Chapter 4
4
CAHUANI
X aphan and Acheron had not allowed Cahuani to back out of the gala. And Cahuani knew that if he tried, they would track him down, then even if they didn’t drag him back to the party by his arms, they would irritate him so badly that he would end up dragging himself. So he stood before the full-length mirror in his suite against his will, straightening his tie then smoothing it down into his black vest.
Once he was satisfied, he donned his cuff links and black felt cowboy hat. The scent of his sandalwood beard oil soothed his senses, and he inhaled it deeply. He was going to need all the help he could get tonight to remain composed. Even after all these years of learning to mask his emotions and conduct himself with some semblance of charisma, he still struggled in a crowded room. The biggest threat in those places was always sensory overload; the air never sat right in his lungs.
He focused on his breathing during the elevator ride down, trying not to think about how he would have to see Anthony tonight.
It would be their first meeting since Anthony had left the Reyes Estate four years ago, and Cahuani knew it would not be a pleasant reunion. While Cahuani still carried the grief of losing his son, Anthony had never once expressed remorse for what he’d done. He hadn’t even had the decency to show up to his mother’s funeral despite Cahuani’s direct summoning spell. He vividly remembered how he had spiraled that first night alone in their family home. Am I still a husband? A father?
He still didn’t know.
The elevator stopped and opened on the second floor, and to Cahuani’s abject horror, there stood Anthony, buttoned up in a plain black suit and tie. Even in that hideous skin, Cahuani would know his son anywhere. He could sense Anthony always, his phantom limb. Their spirits would always be joined. Until Anthony’s betrayal, Cahuani never thought the connection would feel like a curse.
The air in the elevator seemed to plummet below zero. The way Anthony’s lips curled when he looked upon his father was a nightmare come to life. No surprise, no shock, no shame on his face. Only that Cheshire grin as he stepped inside.
“Hey, Papa Bear.”
Surprisingly, the sound of the old title on Anthony’s lips made Cahuani’s stomach churn. He had thought it would’ve bothered him more earlier, when Tlalli had used it, but no. It had glanced off him then. Now, it made him want to climb up the fucking walls.
Anthony had been Little Bear once upon a time, the two men sharing a second form. Not many Nahualtin inherited either parent’s Nagual, and those that did usually received it from the parent that carried them. Yet Anthony hadn’t taken the hummingbird form of his mother. Instead, he’d inherited his father’s form. That had always seemed special to Cahuani.
It apparently hadn’t meant a damn thing to Anthony.
“Come to buy something else you can’t hold on to?” Anthony jabbed.
Cahuani slid his hands into his pockets. Pained as Cahuani was about not only seeing his son, he would not let Anthony goad him into anger—not here, not now. This was business. Personal shit had to be set aside.
“I’m surprised they didn’t skin you, honestly,” Anthony went on with a chuckle. “You must have done a whole lotta crying and pleading, huh?”
“When you are respected as I am respected, you get to make a few mistakes,” Cahuani returned, his voice level. “Maybe you’ll get there one day.”
Anthony howled with laughter. “I don’t need anyone else’s respect.” He moved to stand in front of his father, then looked down at him. “And I don’t make mistakes.”
“Hmm.” Cahuani nodded politely. “But if you did make a mistake, particularly here at this auction, what would happen to you?” He met Anthony’s sharp gaze. “What can you buy with none of your own money and no one else’s respect?”
Anthony clenched his jaw, thin-skinned as ever, his eyes flashing with raw rage. That made Cahuani feel a few inches taller. It reminded him that he was the father, not the son, and certainly no Holy Spirit.
“You have no idea what I got,” Anthony spat back. “You don’t know who I am now, old man.”
“I know exactly what you are. I’m not impressed.”
Anthony snorted. “You couldn’t handle me at your worst, Papa Bear, so?—”
Cahuani took a quick step forward and reveled in the sight of Anthony’s spirit recoiling at once even though Cahuani had not struck him. Cahuani never had. He never believed he needed to. Instead, he reached up and straightened Anthony’s tie, then tightened the knot at the top.
“You have never seen me at my worst, Anthony .” He gave the tie a firm tug before releasing it. “Do me a simple favor this weekend, yeah? Be a good boy and stay out of my way. Oh, and while you’re at it, make sure your girlfriend does the same. I’ll tell you like I told her earlier. This is your only warning. I’m not tellin’ either of you again.”
Cahuani smoothed his hands over Anthony’s shoulders, gave them a firm squeeze, then moved around him and out as the doors slid open. Cahuani could almost feel the steam rolling off Anthony’s back, which soothed him some, though he also felt a tremendous amount of guilt for taking any comfort at all in his son’s lack thereof. But this was where Cahuani drew his boundary. This was how it had to be. His boy was gone, his name erased. And the monster who had killed him had not even kept his face.
At least that made it easier to pretend he was someone else.
Cahuani found Xaphan and Acheron standing opposite the concierge’s desk, looking through an archway into the hall where the gala was being held. People were already filling the hall fast, and Cahuani felt sweat collecting on the back of his neck.
“Wow, you clean up nice,” Xaphan stated, clapping a hand on Cahuani’s shoulder.
Though Xaphan and Acheron had human vessels that looked much younger than his, they had been alive for centuries. However, from what Cahuani understood, Acheron was quite new to working here on Earth and in a human vessel. He was originally what was known to mortals as a sleep paralysis demon and worked in the sleep realm that existed not simply between Earth and Hell but life and death.
“You two as well,” Cahuani returned with a tip of his hat.
“Was that, uh . . .”
Xaphan gestured toward Anthony’s departing form, and Cahuani nodded, attempting to hide any ill feeling that may have been left behind on his features.
“I’m not seein’ the resemblance there, boss.”
“I think that’s his intention.”
“So the angels are here already?” Acheron asked, saving them from an awkward silence.
“That’s right...” Cahuani replied. “But I don’t know. Something feels off.”
“No, I’m with you,” Xaphan said. “No offense, I’m sure your son is top-tier to them, but they sent him to get this thing? On his own?”
Cahuani shook his head. “He isn’t alone. They sent Tlalli as well?—”
“Wait, the one who robbed you?”
“Yep.”
“Is that the woman you were talking to at the bar earlier?”
Cahuani nodded with a wince, Tlalli’s eyes flashing behind his own for a brief moment. Acheron whistled, and Xaphan barked a laugh. Cahuani appreciated their levity, although he couldn’t bring himself to participate.
“Well, they must’ve known the Puri would send you,” Acheron pointed out.
“And they’re expecting me to drop my guard,” Cahuani agreed. Or at least, he wanted to, but that felt too simple.
“Exactly.” Acheron clapped once. “So as long as that don’t happen, we’ll be good, right?”
Cahuani smirked. “That’s definitely not going to happen.”
Nonetheless, he still felt as if he were missing something, and he didn’t know how worried he should be.
“Just keep vigilant,” he said at last, gathering his wits. “Anthony is many things, but he is still my son. I know him better than he knows himself. It’s the woman he’s with I am concerned about.”
“We got your back,” Xaphan assured him. “With them and everyone else.”
“I would hope so. Otherwise, what use are you?”
Cahuani smiled after a moment, and the demons did the same before the three of them headed into the large hall.
It was immediately evident to Cahuani that Xaphan could work a room, though Cahuani supposed that should have been a given. Xaphan was a member of the Anima Dae, reaper demons that collected souls for the Puri. Like other factions such as the crossroad demons of the Crucis Dae and the infiltrator demons of the Obscurus Dae, the reaper demons worked on Earth and knew how to deal with people. Xaphan himself had been a reaper for centuries, and it showed. Cahuani was grateful the Puri had sent him. It allowed Cahuani to resign himself to silence for the most part.
Soon enough, Acheron was more comfortable in the crowd as well. Cahuani had never been able to adjust so quickly, despite his best efforts. He no longer looked at this as a character flaw though, instead learning to play to his own strengths.
Though others flocked toward a first look at the auction items, the trio abstained. After all, the chalice they had come to claim would not be on display. It would be concealed until the night after, and even then, they need not see it. They knew what they had come for. Cahuani imagined the angels did, too, but that was irrelevant. Nothing would help the angels succeed this time.
The chalice itself seemed quite ordinary in appearance according to the description Sloth had provided. It was a simple golden chalice that the Puri had apparently given to a pope they neglected to name for a purpose they neglected to share, and it was supposed to have been returned to them upon his death. Unfortunately, it had been “lost” for centuries inside Vatican City, one of the few places that the Puri could not penetrate. At least not on their own.
The few members of the Obscurus Dae that had been able to infiltrate Vatican City’s walls had come up empty in their searches until just a few weeks ago, when they found that the chalice had been moved and was now on auction. Cahuani had no idea who had brought it here or how, but that information was inconsequential to his role. His only job was to make sure the cup made it back to Hell, a much easier task than sharing space with Anthony for three days. Cahuani’s team had a secret weapon, one the angels could never possibly compete with.
Cahuani managed to make it through two drinks before he laid eyes on his son once more. And Tlalli, who stood at his side looking positively... miserable?
Cahuani observed her for a moment too long with far too much concern for his liking. In the few seconds—okay, maybe minutes—he’d stared at her, she’d turned her head to scowl at Anthony at least a dozen times, her lip pouting out farther each time. Cahuani still wasn’t convinced her behavior wasn’t an act, but her expressions made him truly consider what Anthony had become in the time since leaving his father’s home. Tlalli may have succeeded in conquering Cahuani’s safe, but that did not mean she had been as successful in doing the same with his son. Cahuani did not know if that was a blessing or a curse.
The moment Cahuani had an opening, he made his way up one side of the dual staircase that stood in the center of the room. He was already popping his knuckles halfway up, counting each crack. It was something he often did to help calm his mind.
“Ce, ome, eyi, nahui, macuilli. . .”
By the time he’d escaped onto the balcony overlooking the room, he felt more in control, now able to see and comprehend the bigger picture. This was his place. This was where he thrived.
“You good?”
Cahuani nearly broke his fingers crushing them together as a voice exploded behind him. Cahuani whipped around but then registered Acheron and berated himself for being so easily startled. He was off his game. He had to get it together.
“My bad,” Acheron said with a wince, offering Cahuani one of the drinks in his hands. Cahuani took it, catching a whiff of bourbon as he brought it swiftly to his lips. “I’m still working on my inside voice. You don’t gotta be though. Good, I mean. I know I’m not.”
Acheron chuckled and sipped his drink while tugging at the collar of his shirt. It was terribly obvious that he still wasn’t comfortable in his human vessel, but his composure was steady, and Cahuani could admit he was impressed.
He had seen demons struggle in their new vessels the way he did in his own human skin, sensitive as he was to the many sights and sounds of a world that had not been made with him in mind. It was why he cracked his knuckles while counting in his native tongue of Nahuatl, why he kept a pair of earbuds—though he preferred the chunky headphones that covered his entire ear, it was best to be discreet in places like this—close at hand. They offered him control that his magic could not.
“I can’t tell, which is more than good enough at this point,” Cahuani replied.
“Well, I can tell that you’re not, so what’s up?”
“You can literally hear emotions. Of course you can tell.”
“Oh, this has nothing to do with my skills and everything to do with the amount of tension in your jaw. That shit hurts. Ask me how I know.”
Cahuani chuckled into his glass. “Spoken like a demon that recently learned that the hard way.”
“Exactly, so . . .”
Acheron said nothing more, patiently waiting for Cahuani to give him something. Of course, Cahuani didn’t know what he had to offer, especially when they hardly knew each other.
Was it tough seeing his son? Of course. Was it tougher seeing him as the enemy? Absolutely. However, those were simply facts that he had to factor into his plans for the duration of this auction, the same as every other variable he was up against. They had to be.
When Cahuani failed to reply, Acheron continued. “You know, this is the farthest I’ve ever been away from home.”
“From Hell?” Cahuani asked, his brows knitting together. He didn’t think the distance changed between there and any place on Earth.
Acheron laughed. “Naw, my—my soul mate.”
“The Orfani woman.” The words passed Cahuani’s lips before he could bite down on them. He remembered the story that Xaphan told him about why Acheron had come to work topside.
But Acheron only laughed again. “Yeah, Penelope,” he confirmed. “She—I mean, since we met, I’ve either worked in Hell or in Sin City, and I’d get to go home to her right after work, no matter where I was assigned. I guess it would be more accurate to say this is the longest I’ve been away from her...”
Acheron’s eyes went somewhere else as he trailed off, and his nails tapped the side of his glass. Cahuani softened at the sight. Yeah, they were more alike than he’d realized. At the very least, their humanness was.
“The rules of any truce on neutral ground always have to be pretty strict,” Cahuani offered, trying to refocus Acheron’s attention. “—Even if the level of enforcement tends to fluctuate.”
“Can you list our rules for me again?” Acheron asked quickly, seemingly not because he didn’t know them but because he recognized that they both needed the distraction.
“No member of the governing bodies, the Puri and the Dominion’s archangels, is allowed to step foot on the premises designated neutral for the duration of the treaty,” Cahuani recited in his most comforting cadence. “They are not allowed to communicate with any representative of either faction on neutral territory directly, whether telepathically or otherwise. No representative is allowed to leave the designated premises for the duration of the truce, in this case three days. No acts of aggression or violence are permitted between the representatives in attendance, and no magic is to be performed in view of any Orfani, mortals with no magical or spiritual connections. No Orfani is to be injured or harmed in any way by either faction. Any such acts are to be treated as an act of war.”
Acheron’s eyes at last met Cahuani’s again. “And that’s usually enough?”
“It has been. Back before the Puri had so much power, the angels may have been a bit less... civil , but they know better now.”
At least he thought they did, but sending Anthony here was certainly a choice.
He could see in Acheron’s eyes that he was having the same thought, so when the demon asked his next question, Cahuani wasn’t entirely surprised.
“What happened to him? I mean, why did he join the Dominion?”
Cahuani leaned against the railing, suppressing the desire to search the room for his son and instead looking down at his boots.
“He thought his mother and I were weak for working beneath the Puri despite our power. A few years before the betrayal, my wife Aliyah and I were offered positions on the Council of the Imbued.” At Acheron’s confused look, Cahuani smiled. “That is the head council of all magical practitioners. Every denomination of practitioners has its own council, and usually we would have had to serve on the Council of the Smoking Mirror, our faction’s personal council, before being offered positions, but they wanted us.”
“But you were already working for the Puri, right?”
“Yes, and I imagine that had a lot to do with the accelerated offer. However, we weren’t interested.”
“Why not?”
Cahuani winced. “The Council is a neutral party, and I’d been working with the Puri and against the Dominion long enough to know that remaining neutral was not an option. Aliyah agreed.”
“And that made your boy angry?”
“Anthony wanted us to take the positions because he believed we would be able to use them against the Council itself, to steer them away from their neutral position and into an offensive one.”
“And you were against that.”
“Honestly? I knew it was what I would’ve done if I’d taken the position. I would’ve tried to show them neutrality wasn’t actually an option, and I would’ve pushed them to side with the Puri.”
“And your wife?”
Cahuani smirked now. “She was against it. She wanted them to see the error of their ways, but she knew we would be villainized by our own people if we forced it, and I realized she was right. We could keep educating willing members, but they had to come to the conclusion on their own. But Anthony thought us cowards for denying ourselves that opportunity, and after that, that’s all he cared about—power. How to get it, how to take it, how to rob anyone else of it. And I tried to sway him, to talk him down. I tried everything I could. I never thought he’d outright betray us. I certainly never thought he’d side with the angels of all beings, but...”
“But he’s his own person, and there was nothing you could’ve done.”
In his heart, Cahuani knew that. He knew that just like the Council of the Imbued had to make its own decisions, Anthony had to as well. That fact didn’t make any of this any easier though. It didn’t make the reality hurt any less.
He took another deep drink from his glass and turned back to the room below. At once, he felt a gaze on him, and he scanned the room until he met Tlalli’s eyes. The moment he did, she quickly averted her gaze.
She was quite the actress. He would give her that.
Yet the longer he looked at her, the more curious he found himself. What could she possibly expect of him? What plan had she and Anthony laid out in their minds? How could either of them believe he would play into it?
Just then, as he watched Tlalli’s golden head make a beeline for the exit after another exchange with Anthony, he decided he wanted to know. He trusted his instincts, and his instincts were telling him this was worth investigating. After all, he had all the faith in his own team’s plan. There was nothing to worry about.
“I’ll catch up with y’all,” he told Acheron.
Ignoring the fresh confusion on the demon’s face, Cahuani handed Acheron his glass and hurried down the stairs and out of the hall, giving chase.