Angel Exalted

by C. L. Coffey

  “I cannot give you that answer, for I do not possess the same abilities as you.”

  Oh great… Cryptic Michael was here. “I am all for figuring things out on my own,” I told him, placing my hands on my hips. “But when somebody’s life is at stake, in these instances, I would think it would be a lot more beneficial to tell me what I need to do.”

  “Angel, I am not trying to be ambiguous,” Michael tried to assure me. “I do not share the same abilities as you. I have never tried to seek someone in a dream, much less try to defeat them. All I can tell you is that tonight, you would have failed the first objective before you had even considered the second.” He reached over and placed a hand on my shoulder. “I feel we should leave things here for tonight.”

  He didn’t give the opportunity to object before he disappeared.

  I sighed, ready to follow him, but something caught my eye down on a lower level of the Forum. It was Cupid and Caesar. The pair were off to one side, hidden from the majority of the crowds. I wasn’t sure what it was that held my attention, but my curiosity got the better of me, and I hurried down.

  Cupid was showering Caesar in hugs and kisses. “I was so worried about you,” Cupid kept repeating during the displays of affection. He looked so happy to see his… I frowned. Boyfriend? Lover? Friend? All of the above?

  Caesar was equally as reciprocate, doing his best to hold on to the archangel like he was afraid that letting go would mean they would never see each other again. Finally, although clutching tightly to his shoulders, Caesar took half a step back. “I thought I would never see you.”

  I realized then what it was that had drawn me over: Caesar himself. He had lost weight. His tanned skin was looking lifeless and sallow, and he was sporting scars around his wrists that looked similar to mine… he had been held captive somewhere.

  From how he had looked when I had last seen him to now, a significant period of time had passed.

  “I begged you not to leave,” Cupid murmured, still looking at the man with awe. “I had a bad feeling about that trip.”

  “Worry not, my love,” Caesar said. “I am here. The pirates who did this to me will not escape my wrath the next time I see them.”

  Cupid pulled back. “What do you mean?”

  “They held me captive for weeks,” Caesar explained, scowling as he stared at Cupid with a vacant look to his eyes, like he was recalling the events. “I promised them I would have my revenge and nail each and every one of them to a cross.”

  Cupid took another step back, his eyes wide with horror as he shook his head. “Julius, you cannot do that.”

  “An oath is an oath,” Caesar shrugged. “I am a man of my word and if I give leniency, many will believe that I will not follow through with my threats. When people do not take you seriously, how can you be expected to lead them.”

  There was a long pause as Cupid seemed to struggle for words. “You cannot do that,” he eventually managed.

  “The only way I would reconsider that, would be if you were to spend the rest of my life with me,” Caesar declared, fixing Cupid a pointed look. “Would you do that?”

  Cupid turned, raking a hand through his hair. He looked so conflicted I wanted to go over and punch Caesar before giving my friend a hug. Caesar was a douche and absolutely, one hundred percent, definitely not a person worthy of Cupid almost losing his wings over.

  “I loved him, Angel,” Cupid said – another Cupid – from beside me, making me jump.

  I looked up at my friend and pulled a face. “The guy is a jerk, and had I known you back then, I would have told you that.”

  “You cannot help who you fall for,” Cupid shrugged.

  “You really don’t see it? Even now?” I asked in disbelief.

  “I loved him,” Cupid repeated.

  I was trying to be objective, or at least non-judgmental, especially considering I was supposed to be an angel and judgment wasn’t my job (and it was also what I had been preaching to Paddy recently), but honestly, I wanted to slap Cupid as well as Julius Caesar. It was almost two thousand years later, and he still couldn’t let the guy go? Had it been two thousand years of dreams like this?

  Regardless of whether or not an angel and a human could be together, it was time Cupid let this go. He was immortal. Just how long was he going to keep pining over this idiot? As soon as I defeated Lucifer, I was going to work on this demon. “What did you do?” I asked with a sigh.

  “I told him I would,” Cupid said.

  “Why do I feel like you weren’t just saying that to stop him leaving?” I asked, wearily.

  “Because I had every intention of leaving Heaven to be with him.”

  I glanced at my friend beside me. “Yet you still have your wings?”

  “My charge almost died,” Cupid said, quietly. “I left him alone to spend time with Julius. When I did, someone tried to murder him. It was only luck that he survived.”

  I glowered at Caesar. I was willing to put money… okay, no, I was an angel and betting wasn’t allowed… I figured there was a very high probability that Caesar had had something to do with that. “What happened?”

  “Michael made me realize that my life was not more important than anyone else’s. Being with Julius would have been nothing more than me acting on my own selfish desires.”

  “How did Caesar take that?”

  “I introduced him to Pompeia: the woman who would be his next wife, hoping he would fall in love with her.”

  “It didn’t work?”

  Cupid slowly raised a shoulder. “He married her. But he also went after the pirates who had held him hostage. He told me he showed mercy when killing them, for my sake.”

  I could see exactly why so many people had stabbed Caesar. If I had been there, I would have been one to stab him too – regardless of whether I had wings or not. I sighed softly, giving Cupid a sympathetic smile. I didn’t have any siblings, but I felt like a protective older sister – even if he had millions of years on me. “How did you meet?” I asked, suddenly curious. I adored Cupid and I owed it to him to at least find that out. “How did you fall in love with him?”

  Cupid turned to me and chewed at his lip.

  I peered up at him. “Cupid, are you crying?”

  “You’re the first person to ask me that,” he said, quietly.

  “Huh?” I blinked a couple of times at him.

  “In all the years since I met Julius, you are the only person to ask how I fell in love with him,” he muttered. “Everyone else was only ever interested in telling me we could never be together.” He gave me a sad smile. “No one ever asked how I felt about him. Even Michael only wanted to warn me to stay away from him.”

  “I don’t want to speak for Michael, but I assume it’s because they were worried about losing you,” I said, sympathetically. “I mean, that’s what I assumed every time you warned me away from Joshua.”

  Cupid slowly nodded. “I wouldn’t wish the pain I felt on anyone. Not even one of the Fallen.”

  “How did you meet him?” I asked, again.

  “It was here, actually,” Cupid said, pointing to the spot the other version of him was. I glanced over and did a double take. That Cupid and Caesar were sharing a passionate kiss, only it looked like someone had hit pause. Dreams were weird. “I was walking around the Forum with my charge, and I bumped into him here.” There was a small pause, and then he stepped in front of me. “What do you know about Julius Caesar, Angel?”

  That was a good question. We had covered the Roman Empire back when I was in school in England. That was a while ago now. “He was a ruthless general. There was something about Cleopatra and Marc Antony, and then he was killed by a large group of people. But I’m not sure if what I remember is historically accurate, or from the Shakespeare play, which I didn’t care for because I don’t like ye olde English,” I shrugged. I really hadn’t paid that much attention in either of those subjects.

  Cupid sighed. “Most of it is true,” he admitted, alth
ough I wasn’t sure if he was referring to Shakespeare or the history books. “But not in the beginning. That’s the bit that most people gloss over because his later years were more exciting. I met Julius in 77 BCE. He hadn’t been back in Rome long. He’d been away in what is now Turkey, serving in the army. He’d returned home, finally, and become a lawyer. That was how I met him.”

  “This place is a court?” I asked, looking around the Forum with a frown.

  “No,” Cupid responded with a brief shake of his head. “But he was defending a young boy who had allegedly stolen something. Looking back now, it was like a scene from a movie. He was so noble and honorable in his actions.”

  “That was when you fell in love with him?” I asked. I had missed the part of Caesar’s history where he became a lawyer, but if that was the case, I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. Defending a child was pretty decent, but the Caesar I knew of had me questioning his motives.

  “That was when I met him, or at least when I first saw him,” he gave me a wistful smile. “Don’t worry. I’m not about to declare I fell in love with him at first sight. He just caught my attention. After that, it seemed I was always running into him. Rome wasn’t as big and populated as it is now. It wasn’t hard. Eventually, my charge met with him. We met through him. I ended up spending time with Julius. The moment I realized I had fallen in love with him was quite insignificant in terms of memorable events. We were in a bath house, and he was telling me about some food he had eaten on his journeys. That was the moment I realized I wanted to travel with him – to see him experience all these new things that had him talking so animatedly.”

  I looked over his shoulder to the frozen versions of him and Caesar. “I guess it’s true when they say you can’t help who you fall for,” I muttered. I sighed and looked back to this Cupid. “I get that, and I get that you were prepared to risk everything to be with him, but Cupid, surely you can see that he wasn’t as great as you saw him. He was pretty toxic.”

  “I know,” Cupid agreed.

  I stared up at him in disbelief. “You do? Then why are you still dreaming of him like this?”

  “Julius was the best and the worst thing to happen to me,” Cupid explained. “I fell in love and I found out what it meant to be prepared to give up everything for someone. I’m an angel. I’m not supposed to experience that, but I did and it was because of him. The reason I keep replaying this, is my own punishment. You carry your guilt for Lilah, and this is how I carry my guilt for Julius.”

  “You didn’t kill him,” I pointed out, gently. “I’m not trying to compare levels of guilt, but I literally ran my sword through an innocent human,” I added. The memory sent a shudder through me, which, had I been awake, would most certainly have been accompanied with a burst of pain – regardless of how much I’d slept or eaten.

  “I may not have been one of the men to inflict one of the 23 stab wounds that killed him, but if I had stuck with my choice, if I had left my charge and left Rome with Julius, he would never have become the ruthless tyrant he did. There wouldn’t have been tens of people out to kill him.”

  “Cupid, you cannot spend any more time feeling guilty because of what ifs,” I said firmly, aware of the irony as I said it. “Enough time has passed.”

  “Maybe,” Cupid shrugged.

  I sighed. I wish it would have been as simple as me telling him this, but he had been feeling this way for so long, I knew this wouldn’t be the last time he had this dream. As I’d also established when we’d discussed my progress over dinner, Cupid barely remembered anything.

  I reached over and pulled Cupid into a hug. If he were human, I would have got him back out there, dating again – creating new memories to dull the old.

  With my arms wrapped around Cupid, my gaze on the other Cupid and Caesar, I felt a big boulder of despair drop into the pit of my stomach. If I didn’t free Joshua from Lucifer, was this the future I could expect?

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Late Night Intrusion

  I had been correct in my guess that a few words with Cupid wouldn’t change his outlook on Caesar. That was evident the next time I entered his dream. Much as it upset me to see that, I had to stop myself from going to find Cupid and telling him to leave the past in the past. Unless I wanted this life myself, I had to focus on Joshua. Cupid had been reliving this for centuries. He could cope for a few more days, until I had defeated Lucifer.

  Then I would devote my time to helping my friend.

  It wasn’t until three nights later that I finally made a breakthrough. It wasn’t enough that I had managed to ‘defeat’ Michael, but I had found a way to find him without being detected. For a little while, at least.

  “You managed to become… me?” Cupid asked in disbelief, for the fourth time. The piece of fried chicken was still being held in his hands, uneaten, since the first time he asked the question.

  “While it is quite impressive, it is not the most effective way Angel should seek out Lucifer. As you can see from her appearance, she left that dream even weaker than normal.” Michael looked over at me with a frown. “You were only able to maintain that appearance for a short time too,” he added.

  Annoyingly, I didn’t have the energy to argue back. He was right. I was completely drained and struggling to find the energy to chew my own fried chicken. Heck, I was struggling to keep from faceplanting my plate and sleeping right there with my nose in a pot of coleslaw.

  “She just needs some more practice,” Cupid said.

  I shook my head. “I don’t have time for more practice,” I told him. It was the middle of January already. Lucifer had been in Joshua’s body for nearly a month.

  “I think you’re right about that,” Veronica said, appearing in the middle of the kitchen.

  “I don’t like that look,” Cupid muttered, staring at his friend.

  I agreed with him. Veronica looked worried. And if Veronica looked worried, then I sure as heck had my concerns.

  “We’ve spent all this time trying to find Joshua – trying to find Lucifer – that our attention has been away from one place we should have kept it.”

  “Paddy,” I said, my eyes growing wide as I comprehended exactly what she was saying.

  Veronica nodded, sliding onto the bench opposite me. “She’s had the angels leaving the convent to look for Joshua.”

  “I can’t do this anymore,” I set my chicken down, my appetite gone. “I know it’s supposed to help me and make me stronger, but it has been almost a month and now Paddy and the angels are hunting him? We don’t have time for this.”

  “Angel,” Michael sighed.

  I shook my head. “No, we’re finding Joshua.”

  “I think it’s a good idea,” Cupid agreed, quietly. “While we still have a chance to save him.

  I looked over at Cupid with a small frown. He didn’t remember most things from his dreams, but I couldn’t help but think that something had been retained from our last encounter, especially as he was unable to look me in the eye. Either way, I appreciated his support.

  Even if it did leave a knot in my stomach.

  “We should check in with Leon,” Michael said with reluctance.

  Veronica shook her head, the grim expression returning. “I already did,” she reported. “So far the NOPD have been unable to track Joshua or his car. Actually, that’s not strictly true,” she shrugged. “They found the Dodge Charger. He’d sold it.”

  “Could you try Dream Walking into his dreams?” Cupid suggested.

  It was my turn to look down and not meet his gaze. The truth was, despite how tired I was crawling into bed, I was still trying to enter his dreams.

  “Angel,” Michael sighed, disappointed with me.

  I shrugged. “He’s my charge, Michael. And despite the covenant, I still love him. I’m worried about him, and honestly, I’m surprised you thought I wouldn’t try,” I told him.

  “I fully expected you to try,” Michael admitted. “But that does not mean you should have d
one it,” he said.

  “Why not?” I asked, turning on the bench to face him fully as I brought my legs up under me. “I mean, if I go up against Lucifer in Joshua’s dreams, I’ll be doing it alone anyway.” Michael looked taken aback at that. “You thought you would come in with me?” I asked, frowning.

  Michael nodded. “I would never expect you to go up against Lucifer by yourself.” Michael slid out from the bench to stand, folding his arms as he walked over to the kitchen sink. He turned back to look at me. “It is evident from the last few weeks that you would not have the skill to defeat Lucifer, even with your mental abilities.”

  Wow, he knew how to make a girl feel good about herself. Even if he was stating the truth…

  “The problem is that you can’t do anything in there,” I told him. “In fact, you’re more likely to be at risk by being in there, because that’s a second person Lucifer could use against me.”

  “You would never need to make that choice,” Michael said, without even considering it. “Your focus and priority must always be Joshua.”

  I shrugged. “The easiest way for this to not even be a problem is for you not to be there to start with. So, end of discussion.”

  “Angel-”

  I shook my head at him. “No, I need you and Cupid and Veronica standing guard. If I have the likes of Paddy, Zachary, and a convent full of angels hunting Joshua and Lucifer, I need all of you to make sure that no harm comes to him while I’m trying to save him.”

  “And we need all the help we can get to defeat Lucifer if you fail,” Veronica stated, calmly.

  I sighed. At least she said ‘if’. “Veronica is right,” I agreed, reluctantly.

  As much as I hated to admit it, my chances of succeeding weren’t great. Even Michael had pointed that fact out several times now. “Yes,” Michael also agreed.

  Veronica snorted impatiently. “All of this still doesn’t explain how we’re going to capture Lucifer to do any of this.”

  “Actually,” I sighed, “I have a plan. And it starts with a trip to the morgue.”