“Let’s have a look at that shoulder, old boy,” said Ignatius, forcing Grimm to take a seat in the kitchen. Grimm grumbled but let his friend apply badly needed antiseptic and bandages to his chest and shoulder.
“Did you manage to open the sluice gate?” asked Ignatius.
“Yep,” said Grimm. “The pond should be empty by morning.”
“Excellent. And did you retrieve Raven’s corpse?”
“Well, sort of. I was checking the body when I found something on a chain round her neck. No sooner had I unfastened it than her body burst into flames. It looks like the one Rook was wearing before I knocked it off him. Come to think of it, he caught fire shortly afterward too. I think it confirms Jonathan’s theory.”
“What does?” asked Jonathan, walking into the kitchen and slumping wearily into a chair.
“This vial,” said Ignatius, holding it up to the light and peering at the tiny black shard inside. “You figured it out, my boy. You figured out how the Corvidae could get in. Very well done.”
“So they were using pieces of Gabriel’s wings to shield themselves?” asked Jonathan.
Ignatius nodded. “Belial could never enter Hobbes End himself—there’s no hiding the power of an archdemon—but the Corvidae are a different matter. Belial must have known what the meteorite really was, so he stole it and used it to hide what he was up to.”
Grimm frowned. “But how did a bit of Gabriel’s wings hide the Corvidae from the village?”
“It’s deceptively simple,” said Ignatius. “The wing is the angel, the angel is the wing. There is no difference. Hobbes End is sentient because so much of Gabriel’s power is here, burned into the earth beneath the pond. Just like his wings, Hobbes End is part of him. When the Corvidae wore these vials containing fragments of his wings, they were hidden beneath a cloak of grace. No wonder the village was so uneasy; it could sense the Corvidae but it just couldn’t see them!” He opened the vial and tipped the contents into his hand. They all peered at what looked like a small sliver of charcoal, then gasped as it crumbled to dust in front of their eyes.
“What just happened?” asked Jonathan.
“Hobbes End has taken Gabriel’s power back,” said Ignatius. “It couldn’t see the demons while they had possession of these fragments, but it gradually sucked the power from them. The Corvidae would have had to replace them each time they came back here.”
“Do you think they’ve run out of meteorite?” asked Grimm.
“I don’t think it matters now,” said Ignatius. “Two of the Corvidae are dead, and Crow isn’t going to come back in a hurry, nor does he need to. Belial has the leverage he requires.”
Jonathan went pale at the thought of Cay being used as a hostage, as a bargaining chip.
“Are you all right?” asked Grimm.
“No,” said Jonathan. “I lost control yesterday and it almost killed me.” He bit his lip. “And I just keep seeing Cay’s face when she saw what I’d done to Crow. So Belial’s taken my entire family, and now he’s taken my friend too. I just don’t know what to do. I want to help, but I daren’t use my wings again—it’s too dangerous. The thought of Cay being hurt and alone, though, makes me feel sick.”
“We know, Jonathan,” Ignatius reassured him. “But there’s nothing we can do now apart from get patched up and wait. Belial wants something, and I bet we find out what it is very soon.”
“Why didn’t Crow take me, too?” asked Jonathan. “I was in so much pain, I couldn’t fight back. I thought Belial wanted me.”
Ignatius paused in his bandaging of Grimm’s shoulder and stared at Jonathan. “You’re right,” he said. “That is strange. Why would he take Cay when he could easily have taken you? Belial won’t have given up on his plans, so why leave you behind, unless . . . ?”
“Unless what?” said Jonathan.
“Unless Belial needs you here,” said Ignatius, his brow furrowed in thought.
“There’s only one thing it could be,” said Jonathan. “He knows about my grandfather’s clock—the key he was building to let me into Heaven. Belial doesn’t just want me, he wants a way into Heaven too! The Corvidae have been lurking about, listening and watching, so they found out what Gabriel was building and waited for him to finish it before they took him.”
“But they didn’t manage to get hold of it?” said Ignatius. “Perhaps Gabriel managed to hide it from them somehow. Hide it somewhere that they can’t go.”
“Like somewhere that only an angel can get to,” said Elgar, vigorously cleaning Rook’s dusty remains from his ears with a cotton bud.
“Or someone with angelic blood, maybe?” said Ignatius.
Jonathan put his head in his hands as everything fell into place. “That’s why they took Cay, isn’t it? She’s a hostage. With Belial holding my dad, and Gabriel and Cay prisoner, he knows that I’ll do whatever he wants. I don’t have a choice.”
Ignatius put a reassuring hand on Jonathan’s shoulder. “I think that’s the likely explanation, but we have to wait. The fact that Belial may want something from you gives us time to figure out how to beat him.”
Jonathan nodded, but he was at a loss as to how they would save Cay, Gabriel, and his father. Belial seemed to be ahead of them every step of the way.
“I hope my mom’s managed to get to Lucifer,” he said. “At least she’ll be safe.”
“We can but hope, Jonathan,” said Ignatius. “We can but hope.”
Jonathan nodded, but he felt more empty than he’d thought possible.
“Right, then,” said Ignatius. “Grimm, would you please attend to my leg before I pass out from loss of blood?” Swapping seats, he gingerly placed his foot on a spare chair while, with the aid of adhesive stitches and a lot of gauze, Grimm began fixing the mess Raven had made of Ignatius’s leg.
“Oh, that reminds me,” Grimm said, turning to look at the cat. “Rook recognized you before he exploded. Called you a traitor. What was all that about?”
“Well, it’s like this,” said Elgar, raising a paw for emphasis. “I’m not—”
“Not really a cat,” said Ignatius. “Haven’t either of you figured that out yet?”
An astonished silence was his response.
“I guess that means no. Come here, Elgar.” Ignatius pointed to his outstretched legs. “Just mind my war wounds, if you please.”
“Here we go!” said Elgar. With great reluctance he clambered out of the sink and walked over to sit on Ignatius’s lap. “I’ll get my things,” he offered. “I haven’t got much. Just an old chew toy and a packet of kippers in the fridge.”
“Oh, stop it!” said Ignatius, tapping Elgar gently on the nose. “You know very well that I wouldn’t send you away, little demon. You’re like family after all this time.”
Gasps erupted from Jonathan and Grimm.
“Oh, great! Now everyone knows my big secret. I may be a bit morally flexible, but I’m not evil.”
“I know you’re not,” said Ignatius.
“Phew!” said Elgar. He paused to glare at Grimm. “What are you smiling at? I may be a demon, but I’m not like Rook. Not all demons are bad, you know. And not all angels are good. Lucifer, anyone?”
Grimm lifted both hands in a gesture of surrender. “Okay, okay, point taken. You don’t have to prove yourself to me, cat. You did a cracking job today.”
“Why, thank you,” said Elgar, gesturing regally. “You may feed me now.”
“Don’t push it!” growled Grimm.
“Well, I know your story’s a fascinating one, Elgar,” said Ignatius, lifting the cat from his lap. “And I’m sure everyone would like to hear it. But since Grimm’s finished patching me up, I’m going to get some rest. It’s been a long day, and I have a feeling that tomorrow will require a clear head.” He limped out of the kitchen, chuckling to himself as he went. “Whoever heard of a talking cat? Honestly!”
“Now I’ve heard everything,” said Grimm. “More tea, anyone?”
Cay felt disor
iented and sick. She’d been bound, gagged, blindfolded, and tossed over Crow’s shoulder. She then suffered a long and uncomfortable trip through the forest while dangling upside down.
Her head was awhirl. What about Mom and Dad, Jonathan, and everyone else? What was going on? She tried to struggle, but the demon’s one remaining arm clamped her so tightly, she began to have trouble breathing. Deciding that nothing could be gained from panic, she stopped resisting and waited to see what happened.
Eventually the demon came to a halt, and Cay felt herself lowered onto a blanket. Her hands were untied, and she heard a metallic clunk as a lid was closed above her. Ripping off her blindfold and gag, she realized that she was in a car trunk.
Shouting to be let out, she hammered on the inside of the trunk and kicked the back of the seats, but there was no response. The car pulled away, and she braced her feet against the bulkhead to stop herself from being thrown about.
The journey was interminable. Hot, half suffocated, and with painfully cramped muscles, Cay was too tired to feel anything but relief when the car finally came to a halt. She heard the sound of doors being opened and closed, then the crunch of footsteps on gravel. The trunk opened, and bright light flooded in.
With even less ceremony than before, Crow grabbed her, threw her back over his shoulder, and marched off. She hung upside down, unable to resist, as she was carried through a doorway, up a large staircase, through another door, and into what looked like a study.
Crow lifted Cay from his shoulder and stood her on her feet, but she sank to her knees, too tired to stay upright. The floor was covered with deep pile carpet, and she immediately just wanted to curl up on it and go to sleep, but all thoughts of sleeping were rudely shoved aside when the swivel chair behind the desk in front of her spun round. In it sat a tall man with the coldest eyes she’d ever seen.
“Ah, Miss Forrester, I presume?” He stepped out from behind his desk and walked up to Cay, and she felt herself trembling as a nameless fear washed through her. His face was little more than diseased tissue paper stretched tight over his skull, and here and there the skin would pulse and ripple, like cockroaches under thinly sliced ham.
Taking Cay’s chin gently in his hand, the man leaned in close and looked her straight in the eyes. “I’m Belial,” he said. “And you, my dear, are going to help me acquire both Jonathan and Gabriel’s clock, whether you want to or not.”
Cay returned Belial’s stare until the stench of decay leeching from him began to choke her—it was like rotten meat being cooked on a barbecue. She knew Belial was supposed to be an archdemon, but she hadn’t really given much thought to what an archdemon actually looked like. This decomposing corpse in a suit was not, however, what she’d expected.
“Where’s Gabriel?” she demanded, struggling to quell the fear that filled her. “Where’s Jonathan’s dad? If you’ve hurt either of them, Jonathan’s going to take you apart!”
“Well, he certainly seems to have disarmed Crow.” Belial chuckled. “The boy is shaping up nicely. With him under my control there’s nothing that can stand in my way, not even Lucifer. And as for my collection of angels, you’ll find out about them in due course.” Leaving Cay shaking with nausea and dread, he turned his attention to Crow. “I take it the absence of Rook and Raven means they underestimated the Reverend Crumb and his friends yet again?”
Crow nodded, clutching at the awful wound on his shoulder.
Belial gave a derisive snort. “Go and get patched up,” he ordered. “You’re dripping on the carpet.”
The demon shuffled from the room, leaving the terrified Cay alone with her captor.
“Right,” he said. “Follow me, Miss Forrester.”
Too scared to disobey, Cay followed Belial out of his office, along a hallway, and into a well-appointed suite of rooms. Tied to a chair in front of the window was Gabriel. His body sagged in its restraints, and his long, unbound hair fell forward, hiding his face.
“I’ll be back,” said Belial, leaving the room and locking the door behind him.
Cay ran over to the old angel and untied the ropes that bound him. “Gabriel?” she cried, shaking his shoulder. “Gabriel, can you hear me?”
The angel slowly raised his head, as if the effort of doing so was more than he could bear, and his hair fell back to reveal a crude bandage covering the upper part of his face. The bottom of the bandage was crusted with dried blood.
“Oh God!” gasped Cay. “What has he done to you?”
Gabriel squeezed her hand and moaned. “He took my eyes, child. He took my son, and then . . . then he took my eyes.”
Squeezing his hand in return, Cay did the only thing she could for Gabriel. She wept for him.
Dawn broke over Hobbes End. On the patio, a bleary-eyed Grimm sat on an old deck chair and nursed yet another mug of hot tea. His injuries ached too much to allow him to nod off for long, so he’d decided to sit and watch the sunrise instead. Beside him, curled up on a cushion, was Elgar.
Upstairs in his room, Jonathan tossed and turned as he dreamed of Cay. She was flying her kite and kept being pulled farther and farther away from him. He tried to run after her, but his feet wouldn’t move.
“Cay! Wait!” he shouted, but she was gone, leaving him alone in the dark.
Bolting upright, his chest heaving with phantom exertion, Jonathan realized that he wasn’t going to be able to sleep any more. He swung his legs out of bed, wrapped himself in a blanket, and went downstairs to make himself some hot chocolate. Hearing voices outside, he peered through the window and saw Grimm and Elgar sitting on the patio. Desperately needing company, Jonathan went outside to join them.
“’Ello, ’ello,” said Grimm. “Can’t sleep either, eh?”
“No,” said Jonathan. “I keep dreaming about Cay.”
“Well, come and join us. Elgar was about to tell me how he ended up as a cat!”
Grabbing a chair from the kitchen, Jonathan perched himself next to Elgar. Cocooned in his blanket, he listened to his friends talk, relieved to have something to take his mind off Cay.
“I was just asking Elgar why he didn’t tell me he was a demon when he first arrived,” Grimm said.
“Because everyone thinks all demons are evil,” Elgar replied sleepily. “Which is, of course, bilge. Take Jonathan’s mom, for example.”
“She may be a demon,” said Jonathan, “but I do know she definitely isn’t evil.”
“Well said, lad,” nodded Grimm, flexing his injured shoulder and wincing as pain shot up his arm. “But, Elgar, if the village let you in without burning you to a crisp, then why would I turn you away?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” The cat sighed. “After everything I’d been through I didn’t want to have to keep on running.”
“What were you running from?” asked Jonathan.
“I’m getting to that,” said Elgar. “Look, Hell’s a big place. There are umpteen different tribes covering an area that makes Heaven look like a postage stamp. Sure, you get your hordes of darkness following the archdemons around, but Hell’s changing. More and more tribes are getting fed up with the constant backstabbing, fighting, and drunken dinner parties, so they’re looking for an alternative.”
“Such as?” asked Grimm.
“Such as the area Lucifer controls,” replied Elgar. “He’s not like the three archdemons; in fact, trying to figure out what’s going on in his head is pointless. Lucifer’s not good or evil; he’s just very, very scary. Scary enough for the archdemons to leave him alone, even when they’d like nothing more than to duff him up.”
“So where do you fit in?” asked Jonathan.
“Well, my parents live in the part of Hell controlled by Belial, but they wanted to leave and go to the bit controlled by Lucifer. Belial found out about this and decided to pay my family a visit, persuade them to stay, if you get my drift.”
“That doesn’t sound good,” said Jonathan. “What does an archdemon like Belial look like, anyway?”
�
�Not the way you’d expect,” said Elgar. “Demons come in all shapes and sizes. Rubbery puddles with tentacles, giant insects, funny-looking things with animal heads, and humanoid ones like my family and your mom. Belial chooses to appear human, but like he’s been dead for a couple of weeks.”
Jonathan swallowed hard. “What did he do to your family?” he asked.
“He sent in the Corvidae to beat my parents and big brother to a pulp for daring to challenge his authority.”
“I’m so sorry, cat,” said Grimm. “If I’d been there, I’d have given them what for!”
“Yeah, I know you would. Mom and Dad wanted to accept their punishment so nobody else would get hurt, but I had other ideas. I waded into the Corvidae as best I could and gave my brother time to get away. I got the stuffing beaten out of me, of course, but it was worth it. Belial was furious. He said that since I was so badly housetrained, maybe I’d enjoy life more as a pet. He turned me into a cat, which, I might add, is a very painful experience. Then he threw me out of Hell and told me that if I ever set foot inside it again, I’d be killed on sight.”
“But that’s awful,” said Jonathan. “Do you know what happened to your family?”
“No, I don’t. If my brother managed to escape, then hopefully he’ll have been able to get an audience with Lucifer. There’s always an outside chance that he might help. But you never know with him; fallen angels can be so testy. I thought about trying to see him myself, but I was too scared that Belial would catch me.”
Jonathan and Grimm just nodded, not knowing what to say.
“So I had no option but to run, and after wandering around for a bit I found myself here. Now it seems that Belial and the Corvidae have managed to catch up with me anyway. Why does the universe insist on farting in my face every chance it gets? Anyway, thanks for killing Rook, Grimm. It gave me a real sense of . . . umm . . . what’s that German word that means shameful joy?”
“Schadenfreude?”
“That’s the one!”
Feeling sad for his friend, Jonathan scratched Elgar gently behind the ears while Grimm placed his mug of tea on the patio for the cat to have a drink.
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