by Amanda Jones
“He probably ran into one of his ‘special friends’ and forgot the line was still open.” Samael said with a roll of his eyes. “You know how distracted he gets where women are concerned.”
Baliel narrowed his eyes at his friend. “Nice try, Sam. You know as well as I do that he’d never leave us hanging this long without at least checking in…especially now.”
“I know. I know.” Sam nodded. “I’m just trying to stay positive here.”
Sergei broke into laughter, doubling over and grabbing his sides as he chuckled. Everyone at the table turned as a unit to look at him like he was an escaped lunatic.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he said, gasping as he tried to talk through bursts of laughter. “It just struck me as really funny that the angel of death is the glass-half-full person here.”
Baliel and Azazel exchanged a look. “Should you kill him Al, or should I?” Baliel asked.
“Can’t do it, Bill. If we kill him, Katia will be really pissed, and if she’s pissed, then Luc will be pissed. I really don’t want to piss Luc off. He just got his wings back and seems to be on the relatively straight and narrow, and happy for the first time in centuries. The vampire’s just not worth it.”
Sergei sobered at the mention of Katia’s name. They’d been friends for years and he’d lost her to Luc, but in the end, her happiness and continued friendship was still important to him. “I’m sorry, guys. I have a tendency to laugh at totally inappropriate times. Stress reliever, I guess. I’m just as worried as you are. It’s been hours.” He turned to look at Yetarel. “You’re sure there were absolutely no sounds you could make out in the background that might give us a clue as to where he was?”
Yetarel glanced back down at his phone and shook his head. “Nope. Nothing useful, just muffled noises.”
“Guys! What’s with all the long faces?” Yetarel looked up and saw Theo approaching. The demon must have just arrived for the start of his shift.
Theo actually ran The Advocate, but preferred his place behind the bar to being seen as the boss. He’d always been a friendly sort, with a smile and a kind word for everyone, and looked just as laid back and casual. The only outward signs of his demonic nature were the two small horns peeking out through his light brown hair. “Y’all look sadder than snowflakes in Sheol!”
“Hey.” The guys mumbled in greeting.
“Whatever happened to the new bartender you’d hired?” Yetarel asked. “She seemed good.”
Theo rolled his eyes dramatically and threw his hands up in the air in exasperation. “Don’t get me wrong, I really liked her…probably more than I should have, but I had to let her go. She kept eating the customers. That’s never good for business. You know my policy — I give them two warnings. Third time they’re out.”
“Vampire right?” Bill asked.
“Yeah, newbie. She was having a hard time controlling the thirst…they’re normally pretty off the handle for the first while.” Theo winced and glanced over at Sergei. “No offense meant, dude.”
Sergei just shrugged it off and smiled. “I had a little extra ammunition on my side. I worked a great spell that lets me control it much better.”
Theo snapped his fingers and pointed at Sergei. “Oh yeah, that’s right. You’re the witch…or whatever guy-witches call themselves. So that shit still works even after you got turned?”
“For the most part, yeah.” Sergei heaved a sigh. “I tried a summoning spell to reach the angels tonight…to see if they’d maybe heard anything from or about B, but no dice.”
Theo frowned as he pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. “That does make sense. I mean, technically, you’re part of the dark now, though you’re not evil. That’s probably why you can’t call on the light…and you guys are….what?”
The former fallen angels all looked at each other and began piping up.
“Confused,” said Bill
“Who the fuck knows.” Al chimed in.
“Fucked,” Sam responded.
Yetarel stared down at the plate in front of him, the stainless steel reflecting his image back up at him. “Neither light, nor dark, somewhere in the middle, but still stuck in our own personal Sheol.”
Sam’s laughter made Yetarel jerk his head up sharply. “There he goes again, Mr. Calvin Klein, staring at his oh-so-handsome visage yet again.” The others chuckled.
Yetarel’s chest felt hollow as he joined in with a half-hearted laugh. Seriously, he’d been listening to twenty years’ worth of Calvin Klein jokes, and the guys never seemed to tire of them. You’d think they’d have at least moved on to a new reference by now. In the end, they really had no idea. And it was probably better that they didn’t. He and B shared a dark and painful secret that they’d long ago decided was best kept locked away. They had each found a way to deal with the pain and hollowness that had been left behind after years of torture. But in the end, they were bound together in a way their friends would never understand.
Yetarel hated the assumption that he was just a vain prick who couldn’t stop himself from looking into every reflective surface if his life depended upon it, but it was far easier than actually trying to formulate the words to explain the truth about himself. How could he possibly put into words that he was looking for an outward manifestation of all the internal scars —peering into the glass to see if any part of his horrific past was evident on the surface? He couldn’t stop himself from trying to see the angel he used to be. Now all he saw was the monster in the mirror. In the end, Yetarel spent his life looking for the evidence whereas B had always felt better when he was numb, whether it was by drowning himself in women, or by mainlining salvia.
None of the other guys knew about B’s drug use. They chalked him up as a man-whore and moved on with life, taking his smart-ass humour and easy smile as a sign that all was well with his world. Funny, Yetarel mused, that they were both regarded as hopelessly shallow by their friends, but in reality they had so much swirling just beneath the surface.
Yanking himself out of his self-destructive thoughts, Yetarel turned to address Theo. “How did you find out about our collective change in state?”
Theo’s eyebrow rose up to his hairline as he gave Yetarel a crooked smile. “You know how it is, my friend. News around here travels faster than a Sheolic brush fire.”
The group grunted in acknowledgement.
“Demons. Fucking gossip-mongers the lot of them.” Bill bit out as he grabbed up his pint and took a long swig.
“Hey, now. Don’t lump us all in together. It was actually some hot blonde that started running her mouth…. She’s been in here almost every day. Must be one of those chicks that spends her time panting over the lot of you.” Theo retorted with a roll of his eyes. “If I had a dollar for every chippy that asked about the Princes of Hell, I’d never have to work another day in my life.”
The guys groaned in unison. The “Princes of Hell” was a nickname their group had gotten after their fall; apparently, the demons had found it rather amusing that a bunch of “holier than thou” angels were stuck on the dark side. It had started off as an insult. But over time it had become their calling card, with women seeking them out, and demons that incurred their wrath shrinking in fear. What had happened a few weeks ago in Sheol had been epic, an unprecedented game-changer, with their group winning a battle against their former boss, Satan. The battle lines between the light and the dark were becoming more clearly drawn than they’d been in millennia. There was a sense of restlessness within the demon population — a feeling that something big was coming, but nobody knew quite what.
“I’m sorry, you know.” Theo sighed.
Yetarel turned towards him with a frown. “About what? The women?”
“No. About Mo.”
Yetarel closed his eyes briefly and sighed. He nodded slowly as he looked down at his lap. “Thanks, man.”
Asmodeus, or Mo as they’d nicknamed him, had fallen in their last battle, cut down just as he was about to make
his escape from Satan’s castle, Halja. After the many centuries they’d spent together as a crew, they’d mourned his loss deeply, none of them knowing quite how to process the loss of their friend.
Outside of decapitation, they were immortal. So, the idea that one of their own was gone seemed somehow impossible. If one of them had to go, Yetarel had always hoped it would be him, however selfish the notion was. On one hand he didn’t want to leave B alone in the world. On the other, death would finally release him from the eternal life sentence he was serving trapped in his mind and body.
Theo’s chair scraped along the wood floor as he drew himself up, the sound rousing everyone from their thoughts. “I’d better head over to the bar. Let me know if y’all need anything, all right?”
The group nodded soberly as he turned and strode off. Each of them stared into their beers, lost in their own private pain. Yetarel sighed loudly and raised his eyes to the group.
“Should we go looking for him at this point, guys? I think we can all agree we’re worried as hell.”
Murmurs of agreement made their way around the table.
“There’s only one problem,” said Sam. “What are our limitations now that we’re not tied to Satan anymore? Can we defend ourselves if we’re attacked? Were any of our abilities affected by our shift in status? What is our status now?”
Yetarel nodded in agreement. “We can’t really take anything for granted at this point. Maybe we can put a call out to Luc and Katia. They’ll definitely be willing to help and we know where they stand in the greater scheme of the Otherworld.”
“No.” Heads all around the table swivelled to stare at Sergei’s pronouncement.
“What?” Sam asked Sergei.
“We can’t bother Luc and Katia with this right now. They’re on their honeymoon and are finally having a chance to enjoy a bit of peace since the near-apocalyptic events of a short while ago. I think averting an apocalypse gives them the right to a bit of a break, don’t you guys?”
A collective sigh rose up around the table as the fallen reluctantly agreed.
“Well, if we’re not going to go to Luc for help, then I guess I’m the lucky winner in the game of Find B.” Sam sighed. “There’s some likelihood that my ability to steal souls is still intact. When I was in the heavens, I was able to escort souls. In Sheol, I did the same. It stands to reason that power wouldn’t have disappeared entirely. I should be the safest outside of The Advocate.”
Sam slid back his chair and tossed some Sheolic ducats down on the table to cover his beer. He saluted his fallen comrades and made his way towards the door of the way station. The despondent group at the table resumed their conversation, nobody noticing the beautiful, blue-eyed blonde rising from a nearby table to trail Sam out the door.
Chapter Six
Mara
The gurney rolled down the hallway, its wheels squeaking over the linoleum floors like a broken grocery store shopping cart. Mara glanced over at Alex; he was certainly putting forth his best poker face on this mission. They were rolling their not-so-dead patient down the hallways of the hospital towards the morgue like a gross anatomy special. They nodded solemnly in tandem at colleagues as they passed, making sure they kept their expressions suitably morose for having recently lost a patient. A few funny looks were levelled their way; it wasn’t the norm to see two surgeons wheeling a gurney around.
“Almost at the exit.” Alex whispered, the sound inaudible to any nearby humans.
Mara nodded almost imperceptibly. Though she didn’t have the need to, she almost breathed a sigh of relief as the exit to the underground, employee parking garage came into view, the door directly across from the hallway leading to the morgue. The old saying “don’t count your chickens” came to mind as one of her favourite doctors strolled around the corner and stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of her and Alex.
“Working as orderlies now?” He asked them with a confused look on his face.
They stopped in their tracks, the body on the gurney shifted slightly and Bataryal’s arm slipped out from under the sheeting to dangle down by his side. The six-foot-five doctor, affectionately nicknamed Mr. Clean, raised his eyebrows.
“Doctor Watt…Howie. Um, we just wanted to deliver this one ourselves. It was a tough loss.” Mara trailed off, knowing exactly how rattled she sounded.
“Yeah, I heard you two had been working on a stabbing vic. Guessing this is him?” Doctor Watt looked over at Alex, brows still raised. “Never seen you guys take a loss so hard before. Did you know him or something?”
Alex cleared his throat. “Something like that.”
Doctor Watt nodded solemnly and walked over to clap Alex on the back. “Sorry, man. Any loss is bad, but my condolences on this one. I’ll leave you to it.” He squeezed Mara’s arm and began to turn away when Bataryal’s arm twitched, stopping him in his tracks.
“Did he just...?” Doctor Watt stood dumbstruck pointing at the arm hanging off the gurney. “I swear I just saw…” He turned to look at Mara.
Mara schooled her expression into the expression of pure innocence she’d practiced one too many times as she looked back at her colleague. “What Howie?” Her heart squeezed as he shook his head and took off his glasses, cleaning the lenses on his pristine white lab coat.
“I could have sworn he moved,” Howie said, moving towards the gurney.
Alex shot Mara a desperate look as he grabbed for Howie’s arm, pulling him back with far too much ease and speed. Doctor Howie Watt could easily have been a pro football player and wasn’t accustomed to being manhandled by his wiry colleague.
“What’s going on? How did you…?” He was beginning to look like his brain was going to melt. Mara decided it was time to make a desperation move.
“Howie, I think you need to hit an on-call room for a while. You must be going on thirty hours at this point. No wonder you’re seeing things.” She reached out to touch his arm lightly and gazed into his eyes. As soon as she caught his gaze, Mara let go, allowing her preternatural senses to reach out and pull him in. She felt the power swirling through her and knew her eyes were glowing gold. Howie’s pupils dilated and his face went slack as his mind opened to her suggestion. Mara had sworn not to use her powers unless absolutely necessary and never on friends. Here she was breaking her promises to herself yet again. She’d now made a vampire, which she’d sworn never to do, and she was currently violating the mind of a dear colleague. She could tell herself that she was doing these things with the best intentions, but isn’t that what paved the road to Sheol?
Stuffing down her self-loathing, Mara began overwriting Howie’s will with her own. In a calm, soothing voice she talked him around the problem. “You’re tired Howie. You’re going to go to the on-call room and sleep. You stopped to talk to Alex and me on our way out to the employee parking lot. Our shifts are done and we’re heading home. You will have no memory of this conversation. Do you understand?”
Howie nodded vacantly, his voice devoid of inflection. “Yes, I understand.”
Mara pulled her power back slowly, not wanting to jar her friend’s psyche. Howie stood still for a moment, slowly swaying on his feet before shaking his head and throwing off the hypnotic effect. He gave Mara and Alex his usual good-natured smile.
“Nice running into you guys on your way out! Gotta hit the hay!” He stepped away and began moving down the corridor towards the elevator bank without a backwards glance.
Alex reached out and touched Mara’s arm. “Mara, I…”
“Don’t. Just don’t.” She shook off his touch and moved back to the head of the gurney. “We don’t have time for a pity party. Let’s get moving.”
“Yeah. Okay.” Alex replied quietly as he moved to walk beside her.
The double doors of the employee parking lot swung open as they pushed the gurney through, and slammed shut behind them. Mara headed instinctively for her car parked in the prime surgical parking near the entrance. It paid to be one of the top dogs in
the hospital. As they neared her vehicle she realized they had a small problem.
“Alex, I think we’re going to have to use your SUV. No way am I going to scrunch Bataryal up in the backseat of my Mini Cooper and risk popping his stitches. All that internal work is probably still healing, and we don’t know why he wasn’t repairing himself properly.”
Alex sighed and waved towards the Durango parked a few spots down. “Lead the way. I’ll put the seats down in the back.”
They worked in silence to situate the fallen angel as comfortably as a half-dead man could get in the back of the SUV. He groaned lightly and winced in pain as he was shifted off the gurney. Mara slammed the trunk door closed and pushed the gurney back through the doors to the hospital corridor, leaving it against a wall for one of the orderlies to move later. Her brain was spinning. Where were they going to hide a fallen angel that basically had a wanted poster out for him in Sheol? Her home wasn’t warded and she wouldn’t ask Alex to put himself in a risky situation he hadn’t had a part in. The Advocate was warded against violence, but there was no way of keeping Bataryal’s presence a secret when dozens of demons from all species made their way through the haven on a daily basis. What on earth was she going to do with the two hundred pound liability in the trunk of her friend’s vehicle?
With her brain still chasing its own tail, Mara got into the passenger seat beside Alex. In typical Alex fashion, he looked over at her and voiced her thoughts.
