Reaper

by Larissa_Ion

  “You’re white as a ghost, Lilli.”

  Something’s wrong.

  No, nothing was wrong. She was being paranoid.

  Azagoth rested his palm on her forehead, testing her temperature. “Are these Hicks things supposed to be like this?”

  She heard the panic in his voice but not the words. Her ears were buzzing. Her head was pounding. And, suddenly, a wave of agony wrapped around her and squeezed so hard she screamed. Vaguely, she heard Azagoth call out her name as a warm gush spread between her thighs.

  “Lilliana? Lilliana!” His voice droned in and out as the room began to tilt. There was shouting. More pain. Her thoughts fragmented.

  And then, finally…nothing.

  “Zhubaal!”

  Terror gripped Azagoth as he shouted for his lieutenant, one of the few fallen angels he trusted with his—and his mate’s—life. Naked and not giving a single shit, he tore open the bedroom door and shouted again. There was so much blood…so much.

  “Zhubaal! Call Idess. I need a doctor. Now!”

  Z had been sprinting through the long, dark hallway toward the bedroom, but he skidded to a halt as he whipped his phone out of the pocket of his jeans.

  “And get Cat,” Azagoth added. Cat was Lilli’s best friend in Sheoul-gra. And just as important, she was female. Surely, a female would know what to do. They had instincts and stuff. Right?

  Lilliana cried out, and he rushed back to her, his heart surging into his throat.

  At least she’s conscious.

  He told himself that was a good sign.

  But the reality, as blood pooled on the mattress beneath her, soaking her white maternity nightshirt, said something different.

  “What’s wrong with me?” she whispered, her amber gaze glassy, reflections of pain and fear shimmering on the surface.

  He gathered her limp body in his arms and tucked her head against his chest, soothing her the only way he knew how.

  “I’m sure it’s nothing,” he said with confidence he didn’t feel. “But a doctor is on the way.” Azagoth hoped Idess could get Eidolon, but at this point, he’d welcome almost any healer.

  He took that back. Heaven had offered to send a team to assist with the birth, but he didn’t trust any of them. Angels were a last resort.

  Lilliana looked up at him, her pale expression brimming with trust, and his heart both swelled with love and broke with terror. Gently, he stroked her chestnut hair, alarmed by how brittle it felt. Something was very, very wrong.

  “I feel lightheaded,” she whispered. “Am I bleeding?”

  “A little,” he said, utterly comfortable with the lie even though he’d sworn to be honest with her. She didn’t need the stress of knowing she’d lost enough blood to kill a human. “Can you feel the baby?”

  She swallowed. “No.”

  Closing his eyes, he reached out with his mind. He’d connected with the baby when Lilliana first came back. Had heard…no, felt…the child call him “father.” Every night since then, he’d awakened with a peaceful sense of awareness that the baby was touching him. Not physically, but mentally.

  Now that Lilliana was home, for the first time in his life, he looked forward to sleeping.

  Hey, Baby Grim. You there?

  He didn’t expect a response, but it was still disappointing that there was nothing.

  The sound of pounding footsteps echoed from the hallway, and a moment later, Eidolon, Idess, and Cat burst inside all at once. Two of Azagoth’s sons, Journey and Emerico, followed but remained inside the doorway as silent, concerned sentinels.

  Eidolon strode over, his gold-plated stethoscope dangling over a black scrub top embroidered with Underworld General’s specialized caduceus on the pocket. Azagoth had never met the infamous incubus in person, but he was about what Azagoth expected: tall, darkly handsome, and athletic. Tools of the trade for a sex demon.

  “What’s going on?” he asked, his voice oozing with confidence and professionalism as he dropped a medical duffel onto the end of the bed. Azagoth wasn’t sure if he was relieved or pissed off that the guy was keeping his composure when Azagoth was on the verge of losing his.

  “She passed out,” Azagoth said as he gently moved Lilliana off his lap and onto the mattress and a pillow, careful to avoid the blood as much as possible. “She was fine, and then she…” He trailed off, unable to voice the obvious.

  “Hurts,” Lilliana moaned. “Hurts so bad.”

  Eidolon gloved up and gripped Lilliana’s wrist. The sleeve of glyphs on his arm, what Seminus demons called a dermoire, lit up as he channeled energy into Lilli. Every protective instinct Azagoth had screamed for him to make Eidolon stop, but he told himself that this wasn’t a random demon channeling evil shit into her. Seminus demons possessed the ability to heal the body and the mind.

  Of course, the same gifts that could heal could also kill. It was what made Sems as lethal as they were horny.

  “When did it start?” Eidolon asked.

  She swallowed, her throat working for so long, Azagoth reached for the glass of water she kept next to the bed. Eidolon shook his head.

  “I’ve been nauseous for a couple of days,” she said between panting breaths. “I mean, I’ve had episodes for my entire pregnancy, but it got worse a couple of days ago.”

  Azagoth froze as he shrugged into his robe. “You lied to me?”

  “I told you it was nothing, and I didn’t think it was,” she snapped with so much strength that it lifted Azagoth’s spirits. “And you lied about me losing blood, so you can suck on your outrage.”

  He laughed despite the situation. Lilliana never put up with his shit, and he loved that about her.

  Eidolon adjusted his grip on her wrist. “What about the pain?”

  “It started just after I woke up this morning.” She shuddered and cried out, and another gush of blood puddled on the sheets.

  “Dammit, Doc,” Azagoth barked. “Do something!”

  Eidolon’s dermoire glowed brighter, and his expression grew grimmer. “This shouldn’t be happening. There’s no reason for it.”

  “No reason for what?” Azagoth’s hands fisted at his sides as he fought to control his panic. “Fucking talk to me.”

  If Azagoth’s bluntness irritated the doctor, he didn’t show it, and Azagoth’s respect for him bumped up a notch. “She needs to go to the hospital.”

  “No damned way,” Azagoth growled.

  “Reaver assured us that if she ever needed to go, she could. It’ll be okay.”

  Angels—except Memitim and Reaver—couldn’t step foot in Underworld General, but Lilliana’s move to Sheoul-gra had all but destroyed her angel status, dirtying her wings just enough that she could temporarily go places most angels couldn’t.

  But that wasn’t Azagoth’s concern.

  “I said no. Whatever needs to happen, it can happen here. No one is taking her from me again.”

  Eidolon rose to his feet, his steady, dark gaze holding Azagoth’s. “I’m going to be blunt because I don’t think we have much time. Do you want to lose the baby?”

  The doctor’s words were a gut punch. Azagoth wanted to destroy the bastard for even asking the question. Wanted to scream in frustration that this was happening. Obviously, he didn’t want to lose his baby, but he was terrified of allowing Lilliana to leave. To go to a place full of strangers and demons and who the hell knew what else.

  He’d just gotten her back.

  “Father.” Idess laid her slender hand on his forearm in a gentle plea. “She’ll have the best care in the world. I promise.”

  “I have enemies,” he insisted. “She’ll be exposed. In danger.”

  “My hospital is protected by an anti-violence spell,” Eidolon said in a soothing voice that shouldn’t have worked on Azagoth but did. “No one can flash in or out. I can assign guards, or you can send your own. She’ll be safe within UG’s walls. You have my word.”

  Journey stepped forward, his booted foot hitting the floor like a
clap of thunder. “I’ll accompany her as a bodyguard. I swear, no one will touch her.”

  “I’ll go, too,” Emerico offered.

  “Please, darling,” Lilliana croaked. “It’ll be okay.”

  He wanted to believe that. Was desperate to believe that. But even as he nodded in assent, he felt a sinking in his gut.

  None of this was okay.

  But losing the baby wasn’t an option.

  “Do it,” he said roughly, catching the doctor’s gaze. “And if you return my mate and child to me, I’ll owe you a debt I can never repay.”

  Eidolon gave him a shrewd look as he gathered his bag. “You can expect me to collect. My hospital doesn’t run on goodwill alone.”

  Azagoth’s pulse hammered as he watched Journey gently gather Lilliana into his arms. She smiled weakly and captured Azagoth’s hand before they started out the door.

  “I love you,” she whispered.

  Azagoth still wasn’t comfortable with emotion, so his voice broke a bit as he whispered back, “I love you, too.” Somehow, he summoned the strength to release her so they could go, but not before he seized Eidolon by the elbow. “Remember, Doctor, someday your soul will be mine.”

  Idess’s hand came down lightly on Azagoth’s shoulder. “Threats aren’t necessary, Father.”

  “I’m used to it,” Eidolon muttered. “He isn’t the first psychotically overprotective mate I’ve dealt with.” The doctor paused at the doorway and turned to Azagoth. “Lilliana will get the best care in all the realms. You made the right decision.”

  Azagoth wasn’t sure of that, but he nodded anyway.

  And then, the moment the door closed, he fell to his knees and screamed.

  Chapter 4

  Eidolon wasted no time in getting Lilliana to the hospital. He burst out of the Harrowgate, followed by Emerico, Idess, and Journey, Lilliana draped in the Memitim’s arms.

  “This way,” he called out, leading them toward the closest vacant exam room. Hospital staff scrambled out of the way as they rushed in.

  “Everything will be okay,” Journey assured Lilliana as he carefully placed her on the exam table.

  Eidolon hoped the Memitim was psychic. Eidolon had treated a lot of powerful, top-of-the-food-chain patients and their loved ones, but Azagoth was in a category of his own. The Grim Reaper’s reach was extensive enough in the physical world, but the fact that it went beyond that, past the grave, meant there was no escaping his wrath. Even if it took thousands of years, he would, eventually, nail your ass to the wall.

  Literally and for eternity.

  Putting those unsettling thoughts aside, Eidolon told the Memitim boys to wait outside. As he grabbed an IV kit from a cabinet, he called over a physician assistant, a cocky, young vampire named Drake with spiky, purple-silver hair.

  “I need Blaspheme on this.”

  As an angel who hadn’t gotten her wings yet, she was able to run UG’s London clinic. She’d be invaluable in this situation with Lilliana.

  Drake’s lips, coated in black lipstick, dipped into a frown. “Uh, Dr. Blaspheme didn’t show up for work today.”

  “What do you mean she didn’t show up?” Eidolon handed the supplies to Meesa, a new nurse at UG. She had quit her job at John Hopkins after twenty years, following an unfortunate incident where a co-worker had seen her shapeshift into a lion. “Did she take the day off?”

  “No, sir. She hasn’t shown up in two days, and no one can get ahold of her. It’s the talk of the hospital.”

  “And I’m just hearing about this now…why?”

  “The clinic tried calling you,” Meesa said, “but you didn’t answer.”

  Shit, yeah. He’d turned his phone off while he was in Sheoul-gra. “Okay, we’ll deal with that later. Get Gem.” He paused. “And call Shade if he isn’t on an ambulance run. If we can’t get him, we need to start a transfusion.”

  Eidolon’s brother, Shade, was a paramedic and had the ability to manipulate bodily functions. A little juice from him could keep a heart beating, lungs breathing, and blood forming.

  Lilliana moaned. “I think I’m going to throw up.”

  Meesa rushed an emesis basin over as Eidolon helped roll Lilliana onto her side.

  “Drake, I need labs. Test for everything, and tell them this is their number one priority.” Summoning his power, he channeled the energy through the glowing symbols of his dermoire and sent it into Lilliana’s body.

  All around him, the sounds of a hospital—the beeps of equipment, the moans of pain, the retching of a pregnant female—faded away as Eidolon began to see inside Lilliana.

  And it was disturbing.

  Touching angels had always given Eidolon a case of the willies, but as a resident of Sheoul-gra and Azagoth’s mate, Lilliana didn’t affect Eidolon’s senses as intensely as she would have if her wings weren’t dirty. But it wasn’t her Heavenly status currently punching Eidolon with a cold fist of dread. It was the shifting, undulating shadow of darkness encasing her womb and the base of each wing.

  “Doctor.” The urgency in Drake’s voice startled him, and he glanced over at the rush of blood flowing onto the table.

  Shit. He dove back into Lilliana with his gift, but it wouldn’t penetrate the layer of darkness.

  “I can’t get to her womb or the baby.” He cursed. “This isn’t natural. It’s not a known disease, but it isn’t acting like a toxin, either. More like an infection. Or a virus.”

  A virus.

  He wheeled around and hit the call button. “Get Sin in here. Hurry!”

  Eidolon’s sister, Sin, was the only female Seminus demon in existence and had once caused a plague that’d threatened to put werewolves on the Endangered Species List. She’d since dedicated a lot of her time to learning everything she could about how viruses worked so she could use her unique gift to create cures…or make really, really lethal viruses.

  His sister was a walking superplague.

  Shade sauntered into the room in his paramedic uniform, a steaming cup of coffee in his hand. “What’s going on?”

  “She needs blood,” Eidolon said. “Fast.”

  Shade tossed his coffee into the trash and had hold of Lilliana’s wrist before the cup hit the bottom of the bin.

  “I’m Shade,” he told her, speaking in the gentle, confident tone that helped make him a great medic. “What’s your name?”

  “Lilliana,” she whispered.

  “Lilliana is Azagoth’s mate,” Eidolon added, taking just a second to enjoy the way Shade’s hand jerked a little.

  “Seriously?” he mouthed, and Eidolon nodded. “Hell’s fucking bells.”

  Eidolon couldn’t agree more.

  A commotion in the ER signaled Sin’s arrival, and she burst into the room. “I hear you’re treating the Grim Reaper’s mate. And she’s knocked up? Holy shit.”

  Sin was as tactful and delicate as ever. “Lilliana,” Eidolon said then gestured to his sister. “This is Sin. I consult with her from time to time. Her mouth has no filter, but she’s the best at what she does.”

  Lilliana nodded weakly and closed her eyes. Shade was likely reducing her nausea and relaxing her system. What Eidolon wouldn’t give for a dozen more Shades in the hospital.

  He turned to Sin. “There’s something inside her I can’t identify. Whatever it is, it’s causing a dangerous situation for the baby.”

  “She’s still losing a lot of blood,” Shade said in a low voice. “Is she a candidate for a C-Section?”

  Eidolon shook his head. “She’s an angel, remember?”

  He’d learned the hard way that it was dangerous for demons to attempt to cut into an angel, let alone one pregnant with another powerful being’s baby.

  “Oh, yeah,” Shade murmured. “Weird that she doesn’t feel like one.”

  “That’s what the corruption of Sheoul-gra will do to you,” Drake announced, giving a sheepish shrug when everyone looked over at him. “It’s what I heard.”

  “Oh, damn.” Sin’
s alarmed tone had everyone whiplashing from Drake to her. “What the fuck?” She frowned, and her dermoire, a faded version of Eidolon’s and Shade’s, glowed brighter. “It’s a weird mass of shit, but inside it, I can see some individual elements. It’s like someone mixed chemicals and bacteria together, and then threw in a virus for fun…” She trailed off, her expression hidden behind a curtain of black hair. “The weird thing—well, the weirder thing—is that the substance isn’t spread through her body. It’s concentrated in the tissues of her wings. Only a few stray bits are attacking her uterus inside the black blob.”

  Lightbulbs clicked on in every corner of Eidolon’s brain. Quickly, he stuck his head outside the room and gestured to Idess, who was waiting nearby with Emerico and Journey.

  “Idess, we need a tissue sample from Lilliana’s wing anchors. I was hoping to talk you through the process. I know you’re not technically an angel anymore, but you’re Memitim, and you’re Lilliana’s stepdaughter, so it should be safe for you to do it. Or at least safer than it would be for any of us.” He lowered his voice. “If you’d rather not—”

  “Of course, I’ll do it.” She smiled sadly. “I’ll do anything for Lilliana.”

  It only took a couple of minutes for Shade to put Lilliana out and for Idess to get the sample. Eidolon handed it to Drake. “Run. Tell them to test for angelicant.”

  Drake took off in a blur of vampiric speed.

  “Angelicant?” Sin dabbed sweat from Lilliana’s brow with a wet cloth, freeing up Meesa to attempt an ultrasound. “What’s that?”

  “It’s an oil of demonic origin. It’s supposed to help angels enter regions of Sheoul they otherwise couldn’t go.”

  “Lilliana wouldn’t take anything like that,” Idess said fiercely. “Never. Not while she’s pregnant.”

  Eidolon searched Lilliana’s pale, ageless face, creased with worry even in unconsciousness.

  “She wouldn’t,” he said. “She didn’t, I’m certain. There are safer ways for angels to venture into Sheoul, and angelicant isn’t safe for any pregnant being.” He looped his stethoscope around his neck. “The most common use of angelicant, mostly among demons, is as an abortifacient.”