by C. L. Coffey
I sucked in a deep breath and forced myself upright. “Is Leon okay?”
“I’m a little more concerned about you,” Cupid told me, crouching down beside me. “Angel, you really do look like you went through a windshield.”
“Close enough,” I muttered. “I will explain all, I promise, but I need to tell Michael too, and right now, I need to make sure Leon and Joshua are safe.”
“We’re in one of the safest places in New Orleans, and they’ve got three archangels and a saint with them,” Cupid pointed out.
“Okay,” I relented. I bit the inside of my cheek, trying not to cry out as I rolled my shirt up.
“Jeeze!” Cupid explained. “Angel!”
The alarmed cry had Michael and Paddy at my side in an instant. “What happened?” Michael demanded. He leaned in, looking at the wound. “This was done by a human weapon. It will heal.” He looked up and glanced over his shoulder. “Raphael!”
I pushed my top down and struggled upright, just in time to see Raphael leaving Leon’s side. “See to Leon,” I insisted.
“Raphael is a healer,” Michael said, shaking his head. “Your wounds need attending to.”
“I’m an angel. I’ll heal,” I told him, stubbornly. “Leon is a human: he needs the attention more than I do.”
Raphael ignored me and stepped forward. “Let me see.” I sighed, but raised the top again. “Get Veronica. She can tend to that.”
I winced. “She’s a little occupied right now.”
Michael stared at me, and then cocked his head. “Why is Veronica on Bourbon Street?” He frowned. “Why are all the cherubim on Bourbon Street?”
I tried to explain, but the words were stuck in me. When Michael’s eyes narrowed at me, I found something I could say. “They’re watching a bar.”
Michael's face was hard to read, with the exception of the vein which was pulsing in his neck. After staring at me, he stood and calmly turned to Raphael. “Please take Leon and Joshua to Lily.” Raphael didn’t question his orders. He turned and hurried over, scooping Leon up into his arms.
“What are you doing?” Joshua demanded.
“Leon will be fine,” Michael assured him. “However, it would be best if he didn’t wake here. Raphael is going to take you both to the hospital.”
“What about Angel?” Joshua asked, looking back at me, torn between wanting to go with Leon, or stay where he was.
“Angel will also be fine,” Michael told him. “Her wounds will heal quickly. It is easier for us to treat her. There will be fewer questions asked. You should go with your friend.”
“Joshua, go,” I added softly when he didn’t look like he was going to leave. “You need to see a doctor too.”
As soon as he nodded his acceptance, Raphael stepped over. “Hold on.” Joshua reached out, grabbed Raphael’s arm, and then they were gone.
Minutes passed in silence. I sat there, wondering what we were waiting for, and then, finally, Veronica and the other cherubim appeared.
The church was suddenly crowded and noisy. All the cherubim were armed to the teeth and none of them looked happy at the fact they had been summoned back. “Why were none of you in the convent?” Michael demanded. “Why were you all in the Quarter, and more importantly, why are you carrying weapons? You agreed when you joined this House that you would turn over your weapons.”
“We agreed we would turn over our weapons until a time when they were needed again,” Veronica corrected him.
The vein in Michael’s neck pulsed again. “I will not tell you again, Veronica: you are treading a very narrow line.”
“Lucifer is back,” Garret announced angrily, stepping around Veronica.
“THAT IS ENOUGH!” Michael bellowed, his voice echoing around the room. “You will all get back to your rooms right now, or I will send you all back to Heaven. And that will be the better option.”
There was a moment of silence, and then the cherubim broke out into angry shouts of disagreement. Michael looked like he was about to explode. “It’s true,” I blurted out.
I didn’t think my words were loud enough to be heard over the commotion, but Michael turned to me, ignoring the cherubim. “What?”
“It’s true,” I told him. “Beelzebub said he was back. Only, I can’t tell you what happened because I’m not allowed to talk about him with you,” I snapped, suddenly feeling angry. I was hurt, Joshua was hurt, Leon was hurt, and there were at least two Princes’ of Darkness – if not a King of Hell too – walking the streets of New Orleans. If Michael had believed me from the outset, maybe we wouldn’t be here now.
“Enough,” Michael said, with a wave of his hand. “We have had this discussion before and I refuse to have it again. I want everyone to return to their rooms. We will discuss the punishment for your disobedience tomorrow.”
“No,” said Veronica, before I could say the same.
Behind me, Cupid sounded like he was choking. “Ronnie,” he said. “Now’s not the time.”
“That’s just it Cupid,” she said, impatiently. “In this House, there never will be the time. We’ve been trying to tell you for millennia that Lucifer wasn’t dead and he was coming back. Angel has been trying to tell you for weeks that she released him, and now? Now she has just returned from actually fighting one of his generals – something which she barely survived – who openly admitted to Lucifer being alive, and you still can’t listen? If you can’t listen to us still, we’re not sticking around to watch you do nothing. There are humans in danger and-”
“Veronica,” Michael ground out. “Either stop this line of conversation now, or leave.”
Veronica glared back at him. Suddenly, she shrugged her shoulders. “Fine.”
“I beg your pardon?” Michael asked in astonishment.
“We’re out of here,” Garret said, stepping forward. “There is nothing more that we can do for you.”
“If you leave, you will not be welcome back,” Michael told them.
“Ronnie?” Cupid simpered.
Veronica looked over at him, her grey eyes softening. “I’m sorry, Cupid,” she sighed. “But Garret’s right.” She looked over to me. “Are you coming?” My mouth fell open. Part of me wanted to, but I couldn’t risk leaving Joshua unprotected. Instead I shook my head. “Very well,” she said, disappointed.
In a blink of an eye, we were alone in the church again. Michael inhaled sharply, and then he too disappeared. I slumped back into the pew, wincing at the pain in my chest. “Let me look at that,” Paddy said. I had forgotten she was there. I sat motionless as she rolled my top up and examined the wound. “It’s already healing. We should clean it up and you should rest. Surface wounds heal quickly, but internal wounds will take a day or two.”
I nodded numbly, too in shock to be able to respond and allowed her to lead me out of the church. I glanced back before I left. Cupid was still there, staring blankly at the spot where Veronica had been.
EPILOGUE
Something vibrating near my head awoke me. It was still dark and the glare from the phone had my eyes watering. Squinting, I read the text message. We need to talk. Ty. I groaned and rolled over. I had completely forgotten about Ty.
Would that be anything to do with your father being BEELZEBUB?!?! Because I already found that out- we have nothing to talk about. I replied.
Please??? Can you meet me by the river – where I took your photo? 1hr? Just hear me out.
I stared at the phone and even typed out a ruder version of leave me alone. But I didn’t send it. Instead, I dropped my phone onto the bed and stumbled into the bathroom.
My reflection was paler than normal. All my scratches and bruises had healed within the few hours’ sleep I had managed. The only thing remaining was an angry red line where Terrence – Beelzebub – had stabbed me. It still throbbed, but not as badly. Paddy was right: I probably wouldn’t be able to tell anything had happened in a couple of days.
I hurried through a shower and got dressed. The convent was
strangely quiet as I slipped outside. The sun was just beginning to rise, creating a sky with deep pinks and oranges. Normally, there would be sounds coming from the kitchen and smells which would be making my stomach grumble. But not this morning. The cherubim really had gone.
I left the grounds and followed the path to the lookout point near the river. I was the first one there. The breeze blowing in off the Mississippi tugged playfully at my hair, the faint scent of the diesel from the barges lingering in the air. Although the sun was beginning to creep over the horizon, the city of New Orleans had yet to fully awaken.
After the events of the last few hours, Bourbon Street had quickly emptied, and like the convent, the city felt eerily quiet. I had no idea why I was here. I was mad at Ty, and feeling betrayed, but a voice in the back of my head said “you were using him to get into Bee’s. He didn’t come looking for you.” No, I would see Ty, and then I was going back to Michael and I was going to make him listen to me, somehow: two Princes’ of Darkness in the city was two too many.
“Hi, Angel,” Ty called softly, pulling me from my thoughts.
As my eyes fell on him, a flurry of different feelings flooded through me – anger, betrayal, disappointment… and strangely, relief. It wasn’t like he knew what was going on – I’d dragged him into a bar where some crazy stuff started happening – and then I’d abandoned him. If Terrence wasn’t his father I could have seen us becoming friends. We’d spent time together and he hadn’t hurt me. And hadn’t he said that he didn’t want to follow in his father’s footsteps? There may even have been a chance that he didn’t know what his father was. No, I wasn’t that naïve and he hadn’t denied it before. The best I could hope for was he didn’t know what his father was up to.
I let out a long breath and moved over to the barrier. I kept my gaze on the water, but sensed him walk up beside me, a few feet from me. “So your father is one of the most famous fallen angels,” I stated. When he didn’t respond, I looked over. I wasn’t sure what reaction I was expecting, but I was expecting something. Instead, I found him staring nervously at his hands. “Are you okay?” I asked, genuinely concerned.
“I saw everything,” he said, cutting me off with a short shake of his head. “I saw you and Joshua get thrown out of Bee’s, I saw you get back up like it was nothing, and I watched as your cherub friend flew from the street to catch Joshua.”
“It wasn’t like,” I frowned and cocked my head. “What did you say?” I asked slowly.
“I saw everything,” Ty repeated.
I slowly shook my head. “No, about my friend,” I clarified.
“The cherub?” he asked me.
“What do you know about cherubim?” I asked, still convinced I had misheard.
Ty sighed, finally looking me in the eye. “I know that Veronica is a cherub, just like I know you’re an angel, and Michael and Raphael are archangels.”
I stared at him, still dumbfounded. It had occurred to me that he had known what I was, but it had never crossed my mind to even consider he knew what Veronica was. “I must be the biggest, most naïve idiot on the planet,” I exclaimed, feeling that prickling at my hairline as the blood rushed from my head. “What am I doing here?” I asked, disgusted more with myself than him.
“Angel, there’s something I need to tell you,” he told me, never taking those grey eyes off me.
“What else can you possibly add?” I demanded, my hands curling into fists by my side.
He ran a hand over his hair, and inhaled deeply. He held his breath for a long moment, before slowly releasing it. “I’m Nephilim,” he admitted, the words making my blood run cold. “That family business I told you about, it’s… evil.”
I stared at him, rolling my eyes. “I pretty much figured that out when your Prince of Darkness of a father flung me out of a window,” I snapped at him. “Thanks for the heads up on that one.” I shook my head and took a few paces before turning back to him. “I don’t know why I’m mad at you. I only spent time with you for a fake ID,” I added. His eyes filled with hurt and I instantly felt guilty – maybe that was the truth to start with, but certainly not by the end – but I didn’t try to take my words back.
“Angel, I like you,” he said, his voice hoarse, but clear. “Not like like you: I really am seeing someone. But, you’re the first angel I’ve met and you’re not as bad as my dad says.” He took a couple of steps towards me, but stopped when I held my hands up. “Dad says that the Winged Ones want to kill all the Fallen and the Nephilim, but I don’t think that you do. Or, at least, I thought you didn’t.”
I stared at him for a long time, and he stared back, not moving, almost like a rabbit caught in headlights, but I suspected he was waiting to see what my reaction was, rather than deciding to bolt. Finally, I sighed and shook my head. “You’re responsible for your own actions, not those of your parents. I didn’t have a problem with you. I… I thought you were my friend.”
Ty smiled, but as quickly as it appeared, it disappeared. “I think of you as my friend too.”
“Then why the hell didn’t you tell me what you were? Or at the very least, tell me you knew what I was?” I asked in frustration.
“Because I have been brought up being told that angels hunt Nephilim. How was I supposed to know?” he admitted.
I shook my head. “Well now you do,” I muttered. I sighed and shook my head. “Whatever. I’m going,” I added.
“I still haven’t told you – Angel, just stop: I had instructions last night.”
“Oh god, why?” I muttered again, the words coming out in a whine. I had a feeling whatever they were; they would make me want to curl into a ball and rock from side to side. “Don’t tell me you were there to kill me?”
Ty quickly shook his head. “No. And I wasn’t supposed to kill Joshua, either. I just had to get you there,” he admitted. “Maybe we should sit down,” he said, pointing at one of the benches.
“Just tell me,” I told him.
He blinked, and then nodded. “The first time I met you, I didn’t know who you were. You really were a spark of inspiration for a project. I heard you say to the cherub that you didn’t think Nephilim were evil. I told my dad that maybe not all Winged Ones wanted to kill us, and ended up telling him about you. He suggested I befriend you to see if that was true. I did, and at first, it was because my dad told me to, but I wasn’t faking any of it.”
I folded my arms and stared at him. “So what were you instructed to do last night, Tyrone?” I asked.
He blanched but stood upright. “I was to get you in. Terrence… Beelzebub… my dad wanted to meet you again. Apparently, he wanted to apologize for the way he acted when he first met you, and he wanted to thank you for something.”
“Yeah, his manners are impeccable,” I muttered, dryly.
“That’s not all,” Ty added. “I was instructed to take pictures.”
I could feel the blood rushing from my head again. “What?” I croaked.
Ty opened his mouth and then closed it again with a loud sigh. Instead, he reached into his back pocket and pulled some sheets of paper out, handing them over.
I took the photographs off him and leafed through them. They were taken from the street outside Bee’s. It was empty – the area had still been blocked off for the concert – apart from me, sailing through the air. The next photo was me hitting the ground. I winced: it looked as painful as it had felt. The next photo was the worst. It was Joshua, sailing through the air, me trying to get to my feet, and, right in the center, Veronica rising through the air to catch him, her beautiful wings of light clearly showing. “Why?” I demanded.
“I’ve already given them to my girlfriend. She’s running them in this morning’s –”
“Your girlfriend is a reporter?” I repeated in disbelief, the photographs crumpling in my hands as they balled up into fists.
Ty nodded glumly. “I’m sorry. I wanted to give you a heads up. I figured I owe you that.”
“I think you owe me
more than that,” I corrected him. “I also think you need to go,” I told him. “Before I change my mind about whether or not I should kill you.” I didn’t give Ty the chance to respond, storming past him.
I hurried back to the convent. It was busier now, but the bustle was caused by confusion. The angels had clearly spent so long relying on the cherubim to look after them, they now had no idea what to do. I ignored them, taking the stairs two at a time, until I got to Michael’s office. I didn’t knock. I just walked straight in.
He wasn’t alone: Raphael, Paddy and Cupid were already there. I ignored them too. “You need to listen to me,” I told Michael. “You need to listen to everything I have to tell you, and more importantly, you have to let me tell you what I need to.”
“Angel,” Michael started, sternly.
“No,” I snapped, cutting him off. “I’ve listened to you, but you have never really heard me. So, damnit, shut the hell up, and let me talk.”
I could feel four pairs of eyes staring at me in astonishment, but there was only one set I was focused on. Finally, Michael nodded. “You may not believe that Lucifer is back, but there are still two fallen angels in your city,” I told him, firmly. “Not just any fallen angels either: two Princes’ of Darkness. Beelzebub and Asmodeus are walking around this city, living in this city – and they have been here for a lot longer than you have.”
“Angel,” Cupid started.
I whipped my head around at him and glared. “No. You will all listen to me, before somebody else gets hurt.” I looked back at Michael. “I don’t know if I released Lucifer anymore. I know what you showed me, but Beelzebub is convinced that he’s back, and I just don’t believe that Lilah would go to all that trouble for nothing. If he is back, then I will take that responsibility: that was my fault. You even said that if I had come to you, then maybe Lilah wouldn’t have been killed. You were right. So I told you straight away about Lucifer and you dismissed what I had to say, and when I tried to tell you again and again, you forbade me from talking to you about it, so what happened since? That’s on you. And before this goes any further, before you let Asmodeus or Beelzebub do something that we’re all going to regret, you need to listen to what I’m saying, and you need to hear it.”