A Third of the Moon and the Stars Struck

by Jade Brieanne

  Anais lowered her head. “You are such a sweet man, Ahn. After my mating to Balladan, I used to think about how you made me feel. Like…dry skin kissed by cool salve. Like the smell of lavender or sweet powder. You made me feel like I was more than the daughter of the Divine. You infused me with the warmth that helped me survive Balladan’s cold touch.”

  “Anais…”

  “You’re so sweet…so impossibly sweet.” She looked up at him and the coldness returned to her eyes, the air, the room. “You are also the most inept, dimwitted, gullible man I’ve ever met in my life.”

  Ahn’s eyes narrowed. “What?”

  “I make your eyes go soft, your dick hard and you let down all of your guards? We are on the cusp of a war and you go and do this?” Anais’s lip curled and she took a step closer, her breath condensing on the glass. “You are weak. You do not deserve your position.”

  Ahn placed a hand against the glass. “What are you…what are you talking about, Anais?”

  “You don’t know what I did or didn’t do but you trust me? How foolish! What if, Ahn?” she said, lowly. “What if it was me that drugged you? What if it was me that fed Balladan the T6? What if I watched him choke and gasp for air? What if I saw his face go blue, his lips go purple, watched his veins catch fire, smelled his flesh burning, watched him burn away to nothing? What if I listened to his screams?” Her fist clenched and her body shook. “What if I enjoyed it?”

  “No…” Ahn pressed. “You couldn’t. Not you…you don’t have that kind of cruelty in you.”

  Anais took a step back and laughed. “You don’t know me. You never did. I am capable of unimaginable things, Ahn. I will do what is necessary to make sure all of the wrongs things on this realm are made right.”

  “Anais. Stop it. Be mad at me, take your revenge out on me. I can take it. Don’t…don’t do something you’ll regret.”

  Anais smile was slow. “Regret is for the weak-hearted.” She turned and walked to the door. “I’ll see you in The Pit of Eendulah.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY SEVEN

  “Hear this now. This decree has been submitted from The Glory Beyond and cannot be rescinded. It has been declared that Ahn’anakim’melkyal Te, noble son of the clan Eliyah, has been charged with high treason against The Glory Beyond, Caeli and the Earthen realm he has been appointed to protect. At the request of Balladan’s mate, Anais, daughter of Khavah and Alloyon, and by way of Twelve law and tradition, he has been sentenced to trial by judicial duel.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT

  Manhattan, New York

  “You do understand you don’t have to do that, right?”

  Jon didn’t understand the question. It wasn’t like he complaining, although…he kind of was. He watched as Key slipped his arms through the sleeves of a very stylish pantsuit that he’d found in the women’s section. One that looked very good on him.

  The angel shook him awake early this morning, an elation in his eyes that Jon hadn’t seen since he’d seen the three angels step foot back on Caeli. That made Jon think. Key seemed happier when he was back home. Earth dimmed his smile.

  Except for Bloomingdale’s. Nothing matched the unholy glee in his eyes as he snatched clothing items off racks, purses off of mannequins and shoes out of boxes. As he waited outside of the dressing room listening to Key’s squeals of delight, another guy, maybe a husband or boyfriend, sunk into the seat next to him.

  “Great way to spend a Sunday, huh?” the man chuckled. “Game is on.”

  Jon nodded. Things like baseball games on Sunday had become something he didn’t have the time for, and of late, couldn’t draw up the desire for. He leaned over anyway when the man pulled out a cell phone.

  “Can’t miss out on account of an all-day shopping trip. Thank God for advanced technology. If only we didn’t love ‘em so much, huh?” the man said, elbowing him with a smirk.

  The man continued to watch the game and Jon continued onto a thought that had been swirling around his mind for months.

  Did he love Key?

  He snorted, which inadvertently grabbed the man’s attention. He waved it off and pretended to pay attention to the game.

  He didn’t love Key. He could barely tolerate Key. They had nothing in common and that included biological makeup. Even their conversations were war. What’s there to love?

  Everything.

  He caught the angel’s olive green eyes over the top of the changing room door as he held up two shirts, one royal blue, and the other some weird purple color. His smirk was infectious and for a moment, Jon didn’t care about anything. The shirt, the dressing room, their next mission. He just cared that sometimes when Key looked at him, he could see gold in Key’s eyes and how sometimes he could see passion and loyalty and attraction.

  The man elbowed him, pointing to the screen. “We scored big!”

  Jon continued looked at Key. Maybe.

  Now they were back at the apartment and Key was in the process of becoming the “New FBI Clerk” again. Again, no complaints, he liked the way the pantsuit accentuated curves he didn’t know Key had. It was just, this, what Key was doing? Was, in his humble opinion, highly unnecessary.

  “She’s a priest.”

  “She’s a demon,” Jon corrected.

  “She’s still a priest! And I figured she would react more positively to a married couple than two testosterone addled enforcers coming to shake her for information.”

  “She’s a demon,” Jon clarified again because he wasn’t sure Key heard him.

  “You look nice,” the angel threw off-handily, although Jon didn’t miss the way his eyes lingered on him in his black tuxedo. “You look like a nice God-fearing, law-abiding man. Wait. That’s a southern phrase, right? God-fearing? What do the northerners say?”

  “I don’t know,” Jon murmured, his ears still ringing with Key’s earlier compliment. “Dad told me “God-fearing” was an H.L. Mencken quote and last I heard Mencken wasn’t too fond of religion so who the hell knows anything anymore? And could you hurry up? We need to leave at some point.”

  “I’m coming, I’m coming,” he said as he slipped on his wig, a new one, brown and long that feathered down his back. He put two bobby pins in his mouth as he twisted the hair until it was in a nice tight bun, then secured it. “Help me zip up this suit and we can go.”

  Jon grunted but did as he was asked. The suit was a funky dark shade of pink and to make sure he didn’t leave a smudge or anything on it, he wiped his hands on pants before grasping the zipper. He glanced at Key’s back as he slowly, slowly, tugged the zipper up. Way slower than necessary.

  He could wax poetic about how soft his skin looked but Key’s back didn’t look soft and it wasn’t a flawless canvas. It was a battleground. Considering that Key’s abilities including healing, he wondered if he kept the scars on purpose. The most interesting of the scars were the nine welts right under his hairline. A 10th one if you included the healing one slashed across the three columns of welts. “I’ve been meaning to ask. These scars on your neck. What do they mean?”

  Key’s fingers came up to rub the scars and Jon heard him hum, a fond kind of sound that sounded oddly melodic. “It’s ritual scarification. Generals and the Leader of The Fallen get them. Nine. It stands for the number of minutes I went without screaming as I pushed Shawolyah down the path that borders Awọn Idajọ. It’s a stone, one that feeds on nephesh, your body’s life energy. It hurts like hell. One person has a number higher than me. Song lasted fourteen minutes. Aria, seven.”

  “You’re a lot stronger than you seem,” Jon said as he finished zipping the suit up. Instead of letting go, he placed his hands on Key’s bare shoulders. “You also smell very nice.” He leaned in further, inhaling. Key did smell nice. He smelled like jasmine, a by-product of the expensive perfume he picked up. Jon didn’t have the ability to smell spirit essence so he imagined Key’s smelling like fresh lilies. His lips grazed the back of Key’s neck, just below his scars. Key shivered but he didn’t mo
ve. Embolden when the angel didn’t shove him off, he tried again, pressing his lips across the scars.

  “Jon,” Key said, tiredly. “Why are you doing this?”

  Jon heard him but he was too busy placing a kiss to the curve where Key’s shoulder and neck met. “You want to know why but you aren’t telling me to stop.”

  Key was silent and Jon spun him around, wanting to laugh at how wide his eyes grew. “You know why I’m doing this.” He ran this thumb across Key’s bottom lip, smearing some of the ruby lipstick, before tugging him closer. “You’ve been torturing me for months.”

  Key afforded him a look that Jon translated as either disbelief or apathy.

  “I don’t understand why you affect me. I’m struggling, really, really struggling, because I don’t know how you, you of all people, flipped this switch on in my head.” He pressed his lips against Key’s jawbone and again, Key didn’t pull away. He was pretty sure he heard a small whimper escape between the angel’s lips. “But you’re there. You are in my head. Like my medulla oblongata because you dictate what my heart does?” Jon paused when he reached Key’s throat. “That was corny,” he said dryly, “but what I’m trying to say is…ask a question you don’t already know the answer to.”

  “Do you like living here?”

  Jon grunted and attached his mouth to Key’s ear. He could smell the perfume on Key’s pulse points. “No,” he said against his lobe. Jon shifted his stance because the situation in his pants was getting uncomfortable. “I hate New York.”

  Key chuckled. “No. Here. Earth.”

  Jon paused, his lips still warm on Key. “I kind of don’t have a choice? Why are you asking me that?”

  “You wanted a question that made sense. You ever heard of the story of the fish and the bird?”

  “If they fell in love, where would they live?” came a voice from the door. Jon looked up and saw Tahir staring at them, a mix of fondness and disgust on her face. “You two are being gross.”

  Key reacted first, taking a solid step away from Jon.

  Jon rolled his eyes towards Tahir. “You are the queen of timing.”

  She bowed. “I do what I can. You two can make stomach pancakes later. You have to catch the Dr. before she leaves her speaking engagement.”

  “Doctor,” Jon said, his head tilted. “I thought she was a priest.”

  “She is. But she also has a doctorate in religious studies and divinity. Another in history.”

  Jon blinked. “So we’re going to see a priest, who is also a doctor with two advanced degrees in religion…but who is also a demon.” He made a face. “Makes sense. Just like everything else, this makes perfect sense.”

  Key made his way to the door, beige heels clicking against the hardwood floor. “Just remember not to do anything strange–like be yourself.”

  Jon mocked his statement behind his back as they exited the room. “I’m rubber and you’re glue, fairy boy.”

  He closed the door behind them.

  CHAPTER FIFTY NINE

  The New York Historical Society Museum and Library New York, New York

  The New York Historical Society Museum and Library looked like any normal history museum to Jon. Limestone steps, busts of important people in American history, nice bright lights, lots of framed scrolls and letters…the usual. There was a life-sized statue of Frederick Douglass just outside the entrance, a prominent man he’d learned about in high school. He gave Fred a low five as he passed when Key wasn’t looking.

  Speaking of Key, the angel was now in the throes of being dra-mat-tic as Jon’s wife. He’d linked his arm through his and kissed him on the cheek,

  leaving an offending smear of deep red lipstick until he could make a show of wiping it off and giggling up at him. Jon was going to make him pay for this.

  They walked through the entrance, passing the bright white lights highlighting various exhibits and made their way straight back towards The Robert H. Smith Auditorium where Dr. Timoko was speaking on–Jon glanced down at his pamphlet–the history of alchemy.

  The auditorium was filled to the brim with people, all dressed to the nines as Key and Jon were. They took their seats amongst the upper crust of the scientific and historical society of New York. A waiter walked over with a tray holding flutes of champagne, which Key took, wrapping manicured fingers around the stem. “My husband would like a glass, too.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” Jon hissed as the waiter placed the glass in his hand and walked away.

  “Well, you are my husband at this moment, so yes, I do.”

  Jon groaned and tipped his flute back.

  There was a loud click, as if someone had turned on a microphone and the lights began to lower in the auditorium. Dr. Timoko took the stage and Jon was shocked, although he shouldn’t have been. He’d seen stranger things. Dr. Timoko looked like a human; no horns, no red skin, no eerily glowing eyes or fangs. Do demons have fangs? He was sure they fangs.

  She was a tall woman, very tall, yet her outfit was impeccably tailored to fit her near 6-foot frame. The only thing that may have betrayed any demonic heritage was the tattoos that covered her chin, which Jon was very quick to point out. Key slapped his hand away like he was foolish.

  “She’s Māori, you idiot. Those are Tā moko markings. Just like the scars on the back of my neck, they mean something–a rite of passage. It is a distinction of their culture and has nothing to do with her demonic heritage.”

  Jon grumbled and sat back.

  Dr. Timoko began her speech, her New Zealand accent flourishing, explaining a few things about alchemy that Jon had no real interest in. Things about gold and everlasting life and a philosopher’s stone. Yawn. He weathered the woman’s boring yip-yapping by slipping his hand into Key’s, knowing the angel wouldn’t yank away. Not when Jon was supposed to be his husband–he’d said it so himself. He turned his wrist up so the back of his hand rested against Key’s thigh. He heard the angel growl but he didn’t care.

  It was an hour into Dr. Timoko’s presentation on the giant screen behind him that Jon finally started to pay attention. He felt Key stiffen beside him.

  Four triangles attached at the corners to form a square, and an eye enclosed in a circle with an iris that radiated out like a sun.

  “Isn’t that…” Jon whispered.

  Key nodded. “Yeah, it is. That’s our clue from the file. Christian led us in the right direction.”

  Someone behind them shushed them and Key glared back at them. Jon tugged on his hand instead. “There are probably more clues in her office. Want to play spy?”

  “Spy?” Key glanced at him. “What happened to you and your morals about upholding the law?”

  “Remember. I’m not an agent anymore. I’m a civilian. That means I get to shelf my morals for a while. Look, she might entertain us but I highly doubt she is just going to give us what we are looking for.”

  Key sighed. “Alright,” he said while nodding towards the entrance. “Let’s be fast about it. Demons are territorial.”

  Jon scoffed. “Not like she’s going to start a holy war over a few documents in her office.”

  “Let us pray she doesn’t.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY

  “This office sucks. Don’t history freaks love being surrounded by history? There’s nothing on the walls but a painting of some clouds.”

  Key wanted to agree because he too had been expecting something different, especially for a Gilder Lehrman fellow. “Maybe the office is temporary?”

  “That will make this either easier or harder. Means she didn’t transport over hundreds of files,” Jon said as he crossed the office and walked up to one of the four oak filing cabinets behind her desk. “I’ll take the cabinet. Can you try the bookshelf?”

  Key decided to take Jon’s command in stride. If he wanted to be lead “detective” then he would let him. They were kind of the reason he was out of a job. He’d even let Jon pick the lock while he distracted the guard and

  disab
led the security cam.

  The bookshelf was beside a large closet door. He grabbed the first book, a weathered tome with pages that looked like if anyone blew on them they would crumble to shit. “Pseudomonarchia Daemonum,” he mumbled. Hierarchy of Demons. “Be careful with any docs you touch. These seem to be very old. They shouldn’t be here,” Key grumbled. “They should be locked up in a Caelian library.”

  “Not everything belongs to you guys,” Jon remarked. “And you haven’t even looked at it.” Jon tilted his head to read the spine. “That’s an old ass copy of Robert’s Rules of Order,” he said, shaking his head.

  “Robert’s Rules?” Key frowned and looked down at the book. The cover indeed had morphed from the tan cover to a brown cover. He tried another one. Slowly, he picked up a burgundy leather covered one. “The Holy Bible.” He looked away and held the book up. “What does this book say?”

  “Harry Potter,” Jon murmured as he took a quick glance at it.

  Key gasped looked down at the book and gasped. What in the hell? “Jon. Pull your phone out.”

  He looked up from a filing cabinet, his hand reaching towards a file in the back. “Uh, why?” He thumbed to a printer behind him. “We can just make copies.”

  “No,” Key whispered, probably sounding paranoid. Which was easy. He was. “The...books are changing.”

  “Say do what?”

  “They are changing,” Key hissed. “If I pick them up, they change. That book just changed from a book on the hierarchy of demons to a book on when to say yay and nay in a meeting! You saw Harry Potter when I was originally holding the Holy Bible! They are changing! What did Christian say about a tertiary system?”

  “Other than that mumbo jumbo computer jargon? Something about it being able to manipulate itself?”