Wicked Nights

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

ANNABELLE STRUGGLED to breathe. Her throat was horribly swollen, the airways already partially blocked. What little oxygen she managed to draw in only exacerbated the problem.

Demons dropped from the sky, homing in on her like heat-seeking missiles. No matter where she hid—inside bushes, the tops of trees, holes in the ground—they found her as if she had a neon sign pulsing above her head. Here. She’s here.

She had more injuries than she could count, and the wings…those hideous wings that had grown into misshapen branches with bulbous membranes rather than feathers completely unbalanced her. Didn’t help that a dead demon corpse was slung over her shoulder, slowing her down. But she couldn’t move on without him.

“Hey, what you doing? Massster callsss.”

Annabelle jolted as the speaker came into view. On a limb just above her, a half man, half snake demon, like the one Zacharel had killed the night they’d met, followed her, his tail winding and unwinding as he slinked forward.

The demons kept doing this, talking to her as if she was one of them. But then, maybe she was. Scales had replaced her skin, claws had replaced her nails, and she had no idea what had happened to her face, could only feel the grotesque differences in the shape of her bones.

The transformation had happened as she’d fought the demon in the cloud, each change coiling from the burn in her chest, a burn that had spread, worsening as her fear had deepened, sharpening as her anger had grown. She’d tried to calm herself, even after she’d managed to win the battle, but by the time she’d made the connection between her body and her negative emotions, it had been too late.

“Come. And why you carry dead anyway?” He reached for her. “To eat? I help eat.”

“Don’t you dare come near me!” she shouted, the world going dark for only a second. Less than a second, really.

But when she refocused, fresh blood covered her shaky hands, dripped from her gasping mouth. The vile taste of it even coated her tongue. And the snake…his body was in pieces and scattered at her feet.

She hunched over and vomited. This, too, kept happening. Demons approached and she momentarily blacked out, only to find them dead when she resurfaced. I don’t just look like a demon, I’m becoming one.

What would happen if Zacharel found her like this? Would he reject her? Kill her? Or would she black out and kill him?

A sob lodged in her throat as she hefted her burden back on her shoulder. I can’t be one of them. There’s another explanation, surely.

A thick tree root tangled with her foot, and her foot lost, propelling her face-first into the dirt and twig-laden ground. Stars winked through her vision on impact, but somehow, she maintained firm hold of her burden.

She scrambled up. The demon’s headless torso slammed against her back, pressing against new tendons and bending her wings, making her cry out. She wasn’t sure—

Something else, something harder, slammed into her from behind. Her feet were swept out from underneath her and she smashed into the dirt. This time, she did lose her hold and the demon shot forward, flipping end over end before smacking into a tree.

Before Annabelle could react or right herself, equally hard fingers were daggering into her scalp, jerking her up, twisting her around. Fierce emerald eyes peered down at her, Zacharel’s face so overcome with rage his features were actually altered. His cheekbones appeared sharper, his lips thinner. Even his body seemed bigger, his muscles straining the fabric of his robe.

“Zacharel, please. Let me go before I—”

“Be silent.” He backhanded her, and if he hadn’t been holding on to her dress with his other hand, she would have smacked into another tree. “You do not speak unless I tell you. Understand?”

A thousand other stars winked through her vision. He shook her, and she cried out.

“What did you do with the human girl?” He got in her face, placing them nose to nose. “I know you did something, for you smell of her.”

Stay calm. “I—I am her. I’m Annabelle.” Her jaw was already swollen, the two parts refusing to work properly. Could he understand her? “I’m Annabelle.”

His eyes slitted dangerously. “You are not.”

Oh, yes. He could understand. He simply did not believe.

His grip lifted to her neck, and he hauled her off her feet, her legs dangling. He kept her suspended like that for several heart-stopping moments. All the while she kicked at him. He was going to kill her. Here, now, he would choke the life out of her, thinking she was a demon. And he wouldn’t be pleasant about it, wouldn’t make it easier for her.

“Taste…” she managed to gurgle out. Taste the truth.

A twig snapped a few feet behind him. He dropped her as he spun. As she gasped for breath, she crab-walked backward. If she could stand, she could run. If she could run, she could hide until she figured out a way to get through to him. But her legs failed her, the muscles like two-ton boulders.

She watched as Zacharel produced his sword of fire and struck, burning through a bush. A sharp cry was released—and then cut off abruptly. The scent of charred leaves and rotten fish filled the air, wafting on a sudden, frigid breeze. A thump, a demon head rolling, followed by another thump as the body fell forward.

He spun to face her, the sword still in his hand. One step, two, he approached her.

“Zacharel. D-don’t. Me. Annabelle. Taste. Truth.”

Still he approached.

Annabelle blinked, darkness closing in around her. “Please…taste…”

“I will never taste a demon.”

“Words…taste…words…” She met his gaze as long as she could, waiting, hoping…slipping into darkness.

ZACHAREL WATCHED as the female demon stood on suddenly steady feet. Between one blink and the next, her eyes went from ice-blue to blazing crimson, the silky length of her blue-black hair lifting from her scalp as if she’d just been struck by lightning. Nails elongated into daggerlike claws, and—

Ice-blue eyes. Like Annabelle.

Blue-black hair. Like Annabelle.

It’s me, Annabelle.

He stilled, his study of the creature intensifying. She wore a red dress similar to the one Driana had worn at the club. The material was ripped, gaping and bloodstained. Dark green scales covered her body—a body shape his hands knew intimately. Her shoulders were stooped, with monstrous wings stretching from around her back, the ends twisted into sharp little knots and points.

Taste the truth.

Demons were liars and tricksters, but when he smacked his lips, it wasn’t a lie or a trick that he tasted. He savored the sweet taste of truth.

The being in front of him was Annabelle.

How had this happened? And oh, Deity, what had he done? Thrown her. Hit her. Choked her. Zacharel released his grip on the sword, the flames instantly dying away. Shame unfurled inside him, dropping him to his knees.

No wonder he could smell Annabelle on her. She truly was Annabelle. And he had hurt her. Hurt her terribly. He would never be able to forgive himself.

He remained in place as she closed the distance between them. “I am sorry, so sorry, Annabelle.” Would he never take proper care of her? Would he always bring her pain?

Her head tilted to the side, as if she heard him, understood him, but the crimson in her eyes brightened, as if she cared not about his apology. And in the ensuing minutes, she proved that very thing. Her claws slashed at him, her little fists beat at him. She twirled with a skill she had not previously possessed, cutting at him with the tips of her wings.

Not once did he attempt to stop her. He deserved this. He deserved this and so much more, and if she wanted to take his head, he would give her his head. I’m worse than any demon.

Finally, though, she jumped away from him and stopped, just stopped and blinked.

“Annabelle?”

She wavered, closed her eyes. A moment passed before she was able to refocus, but when she did, he realized her irises had returned to that startling shade of ice-blue.

“Annabelle!” He leapt to his feet.

“Zacharel?” At least, he thought she’d said his name. The word was jumbled, nearly inaudible.

“I’m here.” Steps slow and measured, he approached her. He didn’t want to rattle her.

As though a strong wind had just slammed into her, she teetered over, fell.

He whipped into motion, catching her before she hit and easing her down. “I’m so sorry, love. I didn’t know it was you.”

Tears filled her eyes, spilled down her cheeks. “Zacharel,” she repeated in that same broken tone.

“Yes, love. I’m here.”

A gurgle of panic left her. Was she scared of him now?

She squeezed her eyelids tightly shut. “Did I…kill you?”

Her poor mind couldn’t distinguish between reality and nightmare. “No, love.” He caressed a fingertip along her bruised jaw. Hadrenial had pleaded for death. Annabelle had pleaded for life. Look what he’d done to them both. Hate myself.

How many hours, days, weeks had he agonized over his decision to do what his brother asked and strike the killing blow? And afterward, when the decision had been made and the action done, how hard had he cried? So hard he’d broken nearly all of his ribs. So hard he’d vomited blood. But even then, he hadn’t wanted to die himself. He’d wanted to live and avenge. Now, he would have welcomed a killing blow.

“You didn’t kill me. I live.”

She coughed, a trickle of blood sliding from the corner of her mouth. When she settled, she whispered, as though ashamed, “Something’s…wrong…me.”

His voice remained low, gentle. “I know, love, but we’ll find a way to fix you.”

“Demon…in cloud…he waited, tried to take brother…I—”

“Shh. Don’t worry about that right now.”

Still she persisted. “Didn’t let… Fought.”

“I know, love, I know, so tell me what happened later, all right? Right now, I want you to drift off to sleep. All right? I will protect you, I swear it.”

“No! Listen!” she said with a sudden burst of strength. “You can’t leave the demon behind….” Her body sagged, the strength gone as quickly as it had arrived. “Have to take him…with you…” Muscles going limp. “His body…please.”

Understanding at last dawned. The slain demon must now carry Hadrenial’s essentia. And she had been carting that heavy weight around, trying to escape, fighting for her life, because she had vowed to protect Zacharel’s greatest treasure.

“I won’t leave him behind, love. Sleep now,” he said again. In sleep, she would not feel the pain. She would heal.

She had better heal.

“Thank you,” she said on a sigh, her head lolling to the side, but her eyes blinked open, as if she didn’t trust him enough to do as he’d asked.

Thank you, she’d said.

Thank. You.

Two words that would forever haunt him. He did not deserve her thanks, and he was certain he would not receive it again when she awoke and came to her senses.

Not knowing what else to do, he pinched her carotid, stopping the flow of oxygen to her brain, forcing her to pass out. A mercy, and yet his shame nearly suffocated him.

So badly he wanted to pour what remained of the Water of Life down her throat. Anything to save her. But he couldn’t. He wasn’t sure what had been done to her, and he was too afraid the liquid would act as poison to her, as it did with other demons.

She’s not a demon! instinct shouted.

He tenderly laid her on the ground, then rushed to strap the dead demon to his back. When he returned to Annabelle, he gathered her close to his chest and stood, careful not to damage her wings further. Her weight barely registered, she was such a slight thing.

Slow and easy, he flew to his former leader’s cloud and demanded entrance. As he waited, Annabelle began to shiver. Her body temperature was too low—because she’d lost too much blood?

The cloud opened to him, and he glided inside. To his despair, Lysander was not the one to greet him. Instead it was Bianka, Lysander’s female, a Harpy with an affinity for trouble and wickedness.

Chewing gum, she looked him and Annabelle over, twirling a strand of her long black hair around her finger. “About time you brought me a cloud-warming gift, but did you have to pick one of the ugliest demons I’ve ever seen?”

“That was so rude, insulting the warrior’s present like that,” another female said. Kaia, Bianka’s twin sister, strode over, a half-empty bottle of Boone’s Farm in her hand. In Burden’s office, what seemed forever ago, she had been dressed for war. Now she was wearing an angel robe and all about relaxation. “Besides, I’ve seen way uglier.”

“Enough,” he growled. Witnessing the twin sisters and their us-against-the-world rapport used to fascinate, reminding him of what he could have had with his brother. Just now, only Annabelle mattered.

The girls looked at each other and giggled, and it was then he knew. They were drunk.

“Why don’t you put it over there,” Bianka said, pointing to someplace behind her, and then beside her and then in front of her, “next to the demon-skin rug I’ll probably give you for Christmas. Or under the table. Or better yet, on the porch where it might be accidentally on purpose kicked to the earth.”

How did his leader stand her? “Where is Lysander?”

She flashed her fangs at him, suddenly irritated. “Someone, and I won’t mention your name, Zach, abandoned his post at the Deity’s temple, which meant my man had to step in and save the day. So I decided to have a girls’ night.”

Another crime Zacharel would be forced to answer for, but that was not a current concern. “My woman needs tending. If you will show me to a bedroom—”

“Told you Big Z had the hots for someone,” Kaia burst out.

“And I told you to stuff it. Guaranteed he misspoke just now.” Bianka anchored her hands on her hips. “Tell my sister you don’t have the hots for a woman. Or a demon. Or anything with a pulse.”

“She is not a demon,” he shouted, the intensity of his anger shaking the cloud.

The black-haired Harpy cringed and clutched her ears. “Uh, do you want to pipe down before I rip out your tongue and slap you with it? Word on the street is, there’s such a thing as an inside voice. I’m skeptical, but do me a favor and give it a try.”

He forced his voice to gentle. “Annabelle is human. My human. She needs help. Now.”

“Let’s back this word train up. A puzzle piece just slid into place inside my magnificent brain. That’s Annabelle?” Kaia stepped forward, clearly intending to brush Annabelle’s hair out of the way and study her face.

He snapped his teeth at her. While he lacked fangs, he did not lack menace. “No touching.”

Kaia acted as if she hadn’t heard him and did exactly as she wanted. Typical of the Harpies. “Okay, wow. It is. What happened to her?”

“I’m not sure.” But I will find out, and I will fix it as promised. “Bedroom. Now. Please,” he added, hoping against hope that would work. With Harpies, you had a fifty-fifty chance of getting what you wanted—or dying.

“You better do it, B,” Kaia said with a sigh. “You know how Lysander gets all wussed-out when you so much as scrape a knee? Well, Zach here is worse with his little princess. Maybe ’cause she’s human and so inferior. Although I think we can scratch the word human from her list of descriptions.”

“She is not inferior,” he roared. “And she is human.”

Bianka studied him for several long, silent minutes. “You’re right, Kye. Zach is worse. So, all right, come on, angel. This way.” She skipped down a hallway.

He trailed after her, leaving a line of snow in his wake.

“Hey, Zach,” Kaia called. There was a pause, the sound of gushing liquid and then a few gulps. She must be drinking straight from the bottle. “You do realize you’ve got a headless demon strapped to your back, right?”

“Of course. I put him there.”

Bianka stopped and waved her hand through the baby-blue mist beside her, a doorway appearing.

Zacharel brushed past her and stepped inside.

A large bed waited in the center, perfect for warrior angels with above-average wingspans, and now perfect for humans with demon wings. He tenderly placed Annabelle on the mattress, smoothed the hair from her face and drew the covers over her body. “We won’t stay long. Demons sense her, wherever she is, and attack.”

“Kye and I just happen to be in need of a good fight. Stay as long as you want.”

That was the thing with the Harpies. They might irritate him, but they always had his back. Even better, they were amazingly skilled warriors. Still, tossing Bianka and Kaia into a dangerous situation—while they were drunk—was a guaranteed way of earning the ire of Lysander and every Lord of the Underworld.

“Thank you, but we’ll be gone within the hour.”

“Dude, you are so missing out on the best nunchuck skills ever, but whatever. I offered, and that’s all I can do—before I pretend you never spoke and do exactly what I want.” He heard footsteps, a grumbled “Save some wine for me, you hussy!” then only the rasp of Annabelle’s breathing.

He removed the demon from his back, the body flopping lifelessly to the floor. The disgusting creature must have opened the urn and touched what it contained inside, the essentia instantly absorbing into his skin.

Zacharel misted his hand, reached inside the creature’s chest and—yes, felt the warm flood of his brother’s essentia against his palm, the fizz of something more than blood, seeking him, wanting out of the demon’s shell.

For a moment, Zacharel was transported back to the night he’d done this to his brother. Just as before, he held tight, and when he pulled his hand free, something thick and clear coated his skin. Something…what was left of his brother. Will not react.

Before a single drop could absorb into his body, he commanded the cloud to produce an urn. He scraped the rim from fingertip to elbow, until every bead had fallen into the container. After sealing the lid, he shoved the urn into a hidden pocket of air. Angels and demons alike would be drawn to it, but he would never again make anyone else responsible for its safeguarding.

Zacharel turned his attention to Annabelle. He cleaned her up, bandaged her wounds and dressed her in a warm, fur-lined robe. All the while, emotions threatened to overwhelm him. More of the shame, more of the fury, helplessness and hopelessness. He couldn’t imagine what had been done to her, to turn her into this. Even when a demon possessed a human’s body, the appearance of that human was never altered.

Annabelle was a demon’s consort—in theory, not in truth, he thought as a wave of possessive heat moved through him—but she would have transformed four years ago, at the moment of her marking, if the act was destined to change her. So…what did that leave? Not that he minded her appearance. She had been beautiful before, but she was equally beautiful now. She was simply his Annabelle. But she would be bothered, and he could not bear that.

Zacharel eased beside her and traced his thumb along her scaled cheekbone. A soft sigh left her as she leaned into his touch. She might do the opposite when she awoke, and turn away from him. She would remember what he’d done to her, how he’d hurt her. She would probably run from him.

He swallowed back a roar of denial. If she wanted to run from him, he would have to let her. He could never atone for what he’d done to her. Never. But he could follow and protect her for the rest of his days. If that meant giving up his place in the heavens, so be it.

She would have to be an important part of his life, Haidee had said.

She was. Far more important than his job, his home.

Unable to stop himself, he touched her now, while he could, and the more he stroked her, the more—sweet Deity, the faster her wound began to heal and her scales began to diminish, until only bronzed skin remained. The wings withered, finally disappearing from view.

His human Annabelle was back. How, why, he didn’t know, but he offered up a prayer of thanks, anyway, something he hadn’t done in centuries.

A rustle of clothing sounded behind him, and he spun, drawing his sword.

Lucien, the Lord of the Underworld possessed by Death, held up his hands, palms out. Black hair shagged over his forehead, and his lips curved down, a thick, jagged scar bisecting one corner. “Whoa there, angel. I come bearing news.” Fatigue dripped from each of the words.

Zacharel released the sword, barely registering when it vanished. Urgency battered him. “Tell me.”

“Amun finished digging through Burden’s secrets. The high lord you’re looking for, the one who claimed Annabelle, is named Unforgiveness.”

Unforgiveness. The name echoed through his mind. Finally, an answer and yet, relief was not forthcoming. “I have never fought him.” Had heard of him, yes. Who hadn’t? The baddest of the bad, the worst of the worst. Zacharel had hunted him the few times he’d heard the demon had been summoned by a human, but always Unforgiveness managed to hide before his arrival.

“Thank you,” he said to Lucien, already relaying the information to Thane.

We managed to capture three more minions, Thane said inside his mind. We’ll find out what they know about this Unforgiveness.

Lucien inclined his head in acknowledgment. “You’re welcome. And now I hope we’re even and never have to work together again.” With that, the warrior disappeared.

Zacharel bundled Annabelle in the blanket from the bed and lifted her into his arms. More than not wanting to draw the demons to Bianka’s cloud, he did not want Annabelle waking up and lashing out at anyone but him.

Oh, Annabelle. Will you ever be able to forgive me, when I’m not sure I can forgive myself?