by Emma Mills
Daniel shook his head.
‘I was hungry,’ he murmured. ‘You don’t know what it’s like. Even before these idiots started guarding our damned door there was nowhere to feed. That’s why everyone is giving in and joining Pierre, because London is a free-for-all… Then he started calling me a pretty boy…’
‘Oh shit!’ Brittany murmured. ‘You bit him, didn’t you?’
‘No! Of course I didn’t! I have a bit more restraint than that… but I might have held him up by his jumper and snarled at him…’ he trailed off, gnawing at his lip nervously.
I grinned. Daniel never slipped up.
‘Jess, what’s so funny?’ Brittany asked, scowling.
I shook my head.
‘Nothing!’ I tried to stop it, but in the end the laughter just burst out and Brittany joined in.
‘We’re screwed!’ she said.
‘Yup,’ I agreed, turning back to Daniel. ‘But why didn’t you just drive out of the garage and head up north?’
‘I thought I’d wait for you, so we can all go together,’ he said, pulling me into his arms. ‘But I swear it needs to be soon. I’m hungry and really fed up of them all.’
A boom resounded on the front window and we all jumped.
‘What the hell?’ I said, running through to the hall and peering out between the front curtains. ‘Oh, no!’
‘The wards will hold, Jessie,’ Brittany said, as another brick was flung at the house, hitting it with a weird boom and bouncing back into the flowerbed.
‘That’s not what bothered me. The news reporters have turned up,’ I said. ‘There’s no way we can drive out. They’ve blocked the drive.’
‘We could get some sleep, recharge our energy and fly to Edinburgh in the morning… carrying Daniel between us,’ Brittany offered.
‘No way!’ Daniel said quickly. ‘Vampires don’t fly.’
‘Some do,’ I said, nudging him.
‘Not me.’
‘I think we should take the car anyway, and if they see us leaving they might give up and go home,’ I said.
‘Magic it is then,’ Brittany said, ‘but I need to go and ground first. I need an energy boost.’
Brittany left the room and I leaned into Daniel.
‘Hi,’ I whispered.
‘Hey you,’ he said. ‘You must be tired?’
I shook my head and leant in to kiss him, shivering as his lips touched mine. The loud peel of the phone rang suddenly.
‘Damn!’ Daniel exclaimed, his face darkening.
I grinned and hopped off his knee, grabbing the phone.
‘Oh Luke… Hi! Daniel said you popped by…’
‘The Council want to see you all,’ he said, his voice robotic.
‘Well that’s lucky because we were just figuring out how to get there. We’ve got some trouble out front,’ I said.
‘We know. Jessie, do you go looking for trouble?’ he said, exasperated.
I frowned.
‘No. What’s up with you?’
‘Nothing…’ He suddenly lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘Jess, I don’t…’ He stopped.
‘What?’ I asked.
His voice returned to normal.
‘Look, the Council are going to send an escort to clear a path to your door. They’ll pick you all up, okay?’ he said. ‘I’ll see you here.’
‘Oh! But we were just recharging our batteries, so once we’ve done that Brit and I can easily clear them…’
‘No! The Council don’t want you performing any more magic… I mean, in case you were spotted on TV,’ he sighed. ‘Just get in the car they send. That will be the best thing,’ and he hung up.
‘That was weird,’ I said, looking at Daniel.
‘I heard,’ Daniel said, frowning.
‘I suppose it makes sense about the magic. The last thing the UK needs is for there to be a witch hunt as well. I’ll go tell Brittany, and I guess we should get ready to go.’
A black Mercedes with blacked out windows arrived moments later, along with a police escort. The police had moved the reporters away and we left the building with not so much as a murmur from the crowd.
‘It looks like we’re being arrested,’ I murmured to Brittany as we followed the two well-built angels back to the car.
‘I don’t care what it looks like,’ Brittany said. ‘At least the Council are finally doing something helpful.’
It was the middle of the night when we arrived in Edinburgh. The old mansion hummed with activity. All the lower floor rooms were lit up, yellow light spilling out into the total darkness as we were led across the gravel.
‘It never fails to impress, does it?’ I whispered to Brittany, staring up at the house as we entered the grand hallway.
She shook her head. Daniel hung back slightly, his eyes wary.
‘Have you seen Seth or Eva?’ he asked the senior official.
The angel shook his head.
‘Ariel will know more. Come,’ he beckoned, holding an old arched door open for us.
‘Ariel?’ I whispered.
Brittany shrugged.
‘This way,’ the angel prompted, moving faster.
The door slammed shut behind us and Daniel glanced back, holding me by the elbow.
‘Jess… I’m not sure what’s going on, but something feels off,’ he whispered.
I looked around. Members of the Angelic Guard were clustered in corners of the room, talking among themselves but keeping an eye on us. In fact the more I looked the more convinced I became that they were all watching us.
‘What’s going on?’ I whispered.
‘I think we would like to see our representative,’ Daniel said suddenly, stopping mid-room. ‘Ariel is the angelic representative so I do not see how she can want to speak to us. Could you please send a message to Seth for me and we will wait here.’
His voice resonated round the room and I watched as several angels nearby stiffened and took a step closer, their hands moving to the hilts of their swords.
‘Oh, there have been a few changes within the Council structure during the past month, but I can assure you that Ariel is…’
The angel was cut off mid-sentence as the opposite door was opened and Ariel entered the room. Her blonde hair was done in a neat chignon that tapered down to her willowy neck. Her piercing ice-blue eyes stared across at us as she smiled frostily.
‘You have a problem, Mr Summers?’ she asked, staring coolly at Daniel.
‘Not at all; I just asked to see Seth. I have been trying to contact him all week,’ he said.
‘And you will see him very shortly. Currently he is being held in the cellars,’ she said.
‘The cellars? That’s where the holding cells are located, is it not?’ he asked.
Ariel nodded, her face solemn.
‘He is busy, but I am sure he would welcome some assistance down there, if you wish?’
I stared at her, but her face showed no emotion.
‘What about Adaryn?’ I asked.
‘I am afraid I am the only member of the board, Balthazar being the exception of course, who is not currently tied up in the cells. There has been much disruption and many arrests over the past month, so it is almost impossible to keep up,’ she sighed. ‘It has taken a devastating toll on Balthazar, our mighty leader, and I have had to take on many of his responsibilities. I have much to do… Now, shall I lead you to them or do you wish to take up more of my time?’
I looked at Daniel. The angels had drawn closer, forming a casual semi-circle behind us. He shrugged. Ariel didn’t lie, everyone knew that… angels just didn’t lie.
‘You say Adaryn and Seth are both down in the cellars and you will take us to them?’ I reiterated.
She nodded curtly.
‘Yes, of course.’
I looked at Brittany, then Daniel. We didn’t have much choice.
‘Lead the way then,’ I said.
She frowned and turned her back, striding off through the side door and towar
ds the cellars.
We followed Ariel down the old servants’ staircase into the cellars, a clutch of angels following behind. I began to feel claustrophobic in the confined space. Daniel sensed it and reached back to take my hand. Once we reached the bottom she held open a heavy, iron-studded door for us to pass through and we heard the door at the top of the stairs close.
‘Come,’ she said.
I hesitated but Brittany stumbled into me, pushing me through the door frame. The angels followed us into this corridor and locked the door behind them. Daniel swivelled round to face them.
‘Unlock that door,’ he ordered.
‘I am sorry Mr Summers, but I am afraid we cannot do that. You see, you are all under arrest.’
The cellars had thick anti-spell charms covering every cubic inch. Any witch incarcerated in the Council’s cells would be powerless. Daniel hadn’t fed in five days and I was exhausted from using all my energy in the ley lines. Before we could move a toe, the guards’ swords were pointing at us. There was no point in fighting. We wouldn’t win.
‘You said Seth and Adaryn were down here!’ I accused.
‘Oh, they are,’ Ariel said. ‘You’ll see them soon enough.’
She turned and we were led through another doorway into the corridor containing the cells.
‘Daniel! Jess!’ Eva called out from the first cell.
‘Eva!’ I should have known… I’m so sorry,’ Daniel said, rushing to her.
‘Mr Summers, there will be time for reunions later. If you could step in here, please?’ Ariel said, opening an empty cell next to Eva’s.
He glared at Ariel and glanced around the room.
‘Daniel, do as she says.’ The voice came from a cell opposite where Seth, the vampire representative, stood in the shadows.
‘What the hell?’ Daniel said.
‘Mr Summers, I haven’t got all day,’ Ariel said.
Daniel looked at me and stepped forward. I pushed past Ariel and ran into his arms, crushing my lips against his.
‘Someone get her off him,’ Ariel’s voice called out. An angelic sword was pressed against my neck until I released him and Daniel was locked inside.
Brittany scanned the room, looking for an escape, but there was none to be found; she was powerless.
‘Miss James, you next,’ Ariel said to me, her eyes victorious as an angel nudged me into the next cell with the tip of his sword, turning the key as I stepped across the threshold.
They showed some respect for Daniel and I. I might have had no magic but I still had my razor-sharp fangs and strength. Brittany was not afforded the same honour. They grabbed her by the shoulders and flung her into the cell.
‘Hey!’ I yelled, as she hit the far wall and slumped to the floor.
‘Witch scum,’ one of the angel guards murmured as they unlocked the hallway door.
‘What are we under arrest for?’ Daniel shouted, as Ariel turned her back.
‘I’ll decide that later, but for now we have work to do, and we don’t want you meddling.’ She turned and stared at me. ‘You in particular seem to find it impossible not to meddle.’
She pulled a woollen shawl around her shoulders and followed the angels out of the room. The lock turned.
‘I don’t know how they think we are going to get past these locks, never mind that one,’ I said.
‘Eva, who’s in here?’ Daniel asked.
‘Pretty much everyone we know who isn’t an angel,’ she replied. ‘Oh, apart from Luke. He’s over there.’
‘Luke?’ I called.
There was no reply.
‘I think they beat him up pretty good,’ she said.
‘But he was the one that called, telling us to get in the car and come here,’ I said.
‘Yeah, they pulled him out of the cell for that little favour, but he obviously did something they didn’t like because they dragged him back unconscious.’
I breathed deeply and could smell the scent of his blood, the unmistakable flowery scent that all angels had, laced with the bitter chocolate flavour that all human DNA carried. Saliva pooled in my mouth as I pushed back memories, memories of sinking my fangs into his wrist. I closed my eyes. Luke had tried to warn us, and unfortunately his three words meant nothing to us, but everything to the angels who overheard him.
‘How are we going to get out?’ I asked.
‘We can’t,’ Seth said, coming to stand at the front of his bars. ‘We are going to wait it out. Whatever they are planning they clearly want to make sure we won’t get in the way. Whenever it’s done they’ll release us.’
‘So we just sit tight?’ I said, shaking my head.
‘We don’t have much choice, Jessica dear,’ Adaryn, the witch representative said, from a cell further down.
‘My aunt will wonder what’s happened,’ I said suddenly. ‘I didn’t have time to call her and say I was home. She will check.’
The cells fell silent and people talked among themselves. Dawn broke and food was brought for those among us who required it. Luke and Brittany had both now recovered.
‘Luke, where’s Caoimhe?’ I asked.
‘I guess she did a better job than me at persuading them of her change of allegiance,’ he said.
‘I’d say she was a complete cow the last time I saw her,’ I blurted. ‘So you mean…?’
Luke nodded.
‘They’ve been watching us closely the last couple of weeks, Leo too. At first we thought it was about finding Brooke, but then when things started going wrong the Council suddenly seemed to change their tactics and back off. We couldn’t understand it. A friend hinted that they wanted to use Pierre to rid the Council of vampires and start afresh…’
‘But I had a meeting with them about working for them freelance…’ I started.
‘And they were happy to let you go, weren’t they?’
I frowned, thinking back.
‘You shouldn’t have tried to warn us,’ I said.
He shrugged.
‘I didn’t do a very good job. Now we’re both here,’ he said.
Seth had been listening closely.
‘If what you say is true that would explain why we have been incarcerated down here,’ he said. ‘But they won’t get away with an angel-run council. No-one other than the angels would stand for it. It’s all very well putting us down here, but that’s not going to make all the vampires, witches and shifters of the world bow down and take their orders from them, is it? No, it must be something more…’
The key was turned in the outer door and Caoimhe walked in, locking it behind her.
‘Kee!’ Luke said, rushing to the front of his cell.
‘Luke, oh, what did they do to you?’ she said.
‘How did you get down here?’ he asked.
‘I have a friendly guard upstairs, but he is guarding the stairwell, so I can’t just let you out, okay?’
He nodded.
‘Everyone else is busy… really busy! They’ve killed Pierre,’ she said, ‘and Connor.’
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Caoimhe had said she would return as soon as she had more information, but an hour later it was a different angel who unlocked the door. He brought a digital screen with him, which he set up.
‘Ariel thought you might like to know what is going on in the world,’ he said with a smirk.
Switching the channel to twenty-four hour news he turned up the volume and left the room, locking the door behind him. Vampire leader dead, Turning point for humankind scrolled along the screen underneath a video which showed Downing Street swarming with angels, their blue swords flying. Pierre and his vampires had clearly become lax with their security, with the angels, being the only viable threat to his rule, showing no interest in his actions for the past month.
The five vampire guards outside Number Ten were swiftly dispatched with zero time for them to sound an alarm. Dozens of angels landed in the street, their wings on full display as they soared from the sky putting on a show
for the cameramen who had clearly been tipped off. They stormed the house and seconds later a senior angel appeared on the doorstep, Pierre’s head dangling from his hand by its famous blonde ponytail.
‘I am the Chief of Defence for the Angelic Guard,’ he declared. ‘After obeying your military’s wishes and not interfering we thought it high time someone brought peace to your kind. Humans simply do not have the power or abilities to stand up to these supernatural species. It is what we were sent to earth for… to protect you! I am going to hand you over to the beautiful Ariel, our council’s president.’
‘President?’ I whispered.
Daniel shrugged and we all stared at the screen as Ariel appeared, gently floating down from the sky, her gossamer wings unfolded and her hair cascading round her shoulders for full effect. She nodded to the Chief of Defence and turned to address the cameras.
‘I am Ariel. I am an angel and I have been presiding over the supernatural council for many years. It has been decided that as the supernatural species of the world have now been uncovered it will serve your best interests if we now serve you too, and more importantly protect you, as no other can do.’ She paused for effect, staring right into the lens.
‘Under our care humankind will be protected and granted civil rights that must be adhered to by all species. Under my watchful eye you will be safe to walk the streets at night. There will be no need for a curfew. You will be safe not only from vampires, witches and werewolves but from your own kind as well - the thugs and murderers that prey on your sons and daughters. Your police force will work alongside ours and together we will become a force to be reckoned with.’
‘Well, none of this is any surprise,’ Adaryn said quietly.
‘I don’t understand why they needed to kick you off the board though,’ I said. ‘Surely the other species won’t listen to a purely angelic council?’
‘To ensure your safety we have taken steps to notify all supernatural beings of the changes ahead,’ Ariel began again. ‘From this moment on all species will be ruled by the Angelic Council. There will be no option to opt out. Witches will be registered at birth. All existing vampires will need to be added to a register and will be given one week to register any newborn vampires, stating the reason they were made. There will be extra legislation made surrounding the control of both vampire and werewolf species. Like vampires all weres will be given thirty days to register their family group. In the future any werewolf attacking humans in a bid to change them will be dealt with severely.’
