Pretty Dark Nothing (30 page)

“Do I know you?”

“You don’t remember?”

Aaron shook his head.

“Then let me refresh your memory.” Azrael grabbed Aaron by the throat and lifted him into the air. His legs dangled, a rag doll in his grip. He jerked and clawed at Azrael’s hands, gasping for breath as his lungs burned. Azrael brought Aaron’s forehead to his lips and kissed him. A Judas kiss.

Lightning slammed into his mind, and his body shuddered as the electricity crackled through his veins. Tossing him to the ground, Azrael extended his wings, a black shadow against the strange glittering sky. Aaron clutched his head and rolled with pain as millennia of memories seared through him. Each one stabbed at him, drawing forth a clear image of his previous life, faster and faster the images flashed until they reached the pivotal moment.

Out of sight to the mortal eye, Kaemon paced the length of the small hospital room as the woman screamed in pain. He despised the idea of watching a tiny, squalling, smelly thing for the rest of its short, pathetic life. This was Sentinel work. He was Elite, a warrior, protector of the realms. It was beneath him to guard one baby, a human at that.

The Dominions had bound Kaemon to this burden. Their pompous declarations of duty were said to come from the top, the Light itself, and Kaemon had best obey or risk dishonor.

“Another push, Katherine. You can do it.” The nurse wiped sweat from the woman’s brow.

Kaemon ached to unfurl his wings, but the small labor room restricted his twelve-foot span of golden-red feathers. He fought the urge to shoot through the roof and fly free. How Sentinels endured such claustrophobic situations vexed him. He had no choice but to wait by the bed of this human woman, whether he liked it or not.

The woman screamed again. Kaemon paced faster as shadows gathered in the corners. Let them come; he was ready. His charge would take its first breath soon, and his assignment would begin. Eighteen years for the child’s power to fully manifest, if it survived, and he had to sit and fend off the darkness until then. Duty be damned. His hand caressed the golden hilt of his sword.

“I see the head.” The doctor locked eyes with the woman. “Push.”

Kaemon stopped mid-stride and held his breath. The child burst forth into the world in a tide of blood and mucus. Perfectly pink, wrinkled, and squalling like a banshee.

The darkness coiled to strike. The dark ones gathered in the corners, waiting. They would kill the newborn and its latent power while it was at its weakest. He flexed his fingers, gripped the hilt of his sword, and readied himself.

The baby would be most vulnerable at the transition from a symbiotic soul, to a lone newborn. They would attack the moment the cord was severed.

The child howled as the doctor cleaved the connection to its mother, as if it sensed the danger the separation brought.

Two shadows leaped forward. Kaemon drew the Qeres blade from its scabbard. The curved blue star-metal rang out the hour of her birth for all to hear. The beasts quailed at the sound, sensing the prophesy of their death in the rare and ancient sword’s venom. The Dominions had not sent an ordinary Sentinel to watch her. Millennia of training had earned Kaemon the rank of Elite, carrier of the Qeres star blade, one of the chosen few.

He slashed, striking as quick as a snake. The beasts blinked and scattered before his fury. Wisps of dark smoke curled around him as he snuffed them out. One by one, the Qeres poison worked through their twisted souls, turning them to dust.

A few remaining demons hissed and backed into the shadows. The dark ones would be cautious now, crafty, but they wouldn’t give up. Not when their future hung on the hidden power possessed within the soul of this child.

The threat gone, for now, he sheathed his weapon and stared down at the tiny bundle as it sucked life from its mother’s breast. Amazed at how small and fragile it looked, he came forward to examine it closer. A girl. She looked like any other human baby, nothing special. He stroked the porcelain skin of its hand with a finger. The child stopped sucking and looked at him. They locked eyes, and she curled her tiny fingers around his.

Lightning struck within him as she tethered herself to him. In that moment, an unbreakable bond formed. Love, pure and strong, surged through him. He never wanted to leave her side. He would risk everything, even mortal death, to protect her.

A moment later, she looked through him. Her soul had completed its journey into life, into the human realm. She wouldn’t know him or remember him. He would be her invisible protector until her latent powers fully manifested, and she was old enough to choose her destiny for herself. Then he would be dismissed, and her training would begin.

The years spent watching her were the happiest and most agonizing of Kaemon’s immortal life. He could touch her mind, influence her. Their bond allowed him to warn her of danger, block the darkness. She knew something protected her, he felt her gratitude, her awe of him. He even thought she might love him. If only she could see him.

When her father broke her heart, Kaemon stayed by her side, night and day. Quinn sobbed into her father’s white t-shirt. She had found it at the bottom of the laundry basket, left behind in his haste to run off with that woman. As he packed his bag, Quinn begged him not to leave her. Kaemon had wanted to kill him where he stood, but killing humans was strictly forbidden.

He had wrapped his golden-red wings around her, his heart breaking with hers. He probed her mind, seeking out the grief that shadowed her heart. Their bond allowed him to radiate comfort, safety, and love through the center of the pain. She relaxed, but only for a moment. A clumsy but effective wall rose to block his thoughts and keep him from influencing hers. For the first time, she deliberately shut him out.

Her reaction stung. He could push through, force her to accept his invocation, but her rejection set him to brooding. If she didn’t want him there, why should he force himself on her?

“She wants the warm touch of a human. Not some cold, ethereal creature.”
The demons preyed on his thoughts.

His knuckles whitened as he gripped the hilt of his sword, never taking his eyes off Quinn, lying on her bed, inconsolable. “Be gone, or I’ll draw the Qeres.”

An empty threat. His heart had weakened in love. The fight drained out of him with every moment of his vanity. They sensed his weakness, his thirst to live in human flesh so he could touch her.

“Look at you, Elite. Bah, we’ve seen Sentinels with more fight than you.” The shadows circled, bold sharks waiting to feed on the turmoil. “Draw your blade, if you dare. Do you even remember how to use it?”

He took the bait, drawing the blade and pressing an attack. The demons arched back, laughing.

“Is that all you’ve got? She doesn’t need you anymore. She’s safe in the arms of another. Too long you’ve been tethered to this weak child. You’re no warrior. The Dominion has reduced you to a common Sentinel. And for what?”

He slashed down, nicking one in the wing. It howled in pain as the poison ate through its body.

“That’s it, Sentinel. Do your duty.”
The world exploded in wisps of evil smoke, blinking around him, fetid breath taunting him. He pressed the attack instead of defending, as the Dominion had ordered.

“They want you on a leash, Sentinel. While the other Elites win victory and honor in battle, you sit here, mooning over a human girl.”

They switched their focus to Quinn, their slithering dark tendrils reaching for her.

“Don’t touch her,” he growled.

“Who’s going to stop us?”
The tendrils melted onto the skin of her hands, her face, turning her from translucent porcelain to gray as death.

Rage thrummed through him. He swung the sword in a great, sweeping arch, cutting through the tendrils as they attached themselves to Quinn. He would show them the true meaning of Elite. The ones touched by the blade screamed and withered in death. The gray scales fell from Quinn, and he pressed on. The remaining demons retreated, a murder of crows scattering across the world to hide from his wrath. Lost in a warrior’s rage, he flew after them, leaving Quinn alone and forgotten.

He hunted them, one by one, tracking one to a small graveyard next to the ruins of a gothic church. It hid among the gravestones, cowering at his presence. He drew his weapon, ready to rid the world of another dark spirit.

“Wait,”
it pleaded.
“I can help you. To be with her, as that boy is. As a human.”

“Lies.” But his heart wanted to believe, and so he stayed his hand.

“We know of those who hold the secrets. The Powers. They hold dominion over births and deaths, do they not? They can make you human.”

“How do you know this?” Could the ancient myth be true? Was there a way to cast off his immortality? Holding Quinn in his arms would be worth the sacrifice.

“I was a Powers, once, befores the falls. I remembers,”
it hissed.
“Seek the Powers, and yous will finds the answer. Seek Azrael.”

Azrael. He knew the name. He had been the Power who attended to Quinn’s making. He sheathed the Qeres blade. “If you lie, I will hunt you down and kill you where you stand.”

The demon’s head bobbed up and down. Then he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Azrael. He closed his eyes, sending out probing threads, searching for the hum of Azrael’s psychic signature. He sensed him within the concrete walls of a hospital, a few hundred miles away. Unfurling his golden wings, he launched into the air.

At the hospital, Azrael hovered over a pale boy in a metal bed. Machines beeped and whirred around him, and a breathing tube protruded from his mouth. The smell of imminent death permeated the atmosphere. Azrael wrapped his dark wings around the frail body, golden sword drawn and ready to separate the soul from the flesh.

“Ah, Kaemon. I sensed you would come.”

“Then you know what I want?”

Azrael nodded. A woman and a girl stood beside Azrael, waiting for their beloved to join them. A bright tunnel stretched behind them, a portal to the next realm, to the city of Arcadia.

“Perhaps there is a way.” Azrael looked at the boy and smoothed his dark hair from his forehead. “Is she worth it, Kaemon? Is she worth throwing everything away?”

“Yes.” Kaemon rasped through clenched teeth.

“Then give me your blade.”

Kaemon hesitated.

“Your blade, before it’s too late.” Azrael held his open palm in expectation. “Or have you changed your mind? Is her love not everything you long for?”

He pulled the blue Qeres sword from the scabbard. It sang as it came clear. Azrael took the hilt and brandished the weapon in great, sweeping arcs. Kaemon stared, mesmerized by the rhythmic pulse of the light as it illuminated Azrael’s wicked grin. Then, Azrael lashed out, dragging the blade down and across Kaemon’s bare chest.

Kaemon cried out. The slow poison of the Qeres dripped into his body. His wings withered. Golden-red feathers fell, one by one like autumn leaves to the ground. He fell against the bed, panting. Azrael shoved him backward and into the boy’s waiting flesh. Lightning struck as their minds melded. The boy, Aaron, seconds from death, reached for his mother and sister, and his life force ebbed in response.

Kaemon felt the boy’s heart, his heart now, slow. Azrael placed his hand on the boy’s chest. A cold burn surged through him, and he saw Aaron rise up from his body. Azrael drew his golden sword and slashed down, separating the boy’s soul from his mortality. A pain ripped through Kaemon as he watched Aaron walk into a portal of light with Ruth and his mother.

He couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe. Everything felt wrong, heavy. He struggled against the constraints of the boy’s boundaries.

“You wanted to be mortal. Kaemon. His life and death are now yours, for what it’s worth.” Azrael held his hand up and turned away as a beam of light shot from his palm through Aaron’s body. Azrael smiled as the light seared away all his memories as he, Aaron, awoke to an unfamiliar world.

Suddenly, the pressure eased, releasing Aaron from the past and snapping him back to reality. Aaron’s eyes widened at Azrael as the last of Kaemon’s memories slid into place

“So you finally remember, old friend.” He sneered at Aaron. “Have you enjoyed your life as this … human? Was it everything you had hoped for?”

Aaron rolled away, panting. “You tricked me,” he snarled.

“Did I?”

“You wanted me out of the way. Why?”

“You came to me. You wanted to be human. You let pride and vanity spur you. Leaving her vulnerable was your own doing. And now look.” Azrael motioned to Quinn’s lifeless body. “I forged her soul myself. Do you know how many millennia it took me to find the right mix of angel and demon spirit not to overwhelm a human soul? How many humans I had to manipulate into breeding to get the perfect balance? The Light demanded it, and I obeyed. And what did I get in return? As her maker, I should have been her Sentinel, not you. It was my destiny. You forced me to take matters into my own hands. You brought this on yourself, on her.”

Aaron raised his arms and exposed his chest. “Kill me if you want, Azrael, like you killed her. My purpose died with her.”

Azrael placed the tip of the blue-star sword above Aaron’s heart.

A surge of current jolted Aaron’s mind and then faded, the psychic equivalent of restarting a dead battery. He glanced at Quinn; she turned on her side, curled into a tight ball. Tears of relief spilled down his cheeks as their connection sparked to life. Backing away from the cold blade pointed at him, he reached for her, sending strength through the tenuous link.

“Aaron?” Quinn rasped.

“You didn’t really believe I would kill my own offspring, did you? You’re a bigger fool than I ever imagined.”

Rage consumed Aaron. He whirled and snatched for the blue sword hanging on Azrael’s hip. Within a blink, Azrael had moved behind him and put the sword against Aaron’s throat. “Do you know what havoc can be reaped with a Qeres blade?” The tip of the blade pulsed against his skin, calling to his angel blood. He remembered the feel of Kaemon’s sword in his hands, his sword. If only he could get it, he could destroy Azrael.