Summon Toren (Archangels Creed #3) (26 page)

Worry for his mental wellness flitted through Sam's mind for a second.

A grinding metal sound ripped the air with a massive flare of white from Toren’s abdomen. The light faded to reveal a naked woman with a skin of swirling liquid mercury. Toren angled his head left and right, looking at the woman as if trying to figure something out.

What was there to figure out? She was clearly female and thin, with small breasts that didn’t detract from her feminine curves one bit.

A spark of jealousy hit Sam hard in the stomach. Toren was looking at the woman, studying her. Sam's fists clenched automatically.

Toren looked back at Sam and his eyes narrowed. “She’s…
you.”

What? Sam blinked a few times and looked at the woman again, head to toe. “Oh my God.”

The woman seemed to have her eye on Joe. Uh-oh.

She gracefully walked toward him. No, more like pranced a little. Like a happy little girl. Was she pretending to be Sam’s younger version?

The demon suddenly morphed into a hideous creature that resembled a red hided bull with the too-large head of a carnivorous dinosaur. Its roar made Sam’s body hairs stand on end and her finger suddenly trigger happy on her gun.

The mercury girl paused in her advance to regard the beast. Her mouth opened to emit a single note in a beautiful clear tenor voice. The note reverberated and grew until it became a metallic screech that reminded Sam of a million nails down the chalkboard.

Then the girl turned into a streak of silver light and shot herself right into the thing's
mouth,
propelling it backward a few feet. The beast’s eyes widened to the size of golf balls and began to tremble.

Sam grabbed hold of Toren’s arm as the demon slowly inflated like a balloon. She squinted her eyes when it looked ready to pop, skin stretched taut, eyes and tongue bulging outward. Insistent, Sam pulled Toren away, wary of what the flying tissue might do.

The demon exploded with a sound like a dud firecracker's fizzle and with mercury particles filling the air. Sam looked around, watching the mercury slowly gather back into its original form.

Sam’s swirling, shimmering younger version, prancing once more, turned back toward Joe. Make that a terror stricken reanimated Joe.

He seemed too afraid to move. Sam had to remind herself that it wasn’t Joe. It was a demon using his body. And whatever inhabited him knew it was in deep shit.

When the woman got to him, she danced before in an almost erotic rhythm.

“You might not want to look,” Toren mumbled.

Oh God.

Mercury Sam opened her arms and took Joe into her embrace, cradling him to her like a lover. In the next instant the metal of her body became a million screaming whirling blades.

The demon in Joe screamed as she drew him into her arms, sucking him into her body that had become a human sized shredder. His swift end came with a grinding
vrrrrrr
and a massive spray of blackened blood. Toren made a moan of disgust and turned his head.

Sam watched in horror as the girl continued dancing around from one reanimated being to the other, passing them all through the human grinder.

When she finished, Mercury Sam looked like she’d taken a swim in crude oil, the sticky brown/black clots and globs of tissue all clinging to her body. But she act she’d frolicked in the lake on a happy Sunday afternoon. She still pranced happily about, all the way until she reached Toren.

“I think I’d have preferred you eating them.”

“I don’t eat my prey mister.” Sam's voice continued to come forth from Mercury Sam's throat. She sucked in a breath and wanted to say how creepy it was but didn’t dare.

The girl looked at her then, eyes of solid mercury. "I'm Peggy. You're Toren's Samantha."

Sam made a good effort at keeping her jaw where it belonged. "Pleased to meet you, Peggy." How could this be the same creature that had practically eaten Ezekiel?

“We shall be friends, I believe. This is good. Josephus says he’s sorry for hurting you.” She looked at Toren next. “And sorry for hitting your wife.”

Toren lowered his head and shook it. “You'd better get cleaned up, you’re not coming inside like that.”

“You’re wanted at the war chamber. The quads are all there, waiting for us.”

“All of them?” He asked. “Great.”

Immediately the black ran off of the odd metallic replica of Sam until she was shiny and clean. She curtsied then spun until she was nothing but a ball of light that shot into Toren.

He jolted with a light
oomph.
“You don’t have to be so damn rough.” He turned to Sam. “We’ll have to clean this up later.”

Sam remembered what they were there for. She jerked toward the house and Toren caught her arm. “Hold your horses. Me first.”

Rather than waste time arguing, Sam followed him into the house. After a careful search they came up empty. Kassie simply was not there. Sam finally broke down in sobs. “I can
smell her
Toren.” She looked all around, searching for some overlooked hiding spot.

“Okay baby, shhh.” Toren held her close, offering what comfort he could.

Sam sobbed into his chest. “She was
right here
two hours and seventeen minutes ago.”

Toren pushed her away a little. “You know that for sure?”

She wiped her eyes, considering. “Yes.” She nodded a little then got more emphatic. “I’m positive.”

“Wow.” He kissed her on the forehead. “Was she alive when she left?”

She paused and thought about it. Closed her eyes and sniffed long and deep. “Oh God, yes, yes.” She nodded rapidly. “Alive and…terrified Toren. Oh God.”

“We’ll find her. I swear to you.” He embraced her tightly and things suddenly blurred.

CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

Skylar couldn’t believe where she was and what she was seeing. She kept pinching herself under the giant black stone table to be sure she was awake. She wanted to gawk but kept reminding herself that it was bad manners. On the other hand, it seemed stupid to just sit there like she’d visited with archangels every day of her life, no biggie.

It was bad enough the single archangels all sat across from the quads,
staring
them down like some diseased specimen under a microscope. For real, they seriously needed to step the hell back.

Skylar did not react well to intimidation. A trait left over from the psychological warfare of her competition days that she often found quite useful in everyday life. But when men tried to show their superiority, it brought out her worst possible traits. That’s what happened when you were called stupid by men all your ever lovin’ life. Especially when those men were barely literate meatheads.

Damn it, when were they going to get this show on the road. She fought the urge to fidget and squirm. Stay calm, cool and collected and don't make Ezekiel or Toren look bad.

Several of the angels stared at her, more like
gaped, ratcheting up her anxiety. Their expressions left no doubt that they found her severely lacking in some essential quality. Ezekiel didn’t seem to appreciate their staring one bit. And he didn’t bother to hide his annoyance, sitting there, eyeing the green one directly across the table.

The archangel's eyes were clear, almost new grass green. Skylar was sure it was a gem but had no clue what the name of it was.

"Green beryl."

Surely he wasn't talking to her? "Excuse me?"

"My gem. It's green beryl. I am Vektor."

Shit! Could they all read her thoughts like that?

"Yes, we can." The amethyst—?—angel two seats to the left answered her. "I am Azen. And yes, amethyst."

Next to her, Ezekiel growled under his breath, and she could feel the coiling tension within him.

"Do not be concerned, human. We have no desire for your female, beyond what we can learn about sexual activities from her." The blue angel further down delivered that particular gem of reassurance.

Ezekiel no longer bother
ed to hold his growl back.

"Lassin, cool it." Toren stepped in before Ezekiel could make a grave mistake. "EZ, the archangels are no threat to you with Skylar. First because she loves you, remember? Second because they know they have wives waiting. Their only interest in her is to learn from her whatever they can that will assist them with building their own relationships. They've studied intensively, but none of that compares to the real thing. So chill."

“I’m not worried about them taking my woman,” Ezekiel muttered, insulted. “She doesn't like being stared down and I don't like that they don’t have the common sense to show a little restraint seeing as they’re the archangels with all the experience and knowledge.”

The diamond looking angel laughed outright. “He’s got a good point. I like this human.” He leaned forward and looked down the row at all his brothers.
“Why don’t you show some
couth.
Act your ages.”

“The human is sensitive to his female.” The black angel’s
words were canyon deep and intimidating. Well his voice was.

“They’ve both gained
my mercurial properties to varying degrees.”

The looks on all the angel
’s faces became somewhat fascinated and Ezekiel settled back in his chair, moving closer to Skylar, his arm protectively or maybe possessively across her shoulders.

Skylar glanced around again, growing more nervous with each passing moment. What were they waiting for, anyway?

Across the table next to the green angel named Vektor, the black archangel glowered at her. He was—

The air in the huge chamber changed. Skylar shuddered in the sudden chill and instinctively dragged in a deep breath of the thickened air.

A brilliant green tornado whirled momentarily just past the end of the table. A giant materialized there, like a knight in shining green armor. He stood like a statue glaring at everyone at the table in turn, sparing no one, then dropped into the huge chair at the head of the table. A thick stack of folders thudded to the stone, edges precisely parallel to the table's edge.

He gave the quad members a collective nod. "Welcome. Thanks to you, we have achieved a significant victory over the enemy." He snapped his fingers and the wall behind him transformed into a video screen of magnificent proportions. The screen displayed an image that seemed slightly familiar.

The swirling action cleared to reveal Toren and Samantha at the center of a swarm of the monkey men. The pair moved with lethal precision and the creatures dropped around them like rag dolls.

The giant spoke again. "Toren and Samantha eradicated an entire hive of these creatures as well as the demon lord Reftelen, who served Hetarne directly." The screen opened another scene.

They were looking down into a cavernous building, divided into a maze of curtained cubicles. The smaller cubicles, constructed on wheeled dollies, were moved singly and in small groups into the center of a dozen much larger compartments. The curtains were stripped down to display whatever sat upon the dolly. People in the larger compartments looked and bid to purchase the goods, all while their identities were protected from one another.

The things being sold varied. Crates of guns. Bulk packages of various drugs. Young sobbing women. The buyers were permitted to leave their cubicles one at a time to inspect the goods before bidding.

As the video segment played, short audio clips also rolled. People spoke in various languages, giving the effect of channel surfing.

"
Stop. Go back."

Skylar had to look around to figure out who spoke. If the others hadn't turned to look at him, she might not have realized who it was until much later. The one with the brilliant diamond eyes was the center of the others' attention.

The emerald looking giant in command nodded and snapped his fingers.

“Listen,” the d
iamond angel instructed as the replay resumed.

Everybody
tuned in carefully. A female voice came from the screen. "Dear God, please grant that poor child a quick death and allow me to suffer in his stead."

“Where
is it coming from?” the diamond angel asked.

The emerald boss guy
panned the view around to reveal a small boy being poked and prodded by two older men. The child stood trembling in terrified silence with tears rolling down his small face.

The angel moved the view around again, searching out the woman who had spoken. Slender and blonde, perhaps in her thirties, she murmured the prayer once more.

“She doesn’t even know the child.” The Vektor guy sounded astonished.

Murmurs erupted in another language suddenly and the emerald man pounded his fist on the table. “English!”

The voices ceased almost immediately. “Sorry.” The yellow angel looked at the quads. “We just rarely witness that level of faith and sacrifice.”

“Back it u
p again and run the faith meter.” This from the angel that reminded her of fire.

The video replayed and a bar
appeared on the right of the screen. The air became literally tense in the room as they waited for her prayer. At the moment it came, the bar glowed to a blinding white. Chaos abounded with several of the angels standing and all of them erupting in the same gibberish from before. In addition to this, the diamond angel got up and headed to the exit it seemed.

"Lyght! Where are you going?" The
emerald man roared.

Without turning, the angel’s wings erupted behind him, a
breathtaking diamond radiance. Just before exiting he paused and presented a perfectly sculpted profile and an eye that looked like a ten-carat diamond. "I'm going to get my wife and child."

S
amantha let out a gasp and pointed to the screen that was frozen on the woman's face. "Oh my God.
That’s Kassie!"

~~ THE END ~~