chapter 27
“What were you talking to Josette about?”
I had been needling Rebecca for the contents of her conversation with the seraph the entire way up to the roof. We had left Josette and Obi behind, and had taken the emergency stairwell up, bypassing the door lock that was supposed to keep guests away from the top of the building. She had been ignoring me until we stepped out onto the blacktop.
It was a dark, dreary, drizzly day, the kind that I had always hated when I had been a kid. I was thankful for the weather now, because it meant Rebecca could be out here without risking her health.
“Landon,” she said, giving me that same look of inferiority that I was getting used to. “You destroyed a fire demon single-handed, and you’re worried about girl-talk?”
“Girls are a lot more intimidating than fire demons,” I replied, shrugging.
She laughed, and then sighed. “If you must know, Josette thanked me for bringing you to her, for helping save the sanctuary and her life. She said thank you in the truck on the way back, but whatever you said to her while I was gone, she was a lot more exuberant. Anyway, as we were talking about it I made a comment about the way you lost all of your clothes in the flames, and she admitted with much embarrassment that God gifted you with a fine physique. You should be flattered to have an angel say that about you.”
My face had turned beet red by then, and I couldn’t make eye contact with her. “I didn’t think Josette thought about me that way.”
She tilted her head to the side to listen, then led me away from the stairwell and over towards the huge air-conditioning unit. “Don’t get too flattered,” she said. “She doesn’t think about anyone that way. But she does believe in you, which is much more important.”
“What about you?”
When we reached the back of the unit she stopped walking and kissed me on the cheek. “I believe in you too. He’ll be here in a few seconds.”
I was going to ask her who, but I felt the presence approaching for myself. It wasn’t Reyzl, but it was familiar. A moment later, a small demon popped up over the side of the roof. He grinned when he saw us.
“Ahh yesss, the vampiresss and her toy.”
Rebecca bared her fangs at the demon. ”Yuli, I suggest you show some respect, or my toy will break you in half with a thought.”
Reyzl’s messenger stopped laughing and looked at me with a frightened expression. “My apologiesss Mastersss... whatss your namesss?”
“Landon,” Rebecca said. “Diuscrucis Master Landon. If Reyzl doesn’t remember him, remind him that it was Landon who killed his servants at the Catskill sanctuary.”
I didn’t think the demon could look more afraid of me than he already had, but somehow his posture took on an even deeper level of fear. He was shaking as he spoke again. “You havess a message for Mastersss?”
“I want to make a deal,” I said. “Tell him we know his plans, and we want a piece of the action. We’ll retrieve the Chalice from the Demon Queen, and keep his amulets in play so he can launch his attack against her. In exchange, he’ll tell us how to reach her. He’ll also agree to allow us to keep the Chalice and take it off the table.”
“If he accepts he’s to meet us on Liberty Island in an hour,” Rebecca added.
I wondered if we had overloaded Yuli’s tiny mind, as he hovered silent and motionless for over a minute. I looked at Rebecca, wondering what was going on, but she was reacting as if the activity were normal. Finally, he nodded. “Yesss, yesss. Masterssss acceptsss your dealsss. He will meetsss you.”
“One hour,” Rebecca repeated. We were going to have to move fast to get there in such a short amount of time.
“One hourssss,” Yuli said. He gave me one last frightened glance and darted away, disappearing around the corner of the air conditioner.
“Can all demons communicate telepathically?” I asked her, once I could no longer sense Reyzl’s messenger.
“No,” she replied. “Yuli is Reyzl’s familiar. They have a blood bond that allows them to communicate without regard for distance, among other things. His messages are the only ones Reyzl trusts completely, which is why I called for him.”
“Well it looks like the deal is on,” I said. “An hour isn’t much time.”
“Then we better get a move on, worm.”
“What about the Touched coming up the stairs?” I asked.
There were four of them total. I had noticed them approaching as the familiar had left, but Rebecca must have caught their scent sooner. That was why she had positioned us out of sight while we had taken care of our business with Reyzl.
She looked at me with black eyes. “We could use a few more swords,” she suggested.
I heard the door groan as it opened, and four pairs of boots stomped out onto the rooftop. I could sense them standing there, uncertain.
“I know I saw it stop up here,” I heard one of them say. “It looks like it’s gone.”
“Let’s look around, just to make sure,” another one said.
They had come up here looking for Yuli. Now they were fanning out, going over to the sides of the building and looking out and down to see if they could catch a glimpse of where the demon was headed. One of the Touched was headed for our not-so-hidden hiding spot.
“Landon?” Rebecca asked.
I didn’t want to kill them. I wish my reasons were more kind, but it was mostly because I didn’t want to upset Josette, or risk doing any more damage to the balance.
“Can you disable them without hurting them?”
She didn’t look pleased, but she nodded. Her clawed fingers retracted back into normal hands, and she reached into a pocket and removed a pair of gloves. She couldn’t cut them without the poison killing them. Then again, I was sure she had done this plenty of times before. It wouldn’t be very helpful to kill your prey before you could drain it of its blood.
Rebecca padded over to the corner and waited for the Touched to approach. I could sense them moving, and knew they were getting closer. I had just enough time to see half a head of long brown hair move past the edge of the HVAC when Rebecca reached out, grabbed the Touched, twisted her around and slipped a hand around her neck and mouth. I looked her right in her frightened eyes while Rebecca constricted her throat until she passed out.
“She has a dagger,” Rebecca said, finding the small thin blade beneath a black down jacket.
“If it’ll hurt a demon, we’ll take it. Come on,” I said, picking up the unconscious woman and taking us out from behind the air conditioner. When we got to the center of the rooftop I called out to her friends. “Hey,” I shouted.
The other Touched were still peeking over the edges of the building, searching for Yuli, but they turned to me when I spoke. There were two men and another woman, all wearing the same black down jacket. Seeing one of theirs in my arms, they stayed motionless while waiting to see what I wanted.
“She’s alive,” I told them. “You can all go home alive, and you can take her with you, but I need your weapons.”
“What does a demon need with a blessed dagger?” the woman asked. Her voice was a mixture of fear and anger.
“Look closer. I’m not a demon,” I said. “But I do need to go and kill one, and I’ll need your knives to do it. Please don’t make me take them by force.”
The woman stepped towards me. “If you hand me my sister, we’ll drop our weapons here and leave.”
I nodded, and started walking towards her with her sister cradled in my arms. When I had reached her, I saw she had tears running down her face. I had been so callous in my consideration of their mortal lives. What was I becoming? I put the woman down and held her so her sister could support her. She used her free hand to reach into her jacket and take out her blade, handing it to me hilt first.
“If you’re killing demons, I wish you good hunting,” she said to me. “Come on fellows,” she shouted to the two men. I could hear their daggers clatter onto the blacktop. A moment later the door groaned again, and they were gone.
“The Order of the Blessed Virgin,” Rebecca said after they had left. “They take a vow of celibacy when they’re Touched. They’re servants, not warriors, which means the angels must be getting desperate to send them out into the fray.”
“They have to be getting reports of the other attacks. We need to get to the Statue. Let’s grab the daggers and go.”