“Dammit,” Reaver breathed. “The cloak that keeps all charmed humans invisible to demon eyes has been broken. It’s what caused my… condition. Someone must intend to use her for great evil.” Before Eidolon could ask more, Reaver shook his head. “You’ve got to forget about Serena. Wraith can’t touch her.”
The persistent headache E had been suffering for days kicked up a notch on the pain scale. “That’s not your call.”
“Don’t do it. I mean it, E. She needs the charm.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Reaver said, his voice as cold as a grave, “the charm is all that’s keeping her alive. If she loses it, she’ll die.”
Reaver watched the expression on Eidolon’s face fall. Shade just looked pissed. As usual
“What the hell do you mean, she’ll die?” Shade demanded. “Does that happen to all charmed humans who give up their charm?”
Reaver didn’t want to answer any of their questions, didn’t want to talk about something so sacred, and he really wanted to kick his own ass for spilling his guts about Marked Sentinels at all. The existence of charmed humans had been a carefully guarded secret for thousands of years, and if it got out… Reaver’s stomach turned over violently.
“Answer the question.” E was all cool Justice Dealer calm, which was deceptive; the guy could go from sub-zero to scorch in a heartbeat. He’d been raised by the Judicia, demons who meted out justice, and his icy, detached disposition only made him that much more lethal, because he was rarely swayed by emotion.
“Serena is a unique case.” Reaver’s voice was guttural, the instinct to protect the charmed human something he couldn’t suppress even though he was no longer worthy of doing so. Technically, no angel could interfere in a Sentinel’s life—not directly. That job fell to their human Aegis Guardian.
He rubbed his temples, considering how much to reveal. He couldn’t do anything about whoever broke her cloak, but if he wanted to save her from Wraith, Reaver would do well to appeal to his brothers’ medical sides, the parts of them that saved lives.
“Serena’s mother, Patrice, was the keeper of the charm until Serena was seven, and Patrice gave it up to her.”
Shade interrupted. “Wait. Patrice had to have been a virgin, right? So Serena was adopted?”
“Patrice was a virgin,” Reaver said, “but she was Serena’s biological mother. She was impregnated through in vitro fertilization.”
Eidolon propped his hip on the sink and watched Reaver with the intensity of a hawk. “How do you know this?”
“When there are only a handful of charmed humans in the world, you know everything about them,” he said, though it wasn’t entirely true.
“And why was she gifted?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Reaver was telling the demons far too much as it was. Eidolon and Shade were about as decent as demons could be, but if Reaver had any hope of getting back into Heaven, he didn’t want to blow it by handing over vital information to demons. Consorting with demons, working in a demon hospital… he was walking a fine line as it was.
“What matters is that shortly after Serena was born, a Mara demon somehow learned the truth about Patrice. He bit Patrice’s parents… and Serena.”
Being bitten by a Mara was bad news. Each one carried a unique disease within its body, to be spread through a bite, and only that demon possessed the antidote to its individual disease.
“He wanted the charm in exchange for the cure. Patrice had a terrible choice to make, and she chose to kill the demon. As a result, her parents suffered for months before they died. Serena spent years in and out of hospitals, and doctors could do nothing. Just before her seventh birthday, her time ran out.” Reaver’s voice was scraped raw after being dragged down memory lane. “When it became clear Serena was going to die and no cure could be found, Patrice passed her charm to Serena in order to keep her alive—”
“How?” Shade interrupted. “I thought sex was the key.”
“Serena was a special case,” Reaver said shortly. The truth, that the transfer never should have happened, was something he didn’t care to discuss.
Or think about.
Shade took the hint and steered the conversation in a new direction. “So what happened after Serena got the charm?”
“Her health improved instantly, but if she loses her charm, the disease will progress. She’ll die in a matter of days. Hours, maybe.”
“Oh, fuck,” Shade muttered. “We can’t tell Wraith.”
Eidolon’s dark brows shot up. “He needs to know.”
“If he knows, he might not take her charm.”
Reaver stared. “Are we talking about the same Wraith who screws and eats everyone he meets?”
“Wraith won’t kill human females.”
“That’s a character flaw I didn’t see coming,” Reaver muttered.
“If it makes you feel any better, he does make exceptions for female Aegi,” Shade said, and turned to E. “She’s just a human, so I don’t know what your deal is.”
“Your own mate is human.”