Or something like it.
I was in a forest. No city lights obstructed the black carpet of sky above, just thin clouds and a ripe, full moon, hovering overhead, large enough that it felt like I could touch it. Squinting from the pale reflection, I noticed stars piercing the sky.
I tried to move, my wrists aching for some reason. But the pain flashed stronger, and the sound of metal rattled. Then I recognized the cold bite of chains. I was chained up to two wooden poles in the earth, arms outstretched, low enough for my bare toes to just barely touch the patchy grass beneath me. Where were my shoes?
Looking down at my feet, I realized that only yards away, the earth fell away from a cliff, down into a deep valley of trees that had to be hundreds of feet below me, judging by the little I could see. The sharp line of demarcation made me think it was steep, not just a hill, but a real cliff. Where was I?
Was it almost sunrise? Or the next night?
A faint groan caused me to flinch, jerking my wrists instinctively, which hurt. I slowly turned my neck to see that a man hung suspended a few paces behind me, but he was on a wooden cross, not chained up.
Crucified.
My dad.
He was still breathing, but unconscious, groaning in his stupor. My heart began to race, and my vision throbbed as a result, the chemicals inside me refreshed at my increased heart rate. I jerked my head to the other side and groaned myself, both in pain and desperation.
Roland.
Crucified, and unconscious. His leg wound bled freely, the dripping of blood faint to my ears as it struck the mud beneath him.
The two of them were higher than me and a pace back, causing me to strain to see them, but it meant I could see their faces slouched against their chests. Something about their positioning teased my thoughts, but the drug cocktail had made my brain sluggish.
I saw two more crosses before me, closer to the edge of the cliff, making a box with Roland and my dad, surrounding me. A blonde man I didn’t know — since I couldn’t see his face — hung face down on one, but the other cross held no body. Yet. I struggled against my chains, snarling as I tried to reach out for my magic to shatter the chains, but I couldn’t touch it. I could sense my power, but couldn’t grasp it.
I heard footsteps approaching from behind me, and began struggling harder.
The scent of rotten eggs wafted to me, and I realized it wasn’t the bears who had taken my father, but the Demon from the auction. I prepared myself, still trembling, to confront the fiery bitch. Would Nate find me? Maybe I had been missing long enough for him to get nervous. And Claire. Was she alright?
I couldn’t move. And couldn’t touch my magic. And everyone I cared about in the world, except Claire, was crucified beside me, helpless.
A man walked into view, and my breath caught, my brain momentarily stuttering.
“Johnathan…” I whispered.
He smiled, nodding. “This is fun, Callie. You have no idea how much fun this is, do you? But don’t worry. Your fun is coming.” He walked closer, studying me. “Predictable.”
“What…” I began, not able to make my mind comprehend. The Demon had been a woman, right? I had been sure of it.
“Should have taken me up on that date. Would have been so much easier. Well, at least we could have had some… fun before getting down to business. Then again, things worked out pretty good this way, too. I like this part better than sex, anyway.”
“What… is this?” I whispered.
“Callie… Penrose, is it?” he asked, but didn’t wait for me to answer. “The girl with four fathers…” he said, shaking his head with pride. “I’ve waited so long for this. You have no idea. No one has been able to find you. Even after capturing your mother and father. They died… valiantly, I guess you might say. Messily, but valiantly. But, wow, were they loyal. Didn’t even give up a hint on where to find you. And I tried hard, Callie.” He gripped my chin, squeezing until it hurt, staring into my eyes as he whispered sadistically. “I want you to know that I tried really hard.” He licked his lips before letting go.
“Four fathers?” I croaked, unsure what to focus on, but wanting to keep him talking. Anything to stall. My parents? Four fathers? What was he talking about? And this was Johnathan… But how? Had there been more than one Demon?
Nate would come. He had to come. He had said he would. That he would watch over me. This was too much. Nate had been a safety net for my confidence, whether I had voiced it out loud or not. In addition to Claire and my dad, Nate’s steadfastness had helped me to form my own spine.
Johnathan nodded to my question, pointing. First at Roland. “The man who taught you strength. Magic.” He pointed at my dad. “The man who taught you love.” He pointed at the blonde man, who struggled weakly, but couldn’t lift his head all the way. “A stand in for your biological father. The one who gave you — whether you knew it or not — the keys to Heaven.” At those words, the blonde man managed to lift his head just enough for me to see his bright blue eyes. I stared. It was Gabriel. The man who had been speaking with Claire, flirting with her at the bar, talking to her on the phone. A stand-in for my biological father? Keys to Heaven?
Johnathan pointed at the empty cross, but I must have reacted too slowly, because he suddenly darted forward and slapped me across the face, nearly unhinging my jaw. Stars twinkled in my vision as he snarled. “Pay attention, Callie. I am infinite, but my patience is not. It will all be over soon. Just a little longer, but I want you to know. To know the depth of my resolve, the depth of my passion. Sex would have shown you some of that, but you kept playing hard to get. We do this my way now.” He pointed again at the empty cross, and I noticed that there was actually a feather pinned into the wood. A very large feather.
I frowned at it, and stifled a groan of confusion as I turned back to Johnathan, my head swimming with pain from the drugs, my jaw aching. I was having trouble piecing his rabid words into an understandable picture. Nothing made sense. I tried for my magic again, and although I could still sense it, it was out of reach. Like moonlight shining down on me.
“To represent everyone’s Father,” he said, pointing back at the cross with the feather. “The one who gives you free will,” he spat.
I just stared at him. Was he referring to God? What did the feather have to do with God?
“Why?” I asked in a whisper. “What do I have to do with this? Why play games with the pieces of the spear? You had all of them,” I mumbled, feeling the fog slowly begin to fade away, but pain still pounded in my ears. Had he poisoned me, or was this a normal side effect?
“Each piece of the Spear of Longinus needed to taste betrayal, or chaos. And they all needed to touch your hand soon after they did so,” he said, sounding smug.
“But…” I strained to think through the ache behind my temples. “I only touched two of them…” still not understanding what he was trying to accomplish. What it had to do with me. Where was Nate?
“I’m glad you brought that up.” And he strode over to Gabriel. Without any warning, he stabbed him in the stomach with a piece of wood. A piece of the spear. Gabriel groaned, helpless to stop him with his wrists nailed to the cross. Johnathan chuckled, and then walked over to me. I fought against my chains, but it was no use. He held the piece of wood against my hand for a few seconds and I felt a single pulse of energy. Then he stepped back, taking it with him. “There. Much better,” he said, smiling up at me.
Roland groaned again, trying to lift his head, then he dropped it. The metal nails hammered into his wrists and shins made me want to vomit, but it would have been only bile. The heads of the nails glinted in the moonlight.
I turned back to Johnathan, who stood directly before me. He was holding the three pieces of the spear. They each had a crimson stain on one wooden end. From the vampire, the wolf, and… Gabriel. But why Gabriel? A stand-in for your biological father, Johnathan had said. Was Gabriel a… blood relative of mine? And what had he been doing in the bar?
C
oincidence couldn’t go this far. It was impossible. Even so, what did it all mean?
“It would have been much more fun if you had worked with me. I gave you every opening. But then Temple had to show up and ruin everything. I saw you almost kiss him tonight, and I must admit, I might have lost my cool.” His eyes flared with deep fire for a moment, part of his true form showing through, the creature I had seen from the auction. It was him. It had always been him. Which meant either he could appear as a female Demon, or… there was another Demon in the game. The one that had warned me to back off in the alley outside the church.
“Kill me,” I whispered, rattling my chains. “Or let me down, and we’ll settle this here and now, you fucking coward. If you’re so high and mighty, put me on level ground and we’ll see who bitch slaps whom.”
He chuckled. “We’re past that, Callie. Or is it Constance?” He tapped his lips thoughtfully, and I stopped struggling, remembering the man from the auction. The Nephilim.
“Constance?”
Johnathan nodded, turning to study the horizon as if gauging time, before turning back. “We had everything in place. The wolves as bait, the faulty information given to Roland. Meeting you at that bar before the auction.” He shook his head, grinning. “But the wards they put on you so many years ago were good, Callie. Even now. I didn’t even sense you from three feet away!”
“What are you talking about?” I whispered, as confused as if he had been speaking French.
He nodded. “We’ve got a few minutes to spare. And it would be nice to prolong your suffering a bit. The Devil knows you’ve teased me enough these last few days…” he added, sharp, white-hot fury lacing his words. “You see, we heard about you from a bad, bad person in the Vatican itself. Took years to get a spy in there, by the way.” He rubbed his knuckles against his shirt proudly. I just stared, struggling to focus through my pain. “And he told us a tale. About an orphan with white hair delivered to a church many years ago. It was almost too good to be true. But that girl worked for one of the Shepherds, so we knew we had to play it careful. Now, I’ve murdered dozens of white-haired girls over the years, in dozens of cities. Looking for you. So, I had my doubts that you would be the one. But that Nephilim calling you Constance? Your biological mother’s name?” He shook his head in amazement. “Happiest day of my life. That’s what confirmed everything for me, although those mangy wolves could have ruined it all by almost killing Roland and trying to renege on their promise to me. But I took care of that.”
I hung there, stunned to silence at hearing the name again — learning that it belonged to my mother hit me like a blow to the stomach. My mother. Constance. The one who had left me outside the church. But why had Johnathan been hunting me for so long? Why was I so important to him? What had my parents done to piss him off so much?
“And Father David?” I asked.
Johnathan shrugged. “That was just for fun.”
I sagged my head, disgusted.
“Callie Penrose. The girl with four fathers,” he said again, sounding wistful. “You will help me open the gates of hell. I thank you for your sacrifice.” He glanced back at the skyline, and I noticed it was lighter, the sky purpling with the approaching dawn. He turned back to me, an eager smile on his lips, flames flickering in his eyes. “But first, a little fun…”
I learned about pain, then.
I had thought I was beyond that after training with Roland, but Johnathan was a master. Roland was only a substitute kindergarten teacher in the arts of pain.
Chapter 46
I gasped as he slapped me, a strictly muscular reaction. I had been fading, losing consciousness. I hurt everywhere. Ribs cracked, face cut, gashes all over my body. My shirt was entirely gone now. I didn’t remember when it had been sliced away. The cool breeze caressing my exposed breasts felt like a lover’s lips, a mockery of the pain racking my body.
I blinked, staring at Johnathan. He was drooling, eyes wild with lust. I spat on the ground. It was more blood than spit. “What… what is Gabriel doing here?” I rasped, remembering that question, if nothing else.
“Like I said, a stand in for your father. I found him following you around town. A Nephilim.”
I just blinked at him. Surely that should have given me a reaction of some kind, but I was beyond the ability to show surprise. My father was a Nephilim, so my mother must have given me my magic. A wizard. I let out a shallow breath. It hurt to breathe deeply. I only wanted to die. I was helpless. Roland was helpless. My dad was helpless. Gabriel was helpless.
Death was all that waited for me, now.
Unless… Where was Nate? He knew things. He should have found me by now. Monsters were scared of him. I dove deep within my core, and imagined my feather to wash out the pain, wanting to die with at least some semblance of beauty around me. The calm of my mental feather came quickly, as if knowing I didn’t have time to achieve it all by myself. I let out a shuddering breath, feeling lighter, abandoning my burdens, accepting my fate.
In that calm, I managed a grim smile, remembering Johnathan’s reaction from earlier. “I wish…” Johnathan leaned closer, eager to hear me beg. “I could explain how good it felt to taste Nate’s tongue—”
He slapped me again, and I felt a tooth loosen. But it didn’t hurt as badly as it should have, as if my mental feather had absorbed some of that pain from me. I looked up to see him panting. I smiled at him, feeling blood dribble down my lips.
“What am I to you?” I managed, wanting to at least hear why he despised me so much.
“You’re what I need, Callie. What I need. A slice of heaven…” he smiled. “Well, enough games, I guess. Time to get to work.”
The feather in my mind quivered at mention of a sudden timetable, and then began to rotate in a circle, faster, and faster. Blurring at the edges. Words poured from my mouth without thought.
“He’s coming! The fifth one rides. On hooves of fire with whips of Hope…” my voice rang clearly, strongly, despite my agonized body.
Johnathan snarled, staring out at our surroundings, and then looking up to the sky. “He can’t. We’re blocked away. No one is coming to save you, Callie. This is where you die. No Rider. No Hope. Just death,” but he did look concerned, glancing over my shoulder several more times.
Where had those words come from? Was I delirious? It wasn’t surprising, what with the pain and the drugs in my system. But… Johnathan had understood, or at least feared what I said.
But I knew he was right. No one was coming for me. They would have already done so.
I groaned, squeezing out the last of my strength to rattle my chains, pulling deep, straining for my magic. I reached closer, but it was still too far away. Like trying to grasp the sun. Or a star. Or a falling feather.
“No use, my sweet,” Johnathan smiled. “Those chains block your magic, and you aren’t strong enough for the other thing. Especially without a patron.”
I struggled anyway, knowing he was right. Even if I broke free, all I would do is fall to the ground in a bloody heap. I was bleeding out. I was sure of it.
Johnathan walked over to Roland, nodding hungrily. “Yes, he dies. Soon. Minutes, maybe…” Then he buried one of the wooden pieces of the spear into his stomach, leaving it there. Roland gasped, eyes rolling for a moment before his head slouched back down. Bloody saliva dripped from his lips as he whimpered incoherently. My void rocked at the unexpected violence.
Then he did the same with my dad, despite me screaming, rattling my chains, even begging. It was as if he didn’t hear me. He buried the other piece of wood in my dad’s stomach, receiving a similar reaction from the already dying man. I sobbed, whimpering, pathetic.
I felt a dark power surrounding me, and saw a small, living shadow hovering before the piece of wood in my dad’s stomach. It quivered as if alive, feeding on the wound. I saw Roland’s spear doing the same. Both men were silent, now, still breathing. But barely.
Johnathan came back before me, studying the last
piece of the spear in his hand, nodding to himself. The tip. Then he dipped the blade deep into my stomach with no more care than if he had been idly wiping up a spill on a counter. I gasped, twitching, muscles protesting the blade.
Then he slowly pulled it out, looked down at it, and turned to stand before the fourth cross, the one with the feather. Blood poured down my leggings, making a puddle at my toes.
“Now for the fireworks,” he said. And he began to carve open the feather with the tip of the spear, as precisely as a scientist would dissect a worm with a razor blade, even though I knew the spear hadn’t looked keen enough to make so fine a cut.
Light washed over the clearing, almost the same color as the moon, and then it began to throb into a darker purplish color, like a violent bruise.
Nate would come. Someone would come. The Vatican would know Roland was dying and send help. An Angel would save us. A Demon was here. An Angel had to come. A Nephilim was bleeding out beside us. What better time for one of God’s children to make an appearance than now?
But other than the darkening purple glow, nothing changed.
I heard the three men on the cross let out a last breath, sagging lifelessly in unison. Without the void and my feather, I would have screamed. But I didn’t. I was the void. The feather.
The purple glow had darkened further at their deaths.
I was all alone. They were all dead. Those who had given me magic, love, and… a slice of heaven… whatever that meant. A Nephilim.
No one was coming to save me. I had asked not to be saved.
No Angels. Just a Demon.
No daddy. Even though I had four of them.
No Nate. Just an arrogant young girl of a wizard with white hair.
It was just me. And… all I could do now was to ruin the spell.
In the void with my feather, I accepted that fact, abandoning my pride, my arrogance, my self.
Feathers and Fire Series Box Set 1 Page 24
