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The smell of snow hung ripe in the frigid night. Low-hanging clouds blocked the moon and stars, leaving only the lamps surrounding the campus buildings and lining the walkways to light Shax’s path. Of course, his cat’s eyes did not need the light. Shapes which would be dim and blurred to humans were clear and vivid.
Shax sheltered under a bush and examined his tail. The smell of burnt fur filled his sensitive nose without the coppery odor of blood. He gave the tip of his tail a tentative lick with his tongue and immediately regretted it. Burnt fur tasted worse than it smelled.
He crawled out from under the bush and trotted down the block. Finding a shadowed corner, he transformed back into his human form. The frigid night seeped under his jacket, licking at his skin, and a quarter-sized spot on his ass stung like a bitch. He pulled out his phone and found a twenty-four-hour diner nearby. Thank God for college students.
Staying in the shadows, his long strides ate up the distance to the diner. He slid into a booth and ordered coffee, the tips of his fingers numb from the few minutes’ walk. When the server returned with the mug, he cupped it in his hands to warm them.
Shax flexed his warmed hand at his waist, once again reaching for the missing obsidian blade. Most days, he was glad it was gone. Damned thing sang with death and despair. But without his blade, he had no chance to complete the contract. There had to be some other way.
Anything he did to her right now would mean her eventual resurrection after the angels fixed the Gates. Lucifer would be more forgiving if he tried something, anything, to rid him of the angel, even though Shax would have to do it all over again at a later date. Pleading a lack of means would go over like a punk rock band at a country music festival. He needed to figure out how to fulfill Lucifer’s bidding if he wanted to avoid spending the next century or two or ten in agony over one trivial angel. He’d already experienced enough misery at the Prince’s hands.
The server filled his cup once more. He savored the bitter warmth as another option wriggled through his brain. Shax could run, put as much distance as possible between him and this city, and stay the fuck away. If he never saw Kheone again, he would have—what was the term those shady politicians used on TV shows? Plausible deniability. Should it take eons to repair the Gates, he might forget he had ever seen her.
Yeah, right.
Maybe the compulsion would release him someday, but Kheone’s face stayed with him, haunting his dreams and calming his nightmares. Lucifer had whispered her name to a coin and ordered her death. Once, Shax had every intention of fulfilling the order. But as he’d pressed his obsidian blade to her throat, Shax had looked into her silver eyes. Eyes that never held a trace of fear in them, only anger and, sometimes, pity. Eyes that would meet death with the same courage she met life. And he’d been unable to kill her.
Oh, sure, the Gates had exploded in a torrent of fire, providing a reasonable excuse for her continued survival. But he’d already loosened his grip on the dagger. In his heart, Shax knew something deep inside him had decided in the moments before the Gates fell to spare Kheone. He could try to fool Lucifer, but he’d never fool himself.
Rising, he pulled out a twenty and dropped it on the table. The voice telling him to find the angel and kill her may have vanished, but the compulsion to do so was a mere thought away. He allowed his defenses to drop and tapped into the knot of awareness in his brain. A shining filament tugged him back to Kheone.
The best he could do for the moment was to keep watch. Kheone and her ilk were at least predictable. For example, he could predict with one hundred percent certainty if they discovered him, he’d be dead. It would probably happen instantaneously, which was a far better fate than if Aeshma should find him. Looked like his cat form was going to get a workout. As soon as he found a dark shadow, he changed.
The first tiny snowflakes fell as he wandered through the neighborhood, catching on his fur and muting the noises of the night. Shax followed the draw of his connection with Kheone to what he assumed was a dorm. A clock tower in the middle of campus rang out twice. With a resigned sigh, he found an evergreen bush with a clear view of the entrance and huddled under it. He would wait her out.
Tik-tok, tik-tok. His tail measured time, and his eerie amber eyes glowed as they caught the light coming from the lamps dotting the campus. Grateful for his fur coat in this cold, his eyelids became heavier, and he slept.
A grumbling engine and an annoying mechanical scraping woke him. The snowplow continued its work down the road. The gray light of the early morning lit the snow which had accumulated while he slept, lending a ghostly blue tint to the crisp air. A glaring rectangle appeared in the middle of the porch, and Kheone stepped outside, glancing around as if worried someone would jump out at her. She walked off. Shax waited a moment and followed her footprints through campus.
He turned a corner. Kheone stood by a blocky, four-story building, rough-hewn stones framed by concrete supports. The tall, narrow windows were dark in the early morning. A nearby lamp cast its golden glow upon her shining hair and threw her face into shadow. A portrait of light and dark, hope and despair, love and hate. Shax took a few steps toward her, his own loneliness drawn to hers.
Shax missed company. Sure, he could entice nearly anyone he wanted into bed. It was great for a night or an afternoon or, occasionally, a morning. But he did not have any companions, let alone friends. A few days ago, he had killed one of the few demons he counted as something resembling a friend. Hinndal had not deserved his fate, but Shax had no choice, not if he wanted to enjoy his freedom while it lasted.
Before he could catch Kheone’s attention, a low, ominous note reverberated through the air, echoing off the buildings around him. A shiver of dread started at the top of his spine and traveled down, stealing his breath and stopping him dead in his tracks. What the—
He had heard that sound before. He still heard it in his nightmares. Shax swept his gaze around, trying to find the source. Shit, this could not be happening again.
The musical tinkling of falling glass drew his attention skyward. A large object fell from the top floor right above where Kheone sat. His paws moved before he could think, and they changed into human feet mid-stride. Shax launched himself at Kheone, knocking her into the snow just before the sickening thud of a body dropped three feet from them, spewing angelic blood. The snow gleamed with the shimmery and opaline substance, and so did they.
Kheone stared at him with eyes wide and mouth agape. She shoved the heel of her hand into his chin, rattling his teeth. Pain shot through his skull, and his vision grayed at the edges. He rolled, used his legs to push her off him, and scrambled away.
She barreled toward him, teeth gritted, a bull chasing a matador’s cape. A second note sounded, louder and expanding. He covered his ears, and Kheone’s momentum carried her into him, knocking him off his feet. A bright light bloomed above them, brighter than the sun, removing all shadows for an eternity of an instant.
Pressure forced them to stay on the ground, and blackness followed, so complete it rivaled the depths of the abyss itself. The icy ground against his back, the warm, heavy weight of the angel, and a body full of pain told him he wasn’t dead. Shax blinked, clearing the red afterimage of the explosion, and looked up. At least, he thought it was up.
Kheone filled his vision, silver eyes snapping with rage and contempt, her proud features contorted into something out of the worst nightmares of Hell. And he should know; he was one. She wrapped her hands around his neck and squeezed. On her throat was a small, dark scar, a reminder he’d almost killed her, had spared her life. He could not hurt her any more than he could grow his wings back and fly away. Shax reached up and grasped her wrists but offered no further resistance. Sparkles flooded his vision as he fought unconsciousness.