Archangels Creed 3:
Summon Toren
© 2013 by Azure Boone & Kenra Daniels, LLC.
All rights reserved. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of Azure Boone and Kenra Daniels or their legal representative.
Author's Notes:
This book contains explicit scenes of sexual activity between different couples, committed to exclusive, monogamous relationships.
There are scenes of graphic violence, some directed toward women.
Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, by any of the characters within is entirely accidental.
We have taken extensive liberties with certain religious dogma and traditions – no offense intended – to fit the plot of our story.
Some readers had an issue with the Archangel Kassern encouraging premarital sex in the first Archangels Creed book. We've addressed that concept in "Summon Dorn" and developed it further in "Summon Toren". Future books in the series will have more elaboration on this and other controversial themes.
Finally, we genuinely hope you enjoy reading "Summon Toren" as much as we enjoyed writing it. At the end of the book, we've included information on our other books and how readers can contact us. We love hearing from readers, so drop us a line!
Thank you for purchasing "Summon Toren"! Enjoy!
Just in case you missed the earlier books:
Archangels Creed: The series ~ "Archangels Creed" will explore the story of each of the twelve Archangels as they struggle to complete their arm of the overall mission.
Satan has found a loophole in the rules that govern his battle against Good. The Archangel Uriel sends twelve Warrior Archangels to Earth on a mission to even the odds.
Each Archangel has one month to find a couple, unite them, and use their union's power to create the Holy Warriors needed to defend the world against Satan's unholy creations.
But the mission isn't so simple when inheriting Humanity comes with challenges beyond the Angel's training, and every milestone in the couple's relationship affects the triumvirate's strength.
Summon Kassern:
How can Archangel Kassern get the World's Most Unlikely Couple to fall in love and help him form the Holy Warrior? He's too busy dealing with annoying human traits he picks up along the way.
Desperate to save her best friend, Karly, and herself from a life of prostitution, Devyn takes a chance when the preacher, Troy, offers escape. But someone offers Karly's boyfriend big money, and he can't let them go without a fight.
Called by God to minister to prostitutes, Troy is careful not to get too close to his flock. Sworn to celibacy, he isn't even tempted, until he saves Devyn and becomes embroiled in her desperate life.
Can Kassern keep them all safe from Karly's psycho ex and whichever demon horde is onto their scent at the moment? Especially with the train wreck that is Karly along for the ride?
Summon Dorn:
Perfectionist Archangel Dorn confidently steps forward to form the second team in the Archangels' Holy Warrior plan. Things go wrong from the beginning, but being teased for choosing a nun as his human partner is worse than having Kassern witness his mistakes. Fortunately, Archangels can learn from their mistakes.
Jessie has the unfortunate habit of making a fool of herself whenever a good looking man is nearby. Devastatingly handsome Lucian seems able to look beyond that and puts her at ease right away, but is he as good as he looks?
After a lifetime of pain, Lucian's heart is a closed door and he permits no one a peek inside, but Jessie blows the locks away. Will she cause him even more pain?
Dutifully heading to the convent, Sally falls into a vipers' pit of evil. With no hope of rescue, she sets out to destroy the horror on her own, even if it means her death.
Can Dorn put everything right again and snatch them all from the jaws of the most devastating evil to ever stalk the earth?
Archangels Creed 3: Summon Toren
The Mercury Warrior
CHAPTER ONE
Toren scowled and forced himself to sit still and ignore the other Archangels. Being required to pull a Superman phone booth style disappearing act only five miles from Samantha did not make him a happy camper. Samantha, or Sam, as she thought she preferred to be called, consumed his every thought since the day he looked into her soul. His entire being focused on preparing for her.
Sitting in statue form and waiting for Uriel to arrive in the War Chamber, Toren revisited the age old concept of patience. How odd. The feeling circulating his mercury mindset could only be identified as anxiety, a sensation utterly unfamiliar to him. And it had little to do with whatever news he would hear in hopefully the next sixty seconds, but everything to do with that human woman.
From the moment she gave him that soft as silk kiss, something happened and he needed to see her and explore the extent of this paradoxical dent she put in his mercurial nature. He found himself wondering over the oddest things. How would she receive him? When should he tell her he was an angel? How would she take that? What was she like when she wasn’t in the middle of dying?
Would she remember him?
He’d never been torn or worried in his existence. But he found himself wanting her to remember, and yet praying she didn't. How could he hope she might remember even a shred of such a horrible experience? Just so she could remember a fragment of something he thought was special hopefully making it easier to win her?
But then he realized. He really didn't want her to have remembered a single bit of that horror. There was really only one thing he wanted her to recall.
The kiss.
Toren thought about all the information he’d gotten from Samantha's Guardian. He’d listened intently to every detail. Anything could prove useful to the mission. She was the only child of a father who wanted a son but got a daughter. A spitting image of him, according to her guardian. Samantha was what humans called a tomboy—a young female displaying mostly masculine characteristics—but when she was fourteen, her father insisted she dress and behave like a girl. A hired hand she'd had a crush on broke her heart by rejecting her budding femininity. She decided being a woman wasn’t in her genes and eventually joined the convent to avoid an arranged marriage her father cooked up like vittles on a Monday night campfire.
Out of all the understandable issues Samantha struggled with, considering herself masculine puzzled Toren the most. Perhaps something about her body gave that impression? It surely was nowhere in that delicate spirit he’d touched through those crystal pure eyes.
The mercury in his body raced as he relived the vivid memory of her soft lips on his. Followed by the one question his shield sought to answer in order to bridge the gap responsible for the enigmatic angst plaguing him. What, exactly, would it all feel like in human form? His lips pressed against hers?
Judging by his mercury’s reaction to the foreign concepts, he guessed the experience would be pure, unadulterated power. His shield, at its unalloyed core, craved whatever she would give. And Toren couldn’t seem to cooperate with the irresistible instinct fast enough.
The air in the War Chamber stirred with energy and Toren’s mind snapped to full attention. Finally. Uriel, commander of the Brotherhood of War Archangels, materialized in the act of striding across the room, decked in his emerald battle gear.
The muted clank of full armor reminded Toren that the enemy actively worked to bring about the downfall of goodness. “An update.” Uriel folded emerald wings as he sat, eyes sparkling with crisp determination. The massive archangel had no need to wait and ensure
the complete attention of his subordinates. “The genetic abominations Socerith has created, those Kharef propagated on his human captives, are a botched prototype. Useful, but not fully functional. What he’s aiming for is a creature that can be used as a world-wide riot accelerator. He needs something able to morph on command between the forms of its genetic contributors, rather than being jammed in a conglomeration of them like Kharef's progeny."
"You mean the monkey men?" Zool’s tone ground with his thirst to bring down the adversary. Perhaps he would be the one to find the key to defeating them.
Uriel nodded. "Yes. And interestingly, those created most recently seem different from those Kassern's triumvirate encountered. A little more advanced. Refined." He paused to let that sink in. "Some of you have encountered beings in the field that transmuted according to emotions, like fear, anger, hunger or pain, making them predictably unpredictable. We aren't sure yet exactly what they are, but they're not feasible for riot accelerators either.”
“Accelerators,” Lassin said. "You used that term twice."
“Yes. Beings designed specifically to exploit human emotions on every level.” Uriel regarded the sapphire giant. “Feel-good vessels programmed to bring humanity whatever…floats their boat. Unfortunately Socerith is technically adhering to the rules. No doubt for the sheer purpose of tying our hands.”
“He’ll get sloppy,” Lyght assured.
“Oh of that I have no doubt,” Uriel said. “But until he throws the stipulations to the wind, we can’t storm the compounds we’ve found scattered over the entire earth.” The Commander's scowl deepened while his lip curled a little in disgust.
“Entire?”
Uriel nailed Zool with his gaze. “His hiding gained him a head start on our retaliation. And he's succeeding in a big way.” His fist banged the onyx table. "Later we will discuss how our spies managed to miss so much activity. I suspect one or more may have been compromised."
“Entire?” Grythe echoed Zool’s astonishment as if Uriel hadn't spoken. That the situation had gotten to that point before being noticed was a difficult concept to swallow.
“Head start, you say.” Azen’s amethyst eyes swept right. “Seems we’re eating his dust he’s so far ahead. Any idea what his end game is yet?”
Uriel shook his head. "So far the general objective is to turn mankind upon itself to maximize the corruption of innocence and increase the harvest of souls. The same as it's been through all the Ages, only much faster. Too fast."
“Well this is all unfortunate news,” Lyght sighed. “It figures we can’t count on the bitch to act corruptly when we need him to.”
“Bitch?” Meron’s brows narrowed like somebody changed the language channel on him. "I thought that term referred to females.” He dug through an inner pocket of his dark yellow topaz jacket. “I will never figure out this accursed language." Exasperated scribbling ensued in a dog-eared leather bound journal. The human kind. The constant requirement on every hand to do all things by human standards was oxymoronic of epic proportion.
“This is not a vocabulary session,” Uriel’s green eyes flashed his annoyance. “Socerith is building an army of undetectable influence, evil that can work and perpetrate wickedness practically in the open. While he’s doing that, he’s also seeking out eligible humans for reanimation. Which brings me to the crux of this meeting.”
Uriel paused to be sure he had their undivided attention before locking his gaze on Toren. “He’s in the process of persuading the Pope to join his cause.”
The shocked silence sat heavy on the group until Vektor dropped one hand flat to the onyx with a thunderclap that matched the fury sparkling in his green beryl irises. "Bloody hell. Just tell us what to do."
Uriel aimed his gaze at all of them individually. “What we always do. We work faster and harder and turn his tactics in our favor. The only thing new about his plan is the effort to make things happen quicker. Mankind’s soul remains his prime target. His strategy remains the same. Self-destruction through the exploitation of their biological instincts. We must remind mankind that instinct without morality turns humans into beasts.”
“Unaccountable pleasure and power, front and center.” Salem muttered on about mankind’s blindness to the dangers of submitting to the impulse to pursue pleasure without thought to consequence.
“The age is already ripe for taking. We've seen it over and over on a smaller scale.” Uriel tightened his expression. “The addictions of the wicked are growing and immorality at every level is flourishing.” The seasoned warrior's anger seeped through, but it only mirrored the depth of his feeling for his youngest siblings, the humans.
Having spent ages cautioning the warriors against emotional involvement in their missions, things were especially dire for Uriel to let his own slip in. But as Commander of The Brotherhood of Warriors, Toren trusted he would use it to sharpen the wisdom of his judgments, rather than cloud them.
“And the righteous?” Kassern finally broke his own silence.
“They more than sense the make-or-break tension at the seams of every society. They know something grave is coming, and they're trying to prepare, but aren't sure how. And now with the new Pope in play, this could get really bad really fast.” Uriel stood, hopefully to end the meeting. “Thankfully, the faithful are more than ready to take it to the next step. They just need to be point in the right direction.”
Dorn stood to face their commander. “All respect sir, but our faithful are pathetically few and far between and dangerously prone to temptation. What about this Pope, what are the odds looking like?”
Uriel rolled a small ball of emerald mist between his two fingers, something Toren noticed he did when in deep thought. “Your female human holds the key. Not your wife, the other one,” as though Dorn had asked. “Jessie. She seems to have obtained one of the more valuable aspects of your power.”
“Like what?” Lyght’s diamond eyes sparkled with curiosity.
“Empathy. Compassion. And prophetic knowledge of the past and present. You need to get her an audience with him. If Socerith succeeds in winning the Pope, his first act will be legalizing birth control for the faithful. It will be heralded as progress in moving the Church into the twenty-first century, and change that's readily accepted by the rest of the modern world. A mere crack in the doorway that will lead to the complete dismantling of an already shaky sovereignty.”
“You speak as though that Church is still pure and not plagued with the grievances of man-tweak and shop keep.” Arith punctuated the gravelly pronouncement by heavily propping his feet on the onyx table, pushing the limits of Uriel's seemingly endless patience, as always.
Man-tweak and shop keep? Somebody was cramming their human vocabulary studies. Toren’s mercury braced for Uriel’s wrath. Arith was just powerful enough to trifle with the commander’s patience. But Toren understood the warrior’s need to engage his superior in a battle. Anything to take his mind off the looming damnation of gaining humanity.
“Many people think it is still pure. But we all know there isn’t a church on Earth that is entirely error free. But at the base of many of these spiritual cells is the soul-saving ingredient that allows us to navigate them through the muddied waters.”
Meron ran his hands over his face and let them drop to the table with a frustrated thump. “I for one will be eternally grateful when this Age is over. It never ceases to amaze me how quickly the ways of sin infest the human spirit and mind until there's a festering cess-pool of human dirty bombs ready to go off and contaminate not only all of humanity, but future generations as well.”
“Any good news in this batch of…” Grythe paused, searching for the word he needed.
“Shit, is the human term,” Kassern offered.
Uriel paused. “Actually, yes. I’ve decided I will go ahead and select your wives to make this process quicker. One less detail for you to concern yourselves with.”
The majority of Toren’s brothers came off their seats in b
ooming protests with Kassern clutching his chest in mock devastation for his brothers.
“Fine by me,” Zool muttered. “Just make sure she’s extremely intelligent and tough, I cannot tolerate a senseless human.”
“Not fine by me,” Lassin said. “Just let me window shop a little longer—”
“No more time.” Uriel snapped his fingers and a viewing port that vaguely resembled a flat screen TV materialized at his side. “These are all convents we know he’s infested, and we're certain there are more we haven't found yet.” He pointed to more than a dozen random spots on the virtual map. “We need to step up this operation. I originally gave you a month to form your triumvirates. Now I need you to accomplish that phase in half the time.”
“Half!” Grythe's wings erupted with a noisy clatter of fluttering crystals.
“Perfect.” Meron patted Grythe on the back. “The sooner we get it over with the better.”
“How are we supposed to woo a woman in two weeks?”
“Trust me, it won’t be a problem. I’m finding you women who are desperate. The human is most vulnerable and susceptible to love at those times. It’ll be simple.” Uriel raised emphatic brows. "You're archangels. Do what you’re good at. Anything and everything.
“That’s darn near sounding like coercion,” Toren drawled. If he didn't know better, he'd have sworn Uriel rolled his eyes.
“Well, if you want to call utilizing instinct to lure a drowning victim into a rescue boat coercion, then fine.” Uriel swiped the air and shut off the screen. “Heavens, we’ve been coercing humanity into the ark for centuries now. Don’t go soft on me now, simply because you’ll be hauling them on your backs.”
Vektor snorted lightly. “Says the ring master to the circus freaks.” When the others looked at him with confused expressions, he shrugged. "I don't know what it means. Someone said it in one of those television things. It seemed appropriate." His words fell as flat as a race joke at the funeral of a racial hate crime victim.
Summon Toren (Archangels Creed #3) Page 1
