The pews ahead of us flickered, faces fading in and out as that unnatural wind raced around and around the room.
Cowboy’s swallow was audible. “Are those ghosts?”
No point in trying to explain how the souls had come to be here, or that they were feeding the demon.
“Yes.”
“Mary mother of God,” he whispered, and I winced.
Ornias roared an answer to Cowboy that filled the air in an echoing blast. “NOT IN MY HOUSE!”
I tucked Cowboy behind me, just a half-step. “Not another word.”
From the back wall of the church, right where we’d walked through the doorway, a thick shadow detached itself from the wall. A long cylinder that moved like sludge, slow and unstoppable, it lacked anything approaching a human shape. As it passed the ghosts sitting in the pews, it touched each of their heads, sucking down some of their energy.
The shadow sludge stopped at the front pew and circled upward, still not forming into anything recognizable. Behind me, Cowboy was shaking hard enough that he bumped me more than once.
“Ornias. Ornias the annoying, apparently. That’s what the books said about you when I looked you up finally. You know, I had no idea you were a demon when I came here last.” I smiled at the shadow that undulated in front of us. The ghosts behind us had all slumped in their pews as if they could barely remain upright.
“You insult me in my house.” The demon’s voice was a growl, a rolling thunder that rippled outward. It slid over my skin and brought with it fear. A demon gift.
“You have a problem, Ornias. And perhaps I can help you,” I said.
Laughter flowed from him. “I have my pets, and new pets arrive every week in this devil-spawned city. I have no problem.”
“Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong. I think your brothers are coming to pay you a visit.” I was taking a gamble, but surely the hellish tableau from Carlos’s front yard confirmed we were dealing with the fallen. And while the fallen were different from demons, they had to know one another.
The thick shadow slowed its movement. “I have no—”
“Those angels that have fallen, are they not related to you? Do they not become demons if they fall?”
The rumbling hiss that blasted out of him sent a literal icy wind around us, and Cowboy grabbed my hip with one hand. I didn’t blame him. My first real encounter with a demon had about sent my mind into a spiral.
I held up a hand. “I want to make sure you are not with them,” I said. “If you were, you and I would no longer be friends. You know, like I’m no longer friends with Bazixal.”
Bazixal was the demon I’d killed to save my son. The cost had been high, but I’d done it.
The wind died down. A bell chimed somewhere high in the church, but I knew for a fact that no one was manning the bells at this hour.
The thick shadow slowed further until it barely moved, just a twitch here and there. “You have become less afraid of the darkness, Phoenix. That is interesting to me.”
When a demon knew your name, you should be afraid, but I felt nothing as I stood there, waiting him out. He might be a lesser demon, but he had knowledge that I needed. “You’re finally catching on. I am not like the others who come to you,” I said. “I need information, Ornias. Don’t make me call on Bazixal. Neither of us want that.” I curled up my lips like I’d smelled something rank. “Killing” the demon had sent him back to Hell, but there was no actual death for a demon, any more than there was death for a ghost.
“What do you need to know?”
“Tell me about the fallen angels. I studied demonology after my run-in with our mutual friend”—Dinah snorted and I put a hand to her, shushing her before I went on—“but I have a feeling I’m not going to find out how to kill them on the internet.”
The demon let out a long laugh that echoed through the church, a cold snapping wind rising with it. “The fallen are not demons, not by our standards. Many of them chose to fall, others were cast out of what the humans would call heaven. And I have no idea how to kill them. That is . . . as the humans say . . . above my pay grade.”
“What would they want with abnormals?” I adjusted my stance, crossing my arms. Cowboy’s hand had not moved from my hip.
Ornias curled around himself like a languid snake, shadow looping in on itself. “Nothing.”
I stared into the smoky darkness. “That’s a lie. You forget I can hear them, even from a pro like you.”
The darkness swirled harder. “How the fuck would I know? They don’t talk to me!”
Cowboy’s hand tightened until it was painful and I dared a look back at him. His eyes were closed and sweat slid down his face. Jesus, it wasn’t that scary. I turned back to the demon. “You would know because I’m betting you keep tabs on what fallen angels you can. You don’t like them, correct? They have more freedom than a weak demon like you. And I bet they could cast you out of your church. A church you can’t leave without being cast back into Hell.”
He lashed out at me, and the cold snapped across my face like a slap, leaving the left side of my face numb. “Bitch, you mock me in my own house! Bringing with you a half-spawn!”
I changed tactics, ignoring his cryptic shot at Cowboy. “How can they be killed?”
His movement slowed. “You truly wish to hunt the fallen?”
“Sure, let’s say that I want to hunt them. They are coming for the abnormals, Ornias. Aren’t the spirits of abnormals your favorite meals? The ones that last the longest?” I tipped my head at an older man in the middle
