Sins of the Son: The Grigori Legacy Page 6

Michael groaned and rubbed a hand over his eyes. Yes, that was what it still came down to, wasn’t it? She was the One. The Creator. The others might question her actions, but after the example he’d set all those millennia ago, their reservations would remain unvoiced.

  As would his. This time.

  Because all those millennia ago, he had also given her his word. Had vowed his undying devotion and allegiance, sworn he would return without question in her time of need, promised he would always remain the Archangel Mika’el—her most powerful warrior.

  He lifted his head, straightened his shoulders, and, for the first time since leaving Heaven, unfurled his massive wings. They stretched open, spanning the width of the clinic, a full double-arm’s-length wider than those of his fellow warriors—at once his power, his glory, and his eternal burden.

  Flexing the great supporting muscles, he shook out the feathers and stood for a moment, absorbing his own unspoken acceptance of the role he had never thought to play again. Coming to terms with all he would have to become. All he would give up.

  Then Michael, once more Mika’el, turned to his messenger. “Where is she?”

  “She waits for you in the gardens.”

  EIGHT

  Lucifer leaned back in his chair and put his feet on the desk, crossing them at the ankles. He linked his fingers behind his head and regarded Samael narrowly. “You’re certain.”

  The former Archangel, standing across from him, shrugged. “Ninety-nine percent.”

  “As an adult. In a psychiatric ward.”

  “With amnesia,” Samael agreed.

  Lucifer twisted his head to stare out the window. He scowled at the gardens intended to be more glorious than those of Heaven, but which had instead become a sad caricature. A perversion of what he’d had to leave behind. His eyes traveled the awkward, aimless curves of a path meant to be graceful; stone walls that had crumbled with decay the moment he created them; trees and shrubs and beds of plants caught in a perpetually failing struggle for life. All mocking his failure to equal the One’s glory.

  Jaw going tight, he looked away, back at Sam. “Something must have gone wrong. It makes no sense this would have been deliberate. The risk is too great.”

  “For both sides,” Samael pointed out. “He could make his choice any minute, rather than in the years we thought we’d have.”

  Lucifer shot him a quelling glare. “If you’re thinking what I think you are, forget it. The Appointed might not have his own Guardian, but you can bet those around him will be watching. Any move against him and we forfeit, remember? Besides, given enough time, mortals are more than capable of turning him against them.”

  “Except we don’t have time because he’s an adult. A highly unstable one, if I’m understanding the mortal concerns right. He could just as easily choose against us and then everything we’ve been working toward would go to shit.”

  “If we try to take him out, the exact same thing happens. That risk is greater than letting him live.” Lucifer shook his head. “I’m not ready for war, Sam. No matter how much training you’ve done or how prepared you think we are, the fact remains we’re outnumbered three to one. We need time to build the Nephilim numbers and every second the Appointed lives is a second in our favor. Leave him alone. That’s an order.”

  “That’s it, then. Your solution is to sit around and wait for your son and a handful of half-breeds to decide our future. Damn it, Lucifer, be reasonable. We’d be better off without him at this point. And without that ludicrous—” Samael stopped short as Lucifer’s booted feet crashed to the floor.

  “You’ll want to be careful how you finish that,” Lucifer drawled. Strolling around the desk, he towered over his aide. “The agreement originated between her and me and it remains between her and me. Understand?”

  Samael clamped his lips together and ruffled his wings. “Frankly?” he shot back. “No, I don’t understand. I never did. We already had a pact with her, one we’d all agreed on. The first strike by either side was to result in war and an end to all this bullshit—and it should have done so when that idiot Power took out his own brother. Outnumbered or not, we could still force her hand and take out most of the human race just as we said we would.”

  Whipped into a fine frenzy now, Samael glared at him. Lucifer waited for his aide to finish venting five thousand years worth of pent-up venom. Samael didn’t disappoint.

  “But no.” The former Archangel drew out the last word in a taunt and Lucifer’s fists tightened. “No, you had to go behind our backs in some fucking slapdash agreement that lets your son have the final say in our future. Our future, Lucifer. You remember, the ones who followed you out of Heaven, who believed in you and fought for you?”

  Lucifer loosened his jaw enough to query, very quietly, “Are you done?”

  Samael drew himself up to his full height, still several inches shorter than Lucifer, and lifted his chin. “Apparently we all are.”

  Closing his eyes, Lucifer counted to ten under his breath. Samael had been a thorn in his side ever since he’d shown up on Hell’s doorstep: hot-tempered, driven by a hunger for power, and possessed of serious control issues. As a former Archangel, however, he’d also been the best battle strategist Hell could ask for, and so Lucifer tolerated him. His patience, however, was wearing thin.

  Samael cleared his throat and Lucifer held up a hand, increased his count to twenty, and opened his eyes. Without warning, he lashed out, backhanding his aide across the cheek and sending him staggering against the wall. Samael pushed upright again, resentment glowing in his eyes. A reddening handprint took shape on his face.

  “What I remember,” Lucifer told him coldly, “is that you chose to follow me, Samael, not the other way around. If you’re unhappy with your decision, you’re welcome to leave anytime. If you stay, however, then you would do well to remember your place—and mine. Do you understand?”

  Samael said nothing.

  Lucifer nodded. “Good. Then understand this, as well. War has never been my primary objective, and I have never pretended otherwise. It isn’t enough to take out most of the humans. I want them all gone. Every single last one of them. War is inevitable—I know that. But not before I say so. Until then, you need to behave like the fucking military leader you’re supposed to be, because if we end up fighting on two fronts, we’ll get our collective asses kicked, and you know it.”

  Returning to the desk, Lucifer took a peppermint from a dish there and tucked it into his cheek before looking back at a glowering Sam. “Like it or not, Seth’s presence prevents Heaven from moving against us. Watch him, but don’t interfere. If you want to throw yourself onto the swords of your kin once the Nephilim numbers are in place, be my guest, but until then, the agreement—my agreement—stands.”

  Samael stared at him, his jaw flexing. Then, with an effort Lucifer suspected would cost them both dearly at some point, his aide dipped his head with a deference at odds with the rebellion flowing from him.

  “Of course,” Samael said. “Your Lordship.”

  “VANCOUVER! FOR A holiday? Isn’t that a bit sudden?”

  Alex sidestepped her sister and stood in front of the open closet, surveying the contents. She’d never been to the coastal city in October, but expected Vancouver’s autumn weather would be similar to that of most coastlines: changeable at best. She took down a stack of sweaters from the shelf and carried them to the bed.

  “I think you might have been right about me going back to work too soon,” she said. “I decided I need a change of scenery.”

  Jennifer scowled. “I don’t believe you. The truth, Alex.”

  Alex set the sweaters by the suitcase. “That is the—”

  “The truth.”

  Alex crossed her arms. “I hate how you can do that,” she muttered. “Fine. The truth is I don’t think we’re done yet.”

  “Done? Done with what?”

  “Seth is back. He’s in Vancouver.”

  Jen’s face paled and she groped f
or the edge of the bed. Pushing the sweaters away, she sat down and swallowed.

  “I see. Do you know why?”

  “No.”

  “He didn’t tell you?”

  Alex shook her head. “I don’t think he can. He’s in the hospital out there. They say he has amnesia.”

  “Amnesia—but he’s an—” Jennifer’s voice choked off. She tried again. “He’s—can he—can his kind even have amnesia?”

  “I’m guessing something went wrong.”

  “And that’s why you’re going out there? To figure out what?”

  “And to help him if I can.”

  “Don’t. It’s none of your business, Alex. Whatever’s going on is between them. It has nothing to do with us.”

  “It has everything to do with us. We’re the ones they’re fighting over.” Alex reached past Jennifer to pick out the more innocuous sweaters in the stack. She didn’t know what she was walking into in Vancouver, and preferred not to stand out in anyone’s memory. As she refolded a brown turtleneck, Jen’s hand closed over her wrist.

  “I don’t care. Let it go. Please.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “If it means keeping you safe, yes, I do.”

  Alex pushed away the suitcase and sat beside her sister. “I have to do this, Jen. There are things I never told you—”

  “It won’t change my mind.” Jen shook her head stubbornly. “Nothing will change my mind. You and Nina are the most important things in my entire universe and I damn near lost both of you this summer. I will not stand by and let you put yourself back in the center of that mess again—I don’t care what your reasons are. I’ll stop you, Alex. I’ll go to Dr. Bell if I have to and—”

  “Seth is supposed to stop the Apocalypse.”

  Jen’s throat convulsed. “The Apocalypse isn’t real. It’s just a myth. A legend.”

  “Like angels and demons?” Alex demanded, her voice harsher than she intended, making Jen flinch. Alex pushed away a wave of pity. Her sister had to know. She wouldn’t put it past Jen to carry out her threat to speak to Bell, and who knew what the repercussions might be? “You saw them, Jennifer. You saw what Caim did to those people. To me, to Nina. That was just the beginning. There are tens of thousands like Caim. If they go to war with the angels—”

  Jen’s grip tightened on Alex’s wrist. Prying her sister’s fingers loose, Alex gathered her into a hug and rested her cheek against the gray-streaked brunette hair. “I have to help him if I can, Jen. He saved my life. He may be the only one who can save all our lives.”

  “I know,” Jen whispered into her shoulder. “But I don’t have to like it.”

  HE STARED OUT the window at the trees and grass and buildings beyond, at the sky, the clouds, the people, the vehicles. Stared, and recognized none of them. He only had names for them because they had been named to him over the past week; only knew it had been a week because he had been told so.

  But he still didn’t comprehend what a week meant.

  He comprehended little, in fact, of what he’d been told by the people who had taken him in, who placed him in this room, who locked the door behind him. His world began and ended with the four walls that surrounded him, the view out his window, and the few hundred words he had learned in his time here. Before that, there was nothing but emptiness. Darkness.

  Pain.

  He sucked in a breath, a piercing sharpness beneath his ribs. Pain. The ones who cared for him had used the word—are you in pain?—but he hadn’t understood its meaning. Now he did. He didn’t know how he knew, but he did. Knew it, felt it deep inside. A key clicked in the lock. Looking around, he watched as the woman who had found him, the one who brought him to this place, came into his room. Dr. Riley, she called herself.

  “Good morning, John,” she said.

  That was the name they had given him. He knew it was wrong but could not correct them. Could not tell them what was right.

  Dr. Riley looked at the clipboard she held. “You had another quiet night, I see. But you’re still not sleeping much. I think I might prescribe something to help you with that.”

  He watched her. Listened. Had no idea what she said.

  Her face changed to a frown. He knew that word from having been asked by a nurse this morning why he frowned; knew it meant Dr. Riley felt the same inside as he did.

  Didn’t know what to call the feeling.

  “Still not talking, either, hmm?” she asked. She put her pen on the paper and made some marks. “Have you remembered anything? A name? A place?”

  He turned back to the window. Behind him, Dr. Riley sighed.

  “Never mind,” she said. “I’m sure it will come in time. In the meantime, you have someone coming to see you this afternoon who may be able to help. A detective from Toronto thinks she may know you. I’m picking her up at the airport at three and then we’ll come by to visit, all right?”

  Toronto. Airport. Detective. More words without meaning. He watched a bird in the sky. The door behind him opened, closed. The key clicked in the lock once more.

  NINE

  He found her in the gardens, as Raphael said he would.

  For long minutes, Mika’el stood at the edge of the trees and watched the One, seated on a swing beneath a massive maple, gently moving back and forth with the breeze. His breath lodged in his throat, refusing to move further. Just as his feet refused to carry him forward, held captive by the memory of harsh words that still lingered after more than four thousand years.

  He closed his eyes against the agony of turning his back on her, as fresh now as if it had only just happened. An agony he carried with him every second of every day since leaving her presence.

  Preternatural awareness shuddered through him and, without looking, he knew the One had turned her gaze on him. He sensed her stillness, felt her ambivalence. It took every ounce of willpower he could summon to open his eyes and meet hers, and then to make himself walk across the lawn.

  “Mika’el,” she said as he stopped before her.

  The sound of her voice speaking his angelic name reached inside him and laid bare places he hardly knew anymore. He drew himself tall, against the urge to bow, afraid he might not be able to straighten again to face her. “One.”

  “You came,” she said.

  A quiver went through Mika’el’s wings, echoing the spasm in his heart. “You doubted me?”

  A tiny smile curved the One’s lips. “I have never doubted you, my Archangel. Myself, yes, but never you.”

  She studied him for a long moment, and then rose and brushed her fingers against his cheek. Her touch radiated through his body. His soul.

  “I have missed you,” she said.

  Mika’el’s breath snagged in his chest and for a moment, all of eternity stood still, centered in that one, feather-light touch. The first connection he’d had with his Creator since leaving her side.

  Countless times in his years among mortals, he had observed the bond between mortal mother and child; a love that drew them together fiercely, completely, sometimes to the exclusion of all around them. He had envied humans that bond, not for its strength but for its smallness, and would have given his soul to be able to reduce what he felt for his Creator to that level. To be free of the anguish caused by her rejection of him. His rejection of her.

  Now, with just a few words and a brush of hand against cheek, the One had renewed their connection and reminded him not just of the endurance of that bond, but its beauty, too. The all-consuming intensity that tied them to one another.

  His Creator’s gaze slid away and her hand dropped to her side. “Walk with me.”

  Mika’el fell into step beside her, hands clasped behind his back, and together they crossed the lawn to a path leading toward the rose garden. For a long time, silence sat between them, neither comfortable nor uncomfortable, just there. Until the One stopped and faced him.

  “He shouldn’t have survived.”

  “Who shouldn’t?”

&nbs
p; “Seth. He should have died in the transition.”

  Mika’el’s entire being went still. “Excuse me?”

  “After Aramael killed Caim, when Mittron came to me to see what punishment the Power would face, I read his intent. I knew the Highest Seraph wished to eliminate the Appointed.”

  “Wait.” He shook his head to clear it. “You knew what Mittron intended and you let him continue? But why?”

  The One’s timeless, ageless face became old and weary and unbearably sad.

  “My son had become weak. Too weak to carry out what we asked of him. Something in him had changed. Turned wrong. He hid it from me and I couldn’t see what it was. I believe in humanity, Mika’el. I’ve always believed in them. I would never have suggested the agreement to Lucifer otherwise. You know that. But I no longer trusted Seth’s ability to become one of them, to learn to have faith in them as I do. I couldn’t allow the transition to go forward.”

  Mika’el shook his head, unable to believe what he heard. “You wanted him to die.” A statement, not a question. “Your own son.”

  The One’s chin lifted a fraction. “There were seven billion souls at stake. Whole and unharmed, Seth would almost certainly have chosen in our favor—at the very least we would have had an equal chance and an additional few years before I—” Her mouth pulling tight, she stopped and gazed into the distance. “I couldn’t risk it. I had no choice.”

  “You did have a choice. Then. Now. Six thousand years ago. Stopping Lucifer has always been a choice, but you just don’t want to see it.”

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “It is that simple,” Mika’el snarled, old angers surging up in him. He stalked the broad width of the path. “The only complication is you. If you had done what needed to be done when all this began—if you had let me do what needed to be done—we would not be here now. But you refused, because you wanted to believe in him, in his potential. Even when your decision nearly decimated your angels, you would not move against him. Instead, you took away your angels’ free will—all that made them individual and unique, so you could try to contain the one who had chosen to fall from your grace.