by Ivy Sinclair
Keeping Paige close and safe was my number one priority, especially as we embarked on the next part of our mission. This one would be far more difficult than the first. If it went well, then I would have to rely on diplomacy as opposed to violence. Of course, the last time I had seen the archangels, they had shot first without any talking at all. Hopefully, the fall of the demons in front of them would stay their hand long enough for a chat.
We appeared on the hill above the church in the cemetery. I heard Paige’s gasp before the scene before me fully registered in my mind. The church of St. Joseph was gone. Nothing but a pile of ash with a smoldering fire around it remained. I had a feeling that Alice would give me an earful the next time I saw her, despite the fact that I hadn’t had a direct part in the destruction.
There were bodies all around us. Some of them were twisted and grotesque and most certainly dead. Others that were beginning to stir and moan. These survivors would come up into the light and have no idea what had happened to them. We had to make sure that they got help, but first we had a meeting with the ambassadors of the light.
Taking Paige’s hand in mine, we began our descent toward the burned out remnants of the church. I sensed that she had questions, but she was holding them inside. I didn’t blame her. Everywhere we looked was further evidence of violence. I would do everything I could to ensure that this didn’t happen anywhere else. Not by my fault or my hand. The fact that I had been part of it at all was something that I would need to atone for. I felt Paige’s hand squeeze around mine, and I looked over at her. Her lips trembled, but she offered me a faint smile. I would do it for her, even if it took the rest of time.
I realized with a start that I had no idea how long that would be now that I was an angel. Paige was human again. That thought flittered through my mind and caused me to frown. It was something we’d need to address about our relationship, but not now. Not until we finished what we had come here to do.
I felt the subtle shift in the air and pulled on Paige’s hand to halt her. Closing my eyes, I let my senses drift out and then I grabbed her close to me. I pivoted in my spot and brought my hand up ready to cast a shield over us if necessary.
“You should be dead.” The words were spoken in a flat tone. I opened my eyes. Benjamin stood in front of us, but he looked different.
“I get that a lot,” I said. I didn’t let go of Paige. I knew that he and Paige had struck a bargain, and that was the reason the archangels had descended on St. Joseph’s. The thing was before I turned, that’s what I had been counting on. I amassed my army intending that I’d make my stand here and wipe out all opposition to my plans. It seemed ironic that in the end, that was exactly what was happening. It just wasn’t taking the form that I originally intended.
“You lied to me, Paige.” Benjamin focused on the woman in my arms. “You said that you would tell me when you found Riley, and instead, I find you in conspiracy with him. After all I did for you.”
“You never did anything for me that couldn’t be leveraged for your own benefit,” Paige said defiantly. I wanted to shield her from all of this, but I knew that wasn’t what she wanted. My girl was strong, and she never backed away from a fight. “To me, that negates any arrangement between us. You weren’t honest with me about your intentions, and I wasn’t honest about mine. Fair’s fair.”
“There has hardly been anything in all of this that has been fair, has there?” Benjamin said. He splayed his hands in front of him. If he meant it to be a sign of submission, he failed simply by the expression of hatred on his face. “I lost everything because of the two of you. My island. My relic. My territory. My position in the hierarchy of Heaven.” He must have seen my look of surprise. “Oh, yes. You haven’t heard. After your disappearing stunt earlier, my brothers voted unanimously to have Ezekiel become the head archangel. In fact, they stripped me of my status altogether. I stand before as nothing more than a lowly angel.”
“Shit,” I heard Paige mutter.
“You can try to blame us all you want,” I said. “At the end of the day, it’s a fate you brought on yourself, Benjamin. You played the side game, and now it’s biting you in the ass. If you think we’re going to feel sorry for you, you can go fuck yourself.”
Benjamin’s eyes blazed, and as his mouth opened, his body went stiff. His eyes widened, and then I saw a stream of blood fall from the corner of his mouth. His body was jerked upwards, and a blossom of red appeared in the center of his chest. Benjamin chortled a short scream.
I held Paige’s arm. Her immediate reaction had been to move toward him, but I knew in that instant what was happened.
“Show yourself!” I called out.
A dark laugh rolled across the air. Benjamin’s body crumpled to the ground. In his place stood Adam. He held Benjamin’s heart in his hand. He gave me a wink and then he ground the heart to dust before letting it slide to the ground over Benjamin’s body.
“He was always a talker. Blah, blah, blah. Life is so hard. Everyone’s so mean to me.” Adam rolled his eyes. “To think that was the best that God could make after he banished me. Quite a downgrade, don’t you think?”
Paige started to shiver against me, and I held her more tightly against me. This was her first time seeing Adam outside of the memories of the Protector. He was even more menacing up close and personal.
He threw back his hood, and I saw that his skin appeared as if it was starting to rot.
“Looks like you picked up a case of acne,” I said pointing at his face. “They have products to help with that now.”
“You are supposed to be dead,” he said looking at Paige.
“Yeah, I get that a lot,” she said, mimicking my words from earlier. Her sarcastic tone wasn’t firm, but it was clear. She was scared, and I didn’t blame her. I wondered if this could be the end. She glanced up at me, and I thought about what I had said. I told her if we defeated Proctor, I would have a plan for Adam. And I did, but it was happening ahead of schedule.
Viho’s talk of darkness and light had gotten me thinking quite a bit about what could happen when the two joined forces as one. I didn’t think it was as easy as just trying to combine them together. Adam was the original dark angel. He had given over to his darkness. I knew well what a seductress it was. He had spent over a thousand years as an instrument of revenge. He had killed his siblings because he was so jealous of them. What would twist someone’s mind like that other than evil?
I opened my mind and let my thoughts wander looking for the one I sought. He had to be close by.
Samuel. My archangel sire. It was his blood that had changed me from a simple human necromancer into what I was today.
“So, your thirst for revenge no longer exists. Pity,” Adam said. “I wanted to make you pay for ruining my plans.”
“On the grand plan side, your strategy seemed pretty weak,” I said. “Kill almost all your siblings. Gain favor with God. When that didn’t work, whoops, let’s ruin the life of your last remaining sibling for all time.”
“You, of all people, should understand that I didn’t want to ruin Eva’s life,” Adam said slowly. “You took away the one that would have secured her fate.”
“What?” The angel wasn’t making any sense.
“You wanted your sister to be like you,” Paige said in a low voice. “You cursed her and made it so that she was sent to that dark place so that she’d cross the line between good and evil. And once she was evil forever, you would have someone by your side.”
“Are you kidding me? A grand plan of mass destruction because you were lonely?” The idea seemed too far-fetched, but as I saw the tightening of the lines around Adam’s face, I realized that it was true. That was how far he had fallen. Simple desires had grown deep roots and set into action a series of events that could damn the entire world.
Unless someone did something about it.
I heard the change of the air behind me. I gave a small sigh of relief. I could only keep Adam entertained with my wit a
nd sarcasm for so long before he’d try to make a move toward us. I knew that I was strong, but he had a thousand years on me. The match wouldn’t last long, and there was a good chance that Paige would end up as collateral damage in that scenario. I wasn’t about to let that happen.
“I have come,” Samuel said.
Adam sneered. “To fall to the same fate as your brother?” He gestured at Benjamin’s body at his feet. I heard Samuel’s gasp. “You left him out in the cold as you angels always do. You made him vulnerable. That’s when the strong ones like me will always be able to take the upper hand.”
A blending of darkness and light. Viho’s words rang through my mind again.
Take Paige’s hand. I had no idea if my silent instruction got through to Samuel or not. When Samuel stepped to Paige’s other side, I gave her the nudge to lock hands with him. I knew the guy didn’t trust me, but we had a bigger issue on our hands.
I knew immediately when the connection locked in. It was as if a massive wave of energy rolled through me. Paige was the conduit. I heard Samuel’s hiss, and then before I could say anything else, he had raised his hand. A flash of light more brilliant than the sun at high noon emerged from his fingertips.
Adam had his arm up to deflect the rays. He flew forward, directly at Paige. I barely had time to try to move her away when the rays grew even brighter and then they were released to envelop Adam’s massive form.
I heard Adam screaming as the rays invaded every part of his body. Then light shone out of his eye sockets, his nostrils, his mouth. It was as if the light was consuming him from the inside out. There was one more massive roar and an explosion.
Upended and thrown backward by the force, the contact I had with Paige was broken. I cried out even as I jumped to my feet, but I couldn’t see anything. It was as if I was blind.
“Paige!” I yelled. “Paige! Where are you?”
“Here, Riley.” Her voice was tired. Worn out.
I moved forward blindly trying to find the source of her voice. Then I felt her hands on my cheek. I’d know her touch anywhere. My eyesight finally cleared, and I was looking down into her sweet face.
“What the fuck just happened?” I said.
“That was the smite to end all smites,” Samuel said as he came up behind Paige. “That kind of power is forbidden for a reason. The destruction it can cause, if it isn’t contained, could be devastating.”
So I had finally seen what a smite looked like. That was one to mark off the list. On the ground where Adam had stood was a small dark stone. I probably wouldn’t have even noticed it except for the occasional shimmer and flash across its surface that almost made it seem to be alive. “He’s in there?” I asked.
“I’ve contained his essence there, yes,” Samuel said. “Which I couldn’t have done without your assistance. Even the power of the collective archangels probably wouldn’t have been enough to contain him.”
“Why didn’t you kill him? Paige asked. “There certainly felt like there was enough power being generated for you to do that.”
He looked at her with a long, considering look. The pause was long enough that I tugged on her arm to bring her closer to me. “There is only one being who can completely destroy an original angel. That is God. I will take Adam’s inanimate form to him, and let him do the rest.”
“Didn’t he do that once before?” That was the part of the whole original angel story that bothered me. “God supposedly did away with Adam the first time.”
Samuel sighed. “That was Eva’s greatest mistake. God couldn’t kill Adam. He told everyone that he did, but he only set him into a state of sleep like what you see here. The only way that he could be reanimated was by blood. Eva rescued him from the deepest vaults of Heaven and set him free. Free to wander the world alone. She thought that she had also stripped him of his power, but Adam was exceedingly clever, and Eva was naïve.”
“He’s not coming back this time, right?” I said.
“No,” Samuel said. “There is no one left who could think for a moment that Adam is anything other than evil. I will make sure that God follows through this time.” He picked up the rock. Then he looked at Paige again before raising an eyebrow at me. “How did you know that using Paige as a mirror between us would work?”
“I didn’t,” I admitted. “But you guys tried to kill me earlier, and she was able to bend that energy in a way to heal me. Remove the taint of the curse. It seemed like as good a plan as any. Combine light and dark into a perfect balance and see what happened. It was something that my father told me.”
“Your father was a wise man,” Samuel said.
I glared at him. “Letting me believe he was alive was pretty shitty. Just sayin’.”
“Viho has proven himself a friend to us over the years. In this situation, he was beneficial. He was able to move among his family and meet you through the course of this adventure, and you got to know your father. I’d say that it was a fair deal, all things considered.” There wasn’t the slightest bit of regret in Samuel’s voice.
That was one reason I’d never trust angels. Even when you thought they were the good guys and on your side, you had to remember that they played a long game that you rarely could see.
“I’d like it if you and your brethren would leave me and Paige alone from now on,” I said. I was okay that there was a slightly menacing wavelength being conveyed in my words. “I won’t say that we’re exactly on the same side, but we’re not on the opposite ones either. As long as you stay out of my face, I’ll stay out of yours.”
“Is that really a guarantee that you can make, Riley?” Samuel asked.
“I want to make good for the wrong I’ve done over the last ten years,” I said. “I want to live in peace with Paige, and not have to worry about angels showing up on our doorstep wanting to smite us. Given how I’ve just helped you, that seems like a much better deal than continuing to fight and possibly injuring more innocent people in the process.”
Samuel seemed to consider my words as he examined the rock in his hands. Then he finally gave a short nod. “I will speak to Ezekiel about it. I will offer my recommendation that we agree to your terms. However, don’t think that he won’t have terms of his own. That’s just the way that Ezekiel is.”
“You know where to find me when you’re ready to negotiate those further,” I said.
“Until then, goodbye my brother,” he said. Giving a small gesture of a wave, he disappeared.
Paige breathed a sigh of relief, and she untangled herself from my arms. She crossed to the body that still lay broken and bleeding next to the road. I could see the tears forming in her eyes as she slid to her knees.
“Oh, Benjamin. Why?” she whispered.
I moved to stand behind her. I wanted to give her the space she needed to say goodbye. I didn’t understand or approve of her feelings toward the archangel, but I did understand the sentiment of losing a friend. Paige had suffered nothing but loss in her short life. I wanted to make sure that she never lost anyone important to her ever again.
Looking up at the sky above us, I saw the clouds parting to let the mid-afternoon sun through. The rays warmed my flesh, and I thought for the first time in a long time that everything was going to be all right. Then I heard Paige’s gasp, and my wings flew out behind me.
Benjamin’s fingers were wrapped around Paige’s wrist. Stunned, I watched as he sat up. The hole in his chest was gone. “Holy shit,” I said. It hadn’t occurred to me that Paige’s ability to heal would extend to a dead archangel, but I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised. She had healed me, body and soul. I pulled her away from him, though. Benjamin couldn’t be trusted when it came to Paige.
“Thank you, Paige,” he said as he climbed carefully to his feet. “I don’t quite know how you did what you just did, but thank you.”
Paige trembled in my arms. “You’re welcome, Benjamin.” Her chin rose. “Now, we’re even. You brought me back to life when I lived with you on Calamata. I’ve
brought you back to life now. No more interference in my life. Go back to your brothers. Please leave me alone.”
There was a sadness in his eyes. I almost felt sorry for the guy. Almost. He nodded, and then he was gone.
I squeezed Paige in my arms and dropped a light kiss on the top of her head. Suddenly, I felt bone-weary as if I hadn’t slept in weeks. “C’mon, babe. Let’s go home.”
CHAPTER TEN – PAIGE
Looking back on everything that had happened in my life since that fateful night I met Riley in the graveyard on Calamata Island, it could easily be mistaken for a crazy dream. One that was part nightmare. There was a part of me that thought each day when I woke up that I’d be back in my bed in that small apartment above the flower shop, and I’d find that it wasn’t real. I was more grateful with each passing day that it was not.
As I stood beside Riley on the gently sloping hill that eventually led to the Protector’s final resting place, I couldn’t help but feel joy and hope for my future. Our hands were clasped together as we stood and listened to Elder Flynn speak the words that bound us together as man and wife in the Hopekee tradition.
I heard the sniffles of our small assembled crowd behind us. Riley’s adopted mother Joanna and his sister Gabrielle stood with Alice. Klein had agreed to stand behind me and act as my family. I was grateful for all of them and had even started to grow close to them. My only regret was that my own parents couldn’t be there to see it.
I felt a swelling of love and gratitude as Elder Flynn finally pronounced us man and wife. I turned to Riley, and he smiled at me with a wide grin. He leaned over and placed a rather chaste kiss on my lips, which just wouldn’t do. I threw my arms around his neck and pulled him close to me. There wouldn’t be any more half-baked, pale emotions in our life. We’d meet everything we encountered with passion and life.