Frowning, Dags found his eyes drawn to the trunk of the tree.
He looked at the hole in the ground in front of it, the opening they’d dug and jackhammered out, presumably to get at the temple inside the mountain.
“So what is this ritual?” Dags said. “The raising of your demon lord?”
Uri smiled, shaking his head.
Then he released Phoenix altogether, causing her to stumble. She nearly fell into a large demon who stood near her. At the last second, she regained her balance, looking up at him, holding her throat protectively in one hand.
The large demon didn’t move.
Dags was still staring at her when Uri spoke, pulling Dags’ eyes back to his friend.
“The ritual is already done, Jourdain,” Uri said.
He reached into an inner pocket of his jacket, which Dags noticed for the first time looked expensive, and tailored to fit him perfectly. Uri looked like his father, or one of his father’s business partners. Or maybe he just looked like his father’s son, possibly for the first time since Dags had known him.
The Russian pulled a cigarette out of the pocket of that expensive jacket and put it to his lips. Tilting his head, he lit it with a Zippo lighter, the same one Dags remembered from the beach.
“We did the ritual last night, Dags,” Uri added, matter-of-fact. Snapping the lighter shut, he disappeared it into the pocket of the overcoat he wore over the expensive jacket. “I’m sorry my people had to shoot you. Truly. But we couldn’t risk you getting in the way, brother. I figured a little bullet hole wouldn’t do much to slow you down. But it would allow my people to finish what I’d ordered them to do.”
Dags stared at him.
He stared at the clothes, at the expensive-looking haircut he hadn’t noticed, at the rings on Uri’s hands, the gold watch, the camelhair overcoat, the tailored suit.
As he did, he found he understood.
Somehow, he completely and totally understood.
Even though he didn’t want to.
“You’re him,” he said. “You’re the Father.”
Uri smiled, tilting his head as he exhaled a perfect ring of smoke.
“Not to you,” he said simply. “We are brothers, Megedagik.”
“You’re not Uri,” Dags growled. “I don’t know what the fuck you are.”
“I am Uri,” the other said patiently. “I am like you, brother. I have always been like you.”
Shrugging, the man with the sun-like eyes made a fluid gesture with the hand holding the cigarette.
“Well… we have missed each other, yes? You were a touch more awakened than me. I am now a touch more awakened than you, perhaps. But when I say we are brothers, I mean we are truly brothers. I want us to remain brothers, Megedagik. I want us to help this world together.”
The longer Uri talked, the more Dags’ head throbbed.
By the time the Russian paused, a sick, pulsing feeling had settled in his gut.
Demons continued to enter the canopy through the opening between branches. Dags counted sixteen now. That didn’t include Uri, Phoenix, Ruby, Kara, or the guy he didn’t know. It didn’t count him, Dags, either.
“Why?” he said finally. “If we’re ‘brothers’ as you say, why did you do all this, Uri? Why take my friends? Why harm people I care about?”
Uri smiled again.
He pointed at Dags with the hand holding the cigarette.
“Because I know you, Jourdain,” he said bemusedly, shaking his head. “I know you are a difficult one. Even in school, I remember. You play dumb, pretend you don’t understand, but I always know better.”
Uri smiled wider, tapping his temple with a finger.
“Even now, I can see this. You ask questions. You pretend to listen to me. But you are stalling me while you think. You let me believe you are listening, but that brain of yours is churning, churning, churning. I know the only way to get you to listen is to make you listen. I can see you think I will kill you⏤”
“Won’t you?” Dags said coldly.
Uri laughed, throwing back his head. “You are a piece of work, Jourdain.”
“You threatened my girlfriend,” Dags growled.
Uri held up his hands, giving a disinterested shrug. “I apologized for that.”
Dags glanced at Phoenix, only to find her still massaging her throat, watching him with an intense, wary look in her eyes as she took in the number of demons around her. His jaw clenched as he looked at her, at the tall, muscular demons barely two feet away from her. He couldn’t do shit with her that close to them.
He needed a distraction. Any distraction.
Even as he thought it, one came.
A gunshot echoed in the space under the oak tree.
Dags jerked in shock, turning his head and half of his body, his hands still in the air.
He saw the gun, realized it was Kara.
He turned back towards the clearing in time to see Uri grimace, his hand going to his left shoulder. He still had the cigarette between his fingers, but real pain shone in his eyes.
“What the fuck?” Uri snapped, real anger in his voice. “Why did you do that?”
Kara poked her head, hands, arms, and gun out from behind the trunk of the tree, just long enough to fire again, aiming at Uri a second time.
That time, two demon-possessed humans stepped in front of him.
Kara shifted her aim, shooting one of those demons in the thigh.
He went down hard on his side, hissing, when his knee crumpled.
Twisting his wrist and hand, Dags reached behind his head.
He grasped the handle of one of the two swords hanging in cross-wise scabbards across his back, what he’d kept hidden under the long coat he’d been forced to buy earlier that day, after trashing all the others he owned. He unsheathed it in a single, smooth pull, hoping like hell the demons were all looking at Kara, or at least not at him.
The sword appeared in front of him, gripped in one hand, when he lunged, throwing the blue-green angel-fire behind it to propel himself forward as fast as he could.
The window was small.
He’d thought about the reality of what he was about to do.
He’d thought about it for the seconds after he was forced to set his gun down on the dirt. He’d thought about it when he willed the universe to give him a distraction and Kara delivered one up. He didn’t want to do it. He knew he would feel guilty.
He knew he might even regret it.
But the reality was, there was no decision really.
Whatever Uri was, whatever he was doing here, whatever he wanted from Dags, he was damned dangerous. No one brought a demon army to save the world unless their definition of “saving” really, really sucked.
This new, demon-army Uri, whatever he was, was bad news.
So when Dags gripped the sword to draw it, he’d already more or less gone through the decision-making process. Every answer to every one of his questions and misgivings pointed in the same direction.
He had to kill Uri.
He’d already zeroed in on his target.
He found Uri in the crowd of demons.
He saw him panting, his hand pressed against the bullet wound in his shoulder, his expression taut from pain and anger.
Like all things weapon-related for him, once Dags made up his mind about what he had to do, his hand, arm and body just seemed to follow. The swords he wore were a gift, and Algerian. They were sharp as hell, and strong, and Dags knew they would do the job. But it was the green-blue angel fire that added the kick that allowed him to fly across the dark space, to catch his oldest friend off guard.
Dags leapt straight for him, sweeping the sword up and back⏤
⏤When a blast of gold-red light exploded out of that crowd of huddled demons.
The ball of fire slammed into Dags’ chest, throwing him backwards into the trunk of the oak tree. He hit into it so hard, he let out a cry of surprise, right before he slid down the rough-barked trunk to land in
the dirt.
Even so, he still had that strange weapon-fight-hunt thing around him.
Panting, still holding the sword in his hand, Dags didn’t land on his ass, or on his face. He landed on one knee, the sword above him in a glinting arc, and now the green-blue current flared and sparked around him, coiling around his body like flaming snakes.
He looked up.
He stared across the clearing to see Uri, now no longer shielded by demons.
It was like seeing a twisted mirror-image of himself.
Enormous wings hung in the air behind the Russian’s back, deep black shot through with dark red feathers. That gold and red current wound and sparked around him, around his wings, around his arms and chest and hands, just like Dags’ angel fire did the same around him.
Uri’s eyes glowed with that same gold-red current as he stared at Dags.
“What the fuck did you do that for?” the other man hissed.
Dags barely heard him.
He was looking around at the looming shadows of demons, at least half of whom were slowly moving towards him, now with fury in their glowing red eyes. It hit him just how outnumbered he was. He hadn’t worried about it so much when it was just demons and he was armed, but now everything had changed.
If Uri was really like him, all bets were off.
“Phoenix?” He continued to stare at the line of shadows with their glowing red eyes. “Are you all right?”
A shaky, freaked-out voice answered him, surprising him by coming from behind him, instead of in front of him like he’d expected. She must have taken advantage of the chaos to run away from Uri and his demon henchmen.
“Yes,” she said. “I’m with Kara.”
She fell silent. Dags could hear her panting, trying to catch her breath.
He somehow felt her surprise then, just before she spoke.
That time, she didn’t speak to him.
“Ty?” She sounded shocked. “Ty! What are you doing here?”
Dags tensed, alarmed at first.
Then he remembered.
Ty must be the man he’d pulled a demon out of, the one Dags grabbed after he’d freed Ruby. He was still brandishing the sword overhead, watching Uri and the other demons, when a deep voice answered her.
“I’d be happy to tell you that,” Ty said. “If I had the faintest idea what the hell was going on. Or how I got here myself.”
Dags looked back, in spite of himself.
He still threw off enough of the blue-green fire, he could see Phoenix talking to a man crouched by the trunk of the tree. Dags could even see their faces. He found himself studying Ty’s eyes, trying to get some kind of impression of him, good or bad.
“What the hell is this, ‘Nix?” the man said. “Who are these people?”
“Cultists,” Dags cut in, before she could answer.
Hell, it was more or less the truth.
Both Phoenix and the man by the trunk turned to stare at Dags.
“Cultists?” Ty said, his voice skeptical. “Okay. Cultists with red eyes?”
Dags blinked.
“You can see that?” Dags turned, staring at him in bewilderment. “On all of them? Or just the one with wings?”
“I ain’t blind, sword-man.”
Dags wasn’t sure how to respond to that.
The tall, handsome man’s own eyes looked so different to Dags now, without the demon light in them. Dags couldn’t help but stare, not just at his eyes, but his whole face, his shockingly bright aura, his whole everything. He really was unusually handsome, now that the demon light had left him. Dags remembered that Kara had actually recognized Ty, and called him a movie star. Thinking about that now, Dags scowled.
Of course he had to be another actor, and of course he had to be Phoenix’s friend. He was tall, muscular, bizarrely handsome.
What else would he be in L.A.?
But that didn’t answer the bigger question.
How the hell could Ty see demon light?
No one else ever seemed to see it.
“Are you going to tell me I’m not seeing this shit?” Ty demanded, motioning towards the line of demons. “I suppose I didn’t just see wings come out of that Russian one’s back, neither? I guess I’m still not seeing those wings now. Or him shooting fire-and-brimstone crap out of his fingers?”
Dags exhaled, feeling suddenly tired.
He glanced down at the rows of demons protecting Uri, briefly locking eyes with the big hulking one from the night before, the same one he’d shot in the chest. The enormous demon glared back at him, flipping him the bird.
Clearly, he was holding a grudge.
“No,” Dags said, glancing back at Ty. “No, I’m not going to try and sell you that. I’m not sure you’ll get an answer that will satisfy you, though. And they are pretty culty.”
His voice sounded tired, even to him.
There was a silence after he spoke.
Ty’s voice rose again, a denser New York accent audible in his words.
“So? That Russian one. He’s the Charlie Manson of the demons?”
Dags thought about that, then shrugged.
“More or less.”
The tall black man grunted.
“And you’re the guy in humanity’s corner?” Ty said next, a wry humor in his words. “The ‘angel’ who owns a small arsenal? Who just got his ass kicked by a demon? I’m supposed to buy you’re the sane one?”
Phoenix snorted, as if she couldn’t help herself.
Dags quirked an eyebrow at her, but honestly?
He could relate.
“Dags,” she said then, her voice subdued. “Come back here. With the rest of us.”
Frowning, hearing the meaning behind her words, Dags fought to think. He glanced at her and Ty, then back at Uri, whose wings still glowed with gold and red flames.
Phoenix thought it was time to retreat.
She thought the demon-battle was over.
She thought they’d lost.
Dags didn’t really disagree.
He’d come to stop the ritual, only to find the ritual had already happened.
He’d come to save Uri, only to find Uri was the same “Father” being the demons worshipped and obeyed.
Jade was with Uri.
Dags couldn’t even find her among those faces now. He had no idea how he would free her, even if he could. He didn’t know if she had a demon inside her, or if Uri had her drugged, or if she’d gone with her husband willingly.
He was outnumbered, and likely outgunned, in more ways than one.
He had people to protect now. People who could easily get killed if he turned this into a full-blown firefight.
“Dags?” Phoenix said, her voice vibrating with fear. “Please.”
“Okay,” he began, gruff. He started to lower the sword. “Okay. We’re leaving, I⏤”
Uri cut him off.
“No.” The Russian’s voice was firm, unequivocal. “Sorry, brother. Truly. But there’s something I need from you first.” Uri sounded tired too. “I had thought you might give it willingly, brother. But I’m afraid I must take it, if you won’t.”
Something about the way he said it made Dags’ blood run cold.
Then, in a heartbeat, everything changed.
Chapter 29
Angel’s Blood
A red light exploded inside the hollow canopy of the oak tree.
Dags stared up, watching that light rain down like liquid, forming a curtained waterfall of shocking scarlet within the tree’s walls, with the oak tree’s trunk at its center. It lit up every face, every leaf on the ground, the sword and Dags’ hands, all the demon-possessed humans in front of him. He was still staring at those pale, red-eyed faces when the drops of light transformed, changing into geometrical shapes, forming patterns and linked chains as they rotated overhead, seemingly caught in the branches of the tree, lighting up the trunk.
He watched them form a wall around the inside of the clearing and the oak’s trunk, the
patterns burning a circle into the ground at the base of the branches.
He realized then, they weren’t just abstract patterns.
“They’re letters,” Phoenix said, from behind him.
He glanced back over his shoulder, still holding the sword in a low arc.
She’d come out from behind the trunk of the tree and stood there, looking around at the symbols burning into the dirt, one of Dags’ Glock-17s gripped in her right hand.
She looked at Dags, her mouth hard.
“They’re letters, aren’t they?” she said, frowning at him. “Can you read them?”
Forcing aside his reaction to her knowing what they were, he stared back at the lines that were coursing down the inside of the branches, burning their symbols into the bark and leaves, and all along the inside of the trunk.
He realized he could read them.
They weren’t in English, but he could read them.
His eyes followed the course of those red, liquid, glowing lines, reading words here and there, following whole phrases and sentences down the inside of branches, and where they spelled out more complex thoughts in lit patterns on the dirt.
He saw Kara staring at them from the other side of the trunk, her face illuminated by the red glow. She reached a hand out, fingers outstretched for the line of blood-red light coursing down the branch closest to where she stood.
Dags barked words at her, speaking without thought.
“Don’t! Don’t touch it!” He glanced around at the rest of them, making sure none of the others were about to do the same. “Don’t touch the light, anyone. Step back.”
Kara frowned at him, but lowered her hand, taking a half-step back. “Why?”
“Just don’t,” Dags said.
Uri, who Dags had more or less forgotten, laughed.
“You do remember,” the Russian said.
Dags turned, staring at him.
Uri held out his arms and hands, almost in a prayer position, his dark wings illuminated behind him. The red light poured from his fingertips up into the air, raining down in that strange curtain-like formation around the tree.
Uri was the source of the light.
Bad Angel Page 24
