Redemption (A NOVEL OF THE SEVEN SIGNS) (42 page)

They’d fought. It hadn’t mattered.

And now hundreds of hungry fearwraiths shrieked and feasted on the corpses, their ghostly bodies swelling fat like leeches.

Jadzia clutched the stone balustrade, sick. In the centre, a space had been cleared, the bodies piled carelessly aside. A makeshift altar, painted on the floor in blood. A fire roaring at one end, belching black smoke, the foul stench of burning flesh. Four devil-sharp iron spikes, driven deep into the stone floor. Wicked hellflame licked the metal white-hot. And crucified, on her back with limbs stretched in an evil four-pointed cross, lay Salome, the Guardian.

Still alive.

Naked, the spikes piercing wrist and ankle. Stretched beyond endurance. Her silver-white hair was filthy. Blood oozed from her wounds, burning, and her angelic flesh tried to
heal, but the hell-spelled spikes tore it afresh, over and over. Her silver wings had been ripped off, and poisoned so they wouldn’t grow back. Her body sweated green with infected agony.

Salome was beyond screaming. She just whimpered, and the sound scraped Jaz’s heart raw.

Beside her, on the stone, sat the holy vial. Still full, glowing bright with glorious wrath.

And dancing around her, a giggling dervish, the demon, Luuceat.

A fat little wart of a man, maybe three feet high. His greasy bald head shone in the firelight. He wore no clothes. He’d rolled in Salome’s blood at some point, and it dripped from his plump body in clots. He held one severed wing, admiring its dying glimmer, and plucked the feathers off one by one with fat fingers. They burst into flame, and he tossed them aloft, watching them fall like shooting stars and go out.

“So pretty,” he hummed. His sing-song voice grated in Jaz’s ears. “Just a little longer, pretty angel. The time will soon be right. You’ll soon burn. Save up a nice big scream, won’t you? Luuceat likes it when angels scream.”

Jadzia shuddered, chilled to the core. Were demons all like this? Did Shax do stuff like this for fun, when he wasn’t bringing her flowers and kissing her hair? Was her sweet, shy demon a vile torturer?

Beside her, Michael crouched in midnight-blue shadow, and grinned. “Plan worked out well, don’t you think?”

Jadzia nodded faintly. Sweat itched inside her armor. The vial was full. The Guardian still alive. She supposed that was a success. But…

Michael’s ice-blue hair glittered in the dark like broken diamonds. “Don’t fret. It’ll soon be over.”

“I hope so.”

A flicker of disapproval that stung her breath. “Trust me,” he said smoothly. “I didn’t bring you here by accident, girl. I like you. You’ve done good work. Perhaps you’ve made up for your sins, hmm? Just stay with me on this one, and we can talk about it. Do you trust me, Jadzia?”

“Yes.” She hoped it didn’t sound too breathless.
Did he just promise…?
No. Too much to hope for. She’d only been Tainted a hundred and fifty years. The others had served much longer. Much harder…

And the others aren’t dating a demon. If he finds out about that
…

Her chin firmed. Michael wouldn’t find out. She was careful. And she feared more that Dash and Lune and the others would find out. Especially Dashiel. He’d picked her up when she was broken, eased her pain, taught her to survive in a world where glory was a whim and the sky just blackish silence. She wanted Dash’s good opinion more than anything.

Anyway, she and Shax weren’t
dating
. Right? They were just…talking. Meeting in secret. Stealing forbidden kisses on moonlit beaches.

They didn’t count, those dark and breathless things they did in her dreams.

She forced a smile, but her skin burned, like she was naked, exposed before her archangel with everything on show. She’d kissed Shax, just a few short hours ago. Let him stroke her to breathless desire. Surely, Michael could smell it on her. See the guilt in her eyes, taste the sweet demon kisses on her breath. Hear her wild pounding heart…

But Michael just smiled, raw. “Good.” And he clenched one massive fist, and whispered to heaven.

Holy fire erupted, blinding, and poured down into the chamber like silver-blue lava. The air sang with holy vengeance. The feasting wraiths screamed and exploded. The fire consumed them, roaring, raging over the dead monks until nothing remained but stink and smoke and black-scorched stone.

And then, in a breath, the fire snuffed out. Silent. Leaving the demon and his crucified angel, and the vial.

Jadzia gasped. She’d seen Michael’s tricks before. Of course she had. Didn’t make them any less cool.

Michael jumped, a swirl of glacial wings. Wind buffeted. The demon prince cursed, and shielded his beady eyes. The archangel landed, and the stone floor quaked and shattered beneath him. “Luuceat, I presume. I don’t think I need an introduction.”

Jadzia swooped down, dizzy, landing a few feet behind her archangel. Blue fire glimmered in his broad feathers. He towered over Luuceat, more than twice the demon prince’s height. Probably twice the fat little bastard’s weight, too.

She wasn’t needed here. Michael was going to wipe the floor with this sniveling slimehead. And the fourth vial would be theirs.

Does that seem too easy?

Luuceat smiled, lickerish. His beady black eyes gleamed, and he made a fulsome bow. “Ah. At last. Luuceat’s been waiting for you. Azaroth told him you’d come.”

Jadzia shivered. Great. Another megalomaniac moron who talked about himself in the third person.
Just die, scumbag, and we can all go home.

Before you lay eyes on me and tell everyone I’m a traitor.

She shuddered. Luuceat was a demon, with a demon’s snide intuition. Surely, he could see…

Michael flashed his sword, a blinding blue crackle of thunder. “Nice crucifixion,” he remarked. “Stylish. Only that’s my angel you’re plucking, shitface, and I don’t recall you asking my permission.”

Sparks flickered between Luuceat’s sweat-shiny palms. An ugly grin split his fat face. “Come get her, then.” He giggled, and exploded into towering scarlet flame.

It roared, the column of fire the demon prince had made. Black smoke billowed, and the red inferno shaped itself into a human figure, tall and long limbed, flames peeling in ribbons as it moved. Its fiery feet hissed on the blackened stones, leaving long glowing footprints the size of platters.

And where the fire walked, it
spread
.

Two, four, seven, twelve Luuceats sprang alive, ringing poor crucified Salome and her vial in a fiery guard. Jadzia stared, her wits dazzled blind. Which was the original? Which was real?

The tall, lanky fire demons roared as one, an ugly harmony. Gouts of flame poured from their mouths.

The heat seared Jadzia’s cheeks, blew her braided hair back. She flashed her sword, grim. Didn’t know which one was real? She’d just have to kill them all.

Michael laughed, and ice crystals hit the shimmering hot air and melted. His muscles swelled, his blade sprang bright with sky-blue wrath. “Sweet trick, demon,” he snarled, and crouched, his diamond wings flashing. “Now I get to kill you over and over again.”

And Jadzia leapt into the fight.

CHAPTER 38

Pinned to the metal floor, Rose screamed. Wordless, insensible, horror, crackling like ice crystals in her heart.

Her precious angel was drinking Fluvium’s blood. And already the curse was eating him.

His aura glared, not honest angelic blue but a poisoned purple glow that scorched her eyes. His wings rippled with violet fire. Black lightning crackled from his feathers, forking from floor to ceiling. The shock clanged through her bones, a powerful clap of thunder.

And still, he drank more. Clawed at the demon’s arm. Sucked the blood deep.

Fluvium staggered back, ripping his bleeding wrist from Japheth’s grip. “Holy motherfucker,” he gasped, “you meant it!”

Rose’s thoughts whirled. He’d expected Japheth to let her die. To save his angelic soul at all costs…

“Take it back,” she yelled, desperate. “I won’t let him. Take it back!”

But Fluvium just laughed, shrill, mad.

And Bridie laughed, too. “Look, Auntie Rosie. Pretty magic!”

The angel—or whatever he now was—crouched on all fours, growling. He clawed at the floor, powerful muscles shaking. Strings of blood drooled from beneath the tangled hair hiding his face. His wings juddered, and as she watched, that gorgeous glimmering gold bled out, replaced with luminescent purple that shimmered in dark rainbows.

The angel’s mark on Rose’s forehead sizzled, and smoked, and healed over.

Japheth raised his head. His eyes burned, unholy, no longer emerald green but wild with ultraviolet rage. Hideously, he laughed, and wickedly curved teeth erupted from his gums. “Surprise,” he growled. “I win.”

The writhing hellspells around him blazed in scarlet delight, and with a satisfied snarl, he broke free. He was one of their own. They’d let him go.

And he dived for her, and swept her into a fiery feathered embrace.

She struggled, blind. The hellspells that trapped her on the floor cringed, and dissolved under his touch. He wrapped her in his powerful arms. His skin smelled of fire. She swooned against his metal-clad chest. His feathers caressed her like perfumed velvet. And the wonderful, terrible heat of his curse called to her, seductive, irresistible. His pulse thundered deep in her ears, vibrating through her, awakening dark desire.

“Peace, Rose Harley,” he whispered. “I’ve got you.”

Her heart bled, aching. So much like himself, yet…

He thrust his hand out, hissing a few sibilant syllables. Violet fire crackled from his palm, and from the bloodstained floor, his weapons vanished in a sting of scarlet sparks.

Fluvium shot at him, a gun in each hand. Bullets whistled, clanging harmlessly on the walls. He cursed, flung his empty guns away, and sprang with a poisoned scream, conjuring his serrated demonblade.

Rose screamed. Japheth hugged her tighter, whispering dark words, and the world vanished in sparkling purple ash.

*   *   *

Dazzling red moonlight swirled. Wind screamed, scratching at Rose’s skin, plastering her hair back. Burning claws pierced her guts. Surely, she was falling into hell…

Glass exploded, stinging her face, and a wooden floor thumped under her boots.

She staggered in Japheth’s embrace. His apartment, moonlight glaring through the shattered window. Angelic charms crackled white lightning over the glass. Japheth hissed at them, fangs gleaming, and they dissolved to white smoke, and vanished.

She shoved him away, catching her breath. “What the fuck did you do?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” He spread shimmering violet wings. Moonlight danced over him, lovingly, painting him in crimson shadows. So beautiful…

“You stupid bastard.” She kicked the wooden sofa table, furious. It skittered across the floor, and she picked it up and hurled it at him, not caring what she hit.

He swept it away with one wing. It hit the wall and clattered to the floorboards. “We’re alive, aren’t we?”

She yanked viciously at her knotted hair. God, she wanted to tear it all out and strangle him with it. “You’re cursed, angel! Don’t you get that? What happened to your precious forgiveness?”

“There is no forgiveness!” He grabbed her arm to make her stop.

She shook him off.

He grabbed her again, both wrists this time. “You were right.” A dizzy, defeated smile. “Heaven doesn’t care. No one cares, Rose Harley. The world’s ending. We’re alone. There’s only us.”

“No!” She twisted free, and hit him, right across his beautiful face.

He didn’t flinch. Just shoved her backwards. “You and me, Rose. What should we do about that?”

She hit him again. He pushed her backwards again. She stumbled, and righted herself, and then her back thudded into
the wall and he grabbed her chin and assaulted her mouth with his.

His teeth collided with hers. Hot, hard, insistent, like he didn’t give a damn. She tasted blood, the delicious dark fruity flavor of the curse… Desire flashed over her like sunburn. She wanted to drink him, swallow him, sink her teeth into his sweet flesh and suck him into her at last…and now, there was nothing to keep them apart.