DEATH SUITS HER_A Supernatural Reverse Harem Romance Adventure

by Leighton Lawless

  “But their weapons are still here,” Dominic says, observing the unusual sight and trying to make sense of it. “Crossbows!”

  Jessup glances at Dominic, who holds a hefty crossbow and a dozen thick arrows.

  “Been a long time since I’ve used one of these,” Dominic says. “Our weaponry’s advanced all the way to the Eleventh Century.”

  Dominic sizes up the crossbow. “I can finally say that I’m about to go medieval on someone’s ass.” He smirks.

  I survey the skeletons. I can’t help but wonder how they even got this far.

  Is Lucifer imbuing them with supernatural strength or tapping into humanity’s capacity for power? Is all this carnage a myriad of test-runs, beta tests, and experiments in warfare?

  The abilities of humans are meant to be suppressed so that they might have a chance to choose righteousness over wickedness. Pride can corrupt even the purest of souls given the right circumstances.

  If the Morning Star has found a way to level his warriors up, his army truly will be a force to be reckoned with.

  “What happened to them?” I ask.

  Michael bends and hoists a piece of leg bone. He studies the curvature of the bleached tibia, the obvious bite marks across most of the bone.

  “Looks like they were someone’s lunch,” he answers matter-of-factly.

  The others gather as many weapons as they can as Jessup keeps an eye glued on the hillocks.

  It’s unclear what’s out in the swamp, but whatever it is, it’s pressed to the ground and remaining out of sight.

  The path forward, the only path, cuts across the heart of the swamp, or as Michael would call it, The Lament Swamp.

  On the sodden path, I lead the way, not because I want to, but because I’m the most eager to get to our destination. I simply do not know how much time Noah has left before it’s too late to rescue him.

  Letting Moloch get his way with my flesh and blood is not an acceptable outcome. If that happens because I took too long to get there, I’ll never forgive myself.

  My feet slip into the swamp’s murky liquid, which is oily and slick. A vaporous stench rises off of it as the mist envelopes everything.

  I take a step and then slip, but Dominic steadies me, keeps me from falling into the murk.

  “You know we risked everything to come down after you,” Dominic barks at me.

  I groan. “Not you too. I’m having hard enough of a time getting Michael off my back.”

  “I’m just saying,” Dominic begins before I cut him off.

  “What? What the fuck are you ‘just saying?’” I spit. “That you want a fucking gold star or something?”

  “How about an apology?” Dominic demands.

  “What’s so wrong with wanting to save my son?” I ask.

  How dare he question my purpose.

  “It’s only wrong when you risk the souls of other people,” Dominic answers.

  “I didn’t ask you to come.”

  “No, you didn’t,” Dominic says. “But you also didn’t consider that all of this is over a mortal.”

  “Sometimes, right is wrong,” I reply. “Sometimes, wrong is right. And it’s not just any mortal. It’s my son.”

  “You sound like Jessup,” Dominic sniffs. “Never thought the two of you would be so in agreement.”

  “He makes a lot of sense,” I reply. “Except the part about not being closer to our loved ones. I should have been there for Noah. I should have been preparing him for this and done more to protect him.”

  Jessup doesn’t chime in, however. This is between Dominic and me, and he respects that. We have some things to work out, or we’re going to end up slicing each other’s throats.

  “A hundred mortal years is like one year to us. And we get to walk the Earth like superheroes, live like kings, and take down people like Nero and Hitler and Richard—” Dominic says.

  “For the record,” I interrupt. “We don’t live like kings. Aside from some battles in the Dark Ages we’ve never taken down people like Nero and Hitler.”

  “That’s not the point!” Dominic snaps.

  “Help me with the point then, Dom,” I say, “because you’re just pissing me off now.”

  “Point is… we could kick ass and take names for a hundred lifetimes, and you want to give it all up to settle down?” he asks. “To spend time with a mortal who is destined to die before you reach your middle years?”

  I grit my teeth, white-knuckling my chain, two seconds away from slashing the life out of Dominic. This is my son we’re talking about. I created him, as much as anyone other than the Almighty can create.

  I nursed him. I taught him his first words. I was there the first time he learned to crawl, read minds, and move objects with sheer will.

  This is my one and only son we’re talking about. He’s destined for great things, regardless of whether or not his life is going to be short by our standards.

  He’s mine, and he’s the only thing that matters to me now that I’m one of the Fallen.

  “Yeah, well, maybe you were the one who helped the demons, Dom,” I say, accusing him as I wait for his glare. At his sneer, I continue. “Maybe you were part of some inside job and—”

  Plaintive wails interrupt us. A muted cry for help reverberates across the dunes.

  We all turn to look in the direction of the pleas.

  “HELP! HELP!” The cries echo across the swamp, silencing both Dominic and me.

  We step closer to the sound of screams. Our eyes glow as we try to perceive anything through the darkness.

  “There’s somebody out there,” Jessup says. “We owe it to them to do our sworn duty and protect them, even if we’re amongst the damned and have no path to redemption. It’s our obligation.”

  Hines puts a hand to his right temple and shouts. “I see him!” Hines jumps off the sodden path and wades across the swamp.

  Up ahead a form is barely visible in the mist, a man standing up to his waist in the murky liquid, gesturing wildly.

  The rest of the team screams at Hines, but he doesn’t stop, just continues toward the seemingly helpless soul. It’s in his nature.

  Since he was brought into The Order and informed of his half-angel, half-human birth, he’s felt a need to put others first. He doesn’t back down in the face of danger.

  This is one of those moments, however, when he should be more cautious.

  The man out in the murk is no ordinary person. It’s Lazarus himself. The one and only.

  The remnant of the man once risen, the first zombie. He drifts toward Hines while waving his hands.

  20

  History Repeats Itself

  Hines stops in the middle of the swamp and stares at Lazarus.

  That’s when he notices the crooked grin on Lazarus’s face and the blackened holes where his eyes and mouth should be.

  Hines freezes up, stunned and overcome with shock.

  I close my eyes and allow my angel sight to take over.

  It’s as if my mind detaches from my body, and a wash of vertigo hits me.

  Once I’ve adjusted, my vision floats to the backside of Lazarus.

  His flesh has been peeled away.

  Just a few strips cover rancid organs and dried, visible musculature.

  Something’s not right.

  I spot dark forms moving under the water to the left and right of Lazarus.

  The liquid begins to splash and grow turbulent.

  Lazarus shambles toward Hines. He’s gibbering like a lunatic.

  “IT’S A TRAP!” I shout and bring my chain up, unfurling the full length in all its might.

  Lazarus leaps past Hines and directly at me.

  I return to my body in time to witness an arrow from Dominic’s crossbow slam into Lazarus’s forehead, sending him crashing into the murk.

  Five cadaverous zombies rise off of the hillocks behind their fallen leader.

  I’m pulled back to the path by Jessup.

  Michael whips his bla
des out and holds steady. He seems locked in a trance, harnessing his anger and pain which boils over.

  Michael spins through the murky liquid of the swamp with the grace of a trained dancer.

  He’s a whirling dervish. He glides across the top of the swamp.

  His blades arc from left to right in chopping motions, severing arms and legs. Michael decapitates every last one of them.

  He’s saved us for the third time.

  Were we wrong to abandon him? Could he have won the First Holy War?

  What if his invasion could have ended all this evil before it even began and had the time to regrow in strength and number? Would things be different?

  I’m beginning to think Michael might have been right in his invasion.

  I know it’s wrong to think so. My wings weren’t ripped from my flesh for failing to win the battle.

  I fell because I disobeyed and followed Michael.

  We wouldn’t be here today if we’d kept our oaths in the first place.

  At the same time, though, if the full backing of Heaven’s armies had been at our backs, we could have prevailed.

  Dominic wades out and pulls Michael back as Jessup screams.

  “More are on the way!” Dominic shouts.

  Just above the ground, I soar down the path to the opposite end of the swamp, which spills out into the roiling river.

  Jessup and Hines cross the river as Jessup turns back to see Michael blazing toward them, followed by three dozen zombies.

  Jessup and Hines plunge into the river and push across, spitting out mouthfuls of the fetid water as they reach the opposite shoreline.

  The zombies give chase as Dominic turns and fires his crossbow and another arrow sears through the air.

  His arrow impales the undead with tremendous force.

  Two zombies snarl as their skulls are torn asunder.

  On the opposite shoreline, Michael and I stand shoulder to shoulder, ready to confront the horde.

  Dominic has fallen into the murky water.

  Michael and I swing into action.

  We move with superhuman speed and grace as we mentally dissect the battlefield and take the fight to the enemy.

  It’s as if the action has slowed down, allowing us to execute moves and attacks that a mortal could never make.

  My vision of all that’s transpiring slows down, and I see what’s before me in slow motion.

  I’m able to anticipate three steps ahead of the attackers.

  I yank Dominic out of the water as he crawls to the left and wields his crossbow to slam the jaw of a zombie that was about to pounce on me.

  “No matter what you think, I wasn’t part of any inside job,” Dominic attempts to convince me.

  I don’t respond. It’s not the right time.

  Instead, I pull my chain back and wade into the marauders who attack in waves.

  Michael and I are an army unto ourselves, just like the old days when we kicked Lucifer’s ass out of Heaven.

  If only we’d finished the job.

  Michael brings his blades down, over and over.

  I flail the sharp arrowhead at the end of my chain in every direction, slashing through one enemy after another.

  The chain itself is as sharp and deadly as the arrowhead and cuts the heads clean off a row of the undead.

  A mosaic of zombie body parts litters the ground.

  Hines and Jessup guard the rear as they book across the abyss, but they run smack into a pack of zombies rushing to cut them off.

  Hines pulls out his sword as the zombies converge and he goes on the offensive.

  He decapitates the first attacker and bisects a second just before he spots a third sprinting for Jessup.

  “Jessup!” he shouts.

  Hines removes his sword from the second zombie’s decaying flesh and hurls it at the third, killing the creature before it’s on Jessup who spins and shrieks.

  “Behind you,” Jessup warns.

  Hines turns a beat too late. He’s tackled by an oversized zombie who mounts him, rearing up, ready to take a bite out his soft flesh.

  Hines flattens to the ground, hands trying to hold back the snapping jaws of the zombie.

  One of Dominic’s arrows pounds into the zombie’s head, knocking him off of Hines.

  Hines rises, spots Dominic who has just fired the shot from a hellacious distance. His mouth twitches in a smile.

  “You owe me, Halfling,” Dominic teases.

  Bringing up the rear, Michael and I run like we’ve got the VO2 max of cheetahs pumping through our blood.

  We outrace the remaining zombies and orchestrate a counterattack of furious slashes meant to wipe out everything before us without mercy.

  As we separate, we swing back around. In one slick, coordinated acrobatic move, we fly through the air with our weapons at the ready.

  In a surgical display of skill and inhuman ferocity, Michael and I shear through the stupefied zombies.

  We punch through the wall of the resurrected, slicing through pallid flesh and bisecting appendages until body parts are piled up at our feet like some kind of twisted cairn.

  More of them come at us, a delegation of the dead.

  Their unblinking eyes are everywhere, their twisted hands stabbing their air. They long for our warm flesh and blood.

  Michael thumps his chest and calls them for them to come to him.

  They swoop down on us like wild beasts.

  Michael’s blades make the air sing.

  I drop to a crouch and unfurl my chain that snaps out and wraps around six of the monsters. Teeth gritted, I pull back on the chain which cleaves their soft flesh.

  A long moment passes, and then we step back.

  The zombies slide apart into piecemeal.

  Organs and appendages drop in a gory heap as the nightmarish creatures collapse like felled trees.

  Michael’s head falls back, and he utters a war cry. He’s loving this.

  This is what he’s always wanted—to take the fight to the enemy. Then, he sucks in a breath and clocks me with a sly smirk.

  I shoot him a wry smile.

  I wonder, for a moment, whether I should allow a past spark to rekindle, but then I push aside the feeling.

  I answer to no one now. I’m my own angel.

  “You keeping track of how many times you’ve saved my neck?” I ask.

  He chuckles.

  We turn and sprint to catch up with the others.

  My chain curls back up near my wrist, resting until it’s needed again.

  “Would I do something like that?” Michael replies. “Three, by the way. I’d say four, but the last one was a team effort.”

  “You. Are. Such. A. Dick,” I say.

  “You’re no better,” he says. “Besides, you like this. You crave this. You’re like me. If there weren’t a war, we’d both be wishing for one.”

  I beg to differ, but he might be right. I was born to be a bringer of death and finality.

  Whether that’s how my name will be remembered, who knows?

  Either way, I’m actually enjoying myself at the moment.

  “Maybe not, but I’ve got a different outlook from what I had before,” I reply.

  “This from the angel who sold out her brethren at the Gates of Hell,” Michael counters, and his eyes glow.

  Right there in the middle of it all, a vision hits me.

  Insane vertigo takes over, and my eyes roll behind my eyelids.

  A vision is overtaking me whether I like it or not.

  21

  A Vision of The First Holy War

  The vision transports me back to the time directly before the First Holy War. I have no choice but to relive the final moments all over again.

  Only, I can’t change my actions or control what happens. I’m stuck in my own body looking out, seeing and feeling it all again.

  I can hear our cries of passion and the sound of flesh slapping against flesh.

  In my mind’s eye I’m back in
place, our hidden space, a recess, a small cavern winnowed out of a mammoth piling of rock.

  It was our nook, Michael’s and mine. A place we met when our desires could no longer be contained.

  In the hours before everything changed, I was riding on top of him, Michael’s raptorial eyes going wide as he thrust into me, the two of us engaged in violent, sweaty congress.

  We were lost in the moment, the cavern suffused with the warmth and light cast from a small fire.

  While it might be a blasphemous thing to say, it was as if, for a moment, we were the only two beings that existed in all of Creation.

  I remember how Michael reached his hands around and gave my backside a squeeze as I closed my eyes and tightened the muscles around the inner portions of my thighs.

  I measured my weight and began bouncing rhythmically as Michael grunted, following my lead, our bodies moving in perfect harmony.

  Then I felt my eyes rolling back uncontrollably and Michael heaved a mighty sigh as we both climaxed.

  I collapsed atop his chest as Michael’s breath came in ragged bursts.

  He kissed my neck as I wiped a lock of hair back from his face.

  We didn’t speak a word for several moments.

  There was nothing that needed to be said.

  It was a beautiful moment, perfect even, but such things, as I’ve come to find in my rather long life, rarely last.

  I traced the contours of his lips with my finger, on the cusp of sharing my inner feelings, and that’s when I heard it.

  A sound built in the distance.

  A mnemonic chant rose to a crescendo and then—

  A horn blared a note that echoed off the walls of our tiny cave, a call to arms.

  Michael titled his face toward mine and the color went away from his cheeks.

  He moved to stand, but I held him down.

  “Not yet…not now,” I said.

  “It’s started,” he replied, “for the love of all that is holy, it has started.”

  Michael and I gather our armor and weapons and surreptitiously exit the cave, mindful to avoid being seen by the others.

  We crash down a hillside and duck through a strand of trees.

  The horn continues to reverberate, and we pray that we aren’t too late.