by SM Reine
There were only a dozen alongside Leliel. These few survivors were all that remained of Eve’s once-massive family.
Elise felt a pang of grief and turned inward. Eve? Are you still there?
There was no response.
“This angel isn’t yours,” Elise said, realizing that she had been quiet for too long. “You don’t know him. Trust me.”
Leliel glanced over her shoulder. “Wait for me,” she told the other angels, and then she broke free to approach Elise.
Anthony aimed his gun at her. “Freeze, birdbrain.”
She didn’t stop. “We have to talk, Godslayer.”
Elise pushed Anthony’s arms so that he was pointing the gun at the other angels instead. “Fine. We can talk.” She leaned in close to Anthony’s ear. “If they move, start shooting.” She didn’t have to give similar directions to Abel. There was angel blood on his chin and murder in his eyes.
If anyone even twitched, they were going to find out exactly how much he was grieving his mate’s murder. And Elise doubted that she would be able to stop him a second time.
Leliel led Elise away from everyone else, stopping at the edge of one of the fields. The crops were flooded with water. Maybe some kind of rice. There was no sign of the farmers—they had been smart enough to hide from the conflict between the werewolves and angels.
“I’ll be brief,” Leliel said. “If Belphegor and an angel have already entered the Origin, you will have to kill both.”
Elise’s hand tightened on the falchion. It made the muscles in her arm spasm, aching where Abel had bitten her. “How do you know?”
“Metaraon and I discussed the next genesis frequently before he died. Despite my protests, he planned to collect a new pantheon. He would have been the lead, as Lilith had led Adam and Eve. He planned—”
“Wait. Lilith led the last pantheon?”
“Yes,” Leliel said impatiently. “She was the sculptor. She shaped the universe as we know it.”
“Everything I’ve seen suggests Adam was in charge.”
“The most vocal is seldom the most powerful.” She gave a delicate, disdainful sniff. “As I was saying, Metaraon planned to have his wife, Ariane, as the mortal god.”
Elise’s mother had been in line to become a god? She cringed to think of how well that would have gone. Ariane was weak. A doormat. She would have been crushed by the others.
“I disagreed, as I said,” Leliel went on. “Belphegor disagreed too. He fought the formation of a new pantheon. That was why I tried to ally with him—both of us wanted to prevent anyone from entering the Origin and triggering genesis. Or so I believed.”
“But he just wanted to be in charge himself,” Elise said.
“Evidently. However, Belphegor doesn’t know what Metaraon knew, and what I know.” Leliel fixed Elise with an intense gaze. “Once the formation of the pantheon begins, the only way to replace any member is to kill all of them.”
Elise frowned. “What if I just kill Belphegor?”
“Then only this mysterious angel will remain,” Leliel said. “But you can’t replace Belphegor until the angel dies, too.”
“And if I don’t want to replace him at all? If I just want to prevent him from causing more damage?”
Leliel smiled, like she approved of this answer. “When I built New Eden, I believed that we could postpone genesis indefinitely simply by never replacing Adam, Eve, and Lilith. If you prevent the triad from forming and kill Belphegor, I believe we could stop the progress of this…” She gestured disdainfully at the sky. “And reconstruct through other means.”
“You believe. Nice convictions there.”
“Nobody knows,” she said. “It’s never been done before. There have always been three. However, the world is safer without gods, and I’ll do what I must to prevent the genesis. What’s your plan, Godslayer?”
“Kill Belphegor. Save the angel. I’m looking for a cure, so to speak. Genesis isn’t on the menu.”
“Then perhaps we can help each other.” The angel glanced at the vehicles. “Where are you going?”
“I’m breaking into Eden through one of Metaraon’s gates.”
“Your journey to the nearest of them will take days like this. Judging by Earth’s degradation, you’re out of time.”
Elise gritted her teeth. “I know. Not a lot of alternatives.”
“We’ll take your people to the gate,” Leliel said. “My angels and I. We can easily transport everyone there directly.”
She didn’t even have to consider the offer. Like Leliel had said, they were out of time and without alternatives. “Fine. Carry everyone to the gate. If you can get us there, I’ll take care of Belphegor and the angel.”
“And you won’t permit genesis,” Leliel said.
“Not if I can avoid it.”
The angel looked grim. “Then we have a deal.”
“You’re fucking crazy,” Anthony said.
Elise snorted. “Give me the bandages.” The bite wound Abel had delivered was still bleeding freely. She would need to feed before she could heal.
Anthony threw the bandages at her. They hit Elise in the chest. “Letting the angels carry us to the gate? We can’t trust them.”
“I know.” She sat on the tailgate of a pickup. “Help me wrap this.”
He huffed, but he still wound the bandages around the injury with quick, practiced hands. It was far from the first time that Anthony had been forced to perform basic first aid, though it might have been the first time he’d done it for Elise rather than McIntyre.
As he worked, Elise watched the angels preparing to transport the pickups. It was deeply unsettling to see someone other than James capable of performing magecraft, even if Makael looked much less confident of the technique.
Elise was relatively confident that they’d be able to kill most of the angels if they tried to pull anything. But she wasn’t sure about Makael or Leliel. They’d be challenging to kill if it became necessary.
“I have a plan,” she said in a low voice.
“Better be a good one,” Anthony muttered.
“Aren’t they all?”
“No,” he said, squeezing her arm a little too hard, reminding her that she’d thought it was a good idea to grab an angry werewolf.
She pulled her arm from him. “Thanks.”
Anthony just shook his head, muttering to himself.
Elise’s mother, Ariane, emerged from one of the houses in the village carrying a bag under one arm. She was smiling at the farmer that she left, speaking to him in Chinese. Elise understood enough of the language to know that Ariane was thanking him, but she’d had no idea that her mother spoke it at all.
Ariane set the bag on the tailgate of the pickup and opened it. “How do you feel, ma fille?”
Elise felt like shit.
No, not shit. Whatever was worse than shit.
Neuma and Gerard were dead because of her; the army that had remained loyal to them was also dead for it. She had watched a boy fail to resurrect his mother and surrendered him to the enemy. Then she’d topped it off by getting a bite wound she couldn’t heal, making an agreement with the angels, and earning the mistrust of her friends.
There really weren’t any words for how Elise felt.
“I’m great,” she said through her clenched teeth. “How about you?”
“Word of the angels’ plan to transport us has spread. I’m worried that my daughter might have lost her grip on reality,” Ariane said.
“Can we not talk about this, Mother?”
“Very well, but we do have to talk about something else.” Ariane lowered her voice. “There’s something that I should tell you. Perhaps both of you.” She beckoned Anthony closer.
He flopped beside Elise on the tailgate. “This is going to be good.”
“Metaraon and I spent much time talking at the end of my pregnancy, when he sequestered me in the garden. He was exhilarated by the knowledge that Adam’s death was near. He wanted to dis
cuss what was to come next.”
“Next?” Anthony asked.
“Opening Eden,” Elise said. “Metaraon had intended to enter the Origin and trigger the next genesis.”
He rolled his eyes. “Oh yeah. That.”
Elise had filled him in on everything that she knew about the impending end of the world, including the part where she planned to open Eden using Abram’s blood. Anthony had taken the news pretty well. As well as anyone could take such a suicidal plan.
Mostly, he just seemed annoyed.
“Metaraon made it complicated to open Eden because he wanted to be the only one who could do it.” Ariane took Elise’s hand. “But he left a shortcut for himself to utilize. If you have a witch create the circle at every gate at the same time, you only need to spill the blood of Adam’s descendant upon one of them, and all will open.”
Elise sat up. “All of them?”
“All of them,” Anthony echoed, rubbing his chin.
She had been hoping that opening one gate would be enough to get them into Eden, considering how much the walls between universes were breaking down. Ariane’s shortcut was a lot better than wild guessing.
“How do you feel about travel, Mother?” Elise asked.
“I expected you to ask that. Chew some of this.” Ariane pushed the leaves into Elise’s mouth.
They tasted bitterly foul. She tried to spit them out, but Ariane held her hand over Elise’s mouth until she swallowed. “That’s disgusting,” Elise said, trying to wipe the dried leaves off of her tongue.
“That might accelerate your healing.”
Her arm didn’t feel like it was healing, but it wasn’t aching as badly under the bandaging. “What do you know about healing demons bitten by werewolves?”
Ariane’s look was withering. “I did serve in the Palace of Dis for years before you took it, ma fille. I know more than you’d think.” She wiped her hands off and cinched the bag. “As for Marion…”
That name left an even more bitter taste in Elise’s mouth.
“No leads,” she lied.
“I’m beginning to fear, Elise.”
“I promised to bring Marion back to you. I will.” Even if Elise hadn’t managed to save Neuma or the army, Marion would still be safe. She had to believe that was true.
Another man appeared beside them. Elise looked up and up to see Abel steaming in the cool air, every muscle tense. “I’m not going anywhere with those fucks,” he growled.
So he’d heard the news, too.
Elise seized his arm, leading him away from Anthony and Ariane, away from the angels, into the privacy of the darkness beyond the edge of the road. “Yes. You are.”
His eyes burned with hate. “They killed Rylie.”
“I know.”
Her composure seemed to just make his anger worse. His lips peeled back over his teeth, and Elise heard the muffled pop of bone from somewhere within his body.
He grabbed her arm, too. But his fingertips were now clawed. The sharp points dug into her flesh, leaving deep indentations that nearly bled. “They killed her,” he hissed. “They need to die. Especially that one. She ordered the killing.” He jerked his head toward Leliel. “I’m going to fucking kill her.”
“Could you win in a one-on-one fight? Could you win against all of them?”
“Does it matter?” His voice was ragged, like his chest had been ripped apart from the inside.
“It matters. You’re the only Alpha left.”
Abel actually gave it a moment’s thought before saying, “Yeah. I could take them.”
“We have to get to the gates,” Elise said. “You can’t kill her.” Anger blazed anew in his eyes, but before he could lose his temper, she added, “Yet. Not until they’ve transported the pack.”
“I’m not going to play nice with these dicks. I’m not going to pretend.”
“I don’t expect you to. I just expect you to be quiet until you reach our destination.” The hand on her arm was starting to hurt, but he hadn’t given her any new injuries yet. “There’s no forgiving what Leliel did. What any of them did. If you think you can take them down without destroying the pack, I’m not going to fight you. For now, stand the fuck down and let me go.”
His fingers unclenched. He’d left four perfect imprints of his claws on her skin.
“Your arm?” Abel asked.
“Fine,” Elise said. He didn’t need to know that the bite wasn’t going to heal on its own.
The camp stirred with activity. The angels were ready.
Elise watched as blue light began encircling the vehicles, forming a rune in the sky. She inhaled the scent of the magic, like ozone and burning grass. She bet she could have cast the spell better.
“I need some of your wolves for the next leg of my mission,” Elise said.
“No. I want them all.”
“There are lives at stake. I might need their help.”
“Tough,” Abel growled. “I’ve got a score to settle.”
Elise thought about fighting him on it, since the only reason he even had those wolf spirits was because she had given them to him, but she could tell that he was ready to fight over this. Abel was going to fight anyone and everyone who got in the way of avenging Rylie.
So she said, “Fine.” She’d just have to kill the Fates some other way.
Abel moved toward the cars. When he moved, there was more motion behind him. The wolf spirits were trailing him at all times now.
As he left, she called to him. “Make it a fair fight, Abel.”
His shoulders were tense, his eyes dark, rage in every line of his body.
But he nodded.
Ariane joined Elise. She was carrying her entire bag of tricks now, not just the herbs. “Do you want me to—?”
“Yes,” Elise said. “Yes. I think we need to.”
“Very well,” Ariane said.
Elise waited until the entire group of cars was taken away in a flare of ethereal light. It hurt to watch the angels leave, knowing that they held the lives of people she cared about in their hands and that she couldn’t follow.
Belphegor was a more immediate danger. He’d threatened her friends, and Elise only had so many friends left to kill.
Once the village was empty, Elise vanished into the night, taking her mother with her.
Belphegor would know she was coming. It was time to get a few steps ahead of God.
Eleven
Elise had told Abel not to attack until the angels transported them to the gate in the Himalayas.
So he waited.
It hurt, but he waited.
He stood under the electric blue rune, watching one of those feathery-winged bastards cast the spell, and he didn’t attack. He saw Leliel, the one in charge, smile to one of her companions—and he still didn’t attack. Even when he felt the wolf boiling in his blood, he didn’t attack.
Summer stood by his side, all tangled up in the wolf spirits that followed him everywhere now. “Which one did it?” she asked, bathed in the blue light of magic. It brought out the lighter tones in her skin, the hints of gold in her hair.
“That one,” he said, pointing to Leliel. “She ordered it.”
Summer didn’t seem surprised. “She’s Nash’s ex-wife.”
“I’m going to kill her.”
She bit her bottom lip. She looked down at her feet.
This was when it would come—the warning not to attack or do anything else likely to get him killed.
Instead, she told him, “I’ll warn the guys.”
She drifted off to tell Abram and Nash and even Levi. One by one, the men turned to look at Abel.
All of them looked as angry as he felt.
Abel gave a small nod to Nash, and Nash nodded back.
“Ten seconds,” Leliel announced, her voice echoing over the farming village.
Ten seconds. Just ten more fucking seconds.
The pack drew in closer, gathering around Abel. The group was a hell of a lot smaller no
w. It was weird to look at all those faces and see that people like Paetrick weren’t among them. All of the people that Rylie had been friendliest with were gone. The nice ones, the people who didn’t like to fight.
The ones who remained were the ones who didn’t mind being werewolves. People who shared in Abel’s aggression.
“Five seconds,” Leliel said.
Summer was whispering to the witches, Brianna and Ariane. Warning them what was to come.
There was no way the angels could have missed what Abel was planning. They were spreading out around the edge of the circle too, watching him warily, waiting to see what he was going to do.
Leliel’s voice broke out over the night. “Now!”
A column of blazing light erupted from the giant rune, filling the entire street. It encompassed all the cars, the wolves, the witches, the other allies. Even the angels.
Everything froze.
For an instant, Abel’s feet lifted off of the ground. Just a couple of inches. Just enough to make him feel disoriented, out of his skin.
He noticed that Abram had drawn his gun in one hand. The other hand was on Levi’s shoulder, like he was making sure they didn’t get separated in the teleportation.
Then the rune flashed, and the village was gone.
A mountain peak appeared where the fields of rice had been. It was cold and snowy and the wind was strong enough to suck Abel’s breath from his lungs. He landed on snow-slicked stone, lost his footing, collapsing to all fours.
He began shifting as soon as he was certain that the transportation was over, even as the vehicles were still landing around him, smashing into the mountainside with crunches that told Abel they wouldn’t be driving anywhere after this.
They were in the mountains, and he could see the gate to Eden just a little further up the slope, glowing faintly with inner fire.
He’d waited to attack like Elise had asked.
Now they were at the gate, and the time for waiting had ended.