Dylan pulled her hand from Wyatt’s. “If you’ll excuse me…”
“Mom, we really need your input on this,” Josephine said.
She paused at the doorway. “It sounds to me like you’re doing all you can.”
“Yes, but you and Stiles—”
“And we will do what we can.”
She turned and left before Josephine or Wyatt could say anything else.
***
Dylan found Stiles in the city park, a lovely strip of grass and trees between the uniform city buildings. It reminded her, sometimes, of the grove of trees behind an old motel where she and Stiles had once met. They were hiding from Wyatt so they could discuss freely the people Wyatt believed to be their allies, but whom Stiles knew were not. More than that had happened in the park…particularly a moment Dylan should have long put behind her, but which, somehow, still cropped up in her thoughts more often than she would like to admit.
“What do you know?”
Stiles glanced at her. “There’s the Dylan I know. Always blunt with no filter.”
“We don’t have time for this, Stiles. Tell me what’s going on.”
He turned from her, facing the direction of the hospital. The lights were ablaze in the building, all of them, something that Dylan couldn’t remember ever happening before. The hospital had a dozen rooms, but only two or three had ever been occupied at one time before. Now, they were struggling to find space for the most critical of the ill. It was so bad that they had to send home patients with bags of medications and overworked nurses stopping by every few days to check in.
“I think I have an idea of what this disease is.”
Dylan stared at him. “What do you mean, you know what it is? Even the doctors have no clue.”
“That’s because most of them have never seen it. But I have. And you.”
“Me?”
He glanced at her and suddenly her mind was flooded with memories. Lily, sitting on her throne with lesions on her body, so weak she could hardly sit up straight. Stiles himself, lying on the ground, covered in lesions and coughing, with bloody foam slipping from between his lips. Joanna…the horrifying sight of Joanna dying from the infusion of darkness that Dylan herself had given her.
She pushed the images away, shivering in the warm evening air as she wrapped her arms around her chest.
“That’s not possible.”
“The lesions, the cough, the weakness, the joint pain. It’s all the same, Dylan.”
“But it’s not possible. That was an angel disease that only affected the angels. The humans were immune.”
“It’s been altered.”
“How?”
Stiles shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Then how do you…”
But then she realized there was no reason to argue. She could see it, probably had seen it from the beginning. She just didn’t want to believe it.
She walked over to a bench and sat down. She felt like curling up into the fetal position and comforting herself by rocking like a baby. She had thought they were past all of this nonsense. The end of the war—the choice made—that was supposed to be the end of it all. Luc and Lily were dead, Joanna was…well, they hadn’t heard from her in thirty-seven years, so she assumed that she was gone. The people were becoming human again, the world was rebuilding itself. They were living their second chance.
And now this.
“Could it be the gargoyles?”
Stiles shrugged. “I don’t know, but I doubt it. It’s their purpose to protect humans, not harm them.”
“You said some turned on them—”
“They turned on the Nephilim. Not the humans. And now…even though they’re all Nephilim, their souls are blessed and they’ve lost their powers, so, technically, they’re human again. And that puts them back under the protection of the gargoyles.”
“Are you sure?”
Stiles came over and sat heavily on the bench beside her. “I’m never completely sure of anything. But I’m pretty certain.”
“We should talk to Donna.”
Stiles hesitated. Neither of them had seen a gargoyle in years. Demetria, one of the gargoyle leaders, used to come by every couple of years, just to check in, but she stopped five, maybe seven years ago. Donna, Dylan’s sister—they shared a guardian in the dorms at Genero—was their only contact with the gargoyles, now. But the last time they saw Donna was over a year ago.
Dylan slid her hand over Stiles’. He wrapped his fingers around hers, squeezing her hand. And then, in a blink, they were standing in a bright, airy room Dylan didn’t recognize. But she recognized the pretty, blonde woman sitting on a couch across from where Dylan and Stiles appeared.
“Dylan!”
She jumped up and ran to Dylan, throwing her arms around her and almost knocking them both off their feet. But Dylan was just as happy to see her, burying her face in Donna’s hair and breathing in the familiar scent of her.
“I can’t believe you’re here. Demetria thought…but I wasn’t sure.”
“What?” Dylan pushed Donna’s face back so she could read her expression. “Demetria thought…what?”
“She thought the two of you might show up. We’ve been hearing about this illness that’s affecting the humans.”
Dylan wished she didn’t have to confirm what they had heard because she could feel the fear that seemed to ebb and flow inside of her sister like the waves of an ocean. It was Donna’s nature, more than it had ever been Dylan’s, to protect those around her.
“A hundred in our community, so far,” she said. “And there are more in the other communities. Some have as many as three or four hundred patients.”
Donna’s pretty eyes clouded over. “I had hoped it was just a reemergence of some flu, or something.”
“Where’s Demetria?” Stiles asked, moving behind Dylan.
“She’s in the conference room with some of the others.” Donna studied Dylan for a long minute, her eyes shifting briefly to Stiles. “This way.”
They followed her up a set of stairs that ended at a tall, wooden door. They could hear voices coming from behind it. Dylan recognized Demetria’s, but none of the others. But Stiles must have heard something, but he suddenly stepped in front of Dylan and guided her behind him.
“Stiles?”
And then Donna opened the door and revealed a room full of gargoyles in their natural, stone-like forms.
One in particular stood, a deep growl coming from somewhere deep in his chest.
“Wilhelm.”
Chapter 9
Stiles burst across the room and grabbed Wilhelm around the neck, slamming him against the far wall.
“Hello, brother,” Wilhelm said with laughter in his voice despite the restriction of Stiles’ hold.
Stiles slammed him to the wall again, only vaguely aware of the plaster and dust raining down around them.
“What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same question. Why haven’t you gone back to where you came from?”
“I didn’t betray my Father.”
Wilhelm laughed. “No. You just betrayed everyone else.”
“Cut it out!” Demetria came up behind Stiles, pulling at his arm. “Wilhelm has made amends, Stiles.”
Stiles shook his head. “He delivered humans to the angels.”
“They weren’t all human,” Wilhelm said. “And you knew it.”
“They were my people. And you sent them to become slaves for Luc and Lily.”
Wilhelm shrugged. “We all make mistakes.”
Stiles shoved him against the wall a third time, the wooden studs that formed the frame snapping with a loud pop.
“Your mistake caused good people to suffer. And it derailed my mission. You almost made it impossible for me to do what I was here to do. If you hadn’t—”
“But it all worked out for the best.”
Anger burned inside of Stiles. If Wilhelm hadn’t been stealing humans from a ba
ttle he was supposed to be helping the humans fight, and if he hadn’t stolen Tyler’s lover, Philip, Stiles would have had a few more days with Rebecca and his unborn son. He wouldn’t have had to work with Joanna to escape Luc and Lily. He wouldn’t have had to risk another angel, possibly exposing her identity to the community where she had found acceptance.
Wilhelm was his ally once. But now, when Stiles looked at him, all he saw was that conference room in Philadelphia…
He felt the movement of air that indicated Wilhelm had come back for another round. Stiles sidestepped him, moving up behind Nick and placing both hands on either side of his head. In an instant Nick’s mental walls fell and Stiles heard the quiet thoughts that Nick thought he was concealing:
We’re almost home free. Just let us get past this and Luc will give us the freedom he promised. A house, silence, and no more of this ridiculous war with these insane humans…
And then he saw it all. The agreement between Nick and Luc, the story he’d told Wilhelm. The way he chose his victims, assuming they were all humans with angel DNA somewhere in their ancestry. He was wrong on that, but he knew Luc wouldn’t bother to verify it. They needed slaves, warm bodies to take the place of the captives Stiles had released from that little farmhouse just over two years before…Rhonda and Anna and all the others he’d freed the day he infected Lily with the angel disease…
Stiles’ angel sword appeared in his hand, welcomed by the horrified gasps of those around him. Wilhelm’s eyes widened.
“You won’t do it. We’re brothers.”
“You stopped being my brother when you turned on the humans.”
“It wasn’t me. It was Nick and Dina—”
“They would never do anything without your permission.”
“Stiles…”
Dylan came up behind him and pressed her hand to the center of his back. He could feel a slow infusion of peace. It was like climbing into a warm bath of bubbles at the end of a long day. It calmed the tension in his shoulders, eased the ache in his chest. But it didn’t completely destroy the anger that was still simmering just below the surface.
He pressed the sword to Wilhelm’s stone throat. A few drops of the gargoyle’s grayish-red blood ran over the smooth, silver blade.
“This is not what we came for.” Dylan wrapped her hand over Stiles’ sword hand, her fingers pressed into the spaces between his. “We came here for the people, not for decades-old revenge.”
But it didn’t feel decades old. It felt as new as it had been when it first played out. He’d let Wilhelm go then. He wasn’t sure he could live with himself if he did it again.
Stiles, this is not who you are.
Dylan’s voice echoed in his mind and turned into Rebecca’s soft, soothing tones. And that tore the scab off of a wound that was so slow to heal.
He stepped back, opening his hand as the sword simply disappeared.
“You will pay for your sins.” Stiles pointed at Wilhelm as he pulled out of the ruin of the wall and shrank into his human form. “One day, you will pay.”
“We all will, brother.”
Stiles inclined his head slightly, acknowledging the truth. One day, Stiles would also pay for the things he had done all those years ago. But there was a difference between sacrificing a friend for the larger good and making a deal with the devil.
Donna rushed around Stiles and Dylan to touch Wilhelm’s face, checking him for injuries. They shared a kiss that clearly showed an intimacy beyond friendship. It disgusted Stiles. He turned and stormed from the room, weary in a way that was new…different.
“I don’t think I can do this anymore,” he whispered under his breath. “I don’t think I can do whatever it is you want from me, Father.”
And then Dylan was there, her hand on his shoulder taking some of the weariness away. He studied her familiar features, a face he had known since before she was even born, and he felt a spark of hope that continued to burn deep in his soul.
He’d told her once that he was a patient man. But he was afraid his patience was beginning to run thin.
Chapter 10
“We’ve been hearing things, but we weren’t convinced that it was as serious as this.”
Dylan leaned forward, bracing her arms on her knees. “We have three dead in our city. We don’t know about the other cities, but I wouldn’t be surprised if more follow.”
“Three does not make an epidemic,” Wilhelm said.
Donna took Wilhelm’s hand, shooting him a look that made him sit back and stare up at the ceiling for a moment.
“Our doctors don’t know how to treat it,” Dylan continued. “And we’re pretty sure we recognize the symptoms.”
Demetria’s eyebrows rose. “From what? Something before the war?”
“During the war, actually.” Stiles was studying his hands—hands that were shaking just slightly. “I think someone or something has modified the angel disease.”
Silence fell over the room. Everyone seemed to be looking at the floor except for Dylan and Donna. And then Wilhelm laughed.
“Brilliant,” he said. “You’ve struck again, Stiles.”
Dylan felt the anger and shame rush through Stiles. For a moment, she was afraid he might charge Wilhelm again. But he stayed seated there on the couch beside her, still staring at his hands.
“We all agreed that creating the illness was the best thing at the time.”
“Yes, well, no one imagined it would be such a colossal failure.”
“What are you talking about?” Donna asked.
Demetria shook her head. “There’s no point in dredging up the past.”
“Oh, why not?” Wilhelm asked. “He had no problem with it a few minutes ago.”
Dylan felt like she’d been dropped into the plot of a bad romance novel. She studied Stiles face and could see that he was hiding something. But no matter how hard she poked, she couldn’t find a crack in his mental walls that hid his thoughts from everyone around him.
“Maybe we should just get this out of the way.”
Demetria shook her head, but Wilhelm seemed thrilled to be the one to reveal one of Stiles’ many secrets.
“Stiles met some scientist from Genero—Matthew something—who told him that the elixir Lily and her friends were trying to make to give them freewill had interesting side effects from time to time. It would make the angels sick; it’d cause them to die quick, but horrifying deaths. So he thought it would be a brilliant way to make the angels go home voluntarily.” Wilhelm shook his head. “He had his scientist perfect a version of the elixir that caused the worst of these side effects, to create a disease that would only effect angels. And then he injected them with it.”
Dylan stared at Stiles. “You did that?”
“It was early in the war. We were trying to stop the angels from annihilating the human race.”
“You injected Lily?”
Stiles’ eyes finally met her own. There were so many emotions in those eyes…so much emotion rolling off of him in waves that it threatened to drown her. Pride, anger, grief, pain, shame…so many that she couldn’t even begin to understand them all.
“What about Joanna? You?”
Wilhelm laughed again. “You mean the idiot caught his own disease? Brilliant, Stiles.”
But Stiles didn’t seem to hear him. He was focused on Dylan and nothing else.
“I didn’t inject Joanna.”
“Then how?”
“The elixir the angels took to give themselves freewill…it changed their powers. Some lost the ability to move into their ethereal form, some couldn’t hear other’s thoughts, and some were unable to heal themselves.” Stiles studied Dylan for a minute. “I’m not sure how Joanna got it…if she really had it. She might have just been playing on your sympathies to try to get you to agree to help Lily.”
Dylan nodded slowly, remembering the conversation she’d had with Joanna when that angel—Ichabod, she’d called him, because he looked like the character from an ol
d book she used to read—took Dylan to Wyatt’s mother, back when Joanna had thought she could manipulate Dylan into making the choice the angels wanted her to make. It would make sense that the scars and lesions Joanna had shown her were something else. She certainly hadn’t appeared all that ill at the time.
“But you,” Dylan said, touching Stiles’ hand. “You had it. You can’t convince me that was a trick.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
That overwhelming sadness that Dylan had always associated with Stiles filled his eyes. But that was before Rebecca. She hadn’t seen it there for so long that she had almost forgotten what it looked like. Seeing it now took Dylan back to a place she had thought they’d put behind them long ago.
She didn’t push him. She suddenly wasn’t sure she wanted to know the truth.
“How could it have been modified?”
It was Demetria’s question, but it was one that was on all of their minds. Dylan turned to look at the gargoyle.
“The most logical conclusion would be Genero. But Genero was leveled in the explosion thirty-five years ago. And the ruins were excavated for materials years ago. There’s nothing left there.”
“There were other places where Lily and her scientists conducted experiments.” Wilhelm stood, pulling away from Donna’s arms. “I’m surprised he hasn’t mentioned that to you.”
Dylan looked at Stiles again. “Is that true?”
He nodded. “There were several, but none were as active as Genero.”
“But if the scientists left behind notes, or records of their work, anyone with a scientific background could have found it and done this.”
“I don’t think that’s possible.”
“Why not?” Demetria asked.
Stiles stood; he was just as restless as Wilhelm was. But he didn’t begin to pace as Wilhelm was doing. He just stood there in front of the couch, his hands on his hips.
“Because I know where the notes Matthew made are. And I know that most of the other facilities were leveled in the war.”
“But not all of them,” Demetria said.
“Not all.”
Demetria sat back in her chair, flopping like a teenager. It was funny because she still looked the same as she had when Dylan was a ward in the dormitory where Demetria was the headmistress. She still had the same dark hair and the same frown lines on either side of her mouth. She still looked like she was a woman in her mid-thirties even though she had to be at least seventy, maybe even much older than that. The gargoyles, apparently, didn’t age, either.
BROKEN ANGELS (Angels and Demons Book 1) Page 5
