Dark Angel's Ward

by Nia Shay

  "Yeah, no shit," I choked, scowling.

  "That is unfortunate." I flinched as warmth suffused the air around me. It skimmed past me, as if an unseen hand had smoothed over my shoulder, and was gone. "But whatever else you are, you are still one of us. And the next time you are called to arms we expect you to answer."

  Thirty-One

  "What does that mean? What do you want from me?"

  My whimpered words echoed back at me, and that was all the response my latest plea for understanding received. Like that should have surprised me by now. I leaned my head back and breathed in slowly, as deeply as I dared. The stench in the air was thick enough to make my eyes water. The Divine Will had left the building, and a good portion of my stamina had gone with it. Without its driving force, my troubles came rushing back with a vengeance.

  My wounded shoulder throbbed in time with my thundering pulse. I glanced absently over at it, finding less of a mess than I'd expected. The bullet seemed to have gone through cleanly, missing the bone to rip through the ridge of muscle. I realized with a bitter laugh that Markus had probably been aiming for my neck, too. How freaking ironic. Good thing he'd been a crappy shot.

  Wincing, I slipped the fingers of my left hand into the hole the bullet had torn in my sleeve and began to rip the fabric. It was slow, painful work--every little jolt sent a wave of fire lancing down my arm. When I'd finally torn the sleeve free from the shirt, I slid it carefully down the length of my arm and off. Clenching the sticky fabric under my right armpit, I looped it upward around the wound. After a bit of fumbling I'd fashioned an awkward one-handed knot.

  I held one end of the sleeve with my teeth and jerked on the other, pulling the knot tight. The resulting flare of agony sent black spots dancing across my vision. I bit down on the cloth and screamed deep in my throat, willing myself not to pass out. When I could think again, I checked the makeshift bandage. It hadn't slowed the bleeding as much as I'd hoped, but it would have to do for now. I needed my hands free.

  Rising on shaky legs, I searched the floor for a glint of metal. Markus's gun had bounced back under the pews and slid almost to the wall. I stepped gingerly across the room to retrieve it. A small handgun, not very intimidating, but I still wanted it with me. Anyone who tried to stop me from helping Zeph this time would be getting a nasty surprise.

  As I turned to go, I spared a final backward glance at Markus's body. The momentary pity I'd felt for him had burnt out. In fact, I felt utterly empty without the rage that had filled me just a short while ago. Which probably meant I was going into shock. Too bad I didn't have time to indulge it. I staggered out into the hall with the gun clutched to my chest like a talisman and tried to remember which way to go.

  The return trip wasn't so easy without the Divine Will leading me on. Nor anywhere near as quick, and time was of the essence. I had to stop and backtrack twice. By that point, my trembling lethargy had bled away into frantic haste.

  I tried to attune myself to the head voices again, hoping for guidance from that quarter, but they eluded me. It figured. The one time I actually wanted to hear them, and I couldn't focus on much of anything besides the pounding of my own heart.

  As I progressed further into the corridors, I began to hear something else. Though faint and hard to discern, it sounded like some sort of scuffle going on elsewhere in the building. I froze, ears straining to make out words from the distant shouts. A gunshot popped. I flinched instinctively, flattening myself against the wall.

  What the hell? The sounds of strife weren't unexpected, but I'd assumed they'd be aimed at me. Had Brax decided to storm the place and rescue me? He couldn't possibly be stupid enough to think I'd ride off into the sunset with him after what he'd done, could he?

  Well, whatever. It didn't much matter if it was Brax, or the Divine Will stirring up more trouble on its own, or the even the Hell's Angels having a spontaneous barroom brawl. As long as the soldier boys were distracted by it, it worked to my advantage. And if Brax did get in my way again, I'd kneecap the bastard for his trouble. I switched my grip on the gun and kept going, staying close to the wall.

  Much to my annoyance, the incubus stayed on my mind as I continued down the hallway. I couldn't forget the soft heat of his skin against my fingertips, the sensation of his life force as it poured into me. The stark pity in his eyes as he'd held me and my fear had shaken us both.

  Oh, I wanted to forget it all. I tried. But my sluggish brain kept replaying the whole dream sequence over and over, until finally I realized why. Once the proverbial light went on, I stopped in my tracks again. The floor plans! He'd planted a map of this place in my subconscious before I'd chased him away. Assuming I could trust a single word out of his creepy mouth, maybe I wasn't as lost as I'd thought.

  As I rounded the corner into a T-shaped passage, I put my idea to the test. I closed my eyes and thought about what lay beyond my sight, just as I had in the dream state. The left...no. It led into a horseshoe that would eventually turn me back around the way I'd already come. But the hall to the right held a stairwell that seemed familiar. Maybe.

  I edged forward to peer around the corner. There was the stairwell, just as I'd envisioned it. I noticed something else, too. A trail of dark splotches dotted the industrial tile of the floor. I hadn't noticed them in my earlier haste, but there were more under my feet, and behind me. Droplets of blood, darkening from red to brown as they dried. Zeph's blood--my pants were stiff with it. It had had been fresh when I'd escaped our cell. Like a trail of breadcrumbs, the bloodstains marked my path.

  I broke into a trot as I followed them, past the stairs and around another corner, and another. By the time I spotted the mess of broken glass and discarded instrument tray, I'd begun to run as fast as my wobbly legs would carry me. Fresh blood dripped down from my shoulder to add to the pattern on the floor.

  I rounded another corner and skidded to a stop. A door stood open at the far end of the hallway. I sucked in a deep breath and held it. I couldn't be sure if I'd reached the right room or not. Briggs's body was nowhere to be seen, but someone might have cleaned up. That same someone might be lying in wait to ambush me.

  I approached on tiptoe with the pistol raised in a two-handed grip. The short trip seemed to take hours. It took all my concentration to move silently, to keep my balance despite my growing dizziness. Finally I peered around the edge of the door, glad to have the steel slab as a shield between me and anyone who might be lurking inside.

  But the room was quiet, and empty but for Zeph. He lay just where I'd left him. His eyes were closed, his face turned toward the doorway. Toward me. All too familiar a pose....

  I ran to him, a fresh burst of panic flooding through my veins. "Zeph, wake up. We have to go now. Zeph?"

  I knew, even before I touched him, that his skin would be cool. It wasn't clammy and awful like it had been in the dream, but nor was it soft and warm as sunlight. "Come on, Zeph," I said loudly. "I can't pick you up again. I'm not Superwoman anymore." I shook him, my breath hitching as he flopped bonelessly with the motion. "Come on. We have to go. We have to get you to a hospital. Please wake up. Please!"

  I'd started crying somewhere in the middle of all that, but I didn't realize it until I saw a teardrop splash onto his shirt and soak in. Surely that would wake him. It always happened that way in sappy movies. He would open his eyes any moment now. I was sure of it.

  So I didn't quite know why I collapsed on top of him, my weeping giving way to wrenching sobs. But the truth of it finally drove home as my cheek touched his. So cold, so still, so terribly wrong. It was too late. And I was as foolish as Pygmalion, begging for life from a marble statue.

  "I'm so sorry, Zeph," I choked between sobs, laying my cheek in the curve of his neck where it had always belonged. The cruelty of it tore at my soul. We'd come so far, fought so hard, all so he could die in this horrible room. Alone.

  "Not alone."

  The words sighed through my consciousness, crackling like a bad radio signal,
but I'd have known his voice anywhere. My Zeph, backed by the choir of the Divine. Oh God...then he really was gone.

  "Not gone," the ghostly voice insisted. "Not alone."

  "Oh yeah?" I sniffled. "How the fuck do you figure?"

  "Forever...in your heart."

  "Well that's just not good enough!" I pushed up on my arms to glare down into his tranquil face. Even dead, he could still piss me off like nobody's business. No damn way would he get the last word, either. "You get your chilly ass up off this table right now! Do you hear me, Zephylostravakanastraeanemius? You get up right now!"

  Azoth flooded out of me along with my shriek, out through my hands--one still rested on his chest, the other curled against the side of his neck as if searching for a pulse. His body jerked as I poured my strength into him, but just once before falling still again.

  I cried out my rage and pain, transferring my right hand from his throat to his still fingers. I gripped them tightly and willed life into them. I couldn't guess how much time passed--perhaps hours, perhaps only minutes, before my body began to tremble. I didn't care. I only screamed louder. "Get up get up get up!"

  I shouted it until my throat ached, until I couldn't seem to fill my lungs fast enough. I was running out of strength to give him. My vision began to blur. My whole body quaked with exhaustion by the time his fingers finally convulsed in my grip.

  I choked in mid-scream, wincing at the pain in my throat. "Zeph?"

  His entire arm shifted at the sound of his name on my lips. I let out a sigh of relief as his hand turned in mine, clinging. Thank God, because I was losing consciousness.

  I let myself slump forward against his chest. His lungs filled beneath my cheek and I rejoiced. And I kept right on falling--through him, through the table, spinning away from myself. The last thing I felt were his arms coming up to hold me, just as my body released its hold on my soul.

  I saw no sign of the proverbial tunnel. Everything was rushing blackness, a darkness that had weight and substance, that could snare and smother. Gibbering voices swirled around me like an ill wind. I ignored them and just lay limp, letting the wind buffet me about. Surely it would stop soon enough. If I could just ride out this last storm, I'd be able to rest. Right?

  It should have been that easy. The whispers faded slowly, the wind dying down from a gale to a breeze. Everything seemed peaceful for a moment, until glass shattered with a deafening crash. Church bells tolled. Thunder clapped and roared. Scalding raindrops pattered down on my skin.

  Damn it, no! I couldn't take any more. I willed myself deeper into the darkness--I'd drown myself in it if I had to. But the thunder boomed louder and louder, until my whole being shook with the force of it. I wanted to scream, to blot it all out.

  Yet despite it all, I began to hear faint music within the storm. A simple melody, but sometimes the simplest can be the most soothing. Nothing to fear, it sang to me, and after a while I began to believe it. I was in a bad place now, but a better one awaited. I just had to hang on a little longer, had to pull myself out of this darkness and into the light. After that, I'd earn my rest. After that everything would be all right.

  I clutched the thread of the music like a lifeline and followed it back home.

  Thirty-Two

  I grew to miss that melody in the time that followed. The sounds that came after it were nothing so lovely--wails, cries, moans, great shrieking peals of thunder. Hearing seemed to be the only sense I still possessed. Or perhaps the noise so overwhelmed me that nothing else registered. If I hadn't been so inert, so numb, I'd have thought myself in hell. But surely eternal torment had to be more involved than this.

  By the time things finally fell silent again, I felt as if a decade had passed. I probably should have spent the time reflecting on my life, repenting my mistakes, and grieving those I'd left behind. I didn't. So sue me. Being dead is far more taxing than it sounds. I couldn't focus on much of anything, couldn't feel much more than a drowsy torpor.

  When a light finally appeared in the distance, it scared the hell out of me. I'd been drifting in the dark for so long I'd forgotten everything else, or so I'd thought. But another very familiar stimulus followed close on its heels--pain. A stab here, a throb there, a generalized ache that slowly formed the shape of the body I'd once possessed.

  Sound returned soon after that. Bits and snatches of whispered conversations floated past me, though the words were too random and disjointed to make much sense. What little I could make out frightened me. I longed for music, any music. Anything soothing. I felt like I was smothering.

  Eventually, I heard another voice, one that seemed familiar, though I couldn't quite place it. I didn't know any other dead people besides my mother, and I somehow didn't see her coming to greet me at the gateway of the great beyond. Besides, this voice sounded masculine.

  An angel of the Host, perhaps, coming to apologize for possessing me? Maybe he was the envoy sent to take me from this void and on into heaven. Surely God wouldn't to lock me out for committing murder when I'd had no say in the matter. I'd have a stern word or two to say about that. As a matter of fact, I had a few choice words for Him, anyway....

  I suppose my determination to bitch out the Almighty was the catalyst. The sedate little light I'd glimpsed on the horizon began to build and build, until it became blinding in intensity. I tried to shrink away from it. It grew brighter still, alternating now with sheets of black as if I'd begun to blink.

  Holy shit...I was blinking. And blobs of color had begun to evolve on the background of white. I focused on them, seeing a pattern in them. I strained to focus and make sense of the images--and found myself staring into the soft brown eyes of Jordan Radcliff.

  "What the hell are you doing here?" I asked, though it sounded more like nails on a chalkboard than actual human speech.

  A grin broke over Jordan's face. Apparently he'd understood me despite my sandpaper throat. "Jade? Are you really back with us this time?" He reached out and grabbed a plastic cup from a wheeled cart beside me. After a moment I recognized the portable table--the kind used in hospitals. I was, in fact, lying in a hospital bed.

  That meant I was alive.

  "I guess so," I rasped in response, both to his question and my own insight. I tried to take the cup from him, but a nest of tubes and wires held my arm pretty well shackled in place. I finally submitted to the indignity of having him angle the straw into my mouth as if I were a toddler with a sippy cup.

  Speech came a little easier after a few swallows. "What's going on?"

  "Just a sec." He practically skipped across the room and scooped up a cell phone from the window seat. He pressed a button on its side that made it squawk, then spoke into it. "Hey you guys, she's awake! I think for real this time!" He glanced back at me and explained, "You've woken up a few times before this, but you weren't really lucid."

  "Compared to whom?" I muttered.

  Somehow his grin managed to grow even wider. "Oh, yeah. You're back." He jabbed the button again and shouted, "Hello! Is anyone listening?"

  An answering squawk sounded. "We heard you the first time, J.J." Despite the tinny speaker, Cara's sardonic edge carried through clearly. "You sure she's not just speaking in tongues again?"

  "Positive! Get your butts down here and see."

  "All right. Sara's almost done here. We'll be down in a few minutes." The channel closed briefly, crackling to life again a second later. "Hey, boss? Can you hear me?"

  "Yeah," I replied automatically. Jordan pressed the call button and gestured for me to repeat myself. "Yeah, I hear you, kiddo."

  "Good." Her sigh grated in my ears. "We thought we'd lost you, damn it. No more scaring us like that, okay?"

  "I'll try to be more considerate the next time I'm kidnapped by psychopaths," I muttered. Jordan rolled his eyes and pushed the call button again. I waved him off--I had no intention of repeating myself.

  He shrugged. "She says to get your butts down here."

  "Shut up, we're coming.
"

  I chewed my lower lip in the silence that followed. A bubble of fear had formed in my stomach during the course of the conversation. Jordan was here with me, I'd heard Cara's voice, and she'd implied Sara was alive and well, too. But none of them had said a word about Zeph. They had to know I'd be worried about him. Shouldn't someone have told me right away if he was all right? Since they hadn't, did that mean...?

  As if sensing the direction of my thoughts, Jordan turned to face me again. "Do you feel like talking?" His exuberance had mellowed, leaving a quiet compassion in its place.

  Oh God, he was about to break the news to me gently. I didn't want to know...but I had to. But when I opened my mouth to ask, the words stuck in my throat. I could only let out a raw croak.

  "Do you need more to drink? Here." He was at my side in a flash, brandishing the cup again.

  I would have batted it away if I'd had the strength, would have screamed at him, maybe. Instead, I obediently took another sip of water. I was still pretty thirsty. As I swallowed, my eyes were drawn to a flash of color in the bend of his elbow, mostly concealed by the sleeve of his baggy concert tee--a bright blue strip of self-adhesive elastic.

  I spat out the straw, saying, "Yeah, I can talk. What happened to...?"

  He didn't give me a chance to finish. Just as well, since I wasn't sure if I'd intended to ask about his arm, or about Zeph. "Why didn't you ever tell me you were a Society member, too?" he asked.

  I gawked up at him. "You know about the Society? How?"

  "Card-carrying member since the age of fourteen," he replied, looking affronted. Then he grinned and shrugged. "Well, if we had cards, I'd carry one."

  "What? But...you're not nephilim."

  He coughed out a startled laugh. "Of course not."

  He couldn't be a Warden, either, since he was male. And he was way too young to be a military man or even a pencil pusher. Besides, most of the functionaries were based in Europe. "So you're...what?"