Reaper

by Larissa_Ion

  “Y-yes. Yes, of course.”

  Shit. Lilliana needed a lifeline.

  “I was about to give her my answer when you walked in,” Azagoth said to her. “Perhaps you’d like to do the honors?”

  She ignored him, keeping her gaze glued to Lucielle. “How many?”

  “How many what, dear?” Lucielle’s voice dripped with saccharine. “Children? Two hundred and twelve.” She shot him a smile that was the oral equivalent of uncrossing her legs. He knew what that mouth could do. And it wasn’t anything Lilliana couldn’t do better. “The Grim Reaper and I go way back. Thousands of years before you were even born.” She gave Lilliana a cool once-over. “I suppose you could join us. I’m very open to new things.”

  “Get out,” Lilliana snarled, pointing at the door. “Get out now. And tell all your broodmare friends that Azagoth is no longer available for stud.”

  Azagoth laughed.

  “Broodmare?” Lucielle bristled. “Being chosen to create within our bodies a unique class of angels from the seed of—”

  “Out!” Lilliana flung out her arm, and Lucielle catapulted through the air, right through the doorway.

  The door slammed shut with a resounding bang that rattled the artwork on his walls. Then Lilli picked up one of his jade horse figurines and shattered it on the floor.

  “Was that really necessary?” he asked. Throwing an annoying angel out on her ass was one thing; destroying a four-thousand-year-old demon carving was another.

  Lilliana rounded on him, her eyes spitting fire.

  “Was it—what? Are you kidding me right now? You should have kicked her out. That…that skank…propositioned you right in front of me. That female you fucked in our bedroom over two hundred times!”

  Whoa. He’d only meant the figurine, but clearly, it didn’t matter. She was pissed, and not just at Lucielle. He’d gotten rid of most of the evidence of his past, the sex furniture, the toys…and she’d burned the mattress. But he supposed the bedroom was still…the bedroom.

  “Calm down,” he said gently. “We didn’t use the bedroom much.”

  And boy, was that ever the wrong thing to say. Over the course of the next couple of days, he’d learned that his library couch wasn’t comfortable and that it wasn’t wise to tell an angry female to calm down.

  He still thought the entire episode was amusing, but as he thought back on it, he realized that he should have tried to see it through Lilliana’s eyes. From her perspective, she’d been ambushed by a female who wanted to have sex with her mate, and a male who thought the whole thing was funny and flattering. And she wasn’t wrong. He’d been so used to females wanting him only for what he could give them—power, notoriety, favors, babies—that it was refreshing to be wanted for him. Okay, they didn’t want all of him. Just his dick. But, still.

  Instead of laughing, he should have reassured her. He should have made it painfully clear to both Lilliana and Lucielle that the only angel who would be bearing his children, the only one he would ever sleep with again, was Lilliana.

  Abruptly, his senses screamed an alert, drop-kicking him out of his reminiscing. Someone powerful had just entered Sheoul-gra.

  While it was on lockdown.

  Again.

  He was going to kill Hawkyn.

  And, maybe, whoever had come through the portal.

  Chapter 31

  Azagoth launched into the air from his balcony, Raika still in his arms. She looked up at him, utter innocence and trust in her big eyes.

  “Don’t worry,” he murmured. “Daddy’s going to keep you safe.”

  He soared over his grounds, flying toward the portal. He saw Suzanne below and dropped down, landing softly behind her.

  She whirled around with a startled yelp, but when she saw Raika, her shock turned to a broad smile. “Hey—”

  “Here.” He handed Raika to her. “I need to handle something.”

  She looked past him and nodded. “Hi, Jim Bob.”

  Jim Bob? “What the fuck?” Azagoth turned so fast, he nearly whacked the angel in the face with a wing. “Who let you in? Hawkyn?”

  Jim Bob shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. What are you doing to save your mate?”

  “What?”

  “What. Are. You. Doing?” he demanded. “Moloch is going to kill her if you don’t release Satan. So, what is your plan?”

  The immediate plan was shaping up to include kicking Jim Bob’s ass.

  “Watch your tone, halo. You don’t get to demand anything of me.”

  “Dammit, Azagoth!” Jim Bob moved forward with the sudden speed of a striking snake. “I need to know what you’re going to do!”

  With a thought, Azagoth lobbed a barrage of summoned blades at the angel. They struck with barely a whisper, a hundred daggers that would slice downward with agonizing slowness, shredding their victim like a cheese grater.

  The force of the blades’ impact knocked Jim Bob into the last standing remains of the gazebo Azagoth had destroyed during his bid to escape.

  “Get Raika inside!” he barked to Suzanne.

  But as he turned back to Jim Bob, something yanked him off the ground before slamming him back down so hard, his body left a crater. Suzanne got blasted several feet away, was sprawled on the ground, but Raika was still cradled safely in her arms, and she gave him a we’re-okay wave.

  Fury lit him like a torch. No one but Azagoth and Lilliana could wield power in his realm. No one but Reaver and Revenant, anyway, and certainly not to that extent.

  “How?” he roared as he burst upward, firing a summoned spear of hell-forged blood iron.

  Somehow, Jim Bob had rid himself of the blades, but he couldn’t avoid the dead-center blow from the spear. He screamed and dropped to his knees. Steam rose up from around the spear where it was buried in his chest, and blood poured down the shaft as he fell forward, impaled off the ground. His head dropped, his face hidden under the hood of his charcoal robe.

  “How did you get in here?” Azagoth stormed toward him. “And how the fuck are you using power in my realm?”

  Jim Bob coughed, spraying blood on the ground. “I helped you build Sheoul-gra, you ass,” he rasped in a voice that was no longer his. A voice Azagoth hadn’t heard in thousands of years. “Did you really think I wouldn’t make sure there was always a way in for me?”

  Utterly speechless, Azagoth willed the spear away. Jim Bob dropped face-first to the ground. Groaning, he rolled onto his back. The hood fell away, revealing a new face and a luxurious head of hair in all the shades of mankind.

  “Gabriel?”

  Azagoth nudged him with his boot, and the archangel sat up, clutching his still-burning chest. “That weapon was unnecessarily harsh.”

  Yeah, it was harsh. It was an anti-angel weapon explicitly designed to cause devastating wounds or finish off an already severely wounded angel. But Azagoth was done fucking around.

  “I disagree,” Azagoth snapped. “And I don’t need to ask why you kept your identity a secret. But why have you been sharing information with me in the first place?”

  “Why?” he asked, incredulous. “I’m a bit invested in your success, asshole. Plus, you’re my source for a lot of shit that goes on in both realms.”

  “Why now?” Azagoth asked, still reeling at the revelation of Jim Bob’s true identity. “Where were you for thousands of years?”

  “I was behaving.” Gabriel coughed and spat blood. “Being a good little archangel. Then, a few hundred years ago, I started seeing dark portents. I figured it might be a good time to get acquainted again.”

  “Archangel?” Suzanne, who was supposed to be safely inside with Raika, drifted closer. “You’re the archangel Gabriel? You gave Declan his tattoo?”

  Azagoth nearly gave himself whiplash looking between the two of them. “Tattoo?”

  Crimson splotches bloomed in her cheeks, and Azagoth suspected that she’d just revealed something she wasn’t supposed to. Gabriel gave her a pained go-ahead nod.

&nb
sp; “Declan and I needed information about the set of wings tattooed on his back,” she explained, still shooting Gabriel sheepish glances. “We found the artist in a shop in San Francisco. The guy who did it was Jim Bob. Er…Gabriel.”

  Azagoth narrowed his eyes at the angel. “Let me fucking guess. The tat is enchanted somehow, and it’s probably an angelic tracking device. Is Heaven so boring now that you have to spend your days tattooing humans?”

  “Have you been listening?” Gabriel said in an angry rush, although the coughing fit afterward took some of the bite out of his tone. “A shitstorm is coming, Azagoth. Some of us are preparing. We’re tracking down those who have angelic DNA. We’re getting humans ready for the truth of our existence. We’re doing everything we can to get our players ready for the End of Days. And that means keeping Satan in his cage until the very last minute.”

  “So that’s why you’re here? To stop me from releasing Satan?”

  “I’m hoping I don’t have to.” He wheezed, and blood bubbled between his fingers as they covered the chest wound. “I came to warn you.”

  Gabriel leaned back against the rubble. The injury hadn’t closed at all. Even in the human realm, it wouldn’t have closed yet, but there would be signs of healing. If Gabriel didn’t return to Heaven soon, his powers would drain, and he’d be trapped here.

  Which was going to happen, anyway. Azagoth couldn’t think of a better hostage than an archangel. Which was probably, in part, why Gabriel had come as Jim Bob. That, and he couldn’t let anyone in Heaven know he was in contact with Azagoth. Heaven had strict rules about who was allowed to contact him, and even stricter rules about who could step inside Sheoul-gra.

  “Warn me about what?”

  “The Council of Orders. They’ve sanctioned your destruction.”

  Azagoth went cold inside. Fucking Deep. Freeze. “Did they?”

  “Azagoth, listen to me—”

  “My lord!” Razr ran toward them from the direction of the portal. “There are two angels requesting entry. They say Hawkyn was called to business, so they’re bringing the milk for Raika.”

  “It’s a trick,” Gabriel warned. “I guarantee they’ve done something with Hawkyn. If you don’t respond, or if you refuse, they’ll try breaking through your portal security.”

  Snarling, Azagoth wheeled around to Razr. “Don’t respond. It’ll buy more time than refusing. Get Cipher. Tell him to monitor the portal enchantment.” Razr took off, and Azagoth spun back to Gabriel. “What else are they going to do?”

  “I don’t know. They kicked me out of the meeting after they disabled Reaver.”

  “What did they do to Reaver?”

  “They used their collective power to restrain him. They were afraid he’d warn you.”

  “They weren’t worried about you?”

  “They don’t know I’ve been in contact with you.” He closed his eyes and took a couple of deep breaths before continuing. “But they were worried enough to assure me that if I tipped you off, I’d answer for a high crime.”

  Stunned by the news, Azagoth took a step back. A high crime was punishable by anything from imprisonment in torturous isolation to execution, but the most common punishment was expulsion from Heaven.

  Gabriel had risked everything to warn Azagoth that, once again, Heaven was going to fuck him over.

  His phone rang, and he snatched it out of his pocket. He didn’t recognize the number, but the moment he answered, he knew the voice on the other end of the line.

  “You know what I want, Azagoth,” Moloch said. “Release Satan now, or Lilliana will be in my bed tonight and dead by morning.”

  “You bastard,” he breathed. “If you touch her—”

  “Oh, I’m not going to touch her. That’s what the hot pokers and maces are for.”

  “You’re going to die screaming,” he swore. “You will beg me for mercy, and I will laugh.”

  There was a long, tense silence, and then Moloch said quietly, “You should know that your angel buddies sent an assassin to kill Lilliana. Just FYI. Oh, and Azagoth? I just changed my mind. You have until the Hour of the Crone to release the Dark Lord.”

  He looked at his watch. The Hour of the Crone, the three A.M. strike of the clock at Mount Megiddo in Israel, when the barrier between all the realms was the weakest, and supernatural powers were at their greatest. It was less than two hours away.

  “If you don’t, Lilliana will die within minutes. I’ll save my hot pokers for when I get your daughter back.”

  The line went dead.

  Hot, rabid anger built like a summer storm in his chest. His inner beast vibrated with the need for release as he rounded on Gabriel.

  “Moloch said you sent an assassin to kill Lilliana,” he snarled. “Is it true?”

  “Possibly.” Gabriel swallowed. “Camael said they had a spy inside Moloch’s organization. Low-level, a pissant fallen angel guard or something. He said he couldn’t get Lilliana out, but he could kill her.”

  Of course. If Lilliana were dead, Moloch would have nothing to hold over Azagoth, and Heaven wouldn’t have to worry about him releasing Satan.”

  Those bastards. Those cheating, lying, holier-than-thou fucks. Fury seared his thoughts to ash.

  “You helped me,” he said in the deep, smoky voice of his beast, “and now I’ll help you. Get out. Get out before I change my mind.”

  A massive quake shook the place. The angels were trying to force their way in.

  He was done. He was fucking done with this. Sandwiched between two massive armies, he saw one way out.

  The world was going to burn, and he was holding the match.

  Chapter 32

  Feral rage rolled through Azagoth’s body in great tremors as he stood at the precipice of an endless void, his gaze locked on the spinning crystal cube suspended over the empty space. No sounds came from inside the cube, but then, he figured that any screaming, moaning, and crying had taken place in the first months of imprisonment.

  He flexed his clawed fingers at his sides as he stared at the prison meant to hold Satan, King of Demons, his son Lucifer, and one traitorous archangel, for another nine centuries and change.

  The evil soul of the fallen angel who’d birthed Lucifer was in there, too, her decaying physical remains keeping the other three company.

  Right now, Azagoth could free them all.

  And kick off the prophesized End of Days way early.

  But he’d have Lilliana back.

  Unless Moloch killed her anyway, or worse, saved her for Satan.

  A dark surge of energy swallowed him, billowing up from the void.

  Release me, and I will return Lilliana to you.

  Satan’s voice was an echo wrapped in pain inside Azagoth’s head. Glorious pain, like an orgasm that went on for too long. And beyond that, there was recognition, an awareness of Satan’s unique energy…and his mind.

  As dark as the demon’s energy had been in Heaven, it was a drop of piss compared to the ocean of malevolence it was now.

  “How do you know about Lilliana? Who have you been in contact with?”

  And how the fuck could he be in contact with anyone?

  I knew I was going to be trapped someday. Do you not think I had multiple contingency plans for the event? Azagoth. Asrael. Listen to me, my old friend. Together, we can break your contract. You give me my freedom…and I’ll give you yours.

  Azagoth panted through the exquisite agony of Satan’s voice…and his words. Freedom. It was something he’d had only once in his life, when he’d isolated himself in the human realm. He’d been lonely, far too empathic to interact with anyone, but he’d been free of everything, including obligations.

  We’ll remake Sheoul-gra in the shadow of the shattered human realm, and it will be a paradise for souls. It will no longer be a place of punishment, but a new Eden, where my demons will feed on the souls of the humans forsaken by angels. You will operate it with no oversight from Heaven, and you will be free to come and go.<
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  Azagoth moaned. Yes.

  Release me! I’ll give you the freedom to live anywhere.

  Yes! Wait, no. He shook his head, trying to get the voice out of his mind, droplets of blood flinging from his nose to splatter on the cliff.

  Lilliana suffers while you hesitate.

  “Damn you!” he screamed, hating himself for what he was about to release on the world. “Promise you won’t harm her. Promise no one will harm her, or any of my children, ever, or I walk.”

  I swear it, Asrael.

  “Convince me, Prince of Lies.” Somewhere deep inside, beneath the demon scales covering his beast body, he didn’t want to be convinced. Being convinced that Lilliana would be safe from Satan meant releasing him and bringing about destruction on a truly biblical scale.

  I can practically feel your tender-skinned mate’s pain as you dither.

  “Convince me, damn you!”

  Azagoth could feel Satan’s agitation. Now, they were getting somewhere. This…this was where he was truly a master. An extraordinary empath, he’d been the one to discover Satan’s deception and the plot to overthrow Heaven’s leadership. He knew how the male thought. How he felt.

  Azagoth knew his buttons.

  “Convince me why I should believe you’ll spare my family when you vowed to bring me to my knees. When you threatened to start killing Memitim if I didn’t stop creating them. You despise me. So, tell me why I should think, for one fucking second, that you will keep your word.”

  Despise? You fool, I don’t hate you. I owe you my eternal gratitude. I lost Heaven, but look at what I built! A kingdom of my own, power beyond imagination. Religions both exalt and fear me. I have more power over humans than God does. Don’t you see, Azagoth? You were my savior. Be my savior once again.

  “That’s pretty convincing,” he said gruffly, because it was, and it was tilting him back into dangerous territory.

  I’ll need your cooperation in our new world, so why would I betray my word?

  That was probably true, but still…fuck, he just needed one reason to not do this. Only one. He had to keep the Prince of Lies talking, even though every second could mean more suffering for Lilliana.