Through the fire, p.28
Through the Fire, page 28
Nothing burned, as if the holy ground recognized its own, but the air got too hot to breathe, hot enough to taste as it crawled down Chris's throat, and battered away again by all of the wings. The world was full of wings and maybe nothing else, their sound relentless, and somewhere in the midst of the unforgiving noise he remembered that Biblical descriptions of angels tended toward the terrifying. Now he understood why. He croaked a protest even he couldn't hear, but Arioch looked his way, then leaped again, ephemeral wings spread.
This time he landed on Raphael's back like a cat trying to claw its way up a person to escape a bath. The archangel's wings collapsed into nothingness and they both fell, landing with shattering weight on pews that went up in a scatter of splinters. His halberd disappeared in the chaos, and Elemiah dropped, his wings, but not his fire, folding away. The church suddenly seemed much, much larger.
Not quite big enough, though, to contain Nicky.
Chris's brother looked like a wild thing, raw power barely kept in check by a human shape. He looked scraped thin, skin too tight over his bones, like Saboac had been, except once upon a time Saboac had had access to unearthly beauty, and Nicky was only human to begin with, so now he was cadaverous, blood-dark veins throttling his neck and face and even his hands. His hands kept opening and closing as if he couldn't control them, and he prowled forward like a predator, not like a human, but a cat or a shark or a frickin' velociraptor, Chris didn't know, but it looked dangerous and inhuman and bloodthirsty.
One of the few remaining angels put herself between Nick and Raphael as the archangel threw off the effects of dropping twenty feet into oak pews. Nick caught her by the throat and threw her aside effortlessly, but not before a glimmer of power surged from her into him and he brightened, then dimmed again like dense smoke was swirling in front of a lamp, except inside him. He stalked through Eli's fire, teeth bared in a hiss, and through the wall of flame Chris saw astonishment cross the angel's face. He reached for Nicky, then clearly thought better of it, even before Arioch growled a low sound of warning.
The castaway was on his feet again, his shirt in tatters and his face scarred with smoke and ash, even though he hadn't gone through Eli's pillar, not that Chris had seen. Raphael came to his feet with a roar, casting his wings wide again. They hit Arioch so hard the blonde angel slammed backward into a wall and slid down it, cartoon-like. Elemiah leaped after him without seeming to consider it, just the one set of his wings spreading to carry him over the archangel.
Which left no one between Nick and Raphael, because Chris didn't think he could get there fast enough. He tried anyway, launching himself over more space than normal with the poleaxe's haft as help, but Nicky had his hands in Raphael's robe before Chris was halfway there.
The shockwave of their engagement knocked Chris on his ass anyway, throwing him halfway back across the floor again. Pews didn't break when he smashed into them. The shock of pain screaming through every part of his body suggested probably he had broken, but in the moment his nerves were too stunned to try anything beyond sending pain and panic through his whole system.
Didn't matter. Didn't matter. Couldn't help Nicky if he was out for the count himself, so he made himself stand and decided he could, if only just. Nothing was broken, maybe. The poleaxe helped, he could lean on that and take a couple of shuddering breaths before pushing himself forward. Whatever was going on, Nick needed backup, and the angels were fucking around somewhere else. Chris couldn't see them anymore. 'course, he couldn't see much that wasn't right at the end of his own nose, except the blur and brilliance of his little brother throwing down with an archangel.
Raphael's wings wouldn't fucking stop battering the air, although he didn't seem to be able to buffet Nick the way he wanted to. Every time those huge emerald things closed, they bounced back again like they'd hit something invisible. Semi-visible. Chris thought he could maybe see a wall of smoke-stained power washing around Nick, almost like Eli's column of flame, except sort of…evil.
He hoped he'd just hit his head so hard he couldn't see anything clearly.
Nick, snarling, got one hand off Raphael's robes and planted it over the archangel's face like he might dig his eyes out. Instead power flared, violent green, with such a backwash that Chris stumbled again, then gasped as the pain fled. All of it, down to the blurry vision, down to the thick bone-bruised feeling in his spine, down to the spots in his hamstrings that were so numb from pummeling he'd hardly been able to feel them. Even exhaustion washed out of him, leaving him feeling like he'd had a great night's sleep and could maybe use a breakfast platter the size of Wyoming. His grim shuffle forward turned into a dead run, and all at once Eli and Arioch were coming from the archangel's other side, too, like they'd planned a coordinated attack.
And in the middle of it, Nick looked—better, almost. Burning bright, instead of stained with the dark threads of demon essence. Chris bellowed a warning at his angels, hoping they'd see it too, but almost as quickly as the improvement came, it faded again. Nick's lips pulled back, baring his teeth, and for a second Chris actually thought his brother was gonna bite Raphael's neck, like he'd turned into some ether-sucking vampire. Assuming angels had ether for blood, anyway. Something like that.
Nick didn't have to close his teeth on Raphael's throat, though: he visibly drew power with his grip, the same kind of surge as from the angel Chris had just watched him drain, except so much more. So much more, waves instead of glimmers, and it fought with the grendel power, rising in conquest and then falling into disarray, until the archangel's wings dulled, their glassy depths thickening from translucent emerald to opaque jade. It happened fast, so fast that Chris had barely made it to within striking distance with the poleaxe before Raphael shrieked and broke Nick's grip, flinging himself away.
"Abomination, unclean, befouled, desecration, profane." Each word came in a rough snarl, like the weight of them might drive Nick to the ground. And maybe it did, because Chris's brother dropped to his knees, screaming with power that rolled off him in pulses. Chris staggered the last step or two to get in front of him, to put himself between the archangel and his brother, and for the space of a heartbeat, and then longer, both the power roiling off Nick and the archangel's litany failed.
Raphael hissed, "Away," and Chris managed a laugh from somewhere deep in his soul, although it came out as more of a shudder than a sound.
"Like hell."
"You will die for this abomination."
"Every day of the week and twice on Sundays," Chris agreed, and the flash of confusion in the archangel's eyes momentarily made the flood of abject terror that Chris was trying not to notice worthwhile. Raphael's gaze darted to the poleaxe Chris held, almost reminding Chris himself of it, and, inspired, he spun it. It cut through the air, leaving a streak of gold in its wake, and he didn't think he imagined the light of caution that sprang to Raphael's face. "Or you could die instead," Chris suggested.
He almost thought it wasn't going to work, but then Arioch and Elemiah were there beside him, the three of them a wall of wing and weapon between Raphael and Nicky. Raphael shuddered, his face contorting with hate, and the glance he gave Eli warned of oncoming vengeance. "Do not imagine this has ended. This will be engraved against you in the Books of Law."
"This is my very purpose," Elemiah said with enough serenity even Chris thought it came across as snide. "Yours lies elsewhere. Whether my name or yours is written, or stricken, from the Books remains to be seen."
"He takes the very grace from our bones, Elemiah."
"Then best you return to the second Sphere before yours bleeds away in its entirety."
Raphael's face slackened with surprise. "You wouldn't."
"I?" Elemiah lifted a broad shoulder and let it fall again. "I would do nothing, but even Powers cannot contain an Exalted forever."
Nick screamed again, as if he'd been waiting for the cue. To Chris's not-particularly-secret delight, the archangel flinched, then snarled. "I promise you this has not ended, Power."
"Probably not," Eli said, still with that irritating serenity. "But it has ended for now."
Fire thundered around him, around all of them, a blazing tower that flashed over Chris's skin, over Arioch, who had kept uncharacteristically quiet for the last minute or two, and over Nick, who howled again. When it banked, Raphael was gone, along with the few other angels who had survived the attack. Elemiah sagged, and Arioch, breezily, said, "An admirable effort, Power. You'll pay for that."
"In all likelihood." Eli turned toward Nick, his expression breaking, and Chris's stomach clenched as he spun to see what was wrong.
Nick was on his feet, cracks of light breaking through his skin with dark boiling power rushing in the depths of those cracks. His hands, the palms upturned, were the color of blood and fire, split along the lifelines, skin looking like it rose away from his flesh and bones. He turned one hand left and right, examining it as if it was a tool to be dissected, then lifted an awful smile toward Chris. "I can see the heart of the universe."
Arioch made such a dismissive sound that even Elemiah shot him a look, but Nick tilted his head, eyes wide and blank with blazing power. "You think not?"
"I think no mortal can contain the knowledge to do so. If you even so much as looked upon the its edge, you would immolate wi—" The rest of his condescension was lost as Nick turned his palm toward him and light, laced with darkness, exploded out.
Chris gave a hoarse yell, shielding his eyes and twisting to follow the bolt's path. It shot through the church wall, blazed a mark across the night, and hadn't yet faded when Chris whipped back toward his brother. "What the hell are you doing, Nicky, that asshole is on our side!"
"Please." Nick's lip curled. "A castaway angel? The Fallen Throne? Even if he was, I would have to destroy him, but really, Chris, why would the castaway be on our side? We all know you're not the brightest, brother. Maybe you should sit this one out. Let your betters deal with the corrupted divine."
Pain as pure and clear as a knife's blade sliced so deep in Chris's chest he had to put his hand there, look down, to see if he was actually bleeding. No. No knives, no blades, just the fucking awful power of words, cutting away his breath, his heart, his belief. That last was always shaky, especially in himself. An easy target. Easier than the blood and bone and muscle, really, and he knew it.
Nick knew it.
Nicky wouldn't say that, though. Nicky who kept telling him he was smarter than he thought, that he could do more than he expected of himself. Nicky was full of shit, yeah, but he'd never admit that. He'd never tell Chris how fucking useless he was. He wouldn't, and Chris knew it, and the cut fucking landed anyway, punched right through him and made him forget how to breathe, made him forget he'd ever known how to breathe.
He looked up again, but it took such a long time to look up again, to meet the soulless glory of Nick's blazing gaze, and somehow he found enough breath to say, "Better to reign in Hell, right? Isn't that what Arioch said? That's enough reason for him to take your side, and if he took your side, he took mine, Nicky." That was it, that was all, there wasn't any more breath in his body, and that was okay because at least that way it couldn't be knocked out of him again.
A flicker of irritation darted across his brother's face. "And do you have an excuse for the Power, too? Perhaps the dogsbody wants to serve a different king? Why else would he let an Exalted live?" A noise came on the end of that, a hiss so broad and deep it didn't sound like it had come from a human animal at all. Nick's hand flashed forward, seizing Elemiah, who neither bellowed nor burst with power the way Raphael had when Nick had grabbed him. He only wrapped a hand around Nick's wrist, blocking some of the terrible glare that bled off Nick's skin.
"The judgement on your survival has not yet been passed, Exalted. But Arioch was right. You shouldn't have lasted this long, much less been able to do what you do now, and while I see all too clearly how dangerous is the path I've chosen, I am not yet, I think, at its end. There's time yet, to pass judgement."
"Not if I drain you of power," Nick whispered.
Eli's eyebrows rose. "I invite you to try."
"Dude! That is a terrible idea!"
It was also obviously too late, as power crackled around Nick's fingers and rage turned his mouth to a thin line. He clawed the fingers of his other hand, clearly trying to drag Elemiah's strength from him.
Instead, he drew fire.
That pillar of incorruptible flame scored across Nick's hands, down his arms, over his chest, singeing, snapping, incandescent, and catching bits of visible grendel power to ignite them. Nick screamed, a low hoarse sound, and Chris took a hard, uncertain step forward. "Eli—"
"He should burn," Elemiah replied softly. "An Exalted so far gone as he is should simply burn, Christopher. I am a Power. The least destructive aspect of my duties is to bind irredeemable evil on the mortal plane, and more often, it is my duty to destroy it. Your brother should burn."
"Well fucking stop it if you think he's gonna fucking immolate!"
The Power smiled briefly, glancing up at him. "And, you see, I begin to suspect why he does not."
"I don't see! Let him go!" Chris took another step, wanting to pull the angel off his brother and fairly certain that even if Nicky wasn't burning, he would, if he laid hands in Elemiah.
Eli murmured, "In a moment." The fire swallowed Nick whole, then faded as he yowled again, and Elemiah moved back. "I can do nothing more for him."
"Looks to me like you did too fucking much already!" Chris stumbled forward, catching Nick's shoulders. "Nicky, buddy, you in there?"
His brother's eyes were blank again, empty of everything that meant anything to Chris. "I need their power."
"You need fuck all except a sandwich and a good night's sleep." Chris's voice cracked and he swallowed down heartache. "Come on, man."
Anger twisted Nick's face again. "Get out of my way, Chris."
"On a cold day in Hell, man." Chris cast a desperate look over his shoulder, relieved to see Arioch, brushing at his shirt as if it wasn't already bedraggled, stepping through the gaping hole in the church's wall. "Is that a thing? Cold days in Hell?"
"Any unpleasantry you might imagine is a thing in Hell," Arioch replied airily, without looking up. "How deeply childish of you, Nicholas. Did you really imagine a little bolt of the corrupted divine could obliterate one whose entire self is made up of the same? Oh." The last word came more softly as he caught sight of Nick, and he came forward more quietly, as if finding himself unexpectedly at a memorial. Nick reached past Chris with shaking, clawed hands.
Chris grabbed his wrist with a lot less effect than Eli had done, although Nick at least looked at him. "Fine, you want them, you gotta go through me first."
A snarl twisted Nick's face again. "Don't be stupid."
"Oh, you just made it real clear that stupid is my only stock in trade, Nicky, so I guess this is the road I'm on. You want the angels, you can go kill them, whatever, but you're going to have to kill me first, because I'm not gonna let you do this shit while I'm still alive." There was a hollow place in his chest, his heart slamming around in it like it was looking for something to hang on to.
"Rrrangh!" The sound clearly came from Nick's belly, scraping his throat on the way through, and he shoved Chris hard enough to knock him backward, careening toward shattered pews. He caught himself and came forward again, shaking his head.
"Gonna hafta do better than that, Nicky. I'm st—hff." That sound came from Chris's solar plexus emptying out, leaving him no room to pull air in again, as Nick's fist caught him in the gut. He was a big kid these days, Nicky was, but the blow felt like a sledgehammer, not something human.
Probably about the same way that stupid fucking text Chris had sent about their dad's death had caught Nick. He sucked air in around his teeth, but couldn't get it farther into his body than his throat. Didn't matter. He stumbled forward again, and by the time he got hold of Nick's shoulders he could almost drag in a fresh breath. "'m still here. C'mon, Nicky, do it right or give this shit up."
The next hit was pure magic, and that almost made it easier. Not the impact, the impact hurt like fuck, he didn't even know what he'd hit, except probably not the pews, 'cause it hurt all over, evenly, instead of in a lot of painfully individual locations. A wall. Probably a wall. That was good, he could use the wall to push up to his feet again. It would have helped if there was something, anything, to sort of brace himself on, a chair or one of the pews or even another poleaxe, but either the angel weaponry had disappeared with them or he just wasn't close enough to see any.
That was about enough putting off the inevitable. He got up again, shaking his head like a bull. Feeling bull-headed, in fact. A grin slashed his face and this time he rushed his brother, tackling him with a shoulder in the belly, and the next couple minutes, seconds, eons, he couldn't tell, were filled with fists and elbows and one epic headbutt that left him cross-eyed and dizzy. He hadn't exactly shaken that off when Nick pinned him, raining hits down with the rhythmic certainty of inevitability. Oh, he was screwed. Totally screwed, couldn't get a defense up if he tried, so in the end he just mumbled, "'sokay, Nicky. 'sokay. Did my best. So'd you. Sometimes shit just happens, right? 'sokay. You do what you gotta. I love you, though, man, okay? Don't forget that. Don't forget."
Nicky went still for a heartbeat, then two, then three, until they stretched into enough time for Chris to start really feeling the jelly his face and torso and shoulders had been pummeled into. Then Nick threw himself backward with a terrible noise, anguish tied with rage and despair. "Chris?"
"Hey, good job." A tiny, broken laugh cracked Chris's throat. "Good job, man, you stopped. Good job, Nicky. But I gotta…I gotta rest now, okay, Nick? Just gimme…a minute, okay…?" He couldn't count the places that hurt. Could maybe count the places that didn't, if he remembered any of their names. Toes. Maybe his toes didn't hurt. Maybe. The world was kind of fuzzy, anyway, dim and getting dimmer, like he really did need that rest, except Elemiah came into his line of vision when all he wanted to do was pass out.
