Rage and Ruin (The Harbinger 2)

“Oh, well, when you ask that nicely, it sucks having to say no.”

“So be it.”

I blocked his thrust, but he moved to my side before I could track what he was doing. His elbow caught my chin, snapping my head back. I stumbled, regained my footing and struck out with my sword, arms trembling as his blade connected with mine. He spun into my peripheral vision once more, but this time I was expecting his attack. Jumping back, I turned—

His fist slammed into my cheek, and pain exploded along my ribs as he landed another blow. My legs folded before I could stop them. My control over my grace was lost as I caught myself before my head slammed into the dirt. Panic unfurled in the pit of my stomach as I struggled to sit up. I pushed it down, knowing I couldn’t give in to it.

“You are nothing but a worthless, selfish human the moment you lose control of your grace.” Gabriel stood above me. “You are weak. Corrupt. Defiled. You are nothing.”

The little ball of warmth inside me pulsed, and I silently cursed, knowing that Zayne had to have felt the burst of panic. He couldn’t come down here. He couldn’t. I needed to get control of the situation.

I had to.

“You are not worthy of what God gifted you. Just like the rest of the humans,” Gabriel went on as I slid my hand to my hip, my fingers unhooking the dagger sheathed there. “You took the purity of a soul and the honor of free will and threw them away.”

I rose to my knees, lifting my head as I felt blood trickle out of the corner of my mouth. “I didn’t throw away anything.”

“You’re wrong. No human soul, not even my son’s, is clean or worthy of saving.”

“Wow.” My fingers tightened on the hilt of the dagger. “Father of the year right here.”

“At least I’ll be there when he dies,” he said. “Will Michael be able to say the same?”

“Probably not,” I admitted. “But I don’t care.”

Surprise rolled over Gabriel’s face, and I saw my window of opportunity. My chance to gain the upper hand and get the Hell out of here, with Roth and Cayman, somehow.

Shooting to my feet, I slammed the dagger deep into Gabriel’s chest. I knew it wouldn’t kill him, but it had to hurt. It had to—

The archangel looked down at his chest. “That stung.”

I jerked the dagger out, eyes widening in disbelief as I saw no blood—

I didn’t see the blow coming.

Gabriel backhanded me, sending me down to the dirt. Stars sparked in my vision. My ears rang. He grabbed my wrist, snatching the dagger from my hand.

“That was embarrassing,” he said, tossing it to the ground. “You’re nothing but a flawed waste of grace, Trinity. Give it up. I can make the next couple of weeks peaceful for you, or I can make them a constant waking nightmare. It is your choice.”

When he let go of my hand, I fell back. My gaze blanked out on me for a moment.

Get up.

“In the end, you’re nothing but flesh and bone,” he said. “Dying from the day you were born.”

Get up.

“It’s all rather revolting, how the human race aids in its own decay.”

Get up.

“Your rage. Your selfishness. Your basic human emotions. All of it corrupts what should never have been given to humans.”

The bond in my chest burned, and I knew Zayne was coming. He was close. Too close.

Get up.

Get up before he gets here.

“You’re right. I am flesh. I am flawed. I am selfish, but I am also grace.” I spat out a mouthful of blood, and from the rage and the ruin, I rose onto my feet. “I have heavenly fire in my blood. I have a human soul, and that is something you will never have.”

The archangel drew back.

“That’s it, isn’t it? That’s why you hate God. That’s why you want to destroy everything. It’s not to make it better. It’s not to end suffering, you lunatic. All of this is because you don’t have a soul.” I laughed, stumbling backward, summoning my grace. It sputtered and then arrived, the handle almost too heavy for me to hold. “You’re a walking cliché, and you dare to insult the aspirations of humans?”

“You know nothing.” He stalked forward, and I saw Roth sit up in his human form. Sulien pushed off the wall.

“You forgot to add ‘Jon Snow’ at the end of that statement.”

He halted, head cocked. “What?”

I swung, aiming for the largest part of him. My grace could and would kill him. I would end this, because it was my duty.

Gabriel grabbed my right arm just above my elbow and twisted. The crack was so sudden, so shocking, that there was a brief second where I felt nothing. And then I screamed. The red-hot shock of pain fried my senses. I lost my grace. The sword collapsed in on itself as I tried to breathe through the pain.

His foot connected with my shin, snapping the bone there, and I couldn’t even scream as I hit the ground on one knee, couldn’t even breathe around the fire that seemed to engulf my entire leg. He gripped me by the scruff of my neck and lifted me. I clutched at his arm with my good hand and kicked out as I saw Sulien grab Roth.

It happened in a matter of heartbeats. Seconds. Brutal, unending seconds when I realized I couldn’t defeat an archangel. This was never a battle I could win, and in the distant part of my mind that functioned above the pain, I wondered if my father had known that and sent me out for the slaughter.

Roth would die.

So would Cayman.

I’d be taken, and the world as we knew it would end, and maybe my father and God didn’t care about what would happen. Their attempts to save humankind were half-assed if they’d thought I could do this, and maybe...maybe God had washed His proverbial hands of the whole mess.

If not, how did they think I could defeat an archangel?

Gabriel slammed me into the ground with the force of a fall from a building.

Bones shattered everywhere.

Legs.

Arms.

Ribs.

I saw something white jutting from my leg as my vision winked in and out. Pain came in a flash of bright light. A thousand nerves tried to fire all at once, attempting to send communications from my brain to my arms and legs, to my pelvis and ribs and spine. My body jerked as something went loose inside. I couldn’t move my legs. The terror that poured through me filled my veins with icy slush. I struggled to get air into my lungs, but they felt wrong, as if they couldn’t inflate.

“I need you alive, at least for a little while longer,” he said.

Sure didn’t feel like he needed that. “Is it because you find me...endearing and lovable?” I rasped words that sounded off, as if half the letters couldn’t be pronounced.

Gabriel knelt beside me, his cruelly beautiful face blurring in and out. “More like I need your blood hot when it flows. I told you I could make this easy and peaceful. I would’ve let you have your heart’s desire. You would’ve enjoyed what time you had left, but you chose this fate. To suffer. So stupidly human.”

Blood spewed from my mouth as I coughed and my breath wheezed. “You...talk a lot.”

“I was the voice of God.” Gabriel’s hand folded over my throat. Air immediately cut off. He lifted me, my feet dangling several feet above the ground and my body loose like a pile of rags. “The messenger of His Faith and Glory, but I am now the Harbinger, and I will usher in a new era. Retribution will be pain with the cleansing power of blood, and as Heaven crumbles into itself, those who remain will have a new God.”

“She’s right. You do talk too much.”

Gabriel turned toward the source of the voice. I managed to turn my head only half an inch, if that, but enough that I could see Roth.

“And you know what?” Roth said, standing without Sulien. His arm hung oddly, but he was standing. “You sound an awful lot like someone I know. Does this sound familiar? ‘I will ascend into Heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.’”

“Do not compare me to him,” Gabriel growled.

“Wouldn’t think of it,” Roth replied. “It would be an insult to the Shining One.”

Several things happened at once. Gabriel let out a roar that shook the world as he threw out his arm. Something must’ve left his hand, because I heard Roth grunt and hit the ground, laughing—he was laughing. Gabriel’s sneer faded.

“Idiot,” gasped Roth. “Egotistical idiot. I hope it eases you to know that you were right.”

“You will be here for the death of your son.”

My gasp at the sound of Zayne’s voice was swallowed in Gabriel’s shout as he turned again.

Zayne stood behind Gabriel, his arm around Sulien’s neck as the Trueborn struggled, his grace flaring from his right arm, forming a spear that could kill Zayne even if he hadn’t been weakened. A different kind of fear crowded me.

But Zayne was fast, so incredibly fast as he gripped the side of the Trueborn’s head and twisted.

Gabriel screamed, his rage thundering through the cavern like an earthquake as Zayne dropped the Trueborn and then shot forward, slamming into the archangel, breaking Gabriel’s hold on my throat. I started to fall, but Zayne caught me. The burst of pain from his embrace threatened to drag me under, and I must have blacked out, because the next thing I knew I was lying on my back and Zayne was rising in front of me, his wings stretched out on either side of him.

And I saw him.

Numerous nicks and grooves scarred his back, and his wings didn’t look right. One hung at an odd angle, and below the left wing, there was a deep cut, exposing bone and tissue. That wound was...

Oh God.

How had that happened to him? How had he been wounded? He just got here. He just...

Summoning everything I had left in me, I managed to shift onto my side. I sat up, but pain screamed through my body. My cheek smacked onto the ground. I managed to lift my chin, seeking Roth. He had to get Zayne out of here. Had to get him away from Gabriel. I yelled for the demon prince, but only a croak came out. Something was wrong with my throat.