Reaver

Thirteen

Reaver stared at the beast Harvester had become, his mind torn between focusing on the fact that he was glowing and the fact that while she’d been latched on, connected to him in a way that seemed more intimate than anything he’d ever done, he’d remembered things about his past with her. Yenrieth’s past with Verrine. The memories had been fleeting and broken, as if they’d been whirling inside a tornado and he could catch only bits and pieces as they flew by.

Harvester stared back at him, her normally green eyes as black as the oily pools dotting the landscape around them. Black and blue veins ran like a road map of evil under her gray skin, and her lips, usually lush and as smooth as a fine merlot, had blackened and peeled back to reveal a mouth full of sharp teeth. She was taller. Larger. And two horns jutted from her skull like railroad spikes.

“We’re going to slaughter you down here, angel.” She charged him, swiping at his face with claw-tipped hands.

“Shit.” He spun, caught her from behind, and threw her to the ground.

His blood had strengthened her, but she was still no match for him. Not yet. Once she was fully healed, they’d be on even footing. He knew from experience that she was his equal in almost every way.

She popped to her feet with a hiss. “You’re going to die.”

“Verrine!” His bellow rumbled through the cave, breaking free rocks and dust that pelted them and swirled through the air. “This isn’t you. My blood did something—”

“It is me!” she screamed, and he swore the air pulsed around her. “I’m not Verrine. I’m hell’s daughter. Evil runs through my veins. You wasted what was left of your pathetic life to rescue a monster.”

“You aren’t a monster.”

“No?” She took a few steps toward him, her hips swaying in that dangerously seductive way she had that drove Reaver crazy with lust. “Want to know what’s going through my head right now? Because I guarantee you’ll change your mind.” She whirled around as Calder burst into the cavern.

“I found the way out!” Calder gave Harvester a double-take. “Damn, bitch, you’re ugly.” He gestured to the tunnel he’d emerged from. “Come on, I’ll show you. We can be in the human realm in an hour—”

Calder’s head exploded like a balloon full of strawberry jelly and cream cheese. Gore splattered on the cave walls and dripped down the stalactites to form gooey puddles on the ground.

“What the fuck?” Reaver leaped away from Harvester, whose finger and thumb pointed like a gun at the demon’s remains.

Smiling, she brought her hand up and pretended to blow smoke from her finger pistol. “Bang.”

Still stunned, Reaver choked out, “He was going to get us out of here.”

“Whatever,” she said with a shrug. “He was an asshole.”

Yes, he was. But he was an asshole they needed. “He was our ally!” he shouted.

“Ally?” Harvester laughed, a crackly, paper-thin sound. “Do you know how many good guys I’ve killed since I fell? Thousands. Humans, demons, angels.” Closing her eyes, she breathed deeply, as if inhaling the scent of her victims’ misery. “I fucking loved it.” She shivered and opened her eyes.

To survive Sheoul and earn a place as Watcher, she had to do things that hardened her heart and blackened her soul.

Raphael had called it. Reaver wasn’t sure what he’d expected from Harvester post-rescue, but this wasn’t it. He’d hoped that Verrine was somewhere inside the fallen angel, and now that he had a few memories in his head, he truly couldn’t reconcile this Harvester with the angel who had, in the human realm, healed children and animals. Who had brought him manna drops after he’d been mangled in a battle with demons.

Who had kissed him.

“Damn you, Harvester,” he breathed. “Whatever is going through your head is happening because of my blood. Or my glow. It’s affecting the evil side of you, but you can fight it.”

She raked her hand through her hair, exposing more of her polished black horns. “It’s easier not to.”

“Since when has doing the right thing been easy?” He inched slowly closer, careful to keep her from feeling trapped. “It wasn’t easy to give up your wings, was it? It wasn’t easy to do the things you had to do to prove your loyalty to Satan, but you did it.”

A tremor shook her, so subtle he’d have missed it if he’d blinked. But then it was gone, and her malevolence burned in her coal eyes once more.

“It was difficult… but only at first.” She licked her lips and moaned with pleasure. “Do you know how quickly you learn to love the rush other people’s misery provides?”

He took another step closer. “Listen to me. You’re an angel. Your mother is an angel, and your father, bastard that he is now, was an angel when you were conceived. There’s more good in you than evil no matter how much Sheoul has changed you. Fight this, Harvester.”

She blinked, and when she opened her eyes, they were bloodshot, but at least the whites were… white instead of inky black. “You remind me of someone.”

Yeah, he thought. I remind you of me. Of Yenrieth.

“Purge your powers,” she said roughly, and he went taut with suspicion. “You have to get rid of the glow.” Her clawed hands flexed at her sides. “It makes me want to… hurt you.”

She was right—if feeding from him had drained the lasher implants and with them, their angel-masking ability, the only way to dampen his angelic signature was to drain his powers. But what if she was lying and he wasn’t radiating an angelic aura? What if she wanted him to drain himself so he’d be weakened and vulnerable?

“Do it,” she purred. “Expend yourself.”

Could he trust her? And did she have to make it sound so dirty?

Harvester’s expression tightened, and all over her body, the veins winding in erratic paths beneath her skin began to pulse. “Do you think I’m going to slaughter you once you’ve depleted your power reserves?”

“The thought had occurred to me.”

“I won’t.” She clenched her teeth as she spoke, as if her brain was trying to keep her mouth from talking. “My word is all I have. I won’t go back on it. I keep to my oaths.”

I keep to my oaths. Another snapshot of memory. He saw Verrine on her knees, sobbing as she pleaded with him. I keep to my oaths. Please, Yenrieth, you have to understand.

Understand what? What oaths? What was that all about? Had he trusted her then? Could he trust her now?

Harvester was starting to pant. “Once you do it, I should return to normal. But hurry. I can’t hold back for long.”

Shit. Even if he could settle Harvester down or knock her out, he couldn’t walk around Sheoul like some sort of divine beacon. He’d be dead, or worse, taken prisoner within hours.

“Stand back.” He gestured to the far side of the cave, near Calder’s body. “Over there.”

With a displeased growl, she moved with him to the exit, and he didn’t like the way she kept staring at him like he was a juicy steak. And not one to be savored.

Reluctantly, he prepared himself, knowing this could be the dumbest move he’d ever made. And that was saying something, because he’d made some whoppers.

Gathering every drop of his power, he threw out his hands and sent a blast of energy at the far side of the cave.

Please, Yenrieth, you have to understand.

Verrine’s words blindsided him again, knocking him so mentally off balance that he lost control of the divine lightning. The lasher implants might be drained of the ability to mask his aura, but they still managed to morph his power into a superstrong wrecking ball of white-hot fire that plowed into the cavern wall. An explosion shattered the air and hurled them a dozen yards down the tunnel. Through a thick plume of dust, he could make out tumbling boulders and falling slabs of earth.

“The cave’s collapsing,” he breathed, and then he stopped breathing as the tunnel they were in began to fold like a house of cards. “Run!”

He grabbed Harvester’s hand—no longer clawed—and sprinted over the uneven ground as the ceiling behind them buckled.

“You’re still glowing,” Harvester shouted above the roar of the destruction. “But it’s faint. I might only be able to see it because your blood is in my veins.”

He wasn’t that relieved. Now he was an angel in hell with no powers, no disguise, and no idea how they were going to get out.