Embracing Eternity Page 6

  Something to help her forget.

  Meela swayed on her feet and the image of the girl in front of her wavered.

  Desperation. Loneliness. Living from one day…no, one second to the next. Doing anything she could to make the next breath bearable. She wanted love and safety. She wanted home.

  The child was just like her.

  They were both lost souls.

  She wouldn’t hurt this girl. The child had been damaged enough in her short life.

  Meela used a bit of the precious power she had left to take a more human appearance and make herself visible.

  Her appearance was too sudden. The girl let out a strangled shriek and scrambled to get away.

  “Wait, it’s okay! I’m not going to hurt you.” Dammit, she had already fucked up.

  The girl pressed herself into a corner, her eyes darting left and right, looking around the room like a cornered animal bent on escape.

  Meela took one more step toward the human, then froze when the girl braced to run.

  “Please, I just want to help.” She held her breath as the girl considered her.

  Then the child relaxed, just a little. Still wary, she kept one eye on Meela as she eased down the wall toward the doorway. “I don’t need help.”

  “Is your pimp looking for you?”

  The girl flushed bright red. “I don’t have a pimp.”

  The lie fell from the child’s lips with a lifeless thud, like a brick dropping on concrete. A pimp had already gotten to her, tainted her life.

  “Big D works this area. If you aren’t one of his girls, he’ll hurt you. If you are one of his girls, he’ll hurt you too.” Judging by the bruises on the girl’s face, he already had. He’d beat her to death eventually.

  Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. And at the rate this one was going she’d soon be as damned as Meela.

  Unless…

  “This isn’t a good place to stay at night. I can show you somewhere to go, though.” This was probably a mistake. She was no Guardian and had no business trying to act like one. If the Master found out about this, he would rip her into so many pieces it would take a millennium to regain form.

  “I’ve stayed in worse.”

  “Well, the midnight crowd hasn’t showed yet.”

  The girl gave her a questioning look but didn’t say anything.

  “Drunks and gangbangers looking to have a little fun, mostly. Junkies too, but they are usually too wasted to hurt anyone.” Meela sent the girl impressions of violence and pain. She didn’t have the strength to give a true image. It was just enough to play on the child’s fear.

  “I don’t want anyone to find me.”

  Meela couldn’t tell if the girl meant her pimp, the police or her parents.

  “The place I’m taking you is safe. I…promise.”

  The words carried a clear chime of truth. A promise she meant. How strange. And yet it felt so good.

  The girl nodded, and Meela moved in close. Placing her hand on the crown of the girl’s head, she pressed knowledge into her. Task completed, she let herself fade from the girl’s vision once more. Blinking and disoriented, the girl stumbled out the door. In an hour she’d be safe, tucked away in a bed at the shelter Meela had planted in her thoughts.

  Meela stared at the empty doorway for several minutes after the girl was gone, contemplating her next move. She’d used most of her remaining power sending the girl to safety. She could make it to Evan, but then she’d have nothing left but what it took to hold her true form.

  Her demon form.

  Hunger pangs twisted inside her, racking her body and soul with pain and reminding her of the time before Creation. Cut off from the Most High, those who had followed Lucifer from Heaven had lived in a state of perpetual starvation, never able to feed and unable to find the merciful relief of death. They stole from each other, fought like beasts. Each battle, each theft had scarred their bodies, corrupting the beauty of their angelic forms and changing them into blackened beasts.

  Meela had refused to look at herself, refused to see what she was becoming. Until the day she’d woken to find herself in a pile of tawny feathers. Her wings, once the most beautiful in all the Heavens, had shriveled. The feathers had all fallen out.

  Through it all, the hunger had never eased, not until Evan fed her. He was offering her something she never thought she’d have again, something more than power. More than freedom.

  He was offering her love.

  Her soul felt a tug, the call of Evan’s power urging her to go to him. Hard on its heels, another rumble of hunger left her trembling.

  She needed to feed, and quickly. The streets were full of mortals who were ready, anxious even, to be led astray. Closing her eyes, she summoned the dregs of power within her and left the building.

  * * * * *

  Meela appeared before him in demon form, her red eyes full of hurt and anger. Her white blouse was a sharp contrast to her black scales and the wind lashed the ropes of her hair around her lovely face.

  Despite her altered form and the soiled demon skin she wore, he still saw the lovely and generous spirit she had once been.

  “You left me.” The pain in those words made his heart ache. She’d trusted him to help her and he’d abandoned her instead.

  But what else could he do? If he’d stayed, he would have tried to rescue her and guaranteed the archangels’ retribution.

  More importantly, he’d seen her reluctance to harm the girl, felt her compassion. He knew she wouldn’t hurt the child.

  “I trusted you to do the right thing.”

  She laughed at that, a humorless sound, full of anger. “Only a fool trusts a demon.”

  “Then I am a fool.”

  She stared at him for a long moment before turning away to examine their surroundings. He’d picked an island just outside the city, a place where nature was preserved and they would be safe from the prying eyes of humanity.

  The deep chill of winter had long since sent the smaller residents of the island into their burrows and nests, and the vegetation was locked in winter’s death. There was no power here but his, nothing to steal, no one to feed her. Coming to this place forced her to put herself in his hands, to trust he would take care of her.

  Evan wondered how far he could push that fragile faith.

  “You promised to feed me.”

  “So I did.” He stood firm, did nothing.

  “Well?”

  “I’ll take care of you,” he said, repeating his earlier promise. “All you have to do is ask.”

  Her hands tightened into fists and her face flushed with rage.

  “I didn’t come here to beg for favors.”

  She spun away from him and marched to the edge of the snow-covered clearing with stiff, angry strides.

  “I’m not expecting you to beg.” Evan called himself every kind of an idiot. Of course she would see it that way. He doubted she’d been freely given anything in eons. But he’d been ordered not to offer her sustenance. To give her power without her asking for it would be a direct act of disobedience.

  “Ah, right. You just expect me to ask for what has already been offered.” Her bark of laughter held no amusement. “It always comes down to this for me, doesn’t it? Promises made and promises broken. Well, fuck you. I don’t need your power. Not when there is a dying city full of desperate people at my disposal.”

  He moved behind her, wrapping his arms around her before she could summon enough strength to leave.

  “I am not expecting you to beg.”

  “Then what do you expect?” She pushed against him but he held tight, arms pinned by his and her wings fluttering uselessly against his chest.

  Ah, the one answer he couldn’t give her. If she knew the archangels had forbidden him from offering, she would never believe he could redeem her.

  “What happened this morning?” He dipped his head to place a gentle kiss against the side of her neck. He could smell the taint of evil there, feel th
e residual pain.

  Something had happened, something robbed her of the precious power he’d given her just hours before.

  She stiffened, her body straining away from his.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “He stole it from you, didn’t he?” He kissed the defiled flesh again. She flinched, as if even that light touch had hurt her.

  “I’m his servant. He can’t steal what is already his.” In that moment, she looked and sounded so forlorn it broke Evan’s heart. There was no sign of the proud, confident cherub Evan had loved in this poor lost being.

  What had Lucifer done to her? Reaching up, he tugged the neckline of her blouse aside to examine her tainted flesh.

  “Stop that,” she snapped and tried to pull away once more.

  “Shh.” Her flesh had been shredded. Thick pink scars marked her from neck to shoulder, standing out garishly against her black scales.

  Merciful Heavens, she’d been mauled. The extent of the wounds sickened him. This kind of violence wasn’t about feeding. Pain wasn’t required to take power from even a reluctant being.

  No, this was about viciousness and subjugation. Lucifer tortured her to keep her in line.

  Ah, his poor little lost angel.

  Evan dipped his head and nuzzled the wounds.

  “Ask me,” he whispered against her skin. Leaving her like this was killing him. She wasn’t strong enough to heal and he wasn’t allowed to take away her pain. Not until she said the word. “Just say ‘please’ and I can help you.” He brushed his lips over her scars and willed the word to pass her lips.

  He needed to help her. Had to make it stop hurting. Healing wasn’t the same as offering sustenance, was it? Surely he could do this for her.

  He kissed the spot again, this time flooding the half-repaired wounds with limited power. He let the warmth of it ease through her in a gentle wave, chasing off the chill and wiping away the pain.

  Flesh knitted and the marks faded, disappearing into her skin as if they were never there.

  As her pain eased, so did Meela. She relaxed in his arms, leaning against him like a lover. Her body, chilled by the harsh winter wind, warmed against his. Her soft curves molded to him.

  “What do you want from me, Evan?”

  So much. The improbable. The impossible.

  “I want you to be happy.”

  Her hands cupped his face and she pulled back to look into his eyes. The hard edges of her scales scraped over his skin, a reminder that she was not like him. Not on the outside. Inside though, where it mattered, she still had an angelic nature. He was sure of it. The fact that she was here in his arms and the child was safe was all the proof he needed.

  She deserved to be happy as much as any angel.

  Her demon eyes sparkled like rubies despite the sorrow etched in them.

  “I gave that up when I chose to follow Lucifer. There is no happiness, no joy for me. There never will be again.”

  “I can’t accept that.” Everyone deserved happiness. Especially Meela.

  “Then you will always be disappointed. Forget this quest of yours. Don’t give up your eternity for me. I’m not worth it.”

  Didn’t she know that she would always be worth whatever sacrifices he had to make?

  “Ah, Meela. Don’t you understand? You are my happiness and I would do anything for you. You always have been. I used to live for your smiles, would do about anything to see you grin.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “Why shouldn’t I? It’s true. I always believed that one day, when you smiled at me, you’d stay instead of running off after another seraph. Now your smiles are more precious than ever.”

  She dropped her hands and moved away once more, this time to the center of the clearing. An air of melancholy surrounded her, and an answering heaviness grew in Evan’s chest and he once more had the feeling that time was slipping away from them. There was no hope left in her, and soon she’d harden her heart and lose her sense of longing too.

  He needed Ren and Gabriel to find something soon. He had to save her before it was too late.

  From here, the ice-glazed shoreline was just visible through the skeletal trees, and beyond that the lake stretched to the horizon. An icy wind came from the water, whipping his hair away from his face and making her dreadlocks dance and sway as they lashed around behind her.

  “I believe you feel this now, Evan. But I also believe you must get past this and forget about me. I can’t be the key to your joy. I’ll…I’ll hurt you.” Her face contorted as if the thought of harming him caused her physical pain. “If you don’t move on, I’ll hurt more than you can fathom, and I don’t want to do that to you.”

  He refused to believe that. Meela could never harm him. She cared for him, at least a little, and she’d protect him. It was the way of angels. The fact she was trying to warn him proved that she wouldn’t hurt him.

  A sound caught Evan’s attention, something that should not be there. Something was making its way through the brush. He stepped in the direction of the noise, searching for some sign of movement.

  There. Something dark was shuffling through a patch of dead grasses. But he could not feel the presence of any animal. Whatever was there was not natural.

  It went still and he could just make out a dark outline through the grasses. He reached out to pull them aside.

  “Evan, no!”

  Meela’s warning came too late. The creature leapt.

  Chapter Six

  Evan had a split second impression of a wrinkled face with ratlike teeth and a gaping cavity in its face where a nose ought to be. The creature came at him, going for his throat. Those curved rodent teeth sank into his flesh.

  Demon.

  Thrown off guard by the lesser’s attack, he stumbled backward, tripping over the hem of his robes and falling to the ground, hard.

  He struck at it, swinging his fists and beating his wings about him in an effort to drive it away. It clung, sinking its teeth and claws in tighter with every move Evan made. There was a rush of movement in the dead grasses and more demons appeared.

  They were misshapen beasts. Some had skin, other scales. Some were shaped as rats, others had more apelike appearances. All had sharp teeth and talons that dripped venom. And they were slowly surrounding him.

  One by one, they jumped. Dark blurs of movement launching themselves at him, biting into his flesh. Weakness hit him. His limbs grew heavy and his head spun as the demons siphoned off bits of his power.

  Meela was there, slashing at them with her claws, trying to force them from him. Kicking and hitting at them did no good. Every attempt he made to dislodge the beasts only made them cling tighter, their claws and teeth ripping into his flesh and burning him with their poisons.

  One of them turned on Meela and Evan’s heart stuttered in fear. A demon was slashing at her, gnawing at her. Demon cannibalizing demon. One after the other rushed at her, abandoning him for easier prey.

  She was too weak to endure this. He had to get them off before they consumed her.

  Gathering his strength, he sent a burst of energy through his body and shot a ball of power at the beasts.

  Stunned, they fell from him and began to writhe on the ground. One made a second lunge at Meela, falling just short as she leapt back.

  Evan increased the flow of power, until the little demons began to sizzle. Squeaks and screams came from them as the overload of pure angelic power ripped through them. Their red eyes glazed and their bodies began to still.

  Within minutes they were eerily quiet.

  “What did you do to them?” Meela’s voice trembled and her red eyes were wide with fear.

  “I’m not sure.” He’d wanted to blast the creatures away from her but something else had happened, something unintended.

  “They are…dead?” Meela knelt to touch one. The movement was hesitant, as if she expected it to jump up and attack her.

  The lesser demon’s body crumbled to nothing
more than a pile of dust under her fingertips. The wind from the lake blew over them, dissolving the piles and carrying away the remains of the lesser like so much ash.

  “They are. You destroyed the demons.” Meela looked up and he could feel the burden of her fear redirected at him.

  It wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be.

  “Demons can’t be destroyed.” He barely choked the words out. They didn’t ring with truth, but instead fell like dying creatures from his lips.

  Demons were like angels, infinite beings, weren’t they? A shard of fear pierced him. The concept of mortality, of death and dying, had never occurred to him. If these little demons could be destroyed, what did that mean for the rest of them?

  “Perhaps these are not like us.” Her brow furrowed and her forked tongue flicked over her lips as she stared at the remnants of the lessers.

  “They are demons.”

  “But not the same kind of demon as me. They appeared. They had a beginning.”

  A beginning meant they were not infinite, and if they were not infinite, they could have an end as well. He pushed himself to his feet and moved to examine what was left of one creature. Touching one finger to the ash-like powder, he searched for any hint of a soul and found none.

  It was nothing but blackened dust, fine silt that drifted on the wind.

  He cocked his head to the side and glanced back at Meela. She stood beside one of the larger piles of demon ash, her eyes filled with fear as she scanned the grasses. Did she fear another attack? Had she, like he, suddenly realized the possibility of her own mortality?

  “I had not realized these creatures were so dangerous.” Evan stood and brushed the soil from his fingers. “Do they do this often?” The possibility that demons ate their own hadn’t occurred to him until now, but it would certainly make sense.

  “Sometimes. Demons don’t have angelic protection like humans, so if they can sneak in and steal a bit of power from us, they will. One or two aren’t usually a problem, but when there are larger groups they can be vicious.”