Aza squinted at Brandon. “The very one.”
Brandon’s mouth tightened, but he didn’t drop his eyes. He lifted his chin and glared into Niamh’s face— daring her to judge him. The corner of her lips twitched upward. “Why are you here, Human child? You could have returned safely to a Human life, not the one you were born to, but magic could have given you a life you believed was always yours. Yet here you are in the City of Shadows, amongst those who will kill you for piercing the Veil if they get the chance. Why?”
Brandon pushed his shoulders back. “I could ask you the same question. Why does an original Demon, who has spent two millennia trying to broker a peaceful existence for the Demon population of this realm, risk her standing with the Council for the sake of the Shadow Children? Ma’am.”
Aza stirred at the wall and stood a little straighter, watching the exchange between Brandon and Niamh with greedy eyes. Niamh’s lips twisted upward into a broad, grudging grin. She reached out and tapped Brandon on the chest. “We each have our own path which has led us to this point in time.” Her smile vanished as quickly as it had appeared and she curled her finger back inside her fist. “I hope your sacrifice shall not be in vain, Human child.”
Niamh whirled away from us in a flurry of gray skirts and disappeared past Aza and through the gate before I had time to process her words. Brandon exhaled and let his hands fall loosely by his side. He muttered to me out of the side of his mouth. “Why does everyone we meet have to be a total weirdo?”
I coughed to disguise my snicker as Aza’s gold flecked stare narrowed on my face. She pulled away from the concrete wall and rose up to her full height. “Keep close, Toto, you’re not in Kansas anymore.”
The Demon’s homage to my favorite childhood film lingered, even though her body had slipped out through the narrow gate and into the treacherous streets waiting for us on the other side of the slime covered walls. Gabriel slid past us so that he reached the exit first. Lizzie and Emmanuel spread out at the rear of our group. Emmanuel’s long fingers were wrapped around the handles of two unlit Spirit Blades, and I realized with a shiver that I had never seen our Master armed before. The warmth of the day drained away, and I pulled my shirt tighter around myself.
Sam closed the gap between us with a sidestep and his forearm rested against mine—skin touching skin. I jerked my arm away and followed Gabriel out through the gate, bracing myself for the terrors of the Shadow City.
Bright sunlight glistened on a vast expanse of clear blue water and dazzled me. I blinked in surprise as a jet of water shot from the lake and split the sky. The waterfront was lined with tall majestic buildings, and gleaming yachts bobbed at the water’s edge. Lizzie dug her fingers into the small of my back, and I forced my feet back into motion on the pristine pavement. I stared back over my shoulder at the pillar of water rising like an ancient god from the seas.
Niamh took a left, and we followed her at speed through a maze of gleaming streets until she slowed her pace at the corner of a cobbled square, outside of a picture perfect old-style coffee shop. Aza grabbed Niamh by the shoulder and ducked under the striped awning in front of the slender blond. Aza’s piercing glare swept over the empty tables and chairs on the pavement and probed the dimly lit building. The door flew open, and a heavy set, balding man thundered over the cobblestones.
“I told you twenty years ago that your kind is not welcome in my establishment, boy.” The man’s voice was dripping with contempt as he stared down at Gabriel. Aza hissed and raised her right hand, but Niamh slipped out of her lieutenant's shadow and confronted the aggressor. The scowl melted away from the man’s handsome features, and he bowed his head. “Lady Ambassador, forgive me, we were not expecting your arrival. You honor us with your presence.”
Niamh returned his respectful nod, but her eyes were bright and beady, like a sparrow watching an earthworm. “Thorn, I apologize for not providing you with advance notice of our arrival. I’m afraid this is quite a sensitive situation, one that I am sure has not escaped the ever-watchful attention of the Demon population of the city, I am sure. You are greatly changed indeed if you no longer have ears on all corners of this majestic city.”
The burly Demon gave Niamh a sheepish smile and mumbled in acknowledgment. Niamh’s eyes flashed. “I would expect no less of you, Thorn. A representative of the Angelic Council will be meeting us here presently, I trust we can rely on your hospitality and discretion until they arrive to escort us to the University?”
Her tone suggested that Thorn would be braver than me if he chose to tell her that we couldn’t use his establishment as our meeting point. He swept his arms open and gestured toward the door. “But of course, Lady Ambassador. It would be my pleasure. Please, come inside.”
“No, thank you. An outside table is sufficient. Please don’t trouble yourself on our behalf, we expect to be leaving presently,” Niamh said.
Thorn dipped his head and started to back away from our motley crew. “If you will not come inside, you must at least accept a cup of chocolat. The children look exhausted.” His curious eyes feasted on us as he disappeared through the glass door and into the café. Lizzie and Emmanuel sat down at one table, Lucas and Megan sat down beside them.
Sam wandered to the edge of the awning and began to examine a brass plaque that was fixed onto the wall of the building adjacent to the café. Brandon ducked under Sam’s arm to get a closer look.
“Boastful gloating disguised as respect for the dead. Pomp and circumstance. I haven’t missed this place.” Gabriel’s lip curled as he watched Sam and Brandon examine the elegant monument. He dropped himself into a seat at the closest table. There were no other customers despite the hustle and bustle of the busy square. I perched myself on one of the wrought iron chairs surrounding the circular table.
A few feet away, a group of older gentlemen were playing chess with giant chess pieces on a board that had been set into the pavement. Every shop front was cleanly painted, every window was gleaming, and each cobblestone looked as though it might have been polished by hand. I struggled to reconcile the beauty around me with the terrifying city of my imaginings. The streets I’d pictured had been better matched to the dirty yard where we had met Niamh and Aza than they were to this urban paradise.
A little girl walked past holding her mother’s hand. Her soft curls fell down onto the collar of her red dress, and she stared at me with huge brown eyes as she passed. Instinctively, I lifted my hand to wave at her, and her round face split into a delighted grin. Her mother snatched the girl up into her arms and recoiled across the pavement, shielding the child from my view as she scurried down the street.
“Welcome to the Shadow City.” Gabriel’s eyes followed the Angel and her daughter until they disappeared out of sight. He arched his eyebrow. “So much for an understated entrance, that woman will be howling about the filthy blooded visitors before she rounds the next corner. Nothing has changed in the past two decades.”
Aza rested her elbows on the table. “Or in the thirty decades before that.”
For a moment, a flicker of warmth passed between Aza and Gabriel, but it was gone as quickly as the summer’s breeze. I watched strangers passing by out of the corner of my eye. “When you talked about the Angelic Council having their headquarters in the Shadow City, this is not what I pictured. This place is beautiful—like something out of a storybook. I’ve never seen anywhere so clean.” My gaze landed on an ornate clockwork model suspended above a watchmaker’s shop. “Everything is so perfect, it almost doesn’t seem real. I can’t imagine a place that looks less like a city of shadows than this one.”
Gabriel’s jaw hardened as he observed the picture-perfect scene around us. “All that glitters isn’t gold, Grace. The streets of this city are paved with lies and deceit.”
I scraped my fingernails against my palm. “I just didn’t expect it to be so… I thought it would be colder. Marble and glass, oversized statues of An
gels—that sort of thing.” I leaned further into the table and lowered my voice. “Are we in some pocket of reality? A piece of land concealed from all those who can’t see beyond the Veil? Like that desert you sent me to when you are sacrificing me to the Spirit Demons. Is this city a place like that?”
Gabriel threw his hands in the air and began to repeat his speech about how he hadn’t really been sacrificing me, but Aza stared at me like I was something she had wiped from the bottom of her shoe. “Is the Shadow City in a pocket of reality?”
“Well, it’s obviously not a real city, I’ve been all over the world and nowhere is this clean. It’s not natural. Anyone can see that. What I mean is, can the Humans enter here, or is it hidden by the Veil? Does it not exist on Human maps?”
Aza snorted and tossed a menu onto the table in front of me, face down so that I could see the address marked clearly on the back. “You still think you’re living in some kids’ TV show.” She shook her head and tapped a gold-tipped nail on the table beside the menu. “You’re not in Toy Town, Demon Child. You’re in Switzerland.”
My cheeks flushed, but before I had a chance to probe further, Gabriel, Emmanuel, and Lizzie shot into a standing position, hands poised over their concealed weapons and faces tight. I followed Emmanuel’s narrow glare to a point in the middle of the square and shrank back into my chair as the figure of a man appeared, as if from thin air. Two more figures appeared behind the first. Younger men, dressed in the distinctive black of the Guardians. Niamh extended her arm and gestured for the others to sit down.
Lizzie returned to her chair, and Gabriel followed suit, but he kept his hand tucked firmly around whatever was concealed inside his pocket. Only Emmanuel remained standing. His back was ramrod straight, and his face burned with the intensity of a spectrum of emotions, flickering from one to the next with such speed that I couldn’t identify them.
The man gliding over the cobblestones wore simple jeans and a button-down shirt that flattered his slight, unremarkable frame. In fact, everything about his appearance struck me as forgettable, except for his sharp, hazel eyes, which flicked over our small group with the lightning speed of vast intelligence as he reached the spot directly in front of us and came to a halt.
“High Guardian Adam, you honor us with your presence. I was told to expect a member of the High Council, but was unaware that its leader would be greeting us.” Even though Niamh was seated, and the Angel standing, she somehow gave the impression that she was looking down on him.
The High Guardian showed no visible response to Niamh’s tone. “Ambassador, always a pleasure. The Council felt it would be best if I led this meeting, given its unprecedented nature. The decision to open dialogue with the Shadow Children was not unanimous. I have taken personal responsibility for your… safety in the city. You know as well as I do that those who place the Veil at risk have forfeited their lives.” His gaze slid from Niamh’s face to Emmanuel’s, transforming into something razor sharp as it moved. “Isn’t that true, High Guardian Emmanuel?”
Chapter Twelve
“Emmanuel used to be the High Guardian? Head of the council of the most powerful Angels on the planet—how did we not know this?” Sam’s voice was gritty, scrubbed raw by the truth of Emmanuel’s past.
Brandon’s stare flitted warily from the head council and the older members of our group, who are walking ahead of us, to the two younger Angels stalking our steps. “Some people knew. There wasn’t a lick of surprise on Gabriel’s face. Or Lizzie’s.”
“Aza wasn’t shocked either. At least, I don’t think she was, I find it hard to read her features. She terrifies me.” Lucas made the shape of a cross with his fingers and pointed it in the direction of Aza’s back.
Megan rolled her eyes and started to nag Lucas about not being man enough to handle a strong woman. Sam stared in my direction, oblivious to their nervous high jinx. I could feel his gaze on the side of my face, but I refused to catch his eye. I gripped the shoulder straps of my rucksack and tried to memorize the route we were taking through the city.
“He’s taking you to the University.” I raised my eyebrows in surprise. The Angel who had spoken was the taller of the two guards, and his appearance was as remarkable and unique as the High Guardian’s had been bland. His lips were unsmiling, but unlike the other Guardian, who was watching us with undisguised contempt, his gray eyes were bright with curiosity. He nodded toward an island of parkland nestled between the busy streets. “It’s where the High Council meet. It was founded almost five hundred years—”
“Pierre!” The other Guardian shot him a warning look. “Ne dit pas grand chose. On ne peut leur faire confiance.”
Brandon rolled his eyes as we crossed the street and entered the University grounds. “Yeah, Pierre, listen to your friend. We lesser beings really shouldn’t be trusted. But you might want to give him a heads up—just because golden harps don’t start to play when we go for a crap, it doesn’t mean we can’t speak French. Or German. Or Italian—seriously, take your pick, friend. I’ve got you covered.”
The gray-eyed Guardian’s cheeks dimpled before settling into their practiced neutral stance. He shrugged off the rapid-fire questions being thrown at him in French from his colleague, and Megan and I exchanged an amused glance.
Lucas walked beside me stiffly, with his hand shoved into the pocket I knew housed his blade. He spoke in a low voice, regarding the Guardian’s warily. “What do you think that guy meant at the café? When he said he didn’t want Gabe’s sort around?”
I scrunched my mouth shut and exchanged a baffled look with Megan. Sam didn’t appear to be listening. Brandon drew his eyebrows together. “I wondered that too. I thought the owner meant he didn’t want Demons around his business when he said it to Gabe, at first, but that doesn’t fit—he’s a Demon himself. Maybe he means Shadow Children.”
Lucas nodded his head, but the creases in his forehead only deepened. Brandon and Megan walked along in silence, both of them with their arms crossed. Sam’s face was the only one I couldn’t see, but the set of his shoulders and the tightened muscles in his arms and back told me all I needed to know without using my powers. I fought the urge to take a step forward and thread my fingers through his.
The path took a sharp right, and we emerged in front of a large, stone structure. I craned my neck to appreciate the elegant lines and the stonework and smacked face first into Sam’s hard chest.
“Sorry.” I held my palms out and tried to sidestep him, but Sam blocked my way. The rest of our group had come to a halt outside an imposing building that seemed to be the focal point for the campus. I tried to walk past Sam again, but he caught me by the hand. Energy surged through my body, burning as it moved over every inch of my skin. I tugged my hand away and shoved it into my pocket, where it couldn’t embarrass me. “What do you want, Sam?”
He let his hand drop loosely by his side and shrugged his shoulders. “I wanted to check you were okay.”
“Am I okay with meeting the leaders of a race that wants people like me dead? Or, okay with breaking up with somebody I haven’t seen for six months, and who hasn’t returned my messages for weeks? Yeah, I’m good on both counts. It’s an awesome day. Thanks for the concern.” I squeezed my lips together and tried not to melt when he turned his mournful green stare on me. I shook my head and pushed past him. “Stop, Sam. Not now. I just can’t.”
Part of me wished he would grab me back and pull me into his arms, but he didn’t. I ground my teeth together as I joined the group, just in time to hear the High Guardian explain that the University was the global center of excellence for Angelic studies. I ran my gaze over the empty grounds and raised my eyebrows. The High Guardian tilted his head to one side. “Do you have a question, Miss…?”
“Grace. Just, Grace.” I crossed my arms in an attempt to hide my embarrassment. He raised his eyebrows and waited for me to continue. “I was just wondering where all the students are. It’s term time,
right?”
The High Guardian shifted his weight from one foot to the other before answering. “For your safety, a public service announcement was issued to the entire Angelic population of Switzerland.” He ran a hand over his jaw and then let it fall loosely at his side. “Everyone knows there are Shadow Children meeting the High Council today. They have been warned that action against their representatives has been forbidden—”
“But either your students fear that’s not possible, or they know that trouble awaits us and they don’t wish to get caught in the crossfire between their most powerful superiors and an enemy of unknown ability. Is that an accurate summation, Adam?” Gabriel practically spat the words out. Sam grunted in agreement, but the black-haired Demon kept his eyes narrowed on the High Guardian, Adam.
Brandon swiveled to examine the deserted gardens. “Are there are no Human students? This is a huge University, one of the best in the world; I’ve seen it on a ton of international league tables. Are Humans forbidden from entering the city?”
Brandon directed his question at Adam, but it was Aza who answered him. “Oh no, Humans are welcome in the City of Shadows, as long as they are the kind of Human who can make money flow like water in the financial district. Humans and Demons are always welcome, provided they keep their noses out of things that don’t concern them, and they keep the Angels in riches. But they’re not welcome at the precious University. Not anywhere with real power.”
A storm passed over Adam’s face, but before I could predict which emotion would win the battle, a group of students in training gear burst from a door at the side of the building lead by a strongly built blond woman. In a flash, the High Guardian stood between our group and the students. “Emily, there will be no training today. You should be inside with the rest of the Council, preparing for this evening.”
The Demon-Born Trilogy: (Complete Paranormal Fantasy Series) Page 36
