“But I still love you, Persephone,” he vowed, his jaw going tight. “Yes, I wanted your father’s throne, but that is the truth, that is not a lie. I love you, and I want you by my side forever.”
“But you’ve never asked me what I want,” Persephone said. “You’ve always made that decision for me. And what I don’t want any more is you. I want...” She turned, beaming a smile at Ramiel that warmed him deep in his soul. “You, Ramiel. I want you.”
The mask of innocence dropped from Hades’s face. “They’ll still hunt us, you know.” He sneered. “Just because you’re in love with one of them won’t change your fate. Every Nephilim who ever dies will do so at the end of an archangel’s heavenly blade.”
“No.” She took a step and held her hands out before her. “You won’t.”
Lightning sluiced through the sky. Ramiel leapt back, scared the fractals of electricity would seek him, but Persephone was a master of her weapon. From six directions, the bolts struck. Hades threw back his head and screamed, the power surging so strong within him that his skeleton glowed from within. Then, there was no skin, only a raw red tapestry of bone and vein. Another blood-curdling scream, and his body became ash.
Persephone pulled back her power and turned, her chest working as quickly as her body could handle.
Ramiel took two tentative steps forward. He wasn’t sure of her mental state. Sure, Hades deserved it, but the two had been a couple for...
“Ohff!”
Persephone managed to both knock Ramiel off his feet and straddle him in one bound. Confusion ensued as she worked the buckles of her breastplate.
“I want you,” she declared. “I want you now, here, and rough.”
Oh, God. Yes. Yes. But not like this. Not at this point in time. Not at the moment when he took her proudly and openly as his lover.
This time needed to be special.
He reached up and grabbed her fingers, pausing her task. She looked to him like she was wounded.
“No, baby, I do want you. But remember, I’m an archangel, and we’re in a realm where I can manifest in my soul form.”
“Yeah, but...”
Her ass smacked the ground hard as he disappeared from beneath her. Persephone’s head lashed left and right, trying to figure out where Ramiel had gone, when she noticed a foggy vapor surrounding her body. The mist, however, didn’t just hover, it gathered around her, infiltrating the chinks in her armor and sifting to the interior of her attire. She had one more moment of confusion, before her body began to hum with pleasure. He was everywhere. EVERYWHERE, simultaneously kissing her mouth, sucking her nipple, squeezing her backside, and pushing deep within her. She fell back against the ground, panting.
“This is what you can do as a soul?”
It was amazing; she felt him moving within her, his weight atop her, his hands cataloging every inch of her flesh, but he was nowhere to be seen. He’d once said that sex as a soul made the physical iteration pale by comparison. She’d be ruined forever for hard bodies by this.
“Holy shit, we are never leaving Hell.”
“YOU ARE NEVER LEAVING Hell!”
Riona stood her ground, despite her lack of angel-lethal weaponry. Her resolve amused Azazel, pulling the corners of his mouth up into a toothy grin.
“But you vowed, advendavi. And what do you care? Once you seal off the heavenly realm, you’ll be rid of me. You’ll never hear from me again.”
“And the souls of all the mortals who’ll die when the realms merge will be forced to linger here in limbo forever.”
He let out a laugh. “Someone’s been reading.”
“What can I say, Hades had a great library. I’m not doing that to mortals, even if it means I fall. And yes, I know that too. I know that’s the cost when an archangel fails to live up to a vow when it’s within their power to do so. But there’s no way I’m letting you into paradise. You will pay for what you’ve done to Marc and Jerry.”
“What I’ve done to them?” he repeated. “Given them life, power, and a proud lineage?”
“You were their father. Did you love them? Did you even like them? Or were they just tools for you? You didn’t care a bit for either of them until their existence became convenient.”
“They both had human fathers and mothers, Riona.” He tipped his head to the side and pulled a long expression set with doughy eyes. “You, poor dear, didn’t even have that much.”
“I may not have had a dad, but I had a mom who sacrificed any chances for her own power and happiness—hell, even the right to retain her own memories, for me. I had all I needed.”
“Including both my sons. And I mean that in the biblical sense.” He tipped his head to the side, watching the scene behind Riona’s shoulder. Jerry and Marc, still engaging Michael in a series of maneuvers, were just far enough to be out of earshot. “That’s right, sugarplum. You slept with Marc. He’s erased your memory of it, but it doesn’t change the fact that it happened. I wonder, what might those two do to each other, if Jerry found out?” He leaned in conspiratorially. “Open the gate to the heavenly realm for me, Riona, and I promise, Jerry will never know.”
“You’re lying.” A fact of which she was positive. Despite that, she couldn’t stop the quiver in her voice. Riona knew she’d come to Hell once before and visited Marc, and yet, her memories of all that happened were fuzzy at best.
“Maybe I am, and maybe I’m not.” He pointed behind him, to the forest Persephone made. “Open me a gate, right there, see through your vow, and all will be well.”
“The Council will murder you the moment you enter.”
“No they won’t. We may die in Heaven, but only with the permission of The One. That’s why we were banking on Persephone doing the deed for us. If they kill me, they’ll be on the outs themselves. Now, open the gate. Come now, Riona, I’m getting impatient.”
She didn’t know what else to do, but as she took a step forward, she felt something long and metallic bend beneath her feet. Riona looked down without moving her head, and realized that the hilt of a heavenly blade lay under foot. Ramiel’s, she realized. Where had it come from?
“Fine, Azazel. You win. But I need an image to latch on to. I thought you were supposed to share that with me.”
“If you think I’m getting close enough to you to seep into your memories, you’re as bright as a banger demon. It’s your special type of magic. You decide how it works. Can I suggest saying open sesame and flailing your arms around.”
“Actually, I have a better idea.” She took to one knee, then the other, and made the sign of the rosary. It had been years since she’d prayed in earnest. In her youth, she assumed that God never listened to her. In this moment, she hoped that he might.
The Fallen chuckled. “If that’s what does it for you.”
When a hum like an electric appliance starting up came from behind him, however, Azazel grinned. He pantomimed tipping a hat at Riona.
“Thank you kindly, Miss. Enjoy working out the sides of your love triangle with my boys. Maybe if you make it in to the Heavenly realm someday, I can show you how the original copy does it bet—”
Two steps through the portal, and Azazel’s footsteps halted. He looked down, confused, and found the tip of a blade that had gone straight through him sticking out.
Riona approached. “Oops, did I forget to mention that I’d gotten a dispensation from Big Boss to kill your ass?”
Circling her fingers around the blade, she pulled it up, along his spine, as she dragged him back through the portal and into the Underworld. Every inch that serrated gave her a warped pleasure. To her surprise, Azazel’s blood wasn’t red, it was black. Thick and oozing, like tar. At the base of his neck, she twisted the dagger and sliced like she was coring a pineapple.
“Ashes to ashes, asshole. I kept my vow; you got to Heaven. Now you can go to hell.”
With one final pull of her hand, his head lobbed. It never reached the ground. In the time it took her to blink, Azazel had t
urned to dust.
“Hey, Romani!”
Dee’s voice carried from across the field. It took Riona a second to realize he was actually calling her. Despite the circumstances, she couldn’t fight the smile that brightened her face. She pulled her magic back, and the portal closed just like a door swinging shut. The angelic blade sat unceremoniously on the ground. Riona retrieved it and bustled over to where Dee had the two lesser Grigori pinned against a tree, their arms twisted behind their backs in a chicken wing hold.
He looked at the blade in her hands. “Ah, good, you found it. These two came at me at once, and managed to knock it out of my hands before I could do anything with it.”
“It wouldn’t have worked on them anyways,” Riona said. “If I’m remembering my bladelore correctly, it’s currently loyal to Persephone. Why aren’t they just porting away?”
“Armaros and Samuel don’t do anything unless they’re told, and nobody told them to stop fighting me,” Dee explained. “They keep coming at me, and I keep ripping their arms off. Then I reattach them—their angelic ability to heal compliments what I can do with my Nephilim magic—and we start the process all over again.”
She did a double take. “Okay, so what do we do with them?”
“Let us go,” Samuel cried out as Dee increased the torque on his twisted elbow. “We’re just soldiers. We fight on the side of whoever’s in charge.”
“Not sure who that is right now. I just killed Azazel, Kochab has fled, and my husband and Marc are playing ‘death by a thousand cuts’ with my father.”
Armaros’s forehead lacerated against the bark as he turned his head in Riona’s direction. “You, princess.”
Riona clicked her tongue. “Tut tut, boys, I’ll handle the sarcasm here. Just chillax until we figure this out. I don’t want to kill you, but if needs be...”
Dee, however, went wide-eyed. He released the angels, who made no further attempt to instigate their battle. Especially not with Riona brandishing the heavenly blade between them. “Riona, I don’t think he’s calling you names. I think he’s addressing you by your title.”
“What? My title. But I’m not...”
In your case, it’s pro tem. Very pro tem.
Riona fell back against a nearby boulder, just the perfect height to sit on. “Oh, fuck me.”
Immediately, the angels worked at the silver buckles holding up their jeans.
Dee put a hand on both of their shoulders and threw the pair to the ground. “She doesn’t mean that literally, assholes.”
Chapter 26
Hand in hand, Ramiel and Persephone emerged from the forest with light steps and creeping eyes. The battle was done; the lack of fighting proved that—but who had been victorious was harder to work out. Until Persephone spotted Marc and Jerry, knives drawn, with a subdued, hemorrhaging Michael on his knees inside a Morgana Box.
“So I’m guessing we won?” he asked as the couple approached the others.
“Azazel is dead,” Marc said, emotionless. “I can’t explain how, but both Jerry and I felt it when he passed.”
“Because he sent us his power before he died,” Jerry added. “Usually that power disappears when the angel dies, but I guess since we’re also blood relatives, it remained. Pretty fucking cool, really. Anyway, Marc and I were able to trap Michael in this Morgana Box. After he lost enough blood, we were able to work together and make scrambled eggs of his memory.”
“You have his angelic blade,” Ramiel said, acknowledging the weapon in Marc’s hands. It was then he noticed its counter compliment in Jerry’s grasp. “What the hell is that?”
Jerry raised the weapon to eye level, letting the other two have a better gander at the dark alloy knife. “Pretty cool, huh? It was weird. After you two did your Superman and Lois Lane thing, Az ordered Marc to kill me; only Riona threw herself in between and took the heavenly blade in her gullet. She went down, but somehow it didn’t hurt her. And when she stood back up, boom—she had this. She said Big Boss gave it to her.”
“Big Boss?” Ramiel took the blade from Jerry, examining its finer details. “Are you sure?”
Marc nodded. “Pretty sure. She was even talking like Charlton Heston from The Ten Commandments for a few minutes. I was expecting her to grow a white beard and conjure up a coat of many colors or something.”
“Well, she is a prophet after all.” Ramiel handed the blade back to Jerry.
“We’re calling it, the hellven blade,” Jerry said. “Looks a lot like the type you guys use, but like an opposite color scheme. Obvs something meant for someone in the Underworld.”
Persephone said, “As long as they don’t use it to kill Nephilim.”
“Speaking of Nephilim...” Jerry worked the hellven blade into a holster on his hips. Where he’d conjured that from was anyone’s guess. “You get over your kill-all-the-angels tantrum? Because I’m an angel, too, you know, and so is Marc. So if you want to try to throw down right now and go at it, I’d like a heads up.”
“If it’s all the same to you, I’d like to just pretend that never happened. And also... I owe you an apology. I was grieving and I sort of got stuck in the anger mode. I’m sorry for what I tried to do.”
“What, you mean encase us in stone and threaten to kill us?” Jerry asked.
Persephone’s cheeks went red. “Yeah, that.”
Jerry sighed, then turned and offered out his free hand. “My wife actually did kill me once, and I got over it. I guess I can give you a second chance, too. Tell you the truth though, I’m a little surprised your two-toned jelly log of a husband hasn’t shown up to raise Hell.”
Shifting his weight from one side to the other, Ramiel blushed. “Um, actually he did. Steph kinda... lit him up like a firework.”
The priest turned now with interest. “Hades is dead, Azazel is dead. Did we actually pull this off?”
“Not entirely.” Jerry raised a finger to the sky, where patches of orange clouds drifted over a blue background. “The realms are merging. We may have kept the Grigori from getting back into Heaven, but the bigger bad still came to pass.”
Just then, a scuffle of footsteps made them all turn, ready to face whatever attacker was heading their way. To their relief, however, it turned out to be only Dee and Riona.
Jerry moved to embrace his wife, but she dodged him and headed for his brother instead.
“Marc!” she called out, grabbing him by the arms and shaking him. “When you were human, you hated dancing. Is that still true?”
He one-eyed her as a sanity check. “Unless you got your hands on some ballerina’s thigh, no self-respecting man should ever dance in public. Though I do remember one particular time in a club with you that was an except... Ow.”
His hand massaged the red welt on his cheek from Riona’s slap. Damn, she was strong. Guess Azazel’s strength in his veins didn’t do much to increase his pain tolerance.
“Do the Macarena.”
He barely got the words “hell no” from his mouth when his arms took on a life of their own. His flailing limbs gave him the appearance of a man trying to beat himself up. Marc’s face screwed up, he cursed the mutiny of his own body.
“The soulja boy! The twist! The monster mash!” With each demand, the priest’s body followed suit. “Okay, stop, stop. Holy shit, it is true.”
Jerry tiptoed towards his wife. “What’s true?”
“I’m the princess.” She sounded even more astonished than they looked. “Shit, I’ve never even been to Heaven, how can I be the chief of the angels?”
“But I’m the devil!” Marc barked out. Then, surveying his own thoughts, he added. “Aren’t I?”
“You are, but you’re also still a demon,” Jerry said. “Azazel may be dead, but the rightful ruler of the heavenly realm could still control you. Wait, did you say Ditter? What does he have to do with anything?”
Riona shrugged. “Apparently he’s Big Boss.”
Jerry’s eyes fell to the ground. “Fuck me.”
&
nbsp; Dee chuckled. “Might want to be careful who you say that to around here.”
The trapped angel on the edge of their party sat up on his knees. “You’re a Pure Soul, aren’t you? Lucifer’s been after one of them for a long, long time.”
Michael’s voice evidenced his weakness. Riona looked to her father. If she felt any sorrow at his condition, she didn’t show it.
“He was looking for a suitable replacement. He didn’t trust any of the Grigori. Hey...” Michael leaned forward, his eyes going misty as his head flattened against the confines of the Morgana Box. “You look familiar. Do I know you?”
Riona’s head swiveled to her husband for explanation.
“Marc and I may have basically erased the last thirty years from his memory. But can we focus? Riona, how can you be the princess? Does this mean that you have to live in the heavenly realm? What, I’m supposed to commute for conjugal visits?”
Marc cleared his throat, winning back their attention. “Can I remind you that unless we stop the realms from merging, where you two engage in your freaky sex sessions won’t be up for debate. We’ll all be universally fucked.”
“Right.” Riona turned to Ramiel. “How do I do that?”
“What, me?” The angel pointed at himself. “You think I have any clue?”
Riona said, “You were the only one of us involved the last time this needed to be done.”
“Not true,” Michael interjected. “I was there. I can tell you what to do.”
“You can?” Riona asked. She placed balled up hands on her hips and cast a downward glance on her dad. “Why, when it’s basically your fault this is happening to begin with?”
“It is?” Michael asked confusedly. “Well, then, all the more reason to help undo it. Okay, so first thing you need to do is name the primaries. You need representation from each of the terrestrial realms.”
“Dee...” Riona pointed at the demigod. “You’re representing the Nephilim.”
When Spell Freezes Over (All My Exes Die From Hexes Book 4) Page 21