If that happened, I, too, would be dead, and my child with me, for none of those masters could possibly allow me to live. I would always be a threat, especially with the shadow of Lucifer standing behind me.
Lucifer would drop the magical equivalent of a nuclear bomb on the city if I was dead, and that would be the end of any war. The Chicago I knew would cease to exist either way.
“Every time I think I’ve thought through all the implications, I realize how stupid I’ve been,” I said tiredly.
“You are not stupid,” Nathaniel said.
“I must be. Why else would I think I could stop this?” I jabbed my hand in the direction of the skyline. “I’ve got enemies galore but hardly any allies to speak of. I put myself at a disadvantage by giving up my Agent’s powers so I could make a point to Sokolov.”
“You are still the granddaughter of Lucifer, as you yourself told Sokolov.”
“As far as I can tell, being the granddaughter of Lucifer has brought me nothing but grief,” I said, my lips pressed together as I stared off in the distance. “And, Nathaniel…he’s backing me into a cage. I can feel it. Slowly, inexorably. I twist and I turn, I growl and I claw, but Lucifer is the lion tamer and he holds the whip. Soon I’ll realize I’ve gone too far backward and the cage door will close.”
Nathaniel said nothing. Nathaniel, whatever he felt for me, would never go against Lucifer voluntarily. He had done so once at Azazel’s behest, but I was sure that he would not put his existence on the line for me to squirm away from the Morningstar. He seemed unable to do so himself.
“What did Lucifer do to you?” I asked, giving voice to the question I’d wondered earlier.
He was silent for a long time. I wasn’t sure whether he was going to answer me.
“Lord Lucifer excels at letting you think that your choices are your own when they are actually his,” Nathaniel said finally.
“I know,” I said, thinking of my marriage, the relationship that was forbidden until Lucifer had decided otherwise. At the time I’d thought it was a reward. Once Gabriel died and I’d realized I was pregnant, I discovered that Lucifer had manipulated us so that he would get the grandchild he wanted. “What did you want so badly that Lucifer gave it to you?”
“Power,” Nathaniel said. “I wanted to be respected, to have the status I felt that I deserved as the son of a Grigori. It is only now that I see that I desired power because Lucifer taught me to do so, because he manipulated me into wanting it. To betraying…”
He trailed off, ruminating on the past.
“Betraying who?” I asked quietly.
It seemed like he was drowning in his memories, and that he was having a hard time swimming back to the surface.
“My mother,” he said.
“Your mother? What did she ever do to Lucifer?” I asked.
“She chose my father,” Nathaniel said simply. “Lucifer wanted her, and when Lucifer desires something, he gets it. My mother, Cassiel, would not have him. She already loved Zerachiel. Lucifer seemed to withdraw from the field with grace. When I was born, he took a special interest in me, favoring me over the other children of the Grigori. He was like a beloved uncle, always ready with a game or a prize. He told me I was special, that I would sit beside his throne one day. Cassiel and Zerachiel took Lucifer’s interest to mean that they were forgiven. It was not so.
“When I was old enough, he promised me that if I would help him with some small tasks here and there, I could come to his court as an apprentice to Azazel, his own right hand. It was heady stuff for a young man. Azazel held much power in Lucifer’s realm. As his apprentice I would be ranked above many of the fallen who were much older and more experienced than I.
“The tasks seemed simple enough at first. I was asked to carry messages, and I did, full of my own importance. Then I was asked my opinion on events I witnessed in my father’s court. Soon I was eavesdropping on private conversations, lurking in places where I might be well positioned to hear, and reporting, always, back to Lord Lucifer.
“Then, one day, I fell asleep in the garden under the gazebo. The flowers and grass were tall there, and I was well hidden by the foliage. I had simply been enjoying the sun and drifted off. When I awoke, I heard voices arguing. They were trying to be circumspect, but they were loud enough for me to hear that one of them was my mother. The other was a man I did not know. They were speaking of Lord Lucifer. I did not hear all of the words. But I heard Cassiel say ‘treason.’
“I remained where I was until their conversation was concluded. All I could think of was that I had uncovered a plot of treason, and Lord Lucifer would reward me well for such a discovery. I rushed to report what little I had heard to the Morningstar. I did not consider that my mother would be caught in the net. I was thinking only of the other man, the one she had argued with. I thought Lord Lucifer would ask my mother whom she was speaking to so that he could find the real conspirator. I thought that she was trying to dissuade the man.
“Of course, I was young and foolish. Lord Lucifer considered them both as plotters, and when my mother was taken for questioning and tortured, she admitted as such. But she would never tell Lord Lucifer who the other man was.
“She was executed in the Morningstar’s court. When my mother was beheaded I was standing at the right hand of Azazel, who stood at the right hand of Lucifer.”
He fell silent again. My heart ached for the boy he had been, for the weight that he had carried over the years. He had watched his mother killed because she had committed treason against Lucifer, because he had revealed her.
He must have thought his life was over when Azazel had ordered him to participate in a rebellion against their highest lord. I wondered, not for the first time, why Lucifer had allowed Nathaniel to live. Then I realized how much Lucifer enjoyed serving his revenge ice-cold.
“Cassiel picked Zerachiel over Lucifer, and then he waited years and years, until you were born and old enough to be used as a tool for vengeance?” I asked.
“Yes,” Nathaniel said. “It is why I tell you over and over not to cross him.”
“And you still declare your fealty to him?”
“I have no choice. I must have a master. It is the way of my kind. And as Lucifer is the most powerful of us all, it is safer to be under his wing than in his sights.”
“You aren’t under his wing,” I said. “Lucifer plays the long game.”
Nathaniel’s life would come to a sudden end one day for his participation in Azazel’s plot. I knew that with the certainty of the sun rising, and I was sure that Nathaniel knew it, too. Yet he kept protecting me, kept putting his life at risk, kept trying to restore his honor even though he was a dead man walking. I realized I could love that kind of man, and that was a disconcerting thought.
“Let us keep walking,” Nathaniel finally said. “There may be other creatures lurking and it is unwise for us to linger so long in an exposed area.”
As we walked it was hard to get my mind off the tale that Nathaniel had just told. It made me see him in an entirely different light, one in which his selfish behavior and his icy demeanor were just a shield to protect himself. Nathaniel was brooding, locked in his own thoughts.
We continued on the path around the aquarium without further incident. I wondered what would become of all the animals inside with no keepers to care for them.
Beezle liked to go to the aquarium sometimes—safely hidden in my pocket, of course. He enjoyed the seahorses, of all things, and the otters. He also liked the popcorn stand on the lower level, because he could eat popcorn and watch the dolphins swimming.
No one would be taking care of the dolphins now, or the sharks or the starfish. Some of them might be dead already with the power out and the filters on the tanks silent. Whatever wasn’t dead would be soon.
It was another problem I could not fix, another tragedy I couldn’t prevent. And then I was crying again, crying so hard I could hardly see in front of me. It was almost foolish to weep over animals when so many people had died in one day, but I couldn’t help it. I was sick of death. In my life I’d seen more of it than I ever wanted.
Nathaniel stopped, touched my shoulder. I turned toward him. He did not offer platitudes. He did not embrace me. He wiped the tears from my cheeks with his hands, his face troubled. His hands lingered on my face,
