The Morning Star

by Debra Dunbar

  I leaned against the counter. “So when is this going down? And where can I find Samael?”

  “Caramort wouldn’t tell me that since I wasn’t willing to sign up as part of their army. I do know where you can find Caramort to ask him yourself, though.” Mestal sucked down his soda, then set his empty glass on the counter. “Oh, you might want to know that he’s got about fifty demons there with him. You’ll have to get through them to reach Caramort, and I’m thinking while you’re beating down his household, you might discover that he’s slipped away and run to hide behind this Samael.”

  So I needed a plan to sneak in undetected, or a plan to lure Caramort out. “Think you can get him to come meet you somewhere? Alone?”

  “No.” Mestal laughed. “Do you have any idea what I had to go through to talk to him? If I hadn’t done some deals for a few of his household back in the thirties, they would have chopped me up in little pieces and tossed me in the ocean. I managed to get an audience once. I might manage to get one again if I send him a message that I changed my mind, but I’ll need to go to him. He’s not going to come to me. I’m not important enough for that.”

  I was going to have to sneak in. Either that or blast my way in and have someone ready to nab Caramort when he tried to escape. My Lows would be slaughtered, and I didn’t want to involve Gregory or Rafi when this trail might lead to Samael. Dar. It would have to be Dar. That fucker still owed me over the Haagenti thing anyway.

  “Okay, so where is he?”

  “Eugene, Oregon. You’re getting the bill for my plane fare and hotel room too. I don’t budget for that shit. Paying expenses out of my pocket isn’t part of our deal. If I’m in your household, you need to cover that.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Fine. Whatever. No first class, though. Or business class either. And no pricy hotels. Holiday Inn Express, or I’m not paying.”

  He pursed his lips and pulled out his phone. “Deal. I like their breakfast buffets. I’ll text you Caramort’s address as well as who in Popiel’s household are working with this Samael guy.”

  My phone pinged and I looked down at it. “Can you try to find out everything you can on Samael? Like where the fuck he’s been for the last two-and-a-half-million years, what, if any, Ancients are in with him, and where he’s holed up right now?”

  He shot me an incredulous look. “Uh, sure. Yeah. I’ll get right on that, boss. Just as soon as I finish up this short-sale project. Now, are we done? Because I have some stock market action I need to get moving on.”

  “Yeah. We’re done.” Hopefully I could pry the information on Samael out of Caramort instead of having to wait for Mestal to finish playing the market. I walked the greed demon to the door and watched him get into a shiny black BMW and drive off. Then I sent a text to Dar.

  He replied immediately.

  You’re fucking kidding me. You want me to do what?

  I texted back: I’ll be the one chopping heads out front. I just need you to be sneaky and grab Caramort if he tries to duck out the back.

  There is no ‘grab,’ Mal. I’ll confront him. He’ll fight me. I’ll win because I’m a badass, but I won’t win without suffering some significant injury. Dar replied.

  Awesome. Oh, and don’t tell Asta, but the bad dude in all this might be the former Iblis. I might need you to help me kill him.

  No. Just…no. That is fucking not going to happen. Dar texted back.

  Thanks, man. Knew I could count on you. I’ll be by to pick you up this evening. Maybe after we can grab some wings and beer. I’ll buy.

  I shoved my phone into my pocket, ignoring the endless pings of incoming messages and headed out to the pool. Some of my Lows had popped over from the guest house. Rutter was fiddling with the grill. Nyalla was laughing at something Snip had said. Doriel had Lux on her lap, the pair of them stiff and awkward. The angel looked relieved to see me. As much as I wanted to leave him sitting on Doriel’s lap, it was clear he’d had enough. And it was clear that her fascination with Lux didn’t extend to wanting actual close contact with him.

  I held out my hands, and with a flash of light he was there, wrapping his arms around my neck.

  “I was thinking of cooking some burgers,” Nyalla told me, just as Rutter nearly caught himself on fire igniting the grill. “Doriel has never had them.”

  The Ancient smiled up at me. “Or these potato things, or the pizza pie, or hot dogs, although I did have grilled canine meat the last time I was here. It wasn’t my favorite. I prefer lamb.”

  Nyalla shot a quick glance over to where Boomer was sleeping and grimaced. “Well, we don’t eat dog. But, if you’re still here tonight, we can go out in Baltimore, grab a bite then go dancing. I’ll invite a few friends, if you don’t mind hanging out with humans and werewolves.”

  Doriel appeared intrigued by the suggestion. “Perhaps. I’m waiting for my household to get back to me on something, so I don’t really want to commit myself beyond this afternoon.”

  Rutter came over to me and tugged on my arm with a singed hand, inclining his head toward the house. I offered to get the burgers out of the fridge, and handed Lux to Nyalla, then followed the Low inside.

  “I have the information on Leethu and the house she’s being held captive in,” he told me as I pulled the ground beef patties from the fridge. “It’s owned by a woman named Red Bird. She bought it only a few weeks ago. Here’s the address.”

  I took the slip of paper he handed me. “DuNoir Valley, Wyoming. Closest town is Dubois, population nine hundred something.” Lovely. Middle of fucking nowhere. If the hunters didn’t shoot me out of the sky thinking I was a goose, I’d wind up mauled by a bear.

  “Nyalla had me go to her brother to check on this Red Bird woman, and there’s nothing on her. It’s as if she appeared out of nowhere a few weeks ago, paid cash for this place, and moved in. There was some online gossip around town that she was running a commune or something out there. One local called them gun-toting lesbians.”

  Well. Leethu did prefer female sexual partners, so maybe this summoning wasn’t as horrible for her as I was imagining. The last time I’d seen her, I’d gotten the impression Leethu could handle this summoning issue herself. Barf’s report of the dead summoner clearly supported that, but if there were a bunch of people yanking Leethu here and there, then this had to stop.

  Gun-toting lesbians or sorcerers, they needed to let my foster sister go.

  I glanced at the clock and grabbed a few spices from the rack. If I hustled, I could get Leethu free, and still swing by to pick up Dar at five to go nab Caramort. Two jobs in one day was pushing it for me, but Gregory was right. I needed to multi-task and get shit done. Besides, how hard could taking down a group of humans be?

  As we headed back out, I noted Doriel was looking particularly ill, and one glance over toward the pool told me why.

  Gregory. Fuck, that’s right. He was here to spend time with Lux and me. Whoops.

  “Hey, babe.” I handed off the burgers and spices to Snip and walked up to give my angel a big kiss, placing myself strategically between him and the Ancient. “Don’t kill her,” I whispered. “I need her right now. And Nyalla’s going to take her clubbing later.”

  “That’s Doriel.” The archangel was not whispering.

  I grabbed his arm and hauled him behind the hedges. “Look, this is my house. I’m the Iblis, an Angel of Chaos, so guess what sort of guests I’m going to have here? That aside, I’m trying to bridge the divide between our people. There’s some dickhead killing enforcers. There might be some dickhead killing angels. Bridging the divide isn’t just me tracking those dickheads down, stopping them and punishing them, it’s working to convince demons and Ancients that it’s in their best interests to play by the rules, that there are all sorts of wonderful things they can enjoy here if they make peace and don’t upset the apple cart.”

  “That’s why she’s within five feet of my offspring,” Gregory snarled. “That’s why the love of Gabriel’s life is taking her to c
lub humans or animals later today?”

  “Clubbing is not…it’s dancing, you moron. They’re going to go to Baltimore, eat dinner, drink a bunch of alcohol and dance. And yes, Lux is five feet from her. He was sitting on her lap ten minutes ago. She looked downright terrified.”

  “She’s about to look even more terrified.” Gregory tried to get around me, and I blocked him, grabbing his arm.

  “No. Take Lux somewhere else for the rest of the day if you want, but you can’t threaten or assault a guest in my home.”

  “My child—”

  “My child, too,” I snapped at him. “I might not be the best angel-parent, but I’ve kept him alive this long. Doriel isn’t going to hurt him. She’s here as my guest in my home. Demons take hospitality seriously, and Ancients take it even more seriously.” I hesitated to let that sink in a minute, and felt the muscles in Gregory’s arm relax. “Now you’ve got two choices. I need to take care of some urgent business that came up, and I don’t expect to be home until midnight at the earliest. You can go over there, make nice with Doriel, eat the hamburgers Nyalla is about to cook, and spend some quality time with your kid, or you can take him and go out somewhere for the day. Doriel will be gone by five. You’re free to come back then and wait for me to return.”

  He scowled, looking over my head toward the pool.

  “Glaring at her isn’t helping,” I scolded. “I need her on my side. If you were nice to her, maybe extended the olive branch a bit, then I’d really appreciate it. I mean really appreciate it. Blow jobs for a month, appreciate it.”

  “I faced her in battle, I—”

  “Two-and-a-half-million years ago,” I reminded him. “They lost. You banished them. She probably wants you dead too, right after she’s done crapping her pants over seeing you unexpectedly like this. I need you to be the strong one here, the mature one. I need you to at least try to mend this fence. Whether that’s just giving her a civil nod before flying away with Lux, or sitting down to eat lunch with her. Your choice.”

  Gregory took a deep breath. “Blow jobs? For a month?”

  I snorted. Like he’d ever take me up on that. We’d done a whole lot of naughty things together, but deep down he was still a bit of a prude when it came to embracing physical sensation. “Yep. For a month.” I held up my hand. “I vow it on all the souls I used to Own. I’ll even swallow.”

  His lips twitched, then he bent down and kissed me. “I love you. That’s the only reason I’m going to eat a hamburger, let alone eat one with that disgusting creature next to me.”

  I winced. “I love you too. Just…just don’t call her that to her face, okay?”

  Gregory looked over my head toward the pool, scowling once more. “I’m not sure I love you quite that much, Cockroach.”

  Chapter 12

  DuNoir Valley, Wyoming was beautiful. It was also in the fucking middle of nowhere. It was a good thing I could teleport, otherwise I’d have to have done like Rutter and take a plane to Denver, then connect with a plane to Jackson, then rent a car and drive forever, up and down mountains, around curves, staring at the gorgeous scenery and wondering if I was going to get where I needed to be in my lifetime.

  Luckily I didn’t have to do all that. Bam and there I was. Well, actually I was in some one-horse, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it town called Dubois. I figured if I was going to bust in on a bunch of Rambo women, I better do a little recon first.

  And the best place to do recon was at a bar. I ducked into the first one I saw which had the promising name of Whisky Moose. Two of the most Wyoming things I could ever think of right in one establishment. Upon entering, I saw a huge moose head mounted over the bar, a wide selection of whisky, a bored, bearded man behind the bar and three portly, fifty-something guys who looked as though their asses may have been glued to the bar stools.

  The first thing I discovered was that if you pronounced Dubois like the French word it was, you not only branded yourself as a tourist, but you might get yourself laughed out of the bar. I quickly covered for my misstep by buying all three people in the bar a round.

  “Fishing, hunting, or hiking?” the bartender asked as he slapped some generic warm vodka in front of me. The place was named Whisky Moose, not Vodka Moose, clearly.

  “None of the above. I want to surprise a friend of mine who is living here with a…a friend of hers. They have a place up in DuNoir Valley. She’s an Asian lady named Leethu. Very beautiful. Very sexy. The woman who owns the place is named Red Bird.” I snorted. “What a stupid fucking name, huh? I’ve got no idea what this Red Bird looks like. Have any of you guys met her?”

  There was silence while the three men on the barstools eyed me up and drank their whisky.

  “Those lesbians?” the one at the end asked. “You don’t wanna go surprising them. Might get yourself shot.”

  “They’re not lesbians,” the bartender told me. “Some of ’em come in every now and then. Cooper said he slept with one of them. The blonde one.”

  “How many are living there?” I tried not to grimace as I sipped the horrible vodka.

  The guys-on-stools looked at each other. “Six?” the one closest to me guessed.

  “No, I think there’s eight,” the middle one said.

  “Hard to tell,” the guy at the end told me. “They come and go. I think only three or four live there full-time like.”

  “One of them Leethu?” I asked.

  The closest guy to me nodded. “There is an Asian woman there, and wow is she gorgeous. I mean smoking. I’d hit that in a hot second, but she’s with that redhead and I wouldn’t wanna mess with her.”

  “Redhead is pretty hot too,” middle guy commented. “Wouldn’t mind hitting that. Or a threesome with her and that other one.”

  “Redhead’s the lesbian,” the far guy said. “You’re not getting any of that. Think the Asian woman might be okay with mixing it up a little, but none of you is gonna get in that redhead’s pants.”

  “I take it the redhead is this Red Bird?”

  The bartender shrugged. “Don’t know her real name. That’s what the Asian woman calls her. They’re totally doing it. But you’re still getting shot if you go out there unannounced.”

  I was a bit confused. There were a lot of reasons to summon a succubus, and sex was probably at the very top of that list. But I’d always supposed that would be some sad, weirdo little guy who hadn’t had fucked with anything but his right hand for his entire life, not a hot redheaded woman who was rich enough to afford to plonk down cash for a house in the mountains.

  Didn’t matter. Leethu might be happy to screw this woman normally, but being summoned…well, that was taking things over the line.

  I pulled my phone out of my pocket and pulled up Google maps. “So I go a few miles down 26, then turn left on this unnamed road here?”

  The bartender leaned over and eyed my phone. “Yeah. That’s the road. Five miles down, make a left on a dirt road. It’s easy to miss, so look sharp. Got washed out a few weeks back, so put it in four-wheel drive.”

  I wouldn’t be driving, I’d be teleporting. But even with that mode of travel, I still needed to know where the fuck I was going.

  “How far down that road is the house?”

  The bartender scratched his whisker-covered chin. ’Bout another three miles, but it’s straight uphill and you’re visible the whole way. Gonna get shot.”

  “Won’t be the first time.” I shoved my phone in my pocket and dug out some money. Then without even bothering to exit the bar or hide in the bathroom, I summoned my sword, revealed my wings, and teleported.

  It was a good thing I’d summoned my sword before teleporting, because I arrived into a war zone. Wards as well as human-style security alarms screamed a warning. A dozen darts slammed into my torso, pumping some tranquilizer into my circulatory system. Over the deafening shrieks of the alarms, I heard several shouts, then felt bullets ripping my body apart.

  I know the guys at the bar had said I’d get shot, but
somehow I’d thought that a sorcerer would be using more a magical means of home protection than guns and tranq darts. Fighting to recreate torn flesh and clear the drugs out of my body, I readied my sword and saw three girls run out of the house toward me, guns raised.

  Girls? Young women? They all looked like high-school kids to me, even the one with the short blue hair. I didn’t mind filling out a four-nine-five report for killing whoever summoned Leethu, but there was no way I was going to do paperwork for killing a bunch of teenagers. The impact analysis alone would take me months.

  “Hey! Whoa!” I held my sword up. “Not looking to hurt any of you. The only one I want to kill is this Red Bird.”

  The girls screamed in a pitch that nearly set my ears to bleeding, and unloaded on me. If I’d been a human, I would have been dead. If I had been a demon, I probably would have been dead as well. As it was, I was a corpse, blood splattered across the ground, my stupid sword beside me. I made sure they’d emptied their magazines before recreating my physical form, this time hiding my sensitive wings, and jumping to my feet. Before they could reload, I’d knocked the rifle out of the youngest one’s hands and pulled her in front of me as a shield.

  The other two girls gasped and immediately jerked their guns to the side, staring at me wide-eyed.

  “Hurt her and Red will kill you,” the blue-haired girl told me. “She has so much as a scratch, and you’re a dead demon.”

  “I’ve got no intention of hurting her. All I want to do is rescue Leethu. If this Red promises to never summon her again, then I won’t kill her. Honestly, that’s my best-case scenario. I really hate having to fill those reports out. Hate. I’d rather everyone walk away from this alive than have to fill one of those fuckers out.”

  “Leethu?” The blue-haired girl shook her head. “You want to rescue Leethu?”

  “Ni-ni?” I pivoted, keeping the young girl still between me and the guns as I looked over to see the succubus walking toward me. “Ni-ni, what are you doing? Let Kitten go.”