She focused on the rage, still spinning inside like a mini cyclone. She remembered Aamon’s words about drawing power from her core. Jordan closed her eyes. The hate she felt might be a manifestation of her power, but it wasn’t the source of it. She pushed it from her and looked deeper, closing herself off to everything around her. Soon, she felt it, a calm but continuous energy. It was ancient, timeless. Images suddenly appeared in her mind. The ocean, deceptively serene from afar but teeming with life, busy beneath the surface. Tree limbs swaying, leaves dancing on a refreshing breeze. Air constantly moving, soothing. Tilled earth, rich brown rows waiting to provide life. A roaring fire, powerful enough to sustain or destroy. The night sky, winking with stars, blazing with comets, beautiful colors swirling around planets. Angel wings, pearl white and stunning, crashing to Earth.
Although it felt like hours had passed, it was only a minute or two later when Jordan opened her eyes. She could feel energy flowing through her like water, heating her chilled core like fire, lifting her up like air, nourishing her like the Earth, and it was endless, like the galaxies above. She knew this was where Sariel’s grace came from just as her demon power was the result of Lucifer’s fall.
Now that she was aware of it, Jordan realized how unnatural it felt. The two powers were never meant to be contained in the same vessel. There would never be any balance, not really. Like oil and water, no matter how much energy she exerted to combine them, separation was inevitable. It felt like three different beings shared her body, yet all of them were her.
How in the hell did this happen?
She got to her feet and circled around the pool of vomit. Gina wrinkled her nose and took a step back but Jordan barely noticed. Instead, she studied the kids standing around them.
They were all so different; short, tall, black, white, Asian, shy, funny, but each had a common bond – they were all Cambions. Jordan was the only one who didn’t belong, and never would. She was human, angel, and demon, but not enough of either to be counted. It didn’t matter where she called “home” – the bowels of Hell, the gardens of Heaven, or a farmhouse in Dixon’s Bluff, WY. She would always be an outcast. For the first time in her life, Jordan looked for her future and couldn’t see a damned thing.
“What’s going on here?”
Aamon appeared in a pair of sweats and white T-shirt, hair rumpled from sleep, eyes squinting against the glare of the light. Jordan had never seen him so casual before. It made him look vulnerable, more human.
Elliott stood behind him, Ivy to his right. She met Jordan’s gaze with raised eyebrows – an unspoken question, Are you okay?
Jordan nodded once.
When Ivy noticed the second party to the early-morning disturbance, her eyes took on the red hue of her inner demon. She took a step forward with obvious intent to do bodily harm. Mumbling words Jordan couldn’t make out, Ivy pushed another kid aside, the only obstacle in her path, but Aamon grabbed a handful of her shirt and pulled her back.
Gina, delighted with Ivy’s anger, gave her a little wave.
Ivy lunged, but Aamon’s grip was solid.
“Jordan, what’s the problem here?”
Before she could open her mouth to answer her satanic sire, Gina whipped up some fake tears and beat her to the punch.
“Dad, she stormed into my room and broke my iPod!” She gestured to the open door. “Come look. It’s in pieces all over my floor!”
Brow furrowed, Aamon ignored her request. “Gina, during the unfortunate accident earlier, you claimed that Mazie broke your iPod.”
Jordan could see the tiny imps behind her eyes, working feverishly to devise an excuse. Aamon shook his head.
“Jordan, perhaps you can elaborate.”
She sighed. Jesus, she was tired. All she wanted was her warm bed and eight hours of sleep. “Yeah, I broke her iPod. It was fine before that, though. She was listening to it when I came into her room.”
Aamon massaged his temples. Jordan heard someone snicker.
“Why did you break it?”
“Because she’s a bitch and she hates me,” Gina wailed, running to his side.
He put an arm around her, shushing in soft, soothing tones. The internal fury Jordan had pushed to the back of her mind jumped to the forefront. In her frazzled state, she couldn’t tell if she was angry because Gina was leaving out her part in this or because Aamon was consoling her. Surely she wasn’t jealous.
Was she?
Don’t be ridiculous, she scolded. If Aamon’s too stupid to see through her charade then that’s his problem, but I’ll be damned if I’ll let her get away with what she did to Mazie.
“I broke her iPod because she lied to you about Mazie, made her feel lower than dirt and wouldn’t accept her apology no matter how many times she offered it, and then took a walk through her dreams and tortured her.”
“You shut up!” Gina screamed. She turned to Aamon. “Dad, she’s lying!”
“The hell I am.” Jordan advanced toward Gina, fists tight by her side. “You invaded her dreams. You gave Mazie back her parents and then made her father hang her with a rope over…and over.” She stood toe to toe with Gina, her voice low and menacing – the sound of wrath. “You were there, watching, laughing, while she begged you to stop.”
Aamon blanched. He stared at Gina with his mouth half open. Jordan wanted to knock some sense into him. After what she just revealed, all he could do was gape like a fish out of water.
“How many more, huh?” Jordan raised her voice, addressing the other kids. “How many times has she abused her power? Who else has been a victim of Gina’s low self esteem and barbaric pastime?”
Whipping around, she glared at Aamon. “I know I’ve been visited by her several times in the dead of night. I’ve been eaten alive, maimed with knives, watched my family die in every way imaginable…” She swallowed hard. “And it happened on your watch, Dad.”
Aamon scanned face after face. Most of the kids nodded before turning away to look at something else – anything else.
When his eyes sought Jordan, she wasn’t swayed by the pain she saw. If anything, it made her despise him more.
“I didn’t know,” he whispered. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Her strangled laugh made him wince. “Because we shouldn’t have to! You brought us here. You took us from our families. You claim to love us. You are our father. Act like one.”
Aamon exhaled through trembling lips. He pulled one child after another into his arms and still, Jordan felt nothing.
“I promise,” he murmured, “this will never happen again.”
When he got to Jordan, she shrugged. His words meant nothing to her. She walked past him, intent on checking on Mazie and falling into bed.
A hand shot out and grabbed her hair, twisting it and yanking her backwards. Gina’s scream was a mix of primal madness and injured animal. Unfortunately, she wasn’t aware of Jordan’s proficiency with hand-to-hand combat – or her newly discovered power.
Instead of trying to get away, Jordan stepped back into Gina, catching her off guard. Leaning forward slightly to protect her head, she used her body to slam the Cambion against the wall. The crash was deafening. Jordan felt sheetrock give beneath them.
Ivy and Aamon screamed in unison. Gina touched the back of her head and smiled like the devil himself at the blood that covered her fingers. Her voice cut through the din, stoking the fire that Jordan had barely gotten under control.
“Tell me, Jordan, who will protect Mazie after you’re dead?”
Before she could react, Gina raised her hand, glowing bright, eager. Jordan only had enough time to connect with her own power before she was flung against the wall with the energy of a wrecking ball.
Her lungs struggled for oxygen. A rib snapped, and then another. Her chest ached, seeming to grow smaller with every small breath she managed. Gina was literally crushing her from the inside.
Panic dug in with long claws, scrambling for purchase as it made a slow cli
mb to her throat. Jordan wanted to scream, to beg for mercy. Somehow, she managed to push the fear down before it manifested on her face. She needed to get control but dear God, the pain was excruciating!
All around her, chaos ensued. One girl named Becca, whose special ability was the element of fire, wound up like Sandy Koufax on the mound and threw a blazing slider. Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough power behind the pitch. The fireball fell short, set the carpet on fire, and only succeeded in separating Gina and Jordan from everyone else. The light from the orange and yellow flames caressed Gina’s face like a lover, highlighting her blue eyes, softening the harsh lines as she frowned. How could someone so beautiful be so ugly?
Jordan’s vision grew dark around the edges. She could barely get air to her shrinking lungs. Panic began its ascent again, faster than before. A tear slipped from between her closed eyes and tracked furrows of pain on her face. The beast within cried silently with her, begging to be let out. Not knowing what else to do other than to give Gina the satisfaction of her death, Jordan opened the door and set it free.
Power pulled like a cresting wave. Jordan felt her soul rise as the swell grew. At the top, she waited, balanced on the precipice, as the whitecap formed.
The rush Jordan felt as the wave broke and surged through her body was almost more than she could take. She fell to the floor, landing on one knee. One hand dug into the piled carpet to keep from tipping over, the other curled tight against her chest.
She could breathe again! Once accepted, the power leveled out, surrounding her with warmth, healing her injuries, giving her strength Jordan never thought possible. The beast, she knew now, was nothing more than fear of the unknown. She was afraid of what she was, of changing into something evil. Well, she would find a way to cope with it. Gina’s cloudburst was mild compared to the squalls a full demon could conjure.
The fire eating away at the carpet and licking the walls a few feet away suddenly disappeared as Jordan lifted her head and met Gina’s wide-eyed stare.
“What the hell?”
Jordan rose to her feet, Jordan said, “Hell has nothing to do with this.”
Slowly, she advanced, shoulders back, arms at her side. She thought about Mazie and the other kids Gina had hurt. It was hard enough being plucked from the only families they’d ever known and transplanted to a world full of demons and other creatures that shouldn’t exist. The last thing they needed was a crackpot in head-to-toe Abercrombie and Fitch invading the only reprieve from madness they had. The daytime horrors were bad enough.
“Jordan, are you…okay?”
“Look at her eyes!”
“What’s happening to her?”
Jordan ignored the whispers, the exclamations of shock. She couldn’t worry about them now.
Gina raised her hand again. The green radiance pulsing from her palm hinted at what was to come. When she closed it into a tight fist, a mild throb – a ghost of the pain that had assaulted Jordan before – returned. She brushed it aside, but the fact that Gina was trying to hurt her, to kill her, was just as bad. What gave her the right to decide anyone’s fate?
A whooshing noise made Jordan pause, but just like the headache, she shoved the noise aside. It reminded her of Gabe, and her heart lurched at the thought. No one was coming to help her, not ever again. The middle of her back, right between her shoulder blades itched and burned. She pushed that aside, too.
More excited whispers reached her ears. Aamon yelled for her to stop. Too late, she thought, and paused in front of Gina.
The Cambion’s eyes were as large as hubcaps. Shaking her head, Gina dropped her hand and backed into the wall.
“What the fuck are you?”
“That,” Jordan said, raising her own hand, “is the least of your worries.”
Her fingers circled Gina’s slim, sculpted neck before she slammed her against the wall.
“Get off me or I swear the next time you doze off I’ll gut you like a deer. Your last breath will be spent watching Mazie feast on your steaming entrails!”
Gina knew what buttons to push. She used Jordan’s affection for the youngest child in the house like a tool, twisting the pain and desperation deeper.
But Jordan no longer felt desperate, at least not for Mazie’s safety. Gina would soon find out why.
She squeezed Gina’s neck harder, cutting off what little air she had allowed before. Gina’s eyes bulged and she clawed at Jordan’s arms and hands, scratching deep furrows with her acrylic nails. Blood instantly pooled in the ragged slits and splattered the floor like the beginning of a murder scene. It didn’t go unnoticed by Jordan that this was the second room of carpet she’d ruined.
“Jordan, that’s enough!” Aamon yelled. “Let her go!”
She bent close enough to Gina’s face to smell her musky, spicy mélange of fear, sweat, and overpriced perfume. “Hear me good, Gina, because I won’t say this again. You will never hurt another kid in this house or anywhere else. If you do, I swear on my brothers’ lives I will kill you…slowly, and I’ll enjoy every minute I make you suffer.” She watched as the girl’s face began to change from dark red to purple. Her eyes fluttered and she swayed on her feet. “Nod if you understand me.”
Like a drunk at closing time, Gina managed a loose head bobble. Jordan let go and felt a small bit of satisfaction when the girl sank to the floor, staining her silk pajama bottoms in blood.
Gina panted, rubbing her neck, which would sport bruises in the shape of Jordan’s fingers soon. Using the wall for support, she clambered to her feet. In a raspy voice, she said, “You owe me a new pair of pajamas.”
Jordan smiled sweetly. “Put it on my tab.”
“Bite me, bitch.” Gina spat in her face.
Something inside Jordan snapped. Instinct told her Gina would never stop. Not only had she lost her position in the house, she’d also been found out. The Cambion would retaliate with a vengeance.
Gina reached back, fist cocked and ready to fly. In her weakened condition, she still managed to put the force of a Brahman bull behind the punch. Even then, Jordan had no problem palming it, stopping her cold.
Her fingers tingled. Rage – raw and unfiltered – saturated every pore of her being. The rancorous black thorn tattooed upon her heart, dormant for months, quickened as bitter blood raced through her veins, baptized in tainted sap.
But there was something else inside, as well. Something pure and good. Something that said she was right for what she was about to do.
Just like when she healed Koda’s wounds, blue pulses of light passed from her chest. They raced down her arms, underneath her skin, riding her veins. Jordan could feel friction as the energy searched for something to save…or kill.
When the throbbing flashes reached Gina’s fist, she began to scream. Aamon leapt into action. Jordan watched, unconcerned, as he raced towards her and slammed into an invisible barrier. Until it happened, she had no idea she was capable of such a thing. But on a deeper plane, in her subconscious, Jordan knew she had that ability. It was like remembering something from a long time ago, or perhaps sharing someone else’s memories.
“Jordan, remember the dream!” Ivy pounded against the barrier. “Remember Gabriel and what happened to him – what you did to him? You have to stop!”
But this was right. Wasn’t it? She was a Slayer. Gina was evil. Evil should be destroyed.
In her mind’s eye, she saw her Guardian fall. Agony filled her once again as his ashes scattered in the wind. She’d killed him out of hate. Was she doing the same to Gina?
My God.
She let go of the girl’s arm and fell to her knees beside her, checking for any signs of burns or damage. There was nothing, no marks to indicate she’d done anything permanent.
Aamon rushed over and began his own examination. Gina put her head between her bent knees and took deep breaths. Jordan stood up and backed away. Ivy was there to meet her, pulling her into a comforting hug.
“Are you okay?” she asked, squee
zing harder.
Jordan nodded, unable to speak. The power was still there and always would be. She’d tapped into it, called it to her, and now it was hers whether she wanted it or not.
“Gone.”
At first, Jordan thought Ivy mumbled the word, but realized it came from farther away.
Gina.
“It’s gone.” She held her hands up in front of her face, shaking them, clenching them into fists. “It’s GONE!” She raised her eyes to Jordan. “You took it!”
“Took what, Gina? What are you talking about?”
Aamon looked at Jordan, but she didn’t acknowledge him. She focused on Gina and waited to hear what she already knew.
“My powers. That bitch took my powers! I have nothing left – nothing!”
Everyone regarded Jordan with mixed expressions. Some seemed fascinated while others looked horrified. Only Ivy stood beside her, unflinching.
“I didn’t take anything, Gina,” Jordan informed her. “I burned them away. You abused what you were given. You didn’t deserve them anymore.”
“You psychotic freak, give them back! You’re a Cambion just like me. You can’t burn up someone else’s powers.”
Jordan cocked her head, hearing a different personality – one hidden for so long but present for the moment – answer her half-sister. It was her, but felt alien.
“The Cambion part of me agrees. The angel part sees things differently.”
Chapter Thirteen
Gabriel
It was good to be back on Earth again. Although he loved Heaven – his heaven in particular – Gabriel couldn’t deny that Earth felt more like home. He’d never questioned why that was. Now, he couldn’t help it.
After his meeting with Yasen, Gabriel had left Heaven as quickly as possible, not knowing if Michael was aware of his journey to the Helix Nebula. He hadn’t stopped to speak to any of his brothers and sisters who called out as he hurried through the Gates. He’d left like a fugitive fleeing from his homeland.
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