Cassius
TO BE A DARK ONE was to know perfection, but be unable to reach it. Now that I had Sariel’s blood flowing somehow miraculously through my veins, I could touch it, smell it, bond with it. But my humanity, or whatever was left of it, rejected the notion completely. Logic shook its head in denial, and so I appeared different, but I was very much the same.
Split completely down the middle between two races.
The answer as well as the end.
In a cruel twist of fate, the angel of life and death had created both—me. I had no idea if I possessed enough power to fight off Bannik on my own, but what I did know was that the battle between dark and light was just starting to get interesting.
Mason was hovering over the stove flipping a steak as he so often did when he was upset about something. I had to wonder if he had some Italian or Greek running through some of those wolfish veins. The blood of Sariel called to me to use it—no longer would I have to guess about anything—but my humanity pressed the fleeting thought away, what fun was life when you knew all the answers already?
I’d learned that as a human.
I’d keep living that way as a Dark One.
Alex sipped a cup of coffee and pretended to be reading but he rarely turned the page, just stared it down, lost in his dark thoughts, the same ones he so often tried to play off when really, it was quite possible he had the hardest future of us all.
And Genesis, lovely, beautiful, pregnant Genesis sat on Ethan’s lap while he drank from her neck.
If you blinked, you could almost miss the small cut near her ear where he kissed and sucked.
“Gross.” Alex said in a bored voice. “At least have the decency to do it in private.”
“You eat at a table,” Ethan pointed out. “Why can’t I?”
“Hah!” Mason flipped the steak in the air again. “Vampire has a point.”
Alex scrunched up his nose while I sat between the two of them, Stephanie still gripped my hand, offering her support, her love, it floated off of her in perfumed waves, stabilizing me, altering me so completely that I knew had I been in Sariel’s place—I would have made the exact same choice.
Because when I closed my eyes.
I saw her.
And only her.
“Sariel has given his life for mine.” My voice didn’t shake, it was smooth, in command, something I didn’t feel, but everyone knows just because you have a feeling doesn’t mean you are that feeling. I felt unsure; that didn’t mean I needed to actually follow through with it and become unsure when it came to my decisions, because they effected every being around me, mortal and immortal, I had to focus on my knowledge, on my heart, on the love surrounding me, not the flimsy feeling that told me to be afraid.
After all.
Fear.
It is not welcome here.
Alex spoke it for me, his eyes locking onto mine as he leaned forward in anticipation.
“Bannik, one of Sariel’s brothers, has fallen. He’s captured the ten remaining archangels of the realm. Each was to be guarding a different part of the human plane. They are all missing.”
Genesis’s mouth dropped open while Mason stopped cooking and turned around eyes wide with shock.
“How the hell did we miss that?” Ethan raged through clenched teeth. “It’s our job to keep the peace and some archangel’s been luring others into his keep? And creating Demon? Where have we been?”
“We can’t blame ourselves,” I said. “Even Sariel did not see it coming until it was too late. Bannik has been planning this ever since Pompeii, ever since his first taste of human blood. At the time I blamed Timber for giving out immortal blood, and now I suspect it was Bannik pulling the strings the entire time.”
“Well damn.” Ethan sighed running his hands through his long dark hair. “That’s been a few… years.”
Alex’s lips twitched. “Try a few hundred, but sure yeah just saying few sounds so much better, like we blinked and oh, look, they invented cars!”
“You—” I jabbed a finger at Alex. “—will need to visit some old family.”
Alex’s nostrils flared. “Watch me curb my enthusiasm.”
“And Mason,” I nodded toward him. “You’ll need to notify all the wolves in the district. Let them know we will need to fight… we’ve been living in peace for too long, we’ve gone soft while they’ve grown strong. We will need to teach our people once again how to draw up their swords.”
Alex raised his hands. “Don’t you mean draw up their semi-automatic weapons?”
Ethan scowled. “Bullets don’t behead.”
“If you’re a good shot they do.” Alex smirked.
“Not the point.” I sighed and tried again. “They need to know how to protect themselves.” I stood, “And we need to keep our secret from the humans at all costs.”
“It’s always such a joy.” Alex yawned. “Protecting the weak while they continue to kill off one another without any realization they’re still alive and breathing because we choose to protect them.”
I smiled as more visions of Alex’s future laid themselves out before my eyes. Maybe I would get my payback a lot sooner than I originally thought.
“One more thing,” I added, waiting until every set of eyes was on me. “You are your strongest when you’re mated.”
The room fell silent.
“I’m calling numbers for you both. You will have a human by sunset next week or so help me I’ll kill you myself.”
Mason let out a guttural howl as he fell to his knees, then got up and ran out of the room.
All eyes fell to Alex.
He was pale.
So very pale.
“Is that going to be a problem, Alex?”
“No.” He swallowed. “No, my King. It is not.”
His thoughts screamed at me.
His words and actions said otherwise—because Alex, might be a lot of things, but he was loyal. He would obey me in this.
And it would eventually be for his own good.
Eventually.
“And what about you?” Ethan asked.
“Me.” I grinned for the first time since I’d woken up. “I have Stephanie.”
“But you have wings.” Genesis blurted out. “Isn’t that… forbidden?”
“Red Bull…” Alex laughed. “…also has wings, but I touch my lips to that can like it’s my job—”
Stephanie shoved him out of the chair, he fell to the floor with a giant thump while Ethan laughed.
“We were mated before all of this and regardless, I’m still a Dark One, I just have actual wings… believe me, you cannot redeem the damned.”
Ethan stood. “Seems to me your wrong… what did you say happened to Sariel again? He went dark? Lost his mind? Ceased to exist?”
“He was taken,” Stephanie blurted out before I got the chance. “With over five thousand angels as an escort.”
The room was silent and then Ethan added, “Seems to me, you can very well redeem the damned… doesn’t it?”
He was right.
Because Sariel had been cursed.
Yet, something told me, he was still—present. Not in the same way as before.
But… aware.
Stephanie slid her hand into mine. “Can we go talk?”
“No,” I grumbled pulling her hard against my chest. “I want to kiss. I want to make love. I want to forget the fact that you stabbed me in the chest and ran away. That we can do anything else is off the table.”
“He gonna throw her on the table right here then?” Alex asked from his semi comfortable position on the floor, even leaning back against the counter he looked like a sexual deviant, just waiting for a lady in a short skirt to walk by so he could steal a peek while she peeled her clothes off in ecstasy.
“Upstairs.” Stephanie smiled pulling me in for a searing kiss. I was already carrying her as fast as I could through the house when I heard Ethan yell.
“Please don’t burn down the room! Keep your feathers under control, Cassius!”