by Amity Hope
Ava looked to Gabe.
“Yes,” he replied to her unvoiced question, not looking too pleased for the reason of his namesake.
“The archangels who chose not to abandon their posts and all that was good, the ones who chose not to fall. Answer me this,” Grier demanded, “which of the vile fallen is your father?”
Gabe’s posture became as defiant as his restraints would allow. “He’s been your brother far longer than he’s been my father. Surely, you can figure it out.”
Grier bristled at his words, her hand flinging toward Gabe, never touching him but causing his head to bash the wall with the sickening sound of a melon splattering on the pavement. The intensity was so great the stain-glastheuchsed window nestled into the wall above him shattered in its casing. Gabe slumped, his eyes sliding shut as his head listed to the side. The celestial restraints seemed to be all that kept him from crashing to the floor.
In that moment, vulnerable and injured Ava forgot that Gabe was part demon and remembered only that he was the boy she thought she loved. She screamed his name as she lunged forward, only to be restrained by a simple flick of Grier’s wrist.
“None of the Fallen have been my brethren for millennia,” Grier declared, her voice like the glass she had just shattered. “But of the legion of the Fallen, I smell the tainted stench of Azael’s legacy coursing through you.” She spoke to Gabe as if he were cognizant. With a look of great distaste she took a halting step forward, as if it physically pained her to be in such close proximity to him.
Ava struggled against her own invisible restraints, willing them to melt away. As Grier’s attention was diverted elsewhere, they seemed to do just that. As she took her first step forward she watched in horror as Grier raised her hands to Gabe’s face, cupping his temples in her palms. His body jolted but remained inert. The only indication that he was still alive was the tortured, primal groan that bubbled up from some deep chasm of his being. She edged closer but did not entirely close the distance between them. She wanted to continue on but she was fearful of this new Grier.
She instinctually knew that the way Grier was holding Gabe was not as innocuous as it appeared. She knew this, even before the blood started to flow. First a slow trickle from his nose…then a bloody tear seeped from his closed lid, zigzagging down his cheek…a spattering of blood fell from his ear, pooling at the floor beneath his feet.
In the same moment a second, larger, bloody teardrop fell and Gabe’s body convulsed in Grier’s grip. Crimson blood bubbled from his lips as an animalistic keening filled the room.
Without conscious thought Ava threw herself at Grier, latching her hands to her wrists in a feeble attempt to pull her away. Instead, Ava was pulled in as the crimson wave of Gabe’s tortured memories engulfed her.
Chapter 20
A young child with pale gold hair, lying face down, strapped to a table while wings the color of pewter trembled. A woman with the same golden hair, something glinting wickedly in her hand. A meat cleaver swung down, neatly chopping the wing from the child’s body. Blood cascaded into the air, then rained down, gruesomely splattering the small white form.
Ava opened her mouth to scream in terror as the agony under her shoulder blades gripped her. Her scream was drowned out by that of the child. Gabe. She knew it was Gabe but—
The cleaver came down again, detaching the second wing. A man stormed the room, ferociously, maliciously enraged. He struck the woman as he used her weapon against her. In a fit of rage he tossed each wing into the fireplace, each igniting like an inferno but burning out almost instantly. An indescribable pain indecipherable and yet paradoxically clearly distinct in its own right as that same man used hot branding irons to cauterize the ghastly, gruesome mess that was Gabe’s wingless back.
The scene blurred into a haze of scarlet, as if looking through blood streaming down a window pane. Ava could smell burning flesh. Feel the sizzle as her skin charred. Only it wasn’t her skin. It was Gabe’s. She knew this and yet it felt one and the same as his memories grasped her and their anguished screams melded into one.
Gabe, now older, forced into a tub of water by the same man. His body went rigid as he fought to remain compliant to this man, his father. Azael plunged him under, holding him beneath the surface. The water began to steam and bubble as the boy’s skin began to scald and blister.
Holy water! Ava’s mind screamed at her as the scene washed away into something new.
Gabe standing in front of a gray house with a red door. Waiting until a girl with a dog rounds the corner then bracing himself as Rafe pummels him with punches. He allows him to draw blood and then decides it’s more realistic if he fights back. The immense pleasure he feels as his brother’s nose crunches under his fist. The same girl touchin
Ava’s anger surged over the betrayal, intense and intoxicating as she realizes their meeting was a set up. She doesn’t have time to ponder the point of it all because the world is changing again. Flickering, flitting, flashing…
Gabe, in the darkness, looking up at the star dappled sky. The girl next to him moves closer. He knows he should move away. His head is screaming at him to move away. But he doesn’t and suddenly her body is pressed into his and he cannot stop his own hand from settling possessively around her waist. He knows she is going to kiss him. And he knows that he cannot allow it. But he does. And his heart is pounding because kissing this forbidden girl is the most deliciously sinful thing he has ever done.
Gabe was not supposed to care about her. It was not allowed. She knows this as surely as she knows that in her heart, she’s a St. Clair, despite her origins. She understands this even if she doesn’t understand why. But he started to care. Images…flickers of memories…thoughts…feelings…a war waging within himself…confused images that she can’t comprehend, thoughts covered in blood and sadness. All coming so fast and fading even faster. She can’t make sense of it all. The thoughts slow down but remain erratic.
Gabe’s heart tumbles in his chest when he sees Ava, ready for their first date. He argues with Rafe about her.
She feels his anger but she can’t hear the words. It’s all so confusing but she knows its Gabe’s confusion she’s feeling as well as her own.
Ava’s head is screaming, What does this mean? But the only response she receives is a burst of flaming red.
Red hair. Rafe. Rafe holding a knife to the throat of a dark haired girl. Gabe lunges forward, knocking her free. If he could only have pried the knife from Rafe’s hand he would have gladly plunged it into his heart.
The rage that emanated from Gabe would have knocked her to her knees if she had not been locked into this nightmare of memories. It was a silvery blue, blinding rage that surged through Ava’s body as she felt what she knew he felt at that moment. A hatred for his brother and a desire to protect her that was so intense that his body ached with it.
Gabe, pleading with his father. Azael again, holding Gabe in a grip without touching him at all while Rafe drinks from a silver flask. A trickle of black fluid flows from the flask, running down his chin. He wipes it with the back of his hand and then clenches that same hand into a fist, using his will and the mystical power of his father’s blood to snap Gabe’s bones. Gabe screaming in agony min back of huntil his throat is nearly shredded as the hours of torture continue on.
Ava’s body and her mind were screaming that she wanted out of these memories. She didn’t know if she could take much more. Yet they continued to come. Most in disorienting fragments and some so whole and real they consumed her once again.
A grisly scene of a dead girl, tossed in a ditch, half buried in the flowing grass. Her dark hair indiscernible amongst the gore and the weeds. Gabe. Holding a knife as tears snake their way down his face, forging trails through the blood that had been sprayed across his skin. It is his greatest fear, terrible and impending, clotting the memory of his father telling him what must be done. A threat as he throws Gabe to the ground, cruelly grinding his ring-laden fists into the ac
hing scars that never healed. A subtle reminder of what will happen to Gabe if he disobeys. Gabe voicing his acquiescence to his father even as his mind fights in rebellion, an indomitable resolution forming to do the impossible. To save the girl, he will need to accomplish the nearly unattainable task of destroying the demon.
Ava fell to the ground with this knowledge wrapping itself around her. Gabe was meant to kill her. He would do anything to keep her alive. Her head buzzed as if full of angry hornets, each one a thought, feeling or piece of a memory pulled directly from Gabe. Each little piece settling into her soul, as if little pieces of Gabe, himself, had managed to become a part of her.
She panted, gasping for air, fighting to comprehend this newfound understanding of the boy, the Nephil. Any anger she may have held toward him became slippery and slid away. She saw him for what he was. A game piece, his father’s toy, perhaps an abomination as Grier decreed but not by choice. And if not by choice, then really, not at all.
“I imagine that was an utterly unpleasant experience,” Grier declared, entirely without sympathy. She stepped away from Gabe who had been released from his restraints and, like Ava, had fallen to the floor. His face was ashen and smeared with blood. Dark crescents bloomed beneath his closed eyes. Ava’s body felt drained of all energy but she managed to pull herself to him.
“Do not mistake his capricious nature for one of actual caring. I know what you saw. He may want to keep you safe today but the nature of the demon is to be fickle, erratic. Today you intrigue him and he finds himself attracted to you. He may even fancy himself in love. But he is not capable of love. His lust will soon fade and he’ll tire of you. Just as easily as he defends you now, he will wield a blade to kill you later.”
She sounded so absolute. Ava couldn’t think of a logical defense. In fact, all logic seemed to have flitted away the moment Grier had entered the church. Ava shrugged out of her hoodie, crumpling it in her hand. She used it to wipe Gabe’s face clean. He emitted a pained groan and Ava felt instantly relieved to at least know that he was alive.
Grier, sensing what she was feeling, sighed. “Ava, you must realize by now it is not easy to kill Nephilim, or even all that easy to harm one.” She glanced at him distastefully. “He may have a he m“eadache when he awakens, but he will be fine.”
Ava wondered if it was blasphemous of her to wish this angel would just go away and leave this half-demon and herself alone. At the moment it was hard to grasp that Grier was of the divine and that Gabe was the embodiment of evil that she proclaimed him to be.
Not caring too much what Grier thought right then, Ava slid Gabe’s head into her lap.
Grier emitted another sigh.
“Can you explain any of this to me?” Ava asked.
Grier turned to take a seat on the pew; changing back into the jean-clad, wingless Grier Ava had thought she’d known. She wondered if she did this to seem less threatening, appearing as her sister, her friend. She wasn’t less frightening. Ava didn’t have the nerve to tell her that.
“I am a Grigori, a Watcher,” she explained. “We were sent to earth millennia ago to watch over the world. Some of those in the same chain of command as I, such as Azael, chose to follow their own path. They were cast from Heaven. Some of us stayed, continuing to follow the command we were given. I am still under that command. I am still watching as I was ordered to do. At this measure of time, it is you that I am appointed to.”
“So…” Ava began hesitantly. “You’re my guardian angel?”
“No,” she replied sharply. “Grigori is not to be confused with a Guardian. While they certainly exist, I am not one of them. I am here simply to watch, to learn and to report.”
“Does everyone have their own Watcher?”
Grier gave Ava a slicing look. “No. Everyone does not have a Watcher. Appointing a Watcher to everyone would be a complete, absurd waste of time. Only those in need of watching have a Grigori appointed to them.”
She said this as though it should answer any questions Ava might have. It didn’t. In fact, it dredged up more.
“Why would you be appointed to me?” she asked, skeptically. She was suddenly feeling self-conscious. She was just a girl. Like millions of other girls. And apparently millions of other girls did not have a voyeuristic angel settling in with their family. “Why me?” she reiterated, flustered by the ludicrousness of it.
“You have become the subject of interest of one of the Fallen. Thanks to Gabriel, you now know as clearly as I do that Azael personally wants you dead. I imagine that seems odd to you. It surely seems odd to us. Demons typically prefer to wreak havoc far and wide. So why would a demon go to such drastic measures to single out one girl?”
Of all that she had seen in Gabe’s head, that memory remained the most elusive. Possibly because she wanted it to be. She didn’t understand it and it terrified her, as it would anyone. Possibly more than that, more than anything she had to wonder…If he wants me dead, why aren’t I already?
“I need to find out the reason for this,” Grier continued. “It needs to be reported.”
“But not so that you can stop it,” Gabe ground out. With some effort he managed to pull himself into a sitting position. He subtly moved himself away from Ava. She tried not to take offense.
“There is a fine balance between good and evil. It is not my job to sway that balance. It is only my job to report my findings. Others in a higher position need to decide what is to be done. If interference is deemed necessary, I would follow that command. However, it is not my decision to make.”
“It’s necessary!” Gabe bellowed. “My father is evil! Vile,” he declared. “You said so yourself! You cannot let him do this because if he does I can promise you it will tip the scales of evil firmly, forever in his favor.”
“Do not preach to me you little maggot!” Grier hissed. “If she is meant to die, it shall be.”
Ava heard a sharp intake of breath and it took a moment to realize it was her own. Observer or not, it was unnerving to hear the angel sent to watch over her speak of her death with such little regard.
Gabe looked at Ava for the first time since waking. She could feel her body trembling as she struggled with her emotions and willed herself not to cry. He held his hand out to her, tentatively, as if he expected her to ignore it. She didn’t. How could she when he was the one who was so obviously struggling to keep her alive? She slid over, falling into his startled embrace, feeling curiously safe in the arms of the one who was supposed to deliver her to her death.
Grier seemed to tower over them as they sat on the floor, she in the pew. She studied them, as if they were little more than specimens in a Petri dish. After an eternity of moments she spoke.
“We will start at the beginning. You tell me what it is that Azael wants her for, why she’s so important to him, and why he has left it to you to kill her. If you can tell me that, I can bring the information to the higher powers and we can ascertain if an intervention is necessary.”
“How about,” Gabe said, getting to his feet and pulling Ava with him, “you agree to help her and I will tell you everything I know.”
Wings erupting from her back, golden robes fluttering about her, Grier flew to her feet to stand before them. She touched her hand to Gabe’s forehGabface="Tiead and he immediately crumpled to his knees as he ground out a painful cry.
“Your species is so abhorrent that it had to be eradicated from this world once before. You are nothing more than an atrocity, an oozing, festering blemish on the face of humanity. To be in the same room as you is loathsome. You will not for one moment commence to command me!”
“Grier, please,” Ava whispered. “He’s only trying to help me.”
“You think he is helping you?” she asked even as she intensified whatever it was she was doing to Gabe. He let out another shrill cry as he held his head in his hands. Ava could tell he was trying to stifle a scream as his body writhed in pain.
“Please!” she begged as she hunched down be
side him, taking his hand. For the first time since this upside down night began she started to cry. “Please stop!”
Grier raised her hand, leaving Gabe panting for air.
Ava placed herself between them.
“I thought you were my friend!” Ava cried.
Grier frowned at her, her eyebrows bunching in confusion. “I have never been your friend. But if he is so determined to save you, the best way to start is for him to tell me everything he knows. I can take that information to my superiors and as I said, if they deem it necessary, they will help you. If they deem it unnecessary, they will allow fate to follow its chosen path. They will not, however, intercede to the contrary. Meaning, they will either help you or they will disregard the need. However, they will not use this information to harm you.”
Ava helped Gabe to his feet, ignoring the intense pain she felt in her hip as she stalled and tried to make sense of this information. “What you’re saying is that best case scenario I get help. Worst case, I get ignored, which means I won’t be any worse off than I am now.”
“We’ll be right where we are now,” Gabe confirmed as he allowed her to slide her fingers around his.
Hearing him say ‘we’ instead of splicing her off on her own sent a little shiver of hope down her spine.
“Okay,” he agreed. “But I know you’re going to be disappointed because I don’t know much. I mean, I wish I knew more, but I don’t.” He looked at Ava apologetically and she felt his fingers tense in her hand. “Azael believes Ava is destined for greatness, that her life in this world will make a tremendous difference.”
“Such as that of Mother Theresa or Gandhi?” Grier tried to clarify.
Gabe shrugged.
Grier gave him a scorching look.
“I’m just saying that I have no idea on what level Azael is speaking. I don’t know the depth or the direction of his claim. Just that Ava’s life will make such a difference that he won’t allow her to live,” Gabe explained.
