by Nancy Madore
“Reeeee…ng!” her father cried again. Lilith whirled around with sudden understanding.
“The ring!” she exclaimed. “Where is it?” She rushed to the thrashing body in search of the tiny ring.
Just then, Gordon stormed into the house like an ancient warrior from the past, donning the mask and calling out loudly in the Sumerian tongue. He abruptly stopped, visibly jolted, when he caught sight of Lilith, and Nadia felt a sudden fear—or was it hope?—that Gordon might stop the incantation there, mistaking Lilith for the djinn he was calling out. Nadia knew she should have told him about Helene’s ring, but she’d wanted to keep it as a bargaining tool with her father. Gordon would never have allowed such a risk. It had been all she could do to get him to come alone, without alerting the others. She didn’t even tell him where they were going, or why, until they were too far to turn back. But she supposed he must have guessed. There were only so many reasons why someone would ask him to bring a mask, a ring and metal shavings—all cast from the same lot.
Whatever conclusions Gordon drew about Lilith, he couldn’t fail to miss the still-writhing body of Edward. And too, Gordon may have recognized Lilith from her grandmother’s stories. He resumed his chanting, rather shakily at first, and the house shook even harder with Asmodeous’ rage as he now faced his opponent head on.
Gordon wasted no time. Still chanting, he bent down and grabbed Nadia beneath her arms, virtually dragging her across the floor. Nadia’s soul wanted to go with them but she felt herself being drawn even farther away. She could feel the warmth of the bright light now, and realized that she was dying.
Just as Gordon was nearing the door, Lilith finally managed to get the ring off Edward’s finger. She slipped it onto one of her claws and paused a moment, as if waiting to see what would happen. Nothing did, at first, but then, quite suddenly, she disappeared. Feeling a strange presence beside her, Nadia turned to find Lilith floating there. But Lilith didn’t appear to notice Nadia. She was absorbed in the scene below, and when Nadia followed her gaze she saw that everything had suddenly gone quiet.
Edward’s body lay in a heap on the floor. Gordon had stopped chanting. There was a new presence moving about the room. They all watched in amazement as the creature slowly took form. Its appearance, once it finally evolved, struck Nadia like ice water to the face. Though her life force remained overhead, she could feel, as well as see, her body shudder below.
The soul of Asmodeous was as awful as it was awe-inspiring. It had two heads; both of which were fully equipped with eyes, nose and mouth. One head—the prominent one from its position facing forward—was that of a ferocious lion. It looked fierce and determined, its large teeth bared in anger. The second head—which literally hung off to one side like a growth—was a disturbing combination of man and lamb. The expression on its face was one of anguish.
Asmodeous' shoulders and torso were similar to that of a giant man, except that there were two enormous, charcoal-colored wings coming out of his back. The lower half of his body was that of a dragon, with the same smoky coloring as the wings. It was a fearsome creature, so large it had to crouch, even with the cathedral ceilings in Edward’s million dollar home. The body looked as if it would be awkward to manage, but Asmodeous moved with the grace of a gazelle. In an instant Lilith was beside him. He towered over her now, but she didn’t shrink away from him. They melded into each other as if they were two pieces of a puzzle. His eyes were wild with pain, like those of an injured animal, and he let out another roar that shook the house to its very foundation. This seemed to revive him, and he suddenly began to speak. His words were so alien—the sound so severe—that they were actually jarring to the ear. He spoke rapidly and with authority, and it occurred to Nadia that he might be issuing forth his own incantation—perhaps one that would challenge Gordon’s hold over him. And God help her—a small part of her secretly hoped he would succeed!
Nadia could see at a glance why Asmodeous and Lilith had been drawn to each other. Theirs were truly kindred souls. There was, in each of them, the beautiful and benevolent side of their natures, contrasting violently with the vicious mercenaries that helped them survive.
Lilith clung to Asmodeous while Gordon carried Nadia’s body out of the house. She seemed absorbed in what Asmodeous was saying, as if she understood every word, and it occurred to Nadia that he could be sharing valuable information with her. There was a strange, wild beauty in the way they held themselves and each other and—even in this, their weakest moment—Nadia could see why they were called the “mighty ones of old,” those glorious gods of Mesopotamia, who yearned, more than anything else, to live.
Nadia could no longer find the line. As she turned toward the light, she had the sense that she had done something horribly wrong. She had committed an act against nature. She had killed her father.
Chapter 52
Nadia watched distractedly as men in air-tight masks and suits worked to secure the area around the apartment building of the last remaining cell. A female reporter was talking rapidly in the foreground as they ran the live footage on her television screen. Nadia’s phone rang, and she hit the mute button on her remote control and answered it.
“We got ‘em,” Gordon told her.
“I know,” she said. “I just saw it on the news.” There was a pause.
“How are you doing?”
“I’m fine,” she said, but there was a tremor in her voice that made it clear she was anything but fine.
“I’m sending someone over,” he said.
“No,” she said. “Please. Don’t.”
There was another pause. “I fucked up,” he said.
Nadia sighed, not sure if she was up to comforting Gordon at that moment. “That’s not true,” was the most she could manage.
“You don’t have to say anything,” he said. “I just want you to know how sorry I am.”
“No matter what you or anybody else might have done, it wouldn’t have mattered anyway,” she said. “I mean…it was me who…who...,” she couldn’t finish her sentence. She kept telling herself that either way she would’ve had regrets. If not her father, it would have been all those people in Washington. Why had this fallen upon her?
That damn letter! If only she hadn’t found it! And come to think of it, that was the same thing that got her great-grandfather killed.
“You did the right thing,” Gordon said.
“I wish someone had destroyed that letter,” she said bitterly, hardly aware that she’d spoken out loud.
“It saved lives,” he reminded her.
She knew he was right. Maybe that’s why her grandmother was so adamant that Nadia go back. Maybe Nadia’s finding the letter somehow atoned for the innocent lives lost when her grandmother wrote it.
But Nadia couldn’t find comfort in the lives that had been saved. Not yet.
“Will has been out of his mind with worry,” Gordon continued. “Couldn’t you just talk to him…let him know you’re okay?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Is…is he there with you now?”
“No. We’ve been given a few days off before the debriefing.”
“Oh,” She suddenly realized how little she knew about them—where they lived, who their families were. A terrible sense of loneliness loomed over her, becoming more insidious with each loss she suffered.
She supposed she would feel better once she got back to work, but suddenly even that filled her with dread. There would always be at least two sides to every crisis. If you helped one, you hurt the other. Who was she to play God, choosing who would win and who would lose? What did her soul look like, beneath the beautiful, pampered flesh?
“Are you sure I can’t do anything for you?” Gordon’s voice brought her out of her thoughts.
“Positive.”
“Good night then, Nadia.”
“Good night Gordon.”
“And thank you. You did a good thing for the world.”
She hung up the phone and rested h
er head on the pillow. When she closed her eyes, images she didn’t want to see appeared so she abruptly opened her eyes to clear them away.
But now she was seeing things with her eyes open! She closed her eyes again, and then opened them.
There, in the doorway, stood Will.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded, sitting up and adjusting her robe indignantly. Yet every impulse she had was clamoring to receive him.
“I had to see you,” he said.
“How’d you get in?”
He smiled sheepishly. “You might want to change the locks to your apartment and your office now that it’s all over.” He lingered in the doorway. “May I come in?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Of course you do, Nadia,” he said, but he stepped into her bedroom without waiting for her consent anyway. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”
“I’m not sure you’re the person to make me feel better.”
“You blame me,” he said. It was a statement, not a question.
“And myself,” she said.
He sighed, accepting this, and she could feel herself softening toward him. If he’d argued the point it would only have made her feel worse. She knew her anger was misplaced. But a small part of her couldn’t help wondering if her feelings for Will somehow influenced her actions against her father. This, more than anything, made her feel like a traitor.
She’d always been so sure of herself, so certain that she was doing what was right. Now, she hardly knew what right was, let alone if she was doing it.
“I should be the one to go through this with you,” he said, sitting down beside her on the bed. He picked up one of her hands and held it in both of his. They were warm and made her feel safe. “I misjudged you,” he said. “I couldn’t have been more wrong. You were brought into this against your will and given an impossible choice. You did nothing wrong.” He squeezed her hand as his eyes gently implored her. “If only I could make you understand…how beautiful…how perfect…you are.” His words reminded Nadia of her father’s words to Lilith. She’d heard somewhere that women were often attracted to men who reminded them of their fathers. She supposed this was true. There was no denying the similarities between Will and her father. They both had that same, unbending certainty in their convictions. And they both loved the women in their life unconditionally.
But these thoughts brought her pain, so she promptly changed the subject.
“Will it all work out?” she asked—“In DC, I mean.”
“They’ve isolated the infected individuals and everyone they’ve come in contact with,” he said. “It looks like we might be able to contain this thing. Thanks to you.”
“What will happen to my…to Asmodeous?” Unwanted tears filled her eyes. She closed them, recalling Gordon’s face when she first came to. “We’ve got Asmodeous trapped in the house,” he’d told her. “But Lilith got away.” She’d closed her eyes again and wished for death. Yet she knew that Asmodeous—if left free—would continue his mission to destroy the West. He would never change his mind—any more than Will would change his.
“Are you sure you want to know?” he asked. She opened her eyes and stared at him until he gave in. “He’ll be brought to the chamber—that shiny dome you asked us about—for debriefing,” he told her.
“Will you be there?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“He was speaking a very strange language,” she told him. “Even stranger than the one you guys spoke.”
“That’s what Gordon said.”
“Have any of the other djinn done that?” she wondered.
“Not that I know of,” he said.
“I wonder what he was saying,” she continued, thoughtful.
“At first Gordon thought he might be invoking some kind of spell of his own,” said Will. “Something to counter what Gordon had done. But after Gordon revived you he went back in and Asmodeous was still there. He appeared to be bound to the ring. He gave Gordon the names of the infected cells.”
“He’d already given me the names beforehand,” Nadia told him. “They were sitting right there, on the table. And didn’t Helene mention Asmodeous escaping the ring before…with Solomon?”
Will was examining her too closely. Nadia lowered her eyes. “We won’t know anything for sure until the debriefing,” he said.
“Gordon may have left him alone too long,” she mused.
“Gordon made the right choice,” he told her—“In saving your life, that is.” and Nadia knew that Will—and everyone else—was still upset that Gordon acted alone.
“I made him promise not to tell anyone,” she said. “I don’t know why.” But she wondered now if that was true. She’d needed at least one of them to help her find out if her father was really Asmodeous, but maybe she also wanted to give her father a fighting chance to escape. Maybe. “And I never told Gordon about Lilith’s ring.”
“He should have at least told us what he was doing,” he said.
“Is he in trouble?” she asked.
“A little. Nothing he can’t handle.”
In the course of this exchange Will kept slowly moving in closer, and now Nadia was in his arms. He was searching her eyes, but they remained averted. She couldn’t quite bring herself to look at him. If he knew how close she’d come to destroying that letter, or how much she wanted her father back….
Gisele was the only person who would have been able to understand. After all, she’d kept the letter a secret all those years. Nadia supposed she was more like her mother than she originally thought.
“I’m going to need some time,” she said, but she snuggled even closer to Will, savoring the feel of his embrace. He responded by holding her tighter.
She thought about Asmodeous and Lilith. The constancy of their feelings for each other after all those years moved her. She supposed it rather put her to shame, with her fleeting, halfhearted love affairs. She wondered if she was capable of feeling that kind of devotion for another person. Her thoughts turned to Will. The attraction between them was undeniable. She longed for his touch. And she admired him. But was that enough?
As the heat of Will’s body warmed and stimulated her, Nadia realized that she did have something in common with Lilith and Asmodeous after all. All of her training came rushing back, reminding her that no matter what happened, life goes on. She had to keep fighting if she wanted to survive. It was worth the fight.
But Nadia wanted more than just to survive.
She wanted to live.
Power of Gods is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Nancy Madore
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States
ISBN: 9781489557414 (paperback)
ISBN: 9781628470307 (Epub)
ISBN: 9781628470314 (PDF)
ASIN: B00D0S4ZIM (Kindle)
Edited by Mark Hackenberg
For Jason
To watch you conquer your demons is to experience grace.
Power of Gods
Contents
Book 2: Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
“Once God has spoken; twice have I heard this: that power belongs to God.”
— Psalms 62:11
Prologue
Fort Greely, Alaska
Present day
Amanda awoke with a start and bolted up in bed.
“Who’s there?” she cried, looking frantically around the room. Shadows loomed, startling her before she recognized them for what they were; a pile of laundry sitting on the back of a chair and her favorite dress, retrieved that very day from the dry cleaners, hanging on the door.
She paused, searching her memory. She’d been jarred from her sleep by the sound of someone calling out her name.
Yet she appeared to be alone in the room. Amanda faltered, reluctant to accept that it was only a dream. It seemed so real! She could still hear the distinct, imploring tone. It was a woman’s voice. Her mother’s?
Amanda brushed this disturbing thought aside and slowly lay back down, pulling the covers up all the way to her chin. Her mother—what an idea! Amanda didn’t believe in ghosts. It must have been her own voice she heard, calling out in her sleep. But why would she call out her own name?