Chapter Seven

Infernum was as arid and desolate as he remembered, and Brax trembled for a moment to be back in this dimension. The air was hot and humid, with an unpleasant stench of sulfur, and he’d had the misfortune of landing close to a vent where smoke escaped from one of the underground gaseous fires that consumed the planet under the crust. The vent had opened since his last visit, but that could have been a long time ago.

He hadn’t been here in almost two hundred years, and it was easy enough to remember why he’d left. He could understand why so many demons continued to fight to regain Caelum, which was a veritable paradise in comparison, but he’d decided after losing his family in the war that never ended there had to be another option. He’d walked away without regret, and he wouldn’t be back now if it weren’t for Abby.

Maybe he could’ve contacted someone on Infernum without having to visit, but this seemed like the most discreet way to be in and out and find the right sources. He just hoped some of his former compatriots remembered him and had information. With that thought in mind, he thought of the bar where many of the soldiers used to gather, and his thoughts immediately took him there.

It was much easier to use his power on Infernum, and not just because he had to be discreet on Earth. They had to blend in when living among the humans, but here, he could openly use any of his powers without garnering unwanted attention. The air around him hummed with the collective power of his race, which made it easier to tap into his own sol to utilize it for whatever purposes he wished. In this case, he didn’t want to walk, so teleporting was certainly convenient compared to traveling by bike or other human means, though he had gotten rather attached to his Harley over the years.

He entered the bar, aware of a wave of silence sweeping through the place for a long moment as everyone turned to stare at him. At first, he didn’t see any familiar faces, and those he looked at appeared full of mistrust and suspicion. He supposed he couldn’t blame their wariness, because if they didn’t know him, they might wonder why he was there.

He made his way to the bar, ordering a drink as he looked around. He still didn’t see any familiar faces.

“What brings you in here?” asked the gruff bartender. Brax was a large man, but this guy was even larger. He was wiping out a glass with a less-than-clean cloth, but his gaze didn’t waver from Brax. “I’ve never seen you here before.”

“I used to be a regular a couple centuries ago,” said Brax with a small smile.

The bartender frowned, his red brows coming together in surprise. “That was before my time, but if you’re such a regular, where’ve you been?”

“Earth,” said Brax with an air of finality to indicate he was done discussing that. “Do you know if any of Squad Eight-One-Seven still comes in?”

The bartender’s eyes gleamed with recognition as he nodded. “They often use a private room.” He jerked his thumb in the direction of the corner. “Through there.”

“Thanks.” Brax started to lay an American bill on the bar before remembering where he was. He fumbled in his pocket, finally coming up with the right denomination that he laid beside his mostly untouched glass and slid off the stool. He followed the bartender’s directions, realizing the place had expanded since he’d last been there.

There hadn’t been a private room before, and there hadn’t been an even larger demon guarding it. This dude was seriously big, even larger than the bartender, and it was enough to make Brax feel slightly intimidated. Of course, he hid that as he approached the guy and nodded. “I’d like to see some of the guys from Eight-One-Seven.”

The man scowled at him. “What’s your name?”

“Abraxas.” He doubted they’d know him as Brax, which was the name he’d adopted once he went to Earth to stay.

The stool groaned in protest when the bouncer stepped down before turning to open the door behind him. He leaned in his head and called, “Marael, do you know an Abraxas?”

“Yeah, let him in,” said Marael, sounding shocked.

He recognized her voice, and he was grinning as the bouncer moved aside so he could walk through the door. It shut behind him a moment later, and he approached the table, finding an empty seat. There were some new faces in the squad, but Marael was still clearly leading.

She was the fiercest warrior he’d ever met, and though she looked much like a fourteen-year-old girl, she was battle-hardened and nearly three thousand years old. He’d been on Earth for too long though, because he winced when she tossed back a shot of alcohol, unable to help thinking about how young she looked versus her action. He was wise enough not to say anything.

She stared at him with dark eyes for a moment, frowning. “What brings you here, Abraxas?” She sounded wary.

He shrugged his shoulders. “I suppose I came to catch up… And…”

She arched her brow. “And?”

“I wanted some information, and I thought you might be a good place to start. What do you know about the angel Zephael’s searching for on Earth?”

“Not much,” said Marael. That appeared to be her full answer for a moment, but before Brax could prompt her for more information, she said, “We were notified to keep an eye out for her if we went topside, and from what I’ve heard, we don’t know a whole lot. We’ve heard from some people on the other side that the angels want her bad too. Their orders are to eliminate her on-sight, so Zephael figured with them wanting to get rid of her, she might be useful to us. He at least wants a chance to interrogate her to find out why the angels want her dead.”

It hovered on the tip of his tongue for a moment to tell Marael that Abby had no memory and probably wouldn’t unless or until they restored her sol. He held back, realizing it had been two hundred years since he’d served under her, and her loyalties had likely shifted and evolved during that time.

When he’d left Infernum, Zephael was still rising through the ranks, and he certainly hadn’t been the leader of all the demons. Marael was a tough one to read, but she seemed to have no beef with Zephael. That didn’t mean she was necessarily loyal to him or aligned with his goals, but it was a risk he wasn’t willing to take.

“Do you have time for a game?” asked one of his old comrades. He started flipping through cards as he did so.

Brax shook his head. “Thanks for the offer, but I don’t. I have to get back, but thanks for the information too.”

Marael nodded. “If you find her, just let us know.”

“Of course.”

“Maybe we’ll see you again before another two hundred years pass,” said his former commander with a note of condemnation in her tone.

He blushed slightly and shrugged, not really committing other than to say, “You know why I left. I wasn’t the first and won’t be the last.”

Marael sighed, but she didn’t seem inclined to argue with him or try to persuade him to return to fighting for the cause. Instead, she lifted a hand in parting and said, “Travel safely.”

“Die with honor,” he said, the response automatically springing to his lips. It had an almost ceremonial air and was often part of Marael’s rallying speeches before they went into battle. Her lips quirked slightly in a soft smile, but she didn’t speak again. He felt uncannily like he’d been dismissed, much as when he had been in service, and he turned and strode quickly from the room.

He didn’t pause, leaving the bar seconds later. He stood out in the parking lot, about to transport himself back to the portal opening on Infernum, when there was a flash of red, and six demons appeared before him. They were all menacing, wearing the armor of the king, and though he didn’t know five of them, he recognized Orias immediately. Brax wished he had Mal and Dante there for backup, particularly since he didn’t know why Orias and the others had appeared. He squared his shoulders and strove to find a friendly smile when he said, “I haven’t seen you in forever, Orias.”

“Not since you abandoned us,” said the other demon, eyes narrowed and expression angry. Apparently, he had taken Brax’s defection personally.

Brax could feel the warm steel of his sword nestled in the scabbard between his wings, and he was tempted to reach for it, but that would be an overt sign of hostility. The odds weren’t good, so he hoped he could talk his way out of this. “Do you need something?”

“We keep track of who comes and goes and imagine our surprise to see you entering Infernum after two centuries on the very day you talked to Zephael about the missing angel. We’d like to know why.”

Brax’s mind whirled as he struggled to come up with an answer they would believe that wouldn’t reveal he knew anything about Abby, and he certainly didn’t want them to realize he had her. “I came to find out more, because I was hoping there was a reward.” It sounded mercenary enough to convince them.

Orias still seemed skeptical. “I would think serving your king would be reward enough.”

“Perhaps to a soldier, but as a freelancer these days, I have expenses. I was trying to determine if it was worth mine and Mal and Dante’s time to actively search for the angel.”

Orias seemed intrigued by the idea, and he removed the crystal from under his chainmail, bringing it to his mouth. “Zephael?”

The king answered immediately. “Yes?”

“Brax is here for strictly mercenary reasons. In a roundabout way, he’s offering to track down the angel in an active fashion in return for a reward. What reward should I offer him? How about the continued privilege of breathing?” Orias glared at him as he spoke the words.

Brax kept his expression neutral, not revealing any reaction to Orias’s words.

“I don’t think that will be necessary,” said Zephael with a chuckle. He liked to present a façade of being playful and laidback, but he was really a powder keg. “Tell him we have a suitable reward that will more than satisfy him if he and his sidekicks find the angel.”

“Will do, sir.” Orias dropped the crystal back under his shirt and looked at Brax. “Are you satisfied?”

Brax pretended he was, nodding as he grinned. “I suppose we just found something to fill the time for a while.” He struggled to sound like he was full of easy confidence. “How hard can it be to find a lone angel?”

“Indeed. We have some of our best scrying for her location now.”

Brax absorbed that information and swallowed the lump in his throat as he nodded. “I guess I’d best get back to it if this little reunion is over?”

“It is for now.” As he spoke, Orias reached between his wings, which were fully visible on Infernum, extracting his sword. He didn’t wave it around in a showy fashion. He just held it for a moment before returning it to the scabbard. “Reward awaits your success, but failure won’t be tolerated.”

Brax got the message, and he nodded once. “When have you ever known us to fail?”

“Only once, when you turned your back on your kind and chose to seek refuge with the apes.” His voice dripped with disdain.

Brax didn’t bother to reply. He just visualized the spot where the portal would open and found himself standing there a second later. After that, all he had to do was step through, and he was soon whisked back to Earth.

When he stepped out of the portal, it quickly disappeared, and his eyes adjusted from the bright light to the more moderate illumination around him as he processed it was after sunset on Earth. There was a disparity in time passing, with it moving more slowly on Infernum than it did on Earth. He had been in his home dimension less than an hour, but several hours had passed here.

He moved forward, taking a camp chair beside the fire as Mal handed him a plate of beans. It had been kept warm by the remnants of the smoldering fire, but they were hard and rubbery. Food was food though, and he shoveled them in as he looked around. “Where’s Abby?”

“She’s already gone to sleep,” said Dante, and he sounded relieved about that.

Brax was as well, for it meant they could speak more openly. “That’s good.”

“What did you find out?” asked Mal with a hint of impatience.

“Marael is still leading the old squad.”

As impatient as Mal was, he still managed a small smile. “I guess I’m not surprised.”

“That’s the squad you were both part of?” asked Dante, who had never formally served in the demon armies. He had been just twenty-one when he decided he liked Earth better and stayed around. That was practically a baby by their lifespans.

Mal nodded. “It was.”

“I also learned Orias is still sore about us walking away.” Brax chewed a particularly stubborn bite of beans as he said that.

Mal snorted. “We were two of his best. What else did you learn specifically about Abby?”

“Not much. I think Zephael wants to use her as some kind of weapon, or at least get intel out of her about the angels. The angels are the ones who want her dead, and Zephael wants her recovered for interrogation.”

Mal winced, obviously familiar with interrogation.

Dante seemed a little more clueless. “What does that mean? He’s going to ask her questions and let her go?”

Brax snorted. “Not bloody likely. He has all sorts of creative ways to get one to talk, and if she has nothing to tell him, he’ll still torture her anyway. He’ll be thorough to make sure she doesn’t know anything, and then he’ll either leave her to die slowly from her injuries, or he’ll do something worse, like decide to keep a pet angel around. She can’t fall into his hands.”

Dante looked upset, bordering on nauseated, and he nodded. “We won’t let that happen.”

“Maybe we should just turn her over to them and be done with it,” said Mal unexpectedly.

Brax frowned at him. “Really, Mal?”

After a moment, his friend had the grace to blush and look away. “No, I suppose not. I don’t like any of this though. I don’t want to get drawn back into the fighting, and I don’t want to go against our own to save an angel.”

“She’s not just any angel,” said Dante. “Abby is our angel.”

Mal rolled his eyes. “Kid, she’s not our anything, except our problem, because we made her that. I’m just saying, we could unmake that problem as easily as we started it.”

“You can do what you want, but I’m not leaving her alone and undefended, especially with a bunch of crazy featherheads on both sides after her.” Dante’s resolve was clear.

Brax nodded his agreement. “I’m with the kid on this one, Mal.”

After a long moment, Mal sighed heavily. “Yeah, I guess I’m in. I just don’t want to get too attached. Neither of you should either.”

“We also either have an advantage or another problem,” said Brax after he scraped off the remainder of his beans into the fire and set the plate down for the moment. “I ended up leading Orias to believe we’ll be searching actively for the angel.”

“How the fuck did that happen?” Mal looked aghast. “Why would you ever lead him to think that?”

“I had to think of a reason why I was on Infernum and asking about the angel. It seemed like the most plausible explanation to be motivated by greed.”

“How’d they even know you were there?” asked Dante.

Brax hesitated and then shrugged. “I guess Zephael has changed things. He’s been king for what, a century?”

“More or less,” said Mal with a shrug.

“I guess he pays more attention to who comes and goes than the last one. Seems to matter to him.”

“I’m glad we got out while we could,” said Mal.

Brax recalled how he’d felt like they were trying to intimidate him when he’d been surrounded by Orias and the other five demon warriors, and he nodded his agreement. He suspected things had changed in more ways than one, and a demon couldn’t just choose to walk away these days and stay on Earth without paying some sort of price for it. They were lucky they had made the decision before Zephael rose to power.

“We have no real information, no plan, and no idea what we’re doing.” Mal ticked off the points with his fingers.

“Pretty much,” said Brax with a crooked grin.

“Typical,” said Mal, though he didn’t seem too put out. “I’m going to bed.”

“Me too.” Dante poured out the rest of whatever he was drinking and stood up, lifting Mal’s plate as he did so and walking over to store it in a bag. There must not be a freshwater source easily obtainable, so they’d have to wash them the next time they rented a hotel.

Brax sat by the fire for a few more moments, mulling over the situation, but he was no closer to finding a solution. With a sigh, exhaustion catching up with him, he stood up and turned to his tent, entering moments later.

He stumbled to a halt when he saw he wasn’t the sole occupant. Abby had placed her bedroll in his tent tonight, and more disconcerting, she was sitting up on it, her eyes wide open and gleaming in the darkness. He could see just a hint of white aura around her irises, another telltale sign she wasn’t human. Even a human could have picked up on that if they were observant enough. He crossed his arms over his chest. “What are you doing in here?”

“I wanted to talk to you, so it seemed like the best way to ensure I could do that. What did you find out?”

After a moment’s reflection, he shared an edited version of events, leaving out the information that he, Mal, and Dante were supposedly tracking her. He doubted she would take that well, and since it wasn’t true, he didn’t feel the need to enlighten her.

She seemed further upset as he stopped speaking, and she twisted her fingers in her lap as she looked down at them. “Why would anyone want me dead? The angels are supposed to be my people, so why are they targeting me? What is it that this Zephael thinks I know?”

“I don’t know the answer to either question, Abby. You probably won’t know until you get your memory back, or until we find someone who does know and get some answers from them. In the meantime, all we can do is keep you safe.”

She burst into tears, burying her face in her hands. There was an air of dejection about her that was so overwhelming he couldn’t stand it. Brax moved forward and knelt beside her, taking her into his arms.

It was supposed to be an embrace of comfort, and that’s how it started out, but as her sobs slowly eased, and her tears ceased, her breathing changed. She exhaled raggedly against his throat, making him shiver at the sensation, and he wrapped his arms around her tighter without thought. He wanted to hold her forever, and he realized it was far too late to avoid getting overly attached.

At first, he thought he imagined it when her lips pressed against his throat, but the second time she did it, it was clearly with deliberate intent, and he moaned at the sensation. He clenched his hands inadvertently around her arms, making her whimper in protest, and he softened his hold immediately, but he didn’t let go. He wasn’t even certain he could do so, particularly when her mouth moved higher, following the arch of his throat until she reached his chin.

It was a strange sensation to feel her kiss the dimple in his chin, and he bent his head quickly, aligning their mouths. This was probably a terrible idea, but it was a mistake he knew he was going to make even as he took possession of her mouth, curving his lips to hers. She let out a breathless little cry, and he swallowed the sound as he kissed her with a level of need he hadn’t experienced before.

Of course, there had been liaisons throughout his life, but never anyone who meant much of anything to him besides his family, whom he’d lost from fighting. A kiss had never felt like this before, like the seconds before the Big Bang, when the universe had reached the maximum point and had no choice but to explode.

She moved closer, her arms wrapping around him, fingernails clutching his shoulders. There was an air of desperation about her as he laid her back on her bedroll, mouth not leaving hers. He couldn’t stand even a small separation, and he continued to ravage her mouth, his tongue sweeping inside to explore every inch and memorize the taste of her.

She was thrashing as she kissed him, clearly needing something perhaps she couldn’t verbalize. Maybe she didn’t know how, or she was too shy, but he understood what her instincts were craving. Without hesitation, he slipped his hand inside her pants and started stroking her slit through the fabric of her underwear.

She moaned and pressed against him, making adorable animalistic sounds in her need and passion as he continued to touch her. He was on the verge of coming just from touching her, and when she found her own release moments later, it took every ounce of willpower he had to hold back.

As she started to calm down, her breathing returning to a more even keel, he realized he hadn’t exerted every ounce of self-control. If he had, he wouldn’t have been able to withstand her attempts when she started to reach for his zipper. He eased away from her, pressing a chaste kiss to her forehead. “Go to sleep, Abby. You need your rest.”

She looked briefly hurt and confused. “Don’t you…?”

He shook his head. “Not right now.” If he were smart, he’d say never. Once he was inside her, and they had become one, he was certain he could never stand to lose her. Maybe that should’ve frightened him more than it did, and long after she had fallen asleep, he laid on his sleeping bag, his groin aching, and a similar spasm in his chest. It was an empty void he was certain nothing could satisfy except Abby. Was he strong enough to resist that temptation, or did he even want to try?