Ascension (Book 4, The Watcher Chronicles) (25 page)

“Oui,” JoJo tells me as I stand back from her. “I have made all the Watchers charms like these, and I have also made us our outfits for the fight.”

“So quickly?” I ask in astonishment.

JoJo shrugs. “I find it hard to sleep with all the excitement. Plus, I wanted to make sure it all fit everyone.”

Malcolm sits the large canvas bag he is carrying on the floor, and JoJo rummages through it pulling out a folded stack of clothing and hands it to me.

“Try this on, mon cheri,” she tells me before digging in the bag and pulling out some more clothes and handing them to Gabe who is still sitting at the table.

“For you,” JoJo says.

She turns to Malcolm. “Could you please go to my studio and grab the bag with the boots, mon amie?”

Malcolm phases and is back almost instantly with our shoes.

“Now,” JoJo says, “I have made sure they will allow you to perform the ghosting we saw in the vision. They will also keep you warm. I did try to make them indestructible, but my power only seems to allow me to make them resistant to natural elements like fire and such. I could not make them have the same properties as my coat.”

“I’m sure that will be enough,” I tell her.

“I hope you are right, cheri.”

Mason phases me up to the bedroom, and I change to make sure everything fits properly.

“Are you sure that’s what you’re wearing in the fight?” Mason asks as he walks around me looking at my outfit.

“Yes,” I say. “Why?  Don’t you like it?”

“That’s the problem,” Mason says, still standing directly behind me. “I think I like it
too
much, especially at this angle.”

I turn around and Mason has to raise his eyes to look at my face.

“Were you just staring at my butt?”

“How could I not?” Mason asks. “It was begging me to.”

I cross my arms and shake my head.

“Don’t even think about it,” I tell him. “We have a lot of work to do today. I don’t have time to play with you.”

Mason smiles and I walk past him to retrieve my baldric and sword from the top of the dresser in the room.

“You are not trapping me with your smile,” I tell him resolutely. “Plus, I want to try something new with you today.”

“Well that always sounds promising,” Mason says, a touch of amusement in his voice.

I turn to face him while I strap on my baldric.

“I want to see if we can take you to the inner realm with us,” I tell him, all joking aside. “You’re part of the fight. You need to see when you need to phase in and take Gabe and Zack out of it.”

“You know with JoJo’s new charms we could help you now,” Mason says.

“No. You can’t be there,” I tell him. “We have to follow the vision. We know we can win that way. If you guys try to interfere, it might just screw everything up. We need to stick to what we know will work.”

“I still want to show you how to wield that sword of yours.”

“Michael seems to be doing most of the fighting for me. I’m not sure it’s necessary.”

“You don’t know Michael will be in control when you go up against Lucifer,” Mason argues. “I would feel better knowing you can swing that thing properly just in case something happens and you end up fighting him instead.”

“He’s right, Jess.”

I look past Mason and see Michael.

“We don’t know what happens between us and Lucifer,” Michael tells me. “It would be better if you knew how to fight back just in case I can’t do it for you.”

I look back at Mason. “Michael agrees with you. Do you have a sword?”

“Of course I have a sword,” Mason says like it’s a silly question. “Who doesn’t?”

I smile. “Then go get it. And could you pick up Chandler on your way back?”

Mason pulls out his phone. “I’ll get Aiden to get everyone else and bring them here.”

It takes about thirty minutes to gather everyone together. We’re all wearing our outfits that JoJo made us to make sure they fit and to make sure we can move in them easily. I have Mason stand in the middle of our circle when we get ready to go to our personal inner realm.

“What happens to Mason if this doesn’t work?” Leah asks me.

“I’m not sure. Hopefully nothing bad,” I reply.

“That’s encouraging,” Mason quips.

I just shrug because I honestly don’t know what will happen if he isn’t brought in with us.

“Here goes nothing,” I say, closing the circle by grasping Chandler’s hand beside me.

Almost instantly we’re all standing in the black interior space of our inner realm.

Mason is standing in the middle of it all and I smile.

“See, I told you it would work,” I say to him and he just rolls his eyes at me.

Mason’s eyes are instantly drawn to the figure behind me.

“Is that your version of Michael?” Mason asks.

I turn around and grab Michael’s hand urging him to stand beside me.

Mason walks over to us.

“Yes, this is Michael to me.”

“Handsomer than I remember,” Mason says extending his hand out to my archangel.

“Don’t blame me,” Michael tells Mason, letting go of my hand to shake Mason’s. “I’m just a figment of her imagination.”

“Why wouldn’t I make you handsome to look at?” I ask.

“Should I be jealous?” Mason asks jokingly.

“Do you really need to ask that?” I tell him.

Mason smiles. “No.”

“Michael.”

We all turn to see Leah and her archangel standing behind us.

Leah’s version of Uriel is that of an older man, probably in his seventies, with a long white beard and short white hair. He’s dressed in a pair of dark blue slacks, white button down shirt and black suspenders. Apparently Leah was going for a grandfather figure.

“Could I speak with you, Michael?” Uriel asks.

In the form Leah imagines him in, Uriel looks like a harmless old man. But I feel Michael’s rage towards his fellow archangel, and I can’t say I blame him one bit.

“You tried to kill my daughter,” Michael says. “I have nothing to say to you, Uriel. It would be best if you left me alone.”

“I’m sorry,” Uriel says and oddly enough I believe him. “I thought I was doing the right thing.”

“You should have trusted our father’s judgment!” Michael yells, startling not just me but most everyone else.

“I know,” Uriel says meekly, his eyes downcast. “And if I could take back what I did, I would. You have to believe that, Michael. Please, I’m begging you for your forgiveness. Let’s heal this rift between us, brother.”

Michael turns his back on Uriel, folding his arms over his chest.

“I can’t,” Michael says. “Now please, just leave me alone.”

Uriel turns away a broken man. Leah places a comforting hand on his back and they walk away from us.

“I think he’s sincere in his apology,” I say to Michael.

“I really don’t care if he is or not,” Michael says to me, not even attempting to hide his anger at his fellow archangel. “When you have a child of your own, you’ll understand why I can’t forgive him for trying to kill Lilly.”

I don’t say anything else. He’s right. I don’t have a child so I can’t really know the hell he went through knowing Uriel, someone he thought of as a friend, plotted to have his only child killed behind his back. It’s a betrayal I feel sure Michael will never forgive.

“Do you think you could show me the fight?” Mason says.

I feel it’s his way of changing the subject.

I look over at Gabe and Gabriel.

“Show us the fight please,” I say to them.

I end up watching the fight three times with Mason.

“Ok,” he tells me after the third time. “I think I have the timing down. We’ll be watching the fight from headquarters. It should be easy enough to swoop in and grab Gabe and Zack.”

“And that’s all,” I say warning him to not try anything else.

“Yes, ma’am,” Mason answers as the fight begins to replay from the beginning. “You know when I got Rafe that staff I didn’t know it would give him that power too.”

I watch future Rafe wield the defensive part of his power.

“It’s impressive,” I have to admit. “So is Leah’s. It’s a far cry from just conjuring a ball of fire in the palm of her hand.”

“Sort of glad to see you get to kick Baal’s ass,” Mason says with a certain amount of pride.

“Me too,” I admit. “And Chandler finally gets his revenge on Levi which seems fitting.”

“Zack’s daggers seem to negate all the princes’ powers,” Mason says.

“How do you know that?”

“They all have a weapon they can call on like Levi’s whip, but none of them are using the weapons in this fight. It’s the only explanation that makes sense. We know the daggers stop them from phasing, and they must prevent them from calling on their weapons too.”

Mason pulls out the broad sword from the scabbard around his waist.

“I think it’s time we started your lessons,” Mason says.

“Are you going to go easy on me?” I ask, jokingly.

“No.”

I look over at Mason and see he’s deadly serious.

“Lucifer will not go easy on you, Jess,” Mason says. “I don’t know how much time I have to prepare you for this fight. It could be tomorrow. It could be next week. It could be a month or even a year from now. I highly doubt the last one but either way you need to be as prepared as I can make you.”

“He’s right,” Michael says beside me. “You need to know how to wield the sword against Lucifer. Mason may not hold back, but he won’t have anger fueling his swings either. Lucifer will. He’ll be angry at you for offering him forgiveness and your friendship, and he’ll be angry with me for abandoning him on this planet and not siding with him in the war. That type of anger would be hard to fight against even in the best of circumstances.”

I pull my sword from its sheath.

“Ok, then. Let’s get started,” I say.

Mason charges me and completely knocks me on my ass.

“Really?” I say to him, rubbing my offended posterior.

He holds out a hand to help me to my feet.

“You need to be prepared for anything,” Mason tells me.

I try to shake off the fall and hold the sword out in front of me with both hands.

“Come on then,” I tell him. “Do your worst.”

For the next two hours, Mason forces me to either defend myself or keep falling on my backside. I end up spending most of the first hour on the snow covered ice of the vision but by the time we enter the second hour, I’m able to make him fall back some.

“Jess,” Michael says to me when Mason and I break away for a breather, “don’t forget you can fly. Use it to your advantage.”

“I’d completely forgotten about that,” I admit. “I was just trying to keep him at bay and not get knocked on my ass every five minutes.”

Michael smiles. “Fly instead of fall,” he advises. “Otherwise, you’ll be sitting on a cold pack for the rest of the night.”

“I think I already need one,” I admit.

I begin to wonder if Rafe’s power would allow him to heal my bruised posterior but quickly squash that thought. I seriously doubt Mason would want another man to touch me there even if it is only to heal. I could call my dad.

Uh, no. That’s an even worse idea. I think we would both end up being embarrassed by the situation. I just need to take Michael’s advice and fly the next time I feel like I might fall.

For the next two days, all we do is practice the fight in our private inner realm. Each night I have Mason massage out my sore spots from our sword play. He doesn’t seem to mind, and I have to admit it does feel rather good.