by Ching, G. P.
The voices from the conference room closed in. The board of directors would need to leave. What if one of them wanted to talk? What if Lucifer showed them out? She pressed the button again, then eyed the door to her left. The stairs.
Ding. The elevator arrived and the thick metal doors slid open, molasses slow. Cord! The real Watcher met her eyes through the crack in the opening elevator. Bonnie dodged for the stairs, the real Cord stumbling out behind her. She made it through the door, slamming it behind her in his face. There wasn’t a lock. Calling on her Soulkeeper strength, she jumped the railing, falling to the landing below.
The real Cord smashed into the stairwell above her. “You’re dead, Soulkeeper!”
Bonnie dropped to the next level, feet flying as she rounded the landing. Heavy footsteps pounded behind her, and a growl echoed through the staircase. Heart hammering against her breastbone, she dropped over the next railing. But he was too quick. He landed next to her. Talons ripped. Blood sprayed the wall. She crumpled to the floor.
In an instant, he flipped her on her back, wrapping a hand around her neck and bringing his face close to her shredded one. “Why do you look like me?”
Bonnie didn’t answer. She struggled against his grip, but he pinned her hands under his knees. She didn’t stand a chance.
“In a quiet mood, are you?” he hissed. “Lucifer will loosen your lips. Although, your friend has left me in need of feeding, and it might be interesting to try a bite of such attractive flesh.” He licked the blood from her face. She moaned, jerking her aching cheek away from his tongue.
Cord plucked Bonnie’s right hand out from under his knee and brought her fingers to his mouth. “Maybe just one.”
Bonnie began to weep as he inserted her pinky finger between his teeth. He clamped down on the tender flesh below her second knuckle. She screamed, anticipating the bite.
Instead, the Watcher’s mouth opened again, an inhuman squeal crossing his lips. Cord dropped her hand and twisted away from her. A chopstick stuck out of the base of his neck. Wham! Ghost formed over her, kicking the Watcher in the gut and sending him flying. Blinking forward, Ghost thrust a second chopstick into the Watcher’s ear and a third in its upper right side, plunging it deep, under the ribs. Cord dropped like a rock, black blood flowing.
Ghost’s hand found hers and yanked her to her feet. “Come on. That’s not going to kill him.”
He helped her down the stairs, half carrying her—quite the feat considering she weighed two hundred pounds in this form. “I don’t understand. Why didn’t you kill him before?”
“I tried. A vigilante from the crowd spotted me and rescued him!”
“Oh God, Jesse…”
“I was able to blink out of there, but I had to leave the weapons behind. Thank God for the Chinese restaurant on the fifth floor.”
“Is Sam okay? Did he come after you?”
“Yeah. I made sure he didn’t find her. In fact, I distracted the bastard as long as possible. I think he got sick of chasing me.” They reached the bottom level, a landing outside a spa with a waterfall and a rice paper screen. The serenity did not match the panic within her.
“Two doors,” she said.
“Better go out the back. That way leads to the lobby and security,” Ghost said.
Pounding footsteps began again above them.
“Sounds like Cordelius has healed himself,” Bonnie said. She thrust against the bar to the rear exit. Ghost pulled her onto a side street, where a small crowd rushed her.
“What do you know about Elysium?” one man asked, shoving a microphone in her face.
Ghost pushed the man aside and ushered her around the corner, where Sam was waiting. She pulled Bonnie into the closest door, an Irish pub. The place was dark and nearly deserted. Perfect. Inside the bathroom, they joined again, quickly shifting back into themselves.
“You need Malini,” Sam said, pointing to the part of her face that felt raw and open.
“Yeah, let’s go.” Bonnie grabbed her sister’s hand and raced out of the pub. Ghost hailed a cab, and she pushed Sam through the door he held open for them. Just as she lowered herself to the seat next to her sister, she saw the real Cord emerge from the building. The crowd closed in on him, obviously confused that the same man had exited twice. Those almost purple eyes met hers, and a sneer played across his lips.
She slammed her door.
“Floor it!” Ghost yelled. Thankfully, the cabbie complied.
Chapter 14
The Second Curse
Alone in the devil’s abode, Abigail ate another nut from the package God had given her. Today, it tasted of a full Italian dinner: salad, spaghetti, and cannoli for desert. The box had kept her alive for weeks. Not the same as eating for real though. Her body had changed, her hands bone thin, her skin taking on the gray tinge of death. And there were other changes. Changes she’d rather not think about.
The box was almost empty. Did that mean she’d be rescued soon? Escape? Or maybe, her purpose would be served and she would die. Blind faith was a human condition, a privilege she’d fought for. She’d stopped trying to make sense of her circumstances a long time ago and simply surrendered to them, holding fast to the hope that this too would pass, one way or another.
The door opened and Lucifer stormed in, face red. Auriel was on his heels, followed by a Watcher who could barely hold his illusion together. Flashes of snakeskin broke through spots on his neck and face. He slumped into the nearest chair, and Abigail got a clear view of his indigo eyes. Cord. Based on the black blood on his shirt and his struggling illusion, he’d been roughed up by a Soulkeeper. A human couldn’t do that kind of damage.
Lucifer rounded on Cord, dark menace filling the room. “Tell me everything. Every detail.”
“She was a redhead. Tall, thin. Beautiful by human standards. And a twin.”
“A twin?” Auriel repeated, wrinkling her nose. “Twin Soulkeepers?”
“Yes. I smelled them in the crowd, then tracked them down to an alley three blocks east. I saw red hair and attacked. One had transformed into … me.”
“The one who was in Harrington? To think, a filthy Soulkeeper walked through our front door!” Auriel shrieked. “I thought he smelled of sunlight.” She lifted the back of her hand to her nose.
Lucifer paced the length of the great room. “There were two on the list that fit this description. I thought we eliminated them.” Flames filled his narrowed eyes. “Eden. They’ve been hiding.”
Cord cleared his throat, his skin blackening around the mouth. “The twin, the one who didn’t look like me, was smaller. It was as if they worked together to form the illusion.”
Lucifer stroked his chin. “Soulkeepers as a group are not like us. They cannot imitate others on a whim. These two must have a gift, a specialized skill. I could not sense her soul. It must be part of her power to mask her humanity.” His dark eyes turned toward Abigail. “Explain about these twins, Abigail. What is the nature of their power?”
A sharp tug engaged deep within her chest, Lucifer’s sorcery compelling her to speak the truth. She resisted. Centuries living as a Watcher had taught her that Lucifer could not undo her free will, and Abigail refused to help him. She’d die first.
When enough time had passed for him to realize she would not comply, he growled in her direction. “Shouldn’t you have starved to death by now?” The dark one glared at her. He knew. He knew she should be dead by now.
Abigail stiffened.
“There was something else, My Lord,” Cord said, thankfully breaking Lucifer’s maleficent stare. “Another Soulkeeper I couldn’t see. Invisible. I remember his smell but never saw the one who stabbed me in the neck.”
Abigail snorted. She would have loved to see Ghost make a fool of Cord.
A lamp flew from Lucifer’s hand and passed through Abigail’s chest, exploding against the wall behind her. She drifted toward the window, unharmed. If Lucifer was going to kill her, she’d go out making him as angry as
possible. Abigail rested her hand on the box in her pocket. No, God promised this would not be her end.
Auriel paced, ignoring Lucifer’s outburst and fixating on Cord. “The Soulkeepers you saw, Cord, were they young ones? Teenagers?”
Cord nodded. “The ones I saw? Yes.”
“The Soulkeepers are almost always teenagers,” Auriel said, running her finger along her bottom lip.
“It is the Great Oppressor’s way to work on the soft hearts of the young,” Lucifer said.
Auriel approached him, pressing herself against his chest. She placed her hands on the lapels of his suit and lifted her eyebrows. “Young ones are required to attend schools here, My Lord.” She grinned wickedly. “All of them. We know three who attend Paris High School.”
Lucifer nodded. “We’ve tried to attack directly before, Auriel, with disastrous results. I’m not ready to expose our cause or risk our numbers. Better to be insidious.”
Auriel shook her head. “They have a system. All the young ones are required to learn the same thing. Perhaps we should run the schools and … reeducate them.”
Lucifer pinched her chin and shook gently. “You are a genius, my dear. We keep an eye on the Soulkeepers and win the young humans to our side.” Lucifer grinned. “We take a page from the Great Oppressors book and strike at the young, reeducate them to see things our way. We win their hearts.”
In her ghostly form, Abigail raised a hand to her mouth to cover her gasp. The second temptation. Lucifer was planning to direct it toward children. She wanted to do something, to stop him or to alert the Soulkeepers, but she couldn’t even help herself. All she could do was watch and listen.
“What is your will?” Auriel asked, showing more teeth than necessary when she smiled.
Lucifer held up his index finger, the nail extending to a sharp point. “You and I, Auriel, are cut from the same cloth.” He ran his finger down the center of his chest, slicing it open to reveal a black, swirling mass where his heart should have been. Abigail squinted and thought she could see faces in the darkness, souls forever trapped, powering the ultimate evil. Lucifer used his razor-sharp nail to cut a wedge of darkness from the mass, then stabbed into Auriel’s chest.
The blonde Watcher yelped in pain, her face twisting as the blackness wormed its way inside her. Black veins tangled under her skin toward her ear. Even through her illusion, Abigail could see her eyes wash red before fading back to blue.
“My second temptation is ignorance. Auriel, you are the vessel. Start with the Secretary of Education. Anyone you talk to will adopt your new curriculum: I’ve made you ultra-persuasive.”
“What is the new curriculum?” she asked.
Lucifer shrugged. “No math or science or language. Teach them the virtues of evil. The benefits of war. Greed is good. Prejudice is necessary. Doing evil is their entitlement.”
She nodded. “We teach them the truth. We teach them to think like Watchers.”
Lucifer grinned. “I want Watchers or the influenced running every school in the country. Go. Get started.”
Auriel bowed at the waist and backed from the room, letting herself out the front door. Lucifer waited until she was gone to turn on Cord.
“You failed me, Cord.”
“What?”
“You allowed the Soulkeepers access to Harrington. They know! They know now that I’m running the company, and if they know I’m running things topside, soon those imbeciles in the In Between will know. They could make things … difficult. All because you weren’t more careful with yourself.”
Cord bowed his head. It was useless to argue. Once the devil had your number, he wouldn’t stop calling until you picked up. “Yes, My Lord.”
With a grunt, Lucifer thrust his hand into Cords gut. Abigail had to look away. Cord cried out, a wicked, high-pitched howl that made her cringe. When she glanced back, Cord had lost his illusion entirely, his black scaly skin and leathery wings spasming on the carpet in a puddle of his insides.
“You are not allowed to die, Cord,” Lucifer hissed. “You will suffer here until I say you may leave, and then you will pull yourself together, capture the nearest human, and heal yourself. And you will not be detected. Do you understand?”
Cord was unable to speak but gurgled in the course of his torture.
Lucifer blinked slowly and turned toward the window, sliding his hands into his pockets. With a deep sigh, he said, “Looks like it’s almost Christmas.” He rubbed his hands together.
It was a full hour before Lucifer freed Cord. Somehow, the Watcher, mouth gaping like a fish out of water, restored his insides to his abdominal cavity. He sewed himself up and hobbled toward the door, a weak illusion snapping into place.
Abigail sighed. God help the first human Cord came across in his current state.
* * * * *
Bonnie, Samantha, and Jesse poured into the Eden School for Soulkeepers, desperate to tell Malini what they’d learned. But it was Gideon who met them at the door. She grabbed him by the shoulders, meeting his eyes. “He’s here. They are all here!” Bonnie stuttered, panting from the run.
“Who’s here?” Gideon asked.
“Not here-here. Not in Eden. He’s topside. He’s running Harrington!”
At that moment, Grace jogged into the atrium, looking from Bonnie to Samantha. “Who’s running Harrington?”
Samantha ran to her mother and hugged her tightly, but Bonnie hung back, trying to slow her racing thoughts. She needed to tell them what she’d learned.
“Lucifer,” Bonnie managed. “Watchers aren’t just influencing the executives at Harrington. Lucifer is Milton Blake. Cord and Auriel are also executives. He’s playing the game from Earth and Harrington Enterprises is his headquarters.”
Gideon made a sound like a cough and backed up a few steps. Grace’s eyes widened. “You’re sure? You saw this?”
“Close up. I posed as Cord. I was as close to the devil as I am to you,” Bonnie said, suddenly more aware of the wound on her face that kept drawing her mother’s eye. The pain had spread from her cheek to her neck and shoulder.
“You need to have that healed,” Grace said, releasing Sam from her embrace.
“Where’s Malini?” Bonnie asked, swaying on her feet.
“She’s upstairs. Stay where you are. You’re in no shape to climb the stairs. Archibald,” Grace said to the gnome, waiting in the shadows. “Please find the Healer and ask her to come here at once.” He blinked out of sight.
“We have to assemble the council,” Bonnie insisted. “The Watchers know it was me. Cord almost killed me. If it wasn’t for Ghost taking a pair of chopsticks to Cord’s jugular just in time, I’d be shredded.”
Grace crossed herself and approached Bonnie with arms outstretched, but her daughter wasn’t finished.
“And something else,” Bonnie said. “I don’t think Elysium was just about greed, Mom. I think Malini was right; it was one of the six temptations.”
Samantha agreed. “It’s the game. You should have seen the picketers.”
Gideon exchanged glances with Grace. “Malini and Dane’s mission failed. Lucifer didn’t retreat, he advanced.”
Grace nodded. “All this time, we were waiting for the signs. The signs were all around us.”
Abruptly, Ghost blinked into existence next to Gideon. “But think of the implications,” Ghost said. “If Lucifer is Milton Blake, he’s not living in Hell.”
Bonnie pointed a finger at him. “Yes! The secretary made it sound like Cord and Auriel meet him there regularly to talk about highly confidential stuff at his private residence. She said Cord should allow extra time to get across town. He’s living somewhere in the city, Gideon. And if I know Lucifer, he’ll keep his prize close. Abigail might not be in Hell after all. There’s a chance we can rescue her.”
Gideon took a step back, as if he’d been pushed. His eyes widened. “We have to go. We have to get her,” he murmured.
“We will, Gideon. If you can research Milton Blake
’s home address in the library, I’ll go myself as soon as Malini gives the okay.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Bonnie saw her mother cringe. But after surviving today, Bonnie wasn’t about to lose her nerve. Abigail had been missing far too long. If she was still alive, they had to do something. It wasn’t just about Gideon. They all needed her. Abigail had forgotten more about the Watchers than any of the Soulkeepers had ever known.
“I’ll find the address,” Gideon said. “And names and pictures of every person in that building, including the doorman.”
Bonnie smiled stiffly, feeling woozy. The foyer swam, then tipped. Gideon caught her before her head hit the floor and a wave of pain rocked her body. Luckily, Malini arrived moments later, healing hand at the ready.
Chapter 15
School Days
“Jacob, you’re daydreaming again. You’ll never pass your physics final if you don’t review your notes.” Malini pursed her lips and tapped her finger on his notebook.
“Excuse me for being distracted. It’s hard to concentrate on physics when you’ve just learned the devil is CEO of an international conglomerate and in competition for human souls on earthly soil. We shouldn’t be here, Malini. We should be killing Watchers.”
A calculus textbook hit the table next to Jacob’s hand. “You guys might want to keep it down. I think I heard the word ‘Watcher’ halfway across the cafeteria.” Dane plunked in the chair across from Malini, leaned back, and threaded his fingers behind his head. He closed his eyes.
“Not you, too,” Malini said. “We’ve got to study. We get through these winter finals, and then we have all Christmas break to work. Gideon found ten properties owned by Milton Blake in Chicago. Abigail could be in any or none of them. After finals, we can search for her and hunt Watchers all holiday.” Malini angrily turned the page in her book.
“Who cares about finals? Abigail could be out there. The world could be ending,” Jacob whispered.
Malini huffed. “And what if it doesn’t? I’ve been accepted at the University of Illinois, Jacob. I have goals. If everything works out, I want to be ready for real life.”
