24. Azrael
Willow doesn’t stir as I drape my jacket over her shoulders and carry her back out through the corridor, through the library, and up the stairs to my bedroom. Once I’m inside, I close the bedroom door. She left the light beside her side—well, my old side—of the bed, on. The asshole has made herself comfortable on my pillow again. She raises her head, her eyes sleepy slits until she sees me carrying Willow and sits up, suddenly alert.
“Relax, I didn’t hurt her,” I tell her, whispering the words, wondering why I’m explaining myself to a damn cat.
She watches as I lay a still-sleeping Willow down and tuck her in. She must be exhausted. All of this, everything that’s happening, has got to be weighing on her.
Fi settles back down and nuzzles into Willow’s neck. Willow moans softly and turns toward the cat in her sleep. I watch her looking so sweet and soft and wonder how I ever thought I could go through with it. How did I think I could hurt her?
I shake my head and glance out the window, just barely seeing the red glow of the tabernacle lamp in the chapel. My chest tightens, and just before I’m about to switch out the light, my gaze catches on the wood carving over my bed. I have to peer closer to be sure but that crack that’s been there for as long as I can remember has, I swear, grown, widened as if it will split the carving in two.
I’m reminded of the altar breaking into two pieces tonight. The angel’s rage. Is this a product of that rage too? No. It feels different in here. It always has. The malevolence in the churchyard is absent here.
My cell phone buzzes with a message. I reach into my pocket and retrieve it.
Emmanuel: Meet me at Bloody Mary.
I check the time.
Azrael: Now?
Emmanuel: Unless you need your beauty sleep.
I send him the middle finger emoji then type out my reply.
Azrael: Give me twenty minutes.
Willow makes a sound, and I shift my gaze back to her. She opens her eyes momentarily, smiles, then closes them again. She’s still asleep. I hope she’s having the sweetest of dreams.
I bend to kiss her forehead as I switch out the light. From my closet, I retrieve my coat and head out into the hallway. Salomé’s light is still on. I wonder how much sleep that woman gets. I pass her room as quietly as possible and go down the stairs. The keys to the Jaguar are in the pocket of my coat and I head out of the front door, locking it behind me even though the property is gated. Feeling somehow like I need to do it.
I park a few blocks from Bloody Mary, wanting to walk. I haven’t been to town in a long time. Emmanuel and I used to come often. We’ve always liked the French Quarter and especially Bloody Mary, the little bar with its secret entrance off Bourbon Street. Tourists don’t find this place. It’s not on any app and has no virtual presence. It’s refreshing.
As the night winds down, people on the streets are thinning out. I wonder why Emmanuel wanted to meet in town rather than coming home.
I take the turn into the alley that houses the bar’s entrance and push open the nondescript door. The familiar smell of the place washes over me. I’ve stayed away too long. I stop to take it in, then look around the good-sized, dimly lit room with its old furnishings and ancient oak bar. The bottles of liquor spanning the wall aren’t fancy, and I’m not sure the last time Mary, the owner, dusted the place. But when I see her watching me from behind the bar, I give her a genuine smile.
“You’re late,” Emmanuel says from our usual table.
I pull out my chair, noticing the folder he has in front of him as Mary brings over a tumbler. The bottle of whiskey, ours and probably the most expensive thing she has in this place, is already on the table.
“Well, well, stranger. It’s good to see you.”
“Good to be here, Mary. How’s business?”
“Can’t complain. You boys need anything, just holler.”
“Will do,” Emmanuel says, pouring me a whiskey and topping off his glass.
“How was movie night, by the way?” I ask, remembering he and Bec were going to binge watch The Vampire Diaries before he headed out to check on the Wildbloods.
“It’s a series, not a movie. And the storm cut it short. What?” he asks, probably seeing my mood darken as my mind wanders to what happened at the churchyard.
“A lightning bolt from the storm split Shemhazai’s altar in two.”
His eyebrows disappear into his hairline. “What?”
The hair on the back of my neck stands on end and I find myself turning to look over my shoulder. It’s almost as if I expect the angel to be standing at my back.
“It split the altar?” he asks, disbelieving.
I nod. I don’t tell him it happened just as I swore to Willow I wouldn’t let any harm come to her. Because what I do or don’t do when it comes to this Sacrifice impacts him and Bec as much as it does me.
“Gran will lose what’s left of her mind. Cheers to that.” He lifts his glass, touches it to mine which is still sitting on the table between us and drinks.
“What did you find out? Why did you have me come here rather than coming home?”
Earlier tonight, he met with Larissa Heart, the detective working the murders. Larissa’s grandmother used to work for our family when we were very young. She was a kind woman. I still have fond memories of her being a warm presence in our lives after our parents passed away and Grandmother moved in.
Larissa is a single mom with a two-year-old daughter, and Emmanuel has always had a special relationship with her. It’s the only relationship he has with a woman outside of the family that is not sexual as far as I can tell. He told me once as casually as he could that he’d promised Mrs. Heart a few days before she passed away that he’d look after Larissa and he’s kept that promise, even interacting with her young daughter on regular intervals. I know he doesn’t like to appear remotely kind-hearted. Grandmother’s upbringing led us to believe it was a weakness, but I’m glad to see Mom and Dad’s influence persisting in my brother. I hope I will be as strong as he is when push comes to shove with Salomé.
The fact that Larissa is the detective on these murders is a stroke of luck for us.
“I don’t have good news,” he says. He drinks another swallow of whiskey. I still haven’t touched mine.
“Tell me.”
He glances over my shoulder, but we’re alone, and no one will eavesdrop on us here. At home, it’s always a possibility. Grandmother’s superhuman hearing. At least that’s what she tells us. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out she’d bugged all the rooms.
“Both victims had the cross carved into their foreheads.” He slips the folder toward me. I place my hand over it but take a moment to digest his words. To ready myself for what I’ll find because I know what it contains. It’s no less brutal when I open the folder, though, and look at the photographs. There are two, zoomed in close. At least I don’t have to see the rest of the butchering they did. It’s only their foreheads bloody and mutilated, bearing The Disciples’ signature. The sign of the cross.
“Christ.”
“Police are withholding that detail.”
I lean back in my chair. “The Disciples are back.”
“There’s more.”
“What more?” I pick up my glass and bring it to my lips.
“They’re targeting the Wildbloods.”
His words stop me. “What did you say?”
He takes out his phone, scrolls to something and turns it around to show me. It’s a photo of the front door of the Wildblood house. Barrett Cromwell is sanding it down, a can of paint ready at his side, but I can read most of what he’s trying to clean up. Someone spray painted a message on their front door. Their fucking front door.
…witch you can’t hide forever
Emmanuel looks as concerned as I feel. It’s absolutely not like him, and it tells me he has more of a stake in this than I realized.
“Someone was on their property. At their door, Azrael. Someone got that close to them.”
“I’m guessing there’s no security system in place.”
“Not apart from their spells.” He rolls his eyes. “Which aren’t going to keep them safe.”
“How do you know that?”
He takes a moment to answer. “I talked to Raven.”
I knew it. “What’s your deal with her?”
“That’s not the question you should be asking.”
“Well, I am asking it. You know the rules. You?—”
“The message was for Willow, Azrael,” he says, turning the subject around absolutely.
The blood in my veins runs cold, and I have a sudden image of Willow, her eyes closed forever, her face desecrated and bloody. That cross carved into her forehead.
“Willow is safe at the house. No one can touch her there. I won’t allow it.” I don’t sound remotely like myself when I say it. I swallow the contents of my glass and reach for the bottle to refill it.
“You’re probably right that she’s safest at the house, for now.”
For now. He doesn’t need to elaborate. She’s safe until I fulfill my obligation as The Penitent. “Her sisters, though, are not.”
“Does Willow know any of this?”
He nods. I feel my forehead crease. She hasn’t said a word. But then I remember how jumpy she and her sisters were when I went into the sitting room. How quick Willow was to hide those letters from me.
“And the Wildbloods don’t know who is targeting them exactly?”
“They know about The Disciples, but that’s as far as I got. There’s more, though. I can tell.” He stands. “I’m going back over there.”
I study my brother. No, this is not like him at all. “Is that what she wants? Raven?” I add in case it wasn’t clear.
“I didn’t ask.”
Ah. There he is, the Emmanuel I know.
I stand too and nod. “Arrange for security. Don’t tell them. I’m sure the Wildbloods won’t agree to a Delacroix’s protection.”
He snorts. “No, they definitely won’t agree to that.”
“How was Bec, by the way? How did she seem to you?” I ask as I take some cash out of my wallet and leave it on the table.
“Good, actually. Better than she’s been in a while. She showed me her new dress,” he says as we head to the exit. “I’m sure Gran will shred it when she sees it.”
“I’m thinking to take her to a different doctor.”
“Oh? Your wife’s idea, I assume? Like the dress?”
“Doesn’t matter, does it? What do you think?”
“This one isn’t doing much for her, so it won’t hurt.” He stops, turns to me. “I don’t think she’s grown an inch in over a year.”
I nod, worry and guilt making it hard to swallow.
He pats my back. “It’s not your fault. You know that, right?”
I press my lips together and nod again in a way that is not convincing to either of us.
“I gotta go,” he says.
“Be careful, brother. The Disciples are zealots, and no matter what we think of their archaic way of thinking, they are dangerous.”
“So am I, brother.” He turns and walks out the door, not waiting for me to follow as he heads down the street in the direction of the Wildblood house.
I head to my own vehicle, my mind racing with all this new information—with all the old.
Willow may be in danger, but I firmly believe the safest place for her is at the house.
Bec is sick, very sick, and not a single doctor can figure out what is wrong with her.
And this curse is hanging over our heads, a dark and flimsy promise of hope for my sister. But the cost it will demand, The Tithe that must be paid, is Willow’s life.
I meant what I said to her. I’d give my life to save Rébecca’s. I can’t take Willow’s, though.
I drive in a fog of thoughts and when I get home, the sun is beginning to rise. I head upstairs to my bedroom, where I’m glad to see Willow is still asleep. She hasn’t even moved. The cat is asleep on my pillow, probably leaving a mountain of fur for me to clean up. She opens one eyelid then closes it again. I guess she’s getting used to me.
Quietly, I open the door that connects my room to Willow’s, enter and close it behind me. I switch on the light and scan the place. The first thing I notice is that the frame holding Elizabeth’s portrait is cracked. I wonder if she dropped it, but she’d be too careful for that.
I walk through, looking at the familiar piles, and go into her closet when I don’t find anything other than what I already saw in her room. I open a few drawers to search but don’t come across anything. I do recognize the black tank top her sisters had given her and unfold it to read what’s on the front in rhinestones: Hi, this is my resting witch face.
It’s from her life before me, before The Tithing—although when she was born with the crescent moon on her breast, her family knew her life was already forfeit. Like mine. Like Abacus’s, when we were born with the scars where the wings of the angels who displeased God would have been torn from their bodies. Hell, maybe this whole generation is lost.
I push the drawer halfway closed but it sticks. I bend to look at what is obstructing it, seeing the corner of an envelope sticking out underneath it. I pull the drawer all the way out and turn it over. There I find the same letters she’d quickly hidden from me the other day.
I peel the tape off the drawer, collect the yellowed envelopes, and look at the first one. It’s addressed to Willow Wildblood, her name a deep, angry scrawl. No return address. No stamp. It must have been hand delivered to her house.
All the envelopes have been opened, and I reach into the first of the five and take out the sheet of paper that’s folded in half. The fold is sharp, as if someone went over it again and again and again, and both paper and envelope are expensive. Made to look old, the letter page itself is embossed with a cross I recognize. It’s the same one that is carved into the forehead of every woman The Disciples kill. My jaw clenches, every muscle tightening as I read the few words on the page:
We’re coming for you, witch.
It’s unsigned. Well, unless you count the cross at the bottom right hand corner a signature.
I open the others, all are similar. Cryptic threats by an anonymous stalker.
You can’t hide forever, witch.
You will submit to baptism or you will die, witch.
You will repent for your sins,witch.
Then there’s the final one, the one that has blood rushing through my veins, pounding against my ears—the one that has me crushing the page in my fist.
You belong to me, witch.