As they neared the juniper wolf, it looked up from the doorway and saw them, snarling and revealing the unearthly fangs that protruded from its narrow mouth.
A low growl emanated from its throat but it didn’t run. It didn’t chase them. Colin and Anna stopped to study the demon that wasn’t behaving like it should.
“There’s something on the stairway. That’s what it was doing. Oh, God, Colin, it must be a person.”
Colin could only agree with her. “We kill it. Even if it’s already claimed its victim, we still have to kill it or it will only take more.”
But they hadn’t stopped because they were worried there was a dead person lying on the steps to the flat; they had stopped because the person must still be alive or the demon would have run. The person had only lost a soul.
They approached it carefully and its solid black eyes watched them, vacillating between them, trying to decide which hunter to attack first. Demons normally chose Anna, thinking she was smaller and would be weaker. They had no way of knowing The Angel had made sure she was just as strong and fast as Colin.
But this demon was full of surprises. It sprang at Colin whose dagger sliced through the beast’s stomach and a dark green mist poured out. That was expected; it would die soon as its energy emptied from its body. Anna thrust her dagger into its side and more of that green mist seeped out.
She stepped around the beast to check on the person lying motionless on the stairs. It was only a child. Anna’s heart beat against her ribs as she took in the frail form of the child, an older child than the one she’d met earlier, but Anna felt her limbs weakening as she studied the boy who was only dimly aware she was near him.
She didn’t have time to talk to him. Colin was beginning to panic.
“Anna! This mist it’s transforming! It’s like… babies!”
Anna turned quickly to look at the vaporous green cloud on the sidewalk beside them. It wasn’t dissipating; they hadn’t killed this demon. The cloud was breaking apart, forming smaller demons that shifted into the shape of wolves, each the same juniper green with round glassy black eyes. Anna and Colin backed away from the wolf pack, the low rumbling in their throats echoing off the buildings in this narrow street.
Colin pulled his knife from the sheath in his belt, assuming the weapon hadn’t been the right one to kill this demon. They were picky like that. He was about to slice through the nearest wolf’s muzzle when the London street blinked and he was standing alone in a vast field, vacant except for the short yellow-green grass beneath his feet. He turned in a slow circle and called Anna’s name, but she wasn’t with him. And he couldn’t feel her.
Above him, the pale blue sky was just as empty as the field and his mind. No clouds or sun or moon yet there was light. He couldn’t tell where the light was coming from.
“Anna!” he called, even though he couldn’t see her or feel her and he knew she wasn’t near. He had no existence without her. She couldn’t disappear from him. They had been promised.
She didn’t respond. There was no answer. No breeze or insects or mice in the field replied because there was nothing in this world. Nothing but crisp grass that stretched on to the horizon in endless miles and in endless directions. He already knew he would find more nothingness if he walked but there was no point in standing still either. So he walked.
He couldn’t be sure how long he walked or how far. It seemed like hours or days but there were no days in this painted world that never changed. Distantly, he heard a sound, a pleasant noise that called to him, awakened his silent mind with the beautiful murmuring that something was near that he’d lost. Something was calling for him. Gradually, he realized someone was calling his name. Not someone. The one. The woman who shared his soul.
Colin’s eyes opened and he squinted as the painful onslaught of the hotel lamp in Boulder stung his eyes. Anna was looking down at him, her eyes full of worry and fear, and she stroked his golden brown hair as he focused on her. He took her hand and kissed it and noticed her fingers were trembling.
“Anna, my love, we’re ok.” But it was an unconvincing lie. He couldn’t possibly lie to her anyway.
She shook her head at him. “I was watching a movie and you suddenly vanished. I couldn’t feel you and I kept trying to wake you, but you wouldn’t wake up.”
Colin’s mouth felt papery and rough as if he’d really just hiked those countless miles through a blank and desolate field. The clock on the hotel nightstand told him he’d only been asleep for an hour.
“God, Anna,” he breathed, the terror of what he was suddenly so sure of filling him with a fear he hadn’t felt since he had prayed for a miracle to save his dying wife. “They’re trying to break our bond. That’s what they’ve been doing with these dreams. They’re trying to separate us. They figured out how to do it temporarily in the woods to abduct you and now they’re trying to break us for good.”
Chapter 11
Anna sat in the front pew of the mostly empty church staring at the crucifix in front of her. The only other person in the church was Colin, and he sat next to her, holding her hand and studying the altar just as closely. Neither of them had slept well in two days and they were tired and angry and confused. But the statues of Mary and Jesus and Joseph weren’t offering them any answers.
Anna refused to leave the church though. They had been sitting in the pew for over an hour and she had spent most of that time praying, but she’d occasionally stop to remind Heaven and The Angel and God or whomever else might be listening that her connection with Colin was supposed to be inviolable. She couldn’t continue on for another century without it.
“She has nothing else she can tell us. That’s why she’s not coming,” Colin sighed.
“She’d better figure something out quickly then. I won’t do this without you, Colin.”
Colin brought her hand that still looked so deceivingly delicate, so fragile and porcelain, to his lips and kissed it. And just like that seventeen-year-old girl she used to be, Anna felt that kiss everywhere, like it filled her body with the excitement and pleasure of his touch.
“I’ll still be here. Physically, I mean.”
But it wasn’t the same, and Colin couldn’t fathom the rest of his servitude disconnected from Anna either. They had become a part of each other, and without it, they may as well quit.
Colin’s stomach rumbled, but he didn’t suggest leaving again. His hunger could wait until Anna either found some peace through prayer or she just got tired and hungry herself and decided to leave. Colin was betting on the latter.
Anna kept her fingers laced through her husband’s and inhaled slowly, taking in the faint scent of burning candles around the statue of Mary where she and Colin had already stopped to light their own candles and pray. She watched the flickering flames as they played with the edge of the votive candle glass and even though she’d lost count of how many times she’d closed her eyes and begged her to appear, she did it anyway. Anna needed The Angel now more than ever.
“Help us. Please,” she begged again, even though it hadn’t worked for the past hour.
Colin squeezed her fingers, doubtful they’d get a different response but prayed with her anyway.
They sat in the silent church for another half hour before Anna rested her head on Colin’s shoulder and was willing to admit they’d been forgotten. Or ignored. Whatever the reason, she was angry, and Colin couldn’t blame her.
“Let’s go to Village Inn and grab lunch,” she offered. She knew Colin was starving.
His stomach rumbled again in appreciation and they had just stood up to leave when they felt her. Anna spun around but the church looked just as empty as before. But they both knew she had come at last.
“Sit back down. She’ll come to us,” Colin offered. Anna sank back onto the hard wooden pew, her heart beating so rapidly she felt dizzy and lightheaded. Colin kept his fingers laced tightly through hers.
Anna looked up by the statue of Mary and The Angel was there, li
fting a long matchstick to offer her own silent prayer. Colin and Anna watched her as she lit the candle and bowed her head. Even though she had her back to them, Colin and Anna were almost certain she even closed those soft gray eyes as she spoke soundlessly with the Heaven she’d just come from. Colin and Anna didn’t know what to think of an angel praying.
She lifted her head, still adorned with the long flaxen hair she’d always had, then sat in the pew in front of them, twisting her body around to look at Colin and Anna.
“You want to know if you’re right about these dreams, and I just don’t know,” she told them.
They’d suspected that, of course. It seemed like Heaven didn’t know anything about what was going on anymore.
“What will happen if they’re successful? What if they separate us?” Anna asked.
The Angel’s eyes wavered between Colin and Anna as she considered her answer. “I’ll try to restore it. Immediately.”
“Try?” Colin asked.
The Angel only shook her head, and Anna noticed her hair stayed neatly in place when she did. Unlike Luca’s angel who apparently preferred a casual, hipster appearance, their Angel always looked just like they would have envisioned an angel – except her choice of clothes over the years had changed. She was wearing a lavender sundress now, beautiful and elegant and even if Anna hadn’t known what she was, she would have thought this was a woman who gave the word “angelic” meaning.
The Angel finally sighed. “I can’t make you promises anymore. I want to. But everything we’ve ever believed to be true has been challenged lately.”
Anna suddenly felt defiant, angry, and she wasn’t even sure if it was because of Hell’s cheating and manipulating the rules of their ridiculous game or if she was actually angry at The Angel for something she hadn’t figured out yet, but she was here. She was an easy enough target. “The least you can do then is make regular visits from now on. We could use a little more help here, even if it is just a pep talk from your boss.”
“Our boss,” she corrected with a small smile, and Colin snickered because it was the first time she’d ever gotten sassy with them. He was surprised to learn angels had a sense of humor.
And then she looked at him, puzzled, because she knew his thoughts, too. “Of course we do. But every time we meet, it’s hardly an occasion when anyone feels like laughing.”
The Angel thought about what she’d said for a few seconds then added, “It’s demons who don’t have a sense of humor. They don’t possess a sense of anything that makes life worth living.”
Anna raised an eyebrow at her because she had never responded to her demand for more frequent appearances, and The Angel reached over to her and tucked a wayward strand of Anna’s dark brown hair back behind her ear.
“I will see what I can do, Anna. It isn’t always up to us. It’s dangerous for us here, so our time is often limited on Earth.”
“We’ll protect you,” Colin said, and he immediately wondered if that had been an utterly ridiculous thing to tell an angel, but both Colin and Anna would have died for her, even if The Angel didn’t want them to.
But she just smiled at him. “I know you would.”
“If there’s some loophole Hell is using, then why don’t we have one? Why can’t we figure out some work around and, I don’t know, let angels use their powers to actually fight demons?” Anna asked, and she wondered if that was a ridiculous thing to say, too.
The Angel tilted her head, thinking. “They must be breaking the rules somehow, but we don’t know how it’s even possible. They are supposed to be automatically summoned back to Hell if they do. Whatever they are doing, they’re circumventing what was agreed upon eons ago, but they hide from us just as they hide from you. We don’t know anything more than you do right now.”
“Is there a written rule book somewhere you can finally let me study?” Anna mumbled.
The Angel’s pale gray eyes sparkled. “I wish there were. It would make my job a lot easier, too.”
“Luca’s angel mentioned a war if this keeps up. What exactly does he mean by war?” Anna asked.
“A declaration of war against Hell could be catastrophic. All of the rules we’ve abided by for millennia would be wiped out, and they’d do whatever they wanted. But they are already starting to do that, which is why we may not have a choice.”
“But you’re angels. You can’t fight back. How would a war between Heaven and Hell even work?”
The Angel made a sound that almost sounded like a weary sigh. “We can’t. We arm every hunter with every gift we can, but ultimately, we can only stand by you.”
“And what about these dreams? There’s no way you can keep them out of our heads? Stop these dreams from even occurring?” Colin already knew the answer, but he had to hear it from her anyway.
“No, the best I can do is help pull you from those dreams, but I can only do that through the one of you that hasn’t been lost. I couldn’t find Anna when she was in that camp, just as you couldn’t. With these dreams now, as soon as you slip away and you stop being able to feel each other, I stop being able to sense you as well. I’ve been helping to wake you up but if they were to figure out how to get into both of your minds at the same time…”
The Angel stopped and watched them with a kind of worry and apprehension Anna and Colin had never seen from her before.
“Wait,” Anna whispered, “it’s not just separating our minds then? The other night when I couldn’t wake up Colin… that was real? If they get to us both, you could lose us, and we may never wake up?”
The Angel took a deep breath, which must have been a habit of humans she’d picked up somewhere because she probably didn’t need to breathe.
“I would never stop looking for you,” she promised.
But it was all she could promise them. Knowing where their bodies were would be useless; it wasn’t their bodies these demons were fighting now. They had realized how indestructible Colin and Anna were and had found a place they were still vulnerable. They were trying to steal their minds.
Colin leaned his head forward, studying Anna’s fingers still intertwined with his. “And our bodies won’t die for more than a hundred years. That’s a long time to be stuck in Hell.”
The Angel nodded in agreement and took one more deep breath before appearing in the pew next to Colin and Anna. They jumped from her sudden presence next to them, but she took their hands, which were still holding onto each other, and looked at them carefully, that love and compassion she’d always had for them so evident in this new fear she had for the O’Conners’ lives.
“That’s exactly what could happen, Colin. And the thought of it happening to you and Anna would be killing me if I were mortal. So that’s why I came to let you out of your agreement. Your service is over.”
Chapter 12
Luca had left that morning to find Andrew in Caracas, so Colin and Anna couldn’t even call him yet. Dylan and Max sat across from them at the Village Inn, picking through their plates of French fries and burgers but after what Colin and Anna had told them, neither of them felt like eating.
Dylan shook his head and dropped the French fry he was holding back onto his plate. “I don’t get it. You get a once in a lifetime chance to get out of the rest of your servitude, and you turn her down?”
Colin didn’t share their reservations about eating. He was still starving, despite what had happened at the church. He swallowed the mouthful of burger and just shrugged. “We’re hunters. Besides, we’re counting on us being able to find them before they can trap us in their brain-prison.”
Max raised an eyebrow at him and snorted. “Brain-prison? Colin, what those demons are trying to do, that’s worse than any kind of prison.”
Anna had ordered onion rings with her burger and was eyeing Colin’s French fries, debating whether she’d made a mistake or not. Colin warned her not to even try it. She reached across and grabbed one anyway, and he sighed loudly to let her know he didn’t appreciate her foo
d thievery.
“Have some of my onion rings,” she offered.
He squinted at her. “If I’d wanted onion rings, I would have ordered them.” But he took some anyway.
“How can you two just sit there like some creepy-ass archdemons aren’t trying to suck the life out of you through your dreams?” Dylan was exasperated. And Colin wanted more of Anna’s onion rings.
“Oh, for crying out loud, switch plates with me,” Anna told him.
Colin took Anna’s plate and glanced up at Dylan. “Well, technically, I don’t think they’re trying to suck the life out of us through our dreams. Just… kill us without actually killing us.”
Dylan rolled his eyes and stabbed his French fry with his fork. Colin thought his years of working as a hunter had perhaps influenced him a little too much, because that fry was mutilated now.
“That’s basically the same thing, Colin. And maybe if you’d let your angel end this deal of yours, these archdemons would ease up anyway. Wouldn’t you get to go to Heaven or something? Isn’t that what you said? Once your deal’s over, that’s it – you just… die?”
It was Anna’s turn to shrug. She wasn’t terribly concerned about dying, considering she’d been ready to leave this Earth for a while now, but she was concerned about what these demons were doing to them and she didn’t think they’d just go back to Hell once she and Colin were gone.
“If we quit, we’re leaving our friends like Luca with even less help than he has now. And knowing what’s going on with us, the angels aren’t going to be making new agreements with anymore humans until they feel like they can protect them from this. If we can’t be replaced, we aren’t walking away. I think these archdemons are hunting Immortals, and with us gone, they’ll just go after our friends.”
“Do they know about Luca?” Max asked.
Demons weren’t supposed to be able to recognize Immortals, but somehow, they’d learned about Colin and Anna.
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