pair of onyxes. God damn, but he was beautiful.
“Okay,” he began.
“Ash,” his partner warned.
“For God’s sake, Erin,” he said. “We’re not kidnapping her.
“Listen, we’re with The Order. We’re the organization that keeps the magical world safe and secret from normal humans.”
He may as well have told me Santa Claus was real.
“What?” I said.
“We protect The Veil,” he said. “It’s a law enacted by The Arcane Council that keeps us safe from regular humans. If the world knew magical beings existed, it would be . . . bad. So we make sure that doesn’t happen.”
My brain, already dulled by all the research I’d done, struggled to take this in. I mean, it was obvious that magical creatures existed. A demon had twice tried to murder me, and there were people who could turn tattoos of knives into real ones. But there was a whole organization?
“What’s this got to do with me?” I asked.
“Like I said, The Guild of the Blade has a contract on your life. We’re trying to protect you.”
“But why do they want me dead?”
He flicked his beautiful eyes at Erin, silently asking her what to do. She shrugged.
“You didn’t listen to me before,” she said.
“Ms. Kincaide,” he said with a sigh. “You’re not a normal human.”
“My brother could have told you that,” I said. “He’s been saying I’m weird my whole life. Why are you interested in me? Why does this Guild of Blades want me dead?”
“That’s what I’m trying to tell you, Ms. Kincaide,” he said. “You’re what’s known as Nephilim.”
I blinked at him twice. He just stared back with those beautiful, sexy eyes.
“A what?” I said, making it clear he was full of shit.
“Nephilim,” he replied. “Ms. Kincaide, you’re a magical creature.”
Seven
T wenty minutes later, I was sitting in a small, featureless room. There was a table. There were six chairs. There was a whiteboard hanging on one of the tile walls. Otherwise, it was a cement box with a door. It made me feel like I was in a police interrogation room, which was not a good feeling. On the upside, Reese from The Terminator came in with me and stayed. His partner left immediately to fetch their superior. She left the door open, so there was an escape route. But it still left me feeling paranoid and scared.
None of those feelings was anything compared to t
he enormity of what Reese – or Ash, as his partner had called him – had told me. I was a magical creature? What the hell did that mean? And what exactly was a Nephilim? I’d never heard that word before.
And how the hell could I be magical? I didn’t have any powers. I wasn’t like Spider-Man or Wonder Woman. I didn’t cast spells like Gandalf or any D&D wizard. There was nothing special about me. I was an ordinary woman. Well, maybe “ordinary” isn’t the right word. I am a badass bitch you do not want to fuck with. But I’m human.
I had a thousand questions, and I didn’t know which one to ask first. And Ash didn’t offer any information I didn’t directly request. He just sat there looking pretty, keeping me low-key aroused. That made it hard to think too. What was it with this guy?
Before I could figure out where to start, Ash’s partner returned with a balding, old, White guy with a snowy goatee. He was tall and thin and wore a black tunic with a patch on the left breast, depicting a pair of lightning bolts crossed like swords behind an eye. He had on black pants that were tucked into black boots. It was clearly a uniform, and it made me more nervous.
“Good evening, Ms. Kincaide,” he said. “I am Director Scott. You’ve already met agents Brinson and Shinoch.”
“‘Met’ isn’t exactly the word I’d use to describe it,” I said. “They pulled a dead demon off me and told me to get into a van. No one introduced themselves.”
“Sorry,” the woman said without an ounce of sincerity. “We were a bit pressed for time, given that we were rescuing you from an assassination attempt.”
“Yeah,” I replied. “Cuz there was no time at all in the ten-minute drive here to even give me your name.”
An uncomfortable silence followed. The woman didn’t appear happy to have been told she was wrong. Ash, the Reese-wannabe, looked chagrined.
“Forgive me,” he said. “I was rude. This must be very alarming for you.”
“You damn right it is,” I said.
“Ashrael Shinoch,” he said, extending his hand. “Call me ‘Ash.’”
I flicked my gaze over to the woman, sending a clear message that this was how you do it. Then I shook Ash’s hand.
“Sassy Kincaide,” I said.
“Sassy?” Scott said. “We were told your name was Cecily.”
“It is on my birth certificate,” I said. “But I go by ‘Sassy.’”
“Well-named,” the woman said.
I turned and gave her the biggest eyeroll I could summon.
“So that makes you Brinson?” I said.
“Yes,” she replied. “Agent Erin Brinson.”
“Well, Agent Brinson,” I said, “thanks for rolling the demon off me, but maybe you could appreciate how effed up this all is from my perspective.”
Brinson at last looked chagrined, though only slightly.
“You’re welcome,” she said. “And sorry. We were focused on trying to get you to safety.”
“Yeah, well, I appreciate that. Now will someone tell me just what in the hell is going on?”
“Gladly,” Scott said. “Please have a seat.”
I wanted to defy him, keep standing, tell him he was not telling me what to do. But I was tired already, and the adrenaline of the fight was wearing off. I dropped into the nearest chair. Ash sat next to me. Brinson took up a position at the door. That did nothing to make me feel better.
“Ms. Kincaide,” Scott began, “we are The Order. As you’ve no doubt guessed, magic is real, and many of the creatures from your myths and legends actually exist. Our job is to make certain humanity as a whole never discovers these facts. Incidents like the Salem Witch Trials and the Spanish Inquisition show only too well what would happen if humanity knew the truth. This secrecy is formally called The Veil, and The Order’s job is to enforce and protect it.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said. “Ash explained that much of it to me. What has any of this got to do with me?”
“As Ash also explained,” Brinson said, “you are the target of an assassination contract made with The Guild of the Blade. Our team was assigned to prevent them from succeeding and to bring you in.”
My patience was wearing pretty thin. They’d told me all this before. It didn’t make any sense.
“And just why do you people care whether I live or die?” I asked.
“Several reasons, Ms. Kincaide,” Scott said. “First, the Guild is officially an outlaw organization. It is often tolerated by the powers that be in the magical world, but it does not have sanction from The Arcane Council to exist.”
“Arcane Council?” I prodded.
“They’re the people in charge of the magical world,” Ash explained. “They created The Veil, and The Order is its official enforcement arm.”
“Correct,” Scott said. “So the attempted assassination of a woman ignorant of the magical community is a serious breach of The Veil.
“Furthermore, we believe they were hired by D’Krisch Mk’Rai, a dragon, who is a known menace to the magical community and regularly flaunts The Veil.”
“Wait. Hold up,” I said. “A dragon? Like, an actual dragon?”
“Yes,” Ash said.
“Giant, winged lizard that can breathe fire?” I said. “That kind of dragon?”
“Yes,” Scott said. “We’ve been at odds with Mk’Rai for some time. He’s a particularly vicious dragon.”
My brain started melting. Dragons were badass enough in D&D. They were telling me they were real and one of them wanted me dead? What the actual fuck was happening here?
“And why does this dragon want me dead?” I asked.
“Because,” Scott answered, “we believe it discovered we were planning to recruit you to kill it.”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. This whole scenario just kept getting more and more ridiculous. I was a magical creature. The magical secret police were recruiting me to slay an actual badass dragon. But the dragon found out and hired a demon to kill me.
“I assure you this is no laughing matter,” Scott said.
“Hey, you don’t gotta tell me twice,” I said, still chuckling. “I’m the one who had to fight that demon. But seriously, how can you expect me to just listen to this?”
“Because the information we’re giving you is true, and it may save your life,” Brinson said.
The arrogance was back in her voice. She clearly thought I was being disrespectful or something. Maybe I was, but can you blame me?
“Okay, I’ll play along,” I said. “Why were you planning to recruit me to slay your dragon for you?”
“You’re one of us, Ms. Kincaide,” Scott said. “You are Nephilim.”
“Yeah, Ash said that too,” I replied. “What the hell does it mean?”
“Nephilim are mentioned briefly in the Bible,” Ash said. “Genesis Chapter Six. They’re the offspring of angels mating with human women.”
“And they were the reason Yahweh sent the flood Noah survived with his ark,” Scott added.
“Wait, wait, wait,” I said. “You’re telling me my daddy was an angel?”
This was too much. Mama slept with an angel? Bullshit.
“No,” Scott said. “So far as we know there hasn’t been any direct mating between angels and humans in millennia. Your line goes back much farther – to the time before The Flood.”
“I thought you said God wiped out all the Nephilim.”
“No,” Scott said. “The Bible isn’t as accurate as fundamentalist Christians claim.”
“You have to view the history in the Bible through the eyes of the people who wrote it,” Ash put in. “This was a pre-science culture. They wrote that Yahweh flooded the whole world and only Noah and his family survived it. But they had no ability to conceive how large the world was. So a flood that devastated a region could, in their eyes, drown the whole world.”
“The Flood allegedly sent by Yahweh was to destroy Nephilim who were wicked and used their power to subjugate humanity,” Scott said, resuming the narrative. “The humans under t
heir yoke prayed to their god, and he delivered them.
“But many Nephilim survived in other countries, for the angels spread their seed wide. You are descended from that line.”
I blinked several times. This was too much to take in. Shit in the Bible was real? I was some magical offspring of human women and angels? And a dragon wanted to kill me? I was beginning to feel sorry I’d asked what was going on. It made more sense before they told me.
“How do you know I’m Nephilim?” I asked.
“Because your father was,” Scott pronounced.
That landed like a bomb on the table. My father. The man I’d never known. The man my mother refused to speak about. He was some sort of half-angel?
“What?” I whispered.
“Your father was Eli Silverman,” Scott said. “He was a commander of this cell, and he was trying to find and recruit you.”
Oh, God. Oh, shit. The dead guy was my father. It really was my dad.
The room started spinning. I put my hands on the table to steady myself.
“What,” I began, but I had to swallow before I could continue. My mouth had gone dry. “What happened to him?”
“He was murdered two days ago,” Scott said.
“By the same assassin who tried to kill you,” Brinson added.
It was suddenly hard to breathe. Detective Weiss had said there was a family resemblance between me and the dead guy. I’d noticed it too, but I had refused to really believe it. I didn’t want it to be true.
Everything I’d suspected about the homicide the cops had shown me was correct. It had been the same assailant. The dead guy was killed by the same demon who had tried to whack me. My name and address were in his pocket because he was looking for me.
He was looking for me because I’m his daughter.
Oh, shit. My father had been searching for me and some fucking demon had murdered him before he could find me. I’d never get to talk to him. I’d never get to ask him why the fuck he’d disappeared before I was born. Why he’d never been there for me growing up. Why Mama hated him so much.
Spots danced in front of my eyes. I couldn’t think.
“Ms. Kincaide, are you all right?” Ash said from somewhere far away.
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