Baptisms of Fire and Ice Read online

  Silence fell across the apartment, heavy as lead, while Adara attempted to process what the angel had said.

  “Let me see if I’ve got this right,” she muttered, wetting her parched lips with her dry tongue. “Due to a plot by Satan and the minions of evil, God broke into a bunch of pieces of energy, and those pieces burned through the sky like meteorites and struck a whole bunch of things, including people. And all the people that were struck now possess a piece of God’s power?”

  “Correct,” he said delicately. “And to make matters more complicated, each human who has now bonded with a shard possesses a different subtype of Providence.”

  “And by different subtype, you mean different ability?”

  “Yes.” He wrung his hands in his lap. “The Creator was omnipotent after all. So the number of powers that They possessed encompassed all the possible powers that existed in the universe, and beyond.”

  Adara forced herself to resume packing, this time with gusto. “And I got one of these countless powers.”

  “You did, and you used it for the first time earlier today. I assume by accident?”

  “You can say that.” She shoved the last few items into her pack and zipped it closed. “I ran into some kind of monster that looked like a cross between a boar and a mole rat.”

  “An imp,” he said. “The lowest order of demon.”

  “Well, this ‘imp’ attacked me and nearly drowned me in a pool, and when I went to defend myself I…I turned into water.”

  The angel perked up. “Elemental coalescence. The ability to physically merge with the basic elements. A strong ability. It will serve you well.”

  “Serve me well?” she snapped. “I don’t even know how to control it.”

  “You will learn.” He turned his head toward the window again. “You must learn. You and all the other humans who now possess shards of Providence must gain mastery over your new abilities. Because the Shattering of Providence did not only serve to end the Creator’s active influence over this universe. It also destroyed or damaged a great many of the Creator’s works. And one of Their greatest works is the barrier that exists between Earth and Hell.”

  “Wait, so demons can just waltz onto Earth whenever they want now?”

  “Not yet,” he countered. “The forces of Hell launched a great attack on the barrier at the exact same time the Shattering occurred. The combined power of the assault and the spiritual shockwave of the Creator’s Shattering rippling throughout all of Creation…Needless to say, the barrier was heavily damaged. The bulk of the damage occurred across the cornerstone points that keep the barrier stable over the region you call North America.”

  The angel procured a scroll from literally nowhere. One second it didn’t exist, and the next, it was in his hand. He offered it to Adara. “This is a map of the Earth with an overlay of the cornerstone spells.”

  Hesitant, Adara took the scroll, slipped the silk band off it, and unrolled it. It was an artful rendering of all seven continents in thick gold ink. Layered on top of the gold was a web of thin silver lines, and each place where the lines intersected was marked by a silver triangle. There were three triangles in North America, and one of them was smack-dab in the middle of Edgerton, Massachusetts.

  Adara lowered the map and gave the angel a suspicious side-eye. “You came here to ask me to do something for you, didn’t you?”

  “For me? No,” he answered. “For your world? Yes.”

  “Why me?”

  “Because you were the first, Lady Adara. The first to use your god shard. And you just so happen to be in the exact right place to put it to further good use. For the cornerstone spell in this city is the most damaged of them all. The rest have some weeks or months remaining before they crumble. But without intervention, this one has days, if not hours, before it falls. And its failure will leave a gaping hole in the barrier through which thousands of demons may emerge onto Earth.”

  He jutted his chin at the map. “Because you possess a piece of Providence, you can repair the cornerstone spells.”

  “How?” Adara asked.

  The angel waved his hand, and a second scroll appeared. “The first set of instructions on this scroll describes the process for repairing the cornerstones. The second set is an effective method of banishing demons. I suspect you will need to use the second set of instructions more than the first.” He held out the scroll.

  Adara didn’t take it. “Are you for real? You’re honestly expecting me—me, a PhD candidate in comparative literature—to become some kind of superhero and save the world from a demon invasion?”

  “No, I am not expecting you to become anything of the sort.” He glanced at the balcony window yet again, his expression much harder this time. “I am, however, expecting you to choose self-preservation. Which in this case means preventing an army of demons from overrunning your city and killing or enslaving everyone in it, including you and all of your loved ones.”

  “I…I’m not sure I can do this.” She screwed her eyes shut, unable to unravel the tangle of thoughts now piling up in her head, so heavy that she felt she would suffocate under the cloying weight, her lungs unable to inflate.

  A hand landed on her shoulder, callused yet gentle, and the angel spoke more kindly than before. “Humans do many things that seem incredible because they are willing to try anything that seems possible. That is why the Creator loved you ever so much. Out of all the creatures of Creation, you possess the most ingenuity.”

  Adara swallowed thickly and said with a weak laugh, “Thanks for the pep talk.”

  “You’re welcome.” The angel rose from his crouch beside her and put his hand on the hilt of his sword. “Now, as much as I would prefer to accompany you on this dangerous quest, Lady Adara, I fear I must remain here and cover your retreat.”

  Adara sucked in a breath that felt like razor blades. “They’re here?”

  “Coming down your street,” he confirmed. “And as I said, the greater demon leading them is not an adversary I can defeat. I will likely perish in this fight, but I promise you I will hold them off until you are safely away.” He drew the sword with the slick sound of steel on leather. “Be warned, however: Each time you activate your shard, the demons will sense the pulse of power and use it to pinpoint your location. So whenever you utilize your ability, do not tarry long afterward. And whatever you do, do not allow a greater demon to capture you.”

  “How do I tell a greater demon from a lesser demon?” she asked as she slipped the two scrolls into the side pouches of her pack and buckled the last few clasps. “Do they look different?”

  “See for yourself.” He ushered her to stand, and when she did, he guided her to the balcony window and pulled back the shade just enough for her to peek through to the street.

  A block away from her apartment, a dozen small misshapen creatures lumbered down the street—more imps—and at the head of the group was what at first appeared to be a man. But as the figure stepped underneath a flickering streetlight, his inhuman features came into stark relief.

  His eyes were pitch black with no visible sclera, and thick black veins lined his face. His skin was peeling off in scaly patches. But instead of falling to the ground, the bits of detached skin turned black and floated in the air around his head, as if trapped in an orbit. So many pieces of skin had flaked off that the man had a literal halo of desiccated flesh.

  “Greater demons,” the angel whispered in her ear, “cannot cross the barrier until it collapses completely, because the amount of resistance the barrier gives is relative to the amount of power that the demon possesses. In the barrier’s weakened state, however, a greater demon can pass a portion of its essence through to Earth. In its base state, that sliver of essence will be drawn back across the barrier in a matter of hours. But unfortunately, there is a loophole. If the demon can possess a human body with that portion of its essence, then it can stay anchored to this plane indefinitely.”

  Adara almost choked on her own spit. �
��That thing out there is a human being?”

  “It was,” the angel said. “Now it is an empty shell, the soul ripped to shreds, the body worn like a suit by the embodiment of evil intent.”

  Adara shuddered. “Does the banishment spell not work on greater demons?”

  “It can, but their degree of fortitude is very high. I seriously doubt you are strong enough to cast the banishment spell on a greater demon by yourself. You’d have to work with another who possesses a shard, possibly more than one.”

  “Are there more people with shards in Edgerton?”

  “This city was one of the primary strike zones, so there are undoubtedly quite a few of you. Most of the abilities granted by the shards will be outwardly apparent in some fashion, so you should be able to identify your peers if they use their powers in your presence. If you do find another shard holder, I suggest you do all in your power to convince them to join your effort. The more of you who work together to fix the cornerstone spell, the greater your chances of succeeding.”

  Adara stepped away from the window. “This is too much. This is way too much.”

  “Don’t try to process it all at once.” The angel moved around her and hefted her pack. “Chip away at it in bits and pieces, and with patience and perseverance, you will eventually come to understand and accept all that you have experienced. Humans are as resilient as they are clever. You can handle this. I know you can.”

  “How can you know that? You only met me half an hour ago.”

  He smiled, a genuine smile, and Adara felt a pang of heartache. Because the man’s smile would have been beautiful beyond compare had a demon not destroyed his face. “I knew the moment you opened the door that you could handle all that Hell might throw at you.”

  “How?” she pressed.

  He gestured for her to turn around so he could help her slide her pack on. “Because the very first thing you did when an angel of the Heavenly Host showed up at your door was shove a shotgun against his chest. Only two types of people would do that, the smart and the foolish. I know which one you are.” He slipped the straps of the pack up her arms and settled the heavy weight on her shoulders. “And so do you, Lady Adara.”

  “Caine,” she said. “My name is Adara Caine.”

  “And I’m Selaphiel,” he replied. “Nice to meet you, and even nicer to see you off to safety. Is there another way out of this building besides the front door?”

  Adara pointed to her bedroom area. “That window there lets out over the dumpster. One of the lids is closed, so I should be able to lower myself onto it with only a short drop. Then I can take the back gate out onto the service road and exit on the south side of the block.”

  Selaphiel gripped her shoulder reassuringly. “A good plan. Now go stand by the window. I will draw the greater demon’s attention. On my signal, exit through the window and run as fast as you can.” His grasp tightened, and his expression shifted into something that Adara would almost call admiration. “Good luck, Adara Caine.”

  Adara gave him a nod of thanks and said, “You too.”

  Chapter Eleven

  A light brighter than a magnesium fire flared across the neighborhood as Selaphiel the angel unleashed his power. And with her eyes shut to ward off the glare, Adara Caine jumped from a window. She landed with a dull thump on the plastic lid of the dumpster, rolled off, and hit the ground running, her pack strapped on so tightly that it did not even budge.

  Shotgun in one hand, the other outstretched to feel the way ahead in case there was an obstruction in her path she couldn’t see, she made her way around to the back gate of her apartment complex, quietly lifted the latch, and slipped through onto the service street that cut through two rows of housing.

  If any of the demons glimpsed her escaping from her apartment through the blinding blaze of angelic light resonating from her balcony, they did not care to follow her. No one and nothing tried to stand in her way as she dashed down the street to safety.

  When Adara was two blocks from her apartment, a mighty boom rocked the earth, nearly throwing her into the wall of a convenience store. She braced herself against the wall with one hand and looked over her shoulder as a wave of heat flooded the street, sweat springing up on her neck and face at its touch.

  A great column of fire rose from the street in front of her apartment, accompanied by a roiling plume of smoke blacker than the night sky. Inside the column danced thousands of the same strange symbols that made up Selaphiel’s wings. Adara prayed—to no one, apparently—that the fire was an attack against the greater demon and not a sign of the angel’s untimely demise.

  You’ll suffer an untimely demise, she reminded herself, if you don’t keep going.

  She resumed her jog down the street, moving as fast as she could with the substantial weight of her pack dragging at her rear. At the next intersection, she took a right onto Halloway Street, which was lined with small boutiques and popular restaurants with outdoor seating. All of the businesses were shuttered, even the restaurants that usually served drinks till early in the morning.

  The dead silence, punctuated only by the faint, fluctuating roar of the fire in front of her apartment, gave the whole area an eerie feel. As she jaywalked across the street, the formal crossings rendered pointless by the complete lack of traffic, she felt as if she was trekking through a ghost town lost in the mountains of the west, rather than a small but flourishing city right near the Eastern Seaboard.

  Adara noted that some of the businesses had been looted already, their large display windows smashed by blunt weapons or strong fists. Her boots crunched as she traversed the fields of glass that littered the sidewalks, each shard glittering under the harsh glare of the fluorescent street lights.

  The sound of glass grinding against concrete wasn’t loud, but the neighborhood was so quiet that each evenly timed crunch made Adara feel like she was waving her arms and screaming, “Woman out alone at night. Come and get me!”

  That uncomfortable feeling saddened Adara, as she’d never felt particularly unsafe in Edgerton, even when she had to walk across the heavily wooded college campus after dark. Serious crimes like rape and murder were rare, especially in this area. The most common crime in the Holloway neighborhood was pickpocketing. Just young people, mostly boys in their late teens, trying to make a few lucky wallet grabs and usually failing.

  Edgerton was a safe, low-crime city. Or at least, it had been.

  Until God died and rained down from the sky.

  Rounding the end of the block, she cut a diagonal across Plinkett Road and made a beeline for an alley she liked to use as a shortcut whenever she traveled to Hudson and Grail’s by foot.

  Some people would call her nuts for traversing a dimly lit alley alone this time of night. But between the shotgun and the clearly visible hunting bow strapped to her pack, Adara didn’t think any common predators would choose her as a target.

  She was far more concerned about the uncommon predators currently prowling around her apartment. The ones with boar tusks and misshapen faces. The imps, and their master—that creature who wore people’s skins like clothing and was apparently so powerful that even an angel did not think he could defeat it.

  I’d rather face a dozen rapists in dark alleys than fight that greater demon, she thought resolutely. So she hurried through the alley, keeping her eyes peeled for humanoid forms hiding in the darkness beside the dumpster or among the trash bags piled up around the side exit of a dance club that was closed for the first time since it opened last year.

  No one ambushed her, and nothing loped out of the darkness and tried to strangle her like that imp from the pool. She made it to the other end of the alley unhampered. Then she darted across the narrow parking lot that separated the row of single-business buildings on Plinkett from the bulky office complexes on the next street over.

  A chain-link fence marked the property line between the club and one of the office buildings. But sometime over the past six months, somebody had cut a hole in
the fence to make for easy passage. Security at the office building apparently didn’t care enough to fix it. All they’d done was stick a sheet of plywood over the hole and strap it in place with zip-ties, which stubborn pedestrians proceeded to cut at least twice a week.

  Adara would never admit it openly, but she herself had cut the ties a couple times. Because the shortcut around the back of the office complex shaved off several minutes of the trip from her apartment to the bar. In the dead of a Massachusetts winter, when that icy wind moaned through the streets, the fewer minutes she had to spend outside, the better.

  The ties had been cut again just yesterday, and the office building security hadn’t yet attached new ones. So all Adara had to do was march up to the plywood and give it a good kick. It tumbled backward onto the asphalt of the office’s parking lot with a thud. Adara winced as the sound echoed through the nearby alleys, having forgotten that the lack of nightlife amplified the effect of every noise she made.

  Chiding herself, she took off her pack and shoved it through the hole in the fence using a series of maneuvers that were not unlike a tango in order to prevent the broken fence links from snagging the fabric. Once it was through, she carefully slid herself through as well.

  A sharp metal point grazed her ear but didn’t break the skin, and she emerged on the other side unscathed. Finally, with a tug of her arm to bring the shotgun across—she’d been pointing it toward the alley this whole time—she was completely past the obstacle.

  Adara congratulated herself for defeating a fence, slung her pack back on, and continued toward the bar.

  Not a hundred steps later, the bright column of fire behind her abruptly flickered out. In its wake, nothing remained but the black cloud of smoke blotting out the stars.

  Adara’s chest tightened painfully, as she assumed that meant Selaphiel’s fight with the greater demon was over. Either he’d prevailed despite his expectations and would perhaps catch up to her and offer his assistance. Or he’d failed as he predicted and his divine body now lay broken and bloody on the road outside her apartment.