Ignite (7 page)

I gasp for air as I roll to my side in a fit of coughing, and the hunger vanishes. The world is spinning around me, bobbing up and down like a ship on rough waters. I blink a few times and focus as hard as I can on a blurry figure. It sways back and forth, fading in and out of view.
Azael.

I see his face come into focus and it is contorted in terrifying rage. His shirt is coated with sticky, black blood and his hand is pressed to his shoulder, preventing more from spilling out.

“Pen, what the HELL?”

I lift myself up on my elbow and rub the back of my head, pressing gently on the growing knot in my skull. “What happened?” My words slur, my tongue slipping on something bitter.

“What do you
think
happened?” He pulls out his shirt collar, exposing a ragged tear in his flesh. “You bit me!”

“I—”

I sit up straighter and notice something warm slipping down my chin. I reach up to wipe at it, and when I bring my hand away, it is covered in the same black blood that is plastering Azael’s shirt to him. My eyes widen to saucers and bile rises to the back of my throat. I’m wracked by another jarring cough, my tangled hair falling around my face. The cough splatters blood across the dirty orange clay, and I can’t tell whether it’s his or mine.

I peer back up at him. “I don’t remember.”

Azael looks at me with shocked fury and whispers one word, just loud enough for me to hear. “
Absum
.”

Chapter 6

In a vortex of hot air, the clay cliffs and ruddy sky slip away and are replaced by the overcast night sky that hangs above the ruins. I land, sprawled carelessly on the overgrown grass of the clearing, my joints bent in agonizing angles. I remain frozen, staring across the dying fire at Azael, and wait for him to say something.

To say anything.

But he doesn’t speak. He just stands there, staring at me with a look of repulsion, as if he’s going to be sick. Sluggishly, he removes his hand from his shoulder, brushing his fingers over the wound and repairing the laceration I gave him. He lets his silence say everything he needs to and I look away from him in discomfort.

I sit up, scooting backwards until my spine hits one of the cool marble tombstones that sticks out of the ground like a crooked tooth, and bring my knees in tight to my chest. I fold in on myself like origami, hoping to become some other shape Azael won’t look at like this. Maybe he’d be more pleased with a paper crane?

But no matter how I twist myself, I can’t escape his accusing glare. The last thing I remember is the smell of the memory, a headache, and then nothing. I blacked out, and when I woke up, I was disoriented and he was bleeding.

I drag my hand across my mouth, convinced his blood is still dripping down my chin. My hand comes away stained black.
Azael’s blood, Azael’s blood, Azael’s blood.
The awareness spits through me like electricity and I begin to panic. I wipe at it again and again, frantically scrubbing my skin raw.

“Enough, Pen!” His voice comes out clipped.

I can’t seem to distance myself enough from his blood. Its blackness marks my chin, rests in my fingernails, and settles in the lines that swirl across my palm—all a relentless reminder of what I did to Azael. I bring my hands down from my face, pulling my sleeve over my shaking fingers, and clutch madly at the fabric until it tears. I wrap my arms around myself, squeezing my panic into submission and digging my nails sharply into my sides.

Azael folds his arms over his chest and crosses the distance between us. He kneels down next to me and scans my face calculatingly.

I bite my lip as hot tears burn the back of my eyes. The taste of his blood lingers in my mouth. “I’m so sorry.”

He lets out a deep sigh and settles himself against the grave next to me. “Get it together. I’ve never seen a blubbering demon, and I certainly don’t want you to be the first. Would give us a bad reputation. I’m fine.”

I turn my head towards him doubtfully.

He pulls down his collar again, gesturing to his now unblemished shoulder. “See? Not a scratch.”

“Anymore,” I correct.

“I’ve healed from much worse. Never from a wound my own sister inflicted, however. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for bloodlust, but that was a little too on-the-nose for me.”

I shift uncomfortably and look down at my lap. My jeans are smeared with orange clay and splattered with his drying black blood.

“You want to explain what the Hell happened?” he asks.

“I was hoping you could explain it to me,” I say, scratching at my dirty jeans. “I don’t remember. I think I blacked out.”

He pulls his eyebrows together in question. “You don’t remember anything?”

I shake my head. “Nothing.”

“What, were you possessed?”

I look over at him in alarm. “Can demons even be possessed?”

“Hell if I know.” He cocks his head sideways. “What’s the last thing you remember before you went all—”

“Blood crazy? Demon Dracula?” I offer. “The smell. And then you said something about Hell redecorating.”

“And then nothing?”

“Radio silence.”

“So you don’t remember breaking my jaw then?”

I widen my eyes in surprise. “I what?”

“Or cracking my ribs and shattering my kneecap?” His voice is flat. Not angry, exactly, but detached, like an observation. It’s as if it didn’t happen to him. He looks over at me and my mouth drops open. He laughs a little too harshly. “I’ll take that stupid look on your face as a no. Well, even blacked out, you can still kick some major ass. I’m not easily overpowered, as you well know. I think I’ll be bruised for a few days thanks to your bony fists.”

I snap my mouth shut and shovel my surprise under the Earth, letting it decay with whoever’s buried in the grave we’re sitting on. Unraveling in front of Az like this is dangerous, so I pretend to be whole and tease him back. “I’d apologize for that, but we were due for a good fight. It must be a major blow to your ego to have been beaten by your unconscious sister.”

“You were the most conscious unconscious person I’ve ever encountered,” he objects. “I call foul. If you were possessed, you had an unfair advantage. I challenge you to a rematch when you don’t have the help of bonus demon strength.”

My throat tightens, strangling my words. “I still don’t understand.”

“Doesn’t matter.” He leans his head back on the tombstone, tilting his chin up to the dark sky and closing his eyes. “Gus will be here soon. Maybe he can figure it out.”

“Maybe.” I turn back towards the fire and watch the glowing coals, sitting forward to rest my elbows on my knees. The embers crackle sporadically, causing small sparks to jump out onto the tall grass. I catch the fire’s spit in my hand and watch it fizzle out on my finger. “Do you think it hurts?” I ask quietly.

“Hmm?” Azael murmurs lazily. He doesn’t bother to open his eyes. “Does what hurt?”

“Dying.”

“We don’t die, Pen.”

“But we can be killed.”

“Only by the sword of an archangel. Why are you asking me this?”

I regard the flames distantly. “I’ve heard that it burns. To be killed, I mean. Heaven’s sword burns the evil out of you. There are stories of demons who fall to ashes after being struck.”

“Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” he exhales.

“It could happen,” I say, glancing at him sideways.

He looks like he’s sleeping, his chest rising and falling slowly. The glow from the fire casts strange shadows across his face, giving him a haunting pallor. His cheeks look hollow, his closed eyes like empty sockets. I notice his dark hair sticking up wildly and consider brushing it flat but think better of it.

“What could?” he asks.

“We could die.”

He squints one of his eyes open and considers me for a moment before shutting it again.

“Michael’s back,” I continue. “And he had the archangel sword.”

“I really don’t think we’re going to have to worry about Michael killing us. At least not for another couple of centuries.”

I shrug to myself. “I wouldn’t underestimate him.”

“Fine, but you shouldn’t overestimate him either,” he argues halfheartedly. “I doubt he could even lift that sword, let alone kill a demon with it.”

I let the conversation drop and sit in the heavy silence. Besides the soft popping of the fire, the only noise is the quiet skittering of small animals in the woods. I watch the dying flames again and think about what it would feel like to burn from the inside out.

Fire doesn’t blister my skin, doesn’t curl my skin back from my bones. I’ve never known the pain of a real burn, but to catch fire from the inside, I imagine, would be the worst kind of agony.

‘Some say the world will end in fire / Some say in ice.’

“Quoting Frost now?” Azael mutters.

“Sorry.”

It’s fine. And for what it’s worth, the world will end in ice. ‘To say that for destruction ice / Is also great / And would suffice.’ Even Milton says so.

Of course. You’ve only read
Paradise Lost
a thousand times.

‘From beds of raging fire to starve in ice…’ Fire needs oxygen, and our ice will choke their flames. Hell runs cold, after all. It’s the Heavens that burn.

And that’s what I’m afraid of.

***

I roll my shoulders and settle back down against the grave, but I can’t seem to settle my mind. I think back to the tree at the asylum and Michael. But instead of remembering his face or his hair, I think about the broadsword that hung from his hip.

It had a glinting golden handle with a large, round ruby secured at the top with a strong but thin silver wire carefully wrapped around it. The grip was carved with an ornate motif comprised of delicate etchings, but I couldn’t make out the design from where I stood. What I did see, though, was the inscription carved in curling letters down the blade of the sword. Four simple words, laced with a subtle threat to all demons who happen upon it: “Light burns through darkness.”

Message received, loud and clear.

I grab my own dagger from my boot, carefully sliding the edge of the blade so it doesn’t cut through my jeans. I place the cool metal in my palm and inspect it closely. It is no match for Michael’s avenging sword.

The dagger is about nine inches long, its bone-white handle short and sturdy. The hilt is carved with a thick rope that extends over the handle and knots around the top of the long, thin blade. The silver brightly reflects the amber of the fire.

I turn it over and study the engraving I have read a million times. “Not with words alone.” The letters are small and pointed, but they aren’t faded or scratched and neither is its message. Words are not enough; it takes action to succeed. Action in life and action in battle. I rely on words as it’s a reminder I’ve often needed.

A loud snap from the fire sends a shower of sparks raining down on me, the embers pinging lightly off of my dagger before they die with a hiss. The flames shoot up tall around the now empty basin. I shove the tip of the dagger back into my boot and pull the dish out from the fire, tossing it behind me. The metal basin hits the grave with a loud clang, startling Az.

“We have company,” I say over my shoulder.

He stretches his arms above his head. “About damn time.”

The orange flames turns a searing blue as it continues to rise. I stand beside the rock-ringed pit and the fire, now reaching as tall as my shoulder, dances wildly. Azael steps up next to me.

“So do you want to tell him about your little episode, or should I?”

I glare at him. “It wasn’t an episode.”

“What do you want to call it?”

“Let’s not call it anything. I’ll tell him about the empty rooms first. He’ll want to know about that. And then I’ll tell him about the last door we tried.” I am sure it wasn’t a regular memory. It felt more like—like an implanted suggestion. Like I lost control of myself.

“So your—”

I groan. “You can have the honor of telling him about how I kicked your ass, since I blacked out.”

“And how you bit me,” he adds cooly.

“Yeah, that too.” I look over at his shoulder again, remembering the blood. The blackness of it still darkens the pale skin across his collarbone. “Sorry about that.”

He laughs. “Now
that
you’re sorry for, but beating me up is fine?”

“Sounds about right,” I answer.

“Okay,” he nods, like he’s proud. Like my not being sorry for hurting him has proven something to him. “I’ll take it.”

The flames pop again loudly, blue sparks spraying us both. It flares and then dies completely, revealing a tall boy in his early twenties with dark, closely cropped hair. He’s dressed in a long-sleeved black t-shirt with gray jeans. The corner of a sharp tattoo peeks out from the collar of his shirt and wraps around the side of his neck, stretching to his other shoulder before disappearing again back into his shirt to spread across his chest. His violet eyes are set under thick eyebrows that are knotted in irritation, like an angry gift wrapped in a frustrated bow.

“Gus!” Azael cheers. “It’s so great to see a familiar face!”