Black Wings

by Christina Henry

  “Stop it!” I shouted. I was nothing but a puppet to Evangeline. “You have no right to murder her for your own vengeance.”

  It is your vengeance as well, Granddaughter. She is responsible for the death of your mother, of your friend.

  She was right, and part of me did want to kill Ariell and Ramuell for that. But defending yourself in battle wasn’t the same as cold-blooded murder. Like I’d told Gabriel, I was supposed to be the good guy.

  Ramuell started to rise and white fire poured out of my palms, setting the nephilim aflame. He screamed in torment and the cavern was filled with the stench of his cooking flesh.

  “We can’t kill them!” I cried out desperately. “It’s wrong!”

  Wrong? Evangeline’s voice was cold and furious. Wrong? It is wrong to punish those who took me from Lucifer, who would have murdered his children in cold blood for their own aims, their own petty lust for power? It is wrong to punish those responsible for the deaths of my grandchildren, who destroyed my direct line so utterly that you are the last survivor? It is wrong to punish those who murdered your mother and who would murder you the same way? No, my granddaughter. It is not wrong. It is wrong to show them mercy.

  I struggled to close my fists, to shut off the flow of magic. I wanted to capture Ariell, to have her brought to Azazel for her crimes. I didn’t want to be an instrument of murder.

  But Ramuell, I thought to myself. Ramuell, I wouldn’t mind killing. If I killed him, Katherine might be set free.

  “No,” I said out loud, and as the conviction in me grew I felt Evangeline in my mind, grasping for control. “No. I’m not like them. I won’t be a monster.”

  And then I heard Beezle’s voice in my head saying, “Concentrate, concentrate,” and I did. I thought of the little match flame inside me, the one that was blazing like a bonfire at the moment. I thought of Evangeline, lurking in my blood. I knew I wouldn’t be able to shut off the flow of magic while she was inside me. But Gabriel had said my will was strong. That was how I’d overcome the spell he’d put on me, the one to make me compliant.

  So instead of trying to shut off the flow of magic, I used my will and my strength to turn it inside, to find Evangeline inside me and chase her out. The electricity that sparked from my fingertips reversed course, flowing back through my veins. I screamed in agony as it tripped through my blood, a hunter seeking its prey. I could no longer keep myself aloft and I fell to Earth in a tumble of wings and bones. I heard something crunch in my leg and nearly went blind from the pain.

  Evangeline screamed, Granddaughter, what are you doing?

  I could feel her inside me, shrinking away from my power, trying to make herself smaller and smaller. The electricity burned through every inch of me, leaving no cell unturned as it searched for Evangeline.

  She burrowed into a corner of my mind, but my magic wanted only one thing. I heard her screaming as it came for her, and her screams were my screams as the magic devoured me to find her.

  Then I felt something in my head pop, and a moment later a gush of blood came from my recently broken nose. My magic cut off in an instant. The bonfire lowered to a match flame again, and I opened my eyes to see Evangeline standing before me, not as a ghost or a memory, but a corporeal being. Her face was alight with fury.

  “How dare you?” she shrieked, pulling at her hair like a madwoman. “How dare you? I have waited eons for vengeance, waited eons for a vessel with the strength that you have.”

  I sat up and swiped at my nose with the sleeve of my sweater. I could taste the tang of dirt and my own blood in my mouth. “Yeah, well, I’m not your fucking vessel, am I? I’m Madeline Black, daughter of Azazel, and of Katherine Black, and I will not be used by anyone, not even you, Grandma.”

  She howled in frustration, scraped her nails along her cheeks and left rivulets of blood. I rolled my eyes at her and assessed the latest damage to my very-human form.

  Every part of me hurt. I flapped my wings and used them to level myself to a standing position, floating a few feet above the ground. I didn’t want to put any pressure on my left ankle, as it was definitely broken.

  The smell of rotten barbecue permeated my abused nose and I spun in a circle, suddenly remembering Ariell and Ramuell. They were both unconscious. Ariell’s skin looked boiled, but her chest rose and fell in shallow breaths. Most of her wings were burned off. There were just a few white feathers, gray now from smoke, clinging to a twisted cartilage frame. This, more than anything, made me feel sorry for her. She looked so small and pathetic without her wings.

  Ramuell was a shapeless, blackened hulk. It seemed he had tried to curl himself into a ball to put out the flames and more or less melted in that position. Somehow the monstrous thing still breathed.

  So, I had my two villains—and one crazy Lost Mother—and no way to contact anyone or to transport them to Azazel. Well, I did have my cell phone, but it was in my jacket pocket at the bottom of the underground path. And I doubted I could get a cell signal in the Forbidden Lands anyway.

  “Hey,” I called to Evangeline, who had fallen to the ground and was pounding it with her fists. “Hey, crazy lady. I need you for a second.”

  She looked up at me, eyes red-rimmed and insane. “And why should I help you, betrayer of my blood?”

  “Cut the drama,” I snapped. “I’ve got to get in touch with someone to pick up these two losers, and I don’t know how to do it. You’ve been manipulating my magic all this time, so you probably know how to do some long-distance communication, right?”

  Her eyes widened, and then she started to laugh, a mad witch’s cackle.

  “Okay, whatever,” I said, and that was when Ramuell tore out my heart.

  I didn’t have any time to feel pain. My soul snapped its tether and floated away from my shell the instant the nephilim’s claws burst through my ribs. I saw my broken body thrown aside. The nephilim screamed in triumph and ate my still-beating heart while I watched. Then he went to Evangeline, scooped her from the ground and bit off her head. I heard her soul fall screaming into his gaping maw.

  I floated up and up. I felt so light, so free. No earthly body to bind me. No earthly cares to chain me. No angel wars, no souls to collect, no demons chasing me. No confusing attractions or unwanted fiancés. Just me, a dust mote in the universe.

  Ramuell stalked across the cavern and tore Ariell in half with his claws. Apparently not sated by his last little snack, he started to eat her. I felt a little twinge of conscience. I should do something, probably. Ramuell was roaming free and no one knew about it except me. He wouldn’t stay here for long. He would find some way to get to a human population and then he would start eating his way through every man, woman and child he could find.

  But what can I do, really? I thought as I drifted. I’m dead. An Agent should be coming for me soon, to take me to the Door.

  Just because you’re dead doesn’t mean that your magic is gone.

  Yes, but I’m tired. Really tired of being chased around by monsters.

  Your magic comes from inside you, from your soul. Your magic is still with you even though your shell is gone.

  I just want to rest, to be free.

  You have a destiny to fulfill, a monster to destroy.

  I couldn’t run away. I wouldn’t run away. I wouldn’t let Ramuell defeat me. I wouldn’t let innocent lives be lost because I was a coward. And whatever the future brought me, I would face it, because I was a child of Lucifer and Evangeline, of Azazel and Katherine, because all their best powers and purposes had aligned in me. I had been raised to understand my duty, and I wouldn’t shirk from it now.

  And as I thought this, I felt my magic in a way that I never had before. I felt it flow through me, a part of me, not a thing that I kept locked away in a small corner and took out only when I needed it. It was always there, always alive within me, and it wasn’t a match flame. It blazed like the heart of the sun.

  I went to my poor shell, and I slid back inside it, and the sun within m
e burned hotter and brighter. All my broken bones reknit, and my skin sealed up without a scratch. But my heart . . . Where my heart had been I could feel a dark core, like a stone, and I realized that I was less human than I had been before.

  I came to my feet, flexing my fingers, my hands, my wings. I felt shiny and new, and my magic was a gentle thing that skimmed the surface of my blood. Then I smiled.

  “Hey,” I called to Ramuell. “You’re going to have to do a lot better than that.”

  The nephilim ceased crunching away at Ariell and turned to me, mouth agape. I didn’t wait for it to attack or to banter. I let my magic flow through me and out, and the room was filled with the light of the sun.

  Ramuell screamed, throwing his arms over his eyes. I waited serenely, warmed by the light, and watched as Ramuell began to disappear.

  It wasn’t like he was melting, precisely, because there was no residue dripping to the floor. It was like bits of him were being burned away, molecule by molecule. First skin, then muscle, then bone and blood. And finally, when there was nothing of Ramuell remaining, there was a burst of light and a pop, and all the souls that had been trapped inside him were before me.

  There was my mother, smiling with pride, and Patrick giving me a goofy grin and a thumbs-up. There was the woman who’d been eaten in front of the Starbucks. And there was . . .

  “Evangeline.”

  The voice filled the cavern, and I turned, and my own light dimmed beside the glory of the one who stood there. His face was perfection, his eyes were like two stars, and his wings were as black and glossy as the deepest part of night. But it was not his beauty that had me choking back sobs. It was the look of love on his face, a look that had always been for her, only for her, his Evangeline.

  The Morningstar held his arms out to her and she came to him, and he enfolded her in his wings and murmured words of love.

  After a few moments he held her away from him, and his eyes gleamed brighter than before. She nodded, and he opened a portal in front of her. Inside the portal was the Door, and Michael was waiting, beckoning to all the lost souls.

  The souls slowly filed through the portal, Patrick waving to me, my mother blowing me a kiss. I didn’t have time to go to her, to tell her all the things that were in my heart. The little girl inside me cried to see my mommy going away again. The Agent in me knew that she had died a long time ago, and this was the best way. The longer she stayed, the harder it would be for her to leave.

  Then Lucifer reluctantly released Evangeline, and she turned to go. Just as she was about to enter the portal, she glanced back at me and gave me a small nod. I returned the gesture, and she disappeared, the portal closing behind her.

  Then Lucifer turned his starlight eyes on me and said, “Granddaughter,” and held out his arms to me as he had to Evangeline.

  I felt compelled to run to him, to embrace him, to feel the warm glow of his approval on me, to kneel to him and call him my lord. This last impulse checked me. I might be his granddaughter, but I was also—as I had told Evangeline—my own self. I was Madeline Black, and I kneeled to no one.

  I walked to him sedately, and put my hands in his. He kissed each one of my cheeks and the magic in my blood sang out in recognition of its kin. The room grew brighter, filled with the light of two suns, and I heard a gasp.

  I looked toward the bend in the cavern and saw Azazel, Gabriel and—ugh—Nathaniel. My father looked like he was about to bust open with pride, but I had no eyes for him. It was Gabriel I was concerned with, Gabriel who was smiling at me. I felt relief bloom in my chest. He was alive. He was safe.

  Then I met Nathaniel’s astonished gaze—he was the one who had gasped—and gave him a nod of thanks. His head bobbed up and down in response but I think he was a little shell-shocked at the idea that his betrothed was related to Lucifer.

  “My granddaughter,” Lucifer said, and I turned my gaze back to his. “Tell me what has happened here.”

  So I told him, about Ariell and Ramuell, about the plot to overthrow him that started with Evangeline and their children and continued even as Ariell was the last conspirator to survive Evangeline’s wrath. I told him of Evangeline’s decision to go with Michael, and of her attempts to kill Ariell through me. I told him of Antares and his attacks upon me. I told him that Ramuell had eaten Ariell, and torn my heart from my body. I told him that I had returned to life and killed the nephilim with the light of the sun. I didn’t mention Ariell’s child. I didn’t want to draw Lucifer’s attention to half-nephilim children with Gabriel standing right there. He might decide to change his mind about the stay of execution he’d granted so many years ago on Gabriel’s life.

  Lucifer said nothing as I recited my tale, only kept my hands grasped in his and his eerie starlit eyes fixed on my face. When I was finished I was a little hoarse, and very tired. My injuries were gone but it took a lot out of a girl, coming back from the dead to defeat evil.

  “I’m kind of thirsty,” I said. Lucifer said something in a language I didn’t understand, and a bottle of water appeared in the air. “Hey, neat trick.”

  “You have killed my firstborn son,” Lucifer said. “This is a crime in the law of my kingdom.”

  I felt something inside me go still and cold. After all of this, was I going to be killed simply because I had destroyed the nephilim?

  “However, in doing so you freed Evangeline’s soul from this Earth, and for that I am grateful. So I have decided to grant clemency in this matter, and you will be forgiven publicly for your crime.”

  “Hey, great,” I said, speaking without thinking. “I just couldn’t sleep tonight if I didn’t have your approval.”

  There was another gasp from Nathaniel and I could practically hear Gabriel rolling his eyes in frustration. I thought for a minute that Lucifer might rescind his offer of clemency and have my head chopped off right there, but he surprised me. He laughed, and his laugh was such lovely music that I had to laugh with him while the other three gaped in wonder.

  “You are my own granddaughter,” he said. “Your spirit does me proud. However ...”

  I felt the cold sting of dread again.

  “You have been granted clemency, but you still owe me a boon for the death of my son. I will be calling on you sometime in the future for the repayment of this favor,” he said, and his fingers tightened on mine in a way that made me understand this favor was nonnegotiable.

  “And what makes you think,” I said, but very softly, so only he could hear, “you can make me do anything that I don’t want to do?”

  He smiled, and his smile was not the beautiful smile of the first and most glorious angel that he was. It was the smile of the devil, and I felt my bravado shrink a little.

  Lucifer leaned forward so that his mouth was at my ear. “I can make you do whatever I like, Granddaughter. There is a secret in your heart that I know, and if you want to protect his life, you will obey me.”

  He leaned back to look in my face and then slanted his eyes toward Gabriel. My blood pumped faster and my hands grew cold, but I said nothing. How did Lucifer know? To admit that I loved him would condemn Gabriel to death in an instant. I lifted my chin and matched him stare for stare.

  “This secret that you think you know—how would you discover the truth of such a thing?”

  “Perhaps a little bird, so recently close to your heart, whispered it in my ear.”

  Evangeline. That bitch.

  “Perhaps the little bird was mistaken,” I said.

  “Be careful, Granddaughter. You are the last child of my heart, but it is my kingdom in which you tread,” Lucifer said, and he kissed me again on the cheek. This time his kiss was as cold as stone. “I will see you soon, Granddaughter.”

  He pulled away from me and clapped his hands. The other three were at his side in an instant. “And now, to return home.”

  Lucifer opened a portal filled with swirling mist. “Thrall, you will return as Madeline’s bodyguard for the present time.”

&nbs
p; “Of course, my lord,” Gabriel said, and knelt before Lucifer.

  The Morningstar met my eyes and I arched an eyebrow at him. I knew why he sent Gabriel back with me, and it wasn’t for my protection. It was to remind me every day of what I would lose if I disobeyed Lucifer’s wishes.

  Gabriel entered the portal before me. I had started to follow when Nathaniel grasped my hand.

  “Madeline,” he said, and his eyes were very earnest. All the haughtiness had fled. He seemed overwhelmed. I felt a little sorry for him, although not enough to want to continue this farce of an engagement. “I . . . I will see you in fourteen days’ time, in Azazel’s court.”

  “Okay,” I said, and let him kiss my hand. It seemed like the thing to do. I nodded at Azazel and Lucifer and stepped backward into the portal, more than ready to go home.

  Just as the portal was about to close, I saw a flash of movement in the cavern. For a moment I thought I saw green eyes lashed with fury.

  Samiel, I thought, and then he was gone, and the portal closed.

  We stepped out of the portal into the intersection at Clark and Belmont, and I realized that Lucifer had somehow known exactly where I wanted to be at that moment. It made me wonder about the full extent of his powers and, therefore, about the full extent of mine.

  Most of the intersection was still roped off with yellow crime scene tape, and it was almost eerily quiet. There was still a faint and lingering stink of sulfur in the air.

  “Why are we here and not at your home?” Gabriel asked, frowning.

  “There’s something I forgot to do,” I said, and flapped my arms at him. “Go stand over there.”

  “I am not to leave your side,” Gabriel said.

  “Just go stand over on that corner,” I said. “I’m going to sit on this bench right here. You’ll be able to see me the whole time.”