Fall From Grace, page 15
part #9 of the Preternatural Chronicles Series
“John has been…lucky…to date. Always finding a last-minute way to wiggle out of death’s clutches.”
The two sat in silence for a few moments as each processed his unspoken meaning.
After coming to a silent consensus, Lily said, “He’ll do anything to make sure the gates open…whether he has John or not.”
“When the last vampire walks the Earth…” Ulric exhaled as he leaned back in his chair, resting his glass on his thigh.
With a wave of his hand, Ulric’s impeccable tie also vanished in a puff of smoke, as did his two top shirt buttons.
Lily wanted to cut to the chase and ask if Ulric was willing to join the side of the Light, but reminded herself the man before her could very well be putting on a show.
Instead, she asked, “What do we do?” while taking another delicious sip of her angelic blood.
Ulric steadily rose to his feet while holding his drink in front of him and made his way to the tall windows that lined the walls behind his desk.
Staring out at a view that Lily hadn’t noticed before, Ulric contemplated.
Lily stood and made her way to stand beside the man, and nearly dropped her glass as she stared out at a sight she hadn’t seen since before becoming immortal.
“Eden…” Lily exhaled, a tear slipping free from the corner of one eye.
“He stole it, when he was cast down to Hell. Hid it here where no angel could ever find it.”
Lily pressed the palm of her free hand against the glass as emotion-filled eyes glided over the scene outside.
A lush, green landscape dotted with hundreds of beautiful animals filled all she could see. A pristine blue lake that could be confused as an ocean sparkled in the yellow sun.
“Uhn,” Lily let out as her free hand covered her gaping mouth. Her vision blurred as she stared at the first home she had ever known. It was just as beautiful as she remembered, or at least how she remembered feeling about her home after thousands of years. Having been human after being cast out of Eden, Lily could only remember her home with a fading memory before Samael had eventually turned her into an immortal. Her preternatural brain had enhanced the faint memory, but by then, it had been nothing more than a feeling that had stayed with her since becoming the first vampire.
“I thought you might like it,” Ulric said, placing a single hand on Lily’s shoulder. She didn’t pull away—didn’t want to pull away in that moment.
“Thank you,” she replied just above a whisper, her throat growing tight with the unbearable desire to weep with joy.
They stood like that for several minutes, each taking in the pure splendor of God’s design nestled in the heart of Hell.
With his hand still on her shoulder, Ulric squeezed once, as if building the courage to say what he wanted to ask.
“This could all be yours, again, you know. Free from the overbearing rule of God.”
Lily’s hand moved back to rest on the glass, longing to romp in the fields and play with the animals once more.
Then his words sunk in, and Lily reinforced the Faraday cage that was blocking her true thoughts just as it was slipping.
“What do you mean?” Lily asked, already suspecting what he was going to offer.
“Be my queen and live in paradise forever.”
Even though she knew the suggestion was coming, the words still impacted her like an invisible punch to her head. Her heart tried to scream John! at the top of its metaphorical lungs, but it was swallowed by sheer will before Ulric could perceive her true feelings.
“Oh?” Lily teased, removing her hand from the window to move some of her long, wavy blonde hair behind her ears. She even made herself blush ever so slightly, not trying to overdo it. Then again, the joy that the thought of living in Eden once more brought her didn’t need to be disguised. “Would he let you have me?”
The hook was baited.
Ulric let his hand slide off Lily’s shoulder as he turned to walk to his desk, where he leaned against the edge. Setting down his glass, Ulric folded his arms over his chest while appearing to chew on his words.
Lily, using all of her mental strength, managed to pull away from the window that held her beloved Eden, and made her way to stand in front of Ulric.
“What is it?” she softly asked, like one lover to another. Now it was her turn to rest a hand on Ulric’s shoulder.
“If there will only be one of us left alive in two years…”
“…then how can we live here, together, for eternity…” Lily finished his thoughts for him, perfectly playing her part.
A portion of her had enough sense to understand it didn’t take much acting, seeing as how he was right. All but one of the last remaining vampires would die to fulfill the prophecy.
“He’ll do it, too,” Lily said for as much her benefit as Ulric’s.
“He believes in the prophecy so much that I fear both you and I are expendable if it means winning. And seeing as how John,” Ulric chuckled at the mention of his once fledgling vampire, “keeps managing to survive…logic would dictate an obvious solution.”
Lily let her hand slide off of Ulric’s shoulders as she actually pondered his words with an unfocused gaze.
Slamming the rest of her drink in one gulp, Lily set the glass next to Ulric, grabbed him by both arms, and asked, “Then what do we do?”
From the corner of her eye, Lily could see Greg’s head fully lifted off the couch as he intently focused on the insane conversation that was not a part of the original plan.
“We kill him.”
21
MAGNI
“Where are you, you son of a bitch,” Magni barked through his teeth while focusing on returning to the control room of his mind.
A feeling of suffocation started growing, as did a pressure that surrounded his entire body.
Fright exploded in his chest, sending an emergency signal to every muscle instructing Magni’s entire body to flex and writhe against this suffocating cocoon of stone.
Panic made Magni drastically shift between wanting to cry like an animal caught in a trap and scream in violent frustration at being completely unable to move. But through it all, a warmth lingered on his shoulder.
“Dad,” Magni breathed out, stilling his raging emotions and freeing his mind.
“This is my body,” he said with absolute confidence and authority.
The constricting prison loosened, shifting from unmoving stone to a dense foamlike substance which reminded Magni of the leather seats in Locke’s car for some reason.
With confidence provided by his feeling of control, Magni willed the portion of darkness in front of his eyes to thin once more so that he might see his enemy and prepare for his next move.
The Ether stood in the center of the room, fixated on the windows that were Magni’s eyes.
Following the direction of his captor’s attention, Magni saw his body was preparing some sort of spell that the young wizard didn’t recognize.
Hands that wavered with distorted energy danced as a mouth chanted incoherent words, sounding to Magni like Mongolian throat singing.
An oval of horrible-looking energy appeared between the thumb and index finger of one of the hands, and the chanting stopped, replaced by a single lingering note.
The free hand opened and smoothly pushed the energy egg, sending it flowing, as if on a current, toward the dark clouds above.
Magni willed more of his container to thin, feeling the importance of whatever was happening and wanting to see where it went.
The oblong ball of energy sunk into the clouds, reminding Magni of tending the castle’s garden with the Fae.
“It’s a seed,” Magni said aloud, understanding what the oval actually was.
The Ether wavered as it turned around without pivoting its body. Instead, the front pushed through itself, switching places with its backside as if it were entirely made of liquid.
Even though the Ether was nothing more than a black silhouette, Magni could feel rage inside eyes that weren’t there as the too tall thing crossed the room in an instant, like the scene from a movie with several frames edited out.
A portion of the stone around Magni’s head vanished as the Ether wrapped its long fingers around his neck, squeezing hard enough to completely crush his airway.
The warmth on Magni’s shoulder remained, once again stifling the panic that demanded to be set free and rage like a hungry fire through dry brush.
Though it hurt, Magni lifted his head and smirked at the creature that was attempting to choke a mental projection that didn’t need to breathe.
The silhouette tilted its head, black smoke continuing to waft from its body as an eyeless face regarded the defiant man.
Magni’s fists clenched, and the entire cocoon of stone evaporated like it had been made entirely out of smoke.
Reaching up with a steady hand, Magni wrapped tight fingers around the Ether’s wrist and began slowly freeing the grip from around his neck, the smirk never leaving his face.
The Ether showed no emotion as its tilted head returned into an upright position. It flew back, its body going incorporeal and slipping from Magni’s tight grip.
With arms outstretched, the smoke wafting around the Ether began to billow like a steam train’s exhaust, filling the control room with black smoke that burned Magni’s eyes.
“You are too late, child. The ritual is complete,” the Ether hissed. “Soon, my maker will be here to devour this universe.”
“John will stop you!” Magni shot back, surprising himself with his own words, which had burst free from his lips without them being told to do so.
The room filled with acrid smoke, blinding and choking Magni, who dropped to his knees in a coughing fit.
“How can he stop The Unspeakable when he cannot even save you?” the Ether said darkly.
The floor went out from under Magni, and he tumbled through the nothingness, a long scream filling the cavernous silence.
22
JOHN
Wind whipped across the five of us as we appeared in the field I had been intensely imagining just before shifting planes to Faerie.
“Are we all here?” I asked, letting go of the hands I held and patting my body in search of any potential sci-fi–esque mutations.
No one answered, and I worriedly looked around to see Locke, Depweg, Meli, and Russell staring up at the sky. Each face wore a different expression, ranging from stern and determined to straight up terrified.
Following their gaze, I slapped on a face of fear at what I saw.
Black clouds lined in glowing white roiled like waves moving at speeds faster than any commercial aircraft could match. Light from the iridescent edges created random, shifting white kaleidoscopes over the land.
I had to grab my beanie as the wind picked up from a steady gust to a straight-up surge. My coat flapped to my side, and I saw the smaller members of the group crouch lower to the ground for fear of being blown away.
Depweg stood like an unmovable mountain as calculating eyes took in the entire battlefield in moments.
His militaristic determination gave me strength, and I let my senses flow around me in search of any information I could gather.
“You know what you have to do!” Locke called out into the wind, leaning forward against the storm, his brown Council cloak billowing like my coat flaps.
All of us nodded except Russell, who looked like he was about to stain his britches. Looking down, I noticed he was actually wearing gray human sweatpants, but he still went without a shirt. The light danced over his ebony skin, providing near perfect camouflage if not for the sweats.
Locke pushed into the wind, grabbing Russell’s arm as he moved, and the pair started walking toward the castle.
I gulped as I noticed the wall surrounding the courtyard had been reduced to rubble and black puddles where the rock floor had been melted in places.
Depweg scanned our surroundings, completely in soldier mode.
Meli grabbed his hand, catching Depweg’s attention. When he turned to her, she hesitated for a moment, and then jumped forward to plant a big kiss on his lips.
The pair remained like that for a few moments, and I forced myself to inspect the land behind me, giving the weres their privacy.
The unmistakable sound of a shifting were caught my attention, even through the rushing wind, and I turned to see a naked Meli falling to all fours.
Tendons lengthened, joints popped, and white fur grew over her entire body in contrast to her brother’s orange coloring.
A huge bobcat creature shook where the human, Meli, had just been. Then she leaped into action and sped toward the city just beyond where the castle walls had been.
I was both impressed and depressed at the shifting-hesitant Meli going full were. It meant that she deemed this situation more dangerous than our mission in Germany. Or maybe she just wasn’t taking any chances this time around, knowing her bobcat form was faster and more deadly, considering we hadn’t grabbed any guns, knowing they would be of little use against the Ether.
Something tugged at my attention as the wind died down, and I looked from the speeding werecat up to the world tree, asking both Depweg and myself, “Why hasn’t it destroyed Yggdrasil?”
Depweg stopped and looked the impossibly giant tree up and down.
Using Mjolnir, I allowed the Sight of the Gods to fill my eyes, and scanned the tree and up toward the sky.
I dropped to my knees as I was metaphorically struck in the head with a sight not meant even for immortal eyes.
Straight above the castle, where Yggdrasil disappeared into the waves of black clouds, was a hole in space. The clouds were pouring in and flooding Faerie, creating a ripple effect similar to dropping a stone into a pond.
But what caught me off guard was what was in the clouds. Countless writhing creatures—or maybe they were appendages attached to a single entity—flowed over one another, just beyond the large hole in the sky.
“Oh God…” I breathed out with a mouth that gaped and eyes that bulged.
“What?!” Depweg asked, grabbing my shoulder and shaking me with one of his powerful hands.
“They are coming…”
23
LILY
“You want to kill…him,” Lily repeated, not daring to say the Lord of Hell’s name while in his dominion.
“Well, perhaps not directly.”
“No, of course not. You would want full deniability just in case your plan failed,” Lily clapped back, intentionally donning a hesitant and doubtful persona.
“Can you blame me?” Ulric said as he pushed off the desk he had been leaning against, picking up his glass as he did. “And you, stop pretending.” He half gestured toward Greg with his hand, using the glass to point rather than taking the effort to literally lift a finger. “I knew you were healed the moment Lily—excuse me, Lilith—foolishly passed some of her energy into you.”
The brief reunion was over, and Ulric had slipped back into a more professional demeanor befitting such an important topic of conversation.
Greg waited a few seconds, considered his options, and shrugged after nothing obvious came to mind.
Lifting his head, the half-centaur shaman, half-human witch repositioned himself on the couch to be more comfortable.
“What do I even call you, boy?” Ulric asked while filling his drink once more, intentionally asking the question while showing Greg his back. Lily instantly recognized the gesture as an alpha predator’s show of being so unafraid that he didn’t even consider the powerful Greg to be a threat.
“Greg,” the shaman answered as he began removing his iron-tipped gloves and stowing them in his satchel. It appeared that Lily wasn’t the only perceptive one between the two.
“Greg?” Ulric asked, this time turning his head to peer at the man sitting on his couch. “Is that short for something?”
Greg took in a breath, obviously ready to partake in the same explanation that he had previously given Lily, when she stepped forward.
Already knowing the answer, but wanting Ulric to be the first to say it aloud, Lily asked, arms folded across her chest, “And what happens after we somehow manage to kill him?”
Ulric smoothly pivoted, holding both hands up at shoulder height with a face that telegraphed, duh. Still holding his drink, he let his free hand drop while bringing the glass to his lips, intelligent, assessing eyes never leaving Lily.
“I don’t follow,” Lily said, playing dumb in an effort to get the maddeningly clever man to say his plan first.
“Oh, but I think you do, Queen Lilith.”
The emphasis on her name threw Lily off for a moment as she tried to detect some hidden message in the simple inflection. But with Ulric, nothing was ever easy.
Then it hit her.
An expression of surprise crossed her features at the ease with which she had achieved her goal, and she went with it. Using the sudden, raw emotion of shock, Lily let herself continue with the charade, especially this close to the finish line.
“You want me to rule Hell as your queen?” she asked softly, looking back to the window that held such a wonderful sight just outside its glass.
And just like that, Lily actually considered the man’s words. It was as if seeing Eden once again had produced an intoxicating cloud of yearning in her mind, poisoning her thoughts and weakening her resolve.
Walking to the window once more, Lily pressed her forehead against the glass while staring at the beautiful animals that lived in harmony at the precise center of Hell.
“Um,” Greg hesitantly spoke up, slowly raising his hand like a student in class.
Seeing Ulric turn his attention to him, Greg asked, “Can, um, I be…like a lord or something?”
Lily slightly tilted her face and stared at Greg’s reflection. A part of her had to appreciate the symbolism the act represented. It was as if Greg was pulling Lily’s mind back to reality. When she focused her attention on his reflection, Eden blurred out.
