by Amy Braun
That got her attention. I gave her a stare that could have frozen a lake, and the magazine began to flap nervously in her shaking hands.
“Take me to her,” I demanded. “Now.”
The woman didn’t need a lot more encouragement. I watched her like I was going to kill her the second she sneezed on me. I don’t think I would have, but I was tired, cold, and stuck in the middle of nowhere trying to find my missing sister. My patience was all but gone.
She led me outside to the parking lot of the motel, glancing nervously at all the windows, probably hoping someone would come out and help her.
I rolled my eyes. I didn’t even have a knife pulled. If I were going to kill her, I’d have drawn it and pressed it into her back to get her moving. Nothing motivates people like the concept of–
Before I knew what was happening, my senses were overloaded. In the blink of an eye, I felt heat, saw a searing light, smelled smoke, and heard crumbling construction.
I blinked to register it all, and that was when I saw the giant orange blaze rising from the corner of the L-shaped motel.
I knew exactly where Dro was.
I left the motel owner in a shocked state of screaming “Oh my God oh my God oh my God,” and I ran for the fire as fast as I could.
None of the other patrons noticed me as I passed them. They launched out of their rooms in various states of undress, shrieking into their cell phones or just shrieking all together. I swung around the banister and darted up the steps, feeling the heat spreading from room to room. Water was building in my eyes and smoke dried out my throat.
“Dro!” I screamed. I didn’t think she could hear me past the roar of the flames. Which meant I had to get closer.
It wasn’t that I wasn’t afraid of fire. I was. Any sane human being who has seen a forest fire on TV thinks, “There is no stopping this,” until the fire trucks and water-bombers show up to save the day.
But until then, you’re at the mercy of a powerful force set on nothing but destruction. Fire consumes everything, and it doesn’t care what stands in its way. It will burn until it decides it wants to be put out.
I kept myself close to the banister, bending away from the flames licking toward me. I could barely see through the tears blurring my eyes, and if I was breathing in oxygen, I couldn’t tell.
“Dro!” I shouted again, before I started coughing.
I was standing in front of the open door of her room, staring at a wall of flame. How the hell was I going to get in there? The floor hadn’t been totally destroyed, but it wasn’t going to last much longer. Every other time I’d seen Dro, she’d been unharmed by the flames she created. But through the racket of the blaze, I heard a noise.
It was faint, but I knew a scream when I heard one.
I covered my mouth with the sleeve of my jacket, and stepped inside the room.
I moved just past the doorway, not trusting the stability of the floor. It was like stepping into an open furnace. Fresh air had been replaced with smoke. The heat slapped my skin and pulled beads of sweat from it. Tears streamed down my cheeks and dried on my face.
I coughed and looked to the left, locking eyes on the bed and the girl in it.
Dro was still screaming, white-hot flames circling her skin and dancing on the edges of her hair. I took a couple more careful steps, wincing whenever the floor groaned underneath me. I got as close to Dro as I dared, too nervous to touch her but unable to back away.
“Dro!” I screamed again. There was no way she could hear me past the fire and her own agonizing screams.
I didn’t know what else to do. We couldn’t wait for help. God knows how we’d explain her miraculous survival to cops and firemen. And I wouldn’t leave her like this, to awake alone in a room full of fire. So I shrugged out of my lucky jacket and tightened it like I was wringing out a towel. I frowned for having to do this, but desperate times, desperate measures.
I whipped the jacket along her stomach.
The reactions were immediate. Hers, and mine.
Dro snapped awake and shot up from the bed, the white flames going out from her body. Me, on the other hand, had to deal with the consequence of sticking my arm over a white-hot flame. I yanked my hand back to my chest, gasping at the razor sharp pain tingling around it. I smelled burning flesh and knew it was horrifically damaged. My new tears of pain mixed with the tears created by the smoke and heat.
I stumbled back, hardly able to see anything anymore. I could barely breathe, and I was getting dizzy from the lack of oxygen. I knew I had to get out of this room, but I couldn’t remember where the exit was.
Dro was suddenly in front of me, looking awake and terrified. I smiled stupidly at her, not sure what else to do other than be grateful she was alive.
She hesitated, then grabbed my shirt and led me toward the door. We made it out just as the roof caved in behind us. The change in temperature brought goose bumps to my skin, but I didn’t stop following Dro. I cradled my charred hand and practically fell down the steps after my sister. She eventually led us behind the motel, away from prying eyes, even though I knew the motel owner was going to report both of us as soon as the cops arrived.
We lost ourselves in the forest, running until we couldn’t move anymore. I leaned back against a tree and slid down it, breathing heavily. I was exhausted, in pain, and I hadn’t even gotten into a fight with anybody.
Dro sat next to me, holding her knees to her chest and watching me with tear-filled eyes.
“You found me,” she whispered.
I grinned at her. “Course I did. Why wouldn’t I?”
She shivered and burst into tears. I reached out with my unburned hand and rubbed her back. She stiffened under my touch, but slowly relaxed. I pulled her closer to me so her head was on my shoulder. We sat there in relative silence, the only sounds coming from the burning motel and my sister’s gentle crying…
I stopped thinking about my sister when our Heavenly parade came to a stop outside an abandoned high school. I frowned at it. I went to school until I was fourteen, and was never able to return to it when the demons started chasing us. Dro and I took some homeschooling when we were living with the Blood Thorns, just so we would have some semblance of an education, but it was another regular life-thing that I’d missed.
Not that I would have gotten much from school. I was the average student, coasting by and needing to be forcibly dragged out of bed so I wouldn’t be late. Still, it would have been nice to suffer through the mediocrity of school instead of spending the next two years running from demons, living on the streets, and learning how to kill people.
Dro on the other hand, loved school. Of course she would. School was where she made friends, learned new things, got to feel normal. What supernatural child with anxiety issues wouldn’t love that?
I sighed. There I went again, trying not to think of my sister, and ultimately thinking about my sister.
The angels led our tragic group inside and locked the door behind us. To my surprise, they didn’t immediately tie us to chairs and put swords against our throats. Michael looked at me, as if sensing my confusion.
“You are free to come and go through this building. The hybrid is not with you, so I am not concerned about any resistance.”
I had a small fantasy about punching Michael in the mouth and asking, “Are you sure about that?” but I was just too tired and depressed to bother with the attempt. Instead, I walked with the guys down the shadowed halls and cold metal lockers.
After shuffling in silence for the better part of five minutes, I turned in front of the group and looked at them all. No one met my eyes.
“We should get some sleep,” I said. “It won’t be long until Michael decides to pound answers out of us.”
Not one of them moved. My three friends had become three statues. Max was the first one to crack.
“I’m not sure sleep is a good idea for me right now,” he whispered.
My chest stung for him. It always amazed me ho
w much Max loved my little sister. Without her, he was like a lost puppy. He was awed by everything she did, happy when she laughed at his lame jokes, and found a purpose in making her feel human. Max wasn’t a fighter, but he knew how to protect Dro from herself almost as well as I did.
But almost wasn’t enough anymore.
I put my hand on his shoulder. “We’ll find her, Max.” I said it for myself as much as him.
He nodded automatically, as if he knew I was going to say that. He probably did.
Max walked out from under my hand to the classroom on the left. He closed the door with a silent click. The next person on my radar was Sephiel.
His shoulders were slumped, and there were a couple more streaks of silver at his temples. He looked older and more human every day. I wondered if it was his immortality wearing off, or because being a human in our group was tiring him out.
“It was not supposed to be like this,” Sephiel said softly, as though hiding his pain. “I was going to protect her, honor Everiel’s last wish. I knew it would be a challenge, that it would test me beyond all measure, but...” He shook his head slowly. “I never imagined how much chaos it would reap.”
Sephiel wasn’t directly blaming Dro for anything. He had a million chances to turn on us or to just leave all together, but he was fond of Dro. Either because she reminded him of the woman he’d loved for thousands of years, or because he respected her struggle to overcome what she was. He’d stayed, and I wouldn’t ask him to leave.
It was selfish, given how much he’d lost and was continuing to lose, but Sephiel was my friend just as much as anyone else’s.
“Get some sleep, Sephiel,” I told him. “You need it now more than ever.”
He looked at me seriously. “I do not trust these angels. I used to, but no longer.”
“They aren’t going to kill us,” I assured him, hoping irony wasn’t lurking behind a corner. “They want the same thing we do, and while I think Michael would rather flay himself than work with us, we don’t have much of a choice.”
Sephiel looked at the ground. I tilted my head to try looking in his eyes. “This is just one more hurdle,” I said. “We’ve been through worse.”
Sephiel raised his head, and showed me just how much he believed me.
“If we have, I do not remember it.”
I let him turn and walk to a classroom on the right. My pep talks weren’t working for anyone. I took a breath to ask Warrick if he was going to shut me down too, only to find he was already walking to another classroom.
“Hey,” I said, catching up with him as he gripped the doorknob.
He dropped his hand but didn’t look at me. I wrapped my arms around his stomach and pressed my cheek to his back. I felt a sigh leave him, heavy and sad. I didn’t waste time telling him how sorry I was.
“I just don’t fucking get it,” he sighed. “One minute we were ready to kill each other. The next minute he’s being erased in front of me.”
Warrick’s voice was shaky, and I wished I knew what to say to ease his pain.
“He looked like himself before he died,” Warrick whispered. “When he looked at me that last time, I wasn’t seeing whoever the fragment made him into. He was just Jackson.”
Warrick sighed again, and I hugged him tighter.
“Do you want to be alone?” I asked.
“No,” he admitted. “But I need to be.”
I pulled away from him. Warrick turned around and dropped his head. I cupped his face and kissed him. He didn’t hold me. He just closed his eyes and breathed into me.
I stepped back, still holding his face. “I’ll be back in a bit. I kinda need some time alone, too.”
Warrick slid his hands along my forearms, nodding as he pried my hands from his face. We gave each other weak smiles before he walked into the classroom and closed the door.
I stood alone in the hallway, staring ahead and seeing nothing. I turned away from the door and walked deeper into the school, hoping to leave the air of grief behind me.
All I did was add loneliness to the mix.
I meandered forward, no idea where I was going and not bothering to care. Too much had happened. Being stuck with a fragment. Losing my sister. Watching two slayers die. Seeing the strongest men I knew eaten up by heartache.
I didn’t know how much longer I could do this.
I would stop at nothing to save Dro, but I wasn’t sure I could save anyone else. Fighting the supernatural was taking its toll. I was tired of constantly looking over my shoulder and watching every shadow. I was tired of running and struggling to survive. I was tired of thinking I would die before my twenty-first birthday.
But stopping Lucifer was the only way to keep him and his demons off our backs. It was the only way any of us could find peace. I could only hope my peace wouldn’t end with me lying under six feet of dirt.
Of course, if it did, I wasn’t going to be surprised.
Eventually I wound up in the gymnasium. Banners for football and basketball teams hung limply from the rafters. Dirt and dust were smeared along the lined, hardwood floor. The curtains on the stage sagged over the sides of it. Both basketball hoops had been yanked down to sit in piles of broken glass.
I couldn’t stand to think anymore, so I drew a knife from inside my jacket and walked to one of the hoops. It was made from plastic, so it would make a good target to practice with.
I flipped my knife end over end, catching it in my fingertips then hurling it at the backboard. The blade crunched into the plastic center right above the mesh hoop.
It felt good to practice, so I threw another one. Then another, then another, on and on until the only weapon I had left was my hatchet.
I took it off my hip and examined the weapon. Not the original that belonged to my father, but Sephiel had gotten a damn good replacement. Thanks to his blessing, I was able to use this weapon with less effort than my previous one. I looked at the Latin phrase engraved on the hilt:
Anima potentis, cor sororis.
Soul of a warrior, heart of a sister.
Where did I go wrong?
I was debating on throwing the hatchet when I felt it behind me. The warm, soothing rush of air so powerful I nearly dropped to my knees. The smell of sulfur was strong, but not as repulsive as usual. It was nearly impossible to resist. I gripped my hatchet so hard that it left an impression in my palm. If I didn’t do this now, I was going to lose my mind.
I spun on my heel and launched the hatchet at him.
He raised his slender hand and stopped it a foot away from his face.
I took a deep breath and cursed my anger for making me stupid and impulsive.
I was completely alone and defenseless, and the Devil had come calling.
Chapter 19
Physically, Lucifer was perfect. He was so beautiful he bordered on androgyny, but the muscles of his shoulders and chest made it clear that he was all male. He was seven feet tall with flawless pale skin. He wore a simple black suit under a black overcoat. His tie was as shockingly white as the smooth hair that went to the base of his spine. Lucifer had wings, but I couldn’t see them under the suit, though he could have been hiding them with magic, as well.
It didn’t matter that I couldn’t see them, because I was focused on his eyes. They were glistening and shining black, like someone had replaced his eyes with those of a spider.
I wanted to say that I was scared. Truthfully, I was, but fear wasn’t the only thing making my heart beat faster. Being around Lucifer was like being a compulsive drug addict looking at a bag of cocaine in a fire. You knew it was bad for you. You knew touching it would hurt, and the consequences would be worse. But that didn’t keep you from staring. It didn’t stop the desire.
Lucifer didn’t say anything. He stood there, looking past my free-hanging hatchet, and watched me.
I should have screamed. I should have run. I should have done anything to get help against him. I knew I couldn’t fight Lucifer. He’d tossed me around lik
e a rag doll when I got in his way, then set me on fire when I slightly annoyed him. Michael might have a chance, but his powers were weakening thanks to me. It would be a small tussle, then a complete bloodbath.
But he was here for a reason. The Devil had a reason for everything. He seemed like the type to plan every miniscule detail, no matter how trivial it seemed. Having Mateo put the fragment inside of me was no accident.
Not pulverizing me on the spot was no accident, either.
“Why are you here?”
What should have been an intimidating question came out as a quivering whisper. I was glad I found the will to speak at all.