“We had a child?” I asked. I had no breath. The recollection came upon me fast, too, like vertigo. My stomach lurched, and I was suddenly glad I hadn’t eaten. “A giant. Like Azazel.”
Michael removed the book from my shaking hand and placed it on the table. “We did.”
“I gave birth to a demon!” I all but shrieked.
“We didn’t know what it would be,” he said.
My legs wouldn’t support me anymore, so I collapsed on the couch. “W–what was Azazel doing here? Was he—it—my…” I couldn’t bring myself to say the word “son.”
Michael shook his head, his face blanching. “That creature was destroyed a long time ago.”
“What happened?”
“It developed a taste for human flesh,” he said. “I couldn’t let it loose on the world. Not after what it did to you.” Then, as though the horror of what had happened had resurfaced, he raked both his hands through his wet hair. “I killed it. I had to.”
I couldn’t remember the pain, but the memory of it showed on his face. I didn’t have to ask what it had done to me. He had been there the whole time, watching, and in spite of all the power he’d once had, he could do nothing to stop it. I saw him holding my hand, his tortured expression, his helplessness. I remembered a heat ripping through me, as though the baby would tear itself out with its claws if it had to. Apparently it did, and Michael had killed his own son because it was a monster.
As if we were both seeing the same memory, he added, “What we did. What I did. It killed you.”
The memory was painful, but it wasn’t his fault. Women had died in childbirth throughout history. Granted, these were different circumstances and it was me he was talking about, but it was a long, long time ago.
“It doesn’t have to be that way,” I said. “We don’t have to have…offspring.”
“It’s not that simple,” he snapped. “I broke laws of a very high order, and that was an abomination in itself. My offspring, as you put it, was simply its manifestation.”
“Why would you be punished for love? You told me to feel love earlier and it kept the demon away.”
“It does. Love does. But not lust, not enthrallment. There’s something wrong with me. Angels are supposed to be impartial. You were in our care. We weren’t supposed to desire you—let alone be blinded by it. We were supposed to watch over you, guide you, protect you from temptation—not lead you into it. God, Mia, I was so easily tempted to want more, to cross that line… Now, it’s how I’m tested. How the demons get in.”
So he was being tested. That was why he pushed me away. Even though we came from different worlds, we were drawn to each other so intensely it could hurt both of us. Just kissing me appeared to weaken his defenses, leaving him open to being attacked like we were tonight. Could things be any more impossible between us?
“Was Azazel a test?” I asked, still confused by it.
“Yes. No. He took advantage of the moment. It’s what demons do. They’ll exploit any weakness.”
“He mentioned Damiel.”
“Azazel wasn’t acting alone, that’s for sure. He was delivering a message. Damiel will be back soon.” He leaned against the fireplace and folded his arms across his chest. “From the looks of it, he’s bringing backup.”
What he said had to be true, but that didn’t stop me from wishing it weren’t. For the last day or so, I’d put the idea of Damiel’s return aside, hoping it wouldn’t happen, but now it was something I couldn’t run away from. When I’d last seen him, Damiel had been in human form. Michael’s battle with him may have been quicker, less gory, but I knew from the way he had been protecting me that Damiel was a much bigger threat than Azazel ever was.
“What do you mean by backup?” I asked, but on some level I already knew the answer. The demon had given us Damiel’s regards.
I pulled my knees into my chest and hugged them for support. Michael didn’t move closer to comfort me. Instead he flipped a switch on the wall and with a hiss of gas a fire ignited in the fireplace. “When I fought him that night, I knew he went too easily. All I did was dispatch him, temporarily freeing the body he’d been possessing, but I did him no real damage.” I noticed how talking about Damiel agitated him, tightening his shoulders and hands, making the tendons pop. “What Azazel said tipped me off. Damiel’s up to more than I suspected.”
“What is he up to?” I asked.
He reached between his shoulder blades and pulled out a long silver handle that curved to fit perfectly in his grip. “He’s building an army.”
“Why? What is he going to do?”
“I don’t know his plans, but it’s a very old grudge between him and me.” He examined the handle. Carved with ornate scrollwork and ancient lettering, it was beautiful. “I don’t think it’s just me he’s after. I think he wants you, too.”
“Me?” The blood chilled in my veins despite the fire. “Why?”
“That was my fault. I trusted him.”
His mouth forming a hard line, Michael focused on the object in his hands. His sword expanded from it, faster than a switchblade and at least as long as his arm. It made me jump.
“Where did that come from?” I said.
“A sheath between my wings.”
Between his wings? Had it been there all the time?
The sword’s blue light glinted in his eyes. Something about it turned his expression from grief to something quiet and determined, deadly even.
“Let me guess, it’s inter-dimensional too?”
“Don’t worry,” he said. “It can’t hurt you.” He moved closer to me and held out the blade.
It seemed to be made from some kind of metallic light, blue but not a laser; there was a silver, steely quality to it as well. Slowly he moved it toward me. “Touch it. You’ll see what I mean.”
I reached a fingertip to the blade and my finger passed right through it, like it was a hologram. There was a cold tickle where it had connected, but no pain. “How does it work?”
“By intention. It can’t hurt humans, but it’s fatal to demons.” To illustrate his point, he ran the blade through his own arm. There was a rippling of light, but no damage. Raising his sword, he readjusted his grip. “Try it again.”
I reached for the blade expecting nothing to be there, and this time it was a cold steel, icy beneath my fingers, but not sharp. The blue light buzzed and arced around them.
“My intention can make it into a blunt instrument, but that’s as much damage as it can do. We’re meant to protect humanity, not harm them.” There was something in his tone—guilt perhaps—that made me wonder what he’d done.
He transferred the blade to his left hand and rotated his wrist, the weapon a silent extension of his arm. So that was how he’d managed to dispatch Damiel without hurting his vessel, Giulio.
“What happened between you and Damiel?” I asked, wanting to know what Michael was talking about before he’d changed the subject. It was an area I had no memory of. “How is trusting him your fault?”
“He saw my obsession back then and tried to keep me away from you, but I wouldn’t listen. His sin was envy. That envy made him competitive, so he wanted everything I had. My rank and position…” He glanced at me and I could tell it still shook him to speak of it. “You. He wanted you because you loved me. It became a compulsion.”
Envy. I thought about how Damiel had sent hellhounds to look for me but only appeared in person after I was hung up on Michael, and it made me shudder.
“He fell quickly,” Michael continued. “Since we were close once, fighting him was especially hard. But I managed to keep him away from you.”
“You protected me from him.”
He stopped moving the sword but didn’t retract it. “For purely selfish reasons.”