He struggled, his face turning red-purple, but he was unable to resist Javos’s magic.
“Tell me what you did,” I commanded. “Or I’ll kill you. Celestials bleed as much as the rest of us, you know.”
His mouth twisted. “The preternatural scum deserve to die. All of them.”
Javos’s hands made a twisting motion. There was a snapping noise, and Faye gasped aloud. Harvey’s body went limp, hanging in mid-air with his limbs dangling. So much for avoiding a war.
“Now you’ve done it,” I said.
“Not going to thank me?” The warlock lowered his hands.
Harvey’s body dropped out of the air, landing on his feet. A glow spread from his left hand, surrounding his body in a halo of light.
I took a step backwards. “What the—?”
Harvey lifted his head, his eyes glowing as bright as his aura, his expression icy calm.
“You shouldn’t be able to stand,” Javos said. “You should be dead.”
My insides lurched. “What did you do?”
Javos snarled, raised a hand, and Harvey’s body lifted into the air again. He should be dead. I’d heard his neck snap.
My blood iced over. “Drop him, Javos,” I said. “Something’s wrong—"
Bright light spread from both Harvey’s hands, scorching up to the sky and burning my eyes. Javos fell back, while Nikolas vanished in a blur of shadow. I froze, a primal terror gripping me, as Harvey landed on his feet once again.
Nikolas had gone. Javos looked at his own hand in disbelief as though in denial that Harvey had broken free. The celestial stood outlined in white light, his eyes blazing as brightly as his left hand.
Javos snarled and reached out, and Harvey stepped out of the way. The light coalesced behind his shoulders, forming white wing-like shapes.
Shit. Please tell me that’s not what I think it is.
There was only one being on heaven’s side stronger than a celestial.
“I am reborn again,” Harvey said, and grabbed Javos by the throat.
“No,” I said. “Don’t—”
The massive warlock struggled, but Harvey’s preternatural strength held him off the ground. With a swing, he hurled the warlock through the wall of the nearest house. Brick crumbled, glass shattered, and more screaming tore through the street.
“He’s an angel!” screamed one of the celestials huddled behind the guild’s gates. “The angels have come to save us.”
“No, he hasn’t!” I yelled at the speaker. “He’s on the side of the demons.” Never mind that Harvey’s aura was as shiny-bright as ever.
“I am reborn,” Harvey said, again. His wings shimmered with iridescent light, and he seemed taller, more present.
Faye stood rigid, her face pale. And Nikolas—he must have gone to Babylon when he’d dodged Harvey’s attack. An angel’s power would burn him alive.
“How the hell did you do that?” I demanded. “You can’t turn into an angel. You were human. You can’t change species, for crying out loud.”
“The Divine Ones can do impossible things, Devi. You should know that.”
He must mean the Divine Agents. Apparently they’d stepped up their game.
“How’s this for impossible?” I drew back and socked him in the jaw. It hurt like hell, but Harvey’s head snapped to the side, red blossoming on the side of his face. “On behalf of heaven and hell alike, screw you. You can’t get into the guild.”
Or can he? Clover’s plans surely hadn’t accounted for him turning into an actual angel. The celestials had run for cover behind the gates, but they still thought him a true divine, and might let him inside if he persuaded them.
I drew my celestial blade. In his new form, Harvey didn’t have any visible weapons, but that preternatural strength was reason enough to keep him at a distance. A blaze of light at my side told me Faye had drawn her weapon, too, for all the good it did.
I swung my celestial sword at Harvey, and it sailed right through him. Damn. He really is divine. The blade only harmed demons. Oh, fuck.
Shadowy lightning exploded from my right hand, bouncing off him as though he held an invisible shield. Even demigod magic couldn’t beat an angel? Seven hells.
“It’s your choice, Devi,” he said. “You could have been Heaven’s champion, the way the Divine One intended.”
“We both know that was never going to happen, Harvey. Sorry to disappoint you.”
He must have spoken directly to the Divine Agents. So much for hearing voices in his head.
Harvey’s hands lit up with power, and he blasted it at me. I dodged, pain spearing my right hand. Ow. If he touched the mark, it’d be like when the Devi clone attacked me—his power would burn out the demon inside me. I was way out of my league. Now would be a great time to show up, Clover. Only another angel could best one of heaven’s foot soldiers. What grade was he? It didn’t really matter, since Clover herself had said even a Grade One angel could outdo a Grade Four celestial.
I summoned my blade, feeding power from my demon mark into it. Shadows mingled with light as the magic I’d taken fused with heaven’s light. “Get out. You aren’t welcome here. The celestials serve heaven. You serve nobody but yourself.” I didn’t truly believe the Divinities would come along and save us, any more than the guild would. As long as heaven was unaware of the rebellion, we were screwed. And even then—maybe they wouldn’t care. They hadn’t intervened so far, after all.
“Heaven will have a new leader,” he said. “The Divine One will rise once more.”
“Who’s that, the person who upgraded you?” It must be an angel. Clover had said they had different levels, from heaven’s foot soldiers to their leaders, but it couldn’t be clearer that Lythocrax wasn’t the only one able to upgrade people. We were in serious trouble.
“Our future,” he said, his hand lighting up once again. I dodged his attack, swinging my doubled-sided blade. The shadowed edge glanced off his arm, and he moved backwards, his eyes narrowing. Gold blood trickled down, heavenly bright, like the monstrous clone Lythocrax had created.
Hey. I got a hit in. Angels weren’t invulnerable, blazing light or none.
Celestial blade out, Faye jumped in, but her weapon passed right through Harvey. Her body collided with his, and he backhanded her, sending her sprawling to the pavement. With blinding speed, he spun and knocked me off my feet, too. Blood trickled into my eyes. Ow. I drew on the regenerative magic stored in my demon mark, struggling to catch my breath. I’d landed outside the guild’s gates, and terrified celestials watched the show from behind the bars. The shimmering light of their demon-proof defences ignited at my presence. Dammit, attack him, not me.
A beacon of light made me start upright, searching for the source. My heart plummeted. The demonglass I’d dropped had lit up again. Purgatory was opening.
Faye lunged at it, only to be knocked back by another blast of light. I tensed, bracing myself, but the blur of light from the portal leapt behind Harvey, grabbing his newly formed wings.
“What the—?”
“Need a hand, Devi?” Clover held Harvey’s wings behind his back as she yanked him towards the portal.
“About damned time!” I yelled, back on my feet. “How could you let this happen?”
Harvey struggled, but light engulfed the pair of them once more—and they were gone.
A stunned moment passed. Then the guild’s gates opened, a number of celestials approaching the spot where Harvey had vanished. Faye stood still, her expression equally stunned. I shook my head, too breathless to tell the celestials to take cover until the coast was clear. If Harvey got away from Clover, he’d be back in an instant.
A male celestial soldier spotted Faye. “Traitor!”
A dozen weapons came out, all of them pointed at Faye.
“You’re the traitor,” shouted one of the celestial novices. “You’re the one on the wanted posters.”
Divinities save me from newbies trying to save the day. “She’s not
the one you should be after,” I said, my head pounding. “Where did the others go? Rachel—and Fiona.” My vision swam. Don’t give out on me now, body. Damn, that angel hit hard.
More celestials came out of the gates to surround Faye. She stood still, unresisting. Outnumbered.
“You’re pointing your swords at the people who didn’t throw a demigod through a building.” I rubbed the back of my head, willing my regenerative power to kick in. “Use your common sense. That angel was on the devils’ side, if you want a simple explanation.”
“Tell Mrs Barrow I’ll speak to her myself,” said Faye, apparently unconcerned by the number of weapons pointing at her. “It’s time I revealed myself to the guild.”
My vision kept swimming. A celestial soldier wavered before my eyes. “Hey,” I croaked. “Don’t lock me in jail again. You saw that angel try to kill me. Where is Mrs Barrow?”
Humans had begun to emerge from the houses. The force of Harvey’s attack had knocked a massive hole in the building he’d thrown Javos into. No human could have survived it. My heart dropped. Shaking off a wave of dizziness, I advanced forwards, only to find my path blocked by a dozen celestials.
“You’re welcome for stopping him from killing you all,” I told them. “Seriously—stop poking Faye, you can tell she’s no demon.”
“Let me speak to her,” said Mrs Barrow. About damn time. The crowd parted, allowing her through. At the edges, terrified-looking humans gathered, their panicked voices jumbling together. My head felt too heavy to lift. I sat down on the pavement, drawing more regenerative power into me, wondering if the celestials would object to me lying down and taking a nap…
Shadows moved in the corners of my vision, and a refreshing jolt of regenerative power spread through my body, bringing me back to alertness. Nikolas was here. Thank the Divinities. He dodged the angel’s magic.
I sat up, my vision clearing, my head no longer swimming. A few metres away, Javos’s body had been laid out in the street. Nobody seemed to want to touch him. Faye and Mrs Barrow were still arguing, though they’d moved closer to the guild’s gates, away from the crowding humans.
Shadows enfolded me from behind, and another soothing rush of regenerative power lifted my head. “Nikolas,” I whispered. “Damn. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
He didn’t say anything. Though I couldn’t see his face, I was sure he’d spotted Javos’s body in the road.
“Stay here, Devi,” he murmured, and walked forwards, parting the crowd. The celestials moved aside, though I wasn’t sure if he’d actually used his psychic abilities or if they were just scared of him. I climbed to my feet and walked behind Nikolas, knowing it was too late.
The divine fire had burned a hole through Javos’s chest. He was dead.
“What did you do to the angel?” Nikolas asked me.
“Clover dragged him back into Purgatory,” I mumbled. “Rachel and Fiona…”
“Over there.”
I spun on the spot, my heart lifting. Rachel and Fiona frantically waved at me across the street, from behind a group of shell-shocked humans. The celestials had pulled back, more interested in Faye’s argument with Mrs Barrow than in the fallout of the warlock’s death.
Fiona skirted around the humans, and ran to hug me.
“Thank the Divinities,” I breathed. “That angel—I was sure he got you.”
“No, we were looking for sources,” Fiona said, stepping back. “And—it’s bad. That explosion we heard? Someone blew up a vampire club.”
“Not the shelter?” I said, horrified. No. Not them, too.
“No,” she said. “Mather’s. You know, the vampire bar. There… there were bodies everywhere, apparently.”
I swallowed hard. More people dead… more innocent lives taken.
Rachel let out a hoarse noise, spotting Javos’s body. “No.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, quietly. “I couldn’t stop him.”
Rachel sprinted to Javos’s body, dropped to her knees, and howled.
10
Javos’s death left more of a gulf than I’d ever expected, considering how few warlocks had actually liked the guy. He’d been manipulative at best even before he’d tried to strangle me, so I wasn’t exactly in the depths of grief, but that Clover had been unable to stop the enemy creating their own angels rattled me beyond words. Even if she’d saved us from Harvey, she hadn’t been able to finish him off.
Not that I’d know for sure, since no matter where I tried to open a way into Purgatory, it failed every time.
“You can’t shut me out,” I yelled at the wall of Nikolas’s living room. “If you let those bastards in, I should be allowed in, too. You wanted me to be your champion, once, didn’t you? You traitorous Divinities—”
“Devi, what are you doing?” Rachel moved into the doorway, sucking on her thumb. Her hair was plain and her stature small, like a child of four or five. I’d seen her in that form before, when we were in the tunnels under Pandemonium, and she’d been that way since Nikolas had brought her home after Javos’s death yesterday.
“Trying to get into Purgatory.” I dropped my arms to my sides and let the pentagram burn out. “Bastards have locked the place up.”
“The angels are running the show,” said Rachel, flinging herself onto the sofa. “That means they can keep anyone out who they don’t want around.”
“Didn’t stop them jumping into this realm through my demonglass.”
“I hope they burn in hell,” Rachel said. “How could that shithead turn into an angel? How?”
“I don’t know.” I sat down on the sofa next to her. “He didn’t look like an angel when he crashed through the demonglass in my pocket and nearly crushed me to death. But then—he said he was reborn. He had wings. And his aura was shiny white.”
“S’pose those dicks make the rules.” She scrubbed her damp eyes with the back of her hands. “They can kill anyone they like. Turn demons into angels.”
“He was a celestial. We have angel magic. Maybe that’s enough… to be upgraded. I didn’t think it was possible, but who knows what we’re up against here?”
Lythocrax had cheated at every turn, outwitting me every time. If his last wish was for me to fear using what had once been my best asset, he’d done a spectacular job. I couldn’t trust demonglass at all. If it didn’t have demon magic in it, it might bring an army of angels into this realm instead.
“Where’s Niko?” Rachel asked.
“With the warlocks,” I said. “He has to sort out what Javos left behind, and make the…”
“Funeral arrangements?” She sniffed. “Yeah. I know. Niko’s trying to pull it together, but the other warlocks are intervening… and then someone has to tell his family. It’s a mess.”
“I didn’t even know Javos had family,” I admitted.
“He has a brother. A rogue, from what Niko said. It doesn’t matter anyway. He’s gone.”
“Rachel, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. There was nothing you could have done.” She looked down, fiddling with her hair. “It’s stupid. I know he was a bastard. But he was the first warlock I met in this realm—aside from Niko—who looked at me like I was a person. Not like… not like the ones in the palace, on Pandemonium.”
“You don’t have to justify caring about someone who was like family, Rachel,” I said. “Nobody’s perfect. Just look at me. I should have stopped Harvey from getting into this realm altogether. I didn’t know he’d…” Use my demonglass. No doubt the Divine Agents had specifically told him to do that, so I’d distrust my own source of power. But who the hell had upgraded him?
If I sat here thinking about Purgatory, the Divine Agents or demonglass a minute longer, I’d scream. Nikolas had been gone all morning, and I’d had bloody enough of being outmanoeuvred.
“I need a problem to sink my teeth into,” I said to Rachel. “Is—is the way to Mather’s bar clear?”
“How would I know?” She shrugged. “I doubt the
vamps would want you walking in there.”
“I doubt they know who did it,” I said. I’d skimmed today’s headlines, but most were focused on the ruckus at the celestial guild yesterday. The tabloids were gleefully dissecting the possible identity of the ‘Angel of Death’ who’d descended to give the warlocks what was coming to them. I’d nearly set the local newsagent’s display ablaze when I’d seen the headlines.
“What, you think it was one of the angel’s people?” asked Rachel.
“I think it’s safe to say it was,” I said. “Maybe one of the others is still in this realm. We might get to rearrange his face a little.”
Her mouth tightened. “Good enough for me.”
It was worth checking out, if just to confirm who’d caused the explosion. But in the end, the answer was always the same.
The Divine Agents.
The angels.
Harvey, his aura as bright as the surface of the sun.
“Maybe put your other form on,” I added to Rachel as I got up. “So they don’t think I’m bringing a kid with me to a vampire hangout.”
“Sure.” Rachel turned into her usual teenage-girl appearance, minus the pink hair. Instead, dark curtains hid her eyes from view, making her look deceptively shy. “Is Fiona around?”
“Not at the moment.” She’d gone home late last night and hadn’t called yet, so I assumed she was with Faye and the vampires, or maybe the humans. She hadn’t had the best experience at Mather’s the last time, so I decided to drive us there alone.
Last time we’d been to the vampire bar, it’d been night time, and I’d been hanging on the arm of a college-aged vampire pretending to be a lackey in order to get information on the whereabouts of the infected bloodstones. An age had passed since that day, and seeing the police cars parked on the cordoned-off road made a lead weight settle in my stomach. There wasn’t much the human police could do in the event of a preternatural attack, so it came as no surprise that there were more vampires on the scene than police officers. I used some of Nikolas’s attention-diverting power to slip through the lingering crowd to get a better look at the bar. The door hung from its hinges, revealing the area inside had been totally gutted.
Celestial Storm Page 9