I shook my head, chuckling. This was going to be a long training session, even if it was short. Which it wasn’t. Ash started training with Jade as I watched from the sidelines, but I was pretty sure he regretted it after the first ten times he went down.
“No magic!” I heard Ash yell for at least the dozenth time since we’d started today, and it had only been an hour.
“I didn’t!” Jade yelled defensively. “I can’t help it if you’re clumsy,” she quipped with one perfectly arched brow.
Ash shoved himself up off the ground with an irritated look at the root sticking up out of the ground that hadn’t been there a moment ago. Jade turned around to walk back to her starting position, winking at me over her shoulder. At least some things never change.
“No, you’re done,” Ash quipped at Jade before turning to me. “It’s Alex’s turn.”
I grinned and stood, low-fiving Jade as we passed, then taking my beginning stance. He didn’t fare much better with me. I kept letting him pin me, so I’d end up on the ground underneath him. I felt a little guilty about it, but not enough to stop. Finally, with a frustrated roar and a truly unladylike guffaw from Jade, Ash leapt up from the ground already cursing both of us as we fell into a miniature fit of giggles.
“Enough! You need to take this seriously. Both of you. Was I the only one in that castle? Am I the only one that remembers battling those demons in the street? The only one who remembers demons streaming through the tear Henry ripped in the Veil? Trust me, Henry didn’t come up with this on his own. He’s still out there, along with whoever he is working with. And the fucking Fallen! Who are probably wreaking all sorts of havoc as we speak. Stop fucking around, and fight back!”
I flew at him from across the clearing, landing a blow squarely in his chest and sending him flying. He tucked mid-air so that he was rolling by the time he hit the ground. As soon as he was up, he rushed me, but I leapt up and out of the way. I was so high up, he passed beneath me. Wings exploded from my back, keeping me aloft as my tail shot out from my tailbone and wrapped around his arm, lifting him off the ground and throwing him back across the clearing in the direction from which he’d come.
I was only slightly in control now. The Guardian and I were one, simpatico, but she was still in there, still pissed, and she still wanted her mate.
I was on him the second he stopped tumbling and came to a stop. I put a knee on his chest and grabbed his hair with one hand, pulling his head back to look him in the eyes. “There is more to life than survival, and we all deserve that, or what are we fighting for? And who are you to lecture me about fighting?” I hissed in the echoey voice I’d come to know as ours.
Ash’s eyes were wide as he stared into mine, but he didn’t answer, and then his gaze shifted, focusing just to my right. Only then did I see the glow. And the blade.
I shot back away from him, feeling my wings and tail recede as I stared in horror at the sword I’d just had to Ash’s throat. It looked eerily familiar, and it felt familiar too. It was light and a delicate champagne gold color, and it was also glowing and felt comfortable in my hand. But how had it gotten there? I hadn’t had a weapon in my hand. There hadn’t even been any weapons in the area.
I turned my thoughts inward, reaching for my Guardian. What is this?
It feels familiar, but much of my knowledge was taken by the Entity before I was sent to the humans, leaving nothing that could be used against the heavenly host. I’m sorry. I do not know. But I can tell you it is angelic in nature. And it is yours, not mine.
Cursing in frustration, I turned and thrust the still-glowing sword into the ground. It went further than I’d anticipated, a testament to my growing strength, and part of me wondered what kind of potential would be unleashed if we managed to unbind my inherited angelic powers.
“Alex?”
“Just give me a minute, Ash.”
“No.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me. You do not get a minute,” he quipped as I fumed at him. “The Veil is temporarily reinforced, but thousands of demons escaped while it was down. The humans think it’s Armageddon out there, and they’re not far off. They’re all whispering about demons and end-times and the angels that were rumored to have been spotted in Seattle. It’s going to be up to us to save them, to eradicate the demons and the Fallen, and to find my Goddess-damned father!”
“Amen, brother,” Jade interjected with her hands in the air in a very church-like Hallelujah.
Ash rolled his eyes at her and continued, “And to find a way to stabilize the Veil permanently. Alex, whatever this new weirdness is, we know what your heritage is, we know what’s inside you, and we know who you are, so we know it will work for us and not against us. If we’re gonna save the world, you have to stop fearing your own power.”
I turned to face him, tears gathering in the corners of my eyes, but this time, he didn’t avoid them.
“I’m sorry I can’t be what you want me to be, what you need, but I will help you be what the world needs you to be. So… a sword appeared out of thin air in your hand. That’s new, but the glowing weapon isn’t. Your sword glowed the last time you had a blade to my throat too. Apparently, I bring that out in you,” he said with a smug grin, then his eyes flamed. It was only a split second, barely enough for me to catch it, but I did, and I relaxed, if only marginally.
“Jade, do you have any ideas?”
“No, sweetie, I’m sorry. My contact with the Angelic Host was minimal at best. I may be ageless, but I was also formless for a very long time. The best I can say is it looks angelic.”
“Yeah, that’s what the Guardian said too.”
“She doesn’t know?”
I shook my head, and both my friends deflated even further. Their faces looked almost hopeless, and the caretaker inside me desperately wanted to fix it. I just didn’t have the answers this time, but as I found myself wishing we had access to an angel to ask, another thought snatched my attention and spirited it away. My eyes widened as I looked between my two friends.
“What is it? What are you thinking?” Ash asked, both of them perking up a bit as they watched me.
“Angels. I was thinking that I wished we had access to an angel to ask. The Guardian may not know, but thanks to the breech, she’s not the only angel we have access to now.”
My comment was met with silence as they both absorbed my words and processed the implications.
“I know it sounds crazy, guys, but we need to find the Fallen.”
32
Alex
My suggestion had been met with trepidation, but I dare say they also saw the validity of my reasoning. We’d agreed to talk about it more the next day, then Ash said he needed to go check in on the club. He packed a bag, showered, shifted, and took off through the forest toward Seattle.
I sat on the lawn and watched him go, much to his chagrin, but he’d stripped and shifted anyway, which I chose to take as a good sign as I sat appreciating the sight of his rock-hard ass, and once he was no longer visible, I lay on the grass staring up at the sky and counting the slowly appearing stars, enjoying a little peace and quiet. Who knew how long it would last with everyone we were supposed to be hunting?
And everyone who was now hunting us.
Jade poofed into being beside me after a few moments without a word, and we spent a little time in companionable silence. At least, until her curiosity got the better of her.
“So… Things got a little intense between you two earlier. And in Germany. I feel like I’ve waited very patiently, and we’re alone now, so... spill. What the blazing hell happened in his office before the world ended?”
I laughed, because what else was there to do. “The world ended,” I said cryptically.
“Alexis Elizabeth Allen, if you think that’s going to get you off the hook, you have another thing coming. Spill. Beans. Now!”
I proceeded to tell Jade about the fight in the bathroom—my flight from the club she’d seen—th
en the demons, passing out, the mating, the lots and lots of sex. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I explained how Ash hadn’t been present for most of it, and how he’d thought he was still dreaming when he had been. I’d come to terms with it, but it still hurt. Then she hugged me just like the last time we’d lain on the lawn beneath the stars. She held me until what had become sobs trickled down to sniffles.
“I’m so sorry, Alex,” she whispered as she pulled back. “He will come around. He is so in love with you. He has been for a long, long time. He won’t be able to resist forever. Eventually, his misguided, dumbass convictions will look as ridiculous to him as they do to the rest of us. Then he’ll beg you to forgive him. The question is, will you still care by then?” Jade tried to reassure me, but his resistance was what was upsetting me, and her cryptic speak of the future was more frightening and frustrating than it had been PGE—Pre Guardian Era.
Then deja vu struck—in the form of the sound of footsteps nearby. But this time, they were much closer than they should’ve been.
Jade and I shot up off the carpet of grass. I beat her to a standing position again, by a lot, and immediately dropped into an shallow, relaxed crouch. My every sense, every nerve was on alert, searching my environment for any sign of a threat. It all took less than the length of a single heartbeat, but this time, I didn’t wonder at my own speed, agility, and reaction time. It felt natural as I scanned the night for the source of the noise. Last time it had been wolves.
This time, a stag stood at the edge of the large clearing the house rested within. He was magnificent by any account, but creepy as shit upon further inspection. For one, he was pitch black. Not a natural color for a stag. For two, he wasn’t quite a stag. He had paws instead of hooves, each lined with wicked claws, his antlers had thorns like a rose bush, his mouth extended much further back into his jaw than was natural, and he had fangs. He began to tremble and fell to the ground, writhing and… I guess melting was the best description… until finally he had fully reformed into a man—sort of, he still had horns—and stood to face us.
The man… Okay, not a man… The being standing across the clearing from us didn’t make a move, just stared intently. I sensed no hostility or danger, but his mere presence was unnerving. I could feel the power pouring off him in waves, much like I felt it coming from Jade, and the Guardian within me sat up and took notice.
How had he gotten so close without us hearing him? Who was he? What was he? Most importantly, why was he here, now. No one should be able to find us here. Ash had said we weren’t on any maps and he’d had the property wards strengthened before we even got on the plane in Germany. I’d felt the strength of them as we’d crossed through the barrier encouraging everyone else to go around rather than through.
This guy wasn’t exactly human, and while this was a State Park, I doubted he followed the letter of the law, so maybe he was here by chance, hunting maybe? That or he was looking for one of us. A chill ran down my spine and I wasn’t sure if it was related to the thought of him looking for one of us, or the thought of this creature hunting. Neither of those explained why the wards didn’t deter him.
“Baby!” Jade cried and sprinted across the yard toward the newcomer, leaving me dumbfounded and gaping at her backside. She practically flew across the yard to the creature waiting there and threw herself into his arms. He lifted her effortlessly off the ground and she wrapped her legs around his waist, burying her head in the mane of black hair falling around his neck and shoulders.
He never took his eyes off me.
Until she kissed him, that is. I’d never seen Jade react so enthusiastically to any man as she pressed her lips to his, gaining his full attention. Her lips opened to accept him, and he gladly obliged her, consuming her. Her body pressed into him, and he slid his hand over her ass and tangled the other in her hair. Her hands were tangled in his mane of pitch-black hair, her dark caramel skin contrasted beautifully with his almost ebony flesh. I’d never seen skin so dark. It almost matched his hair, and while it looked decidedly supernatural, it was beautiful. Their bodies intertwined like two pieces of a puzzle, creating a beautiful tapestry.
My breath quickened as I felt what could only be magic wash over me and I couldn’t look away. They seemed to have forgotten my presence completely. I thought I should remind them, but part of me, the part currently in charge of my actions, had no such intentions.
They were Beauty and the Beast, twisted in a beautiful and terrible embrace. He turned and pressed her into the tree next to him, shoving himself against her so hard I had to remind myself she was a goddess. Using the tree trunk as leverage, he held her up with only the pressure of his body against hers as his mouth trailed down her jaw and neck. His clawed hands explored her legs as he pushed her skirt up. That’s when I saw his fangs, glinting in the first beams of moonlight.
Seeing him sink his teeth into my friend should’ve terrified me, but instead, I felt a fiery heat from deep inside as he thrust his hips toward her. Only then did I really register that he was naked. He was entering her, savagely, his teeth still buried in her neck as she moaned and writhed against him. He began pumping into her furiously, and I could hear the wet slap of skin from my vantage point across the yard, pounding out a rhythm in perfect harmony with her cries.
They were igniting passion in me, desire that found me wishing I’d chased Ash into the woods and had me considering following him now. My breath hitched as I heard her scream her release into the night.
That was about the point I realized I had just watched my best friend screw what could only be a vampire against a tree in the woods. Not my finest moment, admittedly. As the magic or whatever it had been slipped away, I suddenly felt immensely awkward, embarrassed for having stayed and watched, and even now, I couldn’t figure out why.
The beast-man pulled his teeth out of her neck first, licking the drops of blood from the wound. I watched as the bite mark closed beneath the ministrations of his tongue and felt myself shudder, not at all unpleasantly. Then he pulled out and stood Jade gently on her own legs. She adjusted her skirt, and I wondered if this was the reason she always wore skirts and dresses. She beamed up at him once more, reaching up and kissing him deeply, then took his hand and led him over to me.
“Alex, I want you to meet someone. This is Firin. Full name Fireanach, but you might know him better as Pan… Faunus… Cernunnos… The Horned God… A bunch more. You’ve had a lot of names, babe.”
“That’s what happens when you live in shadow, my love. The humans turn you into a fairytale,” he replied, staring at her adoringly.
“He’s my… hmm… What are you exactly? My boyfriend? My lover? My mate?”
“I prefer the term Consort, darling. But I’ll make you my mate just as soon as you give in to me.”
I fear my jaw was resting on the floor by this point. I don’t actually know. I was so blown away by what was taking place in front of me. Faced with such irrefutable proof of this world I’d only heard a lovely story about and my friend’s part in it, I couldn’t form a thought, let alone a sentence. There was a vampire god with horns standing before me claiming to be my best friend’s ‘consort’. This was no story. My head swam a little and I felt each of them grab an arm, steadying me.
“Don’t faint, now. Ash isn’t here to catch you.” Jade giggled and despite the magnitude of the situation, I still managed to blush.
“Who is Ash?” Firin—a.k.a. the mother-fucking Horned God—asked her. Seriously, how had my brain not exploded yet?
“Oh, baby. That’s a loaded question if I ever heard one. For now, suffice it to say that this is his place and they have a star-crossed tragedy playing out if I’ve ever seen one.”
I hadn’t spoken yet. I don’t think either of them realized it at the moment, but that wouldn’t last forever. I needed to get my shit together before someone wanted words out of me. Luckily, or unluckily, there was another distraction at that exact moment, buying me some more time.
“Firin,” a voice called from the dark beyond the tree line.
My head snapped in the direction the voice had come from. With my new, infinitely better eyesight, I could see in the dark as well as in the light. I saw a single human-shaped body standing unnaturally still in the forest, just beyond the smaller clearing we’d used for weapons training. As I stared into the blackness, more bodies became visible, and more as they moved closer. I hadn’t noticed them before because they weren’t moving. They weren’t even breathing.
“Vampires,” I breathed.
“And nephilim,” Jade and Firin added, simultaneously.
The group of nephilim and vampires moved forward through the trees in a blur. It was like watching a movie in super-fast forward and in the matter of a breath, we were surrounded. It was so surreal. The air around us grew colder. It was oppressive cold, pressing in on me like it had a physical presence. Coupled with the cold was the sheer beauty of every one of them. Each individual was more beautiful than the next and it lent an otherworldly quality to the moment.
“Cain, have you run the perimeter?”
“Yes, sire. The area is clear. It’s been scent marked, as well. No one should come within a hundred miles of this cabin. If they do, they’re looking for a fight,” the vampire, Cain…
“Wait, Cain? As in…”
“Don’t bring it up, dear. Bit of a sore spot, still. Aodh? A moment?” Firin continued like it was business as usual. Cain was a vampire. No big deal. Right. I swallowed.
“Yes, brother?” I almost started as an imposing and painfully beautiful voice spoke from directly behind me, but I had a feeling looking jumpy or weak in this crowd might make my partially human self look a bit too much like prey. I kept as still as I could, refusing to even turn around and acknowledge the potential threat behind me. He was no threat to me, and I wanted to ensure they all knew it. But the voice of the man behind me… vampire... nephilim... who the hell knew anymore, but the sound of his voice tugged at some memory as the butterflies in my tummy dove into a chaotic frenzy, and I was suddenly afraid to turn around for quite different reasons.
Veiled Guardian: A Borne of Angels Novel (The Awakening Book 1) Page 27