Embraced (Eternal Balance)

by Jus Accardo

  Heckle frowned. “You have free will, Sam. There’s nothing physically standing in your way… But I advise you not to test the deal’s limits. You especially won’t like the result.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but Heckle kept going.

  “Your jobs—my job—is about maintaining balance. Keeping things even. Every happiness must be balanced out by suffering. Each failure must be countered by a win. It is the only way to keep the world spinning.” He fixed his gaze on me, expression grim. “Being kept away from Sam, from having her in your life the way you want, makes you suffer. Your suffering maintains the balance of something else. It’s a never ending string of events. In order for you to get what you want, someone else must lose.”

  “Right now I don’t give a shit about balance. We need that cuff off her. If killing this demon is the way to do it, then I’m for it.”

  But apparently Azi wasn’t.

  A series of flashes, frenzied and intense, nearly brought me to my knees. I stumbled back, hands reaching for the car to steady myself as I forced the air back into my lungs.

  “Jax?” Sam’s voice was a beacon, pulling me from the fog.

  Heckle came to stand in front of me. His somber expression, the way his brows knitted together to form a deep V, made me edgy. “I take it Azirak isn’t happy about the target?”

  There was only one reason Azirak wouldn’t be happy about the target. “Malphi is from Azi’s faction, isn’t it?”

  “I’m afraid so. The demon you’re after is Azirak’s second in command.” Heckle paused. “Its…intended.”

  Sam frowned. “Intended what?”

  “Fuck.” The walls felt like they were closing in. Another series of flashes, this time involving the dark female figure I’d seen back at the house. My skin prickled, nerve endings igniting like the sun. The breath shot from my lungs. “Malphi is Azirak’s mate, isn’t it?”

  Heckle only shrugged. “I told you there were complications…”

  Chapter Eight

  Sam

  “What about the cuff?” I sucked in a breath, refusing to meet Jax’s stare. He hadn’t taken his eyes off me, and despite the buzzy feeling of anger still simmering beneath the surface, I wanted to reach out and touch him. If I could just feel his skin beneath my fingers, everything would be all right. “You don’t think Azi will let us kill Malphi?”

  Heckle frowned. “To be honest, I’m not sure.”

  “That’s not helpful,” I ground out, taking another deep breath. The urge to lunge forward and shake Heckle until he gave us something useful was almost overwhelming. Was this how Jax felt all the time, walking around with a storm brewing just beneath the surface? How the hell did he do it?

  Jax clenched his fists. “We need to find Malphi and get Chase to remove the cuff. If that means beheading the demon, then so be it. Do you have any suggestions on where we should start?”

  “That’s easier said than done, I’m afraid. Demon pairings are strong. It’s ingrained in their nature. Even ones that haven’t been consummated yet. I have doubts that Azirak will allow you to kill Malphi—and I am betting Chase knows that. This is a win for him either way. If you fail, he can use the cuff to bargain for Sam’s power. If you succeed, then he doesn’t have Malphi to deal with.”

  I shifted, pulling the sleeves of my shirt down over my fingertips. There was a sudden chill in the air. “Why is he so worried about Malphi?”

  “She is the mate of his sworn enemy. A motivated one, at that. Jax has already refused to kill Chase once. Malphi will not suffer the same attack of conscience. As long as Jax remains in control of Azi, its mate is the greatest threat to Zenak.”

  I didn’t like the expression on Jax’s face. His eyes had glassed over, lips hitched up just a hair. I’d seen it a hundred times, each time the demon communicated with him. After a moment he blinked, jaw clenched tight. “We need to get the cuff off on our own.”

  “Azi?” I tried to keep the fear from my voice, but I failed. Whatever it was that the demon had shown him, it’d shaken Jax.

  “I’m worried Heckle is right,” he snarled. There was frustration in his eyes, but also the smallest hint of doubt. Of defeat. If Azi truly wanted to prevent us from harming its mate, we’d have a fight on our hands. And if it came down to either me or Malphi, I didn’t think I could say with one hundred percent certainty that I would win. “It—we need another option.”

  “I can offer one possibility, but the chance is slim,” Heckle said. “There’s a man in the Hunter’s Trail Mountains, at the top of the highest peak. He might be able to help you.”

  “Why?” Jax asked. “Who is he?”

  “The Archangel Michael.”

  “The Archangel Michael lives on top of Hunter’s Trail?”

  I didn’t want to feel hope. Hope was dangerous. It could lift you high then send you plummeting at breakneck speed. Hope could shatter you beyond recovery. Still, I couldn’t help it. A small bit seeped in. Or, maybe it came from Jax. I couldn’t tell anymore what was mine and what was his.

  “He can get the cuff off?” Jax asked, coming to stand beside me. It took all my reserve not to slip my hand into his. “I thought only Chase—or his death—could remove it.”

  Heckle stepped away from the car and brushed both hands down the front of his jacket, a completely human gesture. “I truly don’t know. This situation is fairly complex, as Pures are extremely rare. An activated Pure walking the earth is unprecedented. One linked to a demon royal… We’re swimming in uncharted waters here. We don’t know how the cuff will react. Chase has the upper hand here, I’m afraid. If Michael has no solution to offer, then you won’t have a choice if you want to save Sam. You will have to kill Malphi and hope Chase keeps his word.”

  “I’m not a royal of hell,” Jax snarled. A rush of anger rippled through him, and by default, into me. “And if it comes down to it, I will kill Malphi. No one, no thing, will stop me.” I had a feeling Jax was talking more to Azi than to us.

  Heckle frowned, then glared like he could see through my skull. “I know Azirak cares for Sam, but do not underestimate the ties it has to Malphi.” He didn’t have to worry about that. The demon and I had shared a few moments, but I had no delusions that the demon would choose me over its mate. It sounded risky, but going to Michael seemed like a more solid bet.

  “We’ll go see Michael. Hunter’s Trail is six hours from here. That would still leave us with a full day. But if he can’t help us…” I shuddered. “How do we find Malphi?” The thought of cutting down random demons until we found the one we were looking for was oddly—not to mention disturbingly—comforting, but we didn’t have time.

  Heckle shrugged. “No clue. That’s your job—but something tells me you won’t have to look hard. It’s going to want to get its claws in both of you as soon as possible. If you’re going to try Michael, make it to him before they find you. But be warned, if he can give you help, it will not come free.”

  “So he’ll want, what? Like, payment?” Something told me the archangel Michael didn’t take credit cards.

  “Yes,” Heckle said. “For Michael to grant you this favor, you will need to give something in return. Something to level the playing field.”

  “To provide balance,” I finished. Jax was right. This balance crap was getting old.

  “Why?” Jax barked. Fists balled tight, he slammed a hand against the roof of the car. “Why should she have to pay anything? This isn’t her fault. It’s not even mine. It’s yours. You threw us into this without warning. If you hadn’t killed her and brought her back, we wouldn’t be in this mess. They wouldn’t know who she was.”

  Heckle’s expression darkened. For the first time, I saw real fury in his eyes. “I would advise you to watch your tone.” He took a deep breath and some of the tension left him. “And while that may be partially true, the situation with Malphi would have arisen regardless. Chase will always be looking for a way to get to you. Since demons recycle and are reborn into human bo
dies again and again, Malphi would be searching for you regardless. You were never free, Jax. Never safe. So long as a demon resides inside you, you never will be.”

  “What kind of balance,” I asked, stepping between them. A fight between heaven’s original Balance Agent, and a demon royal was the last thing my frayed nerves needed. “I don’t have anything to give.”

  Heckle held my gaze for a moment. There was a spark of regret, but it was there and gone almost too quickly to notice. “There is always something left to give, Sam.”

  “This is such bullshit,” I spat, and while a part of me was horrified, another part felt exhilarated. The anger felt good. Like a warm blanket on a cold winter’s night.

  Jax pushed harder on the gas pedal, and the speedometer passed sixty-five. We were well into Burke now, the map he’d picked up at the gas station wedged in the console between us.

  “Sammy, please calm down. For one thing, getting pissed isn’t going to help the situation. And aside from that, I hate being the calm one. The voice of reason sounds fucked up coming from me. Okay?” He looked like he expected me to go nuclear or something. “How about something to eat?” he asked, veering toward the ramp to exit the highway. There was a row of choices on the main road. All fast food. All greasy and disgusting. All sounding good.

  “I’m starving,” I admitted. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten. It had to be yesterday, before work. Yesterday, when my world was less complicated. Or at least, slightly less. Ever since Jax walked back into my life, things had been a little rocky.

  He nodded and pulled the car into the parking lot of a small deli. It was old, with peeling paint and huge potholes in the lot, but I didn’t care. I would have agreed to eat sushi if that was all there was—and I hated sushi. “Stay here. I’ll grab something and be right back.”

  I waited until he was out of sight before pushing open the door and sliding out to stretch my legs. Everything had started to cramp from sitting still for so long. I’d never been good at extended car rides, and it probably didn’t help that I was wound tighter than fishing line.

  Was this what my life would be like from now on? Dodging the greedy, grabby hands of heaven and hell? All because I was the unlucky recipient of Pure genes? I might not have it all figured out yet—as Aunt Kelly pointed out on a daily basis—but I knew damn well what I didn’t want. And that was to live my life running away.

  “Excuse me.” A woman approached the car with a tentative smile. She came from the store next to the deli, a plastic bag in her hands. “Any idea what time it is?”

  I pulled the cell from my pocket. “Just after one.”

  “Damn it,” the woman muttered. “Late as usual.” She looked to the road. “Any chance you know a shortcut to Parker Avenue?”

  “Sorry. Not really from around here.” I followed her gaze to my wrist, to the demon cuff. Every hair on my body jumped to attention. Oh, seriously? Some random person approaches and asks the time? The time? Really?

  She came a little closer, squinting. “Wow. That’s an interesting bracelet.”

  I reached behind me, feeling for the door handle. When I found it, I slipped my fingers beneath the latch and yanked upward, but it didn’t budge. Locked. Awesome. Mistake number two. I was batting a thousand today.

  The woman shot me a deceptively warm smile.

  “This thing?” I asked. “Junk jewelry. See that huge guy inside the deli? My boyfriend. He got it out of one of those vending machines. Kind of a joke.”

  The woman set the plastic bag down on the blacktop by her feet and smiled. This time, it was predatory. Hungry and…wrong. She closed her eyes and gave a dramatic roll of her head. When she opened them, her dark brown eyes had turned blazing orange. “I know who he is.” Another step. “And I know what you are. You’re a wonderment.”

  Without Jax, I had no chance of fending off a demon—or whatever the hell this thing was—on my own. Unless I had a secret set of super powers—and I hadn’t seen any sign of them—I was in trouble. My only chance was to run. A head to head fight and I was going to get squashed like a bug.

  I sighed and bent my head, making like I was about to surrender. Instead though, I stepped forward and brought my left elbow up, hard, like I’d seen Jax do. It connected with her jaw, and I cringed as pins and needles exploded beneath my skin and rocketed down my arm. She stumbled away, distracted, and I dashed off in the opposite direction. I got to the edge of the building, and just around the corner, before I ran into her again.

  Literally.

  Impossibly.

  I backed up, staring into greedy eyes as she smiled. “Silly human. Outrunning us is impossible. Our minions are everywhere.”

  “Sounds exhausting,” I said, taking another step back. My heart hammered an erratic rhythm inside my chest.

  “Come with me and you won’t be harmed.”

  “I don’t know you well enough to go home with you. Plus, you’re not really my type.” I swallowed and continued my slow retreat.

  “We feared you would be difficult,” she said, utterly calm. It was her unruffled demeanor, more than the menacing tone, that rattled me. Like she was positive this would go her way. And why wouldn’t she be? I was, after all, only human.

  I shrugged and kept inching backward. With a nervous laugh, I said, “Yeah? Well, making it easy on demons isn’t really my style.”

  “Demon?” The woman laughed, a trilling echo that hurt my ears. “I’m no such filthy thing!”

  A rush of air blew into my face and something large—no, huge—fluttered open and loomed above my head. “Wings,” I breathed. A massive expanse of jet black feathers filled the small space. “You’re—”

  “An angel.” She tilted her head to the left, then to the right, studying me as though I was something alien. “And you are human. I do not understand why you align yourself with darkness. We are forces of good. We wish to eradicate the demons. To free the world.”

  “That sounds noble and all, but Heckle said—”

  The angel hissed and spat. “Heckle.” She said the name as if it were the vilest of curses. “He is nothing more than God’s pitiful attempt at clinging to something that was lost long ago. He felt it was his fault that Cain killed Abel. His design, flawed. But the world is meant to be flawed.” She stepped closer, fists clutched tight. The movement was aggressive. Menacing. “It is meant to be violent.”

  I backed away. “That’s kind of a contradiction. A minute ago, you said you wanted to get rid of the demons. Now all of a sudden you’ve got a lust for violence? Someone needs to go back on their meds…”

  “If there is no violence, then we have no place here. No purpose.” Her eyes blazed from black to fiery orange. “We are needed to maintain balance, not Heckle. It was our job. Then more and more Tainted walked the earth. He became more important. We, less so. Now he controls the power. He holds our fate in his hands. God’s favorite.” She spat again. “A wretched little cur.”

  “Tell me how you really feel.” I inched another step into the alley.

  “We were content to obey. That is our lot. But then you came. Your kind rarely survives to adulthood, yet you did. Somehow you’ve been activated and now, who pulls your strings and controls your power? The Master of Balance.”

  “No one pulls my strings or controls me,” I said as calmly as possible. “And I’m just a girl. Nothing special.”

  She laughed. A broken, distorted sound that was nothing close to being human. “A mortal, yes. But nothing special? Either you take me for a fool, or you are ignorant.” Another step closer. “Either way, you belong to us. You are Pure.”

  “Pure?” Maybe if I played dumb, she’d let her guard down. Give me an advantage. “Honey, that ship sailed a long time ago.”

  She shot forward, closing the distance between us, and screamed, a horrific sound that made the very air blur and brought me to my knees. Arms much stronger than they appeared wrapped around my waist, roughly hauling me to my feet as a rush of wi
nd blew over me. What little sun shone into the alley was blotted out and the air seemed to thin. Breathing was harder, if not nearly impossible, and something soft and feathery brushed the side of my face.

  But just as suddenly as it all began, it ended. The air rushed back, along with the light, and the angel fell away. Eyes wide, she collapsed to the ground, leaving a tall, dark figure with black-rimmed eyes towering behind. In his hands was the thing’s heart.

  Jax dropped the gore-coated mass and stepped over the dead angel. He stalked forward and grabbed my face, yanking it to his. Our lips met, fierce and desperate, as the tips of his fingers curled around small sections of my hair. He pulled on my bottom lip, tongue skating across then slipping inside. For a blissful moment, the kiss made me forget about the hell hanging over our heads.

  When he finally pulled away, I watched his eyes change. They went from solid black, to thinly lined, to their normal, beautiful gray. “Did it hurt you?”

  I shook my head. “No. But it did escalate things.”

  He looked from me to the angel. “How so?”

  I stared at him. Was he kidding? “Do you not see what this thing is?”

  He blinked and nudged the angel with the toe of his boot, glancing from me to the corpse again. A single black feather fluttered free and landed at his feet. “…dead?”

  I double checked, just to make sure I hadn’t lost my mind. Nope. They were still there. Two huge black feather-covered appendages protruding from either side of her back. “Wings?” I said. “An angel?”

  He laughed. “Sammy, come on—”

  “Jax,” I snapped. I had no clue why he couldn’t see the wings, but they were there. I bent to retrieve the feather and held it out for him to see. “Where do you think this came from?”

  He blinked several times, squinting. “Sammy, there’s nothing in your hand.” Palm resting flat against my forehead, he cocked a brow and said, “You sure you’re okay?”

  “Fine then.” I dropped the feather. “You can’t see it for whatever reason, but that woman was an angel.”