Chapter 17

Atlas

When the window between the guards changing shifts appears, Samson and I leap from our current roof to the top of the warehouse. We've got our obscuria intact but aren't sure if it will help, especially if we're dealing with other sereph. With the stealth we've been taught and practiced for most of our lives, Samson dispatches the single guard on the roof with very little fanfare.

A man. Not a demon. Not a sereph.

He grimaces.

He's a part of abducting Ivy, I say. Of holding these women hostage.

Sampson nods. They are weak. Humans.

This wasn't against the code. I glance at Samson as I check the guard's weapon—a bow and arrows with poisoned tips. The arrows can kill a demon, but they've been made for serephs. I hold it out to Samson so he can see it. He would have tried to kill you, I say and move to break it, but Samson shakes his head.

Your wings will be hidden. Keep it.

He's right. My wings are too bright, especially if the obscuria doesn't work, and I'm suddenly wishing I had his black wings.

It feels like it's against the code.

Our laws have always stipulated the preservation of weaker life—human, animals—in exchange for our gifts to protect them from demons. But serephs don't often intervene in the chaos of human life. Human against human unless possessed, is allowed. This—a man hunting sereph—is different, I tell him.

Samson nods again.

In place. I say, and after a succession of "go" from each of my brothers, I use the guard's key to unlock the roof access door and sneak into the warehouse with Samson at my back. My wings are the tattoo once more, and with an arrow notched in the bow, we sneak across a metal, grated catwalk. There are rows and rows of rooms, as if we've walked into one of those temporary storage facilities, right under our feet. And at the opposite end of the warehouse, a bright light burns, but what it's illuminating isn't clear.

We haven't planned to look for Ivy first but rather to take out the captors. It will be too difficult to locate her without getting caught, Luka had said.

There are so many prisoners, Tate had said. It's fucking unfathomable.

Rome, Luka and Tate indicated there are around a dozen men, a manifold demon, a few sentinels, but it's the nezzah demon, a horrible creature with wings and armored skin, we're all worried about. Truthfully, I've never seen one. Supposedly they are nearly impossible to kill unless you can hit them in the keyhole—or the small vulnerable spot in their armor—so most sources say to just dispatch them back to the Netherscape with a portal.

"Aspectum." I whisper the spell, and my eyes focus on what I'm seeing as if I'm standing in the warehouse in the middle of the day rather than the middle of the night. I see movement in the walkways.

"Hazel?" Ivy's voice echoes through the warehouse "Hazel Day? Are you here?"

My body responds to her with a pulse of power that nearly brings me to my knees, the tattoo at my back glowing with the need to release my wings.

Samson grabs my arm. I'll go. Let me find her.

They'll see you?—

They're men.

"Ivy?" a voice yells from somewhere under me.

"Hazel? Hazel!" Ivy's voice yells from somewhere in the maze of cells.

I track Samson's flight, my chest tight with worry.

A man runs under me for one of the containers. "Shut it, bitch," he yells.

One man and me. I decide to go after Ivy's sister and jump from the catwalk with the stealth of a cat and follow him.

What are you doing!Samson yells at me.

"Ivy! Ivy!" Hazel yells. There's the rattle of metal in my vicinity, a hint that she's trying to get out . . . then a cacophony of voices, women. "Help. Help." It starts as a tentative plink of raindrops, the hint of a storm.

Ivy's sister,I snap back through the link.

I creep up behind the man, pulling my knife from the sheath at my back. I've found Ivy's sister, I tell Samson. Come get her.

The voices grow louder, bolder. "Here!" and "Let us out!" a storm gathering power.

Men's voices respond, and a scuffle in the distance.

We're not a surprise anymore, brothers, Rome's voice slides through the bond.

The man in front of what I believe to be Hazel's cell smacks the metal. "Shut up in there," he orders. "Oh, I'll provide you some more of that treatment you've been getting."

"Fuck you!" Hazel screams from inside the container, hitting the metal even harder, increasing the din of voices around us.

I approach and notice the moment he knows he's not alone. He turns, slowly, his back to the rattling cage. He shifts back and forth on his feet, tilts his head. He can't see me, but he can feel something, because he hesitates. "Who's there?" The man raises his gun.

"Hello?" he asks.

"Hello," I reply while pushing the gun to the side.

He fires.

With a quick stab, I plunge my knife into his carotid. When I pull it, his blood sprays, ruining my obscuria, so I drop it, and allow my wings to burst forth.

"Where is she?" Samson yells above me.

I look up, then grab hold of the door. With a burst of strength, I yank the lock, and pull the door from its mechanism with a loud clatter.

A woman—she resembles Ivy with her big eyes and the shape of her face, though her hair is darker—sees me and screams.

"Hazel?"

Samson pushes me out of the way. "You fucking look like the angel of death with all that blood. I'll get her out and the others. Go. Ivy is near the lab at the front."

"The nezzah?"

"Didn't see it."

I jump up and fly through the building, dodging equipment, metal catwalks, chains. I catch sight of Rome, Luka, and Tate fighting below me. A manifold demon bursts into eight. Tate's flipping his knife with a terrifying smile on his face. With a quick flick, the knife embeds in the forehead of the original manifold and all of them burst apart with a screech, break into pieces, and turn to dust.

Get the women out! I yell. I'm going after Ivy.

There's a group of men pulling her into a room made with plastic sheeting. It's glowing blue—the lab.

I drop from above to the floor of the warehouse.

"Sereph!" someone yells.

Atlas?Ivy's voice filled with terror slides through me, connects with my spine, and my vision goes white with rage.

"I've got your six, Atlas," Luka yells from behind me.

A man lunges from my right. I slice with my knife. His blood spurts. Another. And another. And another. With my brother at my side, we make quick work of what comes for us, until he and I are standing back-to-back amidst a shameful surplus of death—men and sentinel alike.

Only I don't feel guilt. I feel justified.

Get her,Luka tells me. "I'll keep watch," he says.

I step through the plastic sheeting.