Divine Blood

by Beck Michaels

  Zev would finish him!

  “Serves you right for leaving her unprotected,” someone hissed in his ear.

  He jumped back, searching for the owner of the female voice. “Who said that?”

  “You’ll need my help to find her. I can cast a tracking spell for a small fee.”

  “What? Where are you?” Cassiel spun around. “Show yourself!”

  A young woman materialized a foot away from him. He stumbled backward against the bakery. She was almost the same height as him in her heeled boots, dressed all in black leather. Her white hair drifted in the mild wind.

  “Witch …” Cassiel said under his breath.

  Her strange lilac eyes flashed with magic. “Pompous lord.”

  Then he realized who she was. “You’re the witch from the market. What did you do to her!”

  The woman hissed, “Don’t insult me, fool. I did nothing to her. Now stop wasting my time or hers. She doesn’t have much of it.”

  “What do you mean?” he demanded. “Where’s Dyna?”

  “They took her.”

  His insides dropped through him, sinking into the ground. “Who took her? Tell me!”

  “You have no one to blame but yourself.”

  Cassiel glared at her. “How do I know you are telling me the truth? This could be a trap.”

  Her eyes narrowed, electricity crackling at her fingertips. “If I wanted to trap you, it wouldn’t take more than a snap of my fingers. I know what you are, Cassiel. Named after the first Celestial king of Hilos. It’s well known in history yet you walk around letting others call it out. You’re fortunate no one has noticed you yet. Fool.”

  He blanched, his whole body tensing in alarm. Was this witch under the Accords? He couldn’t trust her, but Dyna’s fear flooded through his chest, drowning him.

  “Now if you want to find her, it will cost you.”

  “How much?”

  “One tracking spell for one feather.”

  He scowled. “No.”

  She crossed her arms. “You do not wish to find her?”

  “Of course I do. But it’s illegal for my kind to trade or sell.”

  “I see. Well, best of luck to you both.” The woman shrugged and walked away.

  “I can’t give it to you,” he snapped.

  She kept walking.

  “Wait,” he whispered sharply. “Fine, but no one can see.”

  The woman motioned at the bakery’s alley. Cassiel rushed in and she followed, hurrying further out of sight of the market. Making sure they weren’t being watched, he reached into the collar of his coat and winced as he plucked a feather.

  He thrust it at her. “Now tell me where she is.”

  She accepted the black feather, and its profile glowed gold. Her lilac eyes widened with wonder. “Incredible …”

  Cassiel pressed a fist to his chest as more of Dyna’s fear seized him. “Cast the spell!”

  The witch tucked her new prize inside her bag. “It’s done. Follow the trail. It’s only visible to you, and it will disappear once you find her. Now go. You best hurry.”

  Then she vanished out of sight.

  Follow the trail? What trail? He didn’t understand what she meant until he spotted it. Down the alley appeared a path outlined in translucent purple flames—the tracking spell she promised. He sprinted down the illuminated path. The sound of his footsteps echoed off the brick walls. It led him around a turn into a wide alley centered between endless rows of tall buildings.

  Cassiel didn’t want to think of what he would tell Zev if he failed to find Dyna. None of this would have happened if he had kept Dyna with him.

  The witch was right. He was a fool.

  He skidded around another turn but then the tracking spell faded. Ahead of him at the far end of the alley was Dyna. But his relief was short-lived.

  She shrieked and kicked, thrashing helplessly against a man in a black coat. He gripped both her wrists in his hand, ignoring her as he spoke to another hidden beneath a gray-blue cloak. The group of men accompanying them laughed at her efforts.

  Cassiel clenched his fists, rage blazing through him as he sprinted for them. “Dyna!”

  All eyes fell on him.

  “Cassiel!” At the sight of him, she fought harder against her captor. “Let me go, Von!”

  She freed an arm and swung it back into his groin. He doubled over in a gasping grunt. That freed her for only a second when a man with dark skin snatched a handful of her red locks. Her painful cry twisted through Cassiel. Filling him with fury, helplessness, and desperation to reach her.

  Dyna raked her nails across the man’s face. He shouted a curse, releasing his grasp. She darted away, but Von recovered and whipped an arm around her waist. She punched and kicked, using the back of her heels to bash Von’s shins, doing everything she could to escape. But he held onto her well this time.

  Cassiel halted as the other men formed a wall between them. They armed themselves with daggers and swords.

  “Release her!” he snarled at Von. Whoever the man was, he was leading this brigade.

  Von looked at him over the heads of his men with an unreadable expression. “I leave this to you, Abenon.”

  The man with bloody scratches on his cheek grinned. “With pleasure, Commander.”

  “No!” Dyna wailed.

  Von hoisted her onto his shoulder and shoved the youngest of them toward the man in the cloak who was already leaving. “Go with Bouvier, lad.”

  “No, I’m with you,” the boy said firmly. They ran together down an opposite alley with her screaming Cassiel’s name.

  “I’m coming for you!” he shouted after her. “I swear it!”

  He had to say it for her and himself. He will get her back.

  Dyna’s cry soon faded. He had the frantic urge to fly after her, but he couldn’t do so without revealing himself and the existence of Celestials to more humans. And he hated himself for it.

  Cassiel grit his teeth as he faced off with the men. “Who are you? What do you want?”

  They only laughed as they circled him. He turned in place to keep them all in his sights. Whoever they were, they undoubtedly planned to kill him.

  His mind raced as he staked his surroundings. The alleyway was wide enough for combat but not too wide to ambush him all at once. There were too many. The chances of surviving were slim unless Zev joined him soon.

  Lord Jophiel had trained him well but in all the years Cassiel had traveled alone between the Celestial Realms, not once was he faced with the dilemma of taking lives for the sake of his own. He steeled his resolve with his uncle’s voice. “The moment your life is in danger, there are only two choices to make: you fight or you die. I have prepared you for both, but I’ll tell you one thing—dying is easy.”

  It went against the law of the Heavens to kill humans. There would be no redemption for this, but he had made his choice.

  Dyna needed him.

  “Go now if you want to live,” he warned. “If you stay, I will not hesitate.”

  Abenon snorted and wiped a streak of blood from the cut on his cheek. “Are you the Celestial? Do you have a pair of shiny black wings under that coat?”

  It was as if they had dumped a pail of icy water over his head. The witch and now all these humans knew what he was? This encounter was not random.

  “Should you fall,” Abenon said to his men.

  “March through the Gates,” they replied in unison.

  “Aye,” Abenon grinned. “And may He receive you. Now take him down, but don’t kill him. Not until we drain him of every drop of his precious blood.”

  A cold shudder went through Cassiel. He truly had no choice.

  Esh Zayin hummed as he drew it from the sheath. Brilliant white flames burst to life along the blade, and the air warped around it from the heat. The men took a step back, holding up their hands against its blazing light. His pulse throbbed with the rhythm of the convulsing flames.

  “The first one forward will
be the first one down,” Cassiel promised. “Should the flames touch you, they will consume you whole to your very soul.”

  No one in the Mortal Realm had the power to destroy a soul, but he hoped the lie would frighten the Raiders enough to withdraw. Their advancement stopped. The dancing white flames gleamed on their wide eyes. Calculating, considering, confidence wavering.

  “Without a soul, you would never pass through The Seven Gates,” one of them stuttered.

  Abenon snarled at his men. “He lies! Now get him!”

  Two men hefted their daggers and attacked from opposing directions. Cassiel moved on instinct, pivoting as his sword blazed through the break between them. He split one from his guts to his sternum and twisted around to run the second man through. The Raider gasped, blood gurgling from his mouth as he caught fire.

  He pulled out his sword, backing away. The men screamed as the flames devoured their entire bodies in a white bloom. In seconds, the fire left behind nothing but a burst of ash. It scattered in the air like black snow, scattering across the ground and sticking to the sweat on his skin.

  Cassiel gasped at the sudden pain searing inside of his chest as he felt Elyōn damn him for all eternity. A profound sorrow fell over him, filling him with the urge to drop to his knees and weep. No one had ever spoken of this part.

  “Bloody hell,” a Raider said. They stared at him, some with shock, some with fear.

  “Lieutenant,” another Raider called to Abenon. “The Captain failed to warn us of this.”

  Warn them? They were not speaking of Von who they had called Commander. How many were involved in this?

  “What of it?” the lieutenant snapped. “We outnumber him, you useless bastards.”

  “Tell me where she is and no one else needs to die,” Cassiel said.

  Abenon signaled and four Raiders attacked. Cassiel rode on pure adrenaline, holy fire roaring as steel clashed against flaming steel. He moved further into the alley, parrying and pivoting from the onslaught of attacks.

  He broke through their defenses, his sword splitting through opponents one by one. Their screams echoed against the walls. Smoke pillars billowed in the air as their bodies became puffs of ash in his wake. His fear had drowned in a cloud of wrath at their persistence. They were forcing their deaths on his hands.

  A Raider came at him and they crossed swords, bringing them face to face. The flames, inches from the Raider’s nose, shone in his petrified eyes.

  Cassiel shoved him back, giving him the chance to escape. “Tell me where they took her and no one else needs to die.”

  But the Raider attacked again. Cassiel evaded the incoming blade and impaled him through. The man clutched Cassiel’s coat, gurgling his last breaths before the flames consumed him. He ripped out his sword, letting the burning body drop.

  “No one else needs to die!” he repeated. It was an offer. A plea. He could feel how each life he took sullied him further. Painting his soul black.

  He only had a split second to duck as two more Raiders swung their swords for his neck. The blades met in a violent clash above his head, clanging like a broken bell. He dropped Esh Zayin and simultaneously drew out the knives from his boots, impaling his two attackers in their stomachs. Cassiel sliced through muscle and bone as he ripped the knives upward out of their chests.

  “No one else …” A spatter of warm blood hit his cheek as the two bodies fell.

  There was a stillness in him.

  A glorious emptiness.

  All he felt was the slick hilt of his weapons.

  “Fine,” Cassiel grated. “You want to die? Then I will kill you all.”

  He sheathed the knives and took up his sword, letting the flames catch on the clothing of the fallen, as he faced the remaining men.

  Eight dead. Twelve alive. Twelve obstacles between him and Dyna. There was nothing in his mind now but a severe determination to cut them down out of his way.

  The Raiders hung back, floating ash sticking to their sweaty faces. Their wide eyes flickered from the charred remains of their fallen comrades and him.

  “Cravens,” Abenon barked at them. “Must I grab you by the bollocks? Get him.” No one moved. “Fuck the lot of you. Master Tarn will hear of this!”

  Master Tarn?

  The lieutenant waved his men aside and unsheathed his twin scimitar blades. Their curved edges glinted menacingly in the white firelight. He held them with obvious skill, so Cassiel braced himself.

  Abenon grinned. “Once you’re dead, I’ll be the one to keep your sword.”

  He came like a whirlwind. Cassiel attuned his defenses to keep up with the rapid dual blades, but he struggled to parry Abenon’s attacks. It forced him back, the twin scimitars a millimeter from overtaking him. The men jeered and laughed, their confidence renewing. But the lieutenant wasn’t aiming to kill. He aimed to disarm him.

  They didn’t want to spill his blood yet, not until they had something to contain it.

  Abenon delivered a spin kick to Cassiel’s face, hurtling him into another Raider. Bulky arms wrapped around him from behind. They compressed so painfully tight, it forced him to lose hold of his weapon.

  “I got him!” a rough voice snarled in his ear. The greasy Raider smelled of weeks old sweat. The stench made Cassiel heave with vomit threatening to come up.

  He flexed his wings with a furious cry. They burst free of his coat with such force it sent the Raider airborne. The man smashed into a wall across the alley and fell into a broken bloodied pile. The Raiders marveled at Cassiel’s wings with their mouths slacked, greed filling their eager faces.

  “What’d I tell you?” Abenon grinned. “Do this and you daft cunts will be up to your necks in gold. Don’t let him fly away!”

  They charged at him.

  Cassiel grabbed his sword and flew into the air out of range. The Raiders hurled knives at him. He blocked the onslaught of blades, but there were too many at once. Pain pierced his right wing. He didn’t realize he was falling until he hit the ground hard. The impact stole the air from him. His sword had fallen out of reach so he reached for an abandoned knife.

  When the first Raider grabbed him, Cassiel shoved the blade up through his jaw. He lost the knife when the others fell on him. He curled inward, tucking his arms around his head to protect his face from their pummeling blows and kicks. A brutal scream tore through his throat when heels stomped on his wings. The tendons snapped beneath their soles, blinding him with agony.

  The attacks stopped. Cassiel opened his eyes to see his flaming sword come down on him. Abenon blocked the swing with a scimitar, bringing Esh Zayin to a stop an inch from Cassiel’s head. He shrunk back from the severe heat, but the white fire quickly died out, leaving the blade to smoke.

  The Raider who held it glowered. “It’s wrecked.”

  Cassiel closed his eyes in brief relief. Humans couldn’t use Celestial weapons.

  Abenon shoved the Raider away. “If you remove his head, his blood will spill all over the ground, you idiot.”

  Another Raider hooked an arm around Cassiel’s neck and squeezed. He wheezed for air, his fingers clawing at the thick leather of the man’s coat. He tried to get his wings to move, but they twitched on his back, broken and useless. For a second, he feared he’d lost his ability to self-heal, but then his injuries tingled and numbed.

  “Horace!” Abenon snapped at the Raider choking Cassiel. “What are you doing?”

  “He killed Locke, Pip, and the others,” Horace said through his teeth. “He turned them to ash. They will never pass through The Seven Gates! Let me kill him, Lieutenant. I want to watch the life drain out of him before I break his neck! I can do it without spilling his blood.”

  “No, we will take him alive. Now bring me some rope.”

  “Commander Von said Master Tarn wanted him bled dry.”

  “Aye, but not here.”

  Von. Cassiel knew he’d heard the name before, but the thought slithered away as all strength left his limbs, and his vision dar
kened.

  Dyna. For all of his efforts, he couldn’t save her. He was useless.

  Horace jerked and released his chokehold. Cassiel gasped for fresh air but lost it again when the Raider’s full weight collapsed on top of him. From his back jutted three arrows

  The men swore, and they backed away. The quiet was eerie as the sound of soft footsteps approached. A stranger in a tattered green cloak came into view. He held a loaded bow with two arrows aimed at the Raiders.

  “Gods.” Abenon motioned at his nine companions. “Well? Kill him.”

  The stranger shot the arrows, killing one. He dropped his bow and whipped out his luminous sword from beneath his cloak. It caught the sunlight as it swung to meet the others coming for him. He was a blur of movement, disarming the Raiders in one swing and slashing through their bodies in the next. The men hit the floor at his feet. He flicked his sword, removing the blood and calmly sheathed it before gathering his bow and Cassiel’s weapon from the ground.

  “Who are you?” Abenon demanded.

  The stranger slipped off his hood. Teal eyes looked at them from a face set in sharp calculation.

  “He’s that elf, Lieutenant,” another Raider said. “The famed warrior of the Vale.”

  Abenon gritted his teeth, spitting another curse.

  Rawn removed the body pinning Cassiel down. “Are you wounded?”

  “Clearly,” he grunted as he sat up. “You followed us?”

  “On my honor, I did not. I was in Corron when I heard the commotion.”

  “You heard us?” They were deep within the alleys.

  Rawn tapped his ear in reply, then yanked out the knife stuck in Cassiel’s wing. He winced at the dull pain, but the wound had already stopped bleeding. The Raiders watched in amazement as it healed.

  Lieutenant Abenon sneered and readied his scimitar blades. “I rescind my order, men. You can stick the Celestial a few times.”

  Rawn lifted Esh Zayin and handed it to Cassiel. Once the hilt was in his hands, petals of white flames unfurled. They faced the Raiders, ready for another fight when a familiar growl rumbled behind them.

  Cassiel smirked at the sound. “At last.”

  A shadow leaped over his head and landed in front of them. Sharp teeth flashed from its black jaws, yellow eyes gleaming, muscle rippling beneath its fur. Abenon froze. He stared at the massive wolf in dread, the color draining from his face.