There But For The Grace (9 page)

The moment I pulled myself into the open, I was battered by chilling winds. Normally, any extreme of the mortal world wouldn’t bother me, but this cut straight to the bone. Crusted ice atop a thick layer of snow scraped at my skin and my wounds, and had I been any less durable, may have left some cuts of its own. The ice was solid enough to make forging ahead through the snow difficult, while being brittle enough to break at any attempt to move over it, sinking me back in to thigh-depth. There was no doubt of where I’d come up. I’d left the pits, only to come up in the Ninth, and deepest, circle of Hell.

Adelaide

I bent at the waist, hands on my knees, and heaved into the bushes outside a twenty-four hour café. I could only assume we were in the same time zone, or nearly so because it was still dark outside, still, I had to ask.

“Where are we?”

“Houston, it was as good a place as any to get you something to eat.”

I rinsed my mouth out with the cool, sweet water from God’s canteen and realized with a start that since filling it the first time, I hadn’t needed to refill it. It just never seemed to run out. Hooray, that was super handy. I swished the water around in my mouth and spit it into the bushes beside me. I looked over to Death and blinked.

He was dressed in a simple pair of slacks and a white button-down shirt. His hair was short and brown, his skin tan from the sun. He had his hands tucked into his pockets and looked like himself except…well… human. He looked like any other businessman who had worked late at the office: collar undone, sleeves of his smart business shirt rolled back halfway up his forearms. It was a handsome look, and I was a little self-conscious standing beside him looking like an urban backpacker.

I was as utilitarian as you could get while still looking somewhat urban chic: black boots, light Levi’s blue jeans, and a white t-shirt that hugged my frame under a black leather biker jacket that did the same. We didn’t exactly look like we went together, but fuck it. I didn’t care. At least we looked more normal than we had a minute ago. If anything, he’d adapted nicely to the situation, and if he’d aged himself up by about ten more years, he could almost pass for my father. As of right now, he probably
could
pass for an older, more responsible brother.

I could work with that if it came down to it. I nodded, and Azrael’s lips quirked into a bemused smile.

“I should like to know why you simply have not questioned anything up to this point,” he said.

I shrugged, “You obviously haven’t spent longer than five minutes with Tab. He’s been my go-to guy when it comes to everything up to this point, and he
hates
questions. It’s like they’re his kryptonite or some shit.” I shrugged.

Death full-on smiled, and he was so very pretty when he did it. Not handsome, not suave, but pretty. Like if I hadn’t been hanging around all these Angels, Archangels, Fallen and what have you for all this time, my panties probably would have gone up in a pyroclastic cloud, but after watching Tab with one of his almost shy, reserved smiles that he almost never let out to play… yeah, Death looked good for being, well,
Death
, but it just didn’t move me. Not the way it probably should have.

“Let’s go inside. Have something to eat. I understand the food here is good, and the prices are better.”

I nodded, “Sounds good. By the time the food hits the table, I’m pretty sure my stomach will be settled.” Truthfully, I was more than a little worried about the fact that I’d ralphed in the first place. I mean, granted, it’d been a minute since I’d done the rough Angel travel through space and maybe even time, but it hadn’t been
that
long.

“You’re right to worry. I am afraid that it is one more thing that is indicative of the strain being placed upon your body. Your mind, however, is remarkably resilient.”

I swallowed hard and looked at him plainly, leveling him as best I could with my gaze, which was a joke. Still, I looked Death incarnate right in the eye and asked him, “Am I dying or something? Is that what you just meant by that? Is having Iaoel in my head killing me?”

His silence was all the answer I needed. He watched me process it, but really, all I had for him was dismissal. I dismissed the information and said, “Get me something to eat and tell me what I need to do to get into Hell.” Because if I was indeed dying, I didn’t have any time to waste thinking about it. I had to get Tab out before I kicked it. I’d promised him, and if it was the last thing I did, then fine, so be it. It was more than I had done with any of the rest of my life.

Death murmured, “Of course,” and snapped me back to the here and now. He held open the diner door for me. “But before we get into that, I would like very much, to know why it is you are so eager to enter the abyss.”

“Quid pro quo?” I asked. He nodded, and I nodded too, more to myself than anything.

“Fair enough, let’s lay all our cards out on the table, shall we?”

Death grinned, “I find you to be refreshingly direct, Adelaide Marion Long.”

“Thanks,” I said dryly, “I aim to please.”

We took a booth near the door as the waitress directed, and I ordered coffee, Death, surprisingly, did the same. I somehow didn’t really picture him as a coffee drinker.

“So, why do you wish to get into Hell?” he asked me, and I blinked.

“Wanna at least try to keep it down?”

“There is no need. Speak plainly, girl. The mortals around us simply see a brother and sister talking about family issues.”

“Good to know.” I huffed out a sigh. “I don’t have time for the long version, so I’ll stick to the basics. I got stuck with the Grace of Iaoel, the Angel of Visions. Tab, the Angel of Free Will, showed up and has, for the most part, kept me alive and able to make my own decisions while both Heaven and Hell have been after my ass.”

Azrael’s eyebrows rose up into his hairline, and I realized I was
sort of
rambling. “Right, so Iaoel knew the location of the keys to the gates of both Heaven and Hell, and we found them. There was a big fight under Chernobyl –”

He stopped me, “Yes, yes, I was there, and Tabbris was dragged through the Hellmouth,” Death waved me on, and I could see the beginning of unease in his eyes.

“Yeah,” I nodded, “You’re picking up what I’m putting down.
With the keys;
Tab was dragged into Hell, with the keys. He had them. I didn’t. Why do you think no one’s come after me yet? They probably have figured it out by now that he has them.”

Death leaned back in the booth and looked grim. I fixed my coffee and drained it in something like three gulps, and the waitress came back around and took our order. Once she had left, Death let out a rather large sigh that left even my heart sinking.

“So it begins,” he muttered and knocked on the table, rapping on its surface idly with his knuckles.

“What? The Apocalypse?” I asked and his eyes shot to mine, I rolled my eyes at him.

“Don’t forget, you’re talking to two.” I rapped on my temple with my fingertips. Iaoel had seen fit to show me a few things, namely four riders on horseback. The images were vague but enough to get the message through clear. I saw four Angels in silhouette against a fiery backdrop, all sitting astride mighty big horses. I couldn’t see faces or anything, or even tell if they were all male, female or a mix, as all of them wore armor and it wasn’t exactly unusual for Angel dudes to have long hair.

Still, I could see enough to know that one of the horses were pale, and I remembered that much about the passage from Revelations.

I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.

“So it seems,” he said and sounded just as dismissive of the information as I did earlier about the fact that the bitch residing in my head was going to eventually kill me. I swallowed hard and told her silently,
don’t think for a minute that I’m not taking you with me if that’s the case. There’s no way you’re getting my body.

My proclamation was met with silence and darkness, not an image to be seen. Our food was set in front of us, and despite my lack of appetite, I did what Tab had told me some time back. I ate it anyways. One never knew when the next meal was going to come. I was being a good little soldier, and that was simply that. I needed to be if I was going to get Tab and me out of this, and whatever time I had left after that, well, I would use it to do something. I just didn’t know what.

“This fucking sucks,” I uttered, and Death made a noise of, I think, agreement.

He huffed a big sigh, “I cannot help you, Adelaide,” he said and then raised a hand when I drew breath to argue.

“I cannot help you on my own. You must have the blessing of the other riders as well. Know that you have mine, but you must convince –”

“Are you fucking serious?” I asked, and I was left pretty much gobsmacked.

“Deadly,” he said with a slight smile, and I couldn’t help it: that shit made me laugh.

“I need to go talk to War, Famine, Pestilence, and…well,” I waved in front of me at Death.

“If it is time, it is time, though I disagree that the time should be now. If the other riders agree that the apocalypse should
not
be nigh, then I will help you.
We
will help you. You must speak to each of us, however.” He took in my dubious expression and mistook it for hesitation on my part, raising an eyebrow as if he expected me to punk out.

“Who do we start with?” I asked.

“You. Who do
you
start with, and that would be Famine.”

“Cool, can you at least point the way in his direction?”

“I will do you one better. I shall take you to him myself,
after
you’ve finished your meal.”

“That’s awfully accommodating of you, Death. Thanks.”

He laughed, and I smiled.

“Please, call me Azrael. ‘Death’ makes me feel like an aged old man.”

I didn’t comment on that one. What the hell could I say? I huffed out a slight laugh and said, “What’s your position on this whole mess?”

“Mine? As I’ve stated, I am inclined to help you, Adelaide.”

“How come?” I asked, when honestly my insides were turning almost liquid with relief and every instinct I had was screaming
don’t question this, you dolt!

Azrael sighed, “If it is time, so be it, but I quite like things the way they are. Humans are fascinating creatures, and while I admit, things have gotten quite rough, I think there is hope for you mortals yet, and as long as there is hope, there is always reason to carry on, is there not?”

“Damned skippy,” I grated, and Azrael laughed, a soft chuckle.

“I do find you to be refreshingly humorous.”

“Yeah, and I find you to be surprisingly… human.”

We finished our meal, and I paid out of the stock of bills hidden in a pocket of my backpack, mostly for the internal bragging rights that I’d bought Death dinner. Maybe when I saw Tab again I could tell him. Maybe he would laugh, but more than likely he would just sigh and say “Adelaide…” like I’d just broke the living room lamp or something. It was funny the things you missed about people when they weren’t there anymore.

Like Piorre, these moments of exasperation from Tab told me that what he’d said, down below in Chernobyl; might actually be applied to me and not Iaoel. My head told me that Tab had no reason to love her, or me, but it also told me that love comes in different forms. Maybe he loved me, but it didn’t mean he was
in love
with me. But that wasn’t what he’d said, was it? I scraped my bottom lip between my teeth as Azrael and I walked down the lonely street to somewhere more suitable to make whatever travel jump we needed to.

“Something weighs heavily on your mind,” he stated.

“Yeah,” I agreed.

“Tell me,” he urged.

“A lot of things, really. I’m dying, isn’t that enough?”

“Ah, you do realize that lying to Death is a pretty futile exercise, don’t you?”

“Yeah, but I’m pretty sure as Death, you understand better than anyone else, some things just aren’t things people want to talk about out loud.”

“Yes.”

I felt a sudden flood of tears sting my eyes, and I looked down at my boots, traversing the broken sidewalk, “I probably don’t really want to know the answer to this, but, is it going to hurt? You know, when I go?”

“Scared?”

“Yeah.”

“I can’t tell you, honestly, Adelaide. There are some journeys that are very personal ones that even I am not exactly privy to. Everyone dies eventually, child, and I do mean everyone.”

I nodded and wiped my nose.

“I just have to make sure to get him out
before
I go,” I said, and Azrael paused. I stopped with him.

“We ready to do this?” I asked.

“Do what?”

“Make the jump to wherever I need to go to find Famine.”

“He prefers to be called by his given Angelic name, Cahethel, even though he is Fallen. Keep that in mind when you do go up to meet him.” Azrael gestured to the rundown tenement looking building we’d stopped beside.

“This place looks abandoned,” I mused aloud.

“It very nearly is.” I turned back to him and stifled the sharp gasp that threatened to leave my lips. He was back in his full Death regalia of cloak and cowl, his skin black as deepest night save for the silvery script tattooed across his face.

“What is that, if you don’t mind me asking?” I gestured to my own face, Azrael smiled a little sadly.

“It marks me as ‘other’ from the rest of the Angelic host. Sets me apart. I am the one thing even Michael and the rest of my fellow Archangels fear.”