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EMRICK
Ten Years Ago…
Turning back to face him, I was thankful for the rain that obscured his form, making his body a mere shape moving through the downpour. Because without the rain, my tears would be visible to my brother and not hidden by the streaking on my cheeks made up of polluted water from the clouds hanging above the smog. The night was perfect for my mood—when my world was falling apart the skies opened up and grieved with me. I’m sure he could see the tears anyway, but he knew better than to say anything about it. Zaqiel may be older than me, but it didn’t mean I wasn’t above kicking the shit out of him.
Crying.
Even the word sounded weak.
A human weakness I never thought I’d submit to. But it wasn’t only due to sorrow—that emotion had been smothered beneath layers of sheer rage, and I intended to keep the pain there, hidden where it belonged. White-hot anger burned through my body and threatened to melt my skin. My wings were out, off-whites and pale grays against the dark of the night as Zaqiel and I stood in some dirty fucking alleyway having a pointless squabble about fate and right and wrong.
He didn’t know right from wrong, not in this world. Zaqiel hadn’t yet spent much time out of the Silver City and still believed humanity was as good and faithful to Father as we were.
As Iwas.
“Come home, Emrick,” he said.
That fucking soothing voice of his only pushed daggers further into my soul. Because it was all fake, even if he thought it was real. It was simply default for Zaqiel to attempt to calm every situation, to be the voice of reason—the angel to soothe the angels. The entire system was shot to hell, including his pacifying voice and the sympathy he portrayed.
Zaqiel was only pretending to understand my anger, but he couldn’t, not really, and I’d have preferred if he had outright said he didn’t understand but respected my decision with how I planned to deal with it. But all I was met with was pitying looks and lectures on therightthing, thegoodthing, like it’s always so simple.
He had a lot to learn.
“Forget the troubles of Earth,” he said. “Come home.”
Shaking my head, the droplets of water ran from my dark hair, flicking off and disappearing into the haze of the rain as it intensified. Barreling down on the dumpsters around us, I had to raise my voice to be heard over the downpour as though God was trying to drown me out with nature.
He’d never control me again.
“I’m going to kill those men, Zaqiel, and you can’t stop me.”
His expression was stony, it always was. Zaqiel—always in control, the level-headed brother, the older, the wiser. “You know the rules.”
“Fuck the rules,”I cried, throwing my hands up. He flinched, and I relished in his momentary loss of stoic control. “Demons kill humans all the fucking time.”
“Not always. That’s not true, and you know it.”
“But sometimes.” I stepped forward, my boots splashing in the puddles on the ground, announcing my approach, although he didn’t flinch or move away. Then we were nose to nose, same height and build, his blue eyes not wavering from my deep brown, so dark they were almost black. “Sometimes,Zaqiel, and isn’tsometimesalready too many? Why are demons allowed to get away with murder, but I cannot?”
“They don’t get away with murder, brother. You know all this.”
“How about you fucking enlighten me?”
His lips pulled tight together, his posture tense at my proximity and the aggression I was displaying, filtering through the air between us in an unspoken challenge. Eyeing my wings, the muscles in his jaw tightened. He wanted to tell me so badly to fold them away so they were out of the prying eyes of humans, but he didn’t want to create any more conflict than was already thick around us.
“Demons can be used as tools,” he said, keeping his tone even as though he was explaining this to a child who should know better. I guess, in his mind, he was. “Sometimes a demon will cross paths with a human who’s fated for death at that moment, and they will be killed. The demon will think it was a lapse of control, but it was no accident they were there at that time…” He paused. “Those humans were marked for death. Whether humans and demons believe in fate or not is irrelevant. They are fated to make choices, to be in a certain place at a certain time, that much is destiny, and the choice they make is up to them. But an out-of-control demon…” He shook his head. “If a demon kills a human outside of these circumstances, they will be sent back to Hell indefinitely or killed. In those cases, there’s no lapse in control but a definitive choice.” He eyed me. “That’s the difference. Thechoiceto kill. As you’re doing now, making a choice.”
I scoffed, and it was then he took a half step back from me, still not dropping my eye contact but a deep frown creasing his forehead. Zaqiel was growing angry. Good. Maybe if he lost a few layers of control, he might feel a snippet of the rage burning in me. Did he honestly believe everything that happened was part of some grand plan? Maybe it was all bullshit, just a cover to control us. Demons could get out of control like animals, but did that make it part of something greater? I doubted it. “But angels aren’t tools…” he continued, taking another step back, “… we workwithGod. If we kill, we do so consciously and with spite against the system.” His expression darkened. “We’renothere to kill, Emrick.”
When I spat at his feet, his eyes flashed, a smoky glow coming across them before they settled into the white of their natural form.
“I’m going to kill them. They deserve it,” I said.
“That’s not your call to make.”
Zaqiel’s wings unfurled with a loud whoosh after I shoved hard at his shoulders with my palms. I could feel my heart pounding against the inside of my ribcage, my breathing heavy and painful.
Every breath was painful now. There was so much anger in me, I didn’t know if I could stand it anymore. But killing those men and feeling their blood on my hands—no tools, I’d use my bare hands—that would help. I know it would. An eye for an eye, isn’t that the saying?
