by M. Leighton
Bo was turning to carry Lilly to the back door when Savannah’s shrill scream brought the hair at my nape to attention.
“Ridley!” she screamed, pointing up toward the rafters.
The next several things happened in a flurry of activity that was so quick, so perfectly-orchestrated, we were all caught off guard and stunned into immobility.
The instant Savannah screamed, we all turned to her, curious to what she was referring. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Devon come rushing in the back door. Then all our eyes followed Savannah’s finger to where she pointed.
It was Sebastian. He hovered in the air above our heads, like the dark and vengeful fallen angel that he was.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
With one sharp flick of Sebastian’s hand, the back door slammed shut behind Devon. That was immediately followed by another scream—also a woman’s scream—that could be heard from outside the barn. It was blood-curdling and quite easily the most frightening sound I’d ever heard.
It grew louder and louder, seeming to come from the sky, and then Annika’s body broke through the dilapidated rafters and fell to the ground, landing with a bone-crunching thud right in front of where we stood.
A shower of wooden splinters rained down on the barn floor, the residue of which covered Annika’s inert body making her look dusty.
Another crash drew our attention upward again, just in time to see Heather burst through the ceiling and land on a huge crossbeam. She crouched there like a flame-haired gargoyle. Her eyes were wide and wild, her mouth partially open in a toothy, hungry grin. Although she looked similar to the Heather I was familiar with, there was something darker about her. It was as though an inner madness was seeping through her skin and staining it. She was terrifying.
“Subdue them, brother,” Sebastian said, speaking to Heather.
Without hesitation, Heather turned her black, empty gaze to Annika and she raised one bony hand toward her. Although Annika was plainly unconscious, her body snapped quickly into a standing position as if she were a puppet on strings. She was rigid, from her pointed toes which barely grazed the dirt floor to her tightly-clamped arms. But it was her head that gave her obliviousness away. It lolled lifelessly atop her neck, dropping back as if she was watching the sky.
In rapid succession, Heather turned her attention to each of us, trapping us all in invisible restraints and moving us into an inescapable semi-circle, at the center of which was Bo. She turned her malignant attention to him last, ripping Lilly from his arms and bringing her to stand to my left.
Bo squared off against Sebastian as he glided gracefully to the ground, as if floating down on an invisible elevator. Sebastian didn’t approach him. He simply planted his feet in the dirt several yards away and watched Bo, a smugly wicked smile pulling at his lips.
As I watched them, a single thought penetrated the panic that I was feeling. Bo had yet to learn all that he needed from the letter. My skin was not yet covered. I felt sure there was very valuable and probably life-saving information that he had yet to learn.
I could’ve screamed. If only I’d fed from Cade more often! Just a few more times might have made all the difference in the world. But now it was too late.
“Let them go,” Bo spat through gritted teeth. “This is between you and me. They don’t have any part in this.”
“My son, you have no idea how wrong you are. These,” Sebastian said, sweeping his arm around the semicircle, “are the ingredients that I need to put an end to this once and for all.”
When Bo said nothing, Sebastian clucked his tongue.
“Don’t be a spoil sport. Did you really think that God could use you and this puny excuse for a mate to kill me?”
I could see the muscle twitch in Bo’s jaw and I knew he was fuming.
“If you’re so powerful then why do you need humans to get rid of me? Why can’t you do it yourself, without them?”
“Unfortunately, God was able to create some...problems for me, but nothing that me, my wife and my brother here,” Sebastian said, tipping his head toward Heather, “couldn’t figure a way around.”
“Your brother?” Bo asked, verbalizing the question I knew we were all thinking.
“Yes, sweet Heather here was kind enough to host Heaven’s most beautiful fallen angel. He’s given her just the right amount of power and hatred for tonight’s performance.”
“Lucifer,” I whispered when understanding finally dawned.
Heather’s head snapped toward me, startling me. She looked at me and laughed, a sound that screeched like a thousand souls crying out all at once. It made my skin crawl as it ricocheted off the barn walls.
“We found her when I was looking for the next place to stash my wayward son. We first thought she would be a good temporary mother for you, Boaz, but she failed to mention that she had a family of her own,” Sebastian said, sliding his sinister gaze to Savannah where she was held to my right. “Her pliable soul wasn’t a total waste, however. Her ‘death’,” Sebastian said, raising his hands to show air quotes, “provided me with the very first of my necessary elements, the Bereaved Child, grief-stricken and betrayed.”
To my right, I heard Savannah’s gasp followed by a strangled sob as she learned the true fate of her mother. It was as if Sebastian hadn’t felt like her suffering was enough for his purposes. No, he felt the need to twist the knife just a bit more.
“She turned out to be more useful than I could have imagined. During my time away, she functioned as my eyes on you. The fateful night of the wreck, the wreck that forever turned the tables in my favor, she saw your reaction to young Ridley here. Heather ended up not only leading me to your mate, but she then helped me to turn her as well, giving me the gift of my second element.”
When he didn’t continue, Bo asked.
“And which one was that?”
“The Doomed Key of course,” he said as if Bo should’ve known that. “She also introduced me to a fetal Lilly, the sweet child that would be the third element. It wasn’t long after that when all the other pieces began to fall into place. I knew I’d finally found the Place of Reckoning, the ideal situation that my lovely Iofiel wrote about. I knew it was in this town that I’d find the only way to thwart our Heavenly Father in His efforts.”
“Are you really so arrogant that you think you can outwit God?” Bo sneered boldly.
Rather than getting angry, however, Sebastian laughed tolerantly.
“Dear boy, look around you. I already have.”
Sebastian left his post and walked slowly toward the semi-circle, to the person almost directly opposite Bo—Annika.
“The One Not Chosen, turned bitter with envy,” he said, pointing to her. “She was so in love with you, so taken with your angel’s face, that it was like child’s play getting her to follow me to you. The truly sad thing is, she thought she found you on her own. She had no idea that I knew who she was.” Sebastian laughed, a mirthless sound that made me feel cold all over. “She couldn’t have been more wrong. I knew she would work just fine once Heather saw your reaction to dear Ridley. Annika would never be the one for you.”
Sebastian moved on to Devon. “The Reluctant Vampire, followed by death and yet refusing to succumb. I think that speaks for itself. The Bereaved Child, grief-stricken and betrayed,” he said as he moved on to stop in front of Savannah. He moved no further, only pointed to me and then to Lilly. “The Doomed Key and The Corrupted Child, born into evil.”
As Sebastian talked, Heather moved slowly to Bo’s left and stopped, staring at Sebastian with her strangely empty eyes. It was evident just in looking at her that she was now completely under the control of something else, someone else.
Bo tipped his head toward her.
“And I suppose she…or he…will give his blood willingly? The First Fallen One?”
Sebastian smiled.
“Now you’re catching on.”
“And then what?”
“And then I shall kill you and the
re will not be a force on this earth that can harm me. After all, isn’t invincibility, true immortality what we all really want?”
“No,” he answered honestly. “I’d give anything not to be like this, to just be normal and live a normal life.”
“Well then, welcome to your lucky day. You see, my son, normal people die and I am here to grant you your final wish. If normal is what you want, then it’s normal you shall have.”
With one sharp shake of his wide shoulders, enormous raven wings sprouted from Sebastian’s back, ripping his silky shirt into shreds that feel from his body. The appendages first stretched high above his head, as if reveling in their freedom, and then they folded to lie delicately against the smooth skin of his back.
I knew without looking that every eye was trained on the shiny feathers, for these were much more than mere shadows. These wings were very real, very tangible, and very intimidating.
I glanced at Bo when I heard his deep inhalation. His chest swelled as if in reflection of his mental rallying. I knew that he was preparing himself for the unknown, for the terrifying, for a truly immortal combat.
Quickly, his eyes darted to me and away again, only to return as if he’d seen something shocking. His eyes narrowed as he scanned my face.
I felt a tingly sensation, as if silky fingers were stroking my skin. The fingers moved as Bo’s eyes moved, as though they were touching every inch of skin that Bo gazed upon. I wondered if he was seeing the last of Iofiel’s letter.
“I’m sorry, Boaz,” Sebastian said, drawing our attention back to him, “but today one of us has to die. And it won’t be me.”
Sebastian extended his left arm. The wing on that side arose from his back and spread forward, as if tied to the motion of his arm.
With one lightning fast, sweeping motion, Sebastian guided his wing around the semi-circle of bodies. None of us could move, as we were all held captive by Heather’s will.
I felt the sting of something sharp cutting into the flesh of my throat as the feathery extension passed by. I didn’t need to look to know that we’d all suffered the same fate. Sebastian had just drawn our blood.
When his wing came to rest at his side, it was dripping with fresh blood. Heather stepped toward Sebastian, stopping about five feet away. She raised her arms straight out at her sides and let her head fall back, a blatant mockery of hanging on the cross.
Without hesitation, Sebastian swung the razor edge of his deadly wing across her throat as well. She didn’t so much as flinch.
After the wing returned to its folded position at Sebastian’s back, he reached behind him and pulled out the short, bloodied feather with one quick yank. He studied it for a fraction of a second before he slid his tongue along the length of it, smacking his lips as he savored the flavor. Finally, he turned the feather sword in his hand to wield it like a stake.
When Sebastian turned to fully face Bo, my heart jumped up into my throat. I recognized this moment. I knew it like an unshakable nightmare. This was the moment, THE moment, that I’d seen in my vision.
An indescribable fear, mingled with an overwhelming helplessness, rose up to choke me. The scene was only seconds away from taking place exactly as I’d seen it, only there was one problem. I wasn’t free to put myself between Bo and Sebastian. And if I couldn’t stand between them then the wrong man would die.
I began to fight against my invisible restraints as my eyes darted between the two men. But it was no use; I could barely move inside Heather’s powerful hold. As my mind raced for a solution, I struggled desperately to hold at bay the panic that threatened to suffocate me.
But then something amazing happened, something that would forever change the outcome of this ultimate battle between good and evil. It was so divine, it could only have come from one source. The God that Sebastian had boasted that he’d already defeated was pulling the ace out of his sleeve.
Raising his chin defiantly, Bo flexed his shoulders. From the center of his back arose two enormous white wings. Like Sebastian, their emergence destroyed his shirt, leaving the tattered remains to fall silently from his shoulders.
I couldn’t quiet the soft gasp at the sight of him. It was as if the angel that he’d carried inside him all his life had burst forth from him to challenge and to save the world around him. He was magnificent.
Bo’s skin turned a golden brown, the sheen of it glistening in the dim moonlight that poured through the hole in the roof. It was as though a river of life had suddenly overtaken the dam that held it at bay. It flowed through him, flowed from him. It rushed over me like a warm breeze, teasing the hair at my temples.
Bo shook his shoulders and his wings trembled in response, as if they felt the power surging through him. Light glistened on the iridescent feathers making them appear as mother of pearl.
A confidence, a deadly assurance radiated from Bo. It shone from his eyes. Even though they were not turned toward me, I could see it. I could see it in the way the darkness itself seemed to recede from his gaze. I smelled it in the unmistakable scent of triumph in the air.
Twisting his body, Bo reached around and did as Sebastian had done. He removed a single feather with one quick yank. As he held it in front of his body, the moonlight glinted off the blade-like edge.
Without taking his eyes off Sebastian, Bo waved his hand around the semi-circle and the invisible bonds Heather had restrained us with fell away, leaving us all to fall in weak-kneed heaps on the dirt floor.
As I watched Bo and Sebastian circle each other like two primal warriors, I fought to get electrical stimulus to the paralyzed muscles of my legs, stimulus that would allow me to move. But somehow the connection was broken. It was as if the link between my mind and my lower half had been severed.
And then the battle began.
In a lunge that happened so quickly even my acute vampire vision could barely track it, Sebastian struck out at Bo. Bo darted left to avoid it, slicing the back of Sebastian’s neck as he passed.
Bo pushed Heather aside. She stumbled, but rather than coming back at him, she continued to back away as if to say This is not my fight. I’m only all in when I know I can win. I thought such an attitude was typical of the Prince of Darkness.
With a single flap of his wings, Sebastian leapt into the air and then fell on Bo, swinging his weapon in a downward stabbing motion. Bo dodged the worst of the hit, but the deadly feather still grazed the skin of his chest, leaving a bloody streak in its wake.
Bo recovered quickly, sidestepping Sebastian and throwing himself into the air to twirl over Sebastian’s head like a graceful bird. Sebastian, in an attempt to anticipate Bo’s landing, spun on his heel and struck out with his feather in a single quick jab.
Sebastian overshot his real target, but his deadly weapon made contact with another. I heard Annika’s gasp of surprise as the feather tore through her chest and entered her heart like a knife slicing through butter.
Both Bo and Sebastian paused for a few seconds, each of them watching Annika as she slumped slowly over onto her face. The last gurgling sounds of her body were muffled by the dirt, but they reverberated through the silence of the room.
“Another victim whose death can be laid at your feet,” Sebastian taunted.
Using Bo’s shock to his advantage, Sebastian turned and swept his feather through the air like a fencing champion, backing Bo away, step by step. Finally, when Bo ran into a wooden support beam for the barn, he raised his own feather and brought it down across Sebastian’s and then he danced quickly away.
Sebastian simply turned toward Bo as he moved away, following him with his eyes until he stopped. With a sinking feeling, I recognized the position that the two men were in. Bo was on one side of the semi-circle, Sebastian on the other and they faced one another across the expanse of earth that lay between them.
Sebastian took one step toward Bo and stopped. Bo matched him by doing the same. I knew that the two were literally steps away from one of their deaths.
Closi
ng my eyes, I said a quick prayer and I focused with all my might. I visualized my legs moving, coming under me, pushing me to my feet and propelling me across the short space. I visualized putting my body between the two fighting angels.
I felt no movement, so it was with a heavy heart that I opened my eyes. What I saw was that the world seemed to have decelerated into slow motion.
I saw Bo’s handsome face draw into a mask of determined fury as his mouth opened in a battle cry. I watched the muscles in his shoulders bunch as he hefted the feather in preparation for his final strike against Sebastian.
It was when I saw him lift one foot to move forward that I felt the burn of my legs coming back online. And just like that, I was on my feet and hurling myself toward the two as they prepared to collide.
They were so focused on one another that neither man turned my way. Neither seemed to notice me coming until it was too late. Just as they both struck out with their sharp feathers, I turned my body sideways and slipped quickly between them.
I was facing Bo as the sword-like feathers entered my chest.
Just as it had happened in my vision, there was no sound and there was no pain. There was simply a heavy pressure as the feathers penetrated my flesh. All other sensation was eclipsed by the relief that I felt.
Bo would live.
Of course, it was important that Sebastian die. About that, there was no question. But to me, knowing that Bo would live made it all worthwhile. I couldn’t fathom a world where he didn’t exist and, this way, I didn’t have to.
The rest played out like déjà vu. Bo backed away from me, a look of complete shock on his face. When I looked down, I knew what I’d see—a bloody spot on his chest where the stake had barely pierced him as it made its way through my body.
