Stranger at the Hell Gate (7 page)

"Here!" She pushed the sword through. "Take it, Jagger!"

Jagger pulled the sword free from her grasp. As it slipped from her fingers, her energy level sapped, the room growing dim.

Sonya knew nothing more.

DEMONS

Jagger grabbed the sword from Sonya and shoved her out of the demon's side. With a cry, he drove the enchanted blade into the closing chasm. The demon screamed in impotent rage as Jagger did what he did best: pure slaughter.

It was foul work but he hacked himself free, finding the heart chamber and shattering it. When the heart broke, the demon exploded, erupting in a shower of putridity that coated everything in the room.

Jagger stood in the remains of his assailant, panting and surveying the room, alert for any part of the demon that may have survived. Nothing but quivering green demon stench.

A noise from the far side of the room took Jagger's attention. Ionis groaned and pulled his knees toward his chest.
He'd survived worse
, Jagger thought.
If he's breathing, he'll live.

Right now, there was another—

Jagger called Sonya's name, spinning on his heels, searching for her. She lay crumpled, unconscious in a watery puddle of demon muck. He dropped to his knees and pulled her shoulder to turn her onto her back. Her head rolled, limp. He yanked off his gloves and felt her throat.

A pulse? There!
Jagger wanted to scream with relief. His breath was ragged, the air burning his throat. Gently he gathered her up and carried her upstairs. The compass glowed like a star through her soiled blouse, lighting the dim stairwell like a ghost light.

DEMONS

The hours dragged by in a torment. Painful. Agonizing. The wait was a new kind of torture for Jagger. He hurried to his feet when he heard the doctor's footsteps on the stairs.

Grayden and Jagger went back a long way. The doctor was a neutral—didn't care much for alignment one way or another. Jagger rarely called him in for professional services, since his demon blood gave him a certain measure of indestructibility.

Right now, Jagger hoped the Seraphim had the same kind of health plan. "So?"

Grayden closed the door to the apartment steps carefully behind him. He shrugged and removed his glasses, wiping the perspiration from his brow.

"She's resting." Grayden poured a cup of coffee from the machine in the corner before settling in the desk chair. "What do you know about that rock she wears? That crystal thing with the wire?"

"I guess it's a throwback to her hippie days."

"I'm serious."

"Fine, fine." He shook his head and ruffled his hair. "She said it's a compass that lights up when it gets close to the blood of Tallon."

"And does it glow around you?"

"Yeah. Apparently my brother's been around, too."

Grayden drew his brows together. "Does the glow go out when you're not around?"

"She said so, yeah. What with the twenty questions?"

"Maybe nothing. Maybe…everything." He took a shallow sip and grimaced at the bitter brew. "'Cause when I checked on her just now, it was lit."

Jagger was at the door in a heartbeat.

"Easy!" Grayden stopped him before he could charge up the stairs. "There's no one up there. I warded the room. No magic, demon, contrived, or otherwise, will break the cloaking. She's fine."

"She's fine,
safe
, or fine,
healthy, unhurt, perfectly fine
?"

Grayden laughed. "You should see your face. I never saw you worry about anyone before. It's comical."

"I'm not joking."

"I know. Look. We've known each other a long time. We've been through a hell of a lot together. You know if anyone on this plane has your back, it's me."

"Then grab a gun and let's go. If that crystal is lit, Acheron is around."

"He's not, Jagger."

"Whatever." He shouldered Grayden out of the way. "I'm going up."

She stirred when he opened the door, raising her hand from the bed. So weak. And so pale against her golden hair, the thin blue line of vein just beneath the skin giving her the look of porcelain. Deep bruises ringed her eyes. She looked so…human.

She struggled to speak but her voice was a rasp. Jagger shushed her, leaning to brush his lips against hers. He smoothed her hair back and stroked her cheek, watching her drift back to sleep before he could say a word.

There'd be time for that later. Jagger sank into the chair next to her bed, holding her delicate hand in his.

Jagger's neck hurt from sleeping in the chair and when he shifted, it caught, stiffer than a year-old corpse. Shit. She'd wanted him to lie down next to her but he was afraid he'd crush her. She needed rest.

Groaning, he rubbed his eyes. "Last time I do that, Sunny. I woke up on stone floors feeling better than this."

No answer. He dropped his voice to a hush, but he wasn't used to whispering. "Still sleeping? Poor girl."

Uncrossing his legs, he leaned forward. The room was shrouded in the muted tones of early morning, the new sunrise not yet clearing the city buildings. Everything was awash in soft gray and blue and pink: the curtains, the vase on the table near the window, the bedspread—

The empty bed.

Gone.

He didn't find the note until much later.

Jagger had searched the building and the surrounding blocks and the old church tower for her, returning empty handed. Not a trace of her, of anyone, anything. The air hurt to breathe.

He didn't find the note until he came back, defeated and angry and frustrated, and sat on her bed, wondering how he'd gotten so stupid that she could have been snatched right out from under his nose.

A note—

I put you in danger. They found you because of me. You're better off if I go.

DEMONS

Enzo stood in the doorway, for the first time at a loss for words. Maybe because Jagger never knew grief before. Enzo had no clue what to say.

Rage? Violence? Self-loathing? Sure. But not grief.

Jagger sat on the empty bed, his back to the door. "Why, Enzo?"

"Blood of Tallon, Jagger. She reached right through that thing when bullets got stuck, and Ionis bounced off."

"She used magic. I saw the flash."

"I know you don't want to hear this, Jagger," Enzo said. "But there's only one explanation. She's got Tallon's blood, too."

"Don't say it." Jagger's gritted teeth sliced the words into a hiss.

"Didn't Grayden tell you her crystal glows all the time?"

"What?"

"She wore the amulet all the time, kid. And it glowed all the time, whether you were around or not. She's gone, man. You have to forget her."

Jagger was sure he didn't hear him right. But didn't Grayden try to tell him something? Did he know? Did he know and not tell him? Oh, fuck.

Terror filled him, a white streak of tremor that shook him to the core. It couldn't be true. He wouldn't let it be. Jagger sequestered the idea, his fear, and he stomped it down. Twisted it, turned it into something useful. Fury.

Fury was a liquid emotion that flowed through his veins, touching parts of his nature he'd never allowed to run wild. Fury awoke parts of his nature he'd long ago learned to quiet and ignore.

Fury wanted a target.

Jagger's breathing stopped as the demon blood took over. His skin paled, alabaster white, as if life simply drained out of him. He rolled his shoulders, set his feet, and smiled.

Enzo knew that look and knew well enough that it wasn't a time for words.

It was time to get out of the man's way.

Months passed in a bloody blur as Jagger threw himself into his work, becoming reckless and more dangerous than ever. He hunted, for demons and for her. So many false leads and dead ends.

Part of him burned away, useless tatters of tendencies that only held him back. Emotion, compassion, anything human. He forgot all the tricks, all the traits he'd learned so carefully to mimic, so that he could pass for human. So that no one would mistake him for demon, the nature that he loathed.

Now, he reveled in it.

What would she think of him? Would she be ashamed? Would she despise him? She brought him so close to his humanity that he forgot his dark side whenever he was with her. She'd touched him in a way he'd swore he'd never allow again.

Not if he couldn't have her.

Jagger pulled his sword free of yet another rotting demon's carcass, smiling with vengeance. He delighted in the killing. He craved it. His blood screamed for it.

For the first time in many long years, he was finally willing to listen.

DEMONS

Another town with a stupid name, even farther from home. Home? He had no home. He hunted, going wherever there was a devil that needed killing. This town was uglier than most.

He'd been tracking a fourth-ring demon for days now. Not real bright, but evasive. Or at least Jagger let it think so. He'd hit it with holy water buck shot the day before, wounding it severely, then let it run. He gave it a head start.

Jagger toyed with his quarry. Once there was a time when he killed the demons and went home. Now there was no home. He had no need to rush.

The trail led into an old hotel, windows boarded up and tenants long gone. Jagger followed the drips of demon slime to a green puddle on the floor right outside a room on the third level. He moved like a gale wind, wearing a steel-cold smile while he kicked in a door. "Wouldn't it be easier to stop running?"

Dirty, dark room. Something small and sharp-nailed scurried behind the wall. "Nice try, asshole. No way out."

Click.

"Well," Jagger said, his smile stretching wider. "That sounded like a big ass gun. Since when did scary demons start needing those?"

"I swear if you don't leave me alone—" The voice, tremulous and thin, held a level of desperation that Jagger recognized. It was the sound of
nothing left to lose
. "I'll use this—"

Then it struck home. Jagger fought to keep upright.

It was Sonya.

DEMONS

"Sunny?" He shook his head, trying to quiet the demon blood and clear his senses. After running hot for so long, it was hard to find his humanity. He lit a flare and peered into the dark, seeking the source of a bright spot of light against the wall. "That you?"

"Leave me alone," she said. "Stop looking like him."

Sonya crouched in a corner, knees drawn up in front of her. Her eyes were wide. Her agony was nearly tangible.

She was alive. And she was holding a sawed-off double-barrel that under less abnormal circumstances he would have whistled at and asked to try out once.

But not now. Right now, it was pointed at him. And judging from the tangy smell of ionic vapors, it was loaded with demon shot. If the bullet didn't kill him, the divine poison could.

"Oh, God. Sonya. Put that gun down."

She coughed and cocked the hammer. "I'm not a sucker, either."

"Sunny. You can't hurt me with that. Well, it'll hurt like hell. But you can't—"

"Didn't say it was for you." She turned the gun around and pressed it to her chin. "I'll end this. I'm so sorry I started it."

Jagger panicked, the white-hot flood of fear surging though him and washing down through his feet. "Stop! It's me!"

"No, it's not." She was dirty, ragged-looking, gaunt. He never heard this tone of voice, so devoid of hope and sunlight. "It's never really you."

"Easy, Sunny. I didn't come all this way to take you home in pieces. Put the gun down."

"I want to believe you…but it's been so long." Tears cut rivers through the dust on her cheeks, pale streaks under white eyes. Holding the gun steady she ripped off the bright crystal, snapping the thin leather cord, and set it on the floor. Flipping the gun, she used the butt of the gun to smash it.

A flare of light shot out and flattened against the wall, which disappeared under its glare. The surface glimmered and pulsed, forming a portal. It hummed as it charged.

"I'm going back."

"Don't leave me again! I don't care what anything means anymore." His anguish, pure human anguish, dispelled the last of the demon thrall. His voice cracked. "Just don't leave again."

"Jagger?" She whispered his name and reached out to him. "Is it…really you?" She pushed to her feet, using the wall for support. Her round belly made the simple act of standing a laborious effort. "Open your jacket."

He wrenched open his jacket. It clung to him, blood and mud and who knew what else making it stick to his skin. In the pale glow of the portal, his sickle-shaped scar shimmered. She wobbled on her feet. "Oh, God. Jagger. You're real."

He ripped his gaze from her midsection and pointed to the portal. The humming sound swelled to fill the room. "Shut that thing off, Sunny."

"Jagger?" She approached him with tiny steps. He threw the flare. Closer, closer, until he could feel her heat and the invisible brush of feathers he recognized as her aura. She touched his chest, fingers finding the sickleshaped scar and tracing it in the dark. "You?"

She looked deep into his eyes, like she'd done that first night, and he spun around the center of her touch. She gasped, recognizing, knowing. He was left with a crisp linen-feeling that purified him. The touch of a Seraph.

She kissed him, tenderly, her swollen body pressing against him when she lifted on her toes to reach him. He reached out to hold her but she shoved him back, catching him off guard.

The portal screeched open, and a great wind gusted out, chasing debris around the room in eddies of power.

"Sunny!" His voice cracked with panic.

"No, no. It's okay now." She smiled, her beauty undimmed by the dust on her face or the tears on her cheeks. "There is hope, after all. I thought I could defeat him, do it on my own…but it got too hard for me. I couldn't spare the precious energy to fight."

"I thought I lost you."

"You haven’t lost me. I had to leave—to draw him away from you, away from his source of power. He thought he chased me at first—oh, his pride! He thought he was so clever!"