by Jenn Stark
“No, you’re not,” Franks snapped back. “You are a liar, the father of lies. And you’re not welcome—”
“Father, please, stop,” Dana cut in, laying a hand on the priest’s arm. A hand the priest ignored, and her words came more quickly, more urgently. “This is Finn Schaeffer. A—a doctor I met tonight. He helped me when those men outside attacked me, and—” She slid a look at Finn. “I probably wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t come along when he did.”
Father Franks frowned, turning to her. “He helped you? How?”
She grimaced, as if trying to put it together herself. “He—scared the men off, most of them. When others followed we…ran here.” She looked away from the priest, and Finn could see her mind stumble over the improbability of their escape. They’d outrun a car racing toward them at full speed. They’d outrun bullets. “We ran…really fast,” she ended faintly.
Franks’s brows rose. “He led you to a church?” When Dana didn’t respond, the priest snorted, shaking his head. “His name isn’t Schaeffer. His kind have no last names.” The priest tilted his head, his smile calculating as he stared hard at Finn. “But since you are here as a friend, Finn, come. A tour of our Lord’s house is in order.”
Franks turned sharply away from them, striding deeper into the building. In his wake, the walls closed in, pressing down on Finn. Stifling him. Still, if he wanted to reach Lester tonight, he had no choice but to follow. If he turned and fled, as every muscle and nerve in his body was imploring him to, then Dana’s trust would be lost to him. The hours wasted seeking out Lester without her could be enough to ruin the entire mission. There was no choice here.
He took one step toward where the priest beckoned, then another. I have the blessing of the archangel, he reminded himself. I’m a Fallen, not a demon. For the next twenty-two hours, anyway.
Dana stepped close to him. “What’s the hang-up between you two? Why doesn’t he like you?” she asked, her words a tight whisper. “Are you a Baptist or something?”
“No.” Finn slanted her a quick look. “He thinks I’m a demon.”
She snorted. “Well, don’t take it personally. We get a lot of those in Cleveland.”
He stopped to consider her. She really didn’t know who or what he was; not yet, anyway. He didn’t know if he should envy or pity her. It was probably best that she remained in the dark, though. Humans were so frail…
Speaking of…
“You’ve stopped bleeding.” He gently touched the side of her head, but Dana jerked away.
Too late, he realized his mistake. Energy arced between them, a tangible spark that leapt from his body to hers, seeking to finish the process he had already begun. She clearly felt it too and briefly touched the wall to steady herself.
She’d been injured again in the fight, he thought. She was only human, after all.
“Are you all right?” he asked, knowing the sensation of his touch still moved through her. Millennia of pent-up energy that clearly couldn’t be contained. He’d have to be more careful.
“I’m fine,” she said, unwilling to meet his gaze. “Shaken up a bit, is all. And the cut—wasn’t deep.” She wiped her palms on her pants as Father Franks paused at the door to the sanctuary, watching as he pulled a set of keys away from his belt like a man about to unlock a torture chamber. “Seriously, how does Father Franks know you?”
“He doesn’t,” Finn said. “He only thinks he does.”
The door to the church boomed open, and Franks looked up from the end of the dark hall, his lips twisting into a sneer. “He cannot hide what he is before God. No one can hide here.” He gestured grandly with his arm. “After you, ‘Finn.’”
Finn met the human’s glare, every instinct in his body crying out at the thought of entering a house of God. He’d done so before as a demon a handful of times, always under duress, and always at the request of humans, who didn’t so much care about the pain their demand would bring, who cared only about ridding themselves of other members of the horde who were strong enough to defile sacred ground.
That took a pretty strong demon.
But for all the injuries Finn had endured at the hands of his foul brethren, none of it could compare to walking into a church. Much less a fully consecrated cathedral.
He knew what was to come. The radiance of this holy place, built by faith alone, would arrow through him, flaying open his skin, laying his spirit bare for punishment. The focused energy of a million devout souls—present, past, and future—driving into him, seeking to destroy him. For he was a creature forged without hope, with no beginning and no end. He was a creature that knew no being greater than himself. And for his pride, for his emptiness, he must pay the consummate price whenever he walked among the true believers of this world.
Finn stepped past Father Franks, and through the cathedral doors.
Light exploded around him. The church was still, slumbering in anticipation of its holiest of days, but the blaring of illumination that assaulted him came not from man-made fixtures, not from the candles wavering in the sterile, frigid silence. It came from the very stones of the cathedral, from the wood of the carved frieze that he stumbled past on his way to the grand altar, and from the thousands of panels of richly stained glass trapped within huge vaulted windows. The luminescence rained down on him, the glass alight with the memory of the arcing, piercing rays of sunshine that showered the blessed with purples, reds, and blues.
And…there was no pain for him here.
The cathedral didn’t hurt him.
It welcomed him.
Under the cathedral’s radiant fire, Finn forced himself forward, half-blind with wonder, taking in the majestic rose window blossoming above the Hand of God, the Madonna portrait deep within the opposite alcove, surrounded by the stars of heaven. He cast his gaze skyward, and the images of Revelations opened before his eyes, peeking out from the elaborately carved arched ceiling, shining down on him in beautiful, glorious relief.
Behind him, he knew that Dana and the priest had also advanced into the room, could hear them speaking in hushed, angry tones, but he could not yet face their curiosity, their questions, the poking, prodding inquisition of children at the zoo. Despite his shock at his own reaction, despite the faint, twisting horror of the demon lurking in his soul, Finn spread his arms, reveling in every last mote of wonder and awe that this sanctified place of God would spare him.
He drew in a long, shuddering breath, then straightened, forcing himself to focus.
“You have a lovely cathedral, Father,” he said, turning to the priest, burying the demon far beneath the impermeable layer of his Fallen status. “I’m glad it has you to care for it.”
Father Franks, it appeared, wasn’t wholly convinced.
The old man strode forward, words of ancient Latin spilling from his lips as Dana’s eyes flew wide, her hand rising to her mouth. In his right hand, the priest brandished a crucifix, and Finn managed a short, brutal laugh. All these millennia later, and the tools of the priesthood remained the same. “What, no surplice?” he asked. “No stole?”
“The arrogant have risen against me; the ruthless seek my life.” The priest’s voice lifted, the Latin incantation rich and fulsome in the cathedral’s hushed beauty. He held out the crucifix, and Finn narrowed his eyes.
“It’s not your words that can harm me, priest,” he said, though pain pricked at him, deep inside. “Not in the way you believe. Not anymore.”
Franks didn’t condescend to reply, and Finn almost smiled. Catholic exorcists never gave in to a demon’s tendency to chatter: that was the way of the rabbis. Different lore, different tools.
But Finn did not have time to placate Father Franks, especially when the priest lifted the crucifix even higher, like a weapon, and stepped closer to Finn with fire in his eyes. To Finn’s heightened senses, the crucifix glowed with the power infused in it by its makers, and by the holy men and women who had carried it ever since. Believing in it, trusting it. Transferring their
energy to it.
Even as a Fallen, this was going to hurt.
Slowly, deliberately, Finn reached out with his left hand to grasp the golden cross, knowing the effort would cost him—but that it would cost the good father more. With a quick, decisive movement, he pulled the crucifix from the priest’s fingers.
Franks’s face flamed red as the cross jolted Finn with a screaming hiss of energy. “Blasphemer!” Franks cried, and with the speed of a trained boxer, the priest pulled his arm close into his body, then released a vicious uppercut that caught Finn squarely on the chin, forcing his head back with a snap.
Dana shouted in surprise, and Finn gaped at the priest, for a moment not even fully registering that the old man was swinging at him again.
But only for a moment.
As Franks completed his motion, Finn’s right hand lashed out and stayed the priest’s fist with no effort at all. The mortal was strong, determined, but his faith held more power than the thrust of his arm. Fortunately, humans never seemed to figure that out.
“I am not who you think I am,” Finn repeated tightly, the pain in his left hand dialing up, channeling the cathedral’s energy currents through him like a lightning rod. “I have the blessing of the archangel of the Lord. I mean you no harm.”
“Father!” Dana was between them suddenly, pulling on the priest’s shoulder until he faced her. “Stop it, seriously. Finn is a friend. That’s what’s important here. He saved me from some seriously bad guys out there. And you”—she turned on Finn, her gaze hard and implacable—“are clearly not a doctor or a priest. So you can start explaining the whole ‘blessing of the archangel’ business this second because I am all ears.”
Dana’s voice rang off the walls, but even as it echoed, Finn and the priest locked eyes again. Neither of them moved as they glared at each other. Neither spoke. Finn’s eyes bored into the priest’s bitter, lost face, so much emotion raging across it that Finn knew this was not the only battle that the priest had fought. There was darkness in those eyes. The darkness of betrayal, loss, and boundless, unbearable sorrow.
Not all of the priest’s demons resided in the world around him.
“Reveal yourself, then,” Franks spit out, staring fiercely into Finn’s eyes. “Reveal yourself as what you are, an angel of the Fallen, and I will stand down and let God wreak his vengeance upon you.” Franks’s entire body shook with a combination of fear and rage, but his face was resolute. The priest fully intended to land another punch, then another. As many as it took to bring Finn down.
Finn grimaced. If every mortal gave him as much trouble as Dana and this priest, he’d never get the list delivered.
“I’m not here to harm you or any of your kind,” Finn said again as the priest’s eyes raked over him. “I’m a messenger.”
“So you’re, ah, an angel?” Dana interjected, though it was clear she didn’t believe that was possible.
“Not exactly.”
“Oh, not exactly.” Her tone was measured, skeptical but not unkind. Probably the way she’d talk to a child, Finn thought. Or someone on drugs. “A demon, then.”
Finn grimaced. “Not exactly that either.”
“Right.” She peered at him, her eyes narrowing. “Do not tell me you’re an alien.”
Finn opened his mouth to respond, but Father Franks’s horror-struck gasp cut him short, the priest’s gaze riveted on Finn’s wrist, which had edged out of the pristine French cuffs of his starched white shirt.
“Heavenly Father, no,” the priest breathed. “You bear his mark.”
Finn pulled his hand away sharply, stepping back from Father Franks as the old man stumbled forward. Dana was there to catch the priest, her arms going around him even as he looked at Finn with newfound dismay.
Finn glanced down, then up again, glaring at the priest, whose entire demeanor had changed. The man looked miserable, stricken at what he’d seen on Finn. And, sure enough, there was something there on Finn’s skin. On his interior right wrist, a mark had appeared, one he’d never seen before. A kind of cross and circle design, with the four arms of the cross extending beyond the edge of the circle at differing lengths, like a poorly drawn Sun Cross or a ragged crosshairs mark. He had no idea what it was—but the priest clearly did.
“Who?” Finn practically growled, instantly thinking of the rogue Fallen. Probably made sense that there was a way to identify Fallens to humans, though he’d never considered it before. “Who else do you know who bore this mark?”
The priest blinked at him, his eyes haggard and confused, the flush of his cheeks fading to a dull gray. “He was…a holy man, they said, once upon a time,” he said quietly, as if from far off. He leaned against Dana almost unconsciously, and she held him up with an equal abstraction, as if she was born to the task. “His name was Bartholomew. And I—I’ve felt his presence again recently. Here in this city. I believed…hoped I was mistaken.” He swallowed, half shuddering, then turned his sorrowful gaze on Finn. “I see now that I was not.”
Chapter Nine
Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist
Cleveland, Ohio
3:20 a.m., Dec. 24
Father Franks shrugged off Dana’s hands, and she stepped back, wary and vigilant. Her career had taught her when to shut up and watch, and this was one of those times. She’d also known, vaguely, that the priest served the diocese as an exorcist, but she’d never seen him haul out a crucifix and accost someone. He and her father had been best friends, and he’d never mentioned the priest doing anything like that. Of course, he’d never talked about the priest at all, so maybe they’d been out fighting demons together all those nights her father had left her alone in the apartment, watching reruns of the WWE, while her mother was out with her tennis friends.
Dana took in Franks’s disheveled clothes, his wild hair, and haggard eyes. He’d clearly thought Finn was a demon or at least some seriously effed-up angel, and given Finn’s bizarre responses to her questions, she couldn’t fault the priest for that one either. She’d encountered two separate people who’d thought they were possessed since she’d started working in security, and both had been seriously scary souls.
Finn didn’t give any indication that he was about to start foaming at the mouth, and he didn’t have a tail, but she clearly needed to be more careful around him. Her mind went instantly to her leg and how he’d seemed to almost magically heal it…then to their unreasonable speed in evading attackers who had looked like demons. Creatures who’d bled black goop instead of blood.
Yeah. She was going to need to be a lot more careful.
But Father Franks now stood hunched in on himself, a criminal forced to the point of confession. Dana’s nerves hummed with the pressure in the room, but she couldn’t speak, couldn’t think. She could barely draw breath.
Finn held out the slender gold crucifix, and Father Franks took the cross, his eyes cast down, his shoulders slumping as he cradled the sacred object. Dana shoved her hands into the pockets of her jacket, grateful for the reassuring feel of her cell phone. So if Finn wasn’t a demon or a straight-up angel…what the hell was he? And who was this Bartholomew character who was distressing Father Franks so much?
A headache thrummed behind Dana’s eyes, tiring her further, but she pulled her phone free, swiping it on. Someone had aimed a gun at them from a limo. Someone who hadn’t been one of the slobbering creatures in the streets. Barely looking at the device, she keyed in the name Bartholomew and sent the text to Max. First-name-only searches were a nightmare in a city the size of Cleveland, but it was Christmas, after all. And she’d been a very good girl this year.
She replaced the phone as Franks turned and placed the cross on the altar, resting his palm flat on the cool marble for a moment before lifting his gaze heavenward, staring up at the enormous wooden screen behind the altar. The saints glared back down at him, unrelenting. Then he spoke, his powerful voice calm, almost eerily flat.
“I hadn’t been a priest for very long when I receiv
ed the call from Rome. It happened to many young men who showed an aptitude for learning, they said, for languages and history. New priests who fit a certain profile. I had become a servant of the Lord with such zeal, determined to make a difference, convinced that I could succeed where so many others had failed.” He shook his head at the memory. “I was told my service in Rome would bring me great spiritual reward. I would study ancient languages, assist the Vatican in matters of clerical importance for a few years, then return to run a parish of my own in some large city, wherever the need was greatest.”
Franks’s voice strengthened as he spoke. “When I arrived in Rome, it was much as they said for the first year. I studied constantly, translating texts, learning and relearning Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic. I memorized arcane rites, ancient arts of spiritual healing, incantations to return evil to its hell. All for the supposed purpose of cataloguing these instructions to fill the Vatican library with yet one more research text. It seemed a colossal waste of time for me. I yearned to preach God’s word to the people, to guide a flock of my own. I knew I could turn them from their paths of ruin, help them find the way to the Father.” His lips twisted. “It was my arrogance that had drawn their attention, you see.”
“Who?” Dana asked, but the priest went on. She thought of Franks with the crucifix, his bold confrontation with Finn. His bent but still-powerful frame. The way his hands had held the holy relic. This man had been her father’s best friend, yet she hadn’t known him at all.
Something clicked inside Dana, a door unlatching. She gripped her hands tight, willing her mind to be quiet and listen.
Franks lifted his eyes to the ceiling, as if he was tracing the patterns of stars tucked into the shadowed archways. “And then it came—a new summons, to a new cathedral. Not so very far away from Rome, barely over the border and into France. A special meeting for me, I was told. A special test in Lyon.”
“Lyon?” Finn asked sharply. Franks turned to him, his eyes bright with unspilled emotion.
