Dark Angel's Ward (25 page)

"Of breeding of children of the Heavenly Host who can function in the mortal world," he replied, as if it should have been obvious. "Ones capable of fulfilling God's will as He intended."

"Oh, so you're speaking for the Man now, are you?" I shook my head, disgusted. "Did he tell you commit murder outright, or did you just infer that part?"

"We did what had to be done."

"But it doesn't make any sense! How the hell did you pick off the entire dark angel population without anybody noticing and crying foul?"

"They are
nephilim
," he insisted. "And it wasn't difficult to provoke most of them into madness."

"Madness." I nodded to myself as it came clear to me. "Of course. If they start going haywire, you execute them to protect the public. Nobody says boo."

"Precisely. And if they were worthy of their stations, they would have been able to resist the temptations we placed in their paths. But all of them have failed. Every last one."

"Yep. Even you, big guy." Snorting a laugh, I wrung Zeph's limp hand in mine. Mostly to distract myself as my entire life was cast in a sickening new light. "Don't feel bad, though. Seems like I'm too much of a hottie for anyone to resist. Even blind men."

"Jandra." This time Brax said it, but in a flat, Zeph-like tone laden with disapproval at my flippancy. Hell, since Zeph didn't seem to be talking anymore, apparently somebody had to do it.

"You used me." I let go of his hand and stalked forward, leaning right up into Markus's face. "You sons of bastards fucking
used
me!"

Twenty-Six

"Not at all." His expression had smoothed out, finally presenting a picture of the kindly country preacher I'd imagined him to be. "You were to be his final chance at salvation."

His words staggered me, literally. Just when I thought I'd finally figured out where this crazy conversation was going, he'd pulled a complete one-eighty. I slipped down from my tiptoe stance and fell back a step. A warm hand clasped my arm to steady me...my right arm, not my left. I shook Brax off, growling at him.

"Yours was one of the most successful groups we've ever produced," Markus went on, oblivious to our tussle. "Eighteen female embryos out of fifty."

I stared blankly at him.

"Do you have any idea how significant that is?"

"Uh, no. Apparently I don't."

He sighed and shook his head, perhaps wondering if I wasn't a bit slow. "We've had consistently better results with female offspring, though naturally occurring nephilim have always bred true to the father. We've only produced eighty-seven females throughout the course of the project, many of which haven't survived to maturity."

"Naturally...occurring? As opposed to?"

"You
are
a bit slow, aren't you?"
Brax's mental voice muttered darkly.

"Shut uuuup,"
I singsonged back.

"As opposed to those of you produced through the Society's breeding program," Markus explained. "Once we understood the nature of the fathers' DNA, we began to perfect the gamete splitting process. That made gender selection a possibility. Of course, that brought up the problem of recombination...."

I tuned out all the laboratory jargon--I didn't understand half of it, anyway. But I'd picked up enough to aim a pointed mental question at Brax.
"Do I even want to know how they got hold of enough angel jizz to establish a 'breeding program?'"

"Well, they have donors, of course."
His reply was rich with his trademark humor. "
Twenty-one of them at last count."

I had to fight to keep the shock off my face. If what he said was true, there were almost two-dozen pureblooded angels alive and on Earth at this very moment, busily providing sperm samples to the creepiest bunch of religious zealots I'd ever heard of. I looked wide-eyed at him. "
Why the hell would they do that?"

"Well, I can't say as I've met any of them personally, but I'd imagine they're just as much enslaved as you and I, dear heart."
His expression went grim.
"Anyway, I can't see them doing it for kicks, like the demons do."

What? They were breeding
demon
s, too?

"Oh, they've been doing
that
even longer,"
Brax responded to my unspoken outburst. "
Demon summoning is an age-old practice, and most of them are more than happy to participate. A little physical gratification and the chance to unleash chaos on unsuspecting humans--what could be better?"

"Then you...you're half-and-half, too?"

He gave a bare nod. "
Your polar opposite, one might say."

"All right," I said aloud, interrupting Markus in the middle of some rant about chromosomes and splicing techniques. "Let me get this straight. You're saying you've been trying to build a better dark angel through science, am I right?"

He nodded serenely. "And we have."

"Because God fucked up with the batch he made, so you're benevolently fixing his mistake for him. Is that what you're saying? Father?"

"Essentially, although I don't approve of your language."

"Oh, please! You're gonna stand there and tell me I'm some kind of freak-ass test tube baby from your little lab of horrors, and since I've failed to save Zeph's wicked soul with my love, you're going to kill us both-- Pally, you haven't even
begun
to hear language from me yet!"

"But I've no intention of killing you, Ms. Maxwell. From all appearances you're the pinnacle of our success."

A sigh echoed in my head. "
Told you they were after you."

I bared my teeth at both of them. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, look at you, daughter!" I got the impression he wasn't using that form of address the same way most men of the cloth used it. "Your every feature can pass for human, even your eyes. You partake of food and drink. You sustain yourself effortlessly on a minute amount of spiritual energy, so little that your donors rarely even notice."

I gasped. "What did you just say?" How in the hell had he found out about
that?

My own hunger hadn't developed until I'd begun feeding Zeph my blood at the age of eighteen. Father Psychopath had his facts straight, too--most of the time, a little extra azoth was all I needed to keep myself stable. Provided, though, that it was purely human energy. It seemed essential to the process of balancing myself out against the effects of Zeph's brain drains. I'd started hanging out in shopping malls for just that reason, once I'd gotten the hang of absorbing the vibes I needed.

"You stand there defiant, gifted with free choice and completely unaffected by the Divine Will," Markus railed on, his face alight with an odd sort of reverence. "You suffer no hunger for manna...."

"She has no taste for human flesh, either," Brax interrupted softly.

"I know this."

That brought a glare to his handsome face, one that bared his monstrous teeth. "Then you might have told
me
."

"Wait." I held up a hand for silence. "So was Melanie Maxwell even my mother?"

That wasn't the question I really wanted to ask, but I couldn't quite bring myself to voice the words that had been pounding through my head for some time now, like a second heartbeat:
you don't know who your father is, you don't know who your father is, you don't know....
"Damn it, I can't believe I'm even starting to go in for all of this bullshit! I've seen pictures from when she was my age. I've always been her spitting image."

"She is your mother," Markus confirmed. "Or was, God rest her soul. You were conceived outside the womb, but both genetically and physically you are her child."

"In vitro?" I asked doubtfully. "Could they even do that in 1985?"

"Of course. In vitro technology has existed since the late seventies. Such intricate gene manipulation wasn't so common back then, but our facilities have always been ahead of the curve. Private investors can fund so much more than government entities ever bother with."

"Well, bully for you. And the whole reason this is even significant is because I happen to be an 'innie' instead of an 'outie?'" I gestured vaguely to my groin.

"Oh, how delightfully crass."

I ignored Brax, focusing on Markus. The priest frowned. "As I said, we've had consistently better results with...."

"Right, got it. Chick angels are better than dude angels. And I have to agree, because if Ryphan is one of your pet projects too, you fucked up royal with him."

I shuddered as I recalled the bastard crawling on top of his victim, like a spider with a fly. I hadn't noted it at the time, but the skin of his back had been smooth and unblemished. He'd never had his wings chopped off--hell, apparently he'd never had wings to begin with. That only added credence to this whole crazy scenario.

"Belleryphan will be dealt with as necessary," Markus replied, drawing my attention back to the present.

"Oh, so you know what he's been up to? And you've just been letting him do it? I'd say he failed the temptation test big time."

"Indeed he has. He'll be terminated in due time, once we've collected enough data from his activities."

My mouth fell open. "Data? That's all those peoples' lives are worth to you?"

"You must understand...."

"Oh, I
do
understand. You are completely in-fucking-sane, and this girl isn't playing your psycho games anymore."

He folded his arms. "I'm afraid that isn't up to you, Ms. Maxwell."

"The hell it's not!"

"Abraxas, if you'll please escort...."

"No thank you, I can escort myself. Come on, Zeph. We're getting the hell out of here."

"Jandra!
No!"

I'd already half turned toward Zeph, so I didn't see it coming. The next thing I knew I was flying, falling, crashing to the floor with enough weight on my back to make my ribs scream in protest. A sharp report split the air above me. Then everything fell eerily silent.

"Stay down, just stay down...."

My ears were ringing so badly I could barely make out the whispered words, let alone identify the voice that had spoken them. But I knew. I knew the warmth and the shape of the body pressed against my back. The intimate pose seemed so familiar....

"Brax?" I wedged up on one arm. "What just happened?"

"Just don't look," he murmured.

"What?" Fear curdled in my stomach. "Why?"

He pressed me down again. I struggled beneath him, getting my other arm underneath myself and twisting, pushing. He held on, but I managed to move both of us somehow. I turned my upper body just in time to see Zeph fall slowly to his knees, then crumple sideways. The carpet beneath him was sprayed with red.

Hermann Briggs stood framed in the kitchen archway, calmly holstering a 44 Magnum. "You talk too much, Markus."

I screamed, lurching up off the floor. Brax fell away from me as if he weighed no more than a doll. I flew to Zeph's side, rolling him onto his back. "Zeph? Zeph!"

He didn't reply. His eyelids fluttered over dark, dark eyes. Shock was setting in. He wouldn't be conscious much longer. I looked down the length of his body, crying out as I saw the wide, spreading stain on the front of his tattered shirt.

I plunged my hands frantically into the gore, seeking to apply pressure, to slow the bleeding, but there seemed to be no solid flesh left. His entire lower abdomen was torn, pouring out blood and life. And nothing I could do would stop it.

I threw my head back and screamed again, my cry more like a wildcat's yowl than a person's. The very sound of it chilled the blood in my veins. But behind the chill came a trickle of sweet, hot rage. It filled me up, chasing the quivers from my limbs and charging me with new purpose. Maybe I couldn't help, but there was something I
could
do.

My eyes snapped open on a blast of fire, aimed not at Zeph, but at Briggs. I could barely see his wavering outline in the ghostly green light, but it didn't matter. My aim was true as I leapt, exploding from all fours onto my feet, lunging....

I'd only covered half of the distance between us before the pain set in. A dull stabbing at first, set just above my navel. It quickly grew to a screaming crescendo, stealing the sudden strength from my body as quickly as it had come. I skidded, falling to the carpet with a strangled cry, my vision going dark.

I waited for another roar from Briggs's gun to register in my ears, but it never came. I hadn't been shot. Zeph's trauma had blown our psychic link wide open again, forcing me to feel his pain as my own. I began to convulse, choking on the agony of it.

Markus's thoughtful voice cut through the relative silence. "That was reckless, Hermann. You might have damaged her."

"You could have killed her!" This from a furious Brax.

"Don't be ridiculous." Briggs sounded bored. "My aim is better than that."

Markus said something else, but I couldn't make out his words over the throb of my pulse echoing inside my head. I bit my lip against the pain and gathered my thoughts with an effort. "
Zeph, can you hear me?"
I broadcast frantically.

"Jandra."
His mental voice came thready and weak, barely a whisper. "
Couldn't move...warn you...."

"It's all right, baby. Just hang on for me."
He didn't respond, but I'd known he wouldn't. I'd felt his mind slip into unconsciousness in the middle of my thought. I had no doubt he still lived, though--the sensations flowing between us were proof enough of that. I clung to the pain, embracing our connection despite what it cost me.

"She still might not survive." Brax's voice sounded again, thick with worry and right beside my head. I felt myself lifted, cradled against his chest. "They're bonded as deeply as they ever were. What if he drags her down with him?"

"Unlikely," Briggs replied. "It will take him hours to succumb. The bond will weaken gradually as he does."