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CHAPTER 14
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2024-10-29 19:42:56Three grams of Charlie in a small plastic bag. Two pills, one blue, one white. Two blotters of acid, one with a strawberry picture, the other with a heart.
I sat on the side of the bed, fist pressed against my lips, one foot constantly tapping a jive against the floor. Reaching out, I straightened up the line of drugs on the bedside table, spacing them out, then went back along and did it again. I stood up abruptly, began to walk away and stopped.Three grams. Two pills. Two tabs.Turning around, I stared at the line-up and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. Taking a step closer, I hesitated, clutching at my hair. With a whimper, I opened the drawer, quickly swiping the cocktail into it and shut it firmly, stepping back to watch the small table lamp wobble on top of the unit, the light juddering on the walls.I walked away. Stopped. Glanced back. Closed my eyes.Screams filled my ears, like the shrieks of a thousand birds, wings furiously beating at the air.
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They were watching me.Davey had insisted they were mostly here just to take a look and report the night back to Oscar, and Addi had maintained as much when I had questioned him earlier about it, but I knew.I knew.I wasn't stupid and they thought I was. Poor, little deluded drug-fucked Casey. Spin her a line. Fill her head with memories and give her a pathetic grasp of hope, and she'll lay back and think of England and let us screw her some more. And it had almost worked. Almost.Yesterday, I'd believed it. I'd wanted to believe it. I'd wanted to believe them, but I'd seen the looks they'd been shooting each other all day. I'd pretended to be oblivious as they watched my every move and I'd smiled as I'd swallowed down the pills and as I'd cut the lines, consuming it all like everything was completely normal.Pretend. Smile. Play the game. It's what I always did.Oscar's goons had split up as soon as they'd arrived, but the shorter one – all five-foot-eight of pur
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I didn't know how long I'd been laying on the staircase.Maybe a lifetime. Maybe just a few moments.I remembered getting in the cab, but not the journey home. I remembered fumbling with the key in the lock and walking into the house, although walking was a stretch of the truth to be fair. Shuffling would have been more apt. I'd gotten as far as the staircase and collapsed, half-twisted on my back, staring up at the ceiling. There was a cobweb right above my head, a thin wispy strand that danced on the breeze blowing through the still-open doorway.I couldn't move. I wanted to, I think I wanted to, I knew I probably should have moved. The front door was open, after all. The keys were still in the lock. But I'd been falling since I'd reached home, falling as I lay on my back staring upwards at the cobweb, falling even though I wasn't falling at all. I was dimly aware that my leg was bent at an angle that was uncomfortable and that there was a dull pain building in the base o
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The others moved into the space behind Davey, spreading out cautiously, but they were rattled, tense, all tooled up. Addi's eyes met mine and I silently willed him to run.Please. Just fucking run .Across the room, Juliette sighed. 'See how tiresome these creatures are, Ethan?''Bitch, shut the fuck up!' Davey shouted at her. 'You shut up right now or I swear I will take out your fucking kneecaps.'Juliette just smiled in response, but by her side, she rubbed her thumb and fingertips together and I thought she's getting ready, she's going to do it ,she's going to strike .'Case, you hurt, babe? These fuckers hurt you?'I saw it, that territorial streak in Davey's eyes, but there was something else there too, a warmth that hit me hard because it reminded me of when we'd first met and of the way he'd looked at me during that first summer in Ibiza. Like I was everything. Like I was his whole world. And I had been for a while, even if I hadn't wanted
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There's a monster at my door.I hear it all the time. This hissing of its breath. The scratching of its claws. Rapping its knuckles on wood.Knock, knock, knock.There's a monster at my door.It wears the face of my mother. It wears the face of many. It smiles to deceive, to trick, but its teeth are needles, razor-sharp and tipped with poison. I see them.I see.There's a monster at my door.No shadow can hide me. Darkness cannot conceal me. I'm a flickering light, I'm warm flesh, I'm a beating heart.Knock, knock, knock .There's a monster at my door and it won't go away.It won't ever go away.*******The faint scent of cigarette smoke filtered through the gap in the partly-open doorway.The voice of a newsreader I couldn't stand, drifted in with the smoke, serving as nothing but background noise to the crack of bone and screams I could still hear.
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I didn't want to think about that, about how the way he said people made it sound like they weren't people at all. They were... something else. Something other.' Lift a stone and you shall find me ,' Ethan continued, dropping the blinds and barring the city outside from my view.'And that's not a bloody riddle?'He laughed as he walked back over to the table, pouring himself another drink. A large drink.'I'm just fucking with you,' he grinned. 'Actually, it's apparently from the Gospel of Thomas. Made famous in that film Stigmata . Did you ever watch that? Cracking movie. Great cast. The message behind it was all a load of shit obviously, but still a damn good watch.''You're mad,' I whispered, staring at him. 'Here I am, thinking I'm the one going insane, but it's you.''Wouldn't that be easier?' he said, taking a swig of whiskey. 'Easier to accept madness than the truth. It's okay, I understand that. Insanity has often seemed the better option to me, but unfort
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I'd never been special. Not once.I'd been told I was, but only by those who couldn't look me in the eye as they hurt me. They stroked my hair and told me I was special, that I was a good girl, that I was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen and then they covered my eyes from it all, as if covering my eyes would make a difference. As if covering my eyes numbed the pain. As if covering my eyes would make me believe them.But I never did, because I knew I wasn't special. I knew .Being Davey's top girl had made other people think I was special, but I'd never believed that either. I just took another pill, snorted another line and smiled as I covered my own eyes.That Ethan could believe there was anything remotely remarkable about me was insane. I was a nobody. Nothing. But he was looking at me like no one ever had, like he was seeing beyond the façade, beyond the Casey Brogan that everyone else saw and he wasn't just seeing the layers of dirt and filth underneath.
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With my hands braced against the side of the sink unit, I knew Ethan was behind me without even looking around. I wasn't going to turn, even though every hair on my neck was practically begging me to.'You forgot my bowl,' he said.'Wash it yourself.' I turned off the hot tap and gave it a blast of cold water. 'You must be used to it by now.'I stiffened as he appeared at my side and dropped his bowl into the water. Turning off the tap, he grabbed my wrist before I could plunge my hands into the sink and pulled me out of the way, taking my place at the basin. I took a step back, folding my arms across my chest and leant against the wall, watching as he scrubbed at the bowls and cutlery with a sponge.Struggling to equate this idea of him as a demon with someone who also washed his own dishes, I let my eyes wander, taking in the dingy, narrow room. It reminded me of the same type of kitchen often found in social housing, something I was quite used to having grown up in a
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When the laughter burst out I couldn't stop it and weirdly, I didn't even want to try.I laughed so bloody hard that I ended up with a stitch in my side and had to sit down, as the pain jabbed at my ribs and made it difficult to breathe, but I didn't care. If it was madness to laugh, it was a good kind of madness and one that I needed. It was a brief descent into an insanity that felt like cutting up a storm on the dancefloor, experiencing those first moments of hedonistic pleasure as the buzz fired sparks of heat into your veins.'Okay, now I know you're high,' I said, as I struggled to compose myself. 'Or maybe I still am. Is that it? Am I on one big fuck-off never-ending trip? I need to know what the Hell was in that fix I got from Leon, because this is the freakiest, most insane, completely unreal thing I've ever heard, and you know what, I've heard some proper crazy things recently.'Ethan's stony glare didn't waiver and I wondered if he practiced that convincing-as-fu
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'You sure you want to do this, Case?'Addi's brow was a mess of worry lines as he looked at me, his gaze flitting down to where my hand rested on my distended stomach. I'd been rubbing it without even realising it. Rubbing it because I could feel Lily moving around inside. Rubbing it because it calmed me. Addi knew that and I knew what he was thinking now. He thought I didn't want to do this. He thought I'd changed my mind.I looked into his eyes and smiled.'Yes, Addison. Perfectly bloody sure, thank you.'I chewed on my lower lip as I studied his face, suddenly uncertain whether he was trying to dissuade me because he didn't want to be a part of this. I couldn't blame him. He might have enjoyed being a gangster once, but things had stepped up a level since his days of dealing drugs on Davey's patch.'You know, if you don't want to be here, Ads, no one's going to stop you from leaving, or think any less of you for not sticking around.''Speak for yours
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'No,' I gasped. 'No.'Ethan glanced towards Blake, lowering his voice. 'Please, Casey, please listen to me. I have to finish this now. Angels? Demons? It makes no difference. They are one and the same. Look at them. Both want to control this world, but it doesn't belong to them. The First might have been the first Angel, but the First was not the first being to walk this earth. Humans were here long before we arrived. The First Angel knew this and knew we didn't deserve to claim it. That's why the Seraphim killed her.'My mouth fell open. ' Her? ''The First was female, Casey, or at least as close to it as it was possible to get.'I rocked back on my heels, feeling overwhelmed by his words, overwhelmed by the pain in my broken arm, but mostly overwhelmed by what I knew he intended to do.'There must be another way,' I said. 'There has to be. You can persuade them, Ethan, if anyone can change things, you can.''This is the only way things can change. Usu
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'Are you fucking insane? ' Ethan shot back, his voice echoing out. 'Think about what you're saying, Azazel! Think about the pain they inflicted on us all over the centuries!''They inflicted it on us, Helel, while you sat quaking in whatever dimension you created for yourself. Don't talk to me of the pain of the Shedim when you turned your back on your kind a long time ago. Lucifer poisoned you, Helel. He poisoned your mind to the truth and infected you with his lies.'Turning his face up to the skies, where the Seraphim and Council waited, Blake called up to them.'Blessed Seraphim!' Blake pleaded with them, gesturing to me. 'Rightful descendants of the Throne, this is proof of my devotion, proof of my commitment to you! I will give you the witch. Do with her what you will, but I beg you to grant the Shedim a pardon. We denounce Lucifer. We denounce the ways of the First to Fall. We will no longer defy your rule. Please, I beg of you, redeem us our powers and let us
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The ground exploded near my feet, sending plumes of white dust billowing up into my face and I stumbled, alarmed as a fissure appeared in the dry, white earth, wide enough to swallow my feet.'Casey, watch out,' Ethan shouted, grabbing me around the waist and pulling me away, just in time.A tall, lithe Dominion, no doubt the one to fire the explosive shot that had made the ground open up, came hurtling through the melee, its moves surprisingly graceful, its hair flying around its shoulders like a cascade of silver silk. With a cry that contorted its beautiful face into something quite repulsive, it released a hail of hard, focused bolts of energy that came at us with such speed that I felt the first ones rip through the air by my face as I pulled out of their way, the fierce velocity burning at my skin. I heard Ethan cry out and judder against me, and I knew he'd not been so lucky. He'd been hit, not badly, but a small trickle of blood was snaking from his temple where th
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'Ethan,' I whispered urgently. 'I can't do what you asked. I don't know how.'He pulled me close again, smiling as he trailed the backs of his fingers of his now-blackened hand down my cheek. 'Just let go, Casey. Trust your instincts. Trust yourself. You can do this.'I swallowed my fear and nodded, still unsure that I could do what he wanted, still sure that his faith in me was misguided.'Oscar, look after Addi.' Ethan gestured to Addi, who was standing behind us all, still staring wide-eyed up at the Archangels as if hypnotised. I couldn't blame him. Even with their terrifying wings of fire, they were still dazzling to the eye. They were rising up into the air now, retreating towards their forces, the screech of the Cherubim heralding their return.Oscar's nose wrinkled as if he didn't much like his appointed role as Addi's guardian. 'And what exactly are you going to do?' he said to Ethan.'I'm going to do just what I promised.' Ethan turned back, direct
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Oscar chuckled. 'Careful, Uriel,' he said. 'Endorian magic has a habit of burning a bit. Hate for you to hurt those pretty hands of yours.'Uriel, who was clutching his hand to his chest, sneered at Oscar, his angered gaze sweeping over him with repulsion. He inhaled deeply and grimaced.'Berith, it appears no amount of time can lessen the stench of your betrayal. So many years in exile and your mutinous intent remains sadly as strong as ever. We believed you had left Lucifer's failed teachings behind you and learned your place. It seems we were mistaken.'Oscar sniffed dismissively. 'The Council have been mistaken about many things, Uriel. Time could never diminish the power of Lucifer's teachings, and time was all I ever needed to make you believe the lie. I've got to say, you boys have disappointed me, you really have. You're such experts at smothering the truth, I thought you'd have realised centuries ago that I hadn't abandoned your brother.'Uriel hissed ag
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Snowflakes tickled my nose and I reached up with my free hand to wipe them away. My other one was gripping Mr. Tumnus' hand tightly.Behind me, the door to the wardrobe was open, the thick wall of fur coats being the only barrier between this world and my own. I knew if I wanted to, I could push my way through them and feel their warmth engulf me. I could go back and yet somehow, I knew that nothing would feel as warm as Tumnus' hand did around my own.'You could go now, daughter of Eve,' he said, softly. 'You should go now, before they get here.'I looked up at him, smiling at the snowflakes that were melting in his hair and settling on his woolly red scarf. The snow was falling heavier now, the wind catching it and making it look like a flock of tiny white birds, spinning and diving in the air. Tumnus blinked as a flake settled on his eyelashes. He looked as if he wanted to say something, but he must have thought better of it in the end, because he swallowed it down
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'Casey, girl, don't you do this!'We glanced at the one called Berith, irritated at his intrusion, but he didn't matter anymore. None of them mattered now.Reaching out with the water, we pulled Helel to his feet, tugging him towards us. We caressed him with the water, ignored his revulsion as we let it run over his earthly form, shuddered as we felt his divine power – so much power like this world had never seen! The mighty Helel! Oh, Morning Star! Oh, Bringer of Dawn! We would have him now, claim him for ourselves, control the one that would be the First!We forced the water into him, just as we had done before, craving the touch of his power again, craving all that he was and all that he would be. He shuddered, fought against us, but we were the Naiad, we were with the water and with Endor, and we would prevail.We brushed aside his petty memories and all those pointless emotions that had enslaved him for so long and poured everything into him, all our p
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'You are sure?' Blake said.The sound of his voice popped in my ears, like a bubble of pressure bursting, pain stabbing in my eardrums and down into my throat.My throat .Something was in my throat.I gagged and coughed up water. I watched, dazed, my eyes barely half-open as it trickled away of its own accord, sliding over the monochrome tiles until it reached an ever-shifting stream of water that I could see stretching round behind Ethan.My cheek was damp, pressed against the floor and a lock of wet hair hung over my eyes. A tiny drop of water slid down the lock and grew fat, hanging there, before finally dropping to the floor and that tiny droplet moved of its own volition and joined the moving stream, like an ant, seeking the protection of its colony.My clothes felt heavy and stuck to my skin. I shivered and tried to focus. Ethan was positioned just as I'd remembered, before the water had come, only now his bound hands were in his lap again and hi
