And then Anna turned around in that alleyway in Nanjing, China and threw up.
Chapter 23
Max and Dylan watched them with a mixture of shock and sadness, perhaps fully understanding now what was going to happen to their friend. Dylan finally looked away from Anna and Colin and closed his eyes, sinking lower into his chair.
“Wait, a minute,” he said, “last night you said you thought he’d be fine. But you’ve killed one of these before. You lied to us.”
“No,” Colin insisted, “we weren’t lying. We’ve never known anything about that demon in Nanjing and we had no way of knowing this would happen to Jeremy. It shouldn’t be possible.”
“I’m so tired of hearing you say that,” Dylan mumbled.
Colin didn’t blame him. He was getting tired of saying it.
But Anna defended him anyway. “This isn’t Colin’s fault. Or mine. We told you what we knew. The mark we’d seen just like the one on Jeremy was on a dead body, so we thought Jeremy had just gotten extraordinarily lucky. And we don’t recognize this mark. It doesn’t belong to any demon we’ve ever encountered. The mark on the demon in Nanjing was clearly one of Mammon’s.”
Dylan opened his eyes and put his head back on the chair. “We should have killed him at his apartment. What kind of friends would let something like this happen?”
Max fidgeted with a small string at the edge of the armrest on his chair. “Do you think it’s hurting him? This transformation?”
Colin remembered the way Jeremy had looked lying in his bed, the bony growths protruding from the skin in his face. How could it not be painful?
“I don’t know,” he answered instead. Because maybe Jeremy wasn’t human at all anymore. Maybe there was nothing left of him to hurt.
“We shouldn’t wait. Let’s go back to his apartment, see if we can figure out where he might have gone,” Dylan suggested.
Colin glanced at Max. “You ok to do this? You were pretty banged up yesterday.”
Max nodded. “A little slower than normal, but you three make up for my tardiness.”
“Colin, we’re really going to hunt Jeremy?” Anna’s fingers had tightened around his hand. He didn’t want to go either, but what choice did they have? Jeremy had spent the last six years of his life hunting and killing demons; they couldn’t let him become one.
Colin tried to comfort Anna on the drive back to Jeremy’s apartment, but she kept staring out her window. She didn’t want to talk or think. In the years since fighting that human-turned-demon in Nanjing, she’d largely forgotten about it, although she’d occasionally come across one with a similar milky coloring or even orange eyes that just lacked the same human characteristics that had told her there was something different about this particular demon.
They’d left China shortly after killing it, and they’d traveled for a while to find one of the few hunters in the world who was living an immortal life like they were. Anna and Colin were hoping he’d have some sort of explanation as to what the hell that thing had been. They found Luca in South Carolina where another civil war on a different continent had just begun. And Luca told them what they’d expected to hear, but what they’d also feared: the demon they’d killed in Nanjing was different because it had still been human, a living human, when it was transformed, but he didn’t know how it had occurred either. He’d only seen it once before himself.
Colin and Anna ended up staying with Luca for a while in South Carolina, then moved farther eastward to Tennessee where the battles were exacting an enormous human toll. More misery. More suffering. More hatred. It had been a long time since Colin and Anna had sought reassurance from The Angel, but after China and now this, they needed a reminder humans were worth the existence they led. But they had a much better understanding now of how to find The Angel when they needed her.
It was far easier to find places of hatred than places of love. When they’d first started on this life together, they’d thought they needed to find grand spectacles like the wars and massacres and revolutions they so often followed. But their corollaries, massive displays of what could make humans good and compassionate, were nowhere to be found. They’d wait in obvious spaces like churches or at weddings, but there was never anything there except people. After years of looking, Anna and Colin began to wonder if The Angel had lied to them. Or maybe they just misremembered. Maybe she’d never meant she’d actually appear again.
Half a century had passed when Colin and Anna were staying at a friend’s house who had contracted typhus. They were immune to illnesses now, so they were taking care of him. He’d had a particularly difficult night, and neither Colin nor Anna had slept much. They may be immortal, but they still had human needs, like food and sleep. They were exhausted. Anna collapsed on the sofa next to Colin and he put his arm around her and kissed her. “Get some sleep,” he told her, “I’ll stay up with him.”
Anna wanted to argue but she yawned instead. She had just stretched out on the sofa when they both felt her. Anna sat up quickly and scanned the room. Colin leaped to his feet. She appeared on the sofa next to Anna, looking at her affectionately with those soft gray eyes.
“My Anna,” she said, “you don’t know how happy I am to see you like this.” She reached out with one of her delicate hands and tucked a dark curl of Anna’s hair behind her ear.
“You’re here,” Anna whispered, and immediately felt stupid for stating something so obvious.
But The Angel just smiled at her and reminded her, “Where you find love, you will find us.”
“Here?” Colin asked. And he actually looked around him, confused.
It was The Angel’s turn to look confused. “How well do you know this man whose life you’re saving?”
Anna tried to think how long they’d known him. Not long. “We met him a few months ago. His wife died a while back, and he’s alone.”
“And yet, you’ve been here with him all week. Caring for him. Nursing him back to health. Isn’t that the most selfless love humans can offer, Anna?”
“Because we can’t get sick,” Colin protested. “It’s no sacrifice for us.”
The Angel turned her kind eyes toward him and held out her hand. “Colin, do you think I would have come to you that night you prayed for help if you both didn’t possess the kind of spirits that made you want to help others, no matter the cost?”
Colin shook his head. “That’s not true. I’d put my wife above anything, and you know that.”
The Angel nodded. “Yes, and there’s nothing wrong with loving one person more than others. But you treat others with compassion and respect. All others, no matter who they are. And that’s a rare thing in this world.”
“I had no idea how rare it was,” Anna said quietly.
She lowered her eyes and looked at The Angel’s hand, still holding her own. Surely, The Angel knew how much the violence and bloodshed she’d witnessed the past fifty years had been weighing on her.
“I know. I wish the world were a different place, Anna. I wish I’d never had to ask you to do this for us.”
Anna looked up at her. “I don’t mind fighting evil. I’ll gladly fight for you, for God and Heaven and all you represent. It’s what people do to each other. That’s what I wish I never had to see.” But The Angel had already known that, of course. And she had been watching it far longer than either Colin or Anna.
The first time they’d met The Angel, the night she’d saved Anna’s life, was the first time they learned there were others like them – not many, but there were a few other rare souls that had demonstrated a great capacity for compassion and love and who were willing to take on this burden. Not all of them had been desperate like Colin; some had just been motivated by their faith or were already fighting demons when an angel approached them and offered them gifts and immortality in exchange for their service. Luca belonged among the latter. And that night, The Angel had told them he would be coming to London soon to train them. Two months later, Luca arrived and their ne
w lives as hunters had begun.
Colin relived the memory of The Angel’s second visit with Anna. How could he not? Everything she felt or thought, he experienced. There was nothing they could hide from each other. It had been strange in the beginning, and Anna had wondered if it wouldn’t drive them both mad, but they quickly adapted and they were so used to having their thoughts always connected now, that when the demon had somehow cut them off from one another, it was like losing one’s sight or hearing. The Angel wouldn’t have given them this gift if she hadn’t known they could handle it.
As they pulled into the apartment complex’s parking lot, filled now with emergency vehicles, Colin and Anna realized they wouldn’t be able to get anywhere near Jeremy’s apartment. The fire department and energy company wouldn’t find any evidence of a gas leak then the cops would treat the apartment like a crime scene, if they weren’t already. As they stared at the activity ahead of them, a knock on Anna’s window made her jump, and because it startled her, it startled Colin, too. Sometimes, having their senses so closely tied together did have its drawbacks.
Dylan and Max stood outside of their car so Colin unlocked the doors and they both crawled into the backseat.
“Well, this was an oversight,” Dylan muttered.
“Yeah,” Colin sighed. He felt kind of stupid for not thinking of it beforehand, but they were all still in shock.
“So how are we going to find him?” Max asked.
Anna turned to look at Max and Dylan. “He’s most likely working for these archdemons here in Baton Rouge now. We may be able to find Jeremy the same way we’ve been hoping to find those bastards.”
“We should probably stop calling it Jeremy,” Dylan added.
The silence that hung in the air after Dylan’s pronouncement was stifling. It was no longer Jeremy. Their former leader, their friend, was dead.
Colin finally broke the silence. “Neither of you are in any shape to be chasing after archdemons that are somehow interfering with the way everything is supposed to be working. Anna and I will try to find him… it… tonight.”
Dylan started to protest, claiming he was fine and he wasn’t about to let them go without him, but Anna stopped him.
“We’re not losing anyone else. You’re going home, Dylan.”
When Dylan tried to protest again, Anna shut him up. “Jeremy put us in charge, remember?”
Dylan bit his lip, his dark eyes full of sorrow over the loss of two of his friends within a week. Anna reached into the backseat and squeezed his hand.
“I’m so sorry, Dylan. We will find him. We won’t let him suffer. I know you feel like you owe this to him, but we can’t afford to lose you. Not as hunters or as your friends.”
Tears finally spilled down Dylan’s cheeks and he looked down at their hands and nodded in acquiescence. “Sorry I’ve been such an asshole.”
Anna fought the urge to crawl into the backseat with him and hug him. “You have every right to be hurt and angry. And friends forgive each other when it’s misdirected. So don’t worry about it. The Angel chose you, Dylan. You’re special for a reason. We need you, so please, just be careful, ok?”
He kept his head bowed but nodded again. Max put his arm around his shoulders, and Anna smiled at him. Maybe Anna had never agreed with The Angel that there was anything exceptional about her, but she knew she was right about one thing: Anna loved easily.
She had loved so many friends in her long life, and had lost so many, but she could never get used to losing them too young. She didn’t think The Angel did either, though. She could see the pain and sadness in her eyes when they spoke of human loss. Anna would never understand how something so perfect and benevolent could care so much for such wretched creatures as humans.
“Anna,” Max asked, “this angel of yours. I don’t doubt she exists, but how can she be as powerful as you and Colin say she is when she couldn’t help find you? When she couldn’t stop this from happening to Jeremy?”
Anna looked at Colin helplessly. Colin twisted in his seat to face Max. “Even after everything we’ve seen and done, there are some things we still have to take on faith.”
Dylan snorted, a sobbing laugh that hurt Anna’s heart. “Well, I’m running a little low on faith right now.” He opened the car door and climbed back out, walking back to his car to wait for Max.
Colin started his own car. Anna had every intention of Max and Dylan going home now so they could get this mission over with, but she didn’t want to leave Dylan this way.
Max sighed and opened his car door. “Look, if she shows up again, tell her to take it easy on him. He was in love with Jas, you know.”
Anna balked. She had most certainly not known that. “Did Jas know? She never said anything.”
Max raised a shoulder as if to say he had no clue how much Jas knew about Dylan’s feelings for her. They’d never dated, so maybe he’d never told her. Anna fell back into her seat.
“God,” she whispered, “poor Dylan.”
Colin was watching him with a new sympathy, a better understanding of the heartache he must be suffering. “Keep checking on him, ok?”
Max promised he would, and he’d get Ben to go over later. Dylan and Ben were the same age and often hung out; even if Dylan didn’t think that highly of his skills as a hunter, he liked him as a person.
Max lumbered slowly back to his car to meet Dylan, turning only once to cast a dejected glance in their direction before driving off with Dylan so Colin and Anna could go hunting for their friend. And as much as Colin had hated Jeremy for hitting on Anna, he’d recognized he was being a little unfair to him – his jealousy that had driven him to act in ways he still felt ashamed of had clouded his judgment about his former leader as well. Colin and Anna drove away, too.
They were on their way back to her apartment when Colin’s phone rang. He didn’t recognize the number so he handed the phone to Anna. He knew who was on the other end before she had a chance to say anything. Luca had called him about his email.
Anna didn’t give him much chance to talk. As soon as she heard Luca’s voice, she sobbed out the entire encounter with Jeremy from that morning and what they needed to do now, and how she couldn’t stop thinking this was their fault. If that demon had just killed him in the field, it would have been a better fate than this hellish transformation.
Luca listened patiently as Anna cried in her sorrow and frustration, and Colin tried to wait just as patiently, but he desperately wanted to know why Luca had called. He was the most knowledgeable hunter they’d ever met, and far older than anyone else they knew. Maybe he’d only called to warn them about the inevitable outcome, and that’s why he didn’t bother interrupting Anna now.
Colin pulled into a parking spot at her apartment complex and Anna finally finished. Luca didn’t say anything right away and both Colin and Anna grew nervous.
“He’s going to blame us. He’s going to tell us we never should have used that gift without knowing what it could do,” Anna lowered the phone from her ear and put him on the speakerphone, even though Colin would have heard the conversation through Anna.
“If he does, then he’s an asshole, and I’m never speaking to him again.” Colin didn’t really mean it, but they had been in a difficult situation, and it had killed both of the demons. Sort of.
“You two have a tendency to find yourselves in unusual situations,” Luca finally said, the Italian accent of his own youth, over six centuries past, still lingering in his speech. Colin suspected he’d intentionally held onto his accent, though. Apparently, women found Italian sexy and Luca had always – or almost always – been single.
“Helpful, Luca,” Anna grumbled.
“What the hell are all these demons doing in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, anyway?” Luca asked.
Colin sighed impatiently. “Luca, what makes you think we know? Next time I see you, I’ll buy you a beer and fill you in on the whole secrecy of this assignment to begin with. Right now, we’ve got three archdemons a
nd a former human turned demon to deal with, so can you concentrate?”
“What do you mean secrecy?” he asked.
Colin thought he was incapable of concentrating, apparently.
Colin quickly recapped The Angel’s instructions to come to Baton Rouge and to pretend not to know one another, her suspicions that he and Anna were on some sort of hit list, the way they interfered with their gifts and Anna’s abduction, and their own theory that maybe The Angel had sent them here because of this particular group of hunters, rather than the presence of so many high profile demons, who may have actually followed them here.
Luca listened quietly again, and when Colin got to the end, he announced, “I need to finish up here in St. Paul, but when I’m done, I’m coming to meet you down there.”
Anna and Colin glanced at each other. Immortal hunters rarely worked together. Because they were married and it was part of their deal, Colin and Anna were the only two who did. There were too few of them and they were needed in too many places for them to congregate in one area, and Luca, the legendary badass-demon-hunter-extraordinaire, the hunter who had come to Colin and Anna and taught them everything they needed to know to begin their own lives as hunters, was coming to meet them in Baton Rouge.
“Luca,” Anna said uneasily, “what do you think is going on here?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never heard of anything like this, honestly. Your theory makes a lot of sense, but it doesn’t explain how they’re doing any of this. I’m kind of surprised my own angel hasn’t visited me to tell me what’s going on down there.”
Colin snickered. “Surely those guys talk to each other.”
“It’s the clouds. Probably interferes with their cell reception.”
Anna rolled her eyes. She still didn’t think joking about angels was funny.
“What about Jeremy?” Anna asked. “What can you tell us about him?”
“It,” Colin corrected.
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