by Danae Ayusso
I hung my legs over the bed and rested my face between my hands. “But what if he hates me?” I sniveled—seriously, if this is demopause, I’m going to kick someone’s ass. I don’t remember anyone saying anything about demon bitches suffering from this!
“No one could hate you for something that you did not ask for or make them do,” he said.
“If it were you,” I started and looked over my shoulder at him, “would you hate me?”
He smirked. “I do not need imprisonment or banishment to hate you, Zion. You in general make me generally not enjoy you.”
Oh, I’m not entirely sure what to say about that.
“So,” I turn back toward the darkness, not really longing to look at the man that hated me anymore, “why did you save me before you knew that it was Karael I was running from?”
I flinched when callused fingers caressed down my spine. “Many reasons I suppose,” Angelus whispered in my ear. “But most importantly, hate is a sin. Now get dressed, we have an angel to kill.”
Now that wasn’t something I heard every day.
“This is the best you could come up with?” I complained, tugging at the ill-fitting, overly tight, shirt. “I look like a goddamn tourist!”
He couldn’t be serious; tight I ♥ NY shirt, cut off booty shorts that were way too short even for my liking, and flip-flops.
Angelus shrugged. “That is what 7-Eleven had. It is that or naked, and I think that naked would get you much more attention than you can afford to have at the moment.”
“Whatever,” I mumbled. “You could have stopped by my place and picked me up something from my massive closet. At least I wouldn’t look like a homeless tourist!”
He raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.
“Please,” I whined, stomping my flip-flop clad feet.
“No,” he said then smirked.
Fuck this.
I snapped my hands out then leveled the silver and black guns that suddenly appeared in them at him. “I want designer,” I snarled.
Of course it didn’t faze him, not in the slightest.
“Are you done throwing your tantrum yet?” he asked and swatted Persuader away.
“Oh come on, crazy emotionally imbalanced demon bitch with the guns is demanding something nicer to wear and you just blow her off?” I whined. “What is wrong with you? Can’t you see that I’m losing it here?” I impatiently tapped my foot and waved my guns around in the air as if I was crazy, which it was really starting to feel that way.
“Would you like to wear my shirt instead, oh wait, I am not wearing a shirt,” he retorted then pushed past me. “Put your toys away and get your ass moving. We are going to be late.”
I put my babies back and sulked behind him. “I didn’t know that you penciled ‘Killing Karael’ into your über busy schedule.”
Sarcasm noted.
He didn’t bother to look over his shoulder at me, but humored me, for once. “I would have thought that someone of your distinction and age would have realized that he has been permanently on the schedule.”
Ugh!
“Where are we going?” I complained.
“To get lunch,” he said as if it were obvious. “Are there any places you frequent in Harlem?”
“Ew, Harlem?” I whined. “You want me to go to Harlem? That’s nearly as bad as Hell’s Kitchen. Again, ew.”
Angelus stopped and waited for me to catch up to him. “Did you neglect to notice which side of the Hudson we are on?” he asked and pointed to the dark water a couple hundred yards from us.
When what he was saying hit, I screamed and he smirked. “You took me to New Jersey?!” I shrieked. “Oh the Dark Mother. I think I’m going to be sick. New Jersey? This is a hundred-dollar pedicure that you are ruining with these stupid Salvation Army reject box footwear and filthy Jersey…well, everything in Jersey is fucking filthy and nasty. I am a goddamn Park Avenue girl, not a wannabe New Yorker Jersey bitch! What is wrong with you?!” I demanded.
“Nothing,” he informed me. “Where is the last place that anyone would look for you? New Jersey. So as I was saying, there is a place in Harlem that serves the best fried-chicken and waffles with grits and collard greens in the north. The macaroni and cheese is heavenly, in more ways than one, and I hear that they have a very agreeable sweet potato pie and peach cobbler that you might like since you have a fetish for desserts. If we hurry, we can still catch breakfast and bridge over to the lunch menu.”
Damn it, that all sounds so good.
“Fine,” I mumbled and took his offered hand, and we vanished.
My body felt as if a building was collapsing on it and trying to return me to the bowels of Hell in the process. The only anchor and life preserver I had was the callused hand wrapped tightly around mine, holding onto mine as if he couldn’t lose me no matter what. Despite the suffocating feeling, and the ridiculous pull and tug from the increase in gravity, I felt safe. Maybe the rude angel wasn’t as bad as he appeared to be.
No, he was that bad, there was no sugar-coating his heightened level of prickitude, but there might have been a chewy, marshmallowy center in that hard ass exterior of his that was just begging for me to sink my teeth into it.
It wasn’t likely, but it’d be fun as hell to find out!
When we reappeared, Angelus steadied me. “Careful, angelic transportation is different than demonic.”
“No shit,” I groaned and tried to get my bearings but everything was spinning. Thankfully I hadn’t eaten in days otherwise I would have thrown up all over his bare feet.
Angelus wrapped his arms around me, and pulled me tight against his chest then tenderly caressed my head. Either he was in desperate need of anti-depressants for this bi-polar roller coaster from hell he was apparently on, or he was completely insane.
“Do not move,” he hissed in my ear, and suddenly my body was surrounded in impossibly soft cashmere.
Like an obedient pet, I held my breath and strained to hear what he perceived as a threat. All I heard was traffic, the hurrying early lunch crowd, talking and laughing from those walking down the sidewalks, water dripping from the back of the alley, a dog barking one alley over, but nothing that I would make me concerned.
But before I could ask, the threat presented itself.
“Are you sure?” a voice whispered, but I didn’t recognize it.
“Yes, now shut up!” another hissed. “The monitor said that there was activity in this secure spectrum switch not more than sixty-seconds ago.”
What in the hell?
“Really, Barth, then where are they? They just didn’t up and vanish!”
“I’m kicking your ass,” Barth hissed under his breath. “Those repo men said that they’d pay cash for any viable sighting.”
“Whatever, if you touch me I’m telling mom,” the other sang and ran down the alley, switching spectrums in the process.
The other groaned but followed, splashing through the puddles as he went, before silence resumed.
I pulled back from Angelus slightly and looked up at him, but my attention went from his burning, solid gold eyes to the white feathery wings wrapped around us like a cocoon of protection. For a brief moment, I started having a strange case of déjà vu. It wasn’t the familiarity of the sight, rather the feeling.
Where have I felt this before?
Better question, why do I like it?
His large eyes burned solid gold and they bore into mine with such intensity that it terrified me. I wanted to cower from him, but I couldn’t move; was it out of fear or longing, I didn’t know. What I did know was that I felt safe in his arms and with him, and regardless of how emotionally imbalanced he made me, or how many times he called me, or hinted, that I was a whore, I liked how I felt safe and secure around him...I liked the way I felt when I was with him.
“How did…why didn’t they see us?” I whispered.
“It is a defense mechanism,” he explained, his wings folding away behind him, and he carefully p
ushed me back off of him. “Think of it as camouflage.”
I had heard of that before, never experienced or saw it first hand, and I thought that only a particular level of angels possessed that ability.
Damn it, where had I heard that before?
“What level of Heaven are you from?” I asked the obvious.
“The level that does not matter anymore,” he mumbled under his breath as he stepped around me, and continued down the alley towards the street.
Was it just me, or was this angel super evasive about himself? I knew I was going to have to pick his brain whether he liked it or not.
I caught up to him and wrapped my hand around his. His head snapped to the side and his eyes widened. So of course I smiled that face-consuming million-dollar smile of mine because his discomfort amused me on levels that I didn’t know were possible. “You dressed me like a two-bit hooker,” I informed him, “so I need my pimp to keep me safe.”
He rolled his eyes and looked away from me. “You are ridiculous.” His complaint was hollow, and his hand tightened around mine; someone liked that as much as I did.
Walking down the sidewalk was an adventure and then some. After the first block, I was sure that Angelus wasn’t as amused with his outfit choice as he first was. Many men tried for my attention, and with each attempt, the angel next to me growled under his breath and his hold on my hand tightened. Obviously he didn’t like to share, even though I wasn’t his, it was still semi-romantic and made me smile. If nothing else, the angel amused me with how hypocritical he was, and how his actions, more often than not, contradicted his words.
Both of us kept an eye out for anyone following, Karael or anyone else that might have posed a threat. Aside from some horny males, and a couple of women, it appeared relatively safe. However, anything that appeared to be safe usually was the farthest thing from being safe.
“Something isn’t right,” I whispered.
“I know,” he agreed and pulled me up the steps of a large church and waved his hand through the air, the doors unlocked and flew open on their own then slammed shut behind us. “Try not to play around this time,” he scolded and I made a mocking face at him.
“Why aren’t I rebounded from churches?” I whispered as he pulled me down the aisle and into the middle row of pews.
“I do not know,” he said, but I had a feeling he was lying.
“How did you get in here?” a man demanded from the back of the church. “You can’t be in here like that! We have a strict dress code here at the Abyssinian Baptist Church.”
Angelus shook his head then waved his hand through the air.
The man flew across the nave and smashed into the wall, collapsing in an unconscious heap on the floor.
Holy shit.
“Um, that wasn’t very nice of you,” I pointed out.
He looked at me, not at all amused. “No one should be turned away from my father’s house. And the doors should never be locked. There is no such thing as an appointed time to worship and to seek guidance. And yet they have hours on the front of his home. They, Man, the disgusting mortals that have favor in my father’s eyes, act as if they are gods themselves by dictating whom is righteous and whom can worship and when and where. They are disgusting beasts that do not deserve the right to have his favor,” he snarled, turning his attention to the apse then glared at the large cross above it.
This angel is so fucked up it isn’t even funny.
“You really do have daddy issues, don’t you?”
“Rhetorical?” he snapped but the corners of his mouth twitched.
“Always,” I assured him and smiled wide.
Angelus looked over at me from the corner of his eye. “There comes a point,” he said softly, “in one’s life when they must choose. Do you embrace all of God’s creatures, even those that turned his back on him and retreated to Hell, those that were cast out of Heaven, and the humans that have done the most horrific and degusting things, all in the name of God, and that only call upon him when they are in need and not when they are grateful, and they act as if He is their own personal servant to save them when they are the ones that have fucked up. For centuries I have battled with that. For countless eons I have sat idly by and watched wars, genocide, corruption, hate, murder, rape, torture, and everything else stomach turning that man has embraced as if it is second nature, all in the name of God, and I never questioned my allegiance and what I was doing or why. Until now,” he said, turning to face me.
Oh whoa. What do you say about that?
“Why?” I asked.
“Because Angelus found a conscience when he looked upon the forbidden fruit,” a booming voice exclaimed.
Karael’s voice echoed off of the rafters and vibrated the ground.
“Isn’t that right, brother?” he mused, landing on the apse and his white wings stretched out from behind his bare, muscular torso.
“Karael,” Angelus snarled with a nod of his head then got to his feet, his wings spreading and I ducked to avoid taking a feathery appendage to the face. “You will not have her soul.”
“Hey,” Karael mused, innocently shrugging, “it isn’t my job to say, brother. She sold her soul, and now it is time to pay up.”
“Clerical error, pencil dick,” I interjected, but they both ignored me.
Something told me that I should have been as far away from there as possible, but I couldn’t, and wouldn’t, leave Angelus.
“I wouldn’t suggest that,” Karael warned and looked to me and smiled. “If you try your little demonic tricks in here, you will kill yourself and then I will lose your soul by default.”
Damn it.
I flipped him off.
“Oh so ladylike,” he mused. “I wouldn’t suggest summoning your demonic weapons either. You see, Zion, I warded this bitch like you wouldn’t believe. I knew that you would go running to Angelus or that he would find you, he always does. And as impossible as it was to locate you, it was child’s play to locate him.”
This angel was really starting to irritate the living hell out of me.
“Why would I go running to him? I only met him the other day when I had to repo a human,” I informed him.
Karael looked at Angelus and a smile filled his face. “You didn’t tell her, did you? Now that is funny.”
“You will not,” Angelus snarled, an angelic short sword appearing in his hand, “desecrate our father’s home.”
“Really?” Karael scoffed in disbelief. “That is your biggest concern at the moment: me spilling a little demon blood on daddy’s floors? I would have thought that you would be more concerned with me-” his words cut off when his hand snapped out in front of his face and caught the invisible dagger only an inch from his eye, the glamour of invisibility fading from the gold instrument of God.
That was hot.
“Now you are starting to piss me off, brother,” he snarled, dropping the dagger Angelus sent at him in an impressive stealth assault, failed assault, but it was still impressive.
“Zion, get out of here,” Angelus hissed.
I wanted to, the Dark Mother knew I wanted to, but I couldn’t leave him.
“You owe me lunch and pie,” I reminded him.
“Very well,” he said to my surprise, and with a single flap of his wings, he was flying across the nave to meet the irate angel flying at him just as fast.
The sound of metal against metal echoed throughout the massive church like a continual ringing of brass bells. I had seen sword fights before. Many. But never angelic sword fights. And, I could honestly say, that it is beyond epic. I wanted to do something to help Angelus, but I couldn’t move. I was frozen in place by awe. It was one of the most morbidly beautiful things I had ever seen in my very long life.
Their swords moved in a blur of silver and gold. Each counter was executed perfectly, and before the other could attack again, they were suddenly the one blocking. I couldn’t tell who had the advantage. It went back and forth with each offensive attack
and they moved around the church quicker then I knew was possible.
When the humming angelic swords locked up, each of their toned arms taut as their muscles strained against the pressure from the other, they finally stilled in mid-air as their wings slowly flapped to keep them afloat.
Karael snarled in Angelus’ face. “You will not beat me. You may have saved her once, but you won’t save her again. Her soul is mine,” he hissed, kneeing Angelus in the stomach, sending him flying across the nave.
Angelus flipped around in a blur of feathers and flesh, his feet smashing into the brick wall above the cathedra, and he pushed off of it, flying back towards the advancing angel with his gold sword at the ready.
Karael jumped to meet Angelus, but the sullen angel flipped around again, slamming into the ceiling of the cathedral feet first then pushed off of it, narrowly avoiding Karael’s sweeping sword. Angelus pulled his sword across his body, his head leaning back as Karael reversed the direction of his offensive strike, his sword passing over Angelus’ throat within mere millimeters. Karael leaned his head to the side a fraction of a second before Angelus’ blade made contact, instead if sheered off one of his dark curls. Slowly, as if time no longer applied, the dark heavenly lock of hair floated to the marble floor below.
Angelus pulled his knees to his chest then flipped head over heels at least a dozen times before his feet touched down on the floor, sliding to a halt in the narthex, the marble floor breaking and pilling up under him as he skidded to a halt.
Karael spun through the air like a feathery missile, flipping around to his feet. When he touched down on the bema, the ground violently shook from the impact and the floor rippled away from the point of his impact, sending a rolling wave of stone that tore through the nave and aisles, throwing wooden pews up into the air one by one.
When the pew in front of me went flying through the air, slamming into one of the walls, splintering into hundreds of pieces from the impact, I jumped from my seat. My body shot into the air like a bullet from a gun, a fraction of a second before the pew I was sitting on exploded into splinters. My black wings unfolded and caught my descent. Slowly they treaded the air, hovering in midair between the two seething angels.
