Massachusetts was as good a place as any. The former Guardian angel had always had a fondness for New England. And he had met somebody very special here once, one of his own—an angel of Heaven—and his being here, in the same state as Eliza, made Pearly feel that much safer about leaving her.
He stopped his work momentarily, wiping his hands upon a rag before reaching into his back pocket for his wallet. He removed a business card—the Seraphim’s business card. He lived among the humans, as a human. This angel—this Remy Chandler—helped them as a private investigator. A detective.
“Take this,” he told Eliza, handing her the business card.
“Who is it?” she asked, her voice still shaking with emotion as she read the card.
“If there ever comes a time that you need help,” he assured her, “this man will help you. That’s what he does . . . he helps people.”
Her lips mouthed the name.
“I don’t understand,” she said as the tears flowed from her eyes.
“You will if it’s necessary,” he said. “He’s a good man. . . .”
“Like you?” Eliza said, reaching out to touch his face, but he stepped away to avoid her tender touch.
“Not like me at all,” Pearly said, the faces of the angels and the men that he’d killed in service to the Thrones flashing before his mind’s eye.
He returned to his work, finishing the last of the sigils before climbing slowly to his feet.
Eliza had become strangely quiet. Pearly turned toward her and found her simply standing, staring off into space, not noticing him, the angelic magick already going to work on her.
He hated this more than anything he’d ever experienced in his very long existence, but Malachi had said that it was necessary to protect her. And Pearly would do anything in his power to keep her safe.
Even if it meant losing her forever.
He watched her as she stood there, her eyes glazed as they traced the symbols drawn upon the wall. And as her eyes finished their review, the marks gradually faded away, blending with the paint of the wall.
She wouldn’t even know they were there, keeping her hidden from those who wished to do her harm.
Pearly stood beside her, resisting the urge to reach out to her, resisting the urge to take her into his arms and hold her for one last time. She would be safe here in the life he had created for her. The house was paid for, and there was money in a special bank account, the residuals of his being on the Earth for so many years, and having such a knack for killing. Somebody always wanted someone dead, and he was more than happy to oblige—for a price—when not kowtowing to the Thrones.
He wanted to tell her that he loved her, and that he was sorry. . . .
But she didn’t even know he was there.
Eliza blinked her beautiful brown eyes, and then went about her business, humming a tune, strangely off-key, as she assumed the functions of her new life. Even her talent for song had been taken away.
Pearly stopped at the door for one final look. She was in the kitchen, putting some glasses away in the cabinet.
“You take care of yourself, Fernita Green,” he called out, using her new name.
Then he opened the door and stepped out into the New England cold. He liked this part of the world, the change in seasons. He hoped that Eliza . . . Fernita . . . would like it too.
Francis took one final look at the house in the quiet Brockton neighborhood as he stood upon the walk.
He had never imagined that he could feel such pain, and not even have a sword plunged through his chest.
Malachi had been very specific that they meet after he had hidden Eliza away. The abandoned church in Italy’s San Genesio seemed just as good a place as any.
Francis pushed open the door and stepped into the run-down structure to see the elder sitting in one of the pews, gazing up to where a crucifix had once hung. There was a stain against the yellow wall over the altar in the shape of the cross.
“Is it done?” Malachi asked, not even turning around.
“Yeah,” Francis replied, the weight of the word nearly exhausting.
“And nobody knows her location but you?” The elder angel turned his head ever so slightly.
“That’s right,” Francis said. “Only me.”
Malachi left the pew and came to stand before him.
“Then everything is as it should be,” he said.
Malachi then reached into the inside pocket of the suit jacket he wore and removed a scalpel. The light from the blade was momentarily blinding, and Francis reflexively stepped back.
“What’s that for?” he asked.
“The final step,” Malachi answered.
Francis didn’t quite understand.
“It’s to take that very important memory away,” the elder explained.
“You’re going to cut out my memory?”
“Not exactly,” Malachi said. “I’m going to take it and move it to someplace else in your mind. Someplace where it will be waiting when we need it.”
Francis considered that.
“Will I still remember her?”
Slowly, Malachi shook his head.
“All your memories of her will be put away,” the elder explained. “That way no one will ever know where to find her . . . until it’s necessary.”
“And when will that be?”
Malachi turned back to the altar, gazing at the cross-shaped stain upon the wall.
“When it is time,” he said. “When all the pieces have fallen into place.”
Francis was suddenly afraid. He wanted to know exactly what all of this meant. He wanted to know exactly what role he and Eliza played in Malachi’s vision of the future.
The questions were just about to flow when Malachi turned back to him, scalpel of light still in his hand.
And before the words could leave Francis’s lips, the blade shot toward him.
Cutting away the brightest light he had ever known, and leaving behind only the darkness.
Hell
Malachi dug deeply within the angel’s brain, allowing the flow of memories to bleed out, flowing into and up through the scalpel and into the elder’s own mind.
“There you are,” the angel said with a joyous grin, digging deeper beneath the gelatinous folds to find—at last—what he had been seeking.
“Just a little bit deeper,” he said to Francis, who twitched about on the verge of death beneath the elder’s ministrations.
“And I should have it all.”
“You have me,” the angel said, opening his palms to show that he was unarmed.
Francis blinked wildly, momentarily unsure of what had just occurred. He had completed a side job in Italy when he had sensed the nearly overpowering presence of one of his own.
An angel of incredible power somewhere close by.
He had found the angel in the church: Malachi, he believed he was called, an important angel of the highest order that had betrayed the Lord of Lords during the Great War.
Malachi had sided with the Morningstar, but fled to Earth after the rebellion was squelched. If Francis’s memory served him correctly, the Thrones wanted this one very, very badly.
Francis had a gun in his hand, and it was pointed at his quarry.
He wasn’t sure whether the Thrones wanted this one dead or alive, but he was more than willing to use the Colt .45 loaded with special bullets made from lead mined from the resources of Hell, bullets that could end an angel of Heaven despite its divinity.
“Are you going to kill me?” the angel asked.
Francis was tempted, but at the same time could feel little malice for the betrayer, for he too had fallen under Lucifer’s spell.
Although Francis had realized the error of his ways.
“All depends on how hard you want to make this, or how merciful I’m feeling at the moment.”
The angel just stared.
“I could end it now for you,” Francis said. “One shot to the head would take it all away.”
“Yes,” Malachi said. “Yes, it would.”