My hand flew to my stinging cheek, but for the first time, instead of feeling anger and humiliation over her actions, all I felt was an odd detachment. Before, I’d always questioned why she hated me, why she couldn’t love me, and now I had the answers. Maybe she still should have loved me. No matter what, I was her child, but the voices had broken her to the point that she was incapable of caring for me.
Kobal closed in on her with his fangs and claws extended. “No!” I cried. I regained my balance and stumbled forward to stop him from killing her. “No!”
“She will not be allowed to get away with hitting you!” he snarled.
“It’s fine.” I wedged my body between his and hers. “She can’t hurt me anymore.”
Kobal’s muscles tensed to spring as he stared at her with a hatred that vibrated through the air around us. My mother drew her knees up against her chest and hugged them as she made a pitiful mewling sound.
“Demon,” she moaned.
I tried to nudge Kobal away, but he wouldn’t budge.
“I won’t allow her to touch you in such a way,” he stated.
“She won’t hurt me again, physically or emotionally.” I was surprised to realize, I believed this. She’d cut me open with her words more times than I could count, hit me more times than I cared to recall, but shecouldn’thurt me anymore. I’d believed this so many times over the years, believed myself armored against her time and time again, yet she’d still slipped through to pierce me in one way or another. There would be no more slipping through for her.
“She willneverhurt me again,” I said. He didn’t go after her, but he didn’t back away either. Turning back to her, I kept myself between them as I spoke. “What happened to the people in town?”
“Taken. Dead. Your father came to claim them,” she said in the singsong voice of children skipping rope on a playground.
“Lucifer was here?”
“He came for you.” She giggled as she glanced at the TV again. Whatever few screws she’d still had in place in her mind were working their way free right before my eyes. “He found only the people and the children.”
“Why did he leave you here?” Corson asked her.
“Left a message for his daughter.”
“What is it?” She stared at the TV instead of responding to me. I stepped in front of the TV, forcing her attention to me. “What is the message?”
“That he knows the truth and so shouldyou,” she said and pointed a finger at me before wrapping her arms around her legs again. “If I go to town today, can I get some rabbits?”
In my head, I heard the clatter of the last screw coming free from her brain and hitting the ground. What had Lucifer done to her? What hadallthe angels done to her?
“What truth?” I asked.
“I think I would like some flowers instead,” she murmured.
“Mother, what truth?”
“Not your mother, just the vessel.”
“She’s broken,” Hawk muttered.
“She’s been broken for a long time,” I said as I knelt in front of her. “Where are Gage and Bailey?”
“Well, they’re with him,” she replied and clapped her hands. “We’re all kin after all, and they are his kin too.”
My eyes flew to Caim as terror curdled like rotten milk in my belly. “Does Lucifer know I am a mix of two angels?” I demanded.
“No, or at least he didn’t,” Caim answered. “I would have known if he did. Weallwould have known if Lucifer learned Michael propagated while on Earth. The fit he would have thrown would have been heard throughout all of Hell. However, if she”—he waved a hand at my mother—“spoke to him about voices, and after seeing what you did with the seals, he may have figured it out.”
“He couldn’t suspect it’s Michael’s line,” Raphael insisted. “You knew nothing of it.”
“Lucifer is not stupid, nor does he have any faith in you assholes!” Caim snapped. “Michael and Ariel were the only two angels who walked the Earth before the fallen. If Lucifer thinks on it, he’ll figure it out. And since Ariel never waddled around with a full belly, he’ll figure out whorealquick.”
“Oh,” I breathed. “Mother, did Lucifer tell you where he was taking Gage and Bailey?”
