light out of the corner of my eye. I turned more fully, hovering in the air, and saw what looked like a geographically isolated lightning storm high above Hollywood Beach.
A lightning storm. In the middle of a clear blue autumn sky.
“Gabriel,” I breathed, and shot toward the light.
I flew as fast as I could, my wings beating against the air, my breath coming in harsh pants. As I got closer I saw Gabriel lay a blast of nightfire at Antares, and Antares fly upward, avoiding it. He held a silver charm in his fist and he pointed it in Gabriel’s direction. A blast of magic emitted from it, strongly scented with sage. This must be Greenwitch’s magic, then.
Gabriel neatly avoided the blast just as I reached him. Antares narrowed his eyes at me in hatred.
“You!” he spat, and tried to blast me with the same magic he’d just launched at Gabriel.
As it had before, my magic seemed to know what to do even if I did not. I held up my hand and a blue pulse emitted from my palm. It captured Antares’s magic and deadened it, almost like an electromagnetic pulse will knock out anything technological.
Gabriel looked at me with respect. “Impressive. Where did you learn to do that?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea,” I said. I was starting to worry that my magic and my body were not my own, that some other force was working through me, and I had a strong suspicion about the name of that force. But I was wary of mentioning Evangeline. The last time I’d thought of her I’d blacked out. I really didn’t want to do that now and fall in the lake.
“So what’s the deal with the charm? I figured you’d have taken Antares by now, being half nephilim and all,” I said to Gabriel, as Antares watched us with narrowed eyes, plotting his next move.
Gabriel made a
That seemed unusual—not that I was an authority on demon magic. But Antares came from two exceptionally powerful parents—Greenwitch and Azazel. Shouldn’t he have had some magic of his own? Then again, perhaps his lack of power was the reason why he’d been passed over as heir to Azazel’s court.
Antares had settled on the long-held tactic of talking your opponent to death. “Little virgin, I will have your eyes for your part in my mother’s death.”
“First it was my heart; then it was my entrails; now it’s my eyes,” I complained. “Can’t you just pick a body part and get to it,
“Ah, so the outcast has told you who I am.” Antares’s eyes flickered to Gabriel. “It will be doubly precious to dismember you, knowing that Azazel’s grief will be legendary.”
“That’s assuming you can get near me in the first place. You can’t even fight without borrowed magic—or a gang of cronies to back you up,” I sneered.
If Antares hadn’t already been red, I’m sure I would have seen him blush. He gritted his teeth. “Make no mistake, sister. You have the blood of my mother on your hands and I will have vengeance. You will not be able to sleep or wake without looking over your shoulder for me. I will not rest until I have destroyed you and our father utterly.”
“Right,” I said, and inside me my magic sang out for Antares’s destruction. I realized that if I didn’t destroy him, he would dog me until I made a mistake, and then he would kill me. So I didn’t stop to think. I let the magic have its way.
The same white flames that had scorched Ramuell in the office downtown burst from my fingertips. Antares’s mouth fell open in shock, and then a moment later he was gone, with no time to even cry out.
Gabriel moved away from me a little, as if he were afraid. “Madeline, what did you do?”
“Nuked him,” I said, breathing hard, unable to believe it had been that easy. “Neat trick, huh?”
“These unexpected manifestations of your power aside, you have now endangered yourself yet again,” Gabriel said angrily.
“What
“I know you do not understand,” Gabriel said. “But the system of loyalty and protocol within Lucifer’s kingdom is absolute. Antares was Azazel’s son and Focalor’s thrall. The law of the kingdom forbids blood combat between siblings in order to preserve peace and prevent unnecessary grasping of the throne within each court.”
“So it was okay for Antares to show up at my house and kick the snot out of me?”
“No,” Gabriel said patiently. “It was not ‘okay.’ Azazel was planning to capture and punish Antares.”
“ ‘Punish’ meaning ‘kill,’ right? So I saved Azazel a step.”
“No. Azazel would not have been able to kill Antares because he was Focalor’s thrall, and there are also laws about harming the subjects of another Grigori. Lucifer does not want constant bloodshed in his kingdom. The laws are designed to prevent the courts from going to war over minor slights.”
“So what now?” I said, still angry. “Do I get punished for taking out Antares?”
“Yes,” Gabriel said. “But not by Azazel, who would likely simply torture you briefly and release you.”
I felt queasy. “Just a little torture before breakfast? No problem.”
“Yes, there is a problem. Because Antares owed allegiance to Focalor and you owe allegiance to Azazel, there are two possible outcomes. The first is that Azazel and Focalor will engage in combat to the death, in Lucifer’s court, before witnesses.”
“And the other option?” I said.
“Azazel can give you to Focalor as an apology.”
My stomach lurched. I could imagine what my fate would be.
“That’s not good,” I said.
“No. It is not.”
18
GABRIEL DIDN’T SPEAK TO ME ALL THE WAY HOME. I felt that the silent treatment was a little unfair, considering that I was the one who was going to get handed over to an unknown Grigori court to be used as a plaything. It never crossed my mind that Azazel might engage in blood combat for me. Gabriel had indicated to me time and again that Azazel would do nothing to risk his court or the sanctity of Lucifer’s kingdom.
Beezle was in the kitchen when we returned. He was watching a bag of popcorn go around on the microwave plate. I could see three torn and discarded bags at the top of the garbage can.
“What happened?” he asked, yanking the bag of cooked popcorn from the microwave and shoving fistfuls in his mouth. “Why were you gone so long? Did you find out anything in the Hall of Records?”
Gabriel crossed to the cabinet where I kept the hot chocolate and pulled out three packets, and then he filled the kettle with water and placed it on the stove. Apparently he was in need of some therapeutic chocolate. He crossed his arms and leaned against the counter next to the stove, stony-eyed and silent.
Between Beezle’s nervous popcorn binge and all of the extra hot chocolate being consumed, there was a trip to the warehouse store in my future. I wondered if I would have time to do something as ordinary as shop for groceries ever again. And if I did have time, what were the chances that I would be able to get through a trip without being attacked by something freaky?
“We didn’t find anything in the Hall of Records. Ramuell, Antares and a bunch of demons attacked the field office. Dozens of Agents are dead. J.B. has powers that I have never seen before, and I didn’t have any time to really ask him about them. I tried burning Ramuell to death and he escaped into a portal. Gabriel chased Antares away from the building and I caught up with them. And then I nuked Antares. Oh, yeah, that’s a new power of mine.”
My dispassionate summary hardly seemed to convey the difficulty and horror of the last few hours, but Beezle appeared suitably shocked.
“You did
