Caged in Bone (The Ascension Series) (25 page)

“This is not good,” James said to the nothingness inside the gateway.

Had he assembled the door incorrectly? Had some stray stone shaken loose of its moorings? He ran his hands over the pillars, but it no longer responded to his touch, and he couldn’t find where it might have been broken. His worry grew as he inspected the places where the cracks had been joined.

He must have imagined Shamain darkening on the other side. The alternative was…impossible.

The sound of voices drew his attention away from the gateway. He turned to see Sophie approaching, bundled up in a warm jacket, her round face framed by earmuffs and graying hair. She was accompanied by Isabelle and Alex, other members of the White Ash Coven that had joined James when he reformed their ranks.

“Something’s gone wrong,” James said, composing his features. He couldn’t let them see his shock. “We’ll need to investigate magical forces that may have interfered with this door. Go back to the houses—tell everyone to meet here immediately.”

The trio stopped walking a few feet away, exchanging looks.

None of them moved to obey him.

“Get the rest of the coven,” James repeated.

Sophie sighed. “Sorry, James.”

She turned to look behind her, and he realized that there was one more woman with the witches—a woman who had politely declined to join his coven last year, a woman that he hadn’t spoken to since absorbing himself in the search for Eden.

It was high priestess, and James’s former girlfriend, Stephanie Whyte.

Her statuesque figure managed to make her puffy winter clothing look elegant. She had probably spent more on the outfit than most people spent on rent each month.

She was flanked by a young woman and an older man that James didn’t recognize, but the fact that they wore iron chains at their hips filled him with alarm. He had seen creatures that wielded iron in such a way before. None of them belonged with Stephanie.

She pulled her scarf down as she glided toward him, strawberry-blond hair falling loose from its severe bun. “Having a problem, James?”

“What are you doing here?” he asked. “Abel said that you were on your way to Northgate.”

“As far as he knows, that’s true.” She kissed James on either cheek. Her lips were soft against his grizzled cheek.

James had been betrayed too many times not to recognize when someone’s alliances had shifted. But this was Stephanie Whyte, the doctor who had staffed the emergency room through a demon apocalypse in Reno, flawlessly moral and beyond corruption. Occasionally icy, but trustworthy.

Yet something was definitely wrong. And it would have been wrong even if Stephanie hadn’t been traveling with basandere.

“What have you done, Stephanie?” James asked in a low voice, trying to keep his coven from hearing.

She pressed a hand to the nearest pillar, gazing up at the arch. “Tell me how this opens.” Her sleeve pulled back as she stroked up the black lines furrowing the white stone.

James glimpsed something on her skin that shouldn’t have been there.

He grabbed her hand, pushed Stephanie’s sleeve above her wrist.

There was a tattoo of a bleeding red apple on the inside of her arm.

That was the mark of the ancient cult called, fittingly, the Apple—witches loyal to Adam, the first man. Much like a tree, it had splintered from its core over the generations, branching out into multiple covens and even some non-magical sects. They had roots in everything. James had taken advantage of one branch to help him open the first door to Eden.

The Apple was populated with misinformed Kool-Aid drinkers, idiots, and politicians.

And, apparently, his ex-girlfriend.

“Dear Lord,” James said.

She didn’t bother trying to pull back. “If you’d returned my earlier calls, you wouldn’t be so surprised,” Stephanie said dryly. “Amazing what happens when you ignore a woman for a year, isn’t it?” She put her other hand on top of his. “Surrender, James, and this doesn’t need to be a fight. Stand down and let us through the gate.”

“They kidnapped you,” he said. “They
tortured
you.”

“There’s more to the story than you know, although that wouldn’t be the case if you had picked up the phone once in a while—not to harp on that point.” Stephanie rubbed his forearm through his sleeve. It was a gesture that she had used to use on him when trying to convince him of something he didn’t want to do, like fixing the garbage disposal, taking the trash down to the curb, or kicking Elise out of the apartment. Not surrendering gateways to Heaven.

He looked beyond her to the coven. Isabelle, who had been friends with Aunt Pamela. Alex, who had taught James how to play piano. Sophie—
Sophie,
of all people, who had babysat for him and been one of Pamela’s many young initiates. If he had had to select anyone from his coven that he could have trusted above the others, it would have been those three.

James pulled away from Stephanie, stepping under the gate’s arch. “This door’s broken. It can’t take you to Heaven.”

Stephanie sighed. “Don’t fight me on this.”

“I’m not.” Although he would have if the gate hadn’t been mysteriously non-functional.

“Aren’t we friends, James?”

He had thought so. Apparently he had been mistaken.

James couldn’t help but think of how amusing Elise would have found all of it.
I always knew Stephanie was a bitch
, she would say. Guess he should have trusted her.

His hand slipped into his jacket, finding the rune on his flesh that connected him to the intra-dimensional teleportation spell. It was positioned over his heart.

There was only one reason the Apple could want to get into Heaven. They had long wanted revenge against the angels that had betrayed Adam. They were insane—radicals, terrorists.

James eyed the basandere hanging back near the trees.

Radical enough to ally with Belphegor and invade Shamain?

Stephanie massaged her right temple with her fingertips. “Fine. I wish I weren’t in such a hurry, but we have to get into Heaven before Belphegor does. Felicity?”

The basandere girl stepped forward, loosening the iron chain she wore as a belt.

James triggered the spell.

He was already standing on the circle he had hidden under the snow. When the portal blossomed to life inside the gate, it immediately consumed him, arcing over his flesh, sliding under his shirt, setting his teeth on edge.

The clearing distorted around him. Stephanie’s face—more annoyed than angry—elongated and blurred.

Time and space bent, jerking James out of Colorado.

The gate was
calling to Uriel. He couldn’t tune it out anymore.

The damn thing had been singing a sweet song to him ever since Nashriel had found it in Mexico. It didn’t matter that he had gone to Earth to check on his friends in San Francisco. While the mortals had told him of ongoing evacuation measures, he had still only heard that song. The words of his human companions had been nothing but a dull, meaningless groan underneath the trill of the gate summoning him back to Shamain.

He needed to go to it.

Ezekiel was still guarding the crystal cave, slouched lazily against the wall with his wings tucked away, picking at his fingernails. He didn’t even straighten when Uriel approached.

“Nashriel said nobody goes in, if that’s what you’re thinking about right now,” Ezekiel said, sounding bored.

Uriel leaned around him to look at the gateway. It hadn’t moved since they had carried it up, thank Adam, but the song was growing quieter by the moment. He couldn’t make out the tune anymore.

“He sent me to check on it,” Uriel said. “Nashriel, that is.”

Ezekiel frowned. “Did he, now?” It wouldn’t occur to an angel that another might be lying; they were all on the same side, with the same goals.

But the gate was quieting, and it frightened Uriel. He needed to reach it
now
.

“Nash was worried it might have come open,” Uriel said—the first excuse that came to mind.

Ezekiel finally straightened, drawing his saber. His gaze sliced across the crystal cave to the gate, pulsing slowly with its internal light. “I haven’t let anyone in. Nobody could have opened it.”

He stepped away from the door.

Uriel pushed past him and all but ran into the cave, ears straining for the song that had chased him all the way to Earth. It was completely gone now. His heart pounded as he reached out for the white stone, smoothing his hands over the glossy pillars.

“What are you doing?” Ezekiel asked sharply.

He pressed his forehead to it, eyes closed, and listened for the song that he knew was there.

Uriel didn’t hear a song. He felt a painful pinch that sent a jolt of surprise to his heart, originating from within the gate.

The second pinch was far less gentle.

Pain punched through his breastbone, straining at his ribs, clenching on his spine.

A scream wrenched out of him.

There was something wrong with the gate. Magic had been pressed into the pillars, pushed through the cracks to settle deep in the core where they hadn’t seen it.

When they had taken the gate, they hadn’t thought to look for infernal magic inside of it.

It was a warlock-cast spell that clawed through Uriel now, setting his nerves aflame. He distantly remembered this agony from the First War—the balefire that had melted nerves and driven angels to insanity after being drenched in it too long.

Ezekiel’s sword flared behind him, leaving a spidery green imprint on the edge of Uriel’s vision.

“Stop touching it—
now,
Uriel!”

“I can’t!” he shouted even as he threw all of his weight into attempting to pull free.

The warlock rune flared and spread. It locked into his spine and pushed at the backs of his eyes.

Crimson light flooded the center of the archway, dancing in electric ropes, lashing around Uriel. Shadows fell over the cavern until all that Uriel could see was the molten red magic making the earth tremble, illuminating the crystals with hellish fire.

A portal opened at the center of the gate with a groan.

“Ezekiel,” Uriel said desperately.

The other angel stepped forward with his blade lifted. “I see it.”

A hand of darkness thrust through the portal, followed by shapely legs, and naked breasts. The shadow twisted and resolved into the shape of a woman. Her hair was endless. Her black eyes were huge, consuming the top half of her face. And the skin below was smooth and featureless—no nose, no mouth.

Ezekiel swung his blade at her, slashing at her stomach. The saber went through her. She didn’t react.

She pointed at him.

The angel launched backward as if thrown. His back smashed into the crystals. He collapsed with a short cry, and went still.

The magic holding Uriel finally vanished.

He lunged for Ezekiel’s sword. Wrapped his hand around the hilt, lifted, and swung.

The demon only stared at him.

“Back,” he said, “go back to Hell!”

Her feet didn’t even touch the ground as she drifted toward him, thickening the air around her, the edges of her form fraying into shadow.

She reached for him with black fingers.

There was the song again—the tune that had lured Uriel to the gate. It so shocked him that he forgot, for a moment, that she was trying to kill him.

It was a moment too long.

Pain thrust through his chest again. Uriel looked down. This time, it wasn’t magic, but Ezekiel’s sword driven through his chest. He hadn’t felt it leave his hand.

It had gone right through his heart from the rear.

He could feel his organs failing.

“Back to Hell,” he whispered, this time without any command in his voice.

He fell. Hit the ground.

As his vision blurred and darkened, he saw a second woman—pale-skinned and dark-haired, human-like—reach out to grasp hands with the shadowy demon. They embraced.

“Welcome, sister,” the pale one said. “He’s ready for us.”

And the dark one replied,
I’m ready, too.

The Fates turned to leave the cave, and Uriel bled.

Few angels traveled
through Shamain on foot, so the streets hadn’t been designed with pedestrians in mind. Architects had wrapped paths around the oldest trees in curlicues that were aesthetically pleasing rather than practical. Angels put care into all their craftsmanship, of course; there was as much detail in each paving stone as in the murals. But the city was a work of art meant to be seen from the sky.

It was strange for Nash to take to the streets and see Shamain as a human might—or a demon without wings.

Everything looked so tall, the trees and buildings. The exaggerated proportions of the bridges and curves were even more extreme when he walked on them. They were steep, sharply twisted, difficult to take on foot.

Summer didn’t seem to care. “This is
amazing
,” she said, spreading her arms out and spinning across the cobblestones. She had kicked off her shoes the instant that they arrived and seemed to relish the feeling of cool ethereal stone underneath her toes.

He strode up the bridge arching over the roots of a centuries-old tree as he searched for a hint of shadow, anywhere that Atropos might have been able to shelter, but didn’t find one. Dense as the trees were, they glowed as brightly as any other building in the city. Their branches were hung with crystals suspended within lanterns, and they drove away the smallest of shadows between leaves.

“Amazing, yes,” Nash agreed, keeping Summer in the corner of his vision. There were no railings on the bridge and the canals were moving faster than they looked. “But there’s more to this city than meets the eye. This beauty came at great cost.”

Summer either wasn’t listening or didn’t care. The glow of the buildings reflected in her wide eyes as she gazed up at the tree.

“Are there more cities like this?”

He couldn’t help but smile at her. She was filled with such innocent wonder. “No. Shamain is one of a kind.” Much like this woman that he wanted to wrap in his arms and shelter from the city that surrounded them—and the angels following them through it.