Chain of Thorns (The Last Hours, #3)

She paused. She could still hear the wailing in the distance. Had it grown louder? She could not tell.

“Fight back!” she cried. “Reclaim yourselves! If you thrust the demons from your bodies, I swear we know how to destroy them! You will be freed! But you must try!” The cries had died away; there was a great silence now. She floated in it, in the darkness and the silence, utterly untethered. She had gone further than she had ever gone before, reached further than she had ever reached. Whether she could return or not, Lucie did not know. She raised her face to the stars, that were not really stars, and said, “We need you. The Nephilim need you. We have fought so hard.”

Her vision had begun to dim, her consciousness slipping away. Lucie whispered, “Please come back to us, please,” and then her mind was swallowed up by darkness, and she could say no more.





35 WINGED WITH LIGHTNING




But see the angry Victor hath recalled

His ministers of vengeance and pursuit

Back to the gates of Heaven: The sulfurous hail

Shot after us in storm, overblown hath laid

The fiery Surge, that from the precipice

Of Heaven received us falling, and the thunder,

Winged with red lightning and impetuous rage.

—John Milton, Paradise Lost



Cordelia ran.

She ran from the north transept of the abbey, circling around the tomb of Edward the Confessor, and burst into the nave, where the choir turned into long rows of pews, all facing the High Altar.

Where Belial sat, sprawled in the Coronation Chair. He was still, one hand under his chin, his gaze fixed on her.

Holding Cortana crosswise, as if it were a golden shield, she began to walk toward the High Altar. She kept her back straight, her face expressionless. Let Belial watch her approach. Let him puzzle at her calm; let him wonder what she had planned.

Let him be afraid. She hoped he was afraid.

She was not afraid. Not now. She was breathless. Stunned. She had known it was true, since they had found Matthew in Edom, and he had told them what happened. But she had not been able to imagine it. Not until this moment, as she strode through the center of Westminster Abbey as if she were going to her own coronation. Not until this moment, when she looked at the High Altar, and saw James.

James. Even with everything she knew, part of her wanted to rush up the steps and throw her arms around him. He would feel like James; his heart would beat like James’s did. His body would feel like James’s body against hers, his hair like James’s if she knotted her fingers into it; he would sound like James if he spoke.

Or would he? She didn’t know. He had asked Matthew to be his voice; was James’s voice, even the sound of it, gone forever? Would she never hear him say Daisy, my Daisy, ever again?

He smiled.

And it felt as if he had slapped her.

James’s face—the one she could conjure up so easily with her eyes closed, the soft mouth and high cheekbones and lovely golden eyes—was set in a sneer, his expression a mixture of hatred and fear, contempt and—amusement. The sort of amusement that made her think of a schoolboy torturing an insect.

Nor were his eyes golden now. Belial’s eyes, in James’s face, were dark silver, the color of tarnished shillings.

He raised his hand. “Stop,” he said in a voice that was nothing like James’s voice, and Cordelia—stopped. She had not meant to do so, but it was as if she’d hit a wall of glass, an invisible magical barrier. She could not take one more step. “That’s close enough.”

Cordelia tightened her grip on Cortana. She could feel the sword tremble in her hand; it knew they had a purpose here.

“I want to talk to James,” Cordelia said.

Belial smiled, a twisted expression nothing like James’s smile. “Well,” he said. “Don’t we all want things.” He snapped his fingers, and out of the shadows at the side of the altar lurched a horrific figure—an animated corpse, a frame of yellowed bones topped with a grinning skull. It wore an archbishop’s miter and a tarnished chasuble that had once been richly embroidered with gold; the vestment was now mostly rotted through, and through the holes Cordelia could see the archbishop’s ribs, hung with stringy bits of leathery flesh. In its hands it held a purple-and-golden crown, studded with gems of all colors. She was reminded, horribly and strangely, of the play on the stage of the Hell Ruelle, the crowd applauding the peculiar coronation.…

“I, for instance,” said Belial, “wish to be crowned king of London by Simon de Langham here.”

The dead archbishop wobbled.

Belial sighed. “Poor Simon; we do keep getting interrupted by your idiot friends. And now, of course, by you.” His silver gaze slid over her like water. “I can’t say it’s been the coronation of my dreams.”

“I don’t see why you want a coronation, anyway,” said Cordelia. “I thought things like royalty, and kings and queens, only mattered to mundanes.”

She had not meant it to be particularly insulting, but to her surprise, rage flashed across his face. “Please,” he said. “I am a Prince of Hell, do you think that title means nothing?”

Yes, Cordelia thought, but didn’t speak.

“I am not going to accept a demotion,” he snapped, settling back against the chair. “Besides, there is magic in ritual. This will cement my hold on London, and eventually on all of England. And after that, who knows?” He grinned brightly, his mood seemingly restored. “With this new body of mine, all is possible. There is no kingdom on Earth that would not fall before me, if I set my mind to it.” He let his head fall back, James’s cloudy dark hair falling charmingly over his forehead. Cordelia felt sick. “Oh, James is miserable.” He chuckled. “I can feel it. To behold you here causes him an agony that is, I assure you, delicious. It’s fascinating, the way you human beings hurt. Not physically, of course, that’s all boringly familiar, but the emotional torment. The anguish of feeling. It is unique among animals.”

“They say angels weep,” said Cordelia. “But I suppose you’ve forgotten.”

Belial narrowed his silver eyes.

“And speaking of physical pain,” she went on. “The wounds given you by Cortana. The wounds given to you by me. They still hurt, do they not?”

Above her, Cordelia heard a sudden susurration of wings. She looked up sharply to see an owl flap through the arched galleries high above them.

“The wounds you have,” she said, “will never close. They will burn forever.” She turned Cortana, so that the engraved side of the blade faced the altar. I am Cortana, of the same steel and temper as Joyeuse and Durendal. “Unless I heal them.”

“Heal them?” he echoed sharply, so sharply that the archbishop, apparently in confusion, stepped forward with the royal crown. Looking annoyed, Belial plucked the crown from the skeleton’s grasp and waved him away. “How can you—ah.” The shock faded from his expression. “Because it is a paladin’s blade. I too have heard the stories that claim such a power. But they are just stories.”

“Stories are not lies,” Cordelia said. She raised her left hand. Then she brought the edge of her sword against it, the blade cool against her skin. She pressed, and it bit in, slicing open her palm. Blood welled from the cut and fell in thick drops to the marble floor.

She held up her injured hand to show Belial, who did not react, only continued watching her. Then she lay the flat of the blade upon the palm and drew it slowly across her hand. When she lowered the sword, the wound was gone, her skin showing no mark or scar, not even a white line where the cut had been. She flexed her hand a few times and then held it up again for Belial to inspect.

“Stories,” Cordelia said, “are true.”

“Interesting,” Belial murmured, as though to himself, but his eyes stayed hooked to Cortana, even as Cordelia lowered the sword. He looked hungry, she thought. Hungry for the end of pain.

“This is the blade Cortana,” Cordelia reminded him, “forged by Wayland the Smith. There is no other like it, and it can heal as well as harm. But it can only do so in the hand of its rightful bearer. You cannot simply kill me and use the sword to heal yourself.”

Belial was silent for a long moment. Finally he said, “What is your proposal, then?”

“Depart from James’s body,” Cordelia said. She knew it was a ridiculous suggestion, but she had to keep him talking. James had said she needed to get close to him, and here she was, desperately searching Belial’s face, looking for any sign of James at all.

Belial gave her a sour look. “Your gambit is sillier than I thought. I have worked far too hard and planned far too long to give up this form. It has been my primary aim all this time. However,” he added, “I am not unwilling to negotiate. If you heal my wounds, I will spare your life.”