Chapter Six
The story Lily had told him was insane.
A pendant that survived for century after century…and from the way she spoke, it might even be millennia after millennia. A woman who destroyed all within her path and made Lily go white with fear.
He hit the Web. Searching for information on Szardi, but there was nothing. He was either too ancient for modern man to know of him, or he’d simply never existed. Jonah was more likely to think it was the former, which meant he was talking about a being that had been worshipped by a witch-priest thousands of years ago.
Woman.
Demon.
Worship.
His grasp of mythology was sketchy, at best, but for some reason, a name came to mind. Running his tongue along the surface of his teeth, Jonah typed it into the search box.
Websites upon the hundreds sprung up, some regarding magazines, some regarding woman’s liberation and more religious websites that he could count.
He kept scanning over them, hitting the next link time after time. Nothing. Nothing.
Wait…
Mother of Demons, worshipped, feared…Myth or Fact.
He clicked on the link, and after closing several annoying popup windows, he found himself staring at a hand-drawn image of a woman, a winged woman… Black, leathery wings that spanned toward the sky.
Below that was another image, the woman cowering as three men, clad in white, faced her down. Like a comic strip, it was drawn without words. The three men stared at her in rage, and one pointed down. The next strip showed her on her knees, begging. The next, the men turned away from her and she fled.
Lilith, the Queen of All Demons, fled the three angels of God. But she had sworn neither she, nor her children, the lilum, would touch any child bearing the mark of the three angels.
Lilith. Jonah narrowed his eyes and read on, stroking his chin. She was worshipped by many—one man in particular. A witch-priest known as Sharzardikai. Szardi…
Holy shit.
The next page showed the pendant. Jonah flung out a hand, hissing, as something sprung up from the computer. A spell locked within the website—damn it. His shields sprung up as his eyes flicked to the power button on the PC. It didn’t shut down the way it should have. Growling, he narrowed his eyes and focused his magic on the power cord, yanking with all the strength he had in him.
The plug stayed in the outlet.
But the cord snapped, fraying, sparks flying. The computer screen flickered, flared…and then split down the middle, busted and completely dead as Jonah sighed shakily. Shit. A spell locked into a website. Bloody, freaking hell—what was going on?
You just came within seconds of coming face-to-face with evil.
Jonah pressed his fingers to his eyes. He wasn’t in the mood to deal with any more Obi-wan Kenobi crap from Sansan.
The angel laughed. Obi-wan Kenobi, am I? Hmmm…I’ve been called worse.
“What was that, Sansan?” he asked, lifting his head and searching the room until he saw Sansan’s reflection in the broken screen of the computer. His eyes watered as he tried to focus on Sansan’s wavy image. “Can you find something a little easier to look at?”
Sansan chuckled. I could. But her reach is long. I’d rather wait here a few moments until I know she cannot reach you.
“Her?” Jonah repeated, doubt thick in his voice. “You want me to believe that some ancient demon laid a spell on the WWW and she’s going to try to come after me?”
Sansan chuckled. Oh, Jonah, she’s a lot more than some ancient demon. Think of her as the mother of all demons…their queen. But, no, she didn’t lay it. One of her followers did, just like the foul bastard Szardi laid spells within the pendants he forged. But when one of power touches such a spell, in any way, even with just his eyes, she feels it. And the greater the power, the stronger the call to her. And you have a great power indeed. You would be a great deal of fun for her, so strong willed, so dark inside…she would exploit every weakness you have. Before, she would have won. Now, I think you would have resisted her, even if it meant dying, but let’s not go there.”
Jonah pushed out of the chair, his body revved, tensed for battle, even though no battle had happened. The adrenaline inside him was singing through his veins, making his senses ultra sharp, putting him on the edge as he started to pace.
“Lily…she was talking about Li… About her, wasn’t she?” To do so is to invite her to come a-visiting, Lily had said. Damn, after that little fireworks display with the computer, he wasn’t about to test and see if she was right.
Yes. Lily is…intimately acquainted with the Queen of All Demons, the angel said quietly.
“And the pendant? That story she told me was for real?” Jonah asked.
He didn’t want to believe it. To accept it. But the skepticism that had barely taken a foothold inside him crumbled. And he knew, even before Sansan spoke.
I do not know every word that she told you, but Lily is one of the rare creatures who doesn’t lie. She may not tell all—but she doesn’t lie. Even when the cost to herself is very high.
The burning question that was eating a hole in his gut finally found its way to his tongue. Focusing his eyes on Sansan’s blurred face, the cracks in the screen making him so difficult to see, Jonah asked flatly, “Who is she?”
The picture slammed into his mind. A woman, cowering on the floor, bloodied wings trying to cover her body as a whip descended. As she lifted her head, a scream falling from her lips, Jonah found himself staring into Lily’s eyes.
Don’t you know? Sansan asked quietly.
“She is one of them,” Jonah said, his voice rusty as he shook the image away.
“If she was truly one of them, she wouldn’t be here. She is here, because a woman with a heart and soul was born into the body of a demon.”
Jonah jerked, his head whipping up as he actually heard that voice, not just felt it. Before him, clad in radiant, shining white, was Sansan. The angel took a step away, then another, wandering the small office as Jonah stared at him in disbelief. The angel actually stood in front of him, he could reach out and touch him—
Sansan laughed. “I’ve walked in the world before, Jonah. ’Tis just not something I choose to do often. I was given a rare gift, a rare responsibility. I do not abuse it.” The angel lowered himself into the only other chair in the room. “Gifts are a rare thing indeed, and power is indeed that. A gift. It should be used wisely, not abused.”
Tightly, Jonah said, “I’ve gotten that point.”
Sansan smiled. “Good. Hmmm… What were we talking about? Gifts? Ah, yes…about Lily. She’s a rare creature, one born into total and complete evil. She had to fight, every day of her existence, to withstand the urges that she was indeed born with, had to fight the compulsions her mother—”
Jonah’s mouth tightened, thinning down into a firm, flat line. “Her mother?”
Sansan frowned disapprovingly. “You are not one to judge…not anybody, Jonah, once called Adamm. Remember that.” Then he leaned his head back, eyes closing. “Every second of her life, she fought. And she paid, dearly. And every time she cried out, we heard her. He heard her. No soulless creature cries as she holds a newborn child that sobs for her mama. But Lily, born into the body of the lilum, she cried.”
Rage built in Jonah’s heart at the picture Sansan painted. “The dream. You do know about my dream?”
“The one about Lily. Yes. I know of it.”
“Did all that happen?” he asked. Sansan said nothing, but Jonah saw the answer in his dark gaze and he had to fight the urge to vomit.
Tortured, beaten, raped by her own blood. “Why is she here?”
“Demons cannot enter the Kingdom, Jonah. Any more than a man with no heart, no soul can enter the Kingdom.” Sansan held out a hand, and within it a ball of light grew, spinning and spinning. From it, light spilled and threw colors on the wall.
Voices echoed and spun around them as Jonah stared at the kaleidoscope of colors, watching until they coalesced into an image… Three men, clad in shining white, watching as a woman, winged, bloodied…beaten. She knelt before them, head bent with fear but when they spoke, she rose from a crouch at their feet, turning and snapping open the thick leathery black wings, her voice a tortured sob as she said, “I want to not be this. I want to be free of her, of this…of what my very nature demands of me.”
Around her, the men watching her nodded, looking pleased. The third one, his face hidden from Jonah, said, “Then you have the chance, Lilan. Become what you wish…now. You no longer are bound to her, she cannot harm you, not her, and not her children. Only the world around you can cause you harm—for a time. You have two months.”
Jonah felt a chill run down his spine at the fear in her eyes. “You. That is you,” he said harshly.
Sansan said, “She wanted a chance. We wanted her to have one. A demon cannot enter into the Kingdom, Jonah. But a woman can. We gave her two months, two months to prove she has the heart and the soul one needs to enter into the Kingdom.”
“You want her to face her mother.” Jonah turned away, hoping to hide the fiery rage that built within, the need to howl. Not right…what they demanded wasn’t right. “Can’t you see how terrified she is?”
Jonah certainly could. Now he understood the fear he’d seen in her eyes.
Sansan sighed. “Indeed, we see it. But having a soul means you’re willing to sacrifice all for another. If she didn’t fear her mother, there would be no sacrifice.”
As Jonah turned, glaring, he found himself alone, in an empty room. Whirling, he grabbed a stained coffee cup from the desk and hurled it at the wall. “Damn it!” he shouted.
And then he collapsed onto the ground, looping his arms around his knees and bowing his head. “Damn it,” he whispered.
He was still trying to recover his ground when the knock came, a long time later. Wearily, he trudged to the door, opening it with dread. He knew who was on the other side.
A woman he had dreamed of.
A woman he hungered for.
A woman he barely knew.
A woman who had been born of a demon.
Staring into her eyes, Jonah thought, almost wildly, I don’t care…
Whatever she had been getting ready to say died as he reached out, pulling her against him. Lowering his head, he covered the rosebud mouth with his, groaning as the clean, pure taste of her flooded his senses. This is not a creature of evil…
He knew evil. She wasn’t it.
She was spring rain, summer warmth and the light of the sun in his arms. A startled squeak escaped her as he kissed her, surprise and hunger lighting those dark blue eyes.
As her hands slid up his chest, Jonah spun her around, pulling her inside the house and kicking the door closed. Backing her up against the wall, he groaned as he felt the bite of her nails at his neck. Her entire body was quivering, vibrating against his. A hungry little purr escaped her lips as he pressed hungry, biting kisses down her neck, to her collarbone as he slid the jacket from her shoulders.
“Jonah,” she gasped out as he jerked her shirt from the waist of her jeans, his hands seeking out the cool, silken feel of her skin.
He wanted to howl as she started to whimper in his arms, rocking against him, an almost feverish hunger in her midnight-blue eyes. “Lily,” he rumbled as he dipped his head and buried his face in the soft, sweet valley between her breasts.
An insidious little whisper of doubt started to creep in as he shoved up her shirt baring the full, silk-covered curves of her breasts. The dusky circles of her nipples were a shadow under the fragile silk. Urging her closer, he took the peak of one nipple in his mouth, drawing deep, shuddering at the hot, female taste of her skin.
As he feasted on the heated satin of her skin, a voice of doubt whispered in his mind. Do you really think this is helping your situation, Adamm?
Savagely, he shoved the voice out of his head. It felt…foreign. But not Sansan. Sansan hadn’t called him Adamm since they had shoved him into this body.
Wonderful way to save your soul, fornicating like the bastard you’ve always been…
He shot to his feet, lacing his fingers through her hair as he pressed his mouth back to hers, waiting for the heaven of her mouth, and the blood pounding in his head, to drown out that nasty little whisper.