Was this what it was like to be human?
Some time later, they both made it to the front room where Lilith’s mother brought them fresh lemonade and homebaked cookies. They sat side by side and didn’t speak for a while. Lilith found that she loved being this close to another human, to her mother.
“I’m sorry,” was the first thing she said. “But I forgot. I think he made me forget. What is your name?”
Lilith’s mother fought to stem her tears. “Abigaille,” she said. “But just Abi.”
“He never knew I remembered our address. Never thought to destroy that memory. I think it was part of his plan. And then . . .” She spread her hands to indicate the city and the world at large. “All this happened.”
“I have so many questions,” Abi said.
“I know, Mother . . . Mom . . .” it felt odd, saying that word. Everything felt surreal. She was finally back where she wanted to be.
“Lucifer held me in a house in the first hell for seventeen years. He didn’t hurt me. He visited often. I never wanted for anything. I was left innocent, uncorrupted. But I was guarded day and night by a terrible being called Samael, who still hunts for me. I’m twenty two now, Mom, and I think Lucifer meant to corrupt me utterly during my twenty-first year. Turn me, basically, into a demon. Maybe thinking I would rule at his side.”
Abi’s mouth was open and the expression on her face was similar to those Lilith had witnessed back at the bar.
“It’s a lot to take in,” Lilith said. “Why don’t we just enjoy this for now?”
A deep-red sunset encompassed the distant skies. They sat for a while staring out the window as it went down and ended in a splash of fire at the far horizon. They sipped their lemonade and ate their cookies until they were ready to talk again. Lilith explained a little more of what life was like in hell but assured her mother that she’d felt safe and looked after, if not properly cared for. The difference being that she’d never felt an ounce of real emotion aimed toward her.
The emotions her mother exhibited now filled Lilith’s heart, made it bloom. She saw in a way that no other human ever could why their existence was so envied by those that only lived with cold, detached sentiments.
The night waned and the morning rose. They dozed against each other’s shoulders. They woke and Abi went off to cook them some breakfast. Lilith took the chance to explore the house and found herself rooted in front of the sideboard.
Feelings flooded her chest as she looked on a dozen old photographs of her, aged between newborn and five. She couldn’t stop the tears then, crying for everything that she and her mother had lost. Her childhood. Her teens. She cried and she couldn’t stop. After a while her mother returned and held her.
“It will be okay,” Abi said.
Lilith heard the words but only felt a dagger in the heart. “He will never let me go. He’ll remember. He’ll twist this in some way. Because he won’t have forgotten your address either. There’s no happy ending here, Mom.”
Abi held her tightly. “Come and eat,” she said. “Everything always feels better after bacon.”
“Bacon?”
Lilith found that she loved it. She loved everything about this world and her mother and her mother’s house. If only they had more memories together.
“It will never end until he gets everything he wants,” Lilith said. She felt stronger now. Her mind was active. “There’s only one thing to do.”
Abi looked at her fearfully. “And what’s that?”
“Save you. Save me. And save our future.”
“Is that all?” Abi tried to smile.
“I have seen people that are capable of it. They call themselves Aegis. I carry an artefact for them. I have to help them, and there’s only one way to do that.”
“Do not risk your life.”
“It’s never not been at risk, Mom. That, I can deal with. But there is a way I can stop Lucifer and help Aegis. There is a way I can help us stay together.”
“And what’s that?”
“I have to get close to my father.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Ken Hamilton was surrounded by utter bedlam. A demonic chaos. Nothing he’d ever experienced had prepared him for this. Death was seconds away.
After bargaining for Felicia’s life, after bartering his soul, and after Milo almost died at Dementia’s hands, the future had seemed about as bleak as surfing across Shark Reef. He’d lost his upbeat outlook. Felicia had lost her sense of fun and free-living. Milo had lost Eliza and a lot of self-respect. Ken didn’t want to die but, at that time, it was looking like the preferable option.
Hell, in all its guises, surrounded him. The baying beasts with the tusks and horns. The nightmare eels with their clacking teeth. More fiends than he could count, all standing on the bleachers and deriding him. The Devil encouraged them, seeing earth’s warriors wilting under the onslaught. He’d held a hand up, about to give Dementia the order to kill Milo.
Then everything changed.
Ken didn’t know exactly what had happened. He saw Dementia race off, apparently to get the artefact he’d buried. And then terrible roars had risen from the crowd, and not just the crowd.
When they went silent Ken heard cheering and yelling from all the hordes of hell, across the entire land. He saw beasts marching around the arena. Some carried swords, others clubs. Even more used only their limbs and teeth as weapons, but they came in files and ranks and walked under banners that flickered in an unfelt wind.
Ken saw banners of black and white, banners with dripping skulls painted on them, banners of crimson hue that were adorned with blood and bile and poison. He covered his ears as the sound of their marching grew to intense levels. They numbered in their hundreds of thousands. They had to. All he could hear was marching.
“The armies of hell!” Lucifer cried. “I summon you now!”
And still they came. It was all Ken could do to remain sane. He saw chainmail and pure silver helmets. He saw shields with impossible curves made of human bone. He saw swords that flickered with black flame. For a moment he was reminded that his own sword lay at the Devil’s feet, but then the horrendous spectacle and noise all around overcame his senses and he grabbed Felicia’s shoulders and threw them both to the ground.
He didn’t know how long they lay there. When he looked up one time, he saw ecstasy on Lucifer’s face. Another, he saw the most terrible rictus of a smile he’d ever seen. Milo crawled over to them, holding them. Hours passed. Ken felt ill, he felt as though he was dying. Felicia held him so tightly she bruised his shoulders. They lay there in the dust, dirt and filth as hell came to arms all around them.
Eventually, Ken saw a shimmer forming. Then, he saw another. And another. He recalled that once the artefacts had been found and the ceremony performed, the Devil would return to earth and six more hellgates would open. This meant the Chosen had lost. Hell was headed to earth.
Ken watched all six hellgates take shape. They wafted and warped the very fabric of space down here. At their center he could see a bright snapshot of the place they were connecting to. He saw a sandy, dry desert where the Devil was headed. Another opened on to a street in Tokyo, which he recognized through movies and the Internet. A third opened in the air, looking down onto the roofs and streets of another place he recognized . . . the place the Chosen had worked and trained. It was York and perhaps this was an act of revenge. New York was another place he saw and finally, his eyes were drawn to the biggest gate of all – the largest rip in the air.
It was Felicia who helped him out. “That’s Vienna,” she said. “They’re sending so many demons there.”
“Why Vienna?” Ken asked.
Felicia coughed and struggled but found she could barely move. “It’s the vampires’ spiritual home,” she said. “Where they were first made and where most of their number still reside. If the forces of hell take Vienna it will utterly demoralize the worldwide vampire forces.”
Ken’s eyes came to rest on the sixth hellgate.
It opened up onto a scene he knew very well. And for the first time in days, for the first time since he’d started walking hell’s cursed byways, he felt a glimmer of excitement.
“That’s Fisherman’s Wharf,” he said. “That’s ’Frisco.”
It was probably the only thing that could have galvanized him. Not even a rock chick could have raised his interest at that point – he was a changed man – but the sight of his home town did.
The mass exodus began in earnest now. Ken saw hundreds and probably thousands marching through one hellgate or another. He saw them flying and crawling through too. He even saw some of them falling, plummeting onto the roofs of York, striking the top of the Minster and other churches and bouncing off. Lying as he was, in a heap on the ground, covered in dirt, he went unnoticed for a long time. Finally, Ken saw Lucifer himself step through a gate and enter the realm of earth. Hundreds capered in his wake.
“Are you ready?” Ken breathed. “This is our only chance.”
Felicia moaned, broken and downtrodden. Quickly, he framed her head in his hands. “Do you want to run free again? To feel the grass under your feet? To flit between the trees? Do you want to live like you used to?”
She met his eyes for a long time, searching. He saw the faintest glimmer of hope there. “Not feet. Paws,” she said. “Wolves have paws.”
“No,” he shook his head. “Pooh Bear has paws. You, Felicia, are a motherfucking werewolf.”
“That’s . . . true.”
“You killed a hierarchy demon and Dementia’s mad brother, Rapatutu. You’re one of the world’s greatest heroes. So now, get up on your paws and make a fucking move.”
He struggled half upright, then thought better of it. “On second thoughts stay low. We don’t want to draw any attention. We’ll crawl back to San Francisco if it’s the last thing we do.”
He inched forward, dragging her at first. Milo came with them, as Ken thought the enormous vampire would. He thought about the flighty, shallow man he’d once been. The Chosen and their trek through hell had made him anew. The hellgate they needed flickered and glimmered in the air right next to the Devil’s obsidian throne.
It was the perfect stroke of fate. Ken hadn’t forgotten the Lionheart blade. It lay there now at the foot of the great throne. It gleamed and it spoke to him. He reached out and picked it up, tried to hide it under his body.
Felicia leaned in close. “Don’t cut your balls off.”
Ken winced. That was a friggin’ good call. “Thanks,” he whispered and pulled the sword away from his body, before smearing the shining steel with dirt to make it less noticeable.
They were eight feet from the hellgate. Ken waited until there was a pause in the flow of beasts. It usually came between armies. He’d been watching all six gates. When it happened, he rose, dragged Felicia to her feet and ran for the guttering gate. He jumped through, running from a fiery red place to a sunlit day, from spongy earth to hard asphalt, and from hellish heat to a cool sea-breeze.
The change sent him sprawling headfirst to the ground. Felicia fell with him. Milo landed feet first, being a vampire he probably didn’t even feel the change. He reached down to pick them both up.
“What now?”
Ken took in the scenario as fast as he could. The pier stood to their left. The city to their right. He was so glad to be back he couldn’t think straight. What he definitely knew was that they were finally clear of hell and they had to contact the rest of the Chosen.
“Come on,” he said. “The creatures are headed into the city. We’ll head for the Golden Gate, or rather the beach underneath it. There’s nothing much there. That should give us some time.”
They ran before more evil fiends breached the gate. Ken told them it was an hour’s walk along the coastline to get to the Golden Gate. As he walked, he remembered with poignancy some of the people they’d lost along the way. Of course, it started with Ryan, because it was Ryan who first piloted him toward the Golden Gate in a Porsche whilst battling Dementia some time ago. He thought about Devon Summers and Eldritch and Eleanor. About Eliza. He wondered where Lilith was now and if she’d reached Miami safely.
Had she contacted Aegis and told them about that artefact?
It was so much worse than when he left. Then, there had only been one hellgate. Then, they’d defeated Gorgoth.
“I wonder what our trip to hell accomplished?” he asked.
“Lilith,” Felicia said, “at the very least.”
He had to agree. He took a moment to study Felicia. The wolf looked much better already. Healthier. Fitter. More virile. The light had returned to her eyes.
He just had to find a way to keep it there.
“There are demons in my city,” he said sadly. “How can we possibly save it?”
Half an hour later they stopped and broke into a convenience store. Ken took three burner cellphones and left cash on the counter. They couldn’t do more than that. He gave Felicia the responsibility to open, switch them on and start making calls as the majestic span of the Golden Gate Bridge approached.
Ken stopped in his tracks, staring.
“Oh, my God. Oh no. That’s enough.”
High above, the Golden Gate Bridge was full of demons. They swarmed along its length from one side to the other, marching, bellowing, screaming their bloodlust. They filled it end to end, their banners flying in the wind.
Ken’s eyes filled with tears.
“How can we ever beat this?”
Felicia held out one of the burners. “Well, I called the number Giles left us first. It went through to a command station, run and guided by Aegis but operated by the army. Apparently, there’s a huge force headed this way.”
Ken turned. “Soldiers?”
“Everything,” Felicia said. “Marines, commandos, Special Forces. Battleships. F22 jet fighters. Even tanks. The battle is coming.”
“The battle of San Francisco,” Ken said, raising the Lionheart blade and cleaning off the dirt. “Man, am I ready for this.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Our great council, attended by most of the world’s beings able to influence the outcome of the next few days, went on.
It stretched into a long afternoon and then we took a break. Belinda wandered off to grab us some food. I didn’t know which way to turn. Lucy stood to the left and Raychel stood away to the far right.
I walked over to Lucy. “Has she approached you yet?”
Lucy looked grateful for my straight-talk. “No. And I don’t want her to.”
I nodded. “Me neither.”
She looked askance at me. “Really?”
“One hundred percent. Bitch ran out on us, remember?”
I wanted her to smile, and she did. She remembered our little rant of weeks ago when we’d both called Raychel a bitch using varying descriptions.
“Uber bitch,” Lucy said with a touch of regret to her voice.
“So,” I said, trying to lengthen the lighter mood. “Got fangs yet?”
Lucy stared at me in shock. I’d already come to a decision. Either I got on board with the new Lucy or I lost her forever. The latter option wasn’t viable for me. So, I’d forced down every ounce of feeling, every sad, miserable iota of it, and tried to repair some bridges.
“Is that a joke?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said, looking down. “Is it funny?”
“Not really.”
“Ah, sorry, Luce.”
“I do feel different,” she said. “Obviously, I’m stronger. Faster. Weaker in other ways. I don’t tire. I don’t need much sleep. I don’t feel cold or warmth, which I hate. I don’t feel fear, but I do feel anger and I remember fear. I remember my old life as if I’m looking back at it through rippling water. I know what I meant to you, Dad.”
That teared me up. Meant? “Has everything changed then?” I managed to croak. “I mean . . . are we still family?”
“I don’t know.” She looked down. “I don’t know what comes next.”
; “You’re still my daughter, Lucy. And I still love you with all my heart.”
“I know.” She met my eyes. “But, sooner or later, every dad has to let his daughter go.”
I knew it. I’d been dreading it. I remembered the wrench of emotion I felt when Lucy left her real childhood behind, somewhere around the age of ten. That had been bad enough. But when they upped sticks and left home . . . I’d been afraid of that since the day she was born.
“You’re right,” I said, swallowing a lump of sorrow. “You’re absolutely right.”
“I have to go,” she said.
“But Lucy, we’re just—”
“See you later.” She turned and dashed away. It was three seconds later when I realized why.
Raychel was moving toward me. I braced for it. I’d been desolate, chasing this woman’s ghost around the world for two years, sure she’d been abducted and murdered, or worse – kept in some foul harem somewhere – driven to drink, as confused, miserable and hopeless as a man might ever be.
“Hi, Dean,” was her opening statement.
“Hi, Dean? What the fuck happened?”
“Honest talk? All right. Whilst I was living in York, Cheyne contacted me after the witch coven spelled an ancient text. It was out of the blue. She pretended to be a client so that we could meet face to face. Then she gave me all this spiel about a once-in-a-lifetime witches’ coven, the end of the world, and some unimaginable god returning. I got up to walk out and she showed me magic. Then she showed me that I could do it too. She showed me that, together, we could make it fiercer, just the two of us, and that our coven would be thirteen strong. That was enough for me to allow her to take the next step.”
“Which was?”
“She showed me the prophecy and her text. She told me that the world was going to change. That there were Uber humans too. That the Chosen would come into their power within two years and we had to be ready, plans were being laid. The Destroyers would come. We couldn’t try to stop it until it all started two years later but we could be ready for it.”
The Chosen Trilogy Boxset Page 48
