I was good, but my God-given talents didn’t include superhuman reflexes.
The Nephilim spun around and eyed my hand with disdain, then confusion. He reached out and clasped it. His hand was surprisingly cold and dry. “And also with you,” he replied. “Don’t make me regret this.” With that, he took off to help his partner.
I joined the fray, skirting the edges of their battle in my attempt to reach the other side of the platform. I was almost past when one of the demons noticed me. I ducked under its grasping arms and swung the stock of my rifle into its jaw. It fell back, dazed, and then stared down at his belly and the steel blade sticking out of it. The female Nephilim grinned in triumph, ripping her sword free before neatly slicing off the demon’s head.
She took a quick look around, and I realized she was bleeding heavily from a wound in her side. She saw me looking and waved me off. “Go now, while you can. This is no place for mortals.” As if to emphasize her point, a howling demon charged her like a bellowing rhinoceros, its face a mass of bulbous protrusions and spiny appendages. I took her advice, turned, and fled, praying I’d make it to the other side in one piece.
Chapter 46
I did make it in one piece, but only just. I slogged forward, dragging an injured leg behind me, clutching my two sawed-offs in either hand, my assault rifle shattered and discarded a few hundred feet back. That’s what happens when you can’t dodge a falling light pole fast enough, in case you’re curious. I’d managed to pry myself from underneath it, but my rifle hadn’t survived, and now my poor leg felt like I’d gotten it caught in a car door; I had a feeling the bruise would be the size of a melon, if I survived the night.
The lights in the sky were much brighter now, so bright it was almost as if the sun had risen. The Grigori hovered above, watching the fighting, but never interfering. I didn’t know why, but guessed it had something to do with the whole balance thing Hemingway had talked about; if they got involved, then the other side would have no choice but to do the same. Maybe that’s why the Nephilim and the demons were the ones going at it—kids will be kids, but once the adults start throwing punches, shit gets real, fast.
I called Serge back, but he didn’t answer. Hopefully he was keeping himself safe somewhere out of sight. Without Othello’s go ahead, he’d be a sitting duck. Fortunately, it seemed the fighting here had all but ended. A few Nephilim were down, flopped over the railing or pitched on the ground. There weren’t any demons, but plenty of blood and ichor to suggest there had been—from what I could tell, when a demon was slain they simply evaporated. Pretty efficient recycle system, all things considered.
No muss, no fuss.
I shuffled past the corpses towards the platform. Once closer, I could make out a few figures standing at the railing facing the GW bridge. The first I recognized immediately—Darrel the Angel had on the same khaki trench coat he’d donned in the subway station. The second, huddled between the Darrel and another man, was Chapman. He cradled a planter in his hands and seemed to be listening to the words of the only other person there I didn’t immediately recognize.
As I approached, the third figure turned to me.
I felt my stomach lurch.
Detective Ricci cocked his head and waved.
Chapter 47
Ricci slid his hands into his pockets and faced me. “Well, this is an unexpected surprise!”
I stood there, mouth agape.
“Do you know her?” Darrel asked, eyeing me warily as if assessing a potential threat.
“She was on the lookout for one of the missing girls I’m ‘responsible’ for finding,” Ricci said, using air quotes. “A prickly bitch, if memory serves. But easily put off—the script is pretty much always the same. I blame being overworked, offer sympathy, maybe a little hope. Eventually they assume the worst and stop calling.” The detective shrugged.
Darrel’s disgust was evident, but he said nothing.
Chapman still faced the water, seemingly oblivious to our conversation.
“I don’t understand. Why are ye here?” I asked, still struggling to understand.
“I’m putting in my bid, obviously,” Ricci said. “I had hoped to do so with a little less fanfare,” Ricci waved a beefy hand at the fighting taking place further down the bridge, “but Mr. Chapman didn’t leave me much choice.”
“He’d already made his decision,” Darrel said. “You have no business here, Marquis.”
Marquis.
I sidled up against the nearby railing and took a deep breath, finally noting the chill in the night air and how much I ached—until now I’d been oblivious, running on pure adrenaline. I could feel a migraine coming on, a dull barb of pain lodged just above my right eye, and that migraine had a name.
The Marquis.
Unless there were multiple aristocrats running around New York City’s Freakish underworld, that meant Ricci was somehow behind Rumpelstiltskin’s abductions of the girls, Gomorrah’s assault on my rental car, and Dorian’s Freaky Fight Night.
But none of that made any sense.
“I thought ye were a good guy,” I said, still reeling from the revelation that Ricci was anything other than a mildly incompetent detective. “Ye visit that kid in prison…” I muttered. “That’s what the old cop said. That ye were a good person…”
Ricci looked confused at first, then brightened. “Oh! Right. I didn’t realize the old geezer was paying that much attention. I’ll have to do something about that.” Ricci began popping his knuckles, one at a time. “That was one of my better ideas. Mentor a mortal, get him to kill his best friend, and pump him for information once he’s in prison. That little Dominican punk introduces me to all the best people.”
I shook my head in disgust and disbelief. “But why?”
Ricci arced an eyebrow. “Why?”
“She means ‘why go through the effort’?” Darrel clarified, his expression softening as he looked at me. “She doesn’t know what you are.”
Ricci glanced at the Grigori in surprise, then back at me, laughter glittering in his eyes. “Oh, that’s rich. You waltzed in here and you don’t even know who you’re talking to?”
Chapman turned, finally, and met my eyes. “He’s one of the Fallen,” he said, sounding tired. “One of the angels who rebelled against God and lost.”
Ricci looked like he’d swallowed a sour candy but nodded. “True, although not entirely accurate. I’m more of a stand in, a representative, if you will. If I were here in my true form, things would get…Biblical.” Ricci chuckled at his own joke. “Unlike the Watchers, when we step out among mortals, the alarm bells tend to go off. So, I took this one over. A little pudgy, if you ask me,” Ricci said, cradling the fat of his belly, “but the fringe benefits are excellent.”
I shook my head, unable to wrap my head around what I was being told. Detective Ricci was one of the Fallen? As in, Lucifer’s angels? I suddenly felt incredibly out of my depth.
And a little like going to confession.
“Wait,” I said, holding a hand up to clarify, “So ye possessed a detective? But why him?” I asked. “What’s the end game?”
Ricci paused as if considering whether to answer me. I realized Darrel also seemed interested in the Fallen’s answer—as if he, too, wanted to know Ricci’s motives.
Ricci shrugged. “I’m sure you’ve noticed a few changes in the world, lately. More selfishness. More hatred. More terror. The times they are a changin’,” he said, mimicking Bob Dylan’s twangy voice. “The end times are coming, and I’m not the only one who’s noticed. There’s a lot of activity downstairs, and a lot of eyes on the Midwest. Pretty soon there’ll be a reckoning, and I intend to have a nice chunk of the Eastern seaboard carved out for myself before that happens.”
I frowned. “How does bein’ a detective help with that?”
“I rub elbows with unsavory people. I look the other way when there’s something in it for me. I make deals. Network.” Ricci grinned. “You’d be surprised the level
of influence you have when people trust you.”
Unsavory people…looking the other way. I squeezed the railing so hard I could feel the metal burrowing into my skin. “You’ve been working with Magnus. Helping him kidnap the girls. Rumpelstiltskin works for you.”
“Oh, you’ve met Magnus?” Ricci said, sounding pleasantly surprised. “Oh yes, the girls! Magnus had a rather elaborate plan to turn them into a high-end escort service. It’s frowned upon in New York City, but women in those positions are privy to so many secrets.” Ricci shrugged. “At some point, you simply indulge your people. He wanted girls he could control, so I made sure he got girls.”
My migraine grew incrementally worse the more Ricci spoke. I could see it now—his web of informants and ex-cons and Freaks—all of them making it possible to corrupt, to control. It was insidious, but also ingenious; it wasn’t a convoluted plot to overthrow the world…it was politics 101.
My lips curled upwards in a slow smile as I realized I knew something Ricci didn’t, something that would throw a wrench in his plan. “Magnus is dead by now, ye know,” I said, spitefully. “Dead, or wishin’ he was.”
Ricci’s eyes flashed. “I doubt that very much. Besides, how would you know that?”
“I believe Dorian called it ‘Freaky Fight Night,’” I said. “Ring any bells?”
Darrel looked confused. “What’s she talking about?”
“This bastard,” I said, pointing accusingly at Ricci, “tried to pull attention away from what ye were doin’ here by pittin’ his minions against a bunch of Freaks for entertainment.”
Ricci threw his hands up. “Guilty as charged.”
The Grigori’s brow furrowed. “So that’s why we haven’t seen any reinforcements,” he muttered.
Ricci grunted. “I’m surprised Magnus was even involved in the fighting. He’s not the type to get his hands dirty. Besides, the two I sent should have been more than enough.”
“D’ye mean Sodom and Gomorrah?” I asked, grinning. I stepped away from the railing and took a step forward. “Because Sodom is irrigating someone’s lawn right now, and Gomorrah is decorating it.”
Ricci sneered. “And why should I believe you?”
“I don’t care if ye do,” I said, stalking forward until I was within spitting distance. “All I care about is what John plans to do with that seed. Ye can go fuck yourself.”
“I don’t—” Darrel began.
“And ye can do the same. Leavin’ me and mine to clean up your mess and take on the Unclean by ourselves. Tryin’ to take the seed when ye know it’ll kickstart a war.” I stared at Chapman, who hung his head, staring at his feet. “What did ye offer him?”
Darrel looked indignant. “We—”
“Death,” Chapman said, interrupting the Grigori. He lifted his head and met my eyes, and I saw that desperation I’d seen before, only this time it was somehow worse. “I just want to die,” he hissed in an anguished voice.
Oh. Yikes.
Chapter 48
I glared at the legendary nurseryman. “What the fuck d’ye mean ye want to die?” I asked.
“Not simply die,” Darrel responded, drawing my unwelcome attention. “He wishes to be given his rightful place in Heaven. Something we, too, wish for him after everything he’s done.” I rolled my eyes. I could sense a sales pitch when I heard it; the Grigori was trying to remind Chapman what he was getting out of the deal while appearing altruistic in the process. The angel sounded like every guy who’d ever offered to buy me a drink at the bar under the guise of improving my night—strings were always attached.
“I spent my whole life trying to be a good man,” Chapman said, ignoring the Grigori. “I never married. I helped people. I worshiped and I sacrificed. At first, I thought this was my reward,” he said, indicating himself, his youthful face and body. “To live forever. To help people forever. But then there were the wars. Between men. Between ideologies. All that death. Such senseless death. And the politics,” Chapman spat, “the games the gods play with mortal men and women…I can’t take it. I don’t want to be a part of this world anymore.”
“But what if you could live without that pain?” Ricci interrupted, sensing his opening. “What if we gave you the power to end everyone’s suffering? To bring down the gods?”
“You know that’s an empty promise,” Darrel said.
Ricci’s eyes lit up with malice. “The Horsemen will ride soon enough. You know that as well as I do. Who’s to say whether Johnny here won’t play a role in that? Especially once he chooses the side that’s bound to win—no matter what your silly book says.”
Chapman’s gaze never strayed from my face. I could sense he was pleading with me, asking me to understand, to empathize. To support his need to see it all end, one way or the other.
“Stop bein’ a coward,” I said, cutting off the other two. They both jerked around to look at me, wondering who I was siding with. I took another step forward until Chapman and I stood within arm’s reach of one another. “Bein’ a good man isn’t about askin’ for a reward. If you’re good, you’re good. If ye aren’t, ye aren’t.” I grimaced, but plowed ahead, refusing to sugarcoat things for the man no matter what he’d been through—I wasn’t that sort of person. “If ye want it to end, I understand. But man up and do it yourself. Don’t drag the world down with ye.”
“That’s not—” Darrel began.
“I’ve tried,” Chapman said with a bitter smile. “I’ve been all over this country, you know. I’ve worked in clinics, treated soldiers, signed up for relief efforts. I’ve put myself in harm’s way so many times. Eventually, once I realized I wasn’t destined to die that way, I tried to end it myself.” Chapman reached into his back pocket and pulled out a whittling knife. He slung the blade free with a practiced flick and ran its edge across his forearm before any of us could stop him.
Chapman switched the planter to his knife hand, tucking it safely under one arm, and held out his wounded arm for me to see. A dark, amber liquid dribbled out from the wound, congealing along its edges.
Sap. He bled sap.
“I’m not even human, anymore, you see,” Chapman said. “John Chapman died centuries ago. I’m just the spirit he left behind.”
Darrel rested a hand on Chapman’s shoulder. “Give us the seed and we’ll follow through on our end. I promise.”
Chapman nodded, then hung his head once more.
“Sadly,” Ricci said, hooking his thumbs in his belt loops and rocking back and forth, “I can’t let you do that.”
“You can’t take it by force,” Darrel replied, facing the Fallen. “Without Appleseed’s blessing, the seed will never take root. There’s nothing else for you to do here. You lost.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong,” Ricci said. He glanced up at the sky, which had lightened somewhat, and studied the Watchers—cloistered so high above our heads they could have been mistaken for stars. “If he won’t give it to me, and I can’t take it, I’ll have to make sure you lot can’t have it, either.”
And the fucking stars began to wink out.
Chapter 49
Darrel stared up in disbelief. “What have you done?”
“Call it a preemptive strike,” Ricci replied.
“What’s happening?” Chapman asked. “What’s he doing?”
“Do you know how one gets a title in Hell?” Ricci asked, clearly enjoying himself. “One pays one’s dues, obviously, but in Hell a title isn’t some arbitrary thing. It’s more like a position. A rank. It means you’re in charge. In practical terms, that rank determines how many legions of demons are under your control.” Ricci smiled. “Can you guess how many legions are given to a Marquis?”
I gaped as the sky brightened enough to see by, sunrise only a few minutes away. I had no idea how many demons were in a legion—I’d always hated conversion tables in math and science. But, from what I could tell, I was guessing the answer to Ricci’s question was somewhere between a shitload and a fuckton.
Give or take a buttload.
Winged demons the size of fighter planes, so many they threatened to blot out the horizon, were battling the Grigori above our heads. Between their size and sheer numbers, they were overwhelming the Watchers, forcing them to descend as they fought to survive. Which, unfortunately, meant the aerial battle was swiftly getting closer.
“We should probably leave ‘em to it, don’t ye t’ink?” I asked Chapman, half-jokingly.
Chapman looked devastated. It took me a second to realize that a man like him—someone who had devoted himself to helping people—would only blame himself for all this. In his mind, his selfishness and his desire to end his own life had caused this mess—and he couldn’t handle it.
“Oy!” I shouted. He jerked his head up. “Pity yourself later. Ye didn’t know this was how t’ings would turn out, but now ye should realize the trouble that seed can cause.” I pointed up. “That’s what Hell on Earth looks like, and I for one am not ready to see everythin’ and everyone I love get caught in the crossfire.”
Chapman studied the sky and nodded. “You’re right.”
“Give the seed to me now,” Darrel interjected, holding out his hand for the planter. “I’ll see it and you are taken care of.”
Chapman locked eyes with me. “No, she’s right. Things have gone too far. I won’t be responsible for the end of the world as we know it. For starting another war.” He turned away from the Grigori. “Let’s go.”
A blinding light flashed before our eyes.
“Motherfucker!” I cursed.
If this shit kept up, I was going to have to insure my eyes.
“We had a deal, John Chapman,” Darrel said, his voice vibrating with power, surrounded by a brilliant, golden aura. “And you will honor it.”
“Uh oh,” Ricci said, cackling. “Sounds like you two pissed off the nightlight. I think I’ll take this body somewhere else and let you sort this out amongst yourselves. No sense ruining a good meat suit.” Ricci sauntered off, leaving his demons to take care of the Watchers. “Take care!”
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