Demon Bound (34 page)

Alice's gaze skimmed the other statues.
And only that one.

Jake began to reply, then realized that although Khavi was still facing the hellhound, she'd switched to English.

“The dragons are of Chaos,” she said in that low tone. “They create, they destroy—there is no difference between each act. All Chaos knows is destruction and creation.”

He frowned, glanced at Alice, and saw the same incomprehension on her face. The words made sense, but he had no clue what Khavi was getting at.

Before he could frame the question, she returned to the table. “It is not a lie.”

But it wasn't all of the truth, either, Jake guessed—and his gut didn't untwist.

“Then Michael was human,” Alice said.

“In every way that matters. He called himself a man, and he lived as one. He did not water his mother's fields with the sweat from his brow, but he
did
work them.”

Alice breathed in and out. Wanting, Jake thought, to dance around the question.

He asked it. “Was Belial his father?”

“Yes. And no.” The faint smile on Khavi's lips might have been mocking or sad—Jake couldn't tell. “Belial was not as he is now. He drank at the table of the dragon, was created and destroyed. When he was full, he became himself again.”

Jake bared his teeth in a grin. “I don't suppose you could say that one more time, but without the woo-woo seer-speak?”

That Alice didn't hold out her hand for his money told him that she was just as frustrated.

Khavi's smile widened, sharpened. “Your novice friends will refer to me as Déjà Vu when I cannot hear. I will not appreciate it.”

Was that why she was deliberately obscure, or was this just a crazy tangent? “I'll tell them not to, then.”

“It is already done.”

Great. Just . . . flippin' . . . great.

Alice's frown became thoughtful. “How is it you didn't know that you would have to tell us about Michael? Or that we don't know everything you do about the Second Battle?”

“I can only see what I know. I cannot see what you do.”

For an instant, Jake considered shape-shifting and growing out his hair, just so he could rip it out. “So,” he said, measuring each word, “Michael had a farm. He considered himself a man. Belial wasn't always such an asshole, and he was the father. Who was the mommy?”

“A human.”

“
How
was she a mommy?”

Khavi tilted her head. “Surely you know how it is accomplished.”

“With a demon? Not exactly.”

“But I have already told you.”

“Dragons,” Alice murmured. “The hounds, the bats, the spiders.” Her gaze lifted from her sketchbook. “Have they all drunk at the table of the dragon?”

“Yes.” Ebony eyes gleamed. “And they ate through their mothers' wombs when they were born.”

Khavi was going to have to work harder than that to freak them out. “Yum,” Jake said, thinking it through. So, Belial had either eaten dragon meat or drunk its blood—as had the bats and spiders. Their offspring would have changed, generation by generation. The original destroyed, and something new created—except Belial, a demon, had returned to his original form when he'd stopped consuming it.

And considering the blinding brightness, maybe it truly was his
original
form—his angelic form.

“You said Michael worked his mother's fields,” Alice said. “So he was not born so violently.”

“No. He slid from his mother with wings of black, and his white-feathered sister not far behind.” She sneered at the head Jake still held, and he remembered the name she'd coupled with Michael's:
Anaria.
“And so we came, two by two, the dark and the light.”

“And Zakril?” Alice asked quietly.

Khavi's expression softened. “Our mother was the demon, and Zakril was the white. There were many demons who dined on the dragon, but not all performed the mating of the human's free will. And of those who did, only five pairs were born.”

It made a sick kind of sense. A human couldn't be transformed into a Guardian or a vampire without their consent. Apparently a demon couldn't conceive without it being willing, either.

“We were ten: the grigori, who watched the humans. Who saw their fear when they looked back at us. Their greed when they attempted to use us. Their anger and their hate and their envy.”

“But?”

Her hand rested on the shoulder of the unnamed male statue. “But Lucifer had not foreseen friendship and family, that demons might care for their human partners and their children, or that the light would balance the dark.”

Lucifer? Jake had been operating under the assumption that this had been one of Belial's grabs for power. “Hold on a second. Lucifer planned this?”

“Yes.”

Something wasn't right about that. Frowning, Jake set Anaria's head on the table, gave himself a moment to think. Michael was stronger than any demon, except maybe Lucifer or Belial. Why create such powerful beings—such powerful potential opponents? Unlike demons and the nephilim, the grigori wouldn't have been bound to serve him. So it didn't make sense.

Unless Jake was going about this the wrong way. He shifted gears and tried to think as Lucifer would.

Because the angels couldn't completely hide their difference from humans, they'd been worshipped as gods—which had pissed Lucifer off. He'd planned to wipe them out using the dragon. And, like any power-hungry prick, he would've assumed victory.

But even with the angels gone, he couldn't do much to the people. Lucifer was still required to honor human free will and life.

So, what's a prick to do? Jake thought grimly. What else, but develop a race of powerful beings and raise them to despise mankind? The grigori wouldn't have had to follow the Rules.

Yep. That would have been one hell of a plan: ten hate-filled Michaels, consumed by anger and loose on Earth with no angels left to fight them.

Just the thought of it coated his stomach with ice.

It took only a second to sign his conclusion to Alice. She nodded, her mouth prim, and crossed her arms beneath her breasts. Yeah, the idea unsettled her, too.

“Then you . . . and Michael”—Alice's lashes flickered as she added the name—“don't have to follow the Rules?”

“We do. It was a condition of our transformation—just as dying while saving another's life was. It still is?” Khavi waited for them to confirm it, then nodded. “We fought alongside Michael after he was changed. As you can imagine, it was not long before we were all killed defending others from demons or nosferatu, just as he was.”

“
Michael
was killed?” Alice shook her head. “I cannot even imagine it.”

“His death might free you, yet you never imagine it?” A hard smile touched Khavi's mouth when Alice stiffened, but she only continued, “I cannot imagine anyone emerging unscathed from a battle with a dragon—as Michael did not. And three of us—of the grigori—were killed simply defending themselves, and could not become one of the watchers.”

“Guardians,” Jake said.

“Yes. And for those of us who were changed, the difference was not so very great. We already possessed our wings, our strength and speed—and we could sense another's emotions. Afterward, we could alter our shape, move between realms, and we each had our individual abilities.” She paused, and her Gift eddied around them. Pulling in the correct words, Jake realized. “Our Gifts. If we Fall, are no longer Guardians, we give those up—but we no longer have to follow the Rules, either.”

Jake exchanged a doubtful look with Alice and said, “You can teleport.” Yet she'd stayed here?

“I
could
—if not for the symbols. But I do not know where he placed the ones that prevent it.” She gestured to the glyphs on her face, then behind her waist. “Somewhere I cannot see.”

Alice's lips parted, and she touched her own shoulder. “Belial. He's the one who has been here, but that you haven't turned your back on.”

“Never of my choice. Just as it is not my choice that he comes now to ask if I have seen you.”

“He—” Jake's gaze snapped to the door, his heart kicking against his ribs. “
Now?
”

“Soon after the nychiptera disperse. No,” Khavi said as Jake's hand sought Alice's. “You do not leave that way. Stay, a moment. I will see where the nychiptera are at present, and how much time you have before he arrives.”

As she strode toward the entrance, metal guards formed over her arms, chest and legs. She shoved on a gleaming helmet with plates to protect her nose and cheeks, and a bow appeared in her hand. Skin hardened to scales; her fangs gleamed when she turned and smiled.

“It will be a wonderful surprise to find you alive when I return.”

CHAPTER 16

The opening of the door brought in the scent of blood and sulfur, the roar from a maelstrom of wings, and chilling, high-pitched shrieks.

They were still ringing in Alice's ears as she walked through the bathing chamber, holding her sketchbook. She didn't call in a pencil. The silk soles of her boots muffled her heavy steps.

It was not so difficult to see into the future. She only had to look around. This was what awaited her if she chose to safeguard her soul by imprisoning herself. This . . . but without the company of a hellhound, or a door, or any event she could look forward to with hope.

She emerged from the chamber to the sound of a soft warning growl from the hellhound, who still lay across the entrance to the opposite room. Jake paused in his slow approach, and his frustrated sigh pulled a smile from her.

No, he could not stop himself from wondering about that chamber any more than she could. But neither of them was willing to challenge a hellhound to look.

“Damn.” He turned toward her, his expression rueful. He pushed his hands deep in his pockets. “So . . . whaddaya think?”

Alice placed her sketchbook on the table. In truth, she did not know what to think. She was completely uncertain—about what was truth and lies, how they would escape Belial again, whether Khavi could be trusted, and if what they'd learned here had any significance at all.

She only had one certainty: how very glad she was that Jake had not been separated from her. That she could rely on his integrity—and that she could test her instincts against his, without having to maneuver through motives and half truths.

And she would do so now. Alice leafed through the sketches until she found Zakril's skeleton and the symbols written above. She'd debated showing it to Khavi, but refrained—uncertain, again, as to the other woman's reaction.

“ ‘She waits below,' ” Alice recited. “Michael said this referred to the woman who had betrayed them.”

“Yeah.” Jake joined her at the table. His leg brushed her skirts, and she wanted to lean against him. Not for support; just to feel his warmth and strength. “But that's not Khavi. Anaria's the one who betrayed them.”

Alice looked at the statue's head, lying on its cheek, then up at Jake. “Why do you suppose?”

“Why she betrayed them or why I think it's Anaria?”

“The second.”

“Good, because I have no clue about the first. As for the second, here—” He flipped to a drawing of the statue in Tunisia. “And outside. You have any brothers, sisters?”

“No.”

“Me neither. Okay, let's use Drifter then. Say you saw a statue with him kneeling in front of this woman, looking like Zakril did outside. Obviously defeated, forced to submit, and hating it—even though he loved her. What would you do?”

Her chest tightened. Put that way, the woman's—Anaria's—serenity and benevolence were an insult. “Destroy it, or take it somewhere Anaria could never see, so she could never take pleasure in it. But I am not Khavi.”

“No, neither am I.” He flipped back to the skeleton, the symbols. “Michael said they were divided—that the others wanted to put a Guardian on the throne in Hell. And he said that Zakril wasn't one of them. So, two questions: If the betrayal was Khavi's, why would she stick his bones on a wall, and then bring his statue down here—removing evidence of his defeat? Evidence that no one would have seen anyway, until you came along?”

“Guilt? Perhaps she was torn between ambition and loyalty. Or perhaps she brought it with her so that she could always look upon his humiliation.”

“But it's Anaria's head she beats up? Yeah, right.”

She smiled slightly. “And the second question?”

“Why would Zakril be bowing down to Anaria? Can you ever—
ever
—imagine Michael forcing anyone to bow to him? Even with Lucifer, he wouldn't bother with the whole debasing routine; he'd just chop off his head.”

That was true. “Yet Khavi admitted that she had hidden from Michael.”

“Yeah, and that's the part I can't work out yet. But she loves Anaria, too—she made it sound like they were quite the tight little group, didn't she?—so I'm guessing whatever her reason for hiding,
that
has more to do with guilt and conflicted loyalties.”

“Yes,” Alice murmured.

Jake's eyes narrowed on her face before he said, “You didn't think it was Khavi who betrayed them.”

“No. But I feared I pitied her too much”—and saw too many parallels in their isolation—“to judge correctly. I wondered if my desire to think the best of her was clouding my vision.”

“And here
I
was wondering if you wanted to think the best of Anaria because she's Michael's sister.”