Reapers (32 page)

She felt a panic slowly growing in the
pit of her soul.

“
David, what’s today’s
date?”

David scratched his head. “Uh…I think
it’s the eighteenth. Why?”

Kara didn’t answer but handed him the
newspaper and pointed to the small article.

Ashley moved next to David to get a
closer look at the paper.

Kara smacked her forehead.
“Of course! It all makes sense now. It wasn’t the
Eighteens
. The imps were
chanting the
eighteenth
of August! The eighteenth of the month! How could
I have been so stupid? Why didn’t I see this before?”

“
Kara, what are you
talking about?” Ashley frowned.

Kara sighed heavily. “They tricked
us.”

“
What? Who?”

“
It was all a diversion,”
said Kara, realizing that it was true as she spoke the
words.

“
Can’t you see? The
reapers were a diversion all along, to keep us busy. They wanted us
distracted so that we wouldn’t notice the eclipse.”

Kara glanced out of the front doors.
The sudden darkness made sense now.

“
Raphael told me that the
archfiends couldn’t open the prison with
just
the key. They needed a rare
astronomical event when the mortal world was in
shadow
.”

“
And the world is in
shadow with a solar eclipse.”

Ashley paled as she looked outside.
“Oh, no.”

“
Exactly,” said
Kara.

A single, great golden ring had
replaced the sun and was casting long shadows on the world
below.

“
How long does it last?”
asked David as he moved beside Kara and craned his neck.

Kara stared at the ring in the sky and
shrugged. “I don’t know, not long I guess. Hurry, we have to get
back to Horizon and warn them before the imps use the
key—”

“
It’s too late,” said
Ashley.

She pointed into the sky behind the
hospital. “Look.”

A beam of fire erupted from the bowels
of the earth, shot up through the air, and tore a hole in the
sky.

Then out from the beam of fire emerged
the winged beasts.

Chapter 23

An Unlikely
Alliance

K
ara leaned on the back wall of the old farmhouse out in Green
Bay, Wisconsin. The smell of wet earth and old pine planks helped
to calm her. It reminded her of her childhood at her grandmother’s
cottage. But it wasn’t enough.

When all the angels had arrived back
at Horizon to heal their wounds, they had been told to rendezvous
at a safe house back on earth to discuss their options. Peter and
Jenny were still in the Healing-Xpress, so Kara, David, and Ashley
had made the trip here with the rest of the legion.

As she stood waiting, she couldn’t
stop thinking of the winged creatures she had seen in the sky.
Their leathery black dragon wings had looked just like
hers.

The one that had injected
her didn’t have wings, so he wasn’t an archfiend. But there was no
doubt in her mind that he must have been their servant, like the
imps. He was probably a
lower
creature, like the lower demons and cast-down
creatures of the Netherworld.

They had not gotten close enough to
get a really good look at the winged creatures that had emerged
from the flames, but Kara could tell that they were humanoid, big,
and winged.

Gabriel’s triumphant look when they
had defeated the reapers had darkened when the creatures had
emerged. He had urged the angels back quickly to Horizon, but he
had stayed back. He had looked defeated as he gazed at the winged
fiends, and Kara had looked away, feeling she was intruding on
something personal.

Kara had felt a connection toward
them, too. She felt a sense of familiarity, like when you look at
an old picture of a family member and see features of yourself. She
was frightened that one day she wouldn’t recognize herself, and
that she would turn on her friends and the legion. She was scared
that she would become a creature of darkness, an angel
killer.

And now as she leaned back, she felt
the weight of her wings again. It was like a heavy burden that was
yet to come.

The thirty-something senior guardians
waited for Gabriel and Ariel to show up. Ariel had told them to sit
tight and wait once they got to the safe house. But wait for what?
Planning was usually done in Horizon, not in some remote
dilapidated and abandoned farmhouse on Earth.

What defense strategies was the legion
working on now? What scheme would prove effective against these
dark gods? Another prison? She doubted the archfiends would fall
for that again.

Kara could see that Ashley was
admiring a large pitchfork as though she would love to be given the
chance to use it. Kara was surprised at their friendship. Never in
a million years had she thought that the two of them could be
friends. And now they were. The spat between them had lifted, and
now they were as thick as thieves. She couldn’t imagine fighting
the archfiends without Ashley’s help. She was a skilled guardian
angel, and Kara could learn from her, just like she had learned
from David in the beginning.

David…

David sat on an old wooden bench next
to her. His right knee was bouncing restlessly, and he was deep in
thought. He was as handsome as ever, even with his forehead
wrinkled with whatever was going through his mind. Kara wished they
could be alone together for a while. She knew he was thinking the
same thing. What was the legion’s plan? How were they going to
destroy the archfiends before they destroyed the world?

There was no point in
trying to hide her wings anymore. Everyone had seen them. She
was
marked
all
over again…

There was a loud creak,
and the double barn doors pulled open—

David cursed.

Kara cursed.

Ashley picked up the
pitchfork.

Ariel and Metatron strode
into the barn. They were followed by twelve higher
demons.

The higher demons were
identical in every way, just as Kara had remembered them. They were
tall and
strong, and wore
expensive-looking gray suits that were tailored to perfection over
their muscular bodies. Their short white hair shone unnaturally in
the dim light and added an eerie gloom to the already somber
atmosphere. Their grayish-blue skin still looked like that of a
corpse a few hours old, and their eyes were as black and soulless
as she remembered. Most of all, she remembered how much she hated
these guys.

Kara instinctively moved forward with
her soul blade in her hand.

“At ease, Kara,” said
Ariel and raised her hand. “Lower your weapon, please.”

But Kara did not lower her
blade. She crossed the room and did not take her eyes off the
black-eyed men. Her hatred and anger throbbed inside her like a
white-hot force that was about to explode. She wanted to gouge out
their eyes with her blade. The higher demons must have tricked
Ariel and Metatron. Why else would they be here?

“I
said
lower
your weapon,” repeated Ariel ominously. “I will not say it
again.”

“You
heard her, little bird,” said Metatron.

His smile was really a
reminder of the deal she had made with him. Although she had not
forgotten about Metatron, she had been distracted by their battle
with the reapers and had not thought about him. Clearly that had
been a mistake.

“And
what do we have here?” Metatron’s smile widened at the distress he
saw on Kara’s face.

He seemed to take pleasure
in sizing up her new wings.

“My
favorite little bird has learned to fly. That will come in
handy.”

He moved around the room,
tapping his cigar ashes on a few unsuspecting guardian angels, and
finally he leaned against one of the back panels of the barn and
crossed his arms over his chest.

He surveyed the room from
behind his sunglasses. It was almost as though he was
protecting
the demons.
But that was absurd. Metatron was corrupt and twisted, but he was
loyal to the legion. Wasn’t he?

Kara lowered her weapon
reluctantly, but she planted her feet in the middle of the barn and
glared at the twelve demons. She opened her wings in anger for
everyone, including the demons, to see.

She folded them
back.

Ashley had the pitchfork
raised toward a demon and growled, “Just give me a
reason.”

She prodded the fork
forward a little, “That’s all I ask.”

“Ashley,” said Ariel.
“Same goes for you and anyone else. Weapons down.”

Ashley lowered her big
fork.

“You are ordered to stand
down,” said Ariel, her voice deep and imposing.

“Is that
clear?”

She eyed everyone
dangerously, waiting to see if any of the angels were stupid enough
to challenge her. They weren’t.

“What
are
they
doing here? Why aren’t we killing them?” Kara put as much
hatred as she could into her voice, not caring to hide it. She was
glad of her hatred. She wanted the demons to know exactly how she
felt.

The higher demons sneered
at her as they strolled around the barn. They enjoyed how they made
everyone jumpy. They seemed to get a kick out of seeing the angels
unable to act upon their natural instinct to kill the
demons.

“Why are
they here?” Kara asked again. Her voice quivered with fury.

“Calm
down, and we will tell you,” said Ariel.

Once she believed that
Kara was calm enough, she studied the room to make sure that all
eyes and attention were on her and what she was about to
say.

“The legion has made a
temporary pact with the higher demons—”

“Are you
crazy?” shouted Kara, before she realized that she was shouting at
an archangel.

Ariel glared at her, and
Kara clamped her mouth shut. She had made a huge mistake, but she
stayed where she was.

“You can’t be serious!”
David’s eyes went from Metatron to the higher demons. “Metatron, my
man, all the torturing forgiven, but seriously, man, have you lost
your mind?”

“We
haven’t lost anything, Davy,” answered Metatron.

His voice was as slippery
as oil.

“Not
yet, anyway. Times have changed, and the legion has to change with
it, if it wants to survive. Things are going to be very different
from now on. I can promise you that.”

He took a long drag from
his cigar and blew the smoke out in the shape of a bird.

Kara couldn’t see his
eyes, but she knew he was looking at her.

And then he added with a
grin. “It’s going to be a bumpy ride.”

“Which is why the higher
demons are here,” interjected Ariel. “We need their
help—”

“
Their
help!” Kara blurted out. “How
can that be? This doesn’t make any sense.”

Ariel ignored Kara’s
outburst.

“We need
their help now. This is the first time since the beginning of the
legion. Horizon has
never
made such a pact with Netherworld creatures. It
goes against all our values. But we are left with little
choice.”

Kara shook her head in
disbelief. “But how…why…?”

One of the higher demons
nodded his head at Metatron and then smiled.

“I’ll
tell you why,” said the higher demon, looking directly at
Kara.

She cringed at the sound
of its greasy voice.

“You
see, little elemental angel.” He paused and then corrected himself
with a sneer, “Or should I say,
fiend
angel.”

Kara winced at the name as
though she had been slapped in the face. Everyone was watching
her.

The higher demon smiled at
her discomfort.

“
We share a common enemy, an enemy that would see us destroyed
right alongside you angels.”

He grimaced, “The
archfiends
.”

Kara looked at Metatron and Ariel, her
eyes wide, as if she hadn’t understood the implications of the
words that had come out of the hateful creature. It was like a
nightmare, and she couldn’t wake up.

She looked at Metatron and feared what
he was about to say next.

He thrust his cigar into his mouth and
raised his fist.

“
We will join forces with
the demons. Together, we will
defeat
the archfiends.”