by A. J. Norris
“Um, aisle. In case I have to pee.”
“Five-and-a-half-hour trip, yep, I’m thinking you’ll need to. Here…have a seat. I’m gonna hit the snack car before we depart. Want anything?” She shook her head. Elliott had given him some walking around money before he’d left the apartment. It wasn’t a lot, but enough to get by for a couple of days. He’d explained his situation to the other angels and although he was reluctant to take the cash they graciously offered, he eventually accepted it.
Raz would have preferred to teleport to Chicago instead of using this mode of transportation. He could have easily explained to Julia how teleporting worked but he still couldn’t bring himself to fully trust her. She might take off on him. Sure, she wouldn’t be able to hide from him, but he didn’t want to make things too easy for her either. Or harder on him. When he returned with an armful of food, the few passengers in the car ogled him on the way to his seat. An elderly couple smiled at him; he winked back. The green eyes of a twenty-something adult man with a knit hat followed him. He possessed an understanding expression.
Okay, that’s weird.
The only other person sharing the space with them, besides Julia, was a woman in business attire, her mind tuned into a laptop. She didn’t look up.
After settling in his window seat, he opened the tray and laid out all the snacks he bought.
“Whatcha got there?” Julia twirled a lock of hair around her index finger.
“Food. Drinks.”
Julia eyed his collection of pre-packed snacks. She picked up a sleeve of Oreos. “Can I have these?”
He shook his head and sucked in air. “You told me you didn’t want anything. So…”
“Hey.” She pushed his shoulder and he chuckled.
“Just kidding. I figured you’d change your mind. Take what you want.” She grabbed a bag of regular potato chips and one of the sodas too.
“How did you pay for this?”
“A friend gave me a little money.”
“Oh, that was nice.” She worked the package of chocolate and cream cookies open.
There was no more talking after the train left the station. The conductor came around and punched their tickets. Julia made herself comfortable by lying her head on his shoulder. He shrugged and dislodged her. She scowled at him, an expression he ignored. Netherworld had only intensified his touch phobia; he was still bothered by people invading his space. And this included Julia. This didn’t stop him from wanting to invade her space though. All. The. Time.
Raz shoved the wrappers into the pouch in the back of the seat in front of him, stretched his legs, and reclined the seat. He closed his eyes and let the gentle rocking of the train put him to sleep. His mind drifted aimlessly from one memory to the next, morphing from one recollection into another.
Raz fought with a Warrior angel. The female had broken his wing; the appendage hung loosely from a break in the crest. Her foot landed in the center of his chest. The air blew all around him as he tumbled toward the portal between the realms. His broken wing made it impossible for him to regain controlled flight. He was falling and he’d not wanted to do so. But that didn’t matter, Raz was susceptible to Abaddon even if the choice had not been his. The Demon Ruler heard the impact of his fall and took him to Netherworld against his will. He awoke on a marble slab inside the cathedral with no memories of who or what he’d once been. In his dream, however, he remembered everything that led up to that point. Aba strapped him to the table and tore his wings from his back. Raz watched helplessly as the Demon Ruler turned the wings into horns then stuck them into his skull right above his hairline. He shrieked and prayed to Deus, but no one came to his aide. His skin burned while the pigment changed to red. The bones in his lower limbs snapped, only to reshape into goat legs and cloven hooves. Fur grew below his waist, thick and soft. The last thing to sprout was a hairless tail. Shooting pain traveled the length of his spine. Aba proudly stood over his handiwork.
All Raz could do was scream, “Noooo!” And scream he did, for fifty years. Each day in Netherworld was equivalent to five years on Earth. It seemed short, but wasn’t. One could not tell how long they’d been there. One day bled into the next until he couldn’t tell how many days passed. Time stood still.
“Ra’zael.”
“No! Y-You can’t do this…”
Someone squeezed his hand. He jerked free.
Oh, but I can…Abaddon smiled smugly.
“Ra’zael, wake up!”
Wha…
He glanced at his surroundings. Julia sat next to him on a train headed for Chicago. Raz rubbed the skin over his heart. Thank, Deus, his wings were still attached. He leaned his head back against the seat.
Julia gasped at the same time he felt the presence of an angel in the seats behind him.
“And to think I gave you your wings back.”
“You, gave them back? You’re the one who stole them in the first place,” Raz told the angel.
Elliott snorted. “Don’t you mean in the second place? And they were horns, jack-hole.”
Raz sighed because he knew why the Redeemer had come. “Let’s get this over with, shall we?”
“Get what over—” Julia started to ask.
“Outta the way, female,” Elliott commanded.
“Don’t talk to her that waaaay—”
Elliott grabbed a chunk of Raz’s hair and wrenched him out of his seat. With the other fist, he connected a left hook with the right side of Raz’s nose. Blood sprayed an empty row of seats.
Julia yelped. “Get out of here!” Raz barked at her. There was irony in that order.
Elliott throttled him again and again, each punch harder than the last. Raz’s back stretched over the top of a seat, arched in a painful position; a weakened stance. He tasted blood and swallowed. His arms were useless. One was pinned beneath him and the other he used to block an occasional jab.
“Why aren’t you fighting back? Fight back!” Julia yelled.
“I…can’t!” Raz dodged a blow.
A growl rose from her throat. The next thing Raz knew, Julia was on Elliott’s back with her arms around his neck. “Get off of him!” she screamed.
The Redeemer grabbed her arms, and in one smooth motion turned around and crisscrossed them. Raz fell to his knees. The angel marched Julia backward and sat her in another row further down. The sliding door between the cars banged shut. The others left, either to get help, or more likely to mind their own business.
The angels rushed toward one another.
CHAPTER
FORTY
Julia
Screw this.
Julia had seen enough testosterone thrown around. She rose from the chair with a huff. The sliding door between the cars squeaked when she yanked the metal panel over. The passengers from their car sat in the numerous vacant seats on the nearly empty train. The lady with the laptop winced and an older couple glanced at her but averted their attention away from her quickly. The gray slouched knit hat of the hipster boy she had seen boarding the train earlier peeked over the seats. He’d stared at her hard before finding his seat. The perceptive stare made her uneasy. His green eyes flew up to meet hers. He stuck his foot into the aisle and blocked her path, nearly tripping her.
“Excuse me,” she snarled. Her mood soured even more. Unimpressed, the skinny dude didn’t remove his leg. He looked bored.
“Sit down,” he said and motioned for her to take a seat in the one facing him.
“No thanks, bud, I—”
“What color are they?”
She sighed heavily. “What color are what?”
“Your feathers?” he whispered.
“Who are you?”
“Hm. So you admit you have feathers. Black, I take it.” He smiled smugly.
“I didn’t admit anything.”
“Oh, please. Sit.”
Julia sat down, her curiosity overwhelmed her common sense. “Tell me what you know.”
He chuckled. “More than I
care to. Who’s at their crossroad?”
“What are you talking about? I don’t know what you mean by crossroad.”
“Oh,” he snickered, “then it must be you. Guess it doesn’t matter if you have wings or not.”
“You’re weird.” When she started to get up, he grasped her forearm.
“You have a choice, you know. There’s always a choice. I was once like you.”
Julia pulled her arm out of his grip. “What’dya know?”
“You know what my Redeemer told me?”
Nope and don’t care.
She started to walk away again, except she found she wanted to know. “What?”
“She told me not to end up like her.”
“Look, you don’t know me and—”
“Quit being an idiot or you’ll wind up in Hell. That’s what happens when you make the wrong decision. I hear the place is pret-ty bad.”
“Who sent you, Abaddon?”
“Hell no. Does that even make sense?”
“Then who are you?”
“I’m no one, and like you said, I don’t know you.”
Julia growled, “Ooooooh, what the fuck?”
The green-eyed man laughed. She stood and fled this time.
“Remember, you can still make the right choice!” he yelled across the rows of seats. “Don’t let your past control your future. After Julia closed herself inside the bathroom, she exhaled with relief. She placed her hands on the stainless steel sink and hung her head low.
“Who was that guy?” Something thumped the rubber floor and banged against a stall door. She wheeled around; she wasn’t alone. Her nose crinkled.
Charcoal.
“Whoever you are, you can come out now.”
The ram-horned half-goat, half-man from the hotel roof emerged.
“You have another message for me?” Julia asked.
“Yesss,” he hissed. Clearly, he thought talking that way intimidated her. He was a goat, not a snake.
She waited for the beast to relay the message. When he stood blinking at her, she threw her hands up. “What? Is! It?”
“My massster—”
“Can you cut the hissing bullshit? It’s annoying and unnecessary. I’m not afraid of you.”
His mouth dropped open and he paled. His red pigmented skin faded to a dusty rose. She’d called him out, like she suspected.
He swallowed hard. “Um…my master said you are to kill Ra’zael the Guardian in exchange for being allowed to retrieve the amulet.”
Allowed?
“Well, you can tell your master, I can retrieve my amulet without his permission if I want.” Julia stepped toward the ram-horned goat. He retreated until his hocks banged into the hollow metal stall wall. “And another thi—”
The goat grabbed her by the lower jaw with a clawed hand and reversed their positions. Her wings smashed against the stall. Warm liquid, blood, oozed down her neck. Her eyes watered. He raised her up until only her tiptoes touched the floor.
***
Ra’zael
Raz and Elliott crashed into each other, their fight not over. A small shockwave washed over the train car. The impact sent them reeling backward. Several rows of seats closest to them, unbolted from the floor and flew away from the warring angels. The windows blew out. The cross-breeze tossed Elliott’s hair around, and Raz suddenly missed his long hair.
The white-winged angel recovered first and lunged for his middle. Raz lay beneath him, wheezing, trying to breathe. He gasped over and over as Elliott landed punches to his gut. The Redeemer grabbed him by the shirt, lifted him up, and slammed his head into the floor where the seats had been riveted to the metal. Raz’s vision fuzzed out. So did his brain.
When he came to, Elliott was kneeling next to him on the floor. He bowed his head and laid a hand on his shoulder. He spoke in Arcadian. “Ego te absolvo, fratre mei, quoniam dilexit multum.” I absolve you, my brethren, you are forgiven.
“Gratias tibi ago.” Thank you. Raz lay there even after Elliott teleported, likely back to his mate. He took deep breaths, grateful for his clean slate and embarrassed at his weak show in front of Julia. He ran his hands down his face.
Raz lumbered to his feet. He needed to go find Julia.
CHAPTER
FORTY-ONE
Julia
Julia pulled at the clawed hand holding her jaw. The fingers wouldn’t budge. They were like a vise. The more she fought to break free, the tighter the grip and the further the nails dug into the flesh of her cheeks.
“You will kill the angel, Ra’zael. And my master may let you keep the amulet.” His gray-yellow eyes bored into hers. Something hid beneath the surface of this beast’s demonic appearance. Of the three demons she’d met, all of them possessed eyes that didn’t match their exterior, even Abaddon’s. She wondered if there were any actual natives of Hell. Julia conjured a wad of spit and let it fly. The demon flinched and his other hand came up and grabbed her throat.
Tears welled in her eyes. “P-Please,” she begged with only a whisper. Her arms slackened as her energy dwindled. Julia knew she was technically dead, but somehow this didn’t matter. Was it possible to die again? What exactly was she?
The goat snorted. “Are you afraid of me now?” He eased his hold on her windpipe. She gasped and tried to shake her head, except he only readjusted his grip. Julia could feel the bruises which had already formed around her neck.
Her focus wavered in and out.
“Are you afraid? Or should I teach you a lesson?” Saliva splattered her face while he spoke. She nodded, hating herself for being weak. “Good. Pretty things in Netherworld tarnish—”
“Jeremiah!” Raz shouted.
Julia dropped to her knees then onto her side, one wing trapped under her shoulder. She wheezed and coughed, writhing on the floor. Her blurred vision made it impossible to see anything further away than a few inches, but she heard the clamor of cloven hooves scrapping across the rubber tile loudly in her ears.
Julia screamed as the ram-goat’s head tumbled past her field of vision. A trail of blood streaked the floor. The horned head settled with a wet sounding stomach-churning thud against the far wall. The body fish-flopped next to her. She bolted upright and scooted backward away from the flailing hooves. Her back leaned against the inside of the bathroom door. Red bodily fluid spray-painted the walls. The scent of pennies flooded her nose and Julia gagged. “Raz…what the…”
He faced her, fire flared in his eyes, his hands curled into tight balls. The angel retrieved the head and snapped the horns off. Crunch. Crunch.
Julia gagged again.
“Come on. Quit dry heaving,” Raz said and turned on the faucet. He took his shirt off, tossing it on the rubber floor. Under normal circumstances she would be checking out his six pack, but nothing about any of this had been normal. The angel washed his hands, chest, and face. He checked his slightly bruised cheeks in the mirror then went into a stall. His urine splashed inside the toilet.
“Seriously? You’re peeing right now? You’re actually peeing? Figures.” She shimmied up the door and stepped toward the sinks.
He emerged from the stall with a clean shirt and without another word, he exited the bathroom. Julia wasn’t sure she wanted to know where the new shirt came from. Standing at the sinks washing her hands and face, she avoided looking at the headless demon. She pivoted to leave. Her shoes slipped on the blood with each stride. Clutching the door handle, she exited the bathroom and wiped her sneakers on the dark carpet outside.
“Uhhh, yuk,” she breathed. Raz was waiting for her at the door between cars.
“You’re just going to leave the body for someone to find?” she asked, jogging to catch up to him in the narrow passageway. He grunted. “What’s with the horns?”
“They’re not horns.”
She snort-laughed. “Okaaay. Look like horns to me.”
“They’re not.”
“Oh. Then what are they?”
“Jeremiah’s
wings.”
“That thing had a name?”
“Has. He’s not dead.”
“Huh? You…”
Took his head off.
They headed to the opposite end of the train from where they originally sat. The Quiet car was deserted. They took a seat in the last row at the back of the train. Julia had so many questions her mind was spinning in circles. Raz folded his arms and leaned his head back against the headrest. She gaped at his profile. She couldn’t believe he’d left that goat demon for anyone to find.
“We should get off this train.”
He looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “Why?”
“Duh. Because you left a goat demon headless in the bathroom.”
“It’s fine. It’s taken care of.”
“By who, some magical force I don’t know about?”
“Yep. Forget about it, all right?”
“Where did you get the clean shirt?”
“I had it,” he grumbled.
“Where? In your magical back pocket?”
He glared at her out of the corners of his eye.
Julia wanted to slap him. It never occurred to her until this moment that he could possibly be hiding things from her. What else had he been less than forthcoming about?
“Who was that white-haired angel and how did he get on and off the train?”
Raz shrugged.
“Don’t give me that I-dunno shoulder shrug. Who was he?”
“An angel.”
“No shit. What was that fight all about?”
Raz sighed and looked at the ceiling. “If you must know, I dishonored him, and that was payback. I’m not discussing this any further.”
She sneered as she mocked him. “I’m not discussing this any further.”
“Knock it off.”
Julia plucked one of his feathers. He grabbed her wrist and removed the plume from her hand. “Believe it or not, that hurts.” He pulled out one of her black feathers.
“Ooouch. You asshole!” She punched his thigh.
“See?”
“Ooooo, I hate you.”
