Judgment (The Alternate Earth Series, Book 3)

by S. J. West

  “Then we should go back and tell the others what we know,” Mason says. “We can figure out the best way to go from there.”

  We immediately phase back to the castle. While Mason and Nina explain things to everyone else, I go straight up to our bedroom to grab my pistol and sword. I’m too amped up to explain things to people anyway.

  I have a way to save Gabe. I’m not about to lose it.

  When I return downstairs, everyone is up to speed on things and ready to go.

  “So we’re sure the apartment this world’s Jered lives in is still standing?” Our Jered asks. “If this is just a ruse to get us there, I wouldn’t put it past them to lure us into phasing into an empty space.”

  “It’s there,” Nina assures us. “I just popped over onto the street next to it to verify.”

  “Ok, then,” Brand says, “let’s go get the dagger and Jess’ sword from Ravan Draeke.”

  In my mind, I see myself and Ravan engaged in a duel to the death, with me coming out victorious and taking back my sword. With my sword back where it belongs, and the dagger safely in our possession again, the next step in our plan will be to find a way to use the dagger on Gabriel. Easy peasy…or so I hope.

  Since this will be our second trip to Jered’s apartment in this world, Mason takes hold of my arm as we all phase over there.

  The apartment is definitely not in the same pristine condition that it was on our first visit. For one thing, there’s no ceiling. The space is completely open to the night sky, where the portion of the moon that still revolves around this planet is inching ever closer. It looks so gigantic now that you would think it’s about to crash into us at any moment, and, in a way, it will be. From Josh’s and Wayne’s calculations, the moon will be entering into the Earth’s Roche Limit tonight. To me, it still seems like a countdown to something. I’m trying to stay optimistic about what that something is, though.

  At this elevation, the wind whistles around the naked steel beams lining the hallway leading to Jered’s private graviton cage, where a surprise awaits us.

  A gagged Ravan Draeke is tied with steel cables to a metal-framed chair. She’s lying on her side, in an awkward position that makes it look like she might have just tried to escape her bonds. Propped up against the black door behind her is my sword.

  We all look around, thinking this has to be an ambush of some sort.

  “What do you think?” Brand asks Xavier.

  “I don’t like it,” Xavier answers as he surveys our surroundings with a critical eye. “This is too easy. It’s like she’s being served up to us on a silver platter.”

  “I agree,” Malcolm says.

  “Well, we can’t just stand here,” Nina tells the group. “We need to at least go down there and see what’s going on.”

  “I’ve got your backs,” Slade tells us, taking up the rear.

  As we make our way down the hallway, a sick feeling grows in the pit of my stomach. Xavier is right. This is just too easy. Nothing in this world has been easy for us, and I’m not naïve enough to believe our luck is changing on a dime.

  When we reach Ravan, I stand over her and find myself staring down into her wide, frightened eyes.

  “Why doesn’t she phase to escape?” I ask Mason.

  “Lilith’s power to phase is limited to Heaven, remember? Since Heaven is cut off from this reality, she can’t phase.” Mason reaches over to the door and picks up my sword for me for safekeeping.

  I bend down on one knee to slip the silky red material out of Ravan’s mouth to ungag her.

  She doesn’t say anything, but her demeanor quickly becomes more defiant than scared.

  “Why don’t you kill me and get it over with?” she asks, eyeing me warily.

  “I should,” I admit, half wondering why I’m not doing just that. “But I need something from you. If you tell me where it is, I’ll think about letting you live.”

  Ravan looks at me as if she wants to strangle me, but she says, “What are you looking for?”

  “Where is the silver dagger?” I ask her. “The one we used on Gabriel to put him into stasis.”

  Ravan looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind.

  “Lucian destroyed it, of course,” Ravan informs me, like I should have already deduced this outcome. “He couldn’t risk you using it on him.”

  I feel my heart sink so low inside my chest that it feels as if it’s suffocating my lungs.

  “Are you sure?” I ask her, not ready to just take her word for it. “Did you see him do it? Or did he just tell you that he did it?”

  “He told me, but I had no reason not to believe him. All I know is that he phased into Hell with it and didn’t have it when he returned. I would be happy to arrange a trip down there for you, Jess. Just undo my bonds and give me a weapon so we can duel in a fair fight.”

  I look up at Mason. “Did she tell me the truth about the dagger?”

  Mason nods, looking worried about what Ravan has said.

  We both know what this means.

  Even if Lucian didn’t destroy the dagger it’s still out of play, because he apparently took it to Hell. Without any way of getting there, we lack the means to retrieve it and end things forever.

  I look back down at Ravan. “Who tied you to this chair and why did they leave you here for us?”

  “That bastard, Lucian, did it,” Ravan spits out, like saying his name is poison on her tongue.

  “But why?” I ask, perplexed. “What did he hope to accomplish by leaving you here for us to find?”

  “I think he wanted you to kill me.”

  “Again,” I say, becoming frustrated, “why? What purpose does me killing you serve? I can’t say I don’t appreciate having you trussed up like a Thanksgiving turkey and offered up to me, but I know he didn’t do it out of the goodness of his heart.”

  “I don’t know what’s going on in that addled brain of his,” Ravan admits agitatedly. “But if I were to guess, he knows that if he killed me himself, Gabriel would refuse to blow the last trumpet. He’s trying to use you to do his dirty work for him, the coward.”

  It did sound like something Lucian would do. He could possibly even kill two birds with one stone with this plan. Ravan would be out of his way permanently, since she doesn’t have an heir to transfer her soul into, and Gabriel would be out for my blood to seek vengeance for her death.

  “Does Gabriel care that much about you?” I ask her, finding such a notion hard to believe.

  “The simple-minded fool,” Ravan says in disgust, “he’s always loved me, for whatever reason. I don’t know why.”

  “Me neither,” I say, at least agreeing with Ravan on that one, small point.

  I reach back down and grab the gag, slipping it back over Ravan’s chin.

  “What are you doing?” she questions me harshly before I cover her mouth with it.

  “Shutting you up until we can figure out what to do with you.”

  After the gag is back into place, I turn to Mason and ask, “What do we do with her?”

  “Use her,” my husband answers.

  “How?”

  “We use her to draw Gabriel out.”

  I begin to shake my head because I don’t want to face the facts. With the dagger gone, we only have one option left open to us.

  Two creatures formed of the same energy can’t coexist in the same space at the same time. Once Gabe touches Gabriel, both of them will cease to physically exist in this reality.

  “Maybe with a little more time we can figure something else out,” I say in desperation. “I’m not ready to give up just yet. We still have some time.”

  “Do we?” Mason questions. “We have no idea what Lucian is telling Gabriel right now. For all we know, he might have already told him you killed Ravan to get your sword back. They all know you would do it in a heartbeat, Jess. None of them would even think to question his story.”

  “Well,” I say, coming up with another plan, “then we use her, but we trade her for th
e dagger or the trumpets. Gabriel can go into Hell. If that’s where Lucian has hidden things, then we’ll use Gabriel to fetch them for us.”

  “But how are we supposed to get a message to Gabriel without Lucian finding out?”

  “I can help you with that.”

  We all look down the hallway and see Sophia standing there now. She holds up her hands, like she’s surrendering to us.

  “And why should we trust you after you lured us here, promising that we would find the dagger with Ravan?” I ask her. “Instead, we find a present from Lucian.”

  “I did what I had to do to gain Lucian’s trust,” Sophia explains. “He needed a reason to trust me again, so I told him that you wanted the dagger. Before I even got your message from Dillon, I already knew the dagger had either been destroyed or taken to Hell. I wasn’t going to be able to give you what you wanted, but I knew I could give you the means to get what you needed from Gabriel. You’re right; he will do whatever you want him to in order to save Ravan’s life. I’m not sure he’ll bring you the dagger, though, if it still exists. He would automatically assume you would want to use it on him again.”

  “But you think he’ll bring us the trumpets?” I ask, holding my breath as I wait for her answer.

  Sophia nods. “Yes, I think he will, if he can reach them.”

  “How will we know if the trumpets he brings us are the ones that haven’t been used yet?” Malcolm asks.

  “Once a trumpet is sounded,” Sophia explains, “it turns into ash. The two you saw Levi and Gabriel throw into the leviathan are the last remaining ones.”

  “That should be enough,” I say to Mason. “If we have the trumpets, we don’t have to use Gabe.”

  “That’s if he can get the trumpets out of Hell,” Sophia cautions. “I don’t know if he can, but it’s worth a try.”

  “It has to work,” I say, unable to hold back the desperation in my voice. “I’m not sure I can survive the alternative.”

  “You will if you have to,” Mason replies. “We need to be prepared for either scenario to play out, Jess, just in case.”

  “I know,” I say, wishing Mason would stop busting my bubbles of hope every time I come up with an idea to save Gabe. I understand he wants me to remain cautiously optimistic, but, for Pete’s sake, could he just not be so damn logical for once?

  “Why don’t we discuss this somewhere else?” Jered suggests, scanning our surroundings with a great deal of unease. “I really don’t like being here out in the open like this.”

  Xavier reaches down and grabs Ravan off the floor with one hand, chair and all. She wiggles around and seems to be protesting hotly through her gag, but Xavier has no problem holding onto her.

  “Where do you want to keep this thing for the time being?” he asks, unable to hide his disgust.

  “Take her down to the basement in the castle,” Brand answers. “I’ll have Josh meet you down there to open the cell door.”

  Xavier phases, with our prisoner in tow.

  “I believe this belongs to you.” Mason hands my sword back to me, hilt first.

  If I didn’t know any better, I would think the sword missed me. As I grip its hilt, I feel it vibrate slightly. It’s almost as if a missing part of me has finally been returned home.

  “Are you ready to go speak with Gabe?” Mason asks me gently, knowing it’s the last thing in the world I want to do.

  “This plan can work,” I say weakly, understanding we need to cover all of our bases, but not wanting to place one of my best friends in jeopardy.

  “It might work,” Mason cautions. “But we have a fool-proof one in our pockets. You know we have to be ready to use it, even if it’s the last thing we want to do, Jess.”

  I take a deep breath, trying to prepare myself for the talk with the other vessels.

  I shake my head in dismay. “If I had known it would come down to this, I never would have brought us here, Mason. I never would have tried so hard to come back.”

  “How could you have known? None of us knew what would happen.”

  “Knowing that doesn’t make this any easier.”

  “Losing someone you love is never easy. It’s not supposed to be.”

  “I don’t know if I can ask him to do it.”

  “You won’t have to. Gabe’s honor won’t let him shirk this responsibility. He understands what’s at stake. You told me that yourself after he spoke with you. Besides, this decision isn’t yours to make, Jess. It’s Gabe’s choice. We can’t make him do it, and we can’t stop him from doing it. All we can do is stand by his decision, whatever it ends up being.”

  “I hate to interrupt,” Malcolm says, doing it anyway. “But Mason’s right, Jess. This is Gabe’s decision now, even though we both know what he’ll choose. He’s too good a man not to do what’s right. If any of us were in a position to stop Judgment Day, you know we would all do what needs to be done.”

  I know Malcolm and Mason are right. If I was the one who needed to make the sacrifice, I would do it in a heartbeat, but it’s different when the life of someone you love hangs in the balance. I’ve always tried to protect my friends, and I know in this instance I won’t be able to do that. Leading Gabe like a lamb to slaughter goes against my nature. If saving what’s left of this world does come down to his sacrifice, I’m not sure how I’ll ever be able to face JoJo again. She’ll have every right to blame me for his loss. I very well may end up losing two friends instead of one.

  “We need to go back and talk with the others,” I say, without much enthusiasm because my heart simply isn’t in it.

  Mason phases us into the library, where the other vessels are waiting. Only Malcolm and Nina follow us to the room. I suspect the others are allowing us our privacy.

  When we phase in, I immediately look for Gabe. He and JoJo are sitting together at a small table in the corner of the room. He’s the first to notice our arrival. Without having to say a word, he seems to understand that our mission wasn’t as successful as I had hoped it would be. He nods once and takes JoJo’s hands.

  “We need to talk,” I hear him say to her.

  JoJo immediately notices the seriousness of Gabe’s tone.

  “What is wrong?” she asks, squeezing his hands tightly. “Tell me.”

  “Wait!” I say to Gabe, before he has a chance to tell JoJo what he might have to do. I want to give them both at least a little bit of hope before he reveals our Hail Mary play to her. It’s a last resort move, and one I pray we don’t have to use. “I have one more plan.”

  I tell everyone what happened, and that we now have Ravan in our custody.

  “You really think Gabriel cares about her enough to bring us the trumpets?” Chandler asks doubtfully.

  “Both Ravan and Sophia believe his feelings are deep enough that he’ll at least try to.”

  “What if he doesn’t?” Zack asks. “What do we do then?”

  “Can we trap him down in the graviton cage here?” Leah asks.

  “Trapping him like that won’t work, at least not for very long,” Mason tells her. “Lucian would eventually find a way to get him out, even if it took years to do it. The threat to this reality remains here as long as Gabriel does.”

  “Well, what if we trapped him inside our inner realm?” Chandler suggests.

  “He would feel the pull before you could trap him like that,” Mason says. “He would just phase away before you could make the realm.”

  “I could use one of my daggers on him,” Zack suggests. “He wouldn’t be able to phase, and we could take him with us.”

  “No.” Gabe says unwaveringly. “We are not bringing that thing with us without him being in stasis. I refuse to have the blood of the lives he would destroy in our reality on my hands.”

  “Then what else is there to do?” Leah asks innocently, not realizing she’s brought us to the crux of the problem.

  “I can stop him,” Gabe tells the others, saving me from having to do it.

  JoJo looks over at
Gabe questioningly. It takes her a moment, but she realizes what he’s saying.

  “That is not a solution,” she tells him, shaking her head at him.

  “JoJo…”

  “Non,” JoJo says shaking her head even more vigorously. “I will not listen to something so preposterous!”

  Leah looks up at me questioningly, still not understanding the gravity of the situation.

  “If Gabe touches Gabriel in this reality,” I tell her, “their souls will cancel each other out, and neither of them will survive.”

  Leah’s eyes immediately begin to tear up. “That can’t be the only alternative, Jess.”

  “We’ve tried everything else,” I say, wanting them to understand that this isn’t something I want to happen either. “If the trade doesn’t work…”

  “It will work,” JoJo says, wiping at the tears on her face as she stubbornly refuses to consider what we’re talking about. “I refuse to believe otherwise.”

  “JoJo…” Gabe says to her pleadingly. “We need to prepare for the worst…”

  “No!” JoJo says even more stridently. “I will not lose you…”

  “Oh, baby,” Gabe says, gently caressing the side of her left cheek, “you will never lose me, not really. I’ll always be with you,” Gabe moves his hand down to JoJo’s belly, “and our son. I need you to understand that I have to do this for you, for our boy, for our friends, and for the people who are struggling to live in this world. If I have the ability to save all of you, I have to do it.”

  “But I need you with me,” JoJo cries, finally allowing herself to completely break down. “I need you, mon amour…our baby needs his father.”

  “There is nothing in this world that I want more than to meet our son, JoJo,” Gabe tells her, unable to stop his own tears from writing their own trail of sorrow. “I hate that I’ll miss knowing what makes him smile for the first time… or laugh. I wish I could be there with you to watch him take his first step and go with him to school on his first day. I wish I could meet the girl he gives his heart to and decides to spend the rest of his life with. Don’t think that this decision is an easy one for me to make, because it’s the most difficult one of my life. I need you to understand that I have to do this. I think this is what I was born to do.”