Sword's Blessing

by Kaitlin R. Branch

  Eli took three large steps and was peering over her crown. He grunted. “Angels, no mistaking the light.”

  “What is it?”

  “When they drop their glamor, their wings and swords glow, night or day.”

  There was a screech, a word, or a name. Samantha looked around, however, it appeared no one but she and Eli had heard it. “Someone has an area lock on that lot.”

  “Upper ability. We know the Angels are young…the Damned must be pretty high up.”

  “Who is it?” Samantha crept forward, pressing her hands against the fabric of the two tents beside her. Its plasticized fabric made zipping noises as the slid through and eyed the fight from the shadows.

  “Cyrene,” Eli whispered. “Shit. Samantha, look what she’s done.”

  Samantha pressed her lips together. The woman had a sword out and was charging Cyrene over and over to no avail. The Damned woman just kept deflecting the sword, which only made the Angel more frantic. Cyrene laughed, and as she shifted her weight Samantha saw what the true measure of the battle was. “That’s the man. The Angel man.”

  “Haven’t seen her in six months and she’s hardly changed her MO,” Eli growled.

  “Eli…”

  “I know, Sam. Let’s go.” He sighed, smiling. “Walking into a fight to save a pair of Angels. Life’s weird, love.”

  “You forgot the ‘sleeping with an Inbetweener’ part,” she said with a smirk, and turned her gaze to the fight again. “Let’s just focus on getting them out. Taking on Cyrene in such a populated area isn’t a good plan.”

  “You throw up your own shields. I’ll body check her and grab the guy. You cover me?”

  “Sounds right.” Samantha pursed her lips. “But are you sure you can? Look at the area on her glamour…it’s huge.”

  “We guessed she got a power up when we heard about the shindig in Chicago,” He leaned down and kissed her. “We do it now or we don’t. Your call.”

  She kissed him one more time. “Let’s go for it.”

  * * * *

  “You see, little Angel girl? This is madness. This is true madness!” Cyrene let out a peal of laughter, and Giselle gasped, a blast of power knocking her to the ground, setting her wings askew. Cyrene stepped away from Armand for the first time. He was no longer struggling. She couldn’t even see if he was breathing. Angels could take a large beating before dying but Cyrene had ripped open his throat…could he be dead?

  No. She pushed herself up to a standing position and took up her sword again, panting. “I will not give in to your hopelessness, Damned.”

  “Give in?” Cyrene smirked, and another blast of power placed her back firmly in the ground. “Oh no, sweetness.”

  Giselle whipped up her sword. Cyrene stepped on the hilt, crunching fingers between metal and the gravel, leaning down with a sickly grin. “I don’t want you to give in.”

  “Then what do you want?” Giselle whispered, heart dropping.

  Cyrene held out her hand, claws caressing the skin of her face, and Giselle flinched. Her power sparked and stung, and Giselle quaked in horror She was really going to die. The Damned’s grip tightened, and claws sank in, wrenching her chin around to face Cyrene again. “I don’t want you to merely give in to hopelessness, Angel. I want you to embrace it as I did!”

  Her other hand rose as if to stab at Giselle’s eyes.

  Then a dark shape slammed into Cyrene’s body over her. Giselle screamed. The shape had horns, claws, the marks of a Damned. Had she come from the frying pan to the fire? “You’ve lost your touch, Cyrene,” the form growled.

  Cyrene seemed furious, her hair even rising with a crackle of enmity. “E-li!”

  A hand took her elbow and pulled her up before Cyrene’s shriek of rage could worm its way into her skull, and Giselle blinked as she was faced with a mortal mien. The picture she’d seen only a day ago now swam into her mind. “S-Samantha Parker?”

  “Yup. Eli, keep her busy! We can’t leave the guy!”

  “He’s dead…” Giselle shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. “I saw her kill him!”

  “It’s all right.” Samantha cast out a hand. Giselle jumped. A bubble rose around them, and Eli was dodging Cyrene’s burst attacks, jumping in to get Armand’s body and then lunging away again. “Just stay calm while we get you out of here.”

  “Armand...” Her lips were numb in horror. She hardly saw the fight, could hardly comprehend the flurry of blows Eli countered as he fell back, Samantha meeting him halfway, Cyrene charging forward again.

  And then the Damned woman stopped short, panting as Samantha held out one hand, eyes narrowed and calm. “Sorry, Cyrene. They’re out of your reach now.”

  “Don’t be so sure, bitch,” Cyrene spat. “Now that I’ve found you, you’re mine! Nice of the Angels, sending a beginner search party, don’t you think? It’s almost as if they wanted me to find you.”

  Samantha raised an eyebrow. “And sacrifice two of their own?”

  Cyrene giggled. “They’re just as perverse and cutthroat as the Damned, girlie.” She drew deep breaths. “I see you’ve gotten better at that trick.”

  “You’ve gotten a little better at yours, too,” Samantha murmured.

  Giselle watched them–dark Inbetweener and fiery Damned staring at each other for almost a full, silent minute.

  Cyrene turned, nose in the air. “I could beat through the shield if I wanted.”

  “You look awful.” Samantha returned, frowning. She looked around the lot, scanning the sky. “Where is the crow?”

  The Damned woman started for a moment, and then swayed and laughed. “Dead,” she said, and though her voice was far away and chuckling, she hugged herself, eyes staring up at the sky. “Dead and rotting.”

  Eli drew a breath. “It’s dead?”

  “Yes!” Her claws twitched, prinking the skin of her neck and drawing small drops of blood. “Yes, so dead. So dead.”

  “But…how are you alive?” Samantha asked, frowning. “How are you standing?”

  “I don’t know.” Cyrene giggled and waved, but to Giselle’s shock there were tears on her cheeks. “Just lucky I guess!”

  Samantha looked confused, worried. How could she worry? That woman had killed Armand, what was she worrying for? “What did you do for that power?”

  Again, a helpless little giggle. Giselle caught her breath. The sound would haunt her waking dreams. Cyrene’s grin returned. “Nothing more than what gave me the power in the first place.”

  Samantha glanced at Eli, who looked at Armand. “He’s still alive,” Eli said. “Barely.”

  “Armand!” Giselle gasped at the limp body draped over Eli’s shoulder. Suddenly unfrozen from the spot, she rushed to the Damned man’s side, taking Armand’s face in her hands. His eyes were closed, his mouth lolled open, but she could feel the warmth of his skin, and tears rushed to her eyes. “I’m sorry I gave up on you.”

  “Stop it. I wouldn’t kill him,” Cyrene hummed, studying her claws. She lapped at the blood on one digit, smirking like a cat. “It would ruin my fun. Go on. Watch him die.” She giggled one last time. “Do try to understand what we talked about.” With a wink, she disappeared.

  Eli’s fists tightened. “I hate it when she taunts,” he growled.

  “Gives us what we need,” Samantha said, watching Cyrene disappear. “Time and space. Put him down, Eli. I have no idea what I’m working with.”

  “You can help him?” Giselle gasped as Eli slung Armand’s body to the ground. “They never said you could heal!”

  “Of course not. Technically I’m not a healer,” Samantha smiled. “I’m a soul manipulator. It’s just you can do an awful lot with that.”

  “Wh–”

  “No time. Quickly. Humans have souls like bubbles, Damned have souls like ropes, what about Angels?”

  Giselle’s eyes widened and she gasped. “What? I can’t tell you! The things you could–”

  Samantha frowned at her. “Do you want to sa
ve him or not? His soul is shattered, honey, and I don’t have a hope of fixing him if I don’t know what he’s supposed to be.”

  “Shattered?” Giselle whimpered. “But h-how?”

  “Steady,” Eli said. “It’s a shield, Samantha.”

  “How do you know?” Giselle turned to him and gasped as she found not a man but a beast. She hadn’t gotten a good look at Eli Tawson in his Damned form. Almost seven feet tall, with curling, sharp-tipped horns and proud black locks coursing to his hips. “Messiah save me,” she whispered.

  Eli snorted, lip quirked. “Souls are a Damned’s specialty,” he said. “Calm down, I’m listed as enemy number one with the Damned, remember?”

  Giselle looked down at Samantha, kneeling amidst the feathers of Armand’s wings, and took another numb breath. No. Not Armand. Not like this. “Please save him,” she pleaded. “Please.”

  * * * *

  “Yeah, working on it.” Samantha replied, not really paying attention to the angel as she pressed the back of her hand to Armand’s face. He was cooling quickly but he wasn’t gone yet. She blinked hard, shifting her vision over to the peculiar, half focus which allowed her to see souls in their raw form. She blinked again as she looked at Armand. The light was intense, amazingly bright. Nothing like a Damned’s rope of fire or a mortal’s nebulous soul aura. It was as if she were staring into one of those science experiments with flame so hot it could instantly melt anything. A bright, purple-white glow putting the sun to shame.

  Samantha let her eyes adjust and then looked again. If he was supposed to be a shield then he was in pieces. Hundreds of them. “What a mess.”

  The damage to his body didn’t even compare. Hell, she was shocked he was still alive enough to have a soul to look at. By this time most anyone else would have dissipated to their appointed realm. Heaven, hell, reincarnation, a Damned, an Angel, whatever. Samantha pursed her lips and squinted, studying the Angel in greater depth. What was keeping him together?

  The answer was obvious once she leaned back. A filament, like a spider web or the finest hair, reaching out, glittering in the air in front of Samantha. She climbed to her feet and followed the thread out and…she looked up. “Oh, duh. Of course.”

  “What?” the female Angel blinked.

  “Sorry…were you two…” Samantha pursed her lips. Was it even possible? Who knew unless she asked? “Lovers?”

  “What?” the dark-haired woman started back. “No!”

  “Whatever you were, you’re keeping him together.” Samantha followed the thread back and smiled. “And that actually gives me an idea. With you as an anchor, I can work something which would otherwise probably not work.”

  “What?” the Angel asked. “What are you going to do?”

  “Fix him. Hush.” Samantha knelt again and scrutinized the soul pieces again. There was too much to fit back together. Like a glass shattered into a thousand pieces, she doubted everything was even there. Cyrene had probably dragged some off, some had dissipated. The glass couldn’t be fit back together perfectly. She could melt it down and create something else, especially with the other Angel filling in the pieces. She took a breath and gathered the pieces together.

  In some ways, Angel and Damned souls were very similar. They were concentrated, molded and pressed tight into a form different from their original mortal bubble. She teased at the piece of soul the Angel had managed to keep around with apparently unconscious help of his partner. She pressed at the shattered bits. Thankfully, once touching, they more or less stuck together, like snow. First she had to get the pieces together, and then she could…

  A peculiar tension built as she pressed more and more together, a waiting explosion. The pieces shivered and dulled in brightness, and for a terrible moment she thought she had lost him completely. But the light poured out of the soul in her hands into the body, and as Samantha watched the hole in the Angel’s throat closed. There was a pause. The soul quivered and then, like a balloon, expanded. The man took a deep, gasping breath, and writhed. Samantha sat back.

  “Not what you expected?” Eli asked as the woman shrieked and fell to her knees opposite Samantha.

  “Don’t knock it,” Samantha stood, studying the Angel’s newly mortal soul. “It worked, right?”

  Still, he was right. She had released Damned souls of their debt, but never actively reverted anyone back to being a mortal. It was almost like the soul had automatically gone back to base form, like he’d been recycled. “Uh oh.”

  “What?”

  Samantha grimaced, watching the woman’s shaking hands over the man’s face. “I think I reincarnated him. And I have no idea what that means.”

  3

  “Armand, Armand.” Giselle stroked his face. Her mind was in a whirl. He’d refused to let her come to harm again, telling her to run. How could she? She could not leave him again! She knew she defied orders the moment she attacked Cyrene. They had no business trying to take down a greater Damned. She reached up, wiped her face of tears. Cyrene might as well have had her claws wrapped around Giselle’s heart as Armand’s throat, and when she’d made her move. Giselle shook her head, kissing Armand’s cheek. He wasn’t dead, he was lying here, breathing and warm!

  “Honey, we’ve got to move,” Samantha said softly. “I can keep this glamor up till the cows come home, but someone will have noticed that throw down.”

  “I...” Giselle took a deep breath and finally snapped to attention. Armand was fine, he just had to sleep it off. It was time to get back on the horse. She stood and sheathed her sword, wiping her eyes and shaking out her wings. Focus. “You’re absolutely right. We’ll get out of your hair.”

  “It would be better if you came along. Samantha wants to be certain your partner–”

  “Armand,” Giselle filled in.

  “Armand, then. Anyway, Samantha did some pretty acrobatic stuff there. If she’s going to keep track of him, he needs to come along.”

  Giselle sucked in a lip, narrowing her eyes at them. Would she have to fight them too? She wasn’t sure. Reliably she could only handle Damned of twenty five thousand souls or less. According to reports, Eli had something like thirty five or forty thousand nowadays, and Samantha could take on a damned of fifty thousand souls if Cyrene was any indication. “I’m not leaving him.”

  “That’s fine,” Samantha said with a wave. “The car seats four anyway.”

  Giselle choked on the answer. “I can’t come with you,” she sputtered.

  “Why not?” Samantha asked, glancing over at her. “We’ve got to move, Armand is hurt, you’re tired, and we aren’t about to try anything funny.” She paused. “What’s your name, anyway?”

  She looked to the side, reluctant. Given their files Samantha was telling the truth, but going with them would be a betrayal of her duty. She was expected to report back. She was expected to leave him in whatever hands he’d landed. He was no longer an Angel, there was no sense in protecting him beyond the scope of mortal protection. Giselle looked over at Armand and swallowed. He looked younger than he had as an Angel. She remembered his smile in the coffee shop as she’d teased him about reading, the way he’d held her when they met after years apart.

  “Giselle. It’s Giselle.”

  “So, Giselle, if you have to report or something, go on. We aren’t going to hurt him. You’re also welcome to come along.” Samantha shrugged and spread her hands. “Up to you.”

  She took a breath. This was what had gotten them separated in the first place, but she understood Armand’s actions more than ever, now. “I’m not leaving him. Let’s go.”

  “Doo dah, doo dah…” Eli hummed the tune to Camptown Races, and slung Armand over his shoulder again. Giselle stayed close, stomach knotted. She knew it was the right choice but the cost terrified her.

  * * * *

  Eli hardly spoke as they walked back to the hotel and in to the covered garage. “Traffic’s going to be beastly,” he muttered.

  Samantha tossed him a set of keys.
Giselle frowned. Of all things, a Subaru? “Where’d you get this car?” she asked.

  Samantha opened the back and set the seats down, letting Eli lay Armand flat as she faintly smiled at him. “Hijacked it the night I ascended.” She chuckled. “It’s a long story, and now it’s our lucky charm. The thing runs like a horse.”

  “From one end of the United States and Canada to the other,” Eli added as he arranged Armand. “I can move us a few states at a time, and the car doesn’t skip a beat.”

  “I didn’t know the Damned could do teleportation,” Giselle said cautiously, sliding into the back seat next to Armand. He was sleeping peacefully—his normally spiky hair going every which way, flopping into his eyes. She brushed it away.

  “Most can’t.” Eli hummed. “I’m not a Damned any more, though.”

  “Your files say you are,” Giselle pointed out, frowning.

  “No, your files say that,” Eli slid into the driver’s seat. Giselle blinked as she realized his horns went straight through the roof. “And frankly, to send you two when they must have known how badly Cyrene wants us, I wonder if she was right and they were trying to kill you.”

  Giselle gasped. “They wouldn’t do–”

  “Eli, no antagonizing the Angels,” Samantha said, patting his forearm. “Drive.”

  “Yes madam,” Eli replied with a low chuckle, and turned the key.

  * * * *

  Armand slept. Giselle watched him closely, stroking his hair. “His wings are gone,” she ventured after a few hours. “Did you put a glamor on him?”

  “No,” Samantha responded after a long pause.

  Giselle looked forward, taking note of the highway they drove on, no longer in the desert, surrounded by lush, almost pervasive greenery on both sides. She swallowed the lump of fear in her throat. “Where are we?”

  “South-east United States.” Eli craned his head at a sign. “Middle of Mississippi looks like.”