Where Angels Fear to Tread

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Even at the height of his power, Dagon had never felt like this.

The power of creation flowed through his veins, charging each and every muscle in his body with the power to transform the world.

It was what he’d always wanted; to take the world and bend it to its knees and make it learn who was its true master.

The old god had returned, filled with vim and vigor, and ready to challenge any and all for the domination of all things.

This was what he had been created to do, and soon the people of the world would awaken from their sleep, his name upon their lips.

Dagon.

But first he would have a snack, feasting upon the flesh and blood of one of Heaven’s born.

Dagon found this one squirming in his grasp to escape, curious.

He wore the form of a mortal, but deep inside, locked and hidden away, was the power of Heaven.

Curious, yes, but not curious enough to stop him from dining upon the holy flesh of one of the Christian God’s soldiers.

He brought the squirming angel closer, imagining what the taste of his flesh would be like. Sweet, he guessed, opening his mouth wide so he could bite. Dagon could smell the blood; he could feel the life and the power pulsing through the man’s body.

This will be a meal to remember, he thought as his jagged teeth sank into the man’s throat.

And his mouth was filled with the blood of angels.

As much as he struggled, Remy could not free himself from the ancient god’s clutches, but it did not stop him from trying.

It was all that he had now, the struggle . . . the fight.

All that he’d had for most of his existence.

He was created as a soldier to the Lord God, serving the Almighty in every manner, but it had become too much, and he had walked away. From one battle to the next; abandoning his true self, to wear the guise of humanity.

Every day was a battle, but every day, as he moved closer and closer to gaining that spark of humanity, he realized it was a battle worth fighting.

The memory of Madeline flashed before his eyes; the true prize to it all. Without her in his life, he would have attained nothing.

She showed him what it was all about; to embrace his new-found humanity, while helping him to accept what he truly was.

“You can’t stop being what you are,” she used to tell him. “It’ ll eventually kill you to deny it.”

He knew she was right. . . . She was almost always right, and he begrudgingly accepted his nature. But it was his humanity, no matter how artificial, that he clung to the most.

Remy loved to be human, there was no doubt about it, but there were times—times like this—when being cruel, and a powerfully inhuman bastard, was just what the doctor ordered.

But there were no doctors handy; only the hot, rotting breath of a revitalized deity as his teeth drew closer.

Remy was thinking of Zoe and how he was going to be breaking his promise to her mother that he would find her.

He was thinking how sorry he was, when the teeth of Dagon bit down upon his neck.

A scream—and blood—bubbled up in his throat.

The blood rushed into Dagon’s mouth, forcing its way down his eager throat.

And it began to burn.

At first he had no idea what was happening, the pain unlike anything he had experienced before.

Dagon tossed his prey aside, as he came to the fearful realization that he’d been abandoned; that the power of God had left him.

No, it had been stolen.

The Seraphim was free.

Remy had no idea what had happened, knowing only that the power of Heaven that he hid from the world was free, and there was no holding it back.

The Seraphim burned in its rage, shucking off Remy’s disguise of humanity to clothe itself in the armor of fire and fury.

For the moment, Remy was gone, replaced by the angel Remiel. Placing a hand that burned like the sun against his throat, he closed the oozing bite with a hiss and turned his attention to the being that roused his anger.

“Dagon!” the Seraphim bellowed, as his wings of gold unfurled and he took to the air in pursuit of his foe.

The deity stumbled across the church grounds, the blood of the angel still eating away at his flesh—his glorious new flesh—like the most corrosive of acids.

The dead he had raised still walked, running by his side like a pack of obedient dogs, eager to please.

Dagon heard the sound of pounding wings behind him, and knew he was being stalked from the air. He stopped, turning to see the fiery form as it dropped from the early-morning sky. The angel landed in a crouch, his wings slowly fanning the air as he approached his prey.

Something had happened to the child, and the power that resided within her. Dagon needed to know the cause of his depletion, and whether or not he would be able get it back.

“Destroy him,” Dagon commanded his reanimated troops, while running toward the classroom building.

Hopefully the dead would buy him the time needed to search out the problem and reacquire his godly manifestations.

The dead came at him in a wave, eager to do their master’s bidding to the end.

Remiel smiled, an unfamiliar expression of feelings that normally he would not show. The Seraphim gathered that not all of his human traits had been cast aside.

But the angel was happy; happy to be free.

And doing what he knew how to do best.

The dead came at the Seraphim in an attempt to destroy him, and he met their attack in kind.

He would end their lives again, only this time permanently, leaving not even the smallest piece of flesh or bit of bone to be resurrected.

The dreams of a perfect world threatened to seduce her again, but Delilah did not want dreams; she wanted reality.

And in order for that perfect world to be hers, she knew what had to be done.

The child was using the power. . . . To the best of her limited ability, she was using the power.

Creation pulsed from her tiny body in waves, affecting their surroundings in the most bizarre of ways. The building in which they’d fought was coming apart, as if the glue that held the very structure together had come unstuck and all the pieces were drifting apart.

The room moaned like a beast in pain as it was slowly disassembled.

Delilah could see that the child was trying to focus, attempting to rein in the tremendous power at her disposal, and to use it to bring her mother back to health.

Such a small, insignificant feat it was for a power so great.

“Zoe,” Delilah called again, climbing back onto her feet. She caught a glimpse of her hand, which had been holding Zoe’s arm when the power had come alive. It was a shriveled black thing, barely functional, but this was just more incentive for her to obtain the prize.

She bravely approached the child again, dodging pieces of concrete and cinder block that floated in the air, their gravity inexplicably canceled.

The child had placed a glowing hand upon her mother’s stomach, her eyes closed in deep concentration.

Delilah was afraid that the power would be wasted, that this foolish child would use up the greatness that had been hiding inside her on the single act of restoring her mother to life, when there were so many other, and far more important, miracles to perform.

“Zoe, please . . . ,” Delilah began. “Let me help you.”

The child stirred, her eyes languidly opening as if waking up from a dream.

“Mommy’s hurt bad,” she said. Her voice still sounded different, as if there were something else present. This seemed to be no longer Zoe alone, but Zoe joined with another. “I have to try and fix her.”

Zoe’s eyes closed again as she went back to concentrating on mending her injured parent’s mortal wound.

It was more than Delilah could stand. To be this close and not have it be hers . . . To be perfectly honest, it drove her a little mad.

“Give it to me!” Delilah screamed, grabbing hold of the child; pulling Zoe away from the act she struggled desperately to perform.

The child was stunned, the amount of concentration she needed to maintain the power, or as she called it, the specialness inside her, temporarily interrupted. The power began to radiate from her tiny body again, the pieces of timber, glass, and stone floating in the air beginning to move faster, drawn toward some invisible current forming somewhere in the air around them.

The ceiling came apart with a scream, exposing them all to the dawn sky.

Delilah sensed it was only a matter of time before the power was fully unleashed, and she would be unable to control it. Through contact with the child she could feel it emerging, growing stronger and more confident, eager to do that for which it was intended.

It was the power of God . . . the Maker . . . a piece of the notion that had shaped the universe.

And for what she had endured, she deserved to have it.

Instinctively, Delilah resorted to her nature, the rumbling hunger that suddenly formed in her belly driving her to act.

She would take this power, as she had taken countless souls for sustenance throughout the ages.

Delilah leaned toward the still-startled Zoe, her full lips eager to touch the child’s, firmly latching on and drawing out the immense power, like poison being sucked from a wound.

But this poison would not kill. Oh no, she thought, feeling the crackle of unearthly energy upon her lips just as they were about to touch.

This poison would bring her life.

She’d almost convinced herself that she had attained her goal, that finally, after so very long, she would at last have peace. But it was not meant to be, and she was sure the Lord God Almighty must have had something to do with it.

The horned god, Dagon, was suddenly amongst them, tearing the child from her grasp.

Delilah was hurled backward, a floating piece of brick wall violently halting her progress before she dropped to the ground.

“This power is not meant for the likes of you,” he snarled with a shake of his great, horned head.

She was startled by the ancient deity’s appearance, noticing the horrific burns around his mouth, neck, and chest, in direct contrast to the perfection of the rest of his body.

The look in the ancient god’s eyes was fierce. She had seen that look many a time before, her own hungry reflection staring back at her.

He wanted the power as well and would move Heaven and Earth to have it.

Zoe, who had been tossed aside when Dagon made his appearance, let out a soft cry as she rose to all fours, scrabbling across the now-dirt floor—strips of linoleum soared in the air above them like awkward kites—to again be with her mother. The little girl’s movement was enough of a distraction for Delilah to make her move.

“Now, Mathias,” she demanded.

Her loving servant had been waiting, crouched in the darkness of a corner awaiting his mistress’ ascension. He would do anything for her; she owned him body and soul, and now it was time for him to perform the ultimate sacrifice.

The former mercenary, his body beaten and bloody from his earlier conflict with Zoe’s father, sprang from his waiting place. From the air he selected a jagged spear of something that had been broken into pieces when the power of creation had begun to dismantle the structure they were in.

Mathias had no concern for his own safety as he came up behind the horned god, thrusting the makeshift spear at Dagon’s back, just as Delilah’s rival for the blessed power started to turn.

The deity lashed out as the spear pierced his side, striking Mathias with such savagery that it snapped the man’s neck, spinning his head entirely around and sending his body flying, dead before he even touched the floor.

Maybe in death he would find something close to what the power had enticed him with earlier, Delilah briefly considered, already forgetting the man who had given his life for her.

There were far more important matters to concern herself with.

She dodged the flailing arms of the horned god. The metal spear had come through at an angle, up through the rib cage and out the chest. If the ancient god still had a heart, and it was located in the typical spot as in most living things, it had either been narrowly missed or at least damaged by the jagged foreign object.

This gave her the advantage; this gave her those extra moments to achieve what she had to do.

Delilah moved through the field of floating rubble, feeling the bits of weightless debris grazing her face and body as she drew closer to her destiny.

Zoe was still beside her mother, though now the two of them floated above the dirt floor, encircled by a ghostly light. Deryn’s blood floated as well, a crimson cord that extended from her mortal wound, to slither in the air around them. The power, as manipulated by the child, was healing the woman. She thrashed in the gravityless air, her breathing coming in short, pained gasps as the magick moved through her, doing as the child desired.

And Delilah prayed—to whom or what she really wasn’t sure—that once she reached the child, and placed her hungry lips upon hers, there would be enough creation left to bring about her personal paradise.

She entered the corona of light around the pair, taking hold of Deryn York’s floating form and pushing it aside in order to get to Zoe. With trembling hands, she reached out, taking the child’s cherubic face and drawing it to her.

And in a moment of absolute bliss, their lips touched, and Delilah drank deep from the well.

The last of the walking dead were about to be vanquished, when Remiel felt the beginning of change in the world.

The angel felt it in his wings, the tips of his golden feathers feeling the ether torn apart like gossamer to reveal the beginnings of something new and fragile beneath.

A dead man, too stubborn to lie down, made one final attempt at attack, hauling his moldering carcass across the burning bodies of his brethren, attempting to sink his teeth into the angel’s flesh.

He joined his brothers and sisters in final death just as his broken teeth touched Seraphim skin; a rush of heat and holy light incinerated the misbegotten thing before it could do any harm.

“Kinda like a bug light,” a gravelly voice spoke.

Remiel whirled, always ready to continue the battle; he saw the large man and immediately recognized a kindred spirit.

“Samson,” the Seraphim said, impressed that the warrior had survived the skirmish.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he answered. The big man looked around, tilting his blind head back slightly to smell the air. “Do you smell that?” he asked.

“Smell it. Feel it. Dread it,” Remiel answered. “Forces are being played with here that should remain untouched.”

The Seraphim reacted, spreading his wings and becoming one with the air. The very fabric of reality was being trifled with—the weave of God itself—and he would do everything in his power to see it protected.

Samson heard the angel go, and hoped he wouldn’t be too late.

The warrior could feel that the change had started, but the existing reality wasn’t giving up without a fight.

It was a difficult and dangerous thing, changing what was and attempting to replace it with something else. It was a matter best left to the gods.

The blind warrior stood for a little while, appreciating the deathly silence, but also cursing it. He listened for a sign of life, something that showed him that at least some of his children had survived.

Samson listened hard, straining his enhanced hearing for a moan, or a sigh, or a troubled breath.

But there was none of that to be heard.

And with a heavy sigh of his own, he knew he must follow the angel, for he still had a job to finish.

He had the Lord’s work to do.

Delilah felt the world begin to change, just as it was torn away from her.

She was hurled violently back, landing upon the ground, just as she heard the lovely sounds of her children awakening from their beds after a long night’s sleep; just as she heard the sounds of their eager feet upon the floors above her head as they were coming down to her.

But it was all gone in an instant, when Dagon reasserted himself.

The deity was in a bad way, the burns that had eaten away the flesh around his mouth and chest having spread across most of his once-impressive physique.

He looked as though he’d bathed in acid.

From where she lay, Delilah saw that Dagon had taken the child, pulling her from the air and dragging her down to the ground.

In one of his misshapen hands he held what appeared to be a piece of broken glass, and he was poised to bring it down upon the struggling child; to cut her open to remove the prize they both wished to possess.

The child squirmed beneath the horned god’s attempts, but he held her pressed to the ground long enough to commit his act.

The glass blade descended. Dagon had aimed for the heart, but the child’s squirming distracted his aim, and the tip of the impromptu knife went into her stomach instead.

It was as if all sound were suddenly stolen away, and time slowed to a crawl.

The child’s mouth was open wide in a silent scream, and her eyes bulged with the horror of what had just been done to her.

And then her eyes closed, and she went very still.

Dagon perched over the child’s body, waiting for a sign.

He did not have long to wait.

The energy erupted from the child in a burst of invisible force, picking up the ancient god and tossing him aside like a rag doll.

Zoe floated up from the ground, her bloodied stomach mended in a flash of white and the smell of burning ozone; even the scarlet stains upon her clothes were soon but a memory.

Gone was the frightened little girl, unsure of the power—the specialness—that lived inside her. Here was a being who had embraced this might and who was about to show those that hurt her what true power was all about.

Dagon seemed to know this as he hauled his broken body up from the ground where he’d been discarded. It wasn’t the first time the deity had been cast aside for something stronger.

“Please,” he begged upon his knees before the floating child, “just a taste . . . I don’t want it all. . . . Just a taste again . . . not to be forgotten . . .”

Zoe looked down upon the lowly god and snarled.

“I used to think you were scary,” she said, her child’s voice oddly alien, “but you’re no scarier than a bug.”

A terrible smile appeared upon the little girl’s face, the pulsing circle of energy that surrounded her momentarily expanding outward to touch Dagon with its might.

It happened so quickly that the old god wasn’t even given a chance to scream. In a flash, his entire mass had been turned to bugs, golden cockroaches that for a moment held the form of Dagon, before they dropped to the ground in a squirming heap.

And Zoe eagerly returned to Earth to enthusiastically stomp upon their skittering forms, happily crushing their shelled bodies beneath her sneakered feet.

Making certain not to miss a one of them.

The Seraphim Remiel plummeted from the morning sky, drawn to the enormous power radiating from the body of one human child.

The child had become a receptacle for a tiny fraction of the Lord God’s power, but even a fraction of the Maker had more power than the puny human brain could ever hope to comprehend.

Here in the body of a little girl was the ability to create worlds, and from what the angel could see, it was driving her mad.

Remiel touched down upon the earth, avoiding pieces of the building that had somehow come apart and were now floating weightlessly in the air like an asteroid field.

The might of God was radiating from her in waves, growing steadily stronger as the child stood.

His human aspect felt sadness for the young one, eager to help in any way he could, but the Seraphim fought this emotion, seeing only the potential for extreme danger; danger to itself, as well as a threat to the world that God seemingly loved above all else.

It was the child who posed the threat with her inability to control the level of divine power that now coursed through her.

Remiel slowly approached, feeling waves of God’s raw awesomeness radiating from the little girl; the potential to create . . . or to destroy.

“Child,” Remiel called, his voice like the most beautiful of voices raised in song, “calm yourself.”

Zoe looked at him in all his angelic glory and was terrified.

“Get away!” she screamed, and the ground spasmed violently, shaking him from his feet, the undulating earth carrying him away.

The angel spread his wings and took to the air, flying above the writhing earth.

“I mean you no harm,” Remiel called down to her, but her fear was too great, and a terrific wind was summoned that was like the hand of a giant—or God—swatting him back to Earth like a bothersome insect.

The weather had started to react to the child’s release; voluminous gray storm clouds, throbbing with electrical fury, were building over their heads.

“Mommy!” Zoe cried out as the thunder rumbled. “Where are you? I want my mommy.”

Jagged bolts of lightning javelined down from the sky, attempting to skewer him with their electrical touch. Remiel scrambled across the ground, narrowly avoiding the deadly bolts raining from the Heavens.

The child was frightened, overwhelmed by what was happening to her; in a state of mind that could very well destroy them all.

The Seraphim was in a quandary. All that it knew was the option of battle, to wrestle something to the ground and end its threat by sword and burning all traces away with Heaven’s fire.

But there was another way; a way the angel of Heaven did not care to recognize.

A human way.

The morning had become like night, the tumultuous air swirling the floating debris at greater and greater speeds, the other structures around the former building beginning to come undone.

The Seraphim momentarily struggled with its other side, the fragile human nature that it despised, this time proving itself to be the stronger. With a growl it allowed itself to be forced down, fully aware that if its weaker nature was not successful, it would be the Seraphim that reasserted itself, and the threat of the child would be put succinctly to an end.

Remy knelt upon the ground, feeling the physical characteristics of his warrior half recede. He was breathing heavily, his heart beating rapid fire in his chest as he glimpsed the nightmare he had been left to face.

The child had lost control, her fear causing the power to lash out uncontrollably and strike at the world that scared her.

She needed to see a friendly face; she needed to see someone who would tell her it was going to be all right. Not having any idea of what had happened to Deryn York, Remy took it upon himself to be that person. He hoped the little girl, filled with the power of creation, would recognize him, and not extinguish his life with a bolt of lightning.

The dirt and rock swirled faster in the air, stinging his exposed flesh. His clothes were in tatters, just one of the many pitfalls of assuming an angelic form, but he struggled on, shielding his eyes from the scouring grit, as he made his way toward the little girl at the center of the storm.

Through the maelstrom he saw her, a tiny, shivering figure lying upon the ground.

“Zoe,” he called out over the howling wind.

Her eyes were closed, and she hugged herself into a tight little ball.

“Zoe, I’m here,” he called again as he got closer.

Spears of lightning rained down in front of him, turning the areas struck to glass, but after a momentary pause, Remy continued on.

“Open your eyes, Zoe,” Remy called out. “It’s me . . . the one you drew . . . the one you said would protect you.”

The wind picked up, roaring like a hungry monster, and Remy felt himself begin to be lifted by the intensifying conditions.

“Zoe, it’s me. . . . Please . . . It’s Remy.”

Through the churn of dirt, he saw that she had opened her eyes.

The storm winds grew more powerful, and he desperately tried to hold on, sinking his fingers deep into the broken ground to anchor himself.

He knew he didn’t have long. If the storm became any fiercer, he would be tossed away like the flotsam and jetsam that already clogged the air. This would be his chance . . . the human chance . . . and if he failed, there would be only one other way to put an end to the potential cataclysm.

The angelic way.

The Seraphim was there, waiting as always, waiting to prove that it was the superior nature, and as much as it pained him to admit, its solution was the likely answer.

The world was coming apart around him, and it was only a matter of time before he was torn apart by the storm. Remy was allowing the angel to flow through him again, to reassert mastery over their form, when the scouring winds almost instantly died down.

Remy dropped to the ground, covering his head as all the floating debris and rubble picked up by the power of the Almighty was released, and gravity reasserted its sway, raining it down upon the land.

Wiping grit and grime from his eyes, he raised his head to see what had happened and looked into the tear-filled eyes of a frightened little girl.

“Where’s your dog?” she asked in a tiny squeak of a voice.

“He’s home,” Remy said, getting to his feet and brushing dirt from what remained of his clothes. “And he thought the pictures of him were really beautiful.”

That almost got a smile, and as he drew closer, Zoe came to him. Remy knelt down, taking her into his arms. Squeezing his neck, almost to the point of choking him, she began to cry.

“Shhhhh,” Remy said, patting her back. “It’s all right. Everything is all right now,” he said, comforting her.

He could still sense that she was in possession of the power, but somehow she had found the strength to keep it down and to gain control of her fear.

The Seraphim grumbled and roiled within him, unconvinced that the threat had been averted, but Remy believed it had.

“Would you like to go home?” he asked her. “How would that be?”

“Yes,” she squeaked, still holding on to him for dear life. “Me and Mommy want to go home to Florida and swim in the ocean with dolphins,” she said, hiccupping back more tears.

Gazing about the wreckage of the event that had transpired, Remy had no idea whether Deryn York had survived. His eyes immediately fell upon a form, carefully climbing over the rubble-strewn ground, and he was excited to see that it was Zoe’s mother.

But she wasn’t alone.

Delilah stood behind the woman, and the closer she got, Remy saw that the temptress had the tip of a large knife pressed to the woman’s throat as they walked awkwardly side by side.

“Bravo, Mr. Chandler,” Delilah said. “The power to calm a storm. I’m very impressed.”

“Let her go, Delilah,” Remy said, exasperated by the whole thing. “Don’t you think we’ve all gone through enough?”

“No truer words were ever spoken,” Delilah said. “Do you seriously think I’d walk away after this without my prize?” she asked.

He was still holding Zoe in his arms, and she lifted her face to see what was happening. Remy would have rather she didn’t, but there was no stopping her.

“Mommy!” she screeched, seeing her mother .

“Hey, baby,” Deryn said, trying to sound calm, but the blade’s tip being pushed against the soft part of her dirty throat didn’t make for the most calming situation.

“Put Zoe down, Remy,” Delilah instructed. “And let the child come to her mother.”

Zoe squirmed to be free, but Remy did not want to release her.

“Put her down now,” Delilah raged, putting more pressure on the bayonet and causing Deryn to cry out.

The child was fighting him now, so he obliged.

“What are you going to do?” he asked, watching as the child ran to them.

“I’m going to make it all better,” Delilah said, watching the child with hungry eyes.

Delilah released Deryn, just as Zoe reached her, allowing the two to embrace.

“Don’t,” Remy cried out, hoping there was a chance that . . .

“I promise you it’ll be a wonderful world,” Delilah said, snatching the child away from her mother, and preparing to kiss her—preparing to consume the power of God inside her.

The Seraphim emerged again, although Remy still managed to maintain most of his control, as he spread his wings and flew to the child’s aid.

There was a flash of light so bright that it blinded him. Remy dropped from the air, rolling across the dirt. Blinding explosions of color erupted in front of his eyes as he struggled to regain his sight.

He could hear Zoe crying and Deryn’s calming words of comfort, but he still had no idea what had occurred.

His vision finally clearing, Remy looked around. He saw a blackened and smoldering body upon the ground that must have been Delilah, and beside it, Deryn York clutching her child protectively as she gazed ahead, eyes wide in surprise.

“What now,” Remy muttered as he slowly turned to see the cause of the woman’s reaction.

The Retrievers stood like statues, staring intently at the mother and child. And suddenly everything made horrible sense. Remy knew why the angels had been in Methuselah’s—and why they were here now.

He and the Retrievers had actually been searching for the same thing, the only difference being that he had been looking for the child, whereas they had been looking for what had been hiding inside her.

Still manifesting aspects of the Seraphim, Remy ruffled his wings threateningly as he moved to position himself closer to the mother and child.

One of the Retriever hosts raised his armored arm and pointed a sword that resembled a large splinter of ice at Deryn and Zoe.

“We want what is inside the child,” the angel said in an emotionless monotone. “Allow us to relieve her of it, and we will be on our way.”

Remy found it interesting that the Lord God had sent His bloodhounds to retrieve something that had been here since the beginning of the world.

Why now? he wondered. What’s so crucial that He would take back this power now?

Deryn held her child all the tighter, looking at Remy and back to the fearsome pair.

“You can have it,” Remy said, “but you must guarantee me the child’s well-being.”

He waited to see how the pair reacted.

They continued to stare, their shiny black armor glinting in the early sunshine.

“We want what is inside the child,” the other Retriever said.

“I understand that,” Remy said, “but you have to promise me the child will not be hurt.”

The pair glanced at each other, a silent message passing between them.

“We cannot guarantee this,” they said in unison.

“Then I’m sorry,” Remy said.

“Sorry?” the Retriever questioned with an odd tilt of his head.

“You cannot have what the child possesses,” Remy told him.

They again looked at each other.

“We could very easily destroy you, Seraphim,” he said with still no sign of emotion. “We could destroy you and take what we desire.”

Remy saw the knife that Delilah had used to threaten Deryn upon the ground, and he reached for it. Holding the blade, he willed the power of Heaven into the metal, causing it to crackle with a powerful, holy fire.

“You’re welcome to try,” Remy told them, and he felt a rush of power flood through him as his warrior nature flexed its muscles in preparation for a battle to come.

He’d always wondered if he could take a Retriever, and now he was going to find out.

The bloodhounds from Heaven responded to the challenge, emitting a birdlike screech as their armor reconfigured into a more combat-ready mode, filled with spikes and many sharp angles. They raised their blades of ice and had started to advance, when they both halted.

At the ready, Remy watched with a curious eye.

The Retrievers appeared to be listening, listening to something that only they could hear.

And as quickly as they had prepared for battle, they stepped down, sheathing their swords, allowing their armor to morph back to its more streamlined design.

“What’s happening?” Deryn asked, holding protectively on to her little girl.

“I don’t know,” Remy said, still watching the Heavenly pair.

The Retrievers stood there a moment longer, their ice-cold eyes darting from the mother and child, to Remy, and then back again.

Finally they spread their razor-sharp wings in unison, and with a final, hawklike screech, they leapt up into the air, and were gone as quickly as they had appeared.

Remy continued to hold on to the knife, waiting for something to happen. He was convinced that the Retrievers were going to drop from the sky in an attack, or that at least something would suddenly appear to challenge him.

But nothing appeared, nothing attacked from the sky, and he actually began to suspect it was all over.

He waited a bit longer, scrutinizing the area for any signs of potential danger and, finding none, allowed himself to relax. The Seraphim, temporarily satisfied, went down quietly, and Remy returned to his more human guise.

Turning, he found the mother and child both staring.

He looked down at himself, at his torn and bloodstained clothes, and self-consciously smiled.

“I knew there was something different about you,” Deryn York said.

“You did,” Zoe agreed with her mother. “I showed you in the picture I drew.”

Her mother turned her face to the little girl. “You did, didn’t you,” she said, and kissed the child’s cheek over and over again.

Zoe laughed sweetly, throwing her arms about her mother’s neck and hugging her for dear life.

“I’d like to take my daughter home now, Mr. Chandler,” Deryn said.

“Not yet,” the little girl chirped, squirming in her mother’s arms to be let go.

The child touched ground in a run, stopping a bit away from where they stood. She was staring sadly down at something.

Remy and Deryn followed the little girl, both stopping as they realized the child was looking at the broken and bloody body of Carl Saylor.

The child squatted next to him.

“Zoe,” the mother cried out, “come away from there.”

“He was a good daddy most of time,” she said sadly, and Remy saw her hand reach out to place something that seemed to appear out of thin air upon her father’s chest.

It was a purple flower that emitted the most wonderful aroma.

They stood there awhile longer, gazing down at Carl’s body, before Zoe broke the silence.

“Can we leave now?” Zoe asked.

And the three walked from the compound into the surrounding woods, finding the path that would eventually lead them home.

Samson emerged from hiding after he was certain they were gone.

He had hated to hide like some loathsome coward, but he knew a blind man would have been useless against the things Remy had faced.

And besides, he had a special purpose to fulfill.

He moved out from behind the section of brick wall that had tumbled, following his nose toward the acrid stink of burned flesh and the supernatural.

Samson knew it was she; even though her flesh had been burned black, practically to ash, it still held the taint of what she was.

Of who she was.

The stink of cooked flesh grew incredibly strong, and he knew he was standing over her.

“Look at you now,” he said, feeling a sudden surge of emotion threaten to overtake him.

He remembered how beautiful she had been and tried to keep that thought, even though by the smell, he knew that beauty had been taken away.

Delilah inhaled a rattling breath at the sound of his voice.

“Still alive,” he said, and shook his head sadly.

Samson dropped to the ground, rock and bits of glass biting into his ancient knees, and felt with his hands until he found her blackened remains. Gently he gathered her up, taking her frail body into his arms.

She could not speak, but he could feel her starting to quiver. He wondered how long it would take her to heal . . . how many souls she would need to consume before returning to her old tricks.

But that question wasn’t relevant anymore because he knew this was the end. For millennia he had tracked her, and now he had her exactly where he wanted her.

Delilah was helpless in his grasp.

This is what I’ve been waiting for, he thought. Samson tried to find the anger . . . tried to find the fiery rage, but instead found only sadness—sadness over how far they both had fallen.

He brought her head up and laid it upon his shoulder, holding her tenderly.

“I’ve never loved anyone more,” he told her, his emotion causing his words to break.

Delilah tried to speak, but it came out as only a scratchy croak, and he was certain she was telling him she loved him too.

And Samson took her life, as it was his job to do, the strongest man in the world broken by the memory of a love so powerful that it put his legendary might to shame.

A love that he would carry like the deepest of scars to the end of days.

The strange man was waiting for them as they came out of the woods.

He was standing on the opposite side of the desolate road, across from where the multiple SUVs had been parked, squatting on his hindquarters, and wearing far too much clothing for the warm and humid West Virginia weather.

At a glance, Remy suspected he was Vietnamese, and wondered why he was there.

The dark-skinned man stood to his full gangly height as they emerged, staring at them with dark, curious eyes. There were satchels at his feet, traveling gear, as if he were on a long journey.

Remy tensed, moving to stand in front of Deryn and Zoe; after the kind of night they’d had, he wasn’t about to take any chances.

“What is it?” Deryn asked, not yet noticing the stranger.

“Could be nothing,” Remy said, allowing his preternatural senses to test the air for potential danger, but getting nothing.

“Who is that?” Deryn asked, finally noticing the man.

“I haven’t a clue, but he seems to know us.”

There was the sound of movement, and Remy turned to see Zoe pull free from her mother’s hand, then run past them into the road toward the stranger.

“Zoe!” Deryn screamed, making a move to grab the child, but for some reason—something in the man’s stare—told Remy to let her go to him.

Remy held on to Deryn’s arm.

“What are you doing?” she screamed, fighting him.

“Wait,” Remy said, watching with a curious eye.

Zoe turned just as she was about to reach the man.

“I have something that I need to give to him,” she said, before turning away from them again and joining the stranger on the other side of the road.

Deryn still fought to be released, but her struggles grew less pronounced as she watched the little girl and the man communicate. They stared at each other, a silent message passing between them.

Zoe finally nodded, squatting down to watch as the stranger dropped to his haunches as well, and proceeded to go through one of his satchels in search of something.

The last time Remy had seen the metal statue of the infant, its chubby legs crossed in front of it and arms spread open in acceptance, it had been on Delilah’s plane in the possession of Clifton Poole.

“That’s Poole’s,” Deryn said, curiosity in her tone.

The man placed the vessel down in front of the child, and she laughed happily, reaching out to hold one of the object’s metal hands.

The stranger and the little girl smiled at each other then, and each nodded. The man reached out a long-fingered hand, and gently tapped the head of the infant’s visage; the vessel snapped open of its own accord.

Deryn gasped at the sudden movement.

Zoe appeared to be in a kind of trance, as the stranger began to hum a simple yet beautiful song. There were no words, but Remy’s mind was suddenly filled with images of a people who had sworn to safeguard a special gift that had fallen from the sky when the world was young, and who today were still performing their duty, as their ancestors had done.

The wordless song also told of a dark time, when their purpose had been lost to them, and how they had sent brave souls out into the world to find their purpose again.

Remy understood now, and by the expression on Deryn’s face, so did she.

Zoe’s body began to glow; a faint aura of yellow at first, gradually building to a nearly blinding white corona, before dissipating in a flash that left both Remy and the child’s mother blinking away blindness that had temporarily stolen their eyes.

When their vision cleared, they saw that whatever had begun was completed.

They watched as the stranger reached for the child-shaped vessel, no longer open, and carefully—lovingly—tucked it back inside his satchel.

Zoe was standing now, watching as the man with whom she had just mysteriously communed gathered up his belongings in preparation to be on his way.

The child finally glanced over at Remy and Deryn, as if suddenly remembering they were there, and gave them a wave, before turning her attention back to her new friend.

The stranger bent down to the little girl with his palm extended, allowing her to give him a high five, before doing the same in return. And all this time not a word was spoken between them, because it wasn’t needed.

They knew what had to be done.

The man watched as Zoe crossed the road. He turned away and started on his journey only when he saw that she had reached Remy and Deryn.

“We can go home now,” she said, standing before them.

Remy looked away from the little girl to watch the man’s progress down the road.

And not surprisingly, he saw that the stranger was gone, as if he’d never been there at all.