Embrace, Entice, Emblaze (93 page)

“Yeah, well, on the upside, I talked to him last night, told him you were out getting takeout. He sounded worried, but by the time I’d finished jabbering on about all the stuff we’ve been doing, he was fine.”

Thank God for Steph. And Dad, he just made it too easy, but

right now I couldn’t complain.

“On the downside?” I asked, knowing there was more.

“He saw the Amex bill and didn’t buy the story I gave him about you needing a thousand dollars worth of urgent school supplies.

He said he’d be expecting an explanation. I suggest starting with

‘I’m not on drugs!’”

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I shrugged. It wasn’t ideal, but I could manage that. I was sure I could produce a few utility bills he hadn’t been following and make up a few extra expenses. It was the least of my worries.

“Are you staying over?” I asked.

Steph hesitated. “If…you know, if that’s okay.”

“Things still crappy at home?”

“Sort of.”

“Maybe we could go get an early breakfast at the mall before

school?” I said, reinforcing that she was welcome to stay at mine.

I really wanted to just sleep for weeks, but it would be nice to do something normal and I owed her a good talk. She clearly had

things to fill me in on.

Steph nodded and gave me a nudge. It was all that was needed

with us.

We turned the corner, the burnt orange doors to Hades shining

at the end of the road.

I felt him as if the senses rose up from the ground, wafted like a heat wave. My grip on Steph’s arm tightened. His senses made me anxious, they were so powerful. But they weren’t at full force. He was holding back, just letting me know.

Jude.

The others all seemed to become more alert as we reached the

entrance to the club, either sensing him too or just knowing he was present through intuition. Griffin seemed to sober himself and stand to attention.

There was a brief pause before we all moved into the heaving

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bar. I had just enough time to say, “Upstairs,” before the doors opened and music blasted out from inside.

We moved through the crowd, toward the unmarked door that

led upstairs. Patrons of Hades were dancing, drinking, flirting. We must have looked like a pretty weird sight to all of them. As a group, we didn’t exactly look like we were out to party.

I prepared myself for anything. Jude had abilities that stretched so much further than he had shown. I didn’t know what he was capable of.

When we reached the bar, I spotted Onyx. He was wearing

jeans and a white shirt. I’d never seen him in jeans before. He looked…stable. And that wasn’t all; he was working, serving a

blond girl from behind the bar, and he looked like he was actually taking some kind of pride in it. That’s not to say I didn’t notice the large glass of what I guessed was bourbon or whiskey sitting by the register.

He spotted me after he gave the girl her drink and change,

and his eyes narrowed. Strangely, I was comforted that he hadn’t changed completely. He cocked his head toward the door that

headed upstairs, letting me know to follow him as he walked on

his side of the bar.

He opened the door and leaned on it as one by one we all filed

into the narrow stairway.

“This will be interesting,” Onyx said as I passed.

“Do you know who he is?” I asked.

He smiled his old wicked smile, but somehow it had less bite

now. “He’s the villain.”

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Fragments of my dream floated back to me as I remembered

my angel maker showing me flashes of the past, of decisions made.

Jude’s choices.

“Why did he come here?” I asked Onyx.

“He’s been watching you for some time, I’d say. Waiting,” Onyx

said, again his words striking a chord with me.

Griffin knocked on Dapper’s door.

“Come in,” called Dapper from inside.

The senses were now strong, and the flavor of apple seemed to

mix with a foul aroma.

“Ew, that’s putrid. What is it?” I couldn’t help asking.

Griffin and Lincoln, as specialists in sensing the floral combinations exiles exude, were also wrinkling their noses.

“Dracunculus Vulgaris,” Griffin said. “A stunning flower that

smells of rotted meat.”

We walked in and found Jude sitting on a stool at Dapper’s

minibar. His robes were still the same dirty brown, still covering his face, his whole frame hunched over.

Dapper stood behind the small wooden bar, looking nervous,

not taking his eyes from Jude.

“I don’t think I was clear when I told you lot not to bring

your troubles here,” he said calmly, as if worried he might stir his unwanted guest.

Since I was the only one who had talked to him in the past, I felt I had to say something.

“Jude…” I started, unsure. “Why are you here?”

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He didn’t answer. I looked to Griffin; he just opened his hands a little. But then Jude started to move. I saw Lincoln’s hand go to his dagger while Jude’s went to his hood and he revealed his beautiful face. This time I was prepared and stopped my hands from floating toward him.

Reaching into the sides of his robe, Jude revealed something

else. The Scripture, the one he’d taken from Jordan. He raised his head, his baby blue eyes looking softly at mine as he held the parchment out to me.

“You’re just giving it to us?” I asked, worried to take it in case it was some kind of trap.

He nodded once.

“What do you want in return?” I asked, trying to concentrate as more images from my dreams flooded back to me. All the pain, the guilt, the responsibility.

“Nothing,” he replied.

“What about Phoenix?”

His head tilted. “He thought he had found my weakness. He

had not.”

“You were supposed to give him the Scripture in return for

something.”

He nodded again. “He will know by now that I have not kept

my end of the arrangement. It will not take long for him to know where I am.”

I looked around the room; everyone seemed unsure of what

to do. Lincoln’s hand still hovered near his dagger. Steph looked 433

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completely baffled and Salvatore had a firm arm around her. He

must have had to restrain her at some point from approaching

Jude. Even Onyx seemed wary, standing at the back of the room,

though I also saw him keeping one eye on Spence. I wondered if he was still a little apprehensive in his presence too.

But I wasn’t scared. Images of my dream continued to flow as if the door had been unlocked. I could see it, feel it.

“How long have you been in the world realm?” I asked.

The corners of his mouth made a minuscule movement. Did he

know I was working it out?

“A little over two thousand years.”

His eyes went to the Scripture and then back to me. I took a

step toward him, toward the thing that had cost so much already.

“You are betraying your own.”

“Sometimes it is necessary, even when others cannot see.”

Because
we
need
a
villain.

He stood. I heard the others shuffle nervously behind me. I took the Scripture in one hand and closed the final step between us. I leaned in slowly and he let me. My other hand took hold of my

cold hard destiny.

This was it. The moment.

And I was right; Jude
was
another cliff. I remembered how Uri had explained it in the desert. Now, it was true again.

It
was
simply
a
matter
of
the
right
question
being
laid
before
you
so
that
you
could, in turn, make the right choice.

My grip tightened around the dagger. This was the same as leaping 434

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and I knew, once I did this, I’d never be able to go back. And then the words of my angel maker floated through my mind, words from my

dream. I’d assumed he was speaking of Jude, but now I wasn’t so sure.

We
all
have
the
capacity
to
find
the
will— even when that which we
must do terrifies us most.

Jude’s cheek was soft and untouched for so very long. I kissed

him. Once.

“Thank you, Judas,” I whispered as I pulled back and drove the

dagger into him, returning him for judgment.

His kind eyes met mine. An eternity of sacrifice showed. A

tortured solitude.

“Thank you, Keshet,” he said, using the same title both my angel maker and mother had given me as his hand reached out toward

me gently. Before his fingers touched my face, they disappeared, along with the rest of him. And though he was gone, I was sure I still felt him the moment he would have connected with me.

I hoped he got the nothingness he had craved.

“Did you just say
Judas
?” Dapper asked.

“Uh- huh,” I answered, looking down at my hands. In one, an

ancient Scripture; in the other, a dagger.
My
dagger.

“Oh. Just checking.” Dapper started pouring himself a drink.

“So it is true,” Onyx said from the back of the room, moving

forward now.

“Which part?” Lincoln asked, sounding out of breath.

“Keshet,” Onyx said, looking at me.

“The rainbow,” I said, distracted. Bewildered.

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I
just
killed
Judas.

Dapper, who seemed to be relaxing a bit now that Jude was

gone, put down his drink. “It’s why your aura is always different,” he marveled, reminding us of his ability to identify auras. “Kind of a contradiction— Grigori power usually comes out all multi-colored, but Grigori auras are always just the one color. It can be different shades for different people, but always just one and, on top of that, a lining of gold. Violet, here, she’s, well, she’s like a rainbow with streaks of gold all over the place.”

“I hate to ask the obvious, but what the hell does all that mean?” Spence spat out.

“It means,” Lincoln started, as if saying it hurt him, “she can connect the realms.”

I didn’t really understand, but I knew he was right and that my mother had always known. It was why she’d sacrificed herself, why she’d named me Violet.

Onyx moved over to the bar and motioned for Dapper to pour

him a large glass of whatever he was having. Whiskey, I think.

Salvatore and Steph collapsed onto the chaise while Zoe made

herself comfortable on Dapper’s shag rug. Griffin and Lincoln

joined me on the other side of the minibar.

I took a deep breath and unfurled the Scripture.

The blood drained from my face. My vision blurred.

“What?” Griffin prompted.

My eyes welled with tears of pure fright. “Does anyone know

what Tartarus is?” I asked, in barely a whisper.

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“The pits of this realm,” Dapper said, as Onyx took a massive

gulp of his drink and offered a much plainer explanation.

“Hell.”

My hands shook, holding the Scripture that was not meant for

us. “This is not the Grigori Scripture. It’s…it’s…”

My heart started to race; my mouth went dry. The large bold

outline of a triangle in the middle with small symbols at each point haunted me to the core. Below that, two sections of text. The words were not decipherable, but they didn’t need to be. Instinct told me what this was.

“I know why Phoenix wanted the Scriptures. It was never about

the Grigori list.” My hands shook so much Lincoln had to take the parchment from me.

“What is it?” Griffin asked, now looking over Lincoln’s shoulder at the Scripture.

“Writing. Diagrams. It’s in another language but…I think

it’s…instructions.” I stared into the room, full of my friends—

Grigori warriors, Steph, even Onyx and Dapper. I feared for us all and could think of only one person who would know what to do.

But Mom was already dead.

“To return one of the damned,” Lincoln said. “Phoenix wants to

bring someone back from hell.”

“Who?” Spence asked, irritated he was missing something.

Lincoln’s ghost- white face now mirrored mine, and even when I

looked at Onyx, I could see he wasn’t exactly a shade of good health either. Together, we gave Spence his answer.

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“Lilith.”

“And so,” Griffin sighed, “we have what he wants and he has

the lists.”

My phone beeped in my pocket and I pulled it out with still

quivering hands. I already knew it would be him. There was no

running, no quitting— he wouldn’t let me, and somehow that

helped. A kind of resignation came over me.

I stood a little taller, not so tired anymore. I stared at the text message as my hands stopped shaking.

Interested in a trade…lover?

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