Fallen: Part 2

by Tamsin Baker

  Fallen

  - part 2.

  By Tamsin Baker

  Dedication:

  To Nicole Morgan.

  My friend.

  Leader.

  And inspiration.

  Copyright © 2018 by Tamsin Baker

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED:

  This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission. All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  Cover by: Winter Bayne

  Edited by: Charmaine Ross

  Contents Page:

  Chapter 1.

  Chapter 2.

  Chapter 3.

  Chapter 4.

  Chapter 5.

  Chapter 1.

  I stepped out of the front door into the cool, late afternoon. For a moment I just swayed on the spot, standing on the doorstep of Jasmine’s brownstone.

  Fear, an unknown emotion to me up until this point, shivered along my spine like a slither of ice. Cold, strong and unwanted.

  I’d just made the biggest decision of my life. I’d left behind the other most important thing in the world to me. My son. I still couldn’t quite get my head around it and yet I knew I had no choice.

  Yes, I could stay here and protect my child, in Jasmine’s home while she tended to him. But that would not bring his mother back to me. And it would not solve the puzzle. Why was Kadie’s life was so important to the Demons?

  I stretched to my full height beneath my shield of invisibility and stretched out my blackened wings. I needed clothes first, and a plan second.

  Kadie’s home was the best place for me go to at the moment.A place I could be alone to think for a while. Everything had happened incredibly fast, and my brain was struggling to catch up with my new reality.

  I had a child. Half Angel. Part human. Part Witch son.

  Impossible…

  I leaned forward, cleared Jasmine’s stoop, flapped my wings and catapulted myself into the sky.

  I flew higher and higher until the clouds were at my elbows and Earth was far away beneath me.

  I glanced up at the never-ending expanse of blue. I’d never before stopped to ask ‘why.’ I’d been taught it wasn’t my place to question my fate, nor the overall ‘plan’. But here I was, still a Fallen Angel, and a new father.

  How had I achieved such a thing? And why was I still an Angel if I was able to father a child? Shouldn’t I be demoted to a human, at the very least? Taking away my immortality seemed like a perfect punishment. Although if I could grow old and die after a life spent with Kadie, it would be punishment at all. I’d finally found someone to exist for

  But now, everything had changed. I’d changed. I wasn’t trying to get back into Heaven anymore.

  But there was so much more to think about than just my impending mortality. Why did Hell’s Demons want my unborn child? And why did the price of his life seem to be the life of my beautiful Kadie?

  No answers came to me.

  I closed my eyes, extended out my arms and thought of my lover. Teramea. The reason I’d been thrown out of Heaven.

  There was a whisper in my ear. The faintest of words.

  Go now.

  My eyes snapped open and I dove back to Earth. I didn’t need her help, nor her guidance. But I wasn’t going to ignore Teramea’s warning.

  I rode the currents of air over Manhattan and landed with a loud thump on the concrete outside Kadie’s house.

  It was just before sundown. A heated tingle of warning stroked my spine. The Hell Demons were rising. I would soon need to hunt them down so they couldn’t cause any more damage.

  I’d never tried to capture one before, nor question them. My goal had always been to kill them on sight. But I needed information from them now and that would be a different dance. If it was even possible.

  I walked up to Kadie’s door and adjusted my height to suit her small house.

  Unbidden, a small smile rose to my lips as a picture of my gorgeous Witch filled my mind. Her red hair spread over her pillow as she cuddled me and laughed with happiness.

  We’d been blessed with some beautiful time together, although all too short. I prayed to the Gods above that we’d have more.

  Coldness creeped inside my gut once again, and I pushed it away. Kadie was not gone, nor was she dead. I needed to stop feeling like I was mourning her life.

  I scooped up the pot plant by her front door and pulled the spare key from its hiding place beneath the bottom soil.

  I needed clothes and somewhere to think.

  I opened the door, not bothering to let go of my invisibility until I was inside with the door shut securely behind me.

  Was Kadie still unconscious? I sent out a message to my Angel Agent.

  How’s my little Witch doing, Tabitha?

  An exhausted laugh sounded in my head. Me? Or Kadie?

  I stumbled for a moment. I needed to remember that Tabitha was part Witch too. And she wasn’t doing well either since helping me with Kadie.

  Both of you, of course.

  Kadie’s still alive, although her energy is low. I have her tethered to me, so I won’t be able to help you much with your search. She is taking up a lot of my power.

  I could hear the exhaustion in her voice, though she tried to hide it.

  Thank-you Tabitha. I don’t know how to tell you how grateful I am for what you’re doing.

  I’m doing this for all of us, Gabriel. Kadie is more important than we know, I’m sure of it. The Demons want her desperately, and there has to be a reason for it. If we win this hand, it may turn the tide for Heaven.

  And that was all I’d ever wanted. My side to win. The good team. Those who had fought for the best of the people on Earth. Not the worst.

  Please let me know if there is anything I can do from here.

  Is your son safe?

  Yes. Jasmine has him.

  That’s good. Now, don’t worry about us. You need to focus on hunting down those responsible for this, and finding an antidote to the poison if you can.

  Yes. I will. Thank you, Tabitha.

  I let go of the connection I had to my Agent, her dimmed energy filtering through our connection and leaving me cold. And lonely.

  I’d gotten used to being alone, but never this clueless, or helpless. I couldn’t look after my son properly, only Jasmine could do that. I couldn’t keep Kadie alive, unlike Tabitha.

  Today marked the day that I truly learnt that I can rely on others, and trust them to do the right thing by me and my loved ones.

  A first for me, on so many levels.

  I stepped into Kadie’s bathroom and flicked on the water in the shower. My clothes were little better than rags after the fight, and I was covered with the blood of my woman and child.

  My family.

  I shook my head as I shrugged out of my tattered clothes. Angels didn’t have families. We had our Gods. We had our legions of warriors. We had friends, sort of… But never a real blood and flesh family.

  What was I now? Part human?

  I stood beneath the spray of hot, clean water and washed away the decay of the day. The dirt of the Earth, the blood of the battle. Unlike any war I had ever fought in before.

  I tilted my head back and let my body relax, willing my mind to re-construct the puzzle before me.

  Kadie was a powerful, but untrained Witch. The Hell Demons had originally wanted to torture her to the point that she’d suicide, or so I’d believed when I’d first been put on her protection duty.

  But maybe I’d been wrong. Perhaps it had been their plan all along to capture her.

  Was
I also part of the plan? Our child too?

  That made no sense. They’d been following Kadie long before I’d begun protecting her, and how could they have known that I would be assigned to her. And then impregnate her. If they’d forseen that, then the Demons of Hell had more power than we ever gave them credit for.

  The child, my child, would have been a bonus for them for certain, but he was not the main reason for kidnapping her, I was sure of it.

  Kadie was the true key, and I had to work out why the Demons wanted her so badly.

  I picked up Kadie’s flowery smelling homemade soaps and scrubbed at my body until my skin ached, then turned the water off.

  Her towels smelled like Kadie. That sweet, slightly earthy scent that always reminded me of how real and genuine she was.

  I groaned aloud in the small bathroom. This is crap.

  I had to pull myself together. I was no use to anyone when I was weakened with sentiment.

  I pushed aside any struggling emotions and dried myself quickly. It wouldn’t serve Kadie for me to fall apart now. Nor my son. Or the Gods I’d always fought for.

  I needed to re-trace my steps. Perhaps go back to the castle where they’d held her?

  Yes. That was the plan.

  If I was lucky I would find a way to the truth, and if that meant following those Demons into a dimension not fit for my kind, then so be it. I’d been burnt by them before.

  I strode into Kadie’s purple painted bedroom and opened her cupboard.

  There, hanging next to all her hippie long skirts were fresh pairs of jeans and long sleeved shirts for me. Pure cotton she said, because it didn’t burn as easily. Why she’d bought me clothes when I said I didn’t need them, I hadn’t understood at the time. Now I was intensely grateful for her kind thought.

  I tugged them off their hangers too hard. The twanged from the pole to the floor and I left them there. I didn’t want to analyse what I’d lost here. For a few weeks I’d had a very normal existence. A human life.

  Kadie had made me feel good, just for being me. I wasn’t used to that. I could become very used to that. If made me think about myself in a totally different way. A way that was very ‘unangel’ like And I’d adored her for the peace she’d given me. I was meant to bring people peace. Not the other way around. It was just another way Kadie was so special.

  Night had fallen and the last thing I needed to do was go back to those castle ruins now. But stillI pulled my jeans up my thighs, did up my shirt buttons and tugged on my ancient black boots.

  The Demons had an advantage at the castle that I’d never seen before anywhere else. There was something strange about the air there. As though the very atmosphere was impregnated with evil.

  When I’d rescued Kadie, the Demons had seemed supercharged. Able to break the rules on where and how they could exist.

  It had been hard enough getting Kadie out during the day. I couldn’t even imagine doing it at night!

  I stepped out the front door once again, carefully locking it behind me. No paranormal creature could step foot in Kadie’s house uninvited, but she’d been stolen away by some human men yesterday, so there were enemies everywhere now.

  I jumped down the front stairs and flexed my muscles. My heart was pumping faster than normal and the heat of my sixth sense tingled.

  There were Demons nearby. And despite the fact I had no current mark to protect, I had another mission. Maybe I didn’t have to go to the castle after all. These Hell creatures would either tell me what was going on. Or die.

  I stepped out onto the grey pavement, and slipped into invisibility. There was a loud gasp to my left as a human witnessed my disappearing trick, but I didn’t stop to worry about that now.

  The human would put it down to their eyes playing tricks on them, I was certain. Their conscious human brains wouldn’t believe in the fantastic. So few did.

  I spread my black wings wide and opened my senses for the evil lurking nearby.

  I sensed them. In the block behind Kadie’s house.

  My back muscles contracted hard as I flapped my wings and took to the skyover the old stone buildings of Greenwich village, searching out the fiery Demons I’d come to hate. I didn’t think Angels could hate, until I’d come face to face with them over so many decades

  There was a flicker of flame in the back yard of a small house. A woman’s antagonised scream pierced my ears.

  My cue.

  I descended on a gust of cold air like the vengeful Angel I was. I pulled my sword from my holster and landed in front of the cowering woman.

  “Surrender or you will die.” I paused to see if my words would have any effect on the two flaming Demons before me.

  The black holes where their eyes should be didn’t even flicker with change or recognition. That was strange. I didn’t know what I’d expected, but it wasn’t nothingness. Where was the burning hatred? The anger and fear?

  They charged at me and I heaved a sigh. I don’t know why I thought I could speak to these things. Dumb hope, obviously. They were little better than wild animals.

  I spun in an arc, slicing at one Demon, then ducking and swinging my sword at the other.

  The Demons lost limbs to my blade. Their hollow screams echoed in the small space as I continued to dance around them chopping off each part of their red and yellow glowing bodies until there was nothing left but a pile of black ash.

  I stood still finally, my heart beating too hard. Too fast. My head was a whirling mess.

  I turned around and faced the back of the fence, waiting for the next attack, but nothing came.

  A woman squeaked and I twisted around to face the beautiful little house.

  “Please don’t kill me,” the woman said, and once again I was shocked into speechlessness.

  Wasn’t I under my invisibility? I checked my energy, and yes, I still was.

  How was this possible?

  “You can see me?” I asked her, and slid my sword onto my back once again.

  She nodded frantically, her eyes wide and fearful.

  This was not good. Why wasn’t my magic working?

  “Don’t be afraid of me. My name is Gabriel. I came here to kill those Demons who were sent here to torture you.”

  I would have liked to say I was there to protect her, but she wasn’t my charge.

  “Demons?” She repeated, slowly moving to her feet.

  She was older than I’d first realised, perhaps forty or forty-five. She trembled like an amber leaf in an autumn breeze, but there was the same magic about her that I had sensed in Kadie.

  Another Witch perhaps?

  I addressed her question. “Yes. Warriors of Hell. They were here to frighten you.”

  “Not kill me?” She asked, wrapping her arms around her body.

  “Ah… no. I don’t think so.”

  Though, what did I know about the strange world that this place had become? For centuries I had believed the Demons wanted people to commit suicide so they could take their souls, but these new attacks were completely different and didn’t fit the original pattern.

  “Has this happened before?” I asked her.

  She nodded.

  Damn… why wasn’t someone in charge of protecting her?

  “I didn’t get your name,” I said.

  “M…Margaret.” She twisted one of the silver rings on her index finger.

  I recognised the sign of a Witch in one of the many bands adorning her hands.

  “Margaret, do you practise Witchcraft?

  Her gaze flew to mine and her eyes showed a depth of intelligence I hadn’t expected.

  “Why do you ask me that?” She said, her tones now stronger and defiant.

  “Because I think someone is specifically hunting Witches in New York. My last charge was taken and tortured, poisoned. And I’m trying to find out why.”

  “Poisoned? What do you mean?” She asked, taking a step closer.

  Her eyes were bright and interested now, and her trembling see
med to have vanished.

  “What do you know about this?” Suddenly there was a path in front of me there wasn’t before. Kadie was not the first, and perhaps not the last that had been pursued and conquered by this enemy.

  The Demon’s had a new mission, and it had something to do with the Witches of New York.

  Chapter 2.

  Margaret crossed her arms over her chest, a strength in her stance that hadn’t been here before. Had she been faking her fear before to get my attention? Surely not.

  “I know very little, Gabriel. The question is, who are you? And what brought you here today?”

  I took a breath and weighed up my options. We weren’t meant to divulge our identities to anyone except our targets.

  Except I was technically without a job. I didn’t have a current target, and my ex-target Kadie, was still very much my agenda.

  I bit the bullet, so to speak and prepared myself mentally to tell her the truth.

  “No. Don’t tell me. It doesn’t matter,” Margaret said. “You killed those Demons for me, and I should trust you.” She took a slow breath then looked me straight in the eyes. “Shall we go inside?”

  That was probably a good idea.

  I nodded and she waved me into her home. “Please, come in and sit.”

  She opened the sliding back door and we walked into a small, cool room full of healing crystals and colourful lights.

  “A few months ago, Witches in the New York covens began to report strange happenings. And then the disappearances started,” Margaret began.

  “How many?” I asked.

  “About twenty all up, all over the state.”

  “That’s a lot of women,” I said.

  I was amazed this was the first time I’d heard of it.

  Twenty women, powerful Witches? All disappearing at once and I hadn’t been told to protect any of them? Or it seemed, anyone else for that matter.

  “Were they all elders?” I asked, assuming the abducted Witches would need to be quite powerful for the Demons to want them.

  “No,” she shook her head. “That was the strange thing. They were often strangers to us, or the newly joined. New Witches, with very little cultivated powers. It took us until last week to work out the connection between our covens, because no one really missed the women until recently. We all assumed they just decided not to keep coming back to our meetings.”