“Go back,” a voice whispers. It’s gravely, male, and as familiar as my own. Yet, there’s something off…something unnatural about it. “Go back. You’ve come too far.”
I can’t see him, but I hear him all around me, as if he’s right beside. I can even hear his breath stirring the hair at my nape. Even through the choking stench of blood and burning flesh, I can still smell him.
“Where are you? Let me see you.”
“No. You shouldn’t have come. You shouldn’t have come back for me.”
I shake my head, feeling the sting of tears in my eyes. “I’ll always come back for you. I’m not giving up. I promise.”
“No.”
“Legion, please…”
“No.”
The ground beneath my feet quakes. Glass shatters. Wood splinters. And the walls begin to cry blood.
“Go!” Legion harshly whispers. “Go before they see you.”
“Where do I find you?” I try to shout above the roar of rising violence.
“You don’t. You won’t.”
A deep fissure opens the floor, splitting it in two to reveal a pit of blazing fire. I attempt to jump to safety, but I’m stuck. My shoes have melted and fused to the broken ground. I try desperately to struggle out of them and scramble away, but the more I thrash, the closer I come to the flames that are licking up my ankles. I try to scream, but my vocal cords fail, my lungs too polluted with smoke to produce a sound. I can’t go like this. I’ve been prepared for death since I was just a little girl, but I can’t go like this. Not now. I’m not done yet. My life, my story…it isn’t finished.
“Wake up,” the Legion’s harsh voice whispers. “Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!”
“Wake up!”
I’m panting, drenched with my own sweat and my throat is sore from screaming myself awake. My entire body shakes as the dream still echoes in my skull. That endless loop, a horror reel on repeat.
Strobe lights. Broken glass. A neon sign. A broken chair. Strange laughter. Blood walls. An undecipherable symbol.
Legion.
He was there. Legion was there. I couldn’t see him, but I could feel his presence. I don’t know where I was trapped—I’d never been there before. But none of that matters to me more than one crucial aspect. He’s alive. Legion is still alive amongst The Many. And even though he claimed to not want to be found, I have to believe that he was lying. He was showing me signs—clues. Maybe he feels that coming for him would only end in disappointment and heartbreak. Or maybe worse. Still, there’s no way I’m sticking around here when he may not have much time left.
Not even bothering to slip on my shoes, I race out of my bedroom and down the hall. I have no idea what time it is, and honestly, I don’t care. I have to tell someone. I have to know that my suspicions aren’t merely false hope.
I lift my fist to knock on Lucifer’s door, but before my knuckles collide with the wood, it swings open.
And there he stands, in all his beautiful, malevolent glory. Naked from the waist up, only black silk pajama pants hang from his cut hips. His hair is just the slightest bit mussed as if he’s been raking his fingers through it. Judging by the empty quiet of the usually bustling halls, it’s either late or very early, and Lucifer looks as if he’s prepped for a porno. Fuck. Hating him would be so much easier if he wasn’t so ridiculously tempting to the eye.
“Well, hello, pussycat. Come to play?”
I swallow and peer around his frame. Shit. Maybe him being prepped for porn wasn’t so off base. He could be in the middle of making a movie right now.
“I, uh, I had a dream,” I stammer once I’ve assessed that he’s alone. “About Legion. I think he was trying to tell me something.”
Luc lifts a brow. “And what would that be?”
I brush past him and enter his room, so I’m not forced to stand there and gawk at him.
“I don’t know. My eyes kept being drawn to the same images over and over again. I think I was in a bar, but it wasn’t familiar to me. He was there, but I couldn’t see him. I felt him, I heard him whispering to me, but he was out of sight. I was only able to see the same scenes. I think he wants me to remember them.”
“And do you?”
I nod. “There were some details that seem unimportant. Broken bottles of booze, a chair, disco lights. But the walls were bleeding, and I could smell death; however, there were no bodies that I could see.”
“Is that it?” he strides to an end table and pours the remaining amber liquid from a crystal decanter into a glass.
“A neon sign, but nothing I recognize. And a weird symbol.” I shake my head. “None of it makes sense. I don’t even know if he was trying to tell me where to find him or trying to throw me off his trail.”
He takes a sip, his brow furrowed in contemplation. “Well…what did he say?”
“He said I shouldn’t have come back for him.”
Lucifer is silent as he sips his drink, his stare blank. Creeping doubt begins to bear down on my shoulders. Could I have just imagined it all? Was it just my subconscious trying to hold on to a ghost?
Feeling utterly silly, I heave out a breath and begin to turn for the door.
“Sorry. I know it sounds stupid, but… I don’t know what I saw or heard. Didn’t mean to wake you.”
“You didn’t. I don’t sleep.”
I turn to face him and find that he’s no longer eyeing an invisible spot on the floor. He’s looking at me.
“You don’t sleep or you can’t?”
“Both.”
“I thought you said your kind are subjected to a level of mortal weakness while on Earth. Illness, exhaustion, hunger…”
“Under normal circumstances, yes. But I’m not normal. I’m not sure normal exists anymore.”
He walks over to where I stand, stopping briefly to relieve his hand of the empty glass.
“How did you know where my room was?”
I blink. “Huh?”
“I never told you. And I highly doubt Legion or Nikolai would want you knowing where I’m staying. This house has nearly twenty bedrooms, if not more. So how did you know?”
I take a sharp breath as I try to come up with a manufactured explanation. There’s no way I can tell him what I saw that night. Not because he was with a man and a woman. Not because in those moments of passion, he seemed so…lost. So alone. I can’t tell him because I’d have to admit that I stood there and watched. That I was so turned on that I was two seconds away from hiking up my sarong and burying my fingers deep inside me while Kairo and his female companion sucked and licked Lucifer’s beautiful, thick erection like it was their last supper. He’d know. He’d see the flush of my cheeks. He’d note the way I’d chew my lip as those memories stoked a blaze in my belly. And I couldn’t let him have that. He had enough ammo to torture me with. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.
“I don’t know,” I shrug, trying to commit to the lie. “Must’ve heard about it from one of Irin’s servants. Probably so I could make a mental note to stay far, far away.”
He smirks, as if the truth is written in bold, black pen across my features. “Yeah. Probably.”
“Well…ok then,” I remark awkwardly. “I’ll just be going back to my—”
“What’s that on your face?”
“Huh?” I frown, batting at my cheeks. “Where?”
He steps in even closer, until there’s barely any space between his chiseled chest and the peak of my nipples, and swipes his thumb across my forehead.
“See?” he says, showing me the charcoal smudged digit. “What is that?”
I step back, and my eyes widen while every emotion wages war within me. Fear. Excitement. Confusion. Determination. I feel it all at rapid speed.
“It’s soot. I didn’t tell you. How? I…I didn’t…” I take a deep breath, reorganizing my thoughts. “In my dream, the floor opened up and there was fire. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t run from it. It was going to burn me alive, and it would have
if Legion hadn’t been shouting for me to wake up. And when I finally did, that’s what I was screaming. Wake up.”
“You know what this means, right?”
I nod slowly. “Legion is alive. He’s still in there, and he’s still him. And if he can find me, maybe we can find him.”
He looks as calm and cool as ever, yet dark clouds begin to roil within his gaze as he utters, “Unless The Many find you first.”
“Tell me again, Eden, and try to recall every detail. What did you see?”
Cain is pacing the floor in Irin’s lounge as he grills me about my dream, while Lilith takes notes from her place on the sectional. Toyol is tapping furiously on his laptop, and Andras is searching national news reports on an iPad to see if anything indicates high-level demon activity. It almost feels like it did before…before we lost Legion to The Many. However, there is a noticeable void where Phenex and Jinn once sat. According to Lucifer, Phenex hasn’t left Jinn’s side since they arrived. And I can’t help but notice how empty it feels in here without Niko and Crysis. Even when we were on the brink of war with Uriel, there was something comforting about having them all here. Aside from Lucifer and Irin, I had everyone I cared for under one roof, Sister included.
I look over to Irin who seems more preoccupied with being fed fresh fruit by one of her young man-servants. At least some things never change. Except for Lucifer, who now sits in the space beside me, which was deemed Niko’s seat.
“The first thing he showed me was the lights, like those strobe lights at a club. Pink, green, yellow. Then it was the broken booze bottle.”
“What kind of booze? And what color were the glass shards?” Lilith questions.
“I don’t know. Scotch? Whiskey? I didn’t see a label, and I think the glass was green.”
Cain nods, considering whatever inconsequential details I could offer. “Ok. What about the sign?”
I go through it all with them again, trying to conjure any buried specifics I may have missed. When I get to the unreadable symbol, it’s Toyol who pipes up.
“Do you think you can draw it for us?”
I haven’t even uttered a response before Lilith is shoving a scrap of paper and a pencil in my hands. “Yeah. If you could, we may be able to pull it up online.”
I frown and reluctantly put the pencil to paper. “I don’t know if I can get it right.”
I concentrate on drawing the set of symbols just right, although it all looks like meaningless shapes and curved lines to me. Before I’m even done with the last foreign character, Lucifer snatches the paper from my hands.
“It’s Demoori Sheol,” he remarks, his brow furrowed in contemplation.
“Demo…what?” I ask. Surely, my terrible drawing can’t actually mean something.
“Demoori Sheol. Ancient demon language. It’s a dialect of Enochian, the angelic tongue. It’s long been abandoned, and only really old or really skilled demons can decipher it.”
Cain takes the paper from Lucifer, ignoring the glare that follows. He quickly reads it and passes it off to Toyol. Judging by the look on each of their faces, whatever it means, it can’t be good.
“So…what’s it say?” I question.
“The fallen shall reign,” Lucifer answers gravely.
“The fallen? Like…fallen as in—”
“Demons. It’s the sign of the rebellion. It’s starting.”
“Actually, it’s already started,” Toyol refutes. He’s typing on his computer like a man—a demon—possessed. “You can’t control them anymore, and if they’ve found a way to break those shackles, we have to assume that they’re planning something big.”
Lucifer waves off the comment but I can tell the reminder of his lack of influence bothers him. “They’re far too stupid to organize a coup all on their own. They would have destroyed each other in the process. They had to have had help.”
“Like, a leader?” Andras chimes in. “A fallen angel just as powerful as the great and mighty king of darkness?”
I look to each of them, searching for confirmation of what I already know, yet no one meets my eyes. “Legion? You think Legion is doing this?”
“I think they’re at least taking their cues from him.”
“But it’s only been a couple days. Surely this would have been in the works for some time. He was here with us.”
“Legion was here,” Cain explains. “But The Many…who knows how long they’ve been gaining strength. Even before he regained his power, they could have been communicating with lesser demons without him even realizing it.”
“Knowing that soon enough, he would be overcome by them,” Lilith adds.
A beat of silence as we all think back to every time Legion was alone on missions or had disappeared from the Se7en’s old headquarters to blow off steam. Could he have known? Of course not. He wouldn’t let them do this. There has to be a reasonable explanation.
Cain turns to the resident tech genius with an order. “Toyol, do an image search to see if that symbol has popped up anywhere else. I’m talking every security and traffic camera in the country. Hack into personal footage if you have to.”
“Already on it, and getting multiple hits,” Toyol replies, his dark eyes still glued to the screen. “They’re everywhere. New York, Detroit, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, St. Louis. Mostly in big cities where it’s easier to blend in. Chicago, of course, but that’s not surprising. They’ve already done their worst here. My guess is that they’ll move across the map, wiping out each city one by one.”
“Shit,” Cain spits. He finally stills his pacing, and stands in the middle of the room, head slightly bowed with his hands on his hips. Frustration is etched in his hard features.
“Uh, guys. I got a hit on a story that struck me as odd,” Andras states. “A bar in Queens, New York. Seven dead, no witnesses, no suspects. Still under investigation, but the most recent ME report is saying it looks like the humans drank themselves to death. Like they literally chugged alcohol until their organs corroded.”
“When was this?” Cain queries.
“Yesterday morning. Just hours after…”
He doesn’t have to finish. We know exactly what he means. Just hours after Legion murdered dozens of demon-possessed humans before plunging The Redeemer into Jinn’s chest.
“I’ve uploaded the photos of the crime scene, but I don’t see any Demoori Sheol symbols.”
“Keep looking,” Cain advises.
“So he could be there? In New York?” I ask, feeling more and more anxious.
“It’s likely,” Cain answers.
“But I doubt he’ll be there for long,” Lucifer answers. “He’ll leave the rest up to the lessers. Do just enough to rouse them from hiding and unleash them unto the city.”
“And how do you know that?” Cain challenges.
“Because it’s what I would do,” Luc explains, his tone dripping with condescension. “If I had a limited amount of time to inflict mass destruction, I wouldn’t stay in one place for very long in fear of being caught. The Legion of Lost Souls absorbs the souls of the lost, the wicked, the depraved. He’ll want to surround himself with as much immorality as possible in order to maintain his strength. So we go where the sin is.”
“But there’s only four of us,” Lilith notes. “Phenex won’t abandon Jinn’s side, and we need him here to oversee his healing. The warlock prince is gone, and Crysis and the Alliance are trying to save what’s left of Chicago. We don’t have the manpower or the resources to be everywhere at once. By the time we get to one city, he could have moved on to the next.”
“So we split up,” I suggest. “And you don’t have four. You have six. Lucifer and I will help.”
Cain shakes his head. “It’s too dangerous. And there’s no telling if and when Uriel will regroup and strike again.”
I sit up straight, preparing for another round with the scarred demon. “This is my fight. I’m not going to sit on the bench while you all run into a battle. Hell no. I told you, this
all started with me and it’s going to end with me. So either work with me and utilize whatever skills I may have, or I’ll do it on my own.”
Cain gives me one of his infamous death glares, but I don’t back down. If he wants to waste time with a staring contest, fine by me.
“And I’ll keep an eye on her,” Lucifer cuts in. “You all may know the self-deprecating Legion that so pathetically wanted to earn his way back to grace. But I know the Legion who would slaughter entire villages before breakfast for sport. She’s safer with me than with anyone else.”
“And we’re supposed to trust that?” Cain’s murderous scowl falls on Luc, who is nonplussed as always.
“You can do whatever you want with it. But I’m here, aren’t I? He’s commanding my flock. Don’t you think I’d do everything in my power to put a stop to that?”
Cain huffs out an aggravated breath before grumbling, “Fine. We’ll split up and try to get ahead of him, hitting the most likely cities first. Toyol and I will go to New York. Maybe he’ll still be there. Lil, Andras…Los Angeles. And you two…” He acts as if even acknowledging us angers him. “Take Detroit.”
“And how will we defeat him, considering we have one weapon between us that might be strong enough to stop him?” I question.
“If we find him, we immediately alert the others. No one does anything but assess the situation and search for clues. If one of us lays eyes on him, we trail him until we all reconvene. The Redeemer is out of play for now. Hopefully it won’t come to that.”
“And if it does?”
“Then we will handle it. No matter what, Legion was one of us—one of the Se7en. You’re not.”
His words sting but I school my features, refusing to show that my mortal heart has been wounded.
“Whatever you say,” I mumble.
Cain looks to his brothers and sister. “We need to leave within the hour. Get what you need.”
“How are we supposed to get to our locations?” Lilith asks. Good question. We can’t all dematerialize.
“I may be able to help with that,” Irin chimes in, the first indication that she’s even been listening this whole time. “I may or may not have an underground hangar on my property. Nothing spectacular, just a few jets and a helicopter. They’re at your disposal. I can have my staff prepare them for travel immediately.”