No answer. Her voice sounded hollow. Lifeless.
Angela attempted to squirm backward or to turn her head more. “
Nina?
”
A hand wrapped around her wrist, tugging her toward the hatch. Angela screamed, instant fear shooting through her. She jerked backward, almost smacking her head on the dirt ceiling, and struggled fiercely, cursing, digging her heels into the soil and the roots. And then another hand wrapped around her other arm, and its strength was ten times greater than before.
With one swift tug she was sliding, falling. Plummeting in the grasp of a person, or a thing, that she couldn’t see.
Down and down into some dark and endless grave.
Their brutality, from what I have seen, is far from human understanding. Worse yet, they believe themselves to be kind.
—
B
ROTHER
F
RANCIS,
An Encyclopedia of the Realms
T
roy killed eight novices in less than a minute.
Her savage efficiency, the speed she’d summoned to cut their throats, bite their faces, and claw their chests, had been a spectacle of both pure horror and a macabre kind of beauty. Like all Jinn, Troy’s instincts and reflexes were honed to such a fine point that human beings trailed behind her like amoebas. But unlike most Jinn, Troy was the High Assassin, the hunter of hunters, answering only to their Queen, and she had the commanding fierceness and utmost agility to adorn the title.
Maybe she’d performed for Kim’s sake more than her own.
He was covered in blood that had spattered onto his shoes and soaked into his coat sleeves. Blood from men and women who’d tried to stand in his cousin’s way, desperate to save the lives of their fellow colleagues. He was a murderer eight times over now, having sacrificed his former friends to her evil.
Troy’s mouth and hands were painted with crimson, and she licked her lips often, probably tasting her satisfaction.
But her eyes were solely for Kim. The second Troy found the Book, the millisecond she determined the Archon’s identity, Kim’s heart would rest between her teeth. It was frustrating when he stopped to think about it. Humanity always thought small, fearing werewolves, vampires, and ghosts instead of what was truly real, what truly mattered.
Jinn lived off creatures weakened by that kind of ignorance and anxiety. The former they took down swiftly, the latter, slowly and cruelly, like cats playing with their mouse.
They were devils with a perverse code of honor, clannish and vengeful.
Yet, after witnessing Troy’s dance of death firsthand, Kim couldn’t help but admire what he’d seen. He could hate her, but he could never say she was inefficient or untalented.
Fury screeched overhead, her voice echoing out over the city.
Kim paused at the entrance to a dank tunnel, catching his breath and resting his legs. Troy paused with him, instantly growling and hissing. Her ears had folded back like fleshy daggers against her skull. “If only you’d inherited some useful traits,” she snapped at him, nastier than before. She shook her head, and the bones tied to her hair rattled ominously. “I should have left you behind with your dead friends. Who, by the way, tasted like watered-down acid. How fitting that you acquainted yourself with spineless cowards.”
“Try not to be too much of a bitch,” he said, almost snarling with her.
Troy’s eyes narrowed, their light softer. “It’s difficult when I’m suddenly the one leading the way. Tell me, Sariel, do you even know where to find the angel?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he muttered. “We’re headed in the right direction, aren’t we?”
Kim resumed walking through the tunnel, his shoes clacking against the cobblestones, the sweat trickling down his neck and chest. Troy swept inside after him, latching onto the ceiling, her yellow eyes peering down at him with rabid disgust as she crawled ahead. Her mere presence had an oppressive effect on him now, as if she were constantly shoving a ticking clock in Kim’s face to show the hour of his death. Soon they emerged into the open again, and Fury glided down to the level of her master, both of them vanishing into the shadows of alleys and rooftops until they wandered down a crumbling stairway, squeezing through an alley too tight for three people side by side. Kim entered Memorial Park, somehow half dazed by the odor of the blood on his coat. It took another chilling hiss from Troy to reawaken him.
Silence lay heavily on the trees, the weeds, its thickness invisibly weighing upon the gate’s iron bars. Troy climbed a maple near the entryway and stiffened.
Fury stiffened with her, her stick-thin legs splayed firmly in the mud.
They were listening for something.
Then it passed, and Troy ruffled her feathers, clearly irritated. “There’s no one here, Sariel. Once again, your pathetic attempt at saving your life is a waste of my time.”
He turned on her, unable to hide the fact that her voice was more of a wound than her presence. Kim’s teeth gritted, clenched by his own irritation. “I simply followed the leader. If Israfel’s not here, he’s somewhere else. He won’t go far. He can’t—”
“
Shut your mouth,
” Troy said, her ears cocking forward.
She was listening more intensely than before. Cautiously, she lifted her head, smelling, and her nails slipped into wood, splitting the branch to mirror her unhappiness. “The angel. Mikel.” The name left her lips with the greatest displeasure. “That annoying woman—Nina—she’s still here.”
“You smelled her?” Kim said, laughing softly. “She would be filthy enough by now.”
“No,” Troy replied, baring her teeth at him. “I heard her breathing.”
He shivered, reaching into his pocket to touch a prayer ward. Whenever her voice took on that rasping, throaty quality, Kim always prepared for violence. But this time, her hunger faded fast, replaced by impatience. Without another word, she scampered into the black branches, disappearing like the hint of a breeze. Kim continued along the pathway, imagining Angela by his side, cursing to himself as Fury took position and strutted confidently near his ankles. Her beak was like her master’s existence—a dagger that could end his life too soon.
Unless he ended Troy’s first.
Kim dared to smile.
That smile grew the closer he came to Tileaf’s tree. Despite the gloom, Nina’s figure took shape in the mist rising from the earth, her brown hair a tangle of wisps and knotted ends. Directly to her right, at the foot of the oak’s massive trunk, Tileaf lay sprawled in the brown moss, her silken dress as bloody as his coat. She was dead, her skin a mess of red and blue, the smell of her corpse resembling vegetable rot. Interestingly, Troy’s nose ignored plant matter of any variety, whether connected to an angel’s flesh or not.
Then he spied the open hollow, gaping at him below a latticework of roots.
Someone had entered the Netherworld Gate.
Angela
. Kim dashed ahead of Fury, ignoring her angry cackles, dropping to his knees in front of the hollow as soon as he reached it, dirt and mulch spraying around his hands. His fingers met cold metal.
He shrank back from the chill, startled to see the Grail’s chain resting below his palm. Kim examined the links, glancing at Nina for answers.
She was lost in some kind of trance, her eyes wide and crimson. The same shade as the Devil herself. As that brief and unsettling flicker of Stephanie’s irises.
He licked his lips, already tasting the mustiness of the tunnel as much as he smelled it.
If he was quick, Troy wouldn’t see him enter the tunnel after Angela. Not that this would be the wisest course of action, or the most logical. But no matter how much it disturbed him that Israfel had suddenly disappeared, the situation begged for him to take advantage of it. He ignored Fury’s infuriated screeches, flattening to enter the hole, his shoes squishing into the mud.
The bird descended on him in a mad rage, her wings beating furiously. Claws scraped at his coat, scratched across his scalp, and sliced his cheek.
He grasped at the wound, fending off the crow with an arm.
Boom.
Boom.
God, not now. More powerful wing beats thundered throughout the grotto. A burst of crimson light dazzled Kim’s eyes, and the sound of electricity crackled into him like a shockwave. He grabbed the prayer ward inside his coat and pitched it, spitting out the first Latin phrase that came to mind, barely aware of what he was saying. “
Sanctus domine—
”
His vision cleared.
The ward shredded to a ribbon of ash, its pieces dusting the soil. Above it, Naamah perched on the roots forming the hollow, the scales on her feet gleaming despite the horrendous lack of light. A blond feather fluffed from her bloody wings, dropping to the ground and into the ash pile, like a bit of dirty snow. It was astounding she could fly at all. The thin skin between the metal struts in her wings seemed almost transparent, raw with exposed bone and ooze. Hideous stitches closed up a gaping wound in her neck. So much pain, contrasting with so much perfection. She leaned over him, her blond braids tumbling out of their carefully arranged coil, her copper face bright with recognition.
“Perfect timing, priest.” She put a fingerblade to her lips. “I was worried you’d be late.”
In the Netherworld all are equal, for the color of death is one alone.
—
U
NKNOWN AUTHOR,
A Collection of Angelic Lore
A
ngela had thought she was falling.
But she was actually flying, her arms outstretched in front of her, wrists gripped tightly by an angel who seemed no older than a teenager, her platinum hair whipping around them both like a blustering curtain. The darkness was absolute, yet Angela could still see her arms and the rest of her body, including most of the angel who guided their descent. She was an albino, her skin so white and transparent each network of veins resembled blue lace. Her wings matched the color of her hair, a silvery white that was duller than Israfel’s but somehow more healthy. And her eyes were red, like blood.
Red—like Lucifel’s.
They landed together as if in slow motion, feet brushing the invisible ground. A moment later, the angel turned away, staring out into the darkness. Her wings drooped slightly, their tips brushing across Angela’s boots.
“Mikel . . .” Angela ventured.
“Yes,” the angel said, putting a finger to her lips. They waited in silence a moment longer, and then Mikel regarded her again, her face young and delicate. “I hope,” she smiled gently, “that you’re not ready to faint.”
Angela shook her head. Her fear had simply been replaced by astonishment. Lucifel’s dreaded offspring looked to be no older than thirteen and just as harmless.
But when it came to angels, she’d already learned the hard way that appearances could be deceptive. Mikel seemed no stronger than a hospitalized child, yet it was all too telling that Kim had been frightened of her, and Naamah wanted to kill her. For all Angela knew, this frail girl could make Troy look like a toothless dog.
She couldn’t afford to let her guard down for a second.
Is this what she actually looks like? But her voice is the same . . .
“How do I know it’s really you?”
“You don’t,” Mikel creased her wings tightly against her back, “but you’ll have to trust me anyway. What you’re seeing of me now is an illusion, a spirit-projection of Nina’s mind.” There was a hollow, banging sound out in the distance, and she paused. Angela shivered under the torment of her eyes. They were too much like Lucifel’s, and even brighter now that they contrasted with so much whiteness. Kim was right—Mikel could have been on her mother’s side from the beginning. There was no way to tell, and now it was too late for Angela to get out of the Netherworld on her own. “The laws of the material world are slightly different in the world of the dead. Since I’m a spirit, I can navigate through this place much easier than you. I’ve been here many times.”
“Why?”
Why would anyone come here of their own free will?
There was no answer.
Angela shut her eyes, and then opened them again, finding such little difference between both states. Or between the physical darkness and her appalling ignorance. “This must be the body they stuffed you into,” she whispered, gesturing at Mikel’s frail form.
The angel sighed, her robe slipping slightly from a shoulder. “Follow me.”
“I don’t see how I’m going to release these souls like you want me to. Why are you helping me instead of your mother?”
Mikel continued walking, like a beacon of platinum in the crushing blackness. “I don’t know my mother—and no matter how much I might want to know her—she’d like nothing more than to see me gone.” Her voice hardened. “The day we meet face-to-face is the day I die. Since I was born a spirit, it takes a special kind of power to end my life. Only Lucifel has that power.”
The mention of Lucifel’s name elicited an instant chorus of moans and screams, some far, some frighteningly near. Tendrils, maybe more roots or cobwebs, brushed against Angela’s hair, face, and arms. She hugged herself, wishing she could shrink to stay away from whatever seemed to grasp for her. If this was the least dimension of Hell, even nothing more than neutral territory, she couldn’t begin to imagine Lucifel’s home. “Nina told me that I have to meet Azrael. She said he’s an angel like you, but wouldn’t give me any more details.”
Mikel stopped, turning back around. Her face was grim. “He will try to stop you from leaving here alive. It’s against the rules, you see, and Azrael is a creature who abides by rules.”
Rules. So it’s coming down to that again.
Angela glanced around at the shadows, envisioning millions of eyes staring back at her. Whenever she took a step, the earth quaked gently under her feet, groans and sighs erupting nearby. It was obvious—her presence was a disturbance to whomever—whatever—existed in this place. She induced change—at least she sensed that much—and the more she thought about the rules, the more she felt it possible to twist and bend them however she pleased. Like Mikel said, some people, perhaps people like Azrael, wouldn’t be too happy with that.
“What is this place?” she said, her tone growing firmer. “Who is that crying?”
“Compared to the other Realms, the Netherworld is a dead zone, literally. Human souls filter here for either rest or torment, their fate depending more on their state of mind at death than human morality. If you live and die in a state of peace, then that is your state here, despite the darkness. If you lived and died in a state of anguish, then . . .” Mikel took a step backward. “Someone is approaching us.”
Two pairs of footsteps clacked swiftly in their direction.
Mikel’s wings snapped open, and she held out her hand. Her curious expression seemed to stop their attackers faster than the barrier, and her eyes brightened. “They’re saying they know you. Should I let them manifest, Angela? But I should warn you, they don’t seem happy that you’re here. You might”—the angel’s tone lowered meaningfully—“have to see unpleasant things.”
Silence. The crushing kind, hinging on a momentous decision.
Angela’s lips trembled. Her own soul shivered violently. Two pairs of footsteps. Two angry pairs. She already knew who this was. “Yes. Let them manifest.”
Erianna and Marcus stepped out from the shadows.
They were covered in burns. Angela clapped a hand over her mouth, struggling to hold back her vomit. Those hate-filled eyes. That charred skin. Her mother’s singed hair and her father’s toothless mouth.
They rushed for her, before she could even try to run.
Angela’s body numbed over. Her breath stifled away, oddly painful. It was nearly impossible to move, and when she tried to speak, her lips felt weighted by cement. Mikel was suddenly so far away, a helpless spectator, and with a terrifying jolt, Angela realized that time had slowed. Before her, Erianna and Marcus laughed at her with their eyes, gloating at her helplessness as they’d never dared to when alive. The past began to swirl around them all, one scene after the next. There was the belt her father had used to devastating effect. The mocking voice of her mother, telling all her friends to ignore Angela, to leave her alone. Brendan, bringing her snacks while she hid, locked in her room. Then, the sounds from her parents’ bedroom at night. The whispers among the maids.
The closet used for punishment.
Her paintings, thrown into the furnace because of their unspoken evil.
It was too much. Her head felt like it would shatter as much as her heart, and unable to bear any more, Angela screamed.
The images cracked and burst apart like glass, leaving Angela face-to-face with Erianna and Marcus again, gasping, her cheeks wet and her eyes blurred by tears. But now she could talk and move slightly, as if revealing her pain had forced her parents to relent a little. “What do you want?” she shouted. “To kill me?”
Their faces said it all. This was their revenge for an accidental death, and the intent was either for Angela to join them in that death or to go insane. The voices from the past intensified, mocking her from a million invisible mouths. Images hadn’t worked, so now her late family was trying noise. Vaguely, she could hear them shouting to join her, their words almost lost beneath the horrendous abuse. If she didn’t take control fast, they would win this time.
Yes, that’s it
.
I’m going to take control
.
It was something she’d never done in the eighteen years of her miserable existence except when it came to suicide, but now she was a step above her parents, mostly because she was alive, possibly because she was the Archon. She’d be damned if they were going to squash her hopes mercilessly one more time. For once, and for forever, they would have to either serve her interests or vanish along with the rest of the past she’d abandoned.
She glanced back at Mikel.
The angel’s eyes were fearsomely bright. She knew what was going to happen, and seemed almost hungry for it.
Angela rounded on her parents again, struggling to move. “Here’s your choice. And it’s your last chance. You’re either on my side—or you’re not. Which is it?”
They glared at her, as if thinking about what that could mean.
Then they lunged for Angela’s throat, their burned fingers grasping maniacally.
“Fine.” She thrust out her hand as Mikel had, shocked at the sudden force behind her words. “
Go back to the darkness
.”
Her parents stopped. The mocking voices ceased. The past that had been so brutally forced upon her crumbled into mental dust. Hideous groans filled the emptiness, and then the horror vanished into a vortex of wind and power. Angela dropped back into time with a sharp rush of air in her lungs, and immediately the funnel centered on Mikel, coalescing into a glowing sphere held in the center of her palm. The angel held it up to her mouth, her eyes brighter than fire, and Angela slumped over with her hands against the cold ground, huffing and shuddering inside. It wasn’t long before Mikel stood beside her again, and she took the angel’s hand, standing on wobbly legs.
The sphere that was her past, and possibly the essence of her parents’ souls, had disappeared. Their brief moment of revenge was over.
“Are you all right . . .”
Angela waved her away, holding her head. “Give me another second. God.” She found her voice again. “They almost—”
“Killed you,” Mikel said. “You’re right. You were lucky to escape.”
Maybe. All Angela knew was that her family deserved an even harsher judgment than this hell, and she’d given it to them. Somehow.
It seemed so long ago when Nina had asked her if she mourned her parents’ passing. Now, any leftover grief felt like a sin. With her own wounds healed by time and circumstance, Angela had forgotten the horror of her past for what it really was, repressing the worst and sugarcoating the rest. And that made her next question sound sadder than anything else.
“What did you do with them?” she said, unable to keep from asking. “Are their souls still here?”
Mikel looked at the ground, her expression vague. “To explain now would take too much time. We must keep going, Angela. Once you’ve reached the pinnacle, it will all be over.”
“But—”
“Please.”
She was right. It hurt—but she was completely right. There was no time, either for Tileaf, or Brendan, or anyone else. Besides, it was blindingly clear that Angela’s parents no longer deserved her consideration. The past was now the past—and only that—forever.
The moment had arrived to let go for good.
“All right,” Angela whispered, but more to herself than to Mikel. “Let’s keep going.”
Her first steps, though, felt weighted with lead.
She followed silently, making certain to stick closer to the angel this time, trying not to look over her shoulder when she heard more footsteps or whispers in the dark. Their breaths escaped together, and Angela began to stare at the back of Mikel’s head, afraid she might lose her mind if she got lost and had to wander around in this abyss by herself. Time passed them by, just how much it was impossible to say, and the scenery—that raw and heavy darkness—still never changed. The terrible truth loomed before her: no living human could stay here long and emerge whole, sane. She wanted to scream, if only to hear the sound of her own voice again, and then, right when she couldn’t bear it anymore, they ascended, climbing up a hill thick with invisible bracken. It was beyond her how any plant could survive in a place like this, no matter how hellish and unearthly.
Clank.
Angela slowed down, trying to listen above the sound of branches creaking aside.
Clank.
“What is that?” she whispered to Mikel.
They would have been shoulder to shoulder, but the angel was petite, her head barely reaching Angela’s neck. Mikel nodded knowingly. “Your brother. He’s up ahead.”
Angela stopped. A sharp breeze sifted through the length of her hair, tickling the newly bare skin of her arms and legs. “You never met Brendan. How would you even know that this is him?”
Mikel said nothing.
A bluish light broke over the horizon. Angela shaded her eyes, watching a strange sun peek over what looked like hills, their silhouettes smooth with gradual curves.