“We don’t have long,” he said. “Soon the Nephilim will notice that its guardians have gone missing and come to investigate.”
“I know,” I managed to say.
My jeans were shredded and sticky with blood; he cut part of the material away from my thigh, and I bit down on my lower lip to keep from screaming. His hands were gentle, and I imagined him in a trench during the Second World War, tending to his comrades. Clearly he had some first aid experience, but Booke wore a ferocious frown.
“I brought a couple of healing spells, but if I use them on you, we won’t have any left for Kel, and I don’t know whether he’ll be able to walk out of here without them.”
“Don’t worry about me, just wrap it up.”
“I could numb it for you.”
“Then do it. Fast.”
This wasn’t a spell, apparently, as he drew out a stoppered vial full of white powder. He poured some into his palm and blew it against the wound. Immediately it stopped hurting, though I could tell it wasn’t any better. The flesh was still torn; blood still oozed sluggishly from the punctures. I took Booke’s hand, allowing him to pull me upright. Yeah, this would do for a stopgap measure.
“I hope I haven’t crippled you,” he said worriedly. “That’s not meant as a first aid treatment.”
“What is it, then?”
“A spell component from the binding spell I used on the third dog.”
Seemed logical. At last the animal didn’t feel any pain when Booke cut its throat. I took an experimental step, found that my leg would bear weight. I’d deal with potential muscle and nerve damage later. For now, I had to focus on getting Kel out of here.
I’ll just go kill a Nephilim now, no problem. After nearly getting my ass kicked by a demon-enhanced Rottie.
That was kind of sad, actually. In Sheol, I had thrown down with the best of them, spells flying fast and furious. But then, that wasn’t really me either. Sometimes those memories got tangled in my head, until I couldn’t remember what had been Ninlil and what had been me. There was still a huge hole inside me where she had been. Barachiel had told me that feeling came from paring the demonic taint from the Solomon line. What that meant for future offspring, I had no idea.
With grim determination, I got the last cartridge out of my purse and loaded the Taser. It was unlikely this would work on an opponent of the Nephilim’s caliber, but maybe keeping Kel on the torture table had weakened him, and that was why he had guard dogs to watch his back in the first place. I could dream anyway. I didn’t know if I had the stamina for a knock-down, drag-out fight.
“Keep your head down,” I told Butch, who didn’t look interested in doing anything else. Then I fell behind Booke. “I think we have to use his own knife on him. Kel can heal from anything else almost immediately.”
He caught on at once. “But the damage the other Nephilim is inflicting isn’t going away as fast.”
“Yeah, exactly. Is the mouse spell still in effect?”
Belatedly I realized I could find out by stepping on some loose gravel. When my footfall came whisper soft, I had my answer. I was too drained to devise a plan, so I just trudged after Booke. At the moment I didn’t know what spells he had left in his arsenal, but as we drew closer, I tapped him on the shoulder.
“Strategy? You’ve got the damage portfolio.”
“See if you can free Kel while I deal with the Nephilim. We can’t risk him killing your friend. He may have orders to that effect.”
Given what I knew of Barachiel, that seemed likely. I wished I could fuel up on magick as I had done in Sheol, but here and now I was weak, wounded, and . . . human. So I had to solve this problem with my brain; too bad it was muzzy and felt like a melon atop my shoulders. Still, I applied myself to the problem. Coming around the last curve in the tunnel, I searched my memory for any useful details about the setup; there had been magickal restraints on Kel—
When I hit the kill site, my feet skidded in the smoldering blood still oozing from the first hellhound. The soles of my shoes smoked, and Booke lifted me away. I was surprised at his strength, though maybe I shouldn’t be. Trapped in the ghost cottage, he must’ve done a basic workout in order to keep fit and sane. I clutched his shoulder as he set me on my feet on the other side of the corpse, wishing I could just dump this problem on his shoulders while I passed out. But that had never been my style, plus this was a two-person job.
Kill the Nephilim. Rescue Kel. Not necessarily in that order.
Free at Last
The
Nephilim didn’t look like Kel. I didn’t know why I expected he would, but when I crept around to the side, I saw that he looked more like a normal human male, except for the gleaming silver blade in his hand. His expression, however, said he reveled in the cruelties he inflicted on his victim. There was nothing angelic about his demeanor at all. Privately I marveled that Barachiel—and others—had managed to construct this elaborate fiction, maintain it over eons.
When I got into position, I signaled Booke. Worry bubbled in my stomach, making me feel nauseous, or maybe it was a resurgence of the illness that had plagued me earlier. It wouldn’t shock me to learn I’d developed an ulcer. I wished I could be the one taking on the enemy, but between the Glock and his foci, the Englishman was far better suited to the task, especially since I was injured and still bleeding. Fortunately, the torturer didn’t possess the same sense of smell as the Rottweilers.
“You look bored,” Booke said, and the half demon spun. I wouldn’t call them Nephilim anymore, now that I knew the truth.
That was my cue. I crawled forward, using the edge of the stone table as cover. With preternatural speed, the demon lunged at Booke, who fired off a round. It pinged into the rock and ricocheted; I couldn’t watch the fight any longer. I had to find some way to free Kel. Bonds of shimmering energy coiled around his wrists and ankles, but I couldn’t find a genesis point on top of the table. From what I knew, all energy required a source, or continuous concentration. Since the half demon was trying to choke Booke at the moment, he couldn’t be the source. Which meant something near the table was keeping Kel in check.
Booke slammed a statuette to the ground and a riot of dark energy blossomed up. It wrapped around him like a cloak, lending him a terrifying aspect, as if he’d become death itself. Even the half demon paused his assault. Then he pressed, only to find that the black-violet tendrils lashed at him like snakes, and when they struck, they pulsed with a paler power, as if siphoning out his life force. The torturer scrambled back, seeing that he couldn’t complete a direct attack.
“You cannot defeat me,” he told Booke. “I am Nephilim. I am Ahadiel, enforcer of divine will.”
By his tone, he actually believed that.
Poor bastard.
They’d told Kel that he was God’s Hand, and that all the bad shit they made him do was ordered by a higher power. Now I knew that wasn’t true. And when he realized that, I didn’t know how he could live with it. He didn’t kill easily or lightly; each death weighed on him, but at least before he had the comfort of believing it was for the greater good.
“Your handlers had a sense of humor,” Booke responded, his tone gentle.
“You mock heaven itself.”
“No, I don’t.” He raised the Glock and fired, the dark energy still whirling about him. “And you’ve weakened. The reason that’s so interesting? The spell I used is a demon drain.”
“That’s not true.” Shock and horror colored the words. “I am
Nephilim
.”
“So they’ve told you.” Booke sounded sympathetic.
I dropped to my knees, knowing how much my thigh would hurt if the numbing powder wore off. Possibly my movements were damaging my leg even more, but I had to get Kel off this table, and if the torturer noticed somebody coming in the back way, no telling what he’d do. Right now, Booke had him off guard, and that was the best-case scenario. The wizard was smart as hell; maybe
only
he could provoke an enemy to chat during a fight.
Angling my head, I peered beneath the table.
Bingo.
There were four gems inset into the stone, reminiscent of the soulstones that powered the gate between earth and Sheol. Hoping they weren’t full of somebody’s spirit, I took a deep breath and grabbed the one closest to me. Pain howled through me like a banshee’s wail, hot and cold at once, so my palm felt as if it was simultaneously smoldering and flash freezing. My nerve endings couldn’t process the overwhelming stimuli, so they shut down, leaving me with a numb right hand—and the jewel didn’t budge. I pulled with dead fingers, agony driving up my forearm toward my elbow. Only death and demon magick tended to be that strong.
Please don’t let these be soulstones.
If the paralysis reached my lungs, my heart, my brain, well, it was over. But I’d already started, so there was no way out but through. I wouldn’t let Kel down.
Maybe there’s a trick to it.
I pushed and pulled, twisted, until I heard a click, and the crystal dropped into my hand. Inert. With trembling fingers, I set it down.
Three more to go.
Maybe setting a circle for protection would’ve helped, but I didn’t have witch magick, and the touch hadn’t responded; there was no emotional charge in these gems, just pure, crackling power
. It’s too late to draw a demon magick circle.
I knee-walked to the second spot. Booke was cursing, so I guessed the fight was back on; Ahadiel had chosen to disbelieve the truth, but the demon-drain spell was making it hard for him to melee. And that gave Booke a fighting chance—strategy, not brute strength, would carry the day.
This time, I knew how to remove the gem, and my hand was already dead, so I didn’t feel much new pain, though the old anguish was busy chewing my biceps, up toward my shoulder. It felt as if there were tiny teeth savaging their way through tendon and muscle. Pretty soon, my arm would hang limp at my side, and I’d be unable to use it, except as a club.
Two more.
I couldn’t manipulate my right hand well enough to remove the jewel so I used my left, and the pain came at me fresh. This time, I wasn’t strong enough to stop the scream. It bubbled up from my throat, past my lips, into a pathetic sound that roused an answering howl from Butch, who was still cowering in my bag. The sounds echoed in the chamber, ringing off the walls.
No hope he didn’t hear.
“Is someone else here?” Ahadiel demanded.
“No,” Booke said quickly. “Let’s finish this.”
“I heard a woman. Where is she?” He didn’t wait for a reply.
Instead I heard footsteps cracking closer and closer to where I fumbled with the third stone. As Ahadiel peered under the table, it dropped into my hand, and a shot rang out. The half demon toppled forward, cracking his head on the rock. The back of his head oozed blood, then Booke limped into sight. His cheekbone was bruised, his lip split and puffy, and I could see the marks from where he’d been throttled. The demon-drain spell must’ve worn off, giving Ahadiel the opportunity to fight.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“He very nearly stabbed me in the kidney. Bloody fast, that one. But I dropped a spell just in time. Are you almost done?”
“Almost,” I said.
Only one left.
Booke bent to investigate the body. “He’s not dead, just incapacitated.”
“I’ll hurry.”
My left hand was clumsy, fingers numb, but I forced them to fasten around the final gem. It took me four tries to manage the special push and twist to disengage the connection. The pain in my right side had reached the juncture between neck and shoulder; on my left, it was at my elbow. I didn’t have long left. Moments, maybe just seconds. Breath felt more labored each time I pulled it into my sluggish lungs.
“The bindings have dissipated. He’s not responding, though. We’ll have to—” His words choked off, presumably because Kel had his hands on Booke’s throat.
Crawling out from under the stone table took all my coordination, given that I could hardly feel my arms, and I had pain shooting into my spine. My voice came out hoarse. “Kel, we’re here to help. Let go.”
His icy eyes opened and cut to me. On waking to find himself freed, he’d lashed out at his tormenters instinctively; I had some experience with his tendency to do that. He breathed once, twice, and then opened his hands. I put my dead fingers over his, hoping it was a comforting touch, as I couldn’t feel it.
So much
of my body was numb at the moment. That couldn’t be good.
Booke staggered back a few steps. Another wave of agony pulsed through me, and my vision darkened at the edges. It was all I could do to gasp, “Can you remove a . . . curse? If not . . . I think I might . . . die.”
His mouth dropped open, but he didn’t ask questions. Booke dug into his coat as I reeled backward. Kel’s hands steadied me against the stone table. He was horribly wounded yet he could still manage to be gentle; I felt it in the careful press of his palms to the small of my back, one of the few spots on my body that retained any feeling. Booke crushed the statuette at my feet, and I received immediate relief. As the attacking magick drained away, I regained more motor control.
“What happened?” he demanded, once he could see I was breathing easier.
“I think it was some kind of magickal trap. Like a poison, kind of. There’s one that shuts down your bodily systems one by one, inducing paralysis until your lungs don’t work anymore.” I shrugged. “That’s what it felt like anyway.”
Booke glared at me with startling ferocity, the first time I’d ever seen him angry. “Corine, that’s absurd. You shouldn’t have continued. I could’ve—”
“How many curse removals did you have in your bag?”
He paused. “Just the one.”
“Exactly. So once I started, if I didn’t finish, we couldn’t have freed Kel without one of us dying. I had to gamble.”
“You should not have taken such a risk for me,” Kel said softly.
He wore his sorrow and disillusionment nakedly, as visible as his tattoos. Though he was still big and powerful-looking, he also carried despair with him, worn like a dark cloak. His eyes gleamed with powerful regret, a millennia of misdeeds weighing on him like gravestones. Now he must live with the knowledge that he’d done everything for Barachiel’s agenda, not a higher power.