LITMIR.BIZ

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hoped that, despite what he’d done, he would be chosen as the next Elite, but instead he learned he had earned another punishment. “Worse,” he discovered, was exactly that.

      For one year, Zacharel would lead an army of angels just like him. The ones no one else wanted under their command. The rebellious ones. The tortured ones. His assignment: to teach them the respect that he himself had yet to demonstrate—for the Deity, for the sanctity of human life. And to ensure that he took his responsibility seriously, he alone would bear the consequences of his warriors’ actions.

      If any of his angels killed a human, he would suffer a whipping.

      He’d already suffered eight.

      At the end of the year, if Zacharel’s good deeds outweighed the bad, he and all of his angels would be allowed to stay in the heavens. If the bad outweighed the good, he and all of his angels would lose their wings and their place in the sky.

      Clearly, Zacharel had mused, the Deity was cleaning house. This way, he could rid the heavens of every thorn in his side in one fell swoop, and none on his Council could call him cruel or unfair, for he’d given them a year’s worth of chances to redeem themselves.

      So here Zacharel and his army were, tasked with handling chores far beneath their skill level. For the most part, that meant finding a way to free demon-possessed humans, aiding those who were immorally influenced and participating in the occasional insignificant battle.

      Tonight marked his army’s nineteenth assignment—though only their third round of combat—and each one had ended worse than the last. No matter what he threatened, the angels seemed to enjoy disregarding his orders. They flipped him off. They cussed at him. They laughed in his face.

      He did not understand them. This year was their last chance, too. They had just as much to lose. Shouldn’t they seek his favor?

      “Now?” Thane asked eagerly, his voice more smoke than substance. Once upon a time, his throat had been slit… and slit and slit until scars had become a permanent necklace.

      “Not yet. I mean it.”

      “If you fail to sound the battle cry soon…”

      They would act anyway.

      “Does no one care that they will suffer my wrath?” he groused. He peered down at the Moffat County Institution for the Criminally Insane, which was hidden in the mountains of Colorado. The building was tall and wide, with a barbed, electric fence, and armed guards walking both the parapet and grounds. Halogens shone bright light into every corner, chasing away the shadows.

      What the guards couldn’t see, no matter how intense their lighting, were the demon minions crawling all over the walls, desperate to slink inside.

      But like the guards, the demons could not see the threat surrounding them. The twenty soldiers under Zacharel’s command remained hidden. Their wings, usually white threaded with gold, were now a star-pricked onyx, a mirror of the heavens. The effortless change was made with only a single mental command. More than that, their angelic robes were now shirts and pants fitted to their muscular bodies, black and combat ready.

      “Why would demons choose to overtake this place?” Zacharel asked. And they had attempted to do so for years, apparently. Other armies had been sent, but none had made any real progress. As soon as one set of minions was taken care of, a new crop would arrive.

      There were only two reasons no other army had thought to find out why. One, they had not cared to aid the humans inside the building. Or two, their job had ended with the battle. Either way, Zacharel would not make the same mistake. He couldn’t.

      Golden hair curling innocently around a face somehow more devilish than saintly, Thane cast a wicked sapphire gaze his way. The contrast between innocent and carnal could be mesmerizing, or so Zacharel had heard. Human and immortal females alike threw themselves at Thane—who made no secret of his sexual desires when he revealed himself to those who were not supposed to know he was there. Especially since his desires skirted the edge of dangerous… of acceptable.

      Most angels belonging to their Deity, whether they were of the warrior class or among the joy-bringers, were as immune to the passions of the flesh as Zacharel. But then, most had not been captured by a horde of demons, trapped and tortured for weeks, as Thane had been.

      When you lived as long as they did, he supposed, especially when those years were spent at war, you were more likely to learn the true meaning of pain and to seek refuge in whatever pleasure you could find.

      Xerxes and Bjorn, Thane’s equals in terms of strength and cunning, had been trapped and tortured, as well. The three were now inseparable, the trauma and horror of the experience bonding them. Warping them—yes, that, too, as proven by their place within his army’s ranks, but bonding them nonetheless.

      “Evil craves the company of other evil, desperate to destroy anything worth saving,” Thane said, wisdom replacing his earlier irreverence. “Perhaps someone inside summoned them.”

      Perhaps. If so, the battle had just become a dilemma. The summoning of demons was strictly forbidden, a crime punishable only through death. Death that would not be collateral damage but intentional, and yet, Zacharel was not sure how the Deity would react to such a slaying.

      Humans, he thought, shaking his head with disgust. Nothing but trouble. They had no idea the dark power they danced with. A power that might seem exciting at first, but one that would merely eat away at their humanity.

      “None of the demons have actually entered the building,” he said. “I’m curious as to why.”

      Thane’s head tilted to the side, his study of the demons intensifying. “I hadn’t noticed, but I see now that you are correct. Majesty.”

      No reaction. “Capture one of the demons, and cart it to my cloud for questioning.”

      “That will be my pleasure.” As much as Thane enjoyed debauching his lovers, he enjoyed torturing demons more. “Anything else, Lord of Us?”

      No. Reaction. “Yes. On my signal, the army may attack, but I want Bjorn to bring the most feral demon he can find to the roof of the institution. Quickly.” Zacharel could have—should have—spoken the orders inside the minds of his soldiers, as all commanders could do, but doing so would have invited their voices into his mind, and that was an intimacy he would not allow.

      A smile of relish flashed, straight white teeth revealed. “Consider it done.”

      Before Thane could whisk himself away, Zacharel added, “I’m sure I don’t need to remind you that no humans are to be harmed during the battle. If you must forgo a demon kill to save a human life, do so. Make sure the others know.”

      At first, he hadn’t minded when his men opted to destroy a human to get to a demon. After his third whipping for a crime he had not committed himself, he’d begun to mind.

      One beat of silence, two. Then, “Yes, of course, Leader of the Supremely Unworthy.” With that parting shot, Thane disappeared in a burst of motion to alert the others even now circling the building.

      A scant minute later, swords of fire appeared in every angel’s hand, the flames more intense, far purer, than any found in hell. Menacing shards of amber light licked over determined expressions and hard-won muscle… and those lights began to arc down in swift succession, screams of pain—and final gasps of breath—soon echoing. Scaled, gnarled and now-headless bodies rained from the walls.

      So much for waiting for Zacharel’s signal. That would have to be dealt with later.

      Though he would have enjoyed slaying the demons alongside his men, he waited, for he sought bigger prey this night. A path eventually cleared, and he glided down… down… and landed gracefully on the flat edge of the roof. He tucked his wings into his back.

      “The feral demon, as requested, Magnificent King,” a familiar voice said from beside him. “Quickly.”

      A huge beast thumped lifelessly

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