Chapter 2.

Margaret crossed her arms over her chest, a strength in her stance that hadn’t been here before. Had she been faking her fear before to get my attention? Surely not.

“I know very little, Gabriel. The question is, who are you? And what brought you here today?”

I took a breath and weighed up my options. We weren’t meant to divulge our identities to anyone except our targets.

Except I was technically without a job. I didn’t have a current target, and my ex-target Kadie, was still very much my agenda.

I bit the bullet, so to speak and prepared myself mentally to tell her the truth.

“No. Don’t tell me. It doesn’t matter,” Margaret said. “You killed those Demons for me, and I should trust you.” She took a slow breath then looked me straight in the eyes. “Shall we go inside?”

That was probably a good idea.

I nodded and she waved me into her home. “Please, come in and sit.”

She opened the sliding back door and we walked into a small, cool room full of healing crystals and colourful lights.

“A few months ago, Witches in the New York covens began to report strange happenings. And then the disappearances started,” Margaret began.

“How many?” I asked.

“About twenty all up, all over the state.”

“That’s a lot of women,” I said.

I was amazed this was the first time I’d heard of it.

Twenty women, powerful Witches? All disappearing at once and I hadn’t been told to protect any of them? Or it seemed, anyone else for that matter.

“Were they all elders?” I asked, assuming the abducted Witches would need to be quite powerful for the Demons to want them.

“No,” she shook her head. “That was the strange thing. They were often strangers to us, or the newly joined. New Witches, with very little cultivated powers. It took us until last week to work out the connection between our covens, because no one really missed the women until recently. We all assumed they just decided not to keep coming back to our meetings.”

“They were looking for Kadie,” I muttered to myself.

Or someone like her. New. Untapped power.

“Who?” Margaret asked, sitting down on a stool near the table.

I continued to stand, my energy buzzing with the heat of undiscovered Demons slinking through the night out there. There were a lot out hunting tonight.

I looked at the woman opposite me asking questions. Margaret.

I wasn’t sure if I should tell her the truth about Kadie.

Would Margaret be a worthy alliance, or an adversary?

As a New York Witch, and someone who was obviously on the Demon’s hit list, she may be someone I could confide in.

“You said the Demons had only been taking the young, untrained Witches. Why would they attack you?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. Maybe something changed. I’m one of the elders of my coven, and yet I had no idea how to stop their attack.”

And yet Kadie had been able to kill them on sight. Her instincts were far superior to that of any Witch I’d ever known.

“You’ve never seen anything like them before?” I asked, although I already knew the answer.

“No.”

This wasn’t making any sense. “Why would the Demons hunt down inexperienced Witches, only to go for an Elder now?”

“Who’s Kadie?” Margaret asked again, tilting her head and looking at me with a searching expression.

“She’s a woman I’m … in a relationship with,” I stumbled to find the right words.

‘A relationship’ was perhaps not the best way to explain it, but the target/Guardian Angel thing was a bit far-fetched for most to understand.

“What does she have to do with us?” Margaret asked, her eyebrows narrowing in suspicion.

“Nothing directly. I don’t think.” But what did I know? “The Demons were tormenting her. I chased them away and killed most of them, but when I wasn’t looking….” I clenched down hard on my jaw. Why had Tabitha called me off Kadie’s case when she’d still been in imminent danger? It just occurred to me and it didn’t make sense. “The Demons enlisted human men to kidnap her and take her to a castle to torture her.”

Margaret’s eyes went wide. “Are you serious?”

“Yes. I don’t know why.”

“Where is she now?” Margaret asked, shifting on her stool and moving forward as though very interested in my answer.

“She is with a friend of mine because she is very unwell. Poisoned, close to death. I’m in pursuit of her kidnappers.”

Well, that was the short version anyway.

“What was in the poison?”

Something about Margaret’s tone alerted me.

“I don’t know. Why do you ask?”

“This Kadie… she is an untrained Witch?”

I nodded. Kadie had said she’d tried to join a Witches coven in Greenwich village, only to be disenchanted by their lack of skills.

“Yes.”

Margaret was nodding, her eyes darting around as her fast brain processed my words.

I was missing something here.

“What aren’t you telling me, Margaret?”

Her gaze snapped back to me, and there was a light in her eyes that hadn’t been there before.

“There’s so much…” she jumped to her feet and began to pace. “Firstly, an untrained Witch can often be the most powerful. They are very primitive, and use their emotions to harness their magic. It can be very volatile if they are strong.”

I nodded, that fitted Kadie’s description perfectly.

“And once they begin to learn and grow their skills, that power sometimes fades a little.” Margaret explained.

“Why would it do that?” I asked. 

Seemed wrong to have a skill that once harnessed would be lesser.

“Because it is under their control, and it is much harder to steal or take advantage of. It is a good thing for everyone. The Witch, and those around her. If we could work out how to keep the raw energy, and make it safe for everyone as well, that would be better, but we haven’t yet.” Margaret said, her tone one of long suffering annoyance.

So Kadie had maintained her powers because she hadn’t been taught how to be a ‘proper Witch’. Ironic.

“Does that have something to do with the Witches that were taken? The fact that they were untrained?” I asked.

She shrugged again, her gaze dropping away as though she was hiding something. “Could be, and that would make sense. An untrained witch wouldn’t know how to guard her energy, and her magic would be easily stolen. Some very young and possibly powerful Witches have gone missing.”

Okay, I would deal with that half honest answer later. I needed to find out more about the poison that was affecting Kadie.

“What could possibly keep Kadie so sedated and weak, but not kill her?” I asked.

Although that was no longer technically correct. The poison was killing her.

My theory was that the Demons, or their human counterparts, had wanted to keep her alive until the baby was born. And then she could die.

“Ah… there are lots of things that could make her very sick, but Witches are very sensitive to certain things.”

Margaret was being cagey and I rolled my eyes with frustration.

“I don’t need your secrets, Witch. I need an antidote.”

And if Tabitha, my only friend for five centuries was risking her life by hooking into Kadie, then I needed to find help. Their lives were in danger and I couldn’t lose one of them, let alone both.

“I’d need to see her before I prescribed anything.” Margaret said softly.

“Not a chance,” I said, meeting her gaze squarely.

“I can’t help your Kadie if you won’t let me.”

“It is much more complicated than you can imagine, Witch.”

She lowered her brow and glared at me. “Listen, Angel. If you’re not going to help me solve this puzzle, you can leave. I need more information about this enemy and I’m willing to help you if you’re willing to return the favour.”

A deal was being made and I wasn’t used to that. I was a soldier, and a very good one. I followed orders by those more intelligent than I.

“And how can I do that?” I asked, suspicion etched into my tones.

Margaret’s gaze slid sideways and she called out softly.

“Simone. Come out sweetheart and meet our visitor.”

There was someone else here?

A young girl, about sixteen or seventeen years, stepped out from behind a closed door. She had long brown hair and a pretty face, but was otherwise totally unremarkable.

What was going on here?

“This is my niece.” Margaret said, drawing the girl closer with her outstretched hand. “The Demons weren’t here for me. They were here for her.”

I nodded slowly, her words making more of the puzzle pieces fit together.

“She is a young, untrained Witch?” I asked for clarification.

Simone’s eyes widened visibly as though she couldn’t believe I’d said the word.

“Yes,” Margaret said simply, though Simone’s breath whooshed quickly in a gasp.

“Then they were trying to take her, not you. So, the pattern still fits.” I said aloud, although it was hardly necessary.

Now the real question was, “What are we going to do about it?”

No matter what the Demons wanted these women for, it wasn’t good but they weren’t my targets, and therefore not my responsibility.

Technically. I made a mental note to ask Tabitha why they weren’t being protected by another Angel.

“Looks like my date with Heaven is off,” I muttered aloud. My days of being a dutiful soldier were done. The idea, although shocking, sat on my shoulders rather easily.

I was going rogue.

“Pardon me?” Margaret said, standing up and staring at me as though I had two heads.

“Nothing. Do you have a plan?”

She surveyed me with her eagle eye.

“We don’t have any plan other than trying to protect our young, and keep them alive until we can figure it all out. Do you have an idea of where these … Demons, as you call them … could be?”

I did. And when the dawn came I would be visiting that wreckage of a castle once again.

“Yes. But I need to wait until first light to travel there. In the meantime, I will take you to Kadie, and you will help her as much as you can. AInreturn, I will vow to do everything in my power to keep your niece safe and to destroy whatever forces are coming after your family.”

Margaret nodded. “That sounds fair. Although I don’t know what I can do for Kadie until I see her.”

I was out of options. I took what I could get.

Tabitha. Can you hear me?

No answer.

Fuck. I was almost out of time too.

“I’ll take you there now. Can we leave your niece somewhere safe?”

“She’ll come with me.”

“That would be tricky.” My wings had been irrevocably damaged in the last attack and I wasn’t sure how I’d go carrying two Witchs over the divide to Tabitha’s house.

Margaret persisted. “Simone is a born healer. She can help, and there is no one on Earth I trust with her safety against those things.”

Tabitha. Please. Answer me.

When no answer came, I gave up hope of getting guidance from my Angel Agent. We were either too late already, or she was putting all of her energy into keeping Kadie alive.

 “Alright. But if I see anything that worries me, then I won’t hesitate to kill you both.”

Simone squeaked and Margaret pulled her niece into her side. Doing such a thing to innocent humans would put me back centuries in my quest to get back into Heaven, but at this point it didn’t matter. I was desperate.

“All right. Get what you need, and we leave within a moment.”

“How are we travelling Angel, or do I need to ask?” Margaret asked, quirking a knowing eyebrow at me.

“I’ll carry you both.”

Not an easy task, given where I needed to fly, but it could be done.

“Simone, come with me. We’ll only be a few minutes.”

The women left the room, hopefully in search of the magical ingredients that would bring Kadie and Tabitha back to me.

I walked outside and sensed the distant heat of Demons in the air.

There were no more in this area now. Would more come to capture Simone? I didn’t know, but I would be on guard if they did.

I drew my sword and extended my wings, ready to fight.

“You’re a fallen Angel.” Simone’s gentle voice whispered behind me.

I turned around to stare at the young woman.

“You can see my wings?”

She nodded. How was that possible? Perhaps Kadie had changed me? Maybe these women were of Kadie’s blood line and they were all the exception to the rule?

I didn’t know and I didn’t care.

“Are you taking us somewhere off world?” She asked, taking a few hesitant steps forward.

“Not exactly. Tabitha lives in a sort of, hidden realm. Still on Earth, but untouched by mortals.”

“Who’s Tabitha?”

Hard to explain to a human. “She’s my friend. And she’s in danger.”

“Okay.” The young Witch didn’t ask any more questions, simply slid her back pack onto her shoulders and stepped forward.

I extended to my full height of over seven foot, and reached down for the young girl with one arm. “You’ll need to hold on tightly, and breathe slowly. I have been told that Tabitha’s realm is not the same as the one you live in.”

Margaret walked into the backyard, tucking herbs and bottles into a side bag.

“You’re going to carry me too, Angel?” The older Witch asked with a small smirk to her lips.

I grabbed her up in my other arm and held them both tight against my chest.

“Put your arms around my neck and hold on to me. We won’t be flying long.”

My wings extended to their full breadth. I beat down and my feet left the ground. Simone swallowed a shriek as she buried her head into my neck.

I enveloped us in invisibility as we moved through the air, higher and higher until I found the door to Tabitha’s world.

We flew through. The realm was different. I knew immediately that something was off. The chill in the air. The darkness of the sun. Tabitha was dying. And Kadie along with her.

“We’re almost there.” I reassured the Witches as we flew over to Tabitha’s house and landed on the grass outside. My chest was tight and aching. I’d like to pretend it was from the exertion of flying with two humans, but I knew it wasn’t.

I glanced at the front door, fear filling my arms and legs, making it impossible to move forward. I didn’t want to know what was going on in that house if it meant I lost both of the women I loved.

“There is sickness everywhere,” Simone said with a deep sadness as she ran a hand over some wilting garden flowers.

“Yes. She is very sick. They both are. Come.”

I pulled on the armour of battle and pushed away the fear threatening to overwhelm me. I had to take these Witches inside the house.

I opened the door and the reek of death assailed my nose.

“No.” Not that. Not yet. Please.

I rushed through the small house and turned into the room where I’d left Kadie and Tabitha, only to come to a grinding stop in the door way.

“About time you got here,” Tabitha panted from her place on the ground next to Kadie’s bed.

She knelt on the carpet as though in prayer, her face obscured by her long hair.

I walked into the room slowly, my gaze on Kadie’s still, pale form. She looked like death had already claimed her and yet I knew Tabitha would not still be here if Kadie had died.

“You’re both still alive,” I whispered, unable to believe my eyes.

Relief swept through my heart like a tsunami, taking my strength with it.

I stumbled and clung to a nearby chair.

“Yes. But barely,” Tabitha answered, the thread of her voice as thin as I’d ever heard it.

I clung to the back of the chair and pulled myself over to the head of the bed. Kadie looked so peaceful, so like one recently claimed by death. My heart ached at the sight and my throat burned from swallowing the tears that rose.

We didn’t have much time.

“Simone. Margaret,” I called out to the Witches and they stepped into the room.

Tabitha lifted her head, her skin the colour of a stormy sky. Grey, with black edges.

“You brought help?” She asked, her tone brighter than when I’d arrived.

Then it hit me. My beautiful, immortal friend had thought she was going to die trying to save Kadie, and I loved her all the more for it.

“You are not going to die Tabitha, and neither is Kadie.”

I wanted to disentangle Tabitha’s form from Kadie’s, but wasn’t sure if that would kill one of them. Or both.

“Don’t disengage them. They are too tightly bound together,” Margaret instructed as she stepped closer. “Simone, can you work out exactly what they’ve been poisoned with?”

As Simone came closer and gently touched Tabitha and Kadie, I stepped further away and explained past events to help them understand.

“I found Kadie with the Demons. She had been beaten badly, so I brought her here for Tabitha to help her. But she soon succumbed to whatever poison they had fed into her. Tabitha connected herself to Kadie to keep her alive, but…”

I gestured to the mess of fragility before me. What else could I say?

“I think it’s a mix of hemlock and some … green thing. I’m not sure what it even is.”

“Why would someone do that?” Margaret asked, her eyes narrowed with anger.

“Can you help them?” I asked, my voice catching with fear.

I didn’t have any knowledge of poisons, let alone ones specifically designed for Witches.

Simone and Margaret exchanged glances that would have gutted a lesser being.

“Tell me,” I demanded. I wanted to know. False hope was not hope, and I knew the difference.

“We can try,” Margaret said quietly. “But it will depend on the strength of the Witch whether she can come back from this. They’re both very weak.”

“They’re both very strong,” I corrected her. “Do whatever it is you need to do and I am sure they will come back.”

Margaret grabbed for her bag and Simone hurried from the room, coming back with bowls of water.

“We need to make a tonic, see if we can cleanse their insides of the poison, then perhaps, a bath?” Margaret said, looking at Simone for guidance.

“Not yet. They’re too weak to be separated. But a poultice over any wounds may help,” Simone said.

“I’ll make the poultice, you do the serum,” Margaret said, grabbing for her bag and pulling out a plethora of herbs and small glass vials.

“What can I do?” I asked. Hating the feeling of being so helpless.

“I need clean rags,” Margaret said.

I left the room and moved through the house. I’d never been inside Tabitha’s bedroom, but in it I found a wardrobe full of clean clothes.

I tore some white dresses from the racks and took them back to Margaret.

“Such a waste,” the older woman said, surveying the clothes, before ripping one of them into several pieces.

Margaret mixed and ground several things together, the smell, one of earth and ash.

Please let this work.

Margaret spread her green and black mixture over three of the rags.

“Help me put them in her most damaged areas.”

I picked up two of the plasters and moved over to Kadie’s body. Margaret peeled back the sheet and I gasped at the horror before me.

“She was fine only a few hours ago,” I said. Though her body had been bloody and bruised, she had been otherwise untouched.

The flesh was now eaten away. Her skin hanging off her bones as she clung to life itself.

“Here and here,” Tabitha said, pointing to flesh wounds in Kadie’s neck and arms.

I placed the poultice on each area and Tabitha began rubbing the mixture over Kadie’s skin. Into every little wound, bruise or injury.

Within minutes she looked like a blacked earth wrestler.

Tabitha let out a strange sigh.

I dropped to my knees and cupped her cheeks to draw her head up. When she was looking at me with pained eyes I asked, “Are you okay?”

She gave me a wobbly smile. “You owe me for this, you know that, right?”

I nodded fervently. “Yes.”

And I’d do another millennium of service and not complain once, if it meant they both survived this.

“Good. Now, keep going. I can feel a change in her already.”

Simone seemed to be throwing everything she’d brought into her concoction. It was bubbling and churning as though alive.

“What are you making?” I asked, and Margaret shook her head, drawing me away.

Simone’s eyes were glowing with a white power and as she began to chant, I could feel the change in the air.

Thank the Gods. I’d brought the right people into this house.

Simone grabbed for two cups, dipped them into the swirling mess of purple and orange.

“Quickly. They must drink.”

Margaret took the cup to Tabitha, who downed it instantly.

She gasped and groaned and shook like she’d been poisoned herself.

I stared down at the still moving mixture. Was this really the right thing to do? To Kadie? The mother of my child.

“Angel! Now!”

There was no mistaking the authority in Simone’s words and I gathered Kadie into my arms and tipped the drink down her throat.

Her lips were loose and half of it spilled down her chest, but I kept pouring, hoping some of it made it into her stomach.

When it was all gone, and Kadie’s beautiful body was covered in even more of the Witch’s magic than before, I lay her down again against the pillows.

Tabitha groaned and pushed herself to her feet, gagging on the liquid still moving through her system. As she stood up, she withdrew her hand from Kadie’s arm and panic flashed through me.

“What are you doing? Are you letting go of her?” I yelled at my Angel Agent.

Tabitha waved a hand at me as she reeled back and sat on the opposite bed . She coughed and spluttered some more, then wiped at her mouth with her thin hand.

“Of course not. Don’t worry, Gabriel. She’s on her way back to us. I can feel her. She’s gaining strength, and will soon be back with you. Woah…” Tabitha swayed a little and gripped the blankets either side of her.

“Thank you, Tabitha,” I whispered as I turned my attention to my woman. I sat on the bed and stroked Kadie’s forehead.

“Come back to me, beautiful girl. Our son needs you.”

Kadie didn’t wake up, but I could see the changes beginning in her body. Her muscles began to repair. The streaks of red that indicated blood poisoning across her skin regressed and retreated.

“How long?” I asked Simone, who was now standing and checking on Kadie’s vitals.

“I don’t know,” she said, running a hand over Kadie’s throat, checking her pulse.

I lifted my gaze and met the young Witches.

“You’ve saved her. I don’t know how I can repay such a debt.”

She met my look head on.

“You can find out those hunting us, and kill them all.”

I stood up and shook the last of my weakness from my bones. There would be no mercy in my quest for vengeance.

“It would be my honour.”