Torn by Fury

by S. M. Reine

  Elise had seen the body of one demon killed by anathema powder before. Davithon had spent his final days in her dungeons and left a mess on his way out. She’d only been able to imagine what it must have looked like when he died, but watching Lincoln go through it was much worse.

  “Help me get him in the center of the circle,” James said.

  She hesitated. More brilliant white lights were burning paths through the sky outside the windows, plummeting toward the streets of her city. There must have been a hundred angels within Dis by now. Her army wasn’t prepared for that. Nobody could be—angels were great warriors.

  But Elise had killed angels before. She could fight back. She should have been with the army.

  “Elise,” James said, more urgently than before. He was trying to get a grip on Lincoln’s bloody arms and failing.

  She gripped the deputy’s shirt at the shoulders and dragged him across the lines. James caught a leg, and together they dumped Lincoln at the place where the radiating lines joined at the center of the circle. There was a large, spherical crystal waiting at the center.

  James noticed Elise eyeing the crystal. “To collect the energy generated by Lincoln’s severance from the infernal power,” he explained. “There will be a bit of a—well, an explosion of power, and this will hopefully contain it without environmental damage.”

  “Hopefully?”

  “Probably,” he said.

  Comforting.

  The ritual space hadn’t been activated yet, but Elise already felt the burn of magic. It made her skin itch. She dropped Lincoln, scratched her fingernails over the back of her neck.

  “I don’t like it any more than you do,” James said. She only noticed then that he looked pale. “Whatever kind of magic this is—it’s dangerous to both angels and demons.”

  “Can you cast it safely?”

  “Probably.”

  Lincoln’s eyelids fluttered. “Have to get back in the game. I can’t stop because of my ankle. Let me back.”

  He had regressed beyond nightmare possession, at long last. He thought he was in college again. Sitting on the sidelines during one of his football games.

  “You should get out of the circle just in case,” James said, shuffling through the notebooks he’d set on the altar. All the pages were covered in more of his tiny, precise handwriting. “I don’t know what this magic will do to you.”

  “You mean do to us,” Elise said. “You said it affects you, too.”

  “One of us has to cast it.”

  Lincoln’s scream was loud enough that Elise wouldn’t have been surprised if it had shattered the windows. They were out of time to debate this, and they certainly didn’t have the time for Elise to learn how to cast the spell herself. Reluctantly, she backed out of the circle, standing beside the towering windows.

  James closed the circle by scattering salt over an open patch at the circumference.

  Magic snapped to life. It shoved against Elise, flattened her to the window, the crystal cold at her back. The air vibrated with the unfamiliar power of it.

  This strange magic didn’t hurt like magecraft did—but it didn’t feel right, either. It was foreign. Something completely new and completely hostile to her.

  James anointed Lincoln rapidly, spreading oil over his already-slick forehead and cheeks. Then James ripped open Lincoln’s shirt, and Elise sucked in a gasp. The sweat wasn’t just burning through the cloth. It was blistering Lincoln’s flesh. Making it peel away, baring the thin layer of fat underneath.

  He was disintegrating.

  She realized that James was chanting—a mix of the old ethereal tongue and vo-ani. Every syllable made the energy in the room tighten like a clamp getting screwed tighter on Elise’s skull, millimeter by millimeter. It felt like her bones were going to crack.

  A blaze of bright light from the other side of the window made her turn, shading her eyes with a hand. There was an angel only a couple hundred feet away.

  Azrael was as beautiful as the day that he had been birthed into her arms. He was making a strange gesture with his arm. It took her a moment to realize that he was slamming the hilt of his flaming saber against the Palace wards, testing their limits. She felt every beat as though he were tapping the back of her neck.

  The Palace wards were linked to her blood. Hers, Neuma’s, and Gerard’s. Any of them could activate the defenses.

  Elise pressed her hand against the window and shoved back at Azrael.

  The old magic pulsed hard. She felt no satisfaction watching him wheel through the air, tumbling head over feet, wings bent behind him.

  “No—damn it, no…”

  James’s voice drew her attention back to the spell. The strange energy in the room had faded, and now Elise saw why. Her aspis was crouched over Lincoln performing chest compressions, elbows locked, shoving the heels of his palms hard into the deputy’s breastbone.

  She could already tell it was useless, and she would have known even if the magic hadn’t been fading. She couldn’t hear his heart anymore. Worse, James was pushing against exposed bone. Lincoln’s skin had almost completely melted away and taken the anointing oil with it. Probably why the spell had died.

  Elise watched as the last of the brain signals within Lincoln’s skull faded, stuttered, and vanished.

  James kept trying anyway. He tried until the magic had drained completely from the air, until the room was totally silent except for a squishing sound, until exhaustion weakened his muscles.

  He tried. Elise appreciated it.

  The circle failed when Lincoln died. She stepped over the perimeter line and put a hand on James’s shoulder. He jerked, sat back on his heels.

  “Wait,” he said. “There might be a spell I can use to restart his heart.”

  “It wouldn’t matter if you could,” Elise said. The damage was much deeper than that. It wasn’t just Lincoln’s skin that had melted away. His innards had liquefied, too, just like Davithon’s had.

  James looked so disappointed. He didn’t have to say anything—Elise could hear his thoughts almost perfectly. Magic wasn’t fast enough… If I’d gotten here ten minutes sooner, or if he’d been a little stronger…failed me…failed her…

  A lot of things had failed her that day. She watched Dis burn under ethereal assault through the windows, numb to her fingertips. She would have to go out there soon. She would have to fight a battle she didn’t think that she would ever be able to win. Not against these kinds of numbers. Her legion just weren’t ready.

  She needed more time.

  “I’m sorry, Elise,” James said. “I’m so sorry.”

  She barely heard him. Her head was filled with a dull roar, punctuated by a whining note, almost like a violin’s string slowly stroked by a bow.

  That sound was coming from behind her. She turned.

  Benjamin Flynn stood in the doorway.

  He was naked, baring every inch of his lanky, not-quite-fully-developed muscles, the curly hair on his chest, the scars rimming his throat from where he had long been collared by the Union. His hands and feet were too big for him.

  And his eyes were blue. Bright, pale blue.

  The room seemed blurred where he stood, as though he warped the space around him.

  “This is wrong,” Benjamin said. “You have to heal Lincoln.”

  “What are you doing here? When did you wake up?” Her voice slid through the air, serpentine and sinuous, just as distorted as the wall behind the young man.

  He flickered, and suddenly, he was standing right in front of Elise. “James needs to heal him!”

  “He’s dead, Benjamin,” she said. “It’s too late.”

  “No. No, it can’t be too late. He has to live. James needs to be able to cast this spell. Don’t you get it? This is so incredibly important. Maybe the most important thing.” Benjamin pleaded with her with his whole body, his posture and eyes and the way his hands shook.

  “I’d think that the ethereal invasion and all the people in Ne
w Eden are slightly more important,” Elise said.

  “You’re wrong.”

  “What do you know? You’re unconscious. I’ve got to be hallucinating.” The whole room had taken on the strange texture of a dream—the slow-motion way that the light from the angels’ wings swirled outside the wards, the floor underneath her boots, the way that she couldn’t control her body. It was a dream.

  “James needs to cast the spell on Earth,” Benjamin said forcefully. “He needs help from Northgate. Hear me? If you remember anything afterward, Elise, remember this part. Get them to Earth. Do it in Northgate.”

  “Remember anything after what?” Elise asked.

  He gripped her head in both of his hands.

  The fact that he could actually touch her—that she could feel the roughness of his palms and the warmth of his body—almost shocked her out of her skin. Literally. She almost phased away from him.

  This wasn’t a dream. This was real.

  “This is important,” Benjamin said again.

  And then the room was gone, taking James and Lincoln’s body with it.

  Reality peeled open around Elise. She could see through the support structure of the Palace. She could see Ace’s body on the floor of her bedroom, all the way down to his capillaries and bones, and the way that his soul was diffusing into the universe.

  She could see the fibers of the old magic that formed the wards protecting the Palace. Beyond that, she could see hundreds of dead demons, all of their bodies and souls and matter twisted together like a thick rope that led into infinity.

  She tried to say, “Stop. Let me go!”

  There was no more Hell. Only an overgrown forest with trees taller than any skyscraper on Earth, the ruins of ancient buildings, and the fragile sapling of an apple tree jutting from moist soil.

  A boy was there, too. A boy with familiar tousled brown hair, bright blue eyes, and an expression much too old for his features. He had seen too much, been alone for too long.

  “Nathaniel,” Elise whispered.

  He smiled faintly when he saw her. He looked just like his father.

  “Soon,” he said.

  She reached for him, but he was a thousand miles away, a million, and the garden disappeared.

  Elise slammed back into her body.

  “Let me go, you dumb bitch,” Lincoln said. His expression didn’t belong to him. It was a look from the nightmare demon that had once possessed him.

  Elise was kneeling on top of Lincoln again, his wrists pinned to the hard rock of Mount Anathema on either side of his head. The blood of the guards he had killed still stained his hands. The fissure overhead was dark violet. The temple honoring the shattered triad stood just behind Elise, and she could smell the bodies inside.

  She had reappeared at the House of Abraxas.

  Her skin crawled. She released him instantly, throwing herself away from Lincoln. “What the fuck?”

  “Whoa!” James exclaimed. “Elise, what are you doing?”

  Lincoln tried to stand up as soon as he was free, but James was faster. He cast the spell so quickly that the deputy didn’t have time to react. A tendril of magic snaked toward him, slammed into his chest. Lincoln’s eyes went blank. He hit the ground once more, unconscious.

  Elise couldn’t seem to breathe. Her head thundered. She gripped her skull the same way that Benjamin had, trying to hold everything together as she spun, looking at the House of Abraxas.

  It was real. She was there again, just hours earlier.

  And Lincoln was alive.

  Her gaze shot to the fissure. No sign of ethereal invasion. The city wasn’t burning.

  If you remember anything afterward, Elise, remember this part. Get them to Earth. Do it in Northgate.

  “Good Lord, what’s wrong?” James asked, reaching out to touch her shoulder.

  She jerked away from him. “Don’t touch me. Don’t even fucking think about touching me!”

  He didn’t, but he watched her so closely that it was hardly like he was giving her any space. “What happened?”

  Elise stretched a hand out. Her fingers were trembling and she didn’t try to hide it. James didn’t move as she flattened her palm to his chest, feeling how solid and real he was, the strength of his heartbeat, the way it pounded in time with hers.

  This is so incredibly important. Maybe the most important thing.

  Her memory of Benjamin’s voice was already fading, and so were her memories of the fight on the crystal bridge, Ace’s crumpled body at her feet, and the sight of the angels burning the city. Her glimpse of Eden slipped away fastest of all. It was like a dream. A horrible dream. None of it had happened—yet.

  But she remembered what was most important.

  Elise swiped the back of her wrist over her forehead, trying to dry her skin. Her sweat was tinted gray.

  “The three of us need to get to Earth,” she said. “Now.”

  Four

  IT WAS A gray day, but then, there hadn’t been many other kinds of days since the Breaking. Even when it was cloudless out—like today—there was still no sign of blue sky. The air was flat and gray and close, as if someone had tossed a blanket over the forest.

  “He’ll be here,” Rylie said, noticing that her daughter was fidgeting.

  Summer had pulled off two of her acrylic French tips and was picking at the remaining glue underneath. She hid her hands behind her back. “I know. Of course he’ll be here. I’m not worried.”

  She was a terrible liar. Rylie took her hand and squeezed it.

  A moment later, Uriel appeared from the trees with his wings hidden, looking for all the world like a hiker that had decided to cross the Appalachians in Converse and skinny jeans. He brought the faint smell of buttered popcorn with him. Rylie had yet to meet an angel that didn’t smell like that to her.

  Summer gave a gusting sigh at the sight of him. “Oh thank goodness, Uriel. I wasn’t sure you’d—”

  “Careful,” he interrupted. His eyes darted around the dense forest. “Don’t say my name.”

  “There aren’t any other angels within at least ten or twenty miles,” Rylie said. “Nobody’s going to hear us.”

  “Names carry,” Uriel said.

  It was hard to tell the difference between another esoteric angel power that Rylie had never heard of before and run-of-the-mill paranoia. Either way, they didn’t need names. They just needed information.

  “He’s okay, right?” Summer asked.

  “He’s healing, but he was hurt badly. He needs more time.”

  “And then what?”

  “And then he’ll go on trial for betrayal to the angels.” He lifted a hand to keep Summer quiet. “We aren’t barbarians; we don’t kill our kind. The worst he faces is long-term incarceration.”

  Summer gripped Rylie’s hand hard. That was how Summer and Nash had met in the first place—he had remained loyal to Adam in the First War, and when the rebels had won, he had been labeled a traitor and exiled to a Haven. Time flowed at variable rates between dimensions. As far as Nash had been concerned, he had spent many hundreds of thousands of years alone, confined to a tiny world. Until Summer found him and they escaped together.

  Now Nash was bucking the laws his brethren set again. They wouldn’t be any more lenient with him now than they were the first time.

  Uriel said “long-term incarceration” like it wasn’t barbaric, like it wasn’t the worst possible punishment for Nash.

  “Take me to New Eden,” Summer said. “Let me break him out. Please. I know you’re friends with him. I know you don’t want him exiled again.”

  “Of course I don’t, but it’s not that simple.” Uriel rearranged the scarf around his shoulders. He was shivering. “If I’m caught helping him, they’ll make me share his punishment. I’ll be incarcerated too. But I’m not like Nash, I’m not—I’m just not as strong as he is.” It seemed difficult for him to say. “I don’t think I’d survive millennia in isolation.”

  “Then come with us,�
�� Rylie said. “Help free Nash, and then stay on our side. We’ll protect you as much as we can.”

  He barked a mirthless laugh. “You? Protect me?”

  She lifted her chin, irked by his dismissal. “Werewolves can kill hybrids with a bite. What do you think we can do to angels?”

  Uriel stopped laughing.

  “I can’t listen to talk of sedition. Nash is a hero, kids. He was Adam’s best soldier. I’m not cut out for that,” he said.

  “Okay, fine.” Summer dropped Rylie’s hand to take a tentative step toward him. “Then don’t do anything. If you just take me there—”

  “Us,” Rylie interjected.

  Her daughter started over again. “If you take us there, we’ll find a way to free him without bothering you. We’ll get him back on our own. Nobody needs to know that you were ever involved.”

  “You don’t know anything.” Uriel shoved his thick-rimmed glasses to his forehead and rubbed his eyes. “You’re just so stupid, you mortals.”

  Rylie’s hackles lifted. “I’d rather be stupid than pure evil.”

  “What did you just call us?”

  “If you aren’t brave enough to save Nash yourself, fine,” Rylie said. “But you owe it to him to let us save him. We’re his family. We have to do something.”

  “It’s impossible. I couldn’t let you into New Eden undetected if I wanted to. There are exactly two routes into the city left, and they’re under constant surveillance. So how am I supposed to smuggle you, huh? Shove you under my shirt?” He plucked at his skinny graphic tee. It had a microbrewery logo on the chest.

  “If you were the one in trouble, Nash would try to save you,” Summer said.

  Uriel jammed his glasses back onto his face. “I know. I know. Like I said, though…he’s a hero. I’m not. I can’t do anything for you except tell you that he’s going to recover. I shouldn’t even do that much. If they find out I’m here…”

  Rylie nodded reluctantly. “Your hands are tied.”

  “Hands and…everything else.” He unfurled his wings with the rustling of feathers. His wingspan was impressive, as were all angels’. It took a lot to lift a man’s body mass into the air. “I can pass a message on to Nash once he wakes up. That’s as good as it gets.”