Four benches, two on each side, lined the small room, while the only other piece of furniture was a single altar adorned with a cross and a menorah. I noticed prayer mats to the side and was actually impressed at the hospital’s tolerance.
The policeman stood in front of the altar with his back to me. “I almost thought you were going to leave,” he said in a dulcet voice that set my nerves on edge. I didn't know who my new friend was, but I began to guess what he was, and it scared the absolute shit out of me. So of course my mouth moved before my brain could smack a ruler across it.
“It’s hard to fit anything into my schedule these days,” I told him, “between running from demons and almost getting killed, I’m kinda booked.”
“Hmm,” was his only response. His hands went behind his back, and he still didn’t turn.
Another emotion began to push its way past the fear. I hated games, especially when lives were at stake. “So is this the part where I kneel?” I snapped at him.
The silence pressed in, and my ears popped. The policeman went rigid, and the lights dimmed. I felt as if I was swimming in Lake Washington with an anvil tied around my throat.
The man’s shadow on the wall stretched upward, sliding along the wood like a river of dark water. It writhed and flowed into the shape of wings.
Chuckling filled the deep well of silence. The air popped like a pin to a balloon and left me shivering. The shadow disappeared from the wall as laughter drifted over us.
A new shadow filled the doorway leading to the hallway outside, and I quickly stepped forward to get away from the sudden chill. “Oh, I like this one,” a strange chorus of voices whispered. I could hear a man’s tenor underneath, but also a strange gulping sound, all laid over by the angry hiss of a cat. The whole concoction struck like lightning across my nerves. The stench of sulfur poured off this newcomer as the darkness coalesced into the form of a man in a dark suit. Alabaster skin and blond hair finished the portrait of the perfect Aryan. His blue eyes sparkled as he chuckled, and he didn’t step through the doorway.
“Enough,” the policeman said. “I will tolerate his insolence because we need him, Baal, nothing more.”
“It feels so good to be loved,” I remarked before my brain rushed forward and snapped my mouth shut. Then the name spiked through my sleep-addled brain: Baal. As in Baal, one of the three kings of Hell. I wasn't really up on my demonology, but even I knew that name.
Ah, the universe had a nasty sense of humor.
“Nicholas St. James,” the policeman said as he finally turned. His copper skin glistened, and his brown eyes smoldered in repressed anger. “I will tolerate your sarcasm up to a point, but I won’t tolerate disrespect.”
“Fine by me,” I said, “but I need to know who you are before I give my respect.” I’m proud to say my voice didn’t waver. Well, maybe a little.
“Oh, I definitely like him.” The blond man laughed, this time his voice soft, like the hiss of an angry feline. “My sweet human, can’t you feel the awe and power of the Great Commander, the Saint of Nebadon? Oh hail the great Taxiarch, patron saint of justified killers!” Scorn dripped off the thing’s tongue. I kept my eyes on the policeman in front of me.
I wasn’t up on my angelic lore, but I knew where the demon was headed. The patron saint of policemen and soldiers. The commander of God’s armies during the Great Fall. Mikhail, the Angel of Death.
Michael.
What the hell did Cate get me into?
“We are tasked,” the being known as Michael said as he began to pace, “with a difficult chore and we need your help, Son of Woman.”
I felt like a bug scurrying under the feet of giants. “OK, first off,” I said after clearing my throat, “we have to stop with all the formal ‘son of woman’ crap. My name is Nick. And,” here was the kicker, and I had to swallow to get the words out, “I hate to say this, but I’m retired. You’ll have to take a number.”
“You seek the Blind Fury, the Deceiver of Faith,” Michael said calmly as the pressure in the air lessened. “The one they call Shabriri. He has marked you and we do not know why, but it does not concern us.”
I’ve heard stories about angels looking right into your soul. I don’t know about that, but the pressure eased as Michael calmed down. Why would he be calm, even in the face of my sarcasm? There was only one reason. He had something he knew I wouldn’t refuse.
“Why do you keep saying ‘we’?” I asked. “And why is the Commander of Heaven cavorting with a king of Hell? I don’t think you’re trying out for a remake of The Odd Couple.”
“You have heard of the Pact,” Michael told me. It wasn’t a question. “If a denizen of Hell is summoned by human hands, the Host cannot interfere. But when a demon becomes a rogue, then three must be made flesh. Our judgment will be final.”
“Three?” I asked. Oh, this kept getting better.
Michael nodded to my left, and I turned to see a silent Asian woman standing four feet from me. I hate to say that a very un-angel-like curse spewed forth as I jumped a foot out of my skin.
“Sraosha, the Scion of Obedience, and bane to the one who hunts you,” Michael continued. “We three seek a Fallen, one who has become lost to the sight of the Host.”
“Wait,” I said as I tried getting my heart out of my throat, “just wait. If you’re looking for this blind demon, why didn’t you just pick him up while he was kicking my ass? He wasn’t trying to stay hidden.”
“We do not seek the Blind Deceiver,” Michael said. “He was summoned here by human hands, and I can do nothing to help you with him. That is the Pact. No, the one we seek is older by far. I do not become flesh for a mere captain of the Fiery Legions.” His scorn at my reasoning was evident.
Did he just say that No-Eyes was a captain of hell? Man, this just kept getting better. “Then who are you looking for?”
“He who is called the Goat of Dudael, the Hound of Hudedun, and the King of the Grigori. He—”
“Look, I know you guys love titles,” I interrupted, “but just tell me his name. And while you’re at it, tell me what you want from me.”
Michael’s eyes blazed again, but he kept his voice calm. “The one we seek was the father of the Nephilim, known only as Azazel.”
OK, that finally put a stop to my runaway mouth.
According to various texts, after the fall of Lucifer, Azazel and the Grigori came to earth and sired a bunch of evil giants named the Nephilim who wreaked havoc on the earth until God destroyed them. God then cast Azazel and his lot into the earth, to be chained for all eternity. That being the Cliffs Notes version, of course. No wonder the heavy hitters had come to play.
“Wait, Azazel?” I asked. “Isn’t he supposed to be bound in the earth somewhere?”
Michael began to pace again, a graceful stride that reminded me of a lion pacing in front of the cage bars. It’s too bad I was in the cage with it. “Azazel was freed half a century ago, by an unknown hand. We three were sent to bring him back.”
“So you need me to help you? Can’t you just, I don’t know, sniff him out or something?”
“He is cloaked to our eyes,” a voice said from the doorway. When I turned, Baal was a woman with deep black hair. Like the man, she wore a form fitting suit of black, although the cloth seemed to squirm in the light. “The chief of the Grigori has done something unheard of. He has found a way to hide himself even from the eyes of Heaven.” Laughter trickled through the girl’s voice.
“We’ve searched for decades,” Baal continued, ignoring the disapproving glare from Michael, “but we have nothing. So the saint decided to seek your aid, against my judgment, and when we couldn’t find you, we found your delicious partner instead.” I must’ve blinked because the demon was now an older gentleman in a dark charcoal suit. His voice oozed across my skin. “Oh, the woman’s fear was exquisite…”
“Enough, Baal,” Michael whispered. “This is my last warning.” The pressure built again, and even the king of Hell flinched b
ack. “We seek your services, Nicholas St. James, to find this one. To find Azazel.”
I glanced at the demon in the hallway and at the silent angel on my left, then back at Michael. That many heavy hitters in the same room spiked my headache again.
I did some equations in my head. Someone had summoned the Blind Deceiver to take me out, so Michael and the others couldn’t help. And now there was an all-powerful rogue demon out there as well. I didn’t believe in coincidences, but it was like trying to put two different puzzles together. I needed more information.
“What does all this have to do with No-Eyes trying to kill me?”
“Again,” Michael said with the voice of a frustrated father talking to his child, “the Blind Deceiver, Shabriri, is summoned, and therefore we cannot intervene. It has nothing to do with our search for the rogue, so it doesn’t concern us.”
“It should concern you if he kills me,” I snapped.
Michael said nothing, but he did smile.
“So why me?”
“You are the best at what you do,” Michael said simply. “We remember the rogue you destroyed in Scotland, as well as what you accomplished in Boston.”
I’d be flattered if I didn’t have the urge to run screaming from the room. “So why do I get the feeling I don’t have a choice?” The powers in the small room slammed into my head like a jackhammer.
Warmth flowed for the first time into Michael’s eyes. “There is always a choice, Son of Woman,” the angel said. The lights dimmed again, and the pressure built behind my eyes again. “It is the mind that creates the illusion of a path surrounded by walls. We will be watching, and we will help when we can.”
My vision tunneled down to the angel standing by the altar. The rest of the world collapsed around his wings.
“Oh, we’ll definitely help,” a soft cackle came from inside my brain. Baal had the human/hissing/croaking voice again. “Help you get what you deserve…”
Then, as if a cosmic giant had snapped his fingers, the pressure disappeared, and so did my new clients. Light flooded the small chapel, and my knees buckled. I sprawled on the floor, my back propped up by one of the benches. Two angels and a king of Hell, all in one day.
I flexed my hands to get feeling back in the fingers, but stopped. In the palm of my hand was a white laminated card with a single phone number written in flowing script.
I couldn’t help it. I began to laugh. Michael had all this power, and yet he had to leave me a calling card. Laughter shook my frame as I thought of the great archangel sitting by his cell phone.
I had to give her one thing. Cate knew how to pick her clientele.
CHAPTER TEN
Sleep became an elusive prey that stayed just out of reach as the night dragged on. After my visit to the hospital I went home and lay in bed for five hours as my memories played across the ceiling. I don’t know if I actually fell asleep, but one minute I stared at darkness and the next I stared at sunshine.
Ann always used to tell me that when in doubt, hit the streets. She never let me get into a funk when I hit a dead end, especially when death waited at the end of the cul-de-sac. So I took the information I had and went hunting.
My first search originated from home. If there is one thing on this earth that has made the life of a PI easier, it’s the Internet. When I first started in the business I had to traipse all over town to find out information. Libraries, courthouses, newspaper stands, you name it. Now you could dig up a whole chest full of information by moving your fingers—if you were willing to brave the wild and inflammatory seas of the web.
I was starting up Google when the skull-grating tones of “Hall of the Mountain King” struck the air again. I needed to change that cell phone ringer. I dug around the mess of covers until I pulled out the culprit.
“Hey, man, how’re you feeling?” Jake said when I picked up.
“Better,” I said. “Sorry I didn’t give you a call last night. I wanted to say thanks.”
“For what? I couldn’t get through that damn fire wall. I tried, man, I really did.”
“The point is you tried. And thanks for telling Beth to get me some red meat. I’m completely burned out.”
Jake chuckled. “You toasted that bastard good. Can I ask you how?”
“I had a little help from our neighborhood troll.”
“Old Finn? Damn, that must’ve been a sight to see. So what happened?”
I filled him in on all the gory details: the demon lying in wait, the woman and her daughter, and finally the confrontation in the county hospital.
For once in the entire time I’ve known him, Jake was speechless.
“Are you still breathing?” I asked.
“I…” More silence. “Michael? As in the archangel?”
“No, as in the pop singer. I would’ve asked him to do the moon walk but he wasn’t in the mood.”
“Jesus, Nick, this is serious! You have any idea what kind of shit you’re in?”
“I think I get that part.” I rubbed the bridge of my nose with my thumb and forefinger, where a headache slowly rose above all my other aches and pains. “What do you know about angels?”
Another pause. “Not much,” he said finally. “Both sides tend to be secretive. We have the Bible, of course, along with a bunch of other religions’ works that basically describe the same thing, but nothing clear-cut. The only reason there’s so many books about demons is that humans love dealing with them. We don’t deal so much with the others.”
“So what do you have?” I asked.
“I do know that Michael is purely Old Testament. You know, the kind with one wing dipped in blood. If you’ve drawn his attention…” He left the thought hanging.
“I get it. But here’s the strange part. He left me a business card with a number on it. What kind of immortal leaves a calling card?”
“The mortal kind.”
“Come again?”
“Think about it, man. When someone summons a demon, the demon becomes mortal. They need to eat, they can be killed…just like us monkeys. Who’s to say angels don’t go through the same process when they come here?”
“So an archangel is just a man when he’s here?”
“That’s like saying you’re just a writer,” he snorted. “If angels follow the same rules as demons, then he’s mortal, but that doesn’t mean he’s human. Far from it. Hell, you’ve seen what demons can do here. Who’s to say what kind of nasty stuff Michael can throw around if he’s angry?”
“OK, I get it. Don’t piss him off.” I dropped my hand from my face. Oh yeah, my head was one beat short of a Led Zeppelin concert. “So the angels are looking for a rogue demon named Azazel, right around the same time someone sends No-Eyes after me.”
“Could be a coincidence.”
“I’ve don't believe in them. What do you know about this Azazel? I mean, I know he got kicked out of Heaven for cavorting with human women, and then got trapped underground for his troubles. Anything else?”
“Most of the angelic lore is about as reliable as that old truck of yours.” Jake snorted again. “Some of the older stories deal with tricksters being bound under the earth, like Loki of the Norse myths, but I’m not sure if they’re related. I do know that a demon has never, and I mean never, gone off the grid before. Usually they go rogue, the clean-up crew comes, and the thing is never seen again.”
“Great, more questions,” I sighed. “So what were you researching, anyway? Beth said you loaded me up in her van and then hightailed it out of there.”
“Yeah, sorry about that. There were a couple of sources I wanted to check out before you woke up. By the time I dug anything up, you were already home and ignoring the phone.”
“Hard to answer when you’re comatose,” I muttered. “Did you find anything?”
“Last night I was as smug as shit. Was going to rub your nose in it and everything. Then I call you up and find out that an angel told you everything.”
I smiled into the phone.
“That’s rough. So you found out about No-Eyes?”
“The thing’s name is Shabriri, at least its mortal name. I’d give my right thumb for a crack at his real name. Captain of Hell, blah blah blah. This is a nasty one, Nick.”
“I figured that one out on my own,” I said as I absently rubbed my aching shoulder.
“If I was you I’d start looking into missing people. This thing needs some serious bloodletting to call into the world. That usually doesn’t go unnoticed.”
“It’s a good start. I have a couple of leads as well, but thanks, Jake. For everything.”
“Hey, man, it’s no problem. I’ll continue to dig from my end, maybe even try to trace the thing back to the source again.”
“Wait,” I said. “You're volunteering?”
“This thing tore up my sister’s shop,” Jake said, his voice with an edge I’d never heard before. “It went after a kid. And it’ll keep coming as long as the person summoning it is still breathing. That’s kind of hard to get over.”
“My own personal Batman.”
“More like Daredevil. Give me a cape and some sonar and I’ll be all over the scumbags. Now what else can I do?”
I thought a moment. “Not much right now. See if you can’t dig up anything about Azazel with your contacts. He probably set off all sorts of alarms when he went rogue.”
“You sure you want to look into this while you’re being hunted? Maybe we should focus on one bad guy at a time.”
“Like I said, I don’t think it’s a coincidence. There’s another player here, one I can’t see. I’ll find that connection if I dig into both.”
“It won’t be easy, man. Most demon lore is sketchy at best. All the best grimoires were burned by the church or lost in some private archive.”
“Then use your Bat powers of deduction. Right now I need to know who might be behind this thing. Give me a call if you find anything.”
“Will do.” Jake paused. “Oh, and Nick. Stop in and tell Thelma you’re OK. She’s worried sick.”
I smiled a bit as he hung up. That was unusual. Most people ran screaming when I entered a room. It was nice to be worried about.
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