Authors: SM Reine
The infernal delegation put forth a dozen issues for consideration at the summit,
said the cat. Its voice was silky and masculine. It struck a chord in Elise, like she should have recognized the speaker.
We have so much to discuss.
Nukha’il turned his cool blue gaze on the cat. “There is only one item worth discussing.”
Is that so?
“Don’t waste my time. Angels have no interest in the matters of Hell. You want to discuss territory rights? Expansion?” Nukha’il shook his head. “Tell your children to expand as they like. None of it will matter soon. Not if the quarantine has been broken.”
If discussions are such a waste of your time, then perhaps I will encourage my children to expand into Heaven. Would that be worthy of your lofty attentions?
“Please. The Council of Dis would crush them by its own rules.”
“We don’t need to discuss the gates,” Elise said. “It’s under control. They’re in my territory, and I’m going to protect them.”
You are human. You are weak.
“I’m not just any human.”
“She is the one who is above us all,” Nukha’il agreed.
Elise paced. Every step made the fog lift from her mind a little more as her fast metabolism burned away the liquor. “So let me do it.”
“The gates are too dangerous—even for you.” He gave a deferential nod. “We must watch them. Metaraon has mentioned patrolling them personally.”
Metaraon. He was the second most powerful ethereal being in existence. Elise wanted him around about as much as she wanted to break her other hand.
She didn’t have to argue. The cat scoffed.
I would be forced to take his presence on Earth as a statement of war. Not that I fear him, of course, but my children are much more sensitive. You understand.
“Then what do you propose?” Nukha’il asked.
The Reno territory, and all that is above and below, has belonged to demons since humans founded settlements there. Let us attend to the city.
Elise cut them off with a slice of her hand. “Yeah, Reno has been under infernal control for years, but without any supervision. The Night Hag slept on it for decades. Anyone could have opened the angelic city. Demons had their chance—they messed it up.”
And you would do better?
“Yes,” she said. “Because I’m the person who most wants to keep the gates closed.”
Nukha’il rolled his shoulders, like his invisible wings were bothering him. “There’s truth to that. What of a compromise?”
Compromising is for the weak-minded,
said the demon.
It was barely an insult, as far as Elise was concerned, but Nukha’il went rigid with fury. He strode forward and seized the cat from the ground. “Your choice of forms is a mistake, demon. I could break you.” His voice was calm, but his entire body shivered with fury.
The cat hissed and struggled in his grip, lashing its body wildly. It sank its teeth into his wrist and rabbit kicked against his arm. It was a pure feline reaction, but the demon’s response was equally poor. The night turned black around Elise. Her skin burned, like magma poured down the neck of her shirt.
She shoved through the thickened air to grab Nukha’il’s arm. Laying her hand on him burned through the glove, but she dug her fingers in and didn’t let go. “You know the rules of negotiation,” she said. “You can’t assault him. It’s immediate relinquishment of rights.”
His muscles quivered. “You heard what he said.”
The cat continued to thrash, but a chuckle like melted butter rolled over them.
To be honest, I find this entire subject puerile. Regardless of what decision you two attempt to negotiate, I will supervise the gates. I cannot abide such a thing on Earth without watching them.
“And neither can we,” Nukha’il said.
“I can’t stop either of you,” she said in a level voice. “But if you’re going to be in my territory, I will be the one in charge.”
The angel and the demon remained locked in deadly anger for a moment before the tension dropped a fraction. Nukha’il’s hand opened. The cat landed, walked a few feet away, and began licking its fur vigorously as though it had never been touched.
Nukha’il smoothed his jacket down. “You suggest cooperation.”
No. There was no way in hell she would cooperate with anyone over the gates—not angels, not demons, not her own goddamn mother. But if there was one thing Elise had learned from her time dealing with the otherworld, it was that they didn’t give two shits what she wanted. Negotiation was a matter of who lied the best. The real issues would be worked out at the end of a blade.
“I know the demons in Reno,” Elise said. “They can help me with the gates.”
A kopis? Cooperate with demons?
It sounded like the idea amused the cat.
What would James think of that?
She stiffened, but quelled her paranoid urge to reach out to her aspis. Everyone knew they were a team. Mentioning him wasn’t necessarily a threat.
But, knowing demons, it probably was.
“So you will lead the infernal forces in Reno. We can send an angelic delegate to supervise.” Nukha’il bobbed his head. “They won’t like it, but it could do.”
The cat washed its face with a paw.
Do what you will.
It turned those black eyes on Elise, and there was far too much intelligence in them to look properly feline.
When the summits began long ago, we met out of a desperate need—a need to stop the war between Heaven and Hell, a need to protect humanity from our battles. I sat with Metaraon and Teleklos, king of Sparta, and had the first civil discussion between factions. Much like today, it was brief, but it brought peace to a torn Earth.
The full weight of shadow settled on her shoulders, curling around her throat like the cat’s tail, and she couldn’t breathe.
This will be the last summit, sword-woman. It’s fitting that it should be between us.
Her skin crawled. “Who
are
you?”
I am the empty space between the stars in the night sky.
“Lucifer?” she guessed.
His laugh curled around her like cool fingers.
No… I am no angel.
And then he was gone, although there was no way to tell by looking at the cat. It wasn’t impressed by its brief possession, or the voluntary exorcism. It looped around Elise’s ankles, rubbing its cheek along her calf.
Nukha’il shed his jacket and unfurled his wings. A few downy feathers drifted to the earth. “I hate that guy,” he said, throwing the coat over his shoulder hooked on one finger.
“Who was it?”
“He was a man, once. But the centuries do strange things to mortal minds in immortal bodies. I never know if he’s going to feel playful or murderous. We’re lucky to catch him on a good day.” He glanced around the trailer. “I don’t see a car. Did you run out here?”
“Something like that,” Elise said.
“I’ll take you back. Here.”
Nukha’il stretched out a pale hand. She stepped back. “I would rather walk.”
“A hundred miles?”
Reluctantly, she placed her fingers in his. Nukha’il’s wings brightened.
They vanished from the desert.
XII
B
enjamin had a
vision that afternoon. It was the barest of glimpses, for once: he saw Elise and an angel on a long, empty highway with the swollen moon just over the horizon. The image was so brief that didn’t even trip the Union sensors. His collar remained silent.
He waited until he was certain Allyson was asleep, and then waited for Elise on the edge of town at midnight.
She was there exactly when he expected, and she didn’t seem surprised to see Benjamin sitting on the side of the road. “It’s over,” Elise said. She pulled a feather out of her hair and grimaced. “If that’s what you’re wondering.”
He wasn’t. He had already seen how the summit would unfold. “Can I talk to you?”
She sighed, pulled her braid over her shoulder, and worked her unbroken fingers through the curls to loosen it. She came up with two more feathers. “Sure. Let’s go to the motel room.”
The shower was running when they reached room twenty-nine. Benjamin swept through the room and removed all the monitoring devices, which were easy for him to find. The Union tried to be sneaky, but their all-encompassing regulations made their practices predictable. He peeled wires off of the bottom of a lamp, crushed a black box he found on top of the dresser, and popped the battery out of a device under the sink.
Elise watched his actions in the mirror as she peeled the glove off her left hand and washed it in the sink. The water swirled pink down the drain. “You’re not with the Union willingly. Are you?” He shook his head and dumped the devices in the trash. “Are you a prisoner?”
“Yeah,” he said, and then, “but not really. My parents sold me.”
She didn’t react to that news. She tugged the glove back on. “And you’re, what, sixteen?”
“Seventeen.”
“Do you want me to break you out?”
The question startled him, but in a good way. Warmth spread through him to the tips of his fingers. It was short-lived—an itch on his neck reminded him of his chains, and he tugged on the collar. “You can’t. They always know where I am.”
“What if we got that off of you?”
“Then you’d have done something I haven’t been able to. I’ve tried for months,” Benjamin said.
Her lips pursed. “I’ll give it a shot.”
Elise gestured to the floor, and Benjamin sat in front of the bed. He felt the mattress sink behind him as she took position at his back. Her left knee rested against his shoulder.
She tipped his head first to one side, and then the other, with a hand that was firm but gentle. Then she drew a slender-bladed dagger that had the mark of St. Benedict stamped near the handle. “Hold still,” she said. He barely breathed as she picked at the lock awkwardly with her left hand. “How did you know my name?”
“I know everything about you.”
Elise’s eyes flicked to his in the mirror. There was an edge to her that said maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t safe sitting between her knees. Her hand stilled for a moment. “Enlighten me.”
He gave a shuddering laugh. “Where should I start? Uh… God, I don’t know. Elise Kavanagh. You attended the University of Nevada. You worked for an accounting firm for a little while, until that argument with your boss. They still send you angry letters sometimes. You’ve got a tattoo on your hip—it’s this black thing you picked out of the artist’s flash because you felt like getting something done, and didn’t care what. I think it’s supposed to be a thorny flower or something. I never saw it too closely.”
She didn’t move. It was like she had become frozen.
“I don’t like to look at the private stuff,” he added, like that would help. “But I can’t always help it.”
It took her two tries to speak. “Mind witch?”
“Precognitive. Sometimes I have retrocognition, too, and it’s hard to tell which is which. The Union says it’s like the fourth dimension’s all rolled up and stuffed in my head.” Benjamin picked at the hole in the knee of his jeans. “I’ve been seeing you for years.”
Metal on metal gave a soft
tink
as she went back to picking the lock. “What else have you seen?”
“I know about Malcolm. I know about Anthony now—I’ve been seeing him all day. I also know about James.”
“And?”
She was pushing for a specific answer. Some people wanted to know their future when they found out what Benjamin could do, even though the Union forbade him from doing what they considered “petty fortune-telling.”
But he didn’t think that was what Elise wanted to know.
Benjamin reached up to touch her hand, hoping that it would soften the blow a little. “I know about the garden.”
The blade slipped. It nicked his neck.
He jumped to his feet and clapped a hand to the injury. Elise was frozen on the foot of the bed, and she seemed to have forgotten the knife in her hand.
The shower was the only sound that broke the silence for a long minute. When Elise found her voice, it was hoarse. “
Nobody
knows that.”
“I wish I didn’t,” Benjamin said. “I wish I didn’t know so much. Like, how Isaac gave you the swords for your seventh birthday. Falchions aren’t meant to be dual-wielded, but he didn’t want you to use a shield, so you got two of them. But that’s not what he meant, did he? He never wanted you to have an aspis—never wanted you to have
James
—and he’ll be angry when he finds out what’s happened to you. He will blame James.” Benjamin could already see it, as he had seen it a dozen times before. Red sky, red earth, her father so tall.
Elise seemed horrified. That was how they always looked.
He pushed on. “You really liked James’s aunt. When they killed her, you felt bad that you never told her that. But not for long. You didn’t feel anything for so long. The garden broke you and reformed you, like a cracked china doll. You don’t think you’ve been put together right. James agrees. He would never tell you that, but he agrees, and he fears for you—but sometimes he’s afraid of you, too. Anthony… well, he doesn’t know enough to fear.”
She got to her feet slowly. So slowly.
“That’s not true,” she said.
“Which part?”
“James isn’t afraid of me.”
He shouldn’t have said that. He changed the subject. “I know everything, so I know you want to know what happened to Michele Newcomb.”
“McIntyre did it.” Elise’s hand tightened on the dagger. “I found the evidence.”
“But that’s not the whole story. The thing is, Michele… I loved Michele.” His voice cracked. Benjamin didn’t bother trying to hide it. “She wanted to know the future, so I gave it to her. I told her what’s coming.”
“What’s coming?”
“No,” he said. “I can’t tell you that. I shouldn’t have told her, either. What’s coming is bad, it’s really bad, and Michele was really good. She wanted to stop it, and… it’s hard to explain why, but she thought that killing Lucas would prevent everything.” His gaze went distant as he recalled the vision. He had seen it as it happened. “She met him at his home. Dana was playing out back, and Leticia was in the kitchen. As soon as Lucas let her in, she…”