Angel Warriors

by Stephani Hecht

  It was his brother Nathaniel and he was looking at this female with a small smile on his face and love in his eyes. Next the female and Nathaniel were in a bed having sex and his brother was marking her. Finally he saw Nathaniel alone, mourning the loss of his mate.

  Cam rolled the female over and pulled down her leather pants just a couple of inches. When he saw what was on her flesh, he let out an anguished sob. It was the Lehor tiger. He had attacked Nathaniel’s mate.

  Crap, fuck, damn. Nathaniel’s mate, this was your brother’s female and you hurt her. You stupid piece of shit. Crap, fuck, damn.

  Cam threw her away from him and ran to the opposite corner. He heard someone yelling in demon talk and was sickened to realize that it was him. Get a hold of yourself, do not let them win. You can fight this. You’re an angel warrior.

  The problem was the demon in him wasn’t going away. He could still hear himself spitting out words in the demon language and he wanted to get back at the female so badly that he was clawing at the ground. He closed his eyes and prayed for relief.

  “You are not alone. I am with you, my son,” a female’s voice assured him.

  He opened his eyes and saw his mother standing there. She was surrounded by a soft golden light and wore a flowing, white dress. He scrubbed his face with his hands, not believing what he saw. How can Mom be here? Last time I checked, she was still in Heaven catatonic.

  Yet, when she took him in her arms, she felt real. As soon as he was in her embrace, the demon thoughts went away. He closed his eyes and let her goodness wash over him, cleaning off all the evil thoughts that Mammon had forced in him.

  “I wanna go home, Mama,” he moaned out, knowing that he sounded like he was five again.

  “I know baby, and I wish I could take you there.”

  “They’re going to destroy me, Mom.”

  “No, they cannot afford to let one of the Order perish. They will try to turn you into one of them, however. You must resist, my son. It will not be easy, but you must for all of our sakes.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me what I really was?” Cam asked. “I might have been able to prepare myself better if I had known about my powers sooner.”

  She looked down sadly. “I was wrong about that. When you get home, you must go to your uncle. He will be able to help finish your training. Whatever you do, you must not trust your Aunt Amitiel. She is going to try to use you for her own political gain.”

  “I don’t have an uncle,” he protested. Maybe he really was imagining this whole thing.

  “It is time for you to know the truth. Michael is you uncle. I am his younger sister. We had a terrible fight before the day of my mating ceremony, and we never spoke as brother or sister again.”

  “Now I know this is one big hallucination,” he muttered to himself. “There is no way in hell I am related to the chief.”

  “You’re not hallucinating,” the female angel said from across the room. She was holding a hand to her injured neck and looking at Lehor with awe. “I see her too. It is the Lady of the empaths, my Nathaniel’s mother.”

  Lehor turned and gave her a smile. “Do not give up hope, daughter. It will take years, but you will see Nathaniel again.”

  “Wait, wait, wait.” Cam waved his hands in denial. “No offense, Ma, but the last time I saw you, you were staring off into space in the healing chambers. How is it that you’re here talking to me now?”

  “My powers were once as great as yours. Michael is helping me channel them so I can come to you. I don’t know how often I will be able to do this, however. I can already feel my strength slipping away.”

  Cam started to say something back to her, but she vanished. He looked over at the female and saw that she was still holding her neck. He ducked his head and winced. He could not believe that he had totally lost it and bit another angel.

  “I’m sorry,” he said softly to her.

  “I know,” the female angel responded.

  “Normally I don’t go around attacking angels, honest. This demon just messed with my mind, and I wasn’t myself.”

  “It was partly my fault. You did try to warn me to stay away. I recognized you as Nathaniel’s brother and did not listen.”

  “How come none of us ever knew about you? Nathaniel never told us that he had a mate.”

  “My father had promised me to another male, but as soon as I met your brother I had other plans. We did not dare tell anyone that we were in love.”

  “But, you’re marked. There’s no way to hide that. Every male around you would have known.”

  Her smile was dreamy as she remembered. “It was the night I was captured. I had finally decided to defy my father, and I let Nathaniel claim me. We were going to tell his family the next day. Little did I know when I went out patrolling that night there was not going to be any tomorrows for us.”

  She told him all about her. Her name was Belora, and she was an archangel. She had been captured five years ago and had never found out what had become of her empath and healer.

  “What do I look like?” he asked reaching up to touch one of his fangs.

  “Your eyes look like a cat’s.” She narrowed her eyes as she sized him up. “Besides that and your fangs, you look like any other angel.”

  He twisted around to look behind him. “Oh crap, please tell me I don’t have wings too. I freaking hate heights.”

  She laughed lightly before she answered him. “No, there are no wings. You are safe in the knowledge that you are still earthbound.”

  That gave him some measure of relief. “It must be lonely down here.”

  “That’s the worst part of Hell,” she confessed. “It’s not the physical pain. It’s being all alone.”

  Four guards entered the cell. Rather than wasting the energy it took to fight, he got up and walked over to them. They wrapped the Chains of Confinement around him. Must have been that comment about roasting their asses.

  “Cam,” Belora called. He stopped and turned around. “Tell Nathaniel I love him.”

  He nodded to her before they led him out. They took him to an empty cell. Inside were the guards that he had injured earlier. They had been healed and were looking for pay back.

  On impulse, he tried to blast them. As soon as he attempted to do so, the chains around him zapped him with enough force to send him sprawling backwards. Even though the pain was agonizing, he scrambled to his feet. He did not want to become their personal hackey sack. As long as he kept standing, they couldn’t hurt him too bad.

  That plan lasted for about two minutes. He managed to stay on his feet for the first half dozen blows. After that they managed to get him to the ground, they started to viciously kick him. One of them broke his nose, and he started to choke on his own blood. All of a sudden, someone hauled him up to his feet by the scruff of his shirt. Fuck, it was Mammon and he looked pissed.

  “I just checked on the female I gave you, and I all I found was a little nip on her neck,” he spat out. “I am very disappointed with you. I guess you need another lesson.”

  Before Cam could fire off a smart comeback Mammon slammed back into his mind. This time the pain was even worse than before. By the time Mammon was done with him, Cam was begging the demons to destroy him.

  Gabi sat on their bed, holding Abdiel’s pillow to her face, inhaling his scent. It had been weeks since the meeting with Beelzebub and they still hadn’t heard anything. Slowly, bit-by-bit, her hope that they would get him back was dying away.

  The Lehors had all moved into the house with her and kept a grim, silent vigil. Ana was pale and thin, a ghost of her former self. None of the brothers smiled anymore. Barakiel was the worst off. Somehow he was receiving all of Cam’s fear and it was effecting the empath so bad that he could hardly get out of bed.

  “Oh God no, just leave him alone,” Barakiel’s voice cried out from the next room.

  “I’m here, Bear,” she could hear Rachael coo. “It will be all right. I’ll get Cam back for you.”

>   Dear, sweet Rachael. It had been her that had comforted Barakiel these long weeks. Ana had been absorbing Cam’s pain, as well, so she had been unable to aid her brother. Rachael had been taking care of him for her. In fact, Rachael took care of all of them. She was the one that brought meals to Gabi and Ana urged them to eat, the one who broke up the many fist fights that the mentally unstable brothers were getting into, the one that was holding them together.

  Rachael was not the silly, immature girl that Gabi had first thought she was. Her new sister was a strong, capable female. She had come at just the right time and was the only thing that was giving Gabi the strength to go on.

  Ana walked into her room and joined her on the bed. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail, and she was wearing one of Cam’s shirts. Dark circles rimmed her light blue eyes.

  “You want to know a secret, Gabi?” she finally asked, breaking the silence.

  “What’s that, Ana?”

  “Cam was always my favorite. I know I wasn’t supposed to have a favorite brother, but Cam and I were always the closest. We are more alike than anyone ever thought.”

  “I know, Ana. I’ve always known how much he means to you. Cam knows too. He always talked about you and tried to do good by you.”

  “Something really bad has happened to him in Hell.” Ana had big, fat tears rolling down her cheeks. “I can feel it. What are they doing to my baby?”

  Gabi had no answer for her so she just held her in her arms and let her cry her heart out.

  Abdiel closed his eyes and tried to think around the haze of pain. How many days have we been locked up? Since there was no daylight in Hell he had lost track long ago. Most of the time had been spent alone. After they had taken Cam away that first time, they never brought him back. Although he had heard Cam screams plenty of times, it seemed to happen on a daily bases.

  One of the more talkative demon guards had told him that Mammon had made Cam his special project. Abdiel felt guilty, while they had almost seemed to forget about him, Cam had been getting the worst of it.

  Abdiel remembered that the guard had told him that they had not been torturing him as much anymore because they wanted him healthy so he could fight in their little angel battles that they had. He had learned that the demons liked to make captured archangels fight each other in a pit for entertainment.

  “No, I’m not going back.” He heard Cam yelling from the hallway.

  There was some scuffling sound and a big thud.

  “He got away, get him.” A demon called out.

  Abdiel heard footsteps and then the sound of a hand smacking against his door.

  “Oh, look he wants his friend.” One of the demons mocked.

  “Cam, you fight those bastards,” Abdiel yelled. “Don’t you let them win. Remember who you are.”

  He heard more scuffling then the sound of them dragging him away.

  “No, please,” Cam was nearly sobbing now. “Don’t take me to him. I can’t stand to be mind fucked again.”

  Abdiel waited in the ensuing silence, dreading what was coming next. Sure enough, about five minutes later, it came. Cam’s screams of agony started to tear through Hell. Each one ripped through Abdiel’s heart, slowly breaking his spirit.

  It went on and on, never seeming to end. Abdiel wondered how Cam was able to keep existing after so many punishments. When it finally stopped, Abdiel found that he was covered in sweat and breathing rapidly.

  A bright flash of golden light bathed the cell and suddenly Lehor was in there with him. She leaned forward until her light blue eyes stared directly into his. He let out a disgusted breath.

  “Great, just what I need. Another freaky dream about Cam’s mom,” he groused.

  She reached out and smacked him on the cheek.

  “Ouch, that hurt,” he said incredulously. “Knock it off, chick.”

  She smacked him again, this time a lot harder.

  “You know, Cam never mentioned that you had a violent streak,” he complained.

  “I’m sorry, but I needed to get you attention, archangel. My son Cam is in trouble, and you are the only one that can help him.”

  Abdiel made a great show of looking up at his chained arms. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m in no position to help anybody.”

  “You must reach out with you mind and reach him that way.”

  “Cam can’t communicate telepathically. They keep those chains on him all the time.”

  “You must use your powers then.”

  Abdiel gave her an aggravated look. “I don’t have those powers. If I did, don’t you think I would have used them by now?”

  “You can visit him in your dreams. I will help show you the way.” She gave him a beseeching look. “Please, Abdiel. He won’t answer me anymore, and we are in danger of losing him. You are the only one that will be able to reach him now.”

  Abdiel had a ray of hope, the first one since they had been taken. “This is all real, isn’t it? I’m not dreaming you.”

  “Well it certainly took you a long time to catch on,” she said tartly, displaying where Cam had inherited his smart mouth. “Now, are you going to help or not?”

  “Of course I’m going to help. I’d do anything for Cam.” This had to work. He knew it was Cam’s only hope of survival.

  She placed her hands on his temples. “Close your eyes and relax. Just think about Cam. Clear your mind and focus only on him.”

  He followed her instructions, shut his eyes and let his mind go. Slowly he felt himself leave his body and all the pain that it contained behind. When he opened his eyes, he was in a dark room and no longer in chains.

  He saw Cam huddled in the corner, his head tucked into his chest. The young archangel was nearly unrecognizable. Dressed only in his bloodied, ripped blue jeans, his bare chest was a mass of welts and cuts made from vicious beatings. He had his hands over his head and rocked back and forth, making soft mewling sounds.

  “Cam, it’s me, Abdiel. I’m here to talk to you for a while.”

  Cam whipped his head up and what Abdiel saw in the young angel’s eyes terrified him. They were completely void of expression. They were dead. Cam curled up his lip and let out a demon snarl.

  “You’re just another mind trick Mammon is playing with me,” Cam said with a snap of his fangs. “Go away and leave me alone.”

  “No, Cam, it’s really me. I’m here in some dream state, but it is me.”

  Cam cocked his head to the side and studied Abdiel closely with his new cat eyes. He must have decided that Abdiel was telling him the truth because his shoulders relaxed and he heaved a sigh of relief. He got up and hobbled over to Abdiel.

  “Am I sleeping too?” Cam asked.

  “I think it’s just me, otherwise you would still not have your injuries. I think I’m having an out of body experience.”

  “However you got here, I’m glad to see you.” Cam couldn’t stand any longer so he crumpled to the ground at his friend’s feet. “It’s too late for me though. I can’t hold on any longer. The next time they get the chains off of me I’m going to use my powers and destroy myself.”

  “Don’t talk like that. Your family needs you. Ana couldn’t go on without you.”

  “I can’t fight it anymore, Abdiel,” Cam sobbed out. ‘I can take the whippings and the other physical torture. It’s what Mammon is doing to me that’s breaking me. He goes inside my mind and shreds it. My God, it hurts so bad.”

  “I want you to say the angel warrior vow every time he starts that crap. Use it to block out the evil. It will help you remember who you really are.”

  “I don’t even remember it.”

  “Sure you do, kid. Say it with me.”

  So they recited it together,

  “I take the sacred vow of the angel warrior. With the shedding of my blood and thus the blood of my forefathers, I swear to give up all my privileges and freedoms in order to fulfill my duties. I promise never to waver in my devotion to my brethren and the hu
man race. I shall always place their needs, desires, and life before mine. I will always walk on the path of light never venturing into the darkness, and if I do I ask my fellow brethren to either bring me back or, if I refuse to return, destroy me.”

  “This is foolish and you know it,” Jehel said angrily.

  “You’ve already told me that several times,” Michael replied in clipped tones.

  They were in the main tent at the center of the command post that had been set up in Siberia. As soon as Beelzebub had let them know where the battle was to take place and the day Michael had started to gather angels and set up a battle plan. He had been briefing Gabi and Rachael when Jehel had come storming in looking for a fight.

  “The council has forbidden you to go ahead with this battle.” Jehel was livid. He obviously was not used to having his authority questioned.

  “The council can kiss my ass,” a voice hissed out from behind them.

  Ana stood there flanked by her seven remaining brothers. She was dressed for battle in all white leather. She had two small swords that hung in hoops at her hips. The weapons were actually called skri and much like tonfa were used one in each hand. Cam liked to tease her and call her Elektra whenever she used them.

  Standing there with fire shooting out of her eyes and her body tensed to attack, she looked like an Amazon warrior and all her fury was directed at Jehel.

  “May I remind you that you are a member of the council?” Jehel asked her coolly.

  “No longer, I quit.” She spat at his feet to prove her disgust. “If the council is not willing to try and get its own angels back, then I want nothing more to do with them.”

  “You are just like your brothers,” Jehel sneered.

  “Thank you, that’s the best compliment I ever got.” Ana held her head up haughtily. “The only reason why we’re in this mess is because my brother had to rescue your son. Cam traded himself for your little wimp and you thank him by leaving him to rot down in Hell.”

  “Like losing you’re worthless brother is any big deal.” Jehel was treading in dangerous water but did not seem to notice it. “We are all better off with both of them were they are.”