“Thank you, Sir.” Shateiel smiled.
The rustling of feathers made them turn, and Gabriel saw the other Archangels had arrived. With Remiel was Ishtahar, his immortal human lover, and she, like Agrat, wore her dark hair loose. It fell in a chestnut curtain to her waist and over her shoulders, a contrast to the green silk salwar kameez, the simple and elegant garb of India that she wore. Gabriel smiled at her, and she bowed in return, bowing to Michael as well when he gave her a shallow bow of his own.
Everyone turned to fix their attention on Uriel, who stood glaring belligerently at Raphael and Raziel. Raphael’s expression was one of long-suffering martyrdom while Raziel’s was amused.
“You are the most stubborn, bad-tempered, ill-bred patient in the history of medicine,” Raphael was saying, obviously continuing a conversation that had been interrupted by Tzadkiel’s call. “You have absolutely no respect for your condition and you refuse to follow my orders, instead gallivanting about like an Archangel of leisure, which you most certainly are not. What am I to do with you, Uriel?”
“Stop lecturing me would be a good start.” Uriel popped a cigar between his lips and lit it with a snap of his fingers. “I’m fine. You’re worrying for no good reason, as you have been since Razzy gave me his magic shot. I don’t need to be coddled; I’m perfectly healthy. So stop the worrying and leave me alone.”
Raphael threw up his hands in frustration. “Uriel….”
“Raphael,” Uriel retorted. “Stop it.”
“Give it up, Raph.” Raziel chuckled. “He’ll do what he wants regardless. He’s right, he’s fine. He’s been fine for ages. You worry too much.”
“One of us has to.” Raphael shook his head. “I swear, one day one of you is going to give me a legion of ulcers.”
“And you can name them all after us.” Raziel nodded, patting Raphael’s shoulder. “He’s fine, Raph,” he repeated. “You know he is.”
Raphael sighed. “Okay, okay. You’re right, he’s fine. I give up.”
Raziel gave Raphael a little shake and nudged his side. “I know this poison really worried you, but I got the antidote, and I’ve got the supplies to inoculate everyone here, so we’re one up on whoever invented it. It’s okay, Raph.”
Raphael let out another sigh. “Yeah. I know. I do.”
“Good.” Raziel turned to face the rest of them. “Hello, everyone. Sorry about that. Uriel’s being… well, he’s being Uriel.”
“Hey!”
“What? You are!” Raziel grinned. “And Raph is worrying himself into an ulcer or twenty.”
“You are certain that Uriel is well?” Michael’s expression mirrored his concern.
“Yes.” Raziel opened the case he held in one hand. “And now it’s time for you all to get your shots and be inoculated against this poison. Because I am awesome, it did not take me as long to concoct as it would if it were a human scientist creating it. So, line up, gentlemen and lady”—he grinned at Agrat—“and roll up a sleeve.”
They dutifully formed a line, and Raziel administered the injections quickly and efficiently. As Gabriel stepped aside, rolling down his chain mail, he looked around the room at the assembled.
That the rest of the Brotherhood were present was no real surprise. Considering the call that Tzadkiel had made to them, Gabriel would expect nothing less than all ten Archangels being present. Shateiel was a surprise, as Gabriel would in normal circumstances fill his lieutenant in himself. Agrat and Ishtahar were also surprising. Neither were combatants, nor were they Archangels. Gabriel began to wonder what Tzadkiel was planning. To require Agrat’s presence meant that her gift would be needed somewhere along the line, and Ishtahar, the immortal human woman who had been loved by angels since the days of Eden, meant that Tzadkiel wanted someone who was human enough to pass inspection to do something dangerous.
Tzadkiel himself was talking in low tones with Brieus and Sophiel, and the three of them looked very serious. His curiosity growing, Gabriel moved to join Michael as his lover stood by the windows.
“I have a bad feeling about this,” Gabriel murmured.
Michael shot him a look and nodded once, imperceptibly. “As do I. I fear I am not going to like this report of Tzadkiel’s at all.”
“Me either.” Gabriel’s sharp eyes picked out the piles of paper, notes, and laptop computers strewn over the large dining table in the corner of the spacious living room. “I think they’ve found things that are going to piss us off.”
“Language.” Michael’s expression became grim. “I fear the same. I also fear what Tzadkiel may be planning. To ask Agrat and Ishtahar to be present… it is disquieting.”
“And then some,” Gabriel agreed. “Plus Shateiel. Not that I mind, but why ask my second-in-command to be here and no one else’s?”
“Maybe Shateiel is here because Agrat is.” Michael looked in their direction. Agrat was speaking Korean, her voice low and musical. It was her favorite language and culture, both Archangels knew, and her physical form had been a Korean woman for centuries. “Perhaps Tzadkiel felt it best to ask Shateiel if he would object to whatever it is he wishes to ask Agrat to do.”
“That… is a good possibility, actually.” Gabriel lit a cigarette. “And it don’t lessen the apprehension any. If anything, it makes it worse and gives me even more questions.”
“As you say.” Michael shook his head. “I fear that his plan is going to be something that I, as Chief Archangel, will need to sign off on.”
“That’s possible too. Which begs the question, what the hell are these humans we’re investigating doing?”
“I am not sure I want to know.” Michael wrinkled his nose. “I fear it will anger me greatly.”
“Same here.” Gabriel shook his head. “We’re not due for an Apocalypse, are we?”
“No.” Michael’s reply was curt yet firm. “Not for a very long time yet.”
“That’s what I thought.” Gabriel frowned. “Then I’m clueless and coming up with all kinds of scenarios that I don’t like at all.”
Gabriel took another look around the room, looking at the faces around him. The Archangels seemed to be a mixture of curious and worried; Uriel appeared belligerent, but that wasn’t anything unusual. Privately, Gabriel concluded that the day Uriel didn’t look belligerent would be the day that he’d worry. Remiel hovered close to Ishtahar, who looked as serene as she always did. Gabriel’s eyes narrowed a fraction as he gazed at her.
“You do not think the Grigori and the other Fallen Ones are trying to escape, do you?”
Gabriel grunted. Michael had just given voice to his own thought. “I hope not. I locked Semjaza up damn good in Aquila, and the constellation itself told me it wouldn’t let him out. The rest of them are in Hell, where you put them. We know that Shamshiel is selling his feathers for who knows what, but he’s still in Hell.”
Michael frowned. “I wish that we had the Order to kill them.”
“Agreed.” Gabriel took a long drag on his cigarette. “I’d really love to kill Semjaza. He pisses me off just by breathing.”
Michael shot him an amused look. “Language. And we do not need to breathe, da bao.”
“You know what I mean. He’s so self-righteous and self-absorbed that he makes my teeth hurt.” Gabriel scowled. “You can’t tell me you don’t feel the same about the other Grigori.”
“No, in truth, I cannot.” Michael sighed. “However, I will refrain from losing my temper until I have heard what Tzadkiel has to tell us.”
“I shall be guided by you,” Gabriel said extravagantly, and then he laughed. “C’mon, dear heart. Let’s go see what’s going on.”
Michael smiled fondly. “As you say.”
“All right, then,” Tzadkiel said, by way of calling the meeting to order. “We’ve found some things, and I’ve got a plan.”
“Don’t you love the way he says that?” Raziel, irrepressible as ever, sat down on the floor, leaning back against the window. “All he needs is a long moustach
e to twirl and to end with a ‘mwa-ha-ha’ type of laugh.”
Uriel laughed at that, sitting beside the youngest Archangel and stretching out his legs. “A mo’ would look stupid on him, but the laugh would be hilarious.”
“Do you two mind?” Tzadkiel asked in an acid tone.
“Sorry. Do go on.” Raziel generously waved a hand.
“Thank you.” Tzadkiel rolled his eyes. “As I was saying before Brat and Brattier interrupted me, we found things.”
“I managed to retrieve a lot of information from Lia Darguill’s computers,” Sophiel began, sitting forward on her chair, a notebook in her hands. “What was most of interest were the hidden files she has. It seems that there are another two dozen of these warehouses around the world, distributing these charms. Most of them are here in the US, and the trade is concentrated here, but there are plans to expand on the ones in Europe, Asia, and Oceania. Not to mention Russia and the former USSR—that’s been earmarked as the most important place for expansion.”
“Once we found this out,” Tzadkiel said, taking up the tale again, “we began to dig around the reports of attacks on single humans. It took a while. There were a lot of reports and a lot of attacks. By narrowing it down, we concluded that at least one third of these attacks were done by demons, wearing the charms.”
“How can you tell?” Raphael asked.
“There’s a certain pattern to them.” Tzadkiel pulled a face. “The attacks are always sexual in nature and in small towns and villages. They’re usually done by men and women who appear to be the sons or daughters of that town or village’s prominent businessman or woman, and those humans don’t actually have children. That’s part of what took so long—checking out family histories and backgrounds and finding out that these demons are masquerading as fake sons and daughters.”
“This took a lot of planning,” Raziel noted. He was now completely serious, and his bright blue eyes narrowed in thought. “A lot of secretive planning. Would Lucifer know about this?”
“If he does”—Tzadkiel rubbed his face with one hand—“he doesn’t care. Remember, he only cares about Apocalypses. This isn’t one. Okay, okay, we don’t know the exact dates for them, but we know the signs and portents that lead up to them. It’s built into our Archangel Graces.” There was a ripple of agreement at that. “So no, Lucifer isn’t interested in this. Oh sure, chaos and mayhem amuse him, but he’s not wasting power and energy on this. He’s biding his time for the next Apocalypse.”
“That’s something, I suppose,” Remiel said with a sigh. “So what else did you guys learn?”
“We hacked into her e-mail accounts.” Brieus consulted his own notebook. “Her boss, the gentleman in New York, has ordered her to shut up shop in Atlanta after our little visit and liquidate all stock. He’s sent her employees elsewhere—well, those that we didn’t kill, anyway. And he’s ordered her up to New York.”
“Do we have a name for this guy yet?” Gabriel leaned forward.
“As a matter of fact, we do.” Tzadkiel grinned. “It was difficult to get it, but we’ve got it. We’ve got Sophiel to thank for that.” He inclined his head at his second, and she blushed prettily.
“I had help, Sir,” she demurred. “Bri had the idea about the Virt-Cash.”
“The what?” Samael looked as confused as he sounded.
“Virt-Cash, Sir,” Sophiel said. “It is a virtual currency that’s used in trading on a virtual black market that you need to be invited to participate in. It’s very underground and very difficult to get involved in. I won’t go into the technical details,” she said with a smile. “They’re quite complex. But Brieus suggested that perhaps the cloaking, for want of a better term, of this black market that Virt-Cash is used in might be what’s used to hide this guy and his plans.”
“Most of what you said just sailed right over my blond and gorgeous head,” Gabriel said. “In English?”
“There’s a cloaking sort of technology,” Sophiel said slowly, choosing her words carefully as if she wasn’t entirely sure she could explain the concept in layman’s terms, “like what we use to keep our wings invisible to human eyes? This is a program that’s designed to hide websites, e-mail, online identities, that sort of thing. There are variations on it, depending on what you want to hide, but basically, only people you invite in behind the cloak can see the content. Like only other angels can see our wings unless we reveal them to the world on purpose.”
“Huh.” Gabriel looked around at the other Archangels, gauging their opinions from their expressions. They all appeared thoughtful, digesting Sophiel’s explanation, and a little wary at the same time. The feeling he had that something bad was coming grew.
“So, to cut a long story short,” Sophiel went on, “we managed to get behind the cloak using our own programs and technology and a little bit of angel power and see what’s going on. It’s… well, we were surprised.”
“We thought this was a case of human greed gone mad,” Brieus said. “It’s not.”
“What?”
“Pardon?”
“Are you sure?”
Everyone spoke simultaneously, and Tzadkiel held up a hand for silence. “Believe me, when they brought me this, I had to have them show me to see it for myself.”
“What is this a case of, then?” Michael demanded.
Brieus took a deep breath. “The human male in New York who is running this show is named Bob Taytton. He’s a failed theology professor. Failed because he was sacked by his superiors for indulging in Apocryphal teachings that dealt with black magic.”
“He believes,” Sophiel continued, “that he is the reincarnation of Sécaire.”
Raziel shot to his feet, his expression like a thundercloud. “Sécaire. The saint? The one who devised the rituals for demon banishment that got misinterpreted by Alastair Crowley and made into a black mass for getting spiritual revenge on enemies? That Sécaire?”
“That’s the one.” Sophiel nodded.
“Our Bob Taytton thinks he’s the reincarnation of the nineteenth century French Saint Sécaire? He’s got a bloody nerve!” Raziel was spluttering in outrage.
“Sécaire… I remember him,” Samael said thoughtfully. “He was a quiet, scholarly man. When I took him Home, he thanked me for guiding him and hoped that his work would be used for good in the years to come.”
“I don’t know what to tell you.” Sophiel spread her hands helplessly. “This guy in New York believes that he is Sécaire and his duty is to bring about a New World Order with him as the head, using the Mass of Saint Sécaire—the one Crowley fudged—as a weapon against anyone human who stands against him. He’s apparently a gifted speaker, and he preaches every Sunday in a private chapel he owns.”
“Which is where my plan comes in.” Tzadkiel took a deep breath. “Taytton has demons guarding him at all times. He has them around his home, his church, working as his chauffeur, his chef, his maid, you name it. He’s made a deal with Shamshiel. Shamshiel gives Taytton his feathers, and in exchange, he gets women and all of the nation of Turkey. This was all in his Internet conversations with his followers that Sophiel and Brieus showed me hidden behind the cloaking. Now. Demons will know an angel instantly. So… Ishtahar, I need to ask you if you would be willing to act as a spy for us?”
Remiel drew in a sharp breath. “No. Absolutely not. I forbid it.”
“Remi—” Tzadkiel began, but Remiel was on his feet, his face red. “No! Ish, tell him!”
“Remiel,” Ishtahar said softly. “Please. Sit.”
Remiel did so, but his expression was furious.
“You wish me to attend his church, am I correct?” At Tzadkiel’s nod, Ishtahar nodded as well. “I see. And you wish me to report on what this man, this Bob Taytton, preaches, to present myself as a true believer and become a part of his congregation, perhaps befriend one or two of the others who believe in him?”
“Yes.”
Remiel was shaking his head and cursing under his breath.
“What is the danger?” Ishtahar’s eyes held Tzadkiel’s, and Gabriel found himself holding his breath.
“If you’re discovered as being Ishtahar, High Priestess of Eden and former wife of Semjaza, mother of Nephilim and now beloved of Archangel Remiel, then… he’ll probably try to sacrifice you in the ritual mass.”
“And if he does not discover who I am?”
“Then, High Priestess”—Tzadkiel bowed formally—“you will be safe.”
“No.” Remiel turned to Ishtahar, stricken. “Please, Ish. Don’t do this.”
“Dear Remiel.” Ishtahar touched his cheek gently. “I must. I was punished for my part in Semjaza’s attempted uprising by being given immortality. I turned it into a gift. I cannot refuse a request of God’s or a request of one of His Archangels.”
“Then I’m requesting that you don’t do this,” Remiel begged. “Ishtahar, please, please don’t do this.”
“I must, dear one.” Ishtahar smiled sadly. “To help protect the Earth and the balance of right and wrong, to help preserve the neutrality of this plane of existence. If what I can learn by this act of intelligence gathering will help defeat this egomaniac, then it should be done.”
“I can send some of my people with you,” Michael said. His voice was soft and firm. “I have some humans whom Gabriel has been training for me. I feel that if you were accompanied by one or two of them, as supplicants, perhaps, with a suitable, iron-clad backstory for how you all came to know of him and his plans, that will give Remiel some small comfort.”
Ishtahar shot Michael a grateful look then turned back to her lover. “Remiel, you see? I will not be alone.”
Remiel glared at her, then at Tzadkiel and Michael. “You better make damn sure they’re the best of the best, Michael,” he growled. With that, he vanished.
Ishtahar sighed. “He is worried I will be harmed.”
“He does know what immortal means, right?” Uriel drawled. “It’s not like you can die.”
“Of course.” She smiled. “Dear Uriel, I, as any of you, still feel pain. He does not want me hurt.”
Uriel huffed at that. “Okay, sure, but you’re not a total waste of space like most mud monkeys. You’re smart.”
No Quarter Page 14