Lethal Rider

“We can. And we have.” Takumi’s gaze dropped, as if maybe this didn’t sit entirely well with him. “Sentinelium angelicus expellum.” He plunged the dagger into the little demon.

“Motherfuckers!” Wraith shouted.

The four flasks flashed, glowing as brightly as the sun. Pain pierced Kynan’s brain. Wraith grabbed his head, and as the agony drilled them both, Kynan stumbled backward, overcome by a driving need to get out of the castle. He and Wraith were shoved by an invisible force as the eight Elders advanced, the glow forming a wall in front of them.

“What the fuck,” Wraith growled, voicing Kynan’s thoughts exactly.

They staggered out the doors, and once the fresh air hit them, the pain stopped, although Ky’s brain felt bruised, as if he’d gotten clocked by a heavyweight boxer.

Lance and the others halted at the threshold. “Don’t come back. Headquarters is now warded against your angelic charms.”

“How? How did you do this?”

“You aren’t the only one with an angel friend.” Lance smirked.

Kynan wanted to knock the cockiness off Lance’s face. An… angel friend? Who—“Harvester.” Now he remembered where he’d seen the silver charm Takumi was holding. Harvester had worn it on a necklace. “Jesus Christ, she’s a fallen angel. She’s evil. You killed a baby demon and used black fucking magic in your ward. Do you know how wrong that can go?”

Lance’s expression grew amused. “It’s called changing tactics,” he mocked. “Making alliances in unlikely places.”

“You shortsighted idiots! There’s a fucking Apocalypse coming. We can’t afford to fragment like this. Not now.”

“You’ve given us no choice,” Juan said.

“So this is it. You take over headquarters, bring in new Elders, and banish anyone who doesn’t agree with you.”

“We’re the new Aegis,” Omar said. “Or, the way we see it, the original Aegis. We’re taking back the old ways.”

“You won’t win,” Kynan said. “We won’t let you.”

Lance spread his arms. “Look around you, charmed boy. We have all the toys. We’ve already won.”

Kynan’s temper snapped, and he started for Lance, intending to beat him to a pulp, but before he reached the threshold, he ran into an invisible wall that felt as solid as a steel barrier. Wraith grabbed him before the crushing head pain could take hold.

“You know what, buddy?” Wraith said. “They aren’t worth it. Not now. But later …” He jabbed his finger at Lance and bared his fangs. “You’re mine. And dude, I play with my food.”

Thirty

Regan felt so damned useless. While Ares took off for Sheoul in an attempt to send a message of warning to Hades about Pestilence’s possible ability to get into Sheoul-gra with Idess, Thanatos tried to summon Reaver. Regan… she took a shower. Thanatos had been adamant that the hot water and steam would make her feel better.

It had felt good to wash away the smell of the Aegis ship and the salt water, but when she stepped out of the shower, she was still tense. As she dried off, she tried her best to calm herself, because the cramping pains in her belly and back seemed to get worse when she was worked up.

Please, please don’t let this be labor. Yes, the fact that they didn’t yet have Pestilence was a huge concern, but right now, her own fears were surfacing. For eight months she’d avoided thinking about motherhood, since the baby was going to Kynan and Gem. But things had changed. She’d fallen for the baby, and she was falling for its father.

That would have been a good thing in a normal world, maybe. But so much uncertainty was going to surround her son’s birth, and so much weight was being placed on his tiny shoulders. She wanted to bear it all, and she wished like hell she knew how.

Thanatos tapped on the door. He entered, his bone armor clacking, tension making the scorpion on his neck sting his jugular.

“Your friends are here.” He flexed his fingers at his sides. “Kynan and Decker. Arik is here too, with Limos and Ares.”

Full house. How perfect, given that she felt like crap and wasn’t sure she wanted to hear what Kynan had learned.

“Give me a minute to get dressed.”

“Need help?”

“No, I—” She broke off at the quirk of a smile on his lips. “I think,” she said wryly, “that if you helped, it might take long enough to get out of here that our guests would become suspicious.”

“Good.” He strode over to her and put his mouth to her throat. With a little rumble, he scraped his teeth over her skin in a blatantly possessive marking. “I want them suspicious. I don’t want anyone fucking with you ever again.”

Ever again? What did he mean by that? They’d both avoided talk of the future, because truly, the future looked so bleak, so uncertain. In Regan’s case, she just didn’t dare to plan. She’d had her life torn apart so much, and each time she’d thought her future with a family was secure the ground beneath her feet fell away again.

Thanatos stepped away and moved toward the door. As he exited, he looked back over his shoulder. “No matter how bad Kynan’s news is, I’ve got you, okay?” Before she could respond, he closed the door softly behind him.

Choking back emotion that seemed to scald her throat, she finished dressing and joined the others in the great room.

The tension in there was as thick as an Oni demon’s blood. But she was glad to see that Than’s nightwalkers were back at work. Peter gave her a respectful nod as he slipped into the kitchen.

Kynan and Decker were sitting stiffly on the long bench that ran the length of one side of the trestle table. Ares, Limos, and Thanatos were standing, fully armored, as if they were waiting for Ky and Deck to attack. Reaver was there, and he and Arik had angled themselves between the two groups as if prepared to prevent a battle from breaking out.

When Kynan saw Regan, he and Decker both came to their feet. She felt Than’s gaze on her as she crossed toward them, her palms sweating and her gut churning. The expressions on her fellow Elders’ faces were the grimmest she’d ever seen.

She stopped next to Thanatos and didn’t beat around the bush. “Tell me.”

Ky and Decker exchanged glances. “It’s bad, Regan,” Ky said. “It wasn’t a spell or possession. Our colleagues planned your kidnapping and the baby’s sacrifice based on some kind of bullshit interpretation of the prophecy.”

“No.” She shook her head so hard her wet hair stung her cheeks as it slapped against her face. “I don’t believe that. You’ve got to be wrong. Talk to them again. I’ll talk to them. This can’t be right. They wouldn’t do that to me. To us.”

“I’m sorry,” Kynan said. “There’s more.”

The glow that surrounded Reaver flickered as he said roughly, “More?”

Regan listened in disbelief and horror as Kynan described what had gone down in Scotland. The Horsemen didn’t react until Kynan got to the part about Harvester’s possible involvement.

Reaver’s wings flared. “Harvester helped them? As a Watcher, the risk would be…” Reaver shook his head.

Kynan rubbed the stubble on his jaw. “They said they had angelic help, and they used blood magic in the ward against me. Only an evil angel would use that kind of spell. They also had Harvester’s silver charm. She could have told them how to find your keep and how to find a way around the baby’s ability to keep Regan safe.”