Kingdom of Lies (Imp Series Book 7) (13 page)

“Oh, you’ll do more than that. Think we can slip away?” The angel glanced through the French doors at Terrelle.

Slip away? Like to a romantic rendezvous? My heart sped up. His duties had allegedly decreased, but mine hadn’t, and in reality, it seemed we were both overwhelmed with crap demanding our immediate attention.

“There’s something odd I’d like your opinion on.”

Okay, not romantic, but still I was interested. Pride, that elusive sin, surged at the thought of a six-billion-year-old angel wanting my opinion on anything. “Sure.” And if I was lucky, this ‘something’ might provide a romantic opportunity. I was a demon. I could find a romantic opportunity in an insect-infested swamp.

With another glance through the doors at Terrelle that had me consumed with curiosity, Gregory gathered me into his arms and transported us.

Once the vertigo faded, I realized I was woefully underdressed for our location. White. White above in the bright clouds of the sky. White across to the horizon in the hard-packed snow and ice underfoot. An icy breeze stole my breath. Wherever we were, it was below freezing—far below freezing.

“Alaska?” I remembered Rafi had been sent there, and I guessed we’d be meeting the other angel.

“No, the south pole.”

No wonder I was quickly turning into an ice cube. “Okay then. Unless you’ve got a Gortex parka and a propane heater hidden under your wings, let’s hurry up and look at this ‘something’.”

He didn’t reveal any hidden polar expedition clothing, so I followed him along the ice toward a black speck in the distance. As we approached, I saw the black speck was a furry animal about three-feet long sprawled on a patch of bloody ice.

I nudged it over with my foot. “A koala? A dead koala in Antarctica. Can’t say I’m not impressed. It is a good joke. Well, unless you’re the koala, I guess.”

Gregory bent down and pried open the frozen jaws, revealing monstrously sharp teeth. Shit. These cute furry things were more badass then I’d ever thought.

“It’s a drop bear. They’re deceptively cute to lure the humans close under their tree so they can jump down and kill them.”

“So, not a koala?” I knelt and rubbed a finger across the bloody ice, reading the genetic signature. Nope, not a koala at all. “Okay, I’ll bite. What the fuck is a drop bear?”

“There are only a handful of them left from when they first arrived nearly three million years ago. They live in Australia and feed on humans.”

I looked down at the frozen one. “This guy is a long way from Australia.”

“So were the others we found all over the globe in the last twenty-four hours. We managed to take down all but one, which is now mounted to the wall of a Norman Spencer of Milton, Georgia.”

Score another hit for humans with firearms. I’d become incredibly fond of them as a species. “So the two or three went on a breeding frenzy
and
discovered the joys of intercontinental travel?”

“After three-million years? Doubtful.”

I had no idea what he was talking about, where any of this was going. I think sometimes Gregory forgot the vast differences in our ages. “Babe, I’m afraid I wasn’t around three-million years ago. What’s going on? Is this related to that Traveler’s Veil thingie?”

“I’m beginning to wonder if Orias did more than just open one or two passageways. Drop bears are not an indigenous species. Neither are manticores, melusine, lamia, hydra, satyr, fairies, or pixies, or a hundred other beings of legend. Three-million years ago, this planet was a hub with gateways to dozens of other realms. We sealed those gates, closed them permanently to give the humans a proper chance to evolve.”

I stood and wiped my hand on my pants, not that frozen blood left much of a stain. “So either Orias has been amazingly busy in the last few days, traveling the world and opening gateways willy-nilly, or your old, sealed-up gates have reopened.”

“Exactly.”

“I hate to tell you, babe, but I’m thinking it’s the latter. It’s fucking fifty below zero here. I can’t see Orias taking a quick jaunt to the south pole for a prank. He’s a war demon, not an imp.”

The angel looked to the horizon and slowly shook his head. “I’d rather it be your friend Orias. If the old gateways are re-opening, that’s a problem we angels don’t have the skills to handle.”

“You’ve handled it in the past. What’s the big deal? You’ve got a few peeps looking for the Veil. Send the rest out to seal these suckers back up, and get Eloa and one or two others to take out the stragglers that crossed over.”

Gregory folded his arms across his chest and gave me one of those intense looks that usually meant he wanted something. Probably not the same something I did. “There’s a bit of a problem with that solution, Cockroach.”

What problem? “I know, I know. You all are stretched thin, blah, blah, blah. I already told you I’d help look for the Veil. And if I happen to come across any drop bears or manticores, I’ll do my best to kill them. Deal?”

“Thank you, but there’s another problem. Angels can’t find the gateways.”

It all suddenly made sense. Gregory had always insisted there were no wild gates, attributing those I’d found to be of my own creation, and he’d alluded earlier that he’d need my help with the one the manticore came through. Angels could create gates, could disable them, but if the doorways weren’t of their own making, they couldn’t see them.

“Got it. This situation is far too big for one very busy archangel and one overworked Angel of Chaos to rectify, correct?”

“Yes.” His expression was grim. “If these are the old gateways that have split open again, there could be hundreds of gates. Thousands, possibly. If it’s this Orias and the Veil, then we are probably only looking at a dozen or more gateways.”

True. Orias would eventually get bored. Although if he got bored and sold the Veil to another demon, we could be facing even more open passageways. Either way, we needed to find Orias and get the Veil back in the hands of the angels—or in my hands. I’d take good care of it.

Gregory motioned impatiently. “We need to shut down these gates. Now. And we need demons to help us find them. I believe the humans would call this an all-hands-on-deck problem.”

“You need us,” I told him, excited at the chance to have angels and demons working together. “All those angels who sneered at the thought of associating with demons, those who turned up their nose at Infernal Mates, they’re going to have to eat their words.”

“Those who care about the human world will.” He looked down at the dead drop bear and ran a hand through his chestnut curls. “Some will see this as an opportunity to redouble efforts at an overthrow of Aaru.”

That was Gabe’s problem, not mine. Honestly, I didn’t care if drop bears, or even Care Bears, ran amok here. They might be soft and squishy, but humans had risen to the top of the food chain for a reason. “Let’s table that one and think about how this furry guy got here. I’m doubting he walked from Australia.”

“He couldn’t survive more than an hour here. The gate he came through has to be nearby.”

I shivered. This was looking less and less like Orias and his Veil. I couldn’t see the demon coming down here into the freezing cold to open a gateway to Drop Bear Land. Fuck, he could do that anywhere.

But I had a favor I needed from Gregory, beyond his help locating Gareth’s gem.

“Seems like you’ve got a bit of a dilemma here, angel. Drop bear in Antarctica. I agree, there’s gotta be a gate around here somewhere. If only there were someone nearby who could locate it. Hmmm.”

He tilted his head and scowled. “I’m already helping you, Cockroach. And I’ve transported you quite a bit lately. What else do you want?”

“Nothing major. There’s an incubus I need to guarantee safe passage through the gates for and access to this world. Immunity.”

Gregory raised an eyebrow. “Your household already have those privileges.”

“He’s not in my household.”

“Then he is not allowed this side of the gates per the treaty signed over two-million years ago.”

Oh for fuck sake. I, for one, was damned tired of being slapped in the face with this treaty. “Look, probably ninety percent of the fallen angels that signed that treaty are dead. Can’t we renegotiate or something?”

Gregory didn’t look particularly moved by my plea. “We’ll put it on the agenda. In the meantime, let’s go find this gate and shut it down before you freeze to death.”

“No. Putting it on the Ruling Council agenda isn’t going to help me now. The humans in Hel are having an environmental crisis. By the time this gets on the agenda, they’ll all have starved to death.”

“What does an incubus have to do with starving humans in Hel?”

Crap. How to explain this one? “I need an elf to help the humans, but the elves all hate me. So I had to turn to a half-elf instead. Her boyfriend is an incubus, and she wants him to have immunity in return for making sure the humans in Hel can grow soy or something.”

Gregory’s eyebrows did that twisted-up thing. “A half-elf? Half with what? And I hate to break it to this poor girl, but giving an incubus immunity isn’t going to make him monogamous.”

I squirmed. “She doesn’t care if he’s monogamous or not. She’s half succubus and is probably getting it on just as much as he is.”

The angel looked heavenward. “This is sounding like the afternoon television shows. Are you sure there isn’t a secret identical twin or a faked death somewhere in this story.”

“Could be. So, do we have a deal?”

“No, we do not have a deal. He’s not in your household. He doesn’t get immunity. It’s the treaty, and there’s no way around it.”

Bullshit. “There’s always a way around even the most ironclad contract with you angels.” I snuggled up to him, rubbing against his chest. “Come on, baby. Tell me where the loopholes are.”

“No.”

“You need more than me to close these gates. I’m willing to cut a deal where I supply you with demons to help find and close the gates if you’ll grant Irix immunity.”

He sighed. “Okay, you have a deal. Help me locate and close these passageways and I will allow this Irix demon immunity.”

“As well as any other demon that is chosen to assist in gate closure,” I added. This would be a perfect opportunity to expand Infernal Mates. What an awesome dating venue.
Accompany your angel to exotic places. Impress him or her with your gate location abilities. Bask in their expressions of gratitude
. Hopefully, carnal expressions of gratitude.

Gregory’s eyes narrowed. He might love me, but that love didn’t blind him to my sneaky demon ways. “Those demons still need to abide by the behavior restrictions of their immunity. Those demons in your household, or those who have been specifically chosen by an angel to do this work are eligible. Irix is the only exception.”

“Those angels who choose a demon are responsible for their demon partner’s behavior.” There was no way I was going to be on the hook for all those four-nine-five reports. No stinking way.

That got a brief smile from the angel. “You know, Cockroach, this means their angel partners will be in charge of delivering justice if the demon violates the terms of their immunity.”

Shit. I quickly weighed the appeal of potentially fucking an angel over the significant chance that one would lop off a demon’s head for jaywalking. We liked to live dangerously, and I didn’t have enough fingers and toes to count the demons that would jump at this opportunity, even with the risks. “Done.”

Gregory nodded. “We’ll need demons with the ability to sense these gateways from as far away as possible. This is going to take long enough to resolve without us having to resort to a grid search pattern all over the planet.”

I nodded, thinking. “And demons with aquatic forms as well as those with the ability to manifest wings. I’m doubting these gateways are all on land if it turns out these are the old passages and not ones Orias has opened.”

“True. And if that’s the case, demons who are comfortable with underground work will also be needed.”

It all hit me. I felt like an iceberg flew out of the ocean and crushed me. Elves joining forces and plotting. Starving humans in Hel. Amber’s bargain. Nyalla’s suicidal career choice. This damned gem of Gareth’s. Nephilim and werewolves. Humans with shitty credit. And now I needed to find appropriately skilled demons to help close gateways. I wanted to run away, to blindly transport myself to some podunk town in a backwater country and hide. Fuck this. I wasn’t even a thousand years old. I should be running around without a care in the world, not shouldering the whole damned thing. Fuck this. Fuck the sword, the title, the feathery wings. Fuck it all.

Arms tightened around me, and my nose crushed against a soft polo shirt on a hard chest. “How do you do this?” I mumbled into the shirt. “Billions of years with everybody wanting a piece of you right here, right now. How do you manage?”

Because I needed to manage. I couldn’t run away. The things I’d be leaving behind included those who made my life worth living. Escape was a pleasant fantasy, but I knew it was only a fantasy. This was my life. It wasn’t the sword’s fault. I had these responsibilities because with each choice I’d made, my feet led me down this path. There was no going back now.

“There is a certain satisfaction to facing difficult challenges. Even when I fail, recovering from that failure and correcting my missteps is cause for pride.” I heard the smile in his voice. “You remember pride, little Cockroach? The most important sin of all? The pinnacle of achievement for every demon?”

I laughed and pulled back to see his face. He had such a long view on situations. Failure could always be corrected when one had billions of years to turn the tide.

“Get that angel of yours to sweet talk Dar into this job. He’s good. Then as soon as I can get back to Hel, I’ll scrounge up some more demons.”

“I’ll do that. It’s going to take me a while to get some angel volunteers for this.”

“Yeah, well, Gabe is just going to have to suck it up and deal.” I looked down at the dead drop bear. “This guy doesn’t have an insulating layer of fat below the skin like polar bears. With nowhere to shelter, I’m guessing this thing came through a gate within a mile of here.”