Chapter 17
OUR RIDE TO the wine country was uneventful until we spotted red flames dancing against a dark forest up ahead. The local police had set up a roadblock north of Napa. Jack waited for us there to get us through.
When Jack, Inga, and I were alone, he said, “Your cover story is that you’re both working for me.”
Inga beamed. “Am I a private detective? Like Miss Marple?”
Jack nodded.
I wasn’t sure Torino was stupid enough to fall for that, but it was Jack’s problem, not mine.
One bit of good luck was that the fire was being blown north by the wind. That drove it away from the largest town in the area, Napa.
Jack drove us to the ignition point in his vehicle. I could clearly smell sulfur in the air, which sent a twinge of fear through me. My last fight with demons hadn’t gone well.
“Definitely hellfire” Inga said.
“No doubt,” Jack said.
We walked over to the edge of the burned area. “It looks like someone torched a bush here, probably with a flaming sword. That’s where the smell of sulfur is the strongest.”
“Because of the stiff breeze,” Jack said, “the front line of the fire is a half-mile away already.”
I used my cell phone as a flashlight to examine the area near where the fire had started. Someone had driven back onto a dirt road about a hundred yards from the highway and parked at a wide spot on the road. Once he’d set the fire—most arsonists were men—he’d probably jumped back in his vehicle and tore off. I checked the ground and found a spot where tires had recently spun over the gravel. Hellfire could kill a demon as easily as an angel, so whoever had started the blaze had a good reason to get out of there quickly. The wind could shift at any time.
I was still examining the area when someone pulled up in a small black SUV. Torino got out, and I steeled myself for the inevitable confrontation.
He ignored Jack and Inga and walked straight up to me. “Where were you two hours ago, when this fire started?”
Jack began to defend me, but I held up my hand to stop him. For once, I had a great alibi, and I couldn’t wait to throw it in Torino’s face.
I told Torino about the jazz club Inga and I had visited, and I showed him the photograph with the band leader. She corroborated my story.
Torino shut up, but I could tell that he doubted me. That was fine. He could run around for a few hours confirming the truth. That would keep him out of our hair.
For form’s sake, I collected a sample of the soil and ash at the ignition point. Although I didn’t doubt that the blaze was ignited with hellfire, I was curious as to what the FBI’s lab might find.
As I stood up, the back of my neck tingled. Off to my left, ten demons materialized out of thin air. They were already holding red flaming swords out.
“Dammit,” Jack said. “This was a trap.”
One of the demons, a goblin, pointed at me. “Here’s a new one.”
I heard Jack’s message to Honah in my head. We’ve been ambushed by ten demons. They seem to have picked out Gabriel as an easy target.
Honah replied immediately. It’s part of a concerted plan. They’re attacking everywhere, drawing off all our resources. Would you like me to remove you from the confrontation?
Jack and Inga both bristled. No, he told the chief. We will take a defensive stance until you can send help.
I will, as soon as I can, but not as much as would like.
Jack was right about the dark immortals targeting the new guy. Two demons dashed toward me, but he was even faster, stepping between me and them, his sword at the ready. Inga took up a position right next to him.
But two couldn’t fend off ten very well. The demons encircled us. I pulled out my sword and faced a huge devil closest to me. His arms reached out a foot more than mine, and his sword was longer.
Just then, Kiko and another guardian angel appeared outside the ring. She dashed at the closest demon to her, an ogre, and stabbed at his right side.
He juked to the left. In that instant, she and the other guardian slipped through the infernal ring to join Jack, Inga, and me. Now we were five against ten. Much better odds.
Jack smiled at the newcomers. “Welcome to our little party.”
The five of us formed our own circle, backs to each other. Kiko tried to step in front of me, but I pushed between her and Inga. I wasn’t a great warrior, but I was better than nothing.
Inga struck first, lunging with her blade against the devil who’d wanted a piece of me. He was bigger than her, too, but she was blindingly quick. Her blade flashed, and he screamed. She’d cut his free hand, slicing off a couple of fingers.
I was now facing a much smaller devil, and he seemed distracted by screaming next to him. Way to go, Inga!
I swept my blade across waist high, and he backed up just in time.
The devil’s screaming was drowned out by clashing swords. All I had do was to hold off the smaller devil and a wraith in front of me.
Jack thought to me, Don’t try to be a hero. Just play defense until we can cut down a few of these guys.
I thought back, You bet.
Playing defense was easier said than done. The two in front of me were coordinating their attacks. Luckily, they couldn’t get to my sides, but I was forced to move my sword back and forth too quickly to parry their blows. I needed a sword in each hand, but I could hardly manage the one effectively.
The wraith’s flaming blade seemed to pop out of nowhere, and it grazed my right arm. The blade didn’t cut me, but its intense heat blackened my skin. The pain clouded my mind. I leapt backwards, bumping into Jack. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to miss a step.
The demon in front of me cackled. “Hurts like a bitch doesn’t it?”
It really did, but I gritted my teeth to keep from admitting it.
Fortunately, the underlying muscles in my arm still worked. Then I remembered the dagger Diana had given me. God bless you. I kept moving both blades, blocking blows from both opponents, and every so often, I got a jab in with my sword.
A demon behind me shrieked in pain, and Jack yelled, “Finally!”
I resisted the temptation to look, too busy trying to stay alive.
Kiko did glance. Then she screamed, an agonizing sound. An ogre’s sword had run her through. In an instant, with a puff of white smoke, she was gone forever.
The ogre in front of her lifted both arms in triumph and yelled, “Yeesss!”
I was almost blinded by fury. Before he could lower his arms, I stabbed at his stomach.
His yell turned into a shriek, but he wasn’t done.
I stretched my arm to the utmost, straining to drive the tip of my blade all the way through him.
With a final push, his high-pitched wail ended with a huge cloud of black smoke.
Normally I would’ve celebrated, but I was still shocked at losing Kiko so suddenly. Confusion welled up in me. How could she have passed so quickly?
Inga and the other guardians screamed as raptors. That sound resonated in me, and I shrieked, sounding more like a falcon than a human.
The demons froze for a second, as though stunned by the noise. I jabbed at my single opponent and sliced open his free arm.
The angels chanted in the language I was beginning to learn. The only word I recognized was vengeance.
I had to get my head on straight, or I’d end up the same way.
The guardian’s rage was so great that their chants echoed off the nearby hill. Two of the demons turned and flew off. The angels quickly destroyed the remaining demons.
When the fight ended, I took several breaths to try to clear my mind. Then I looked more carefully at the spot where Kiko had stood, hoping somehow that she’d changed forms, or even had become a pure spirit. Nothing. No bird or any other sentient being existed in her place. Nor did I feel her magical aura. She had gone to the great void, nothingness forever.
; A wave of guilt overwhelmed me, and my legs wouldn’t support me. I collapsed to the ground.
When the others asked if I’d been injured, I told them the terrible truth. “The only reason she was here was to protect me.”
Inga sat next to me and put an arm around my waist. “That’s not true, Gabe. Those demons set this trap without knowing who’d be drawn in. They were happy to see a weak angel, sure, but everyone in the legion was once the newest and weakest.”
Jack raised his face to the dark sky and screamed again at the top of his lungs. Despair filled the air. I shared their emptiness, but couldn’t speak.
A moment later, he reached his hand out to mine and pulled me up. “This loss had nothing to do with you, buddy. She must’ve lost her concentration for a second. That’s all it takes.”
I said to all of them, “When Jack beat his first opponent, she glanced over for second. I almost did, too. You can check.”
I don’t think any of them did, but a few seconds later, Honah appeared. He closed his eyes for a moment then looked at me. “What happened to her?”
None of us spoke. I tried to, but my throat was so tight words wouldn’t come.
The chief must’ve checked my memory because he held his head with his hands and wailed out his misery. For a full minute, he held his piercing scream. Then silence.
I expected him to lay into me as the partial cause of our horrible loss. He had to have recognized my role in insisting on fighting next to her. He didn’t speak to me.
Maybe he was beyond pointing the blame for the moment. It was too soon to get past his grief. But soon, he would…and point the finger at me.
Honah stood motionless. All of us crowded around him, trying to comfort him and each other. Once more, I felt like the odd man out. They’d all worked together for so long, at least decades. They knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses, and how to correct for them. I barely understood how to pull out my sword.
Although Kiko and I had worked together for a couple of months, she’d rarely spoken to me. I had thought myself too lowly for her, but I didn’t really know why she’d been so reserved. Maybe she was just painfully shy. I hadn’t tried to find out, and that grieved me.
I made a point of telling everyone individually how sorry I was for her loss. They nodded and told me the same. She was the first angel to die since I’d become immortal. Living forever obviously didn’t work out for everybody. And given my many weaknesses, I realized it wasn’t likely to work out for me.
Inga, my tough warrior friend, cried openly. I patted her on the back. She wrapped her arms around me and sobbed on my shoulder. We wept together. My blackened arm ached from stretching it around her, but I ignored the pain.
I couldn’t get past the feeling that I’d somehow contributed to Kiko’s annihilation. Maybe if there’d been only four angels, all more experienced fighters who wouldn’t have had to protect me, they could’ve had an easier time of it.
Honah stared at me. “Don’t be ridiculous. You have nothing to regret. You fought bravely and made no fatal mistakes. If you hadn’t been present to help, their struggle would’ve been even more difficult.”
He obviously didn’t care much for self-pity, so I pushed those ugly thoughts out of my mind.
After a few minutes, I let go of Inga and stared up at the starlit sky. Why did God allow so much loss?
Waves of despair flowed through me. After losing my mother so young, it had taken me years to come to terms with death. My depression could easily come back again. The shock of losing Kiko was keeping me from thinking about anything but this loss.
Then I looked around. None of us were coping very well. They all had glassy eyes that didn’t seem to see anything. We wandered in circles.
Milton showed up and pulled Honah aside. They spoke in hushed tones for several minutes before they returned to me and the others who’d fought. Milton put his arm on my shoulder. I was sure he was ransacking my head to see how I’d made the situation worse instead of better. Despite Honah’s comforting words, I knew I could’ve done more. If I’d fought better, maybe Kiko wouldn’t have been distracted.
Milton looked me straight in the eyes. His shoulders were slumped, and he shook his head slowly. “Do not reproach yourself. You did not contribute to her mistake.”
One by one, he walked up to each of us survivors, put his hand on their shoulder, and stared into their souls. He had no words of criticism for any of us. Then he looked to the north, where the fire continued to blaze. “This trap was devastatingly effective. Caligula is an extraordinarily dangerous foe.”
I couldn’t agree more. Even worse, I couldn’t imagine how we were going to lay our hands on the monster.
-o-o-o-
IN AN INSTANT, we appeared back at the legion headquarters. The word had already gotten out. The room was packed, and many of the angels were openly weeping. In the past, I’d thought them surprisingly cold and unemotional, but I was wrong. They were having trouble warming up to me, but they’d obviously felt great affection for Kiko.
In my distress, I’d forgotten about my arm. Inga approached Deng Ming and led him by the hand to me. He spoke to me in rapid-fire Chinese, but I didn’t understand. Then he placed his fingertips on my charred skin. As my pain flowed into him, he froze for a few seconds.
Once Ming could move again, he took a deep breath but didn’t lift his fingers. My pain flowed away into him and beyond into the infinite. Then he healed my skin.
I wished he could heal my sense of emptiness easily, but my despair didn’t lessen. Nor did his, if his sunken, red eyes were any clue.
“Thank you, so much, Ming,” I told him. “You perform miracles.”
He gave me a weak smile and patted my back before wandering off.
All of us continued to mill about, chatting with each other, trying to find the right words. This immortal world could be so brutal.
-o-o-o-
Sunday, August 20th
ONE THOUGHT KEPT coming back to me— Caligula had to pay with his own life for taking Kiko’s. I would not accept surrender anymore. Demons didn’t usually give up, but that wouldn’t be an option for him, not if I had anything to say about it.
My fury was as strong as ever, and it drove me back to work. While many folks continued to wander about trying to comfort each other, I sat back at my desk and continued my research on the demons connected to him who might be sheltering him and his group.
I was still researching when Honah told me it was time to return to the ranch.
Jackie had left the night before, leaving me, Ellen, and Clara to take care of each other. I tried to hide my feelings, but my sister knew me too well.
“What’s wrong?” she asked as I made her breakfast. She was still eating for two.
I couldn’t make up much of a lie. “I just heard that a friend, not someone I knew well, just an acquaintance, died a violent death out in the Bay Area.”
Ellen’s blissful peaceful face changed instantly. “Oh, I’m so sorry.”
I shrugged, couldn’t give her any more details, despite her asking.
“I can help for you to go out there,” she said.
“I don’t think I should. She was not someone I knew well.” There was no point in dragging Ellen and Clara into my misery. I reached out my arms for my niece, and I took her on our morning tour of the property.
Each day, she seemed more alert and interested in the ranch and particularly the animals. It was such a joy to hold her knowing that I could keep her safe from most harm. To protect the innocent, like Clara, Caligula had to go.
Ellen and Clara kept me company throughout the morning as I handled the ranch chores. It was another hot day, but thunderstorms rolled in during the early afternoon. That was a blessing California wasn’t getting. It almost never rained in California between April and October. That annual drought made wildfires along the West Coast more dangerous in late summer and early fall.
&nbs
p; -o-o-o-
IN THE LATE afternoon, I told Ellen a white lie about working for a client in my private detective business so I could leave earlier in the day for California. She was thrilled to hear I had a paying client, and I told her he was richer than sin, which was true. Honah could probably put his hands on more money than Bezos and Gates put together.
The chief teleported me west, but not to the legion’s office. A crowd of over a thousand angels stood in an ancient grove of redwoods. Actually, we were inside a state park, in an out-of-the-way part, but people were wandering around nearby in the mortal dimension. They didn’t see us at all.
Honah wore a ceremonial war bonnet made from bald eagle feathers, and his face was painted as though he was about to ride off to battle. That was close to the truth because his immediate sorrow had been replaced by a cold, steely resolve in his eyes.
Honah and several other Indian angels beat war drums and chanted in a language I didn’t recognize. His voice broke as he sang.
I stood on the edge of the crowd in the back, but Milton sent me a mental message. Come forward. You fought at Kiko’s side, and you deserve recognition for helping in her final battle.
I’d hoped to stay anonymous. Some of the angels might resent me for being weak and suspect that I got their friend killed. And they were right to think that. Plus, I didn’t know her nearly as well as most of the others.
But I wasn’t going to argue with the Earth’s most powerful being on an occasion like this. Yes, sir.
I skirted the edge of the crowd until I reached the front and noticed that all the others there at Kiko’s end were standing in a line behind Honah. He and the other Indians continued to chant, and I let the anger and defiance in their voices soak into me. If Caligula thought that he could help himself by destroying one of us, he was nuts. Nothing would persuade us to back off.
When the Indians finished singing, Milton stood on the trunk of a downed redwood so everyone could see him. “We gather together to commemorate the achievements of one of our sisters of the light. She gave her existence so that others may know the Lord’s blessings.”
Because of Dad, I’d heard many funeral services, and Milton hit all the right notes. He summarized Kiko’s life as a human and followed with her devotion to God as one of his chosen messengers. Milton also talked about the vital need to fight evil on Earth and everywhere else it could be found.
Infernal Justice (Angels at the Edge Book 2) Page 17