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Chapter One
The kitchen island in the pack house was the only lit part of the ground floor in the hours before dawn Sleep had been elusive of late, but I wasn’t alone in reat comfort
“Are you sure about this?” Cora asked for the uo back to the Underealm and check if Mal’s back You have no idea what you’ll be walking into”
Purgatory That’s what I’d be walking into Malachi’s territory His domain He knew the place inside out I’d hoped he’d be able to coe, where the cores of the purest souls were held prisoner, but he wasn’t at the Keep
He and Azazel were scouring the Undereal for Lilith
I stared into er I can’t expect Mal to drop the search for Lilith to come and help us”
Grayson topped upand then took the seat besideheat couldn’t chase away the chill that see to my veins ever since the Dread attack on Deadside and the Doel’s, Cassius’, revelations
I’d been stupid to send Cora to fetch Mal fro Lilith If they failed, Mammon would take over the Undereal, because there was no doubt inhim into the earthly realm sooner rather than later The de, and the Underealh for him However, if I didn’t find a way to save the Beyond, there would be nothing for hi creature on it, would cease to exist
We needed to handle Purgatory and finding a neer source for the Beyond without Mal or Azazel
“Seraphina won’t be alone,” Uri said to Cora “I’ll keep her safe”
“Have you been to Purgatory before?” Grayson asked him
“No, but celestials cannot be corrupted by nant spirits”
I gave him a skeptical look “Really? Then why is the Eye still active? Why haven’t the celestials done aith the nant spirits that live there?”
He pressed his lips together “It isn’t the nant that we shy away from, it’s the rift you call the Eye The forces within are unlike anything we’ve ever experienced The celestials who ventured forth never returned, and so we steer clear However, Purgatory was created by the Beyond You will be safe with me”
I believed in him “I trust you”
He’d gone to great lengths to protect s ripped froive his celestial captors my name I trusted him with my life
I owed him my life
He had a little color back in his cheeks now, and the wounds on his back had healed, all except the spots where his wings had been Those wounds were deeper than the rest They’d take es to prevent infection even though I wasn’t sure celestials could get infections I was still getting used to his slightly longer hair and the five o’clock shadoas sporting It erous; that, coupled with the clothes Grayson had loaned him, made him look like part of my pack
I blinked to dispel the possessive thought I was grateful, that was all He’d brought us the truth And I cared about him as a friend Hell, the last couple of days I’d been afraid the Beyond would cut him off from the celestial power like they’d done the Dread, but they hadn’t I guess now that our worlds were on the verge of going to shit, they didn’t see the point in locking hi, so to speak We knew the truth about the Beyond, how they were using souls to power their realm and how the earthly realm was connected to their world If the Beyond fell, then so would earth
“Why hasn’t Cassius gotten back to us yet?” Cora asked Uriel
The celestial shrugged “I have no idea He’s an upper-level celestial We run in different circles, literally He’d have to get a hteous and petition for the infor his best”
But it had been seventy-two hours since we’d last spoken to him He needed to speed shit up If what he said was true, if we only had a handful of weeks left before the power supply to the Beyond ran out, then we couldn’t afford any delays
The distant beat of wings drew ray, signaling the arrival of dawn and the return of Keon The last couple of days he’d gone flying alone just before the sun rose He was agitated and restless
Here wasn’t the place he needed or wanted to be, yet he stayed to keep me safe, because if I died then Lilith would suffer
Eve’s curse kept hi for his queen
He strode in, his dark blue hair ept and tousled, falling over his bare shoulders and pectorals He wore a pair of black joggers loaned to him by Grayson and his feet were bare He looked wild, feral, and dangerous
“Another pre-dawn itation
“No s” I stood and pushed back et back, if we haven’t heard froo find him myself”
Keon’s jaw ticked Yeah, he wasn’t happy about not being able to coatory with me But only a full-blooded celestial or the wielder of a scythe could coht be Lilith’s son, but he was still very much a daemon
Keon fixed his yellow cat eyes on Uri “You will keep her alive”
It wasn’t a question
Uriel’s expression was sincere “Of course”
Keon locked gazes with hi beat, but whatever he saw in Uriel’s eyes h to satisfy him because his shoulders relaxed a fraction
There was only oneI needed to find out “Uatory is?”
Luckily for one, but he could still do his nifty teleport thing, and it brought us to a side street a few round train station in East Necro
It was a small station I’d never stopped at before
“Purgatory is in there?” It was super early, but people were already up and about, ready to start the daily grind In an hour this place would be crawling “You can’t be serious”
His expression was deathly serious, though “We need to take a train three platfored Ado, just thick forestland and tales of monsters to keep huy, we’ve had to adapt “The scythes open the way for a Dominus, and a celestial can also open the door Humans are safe Trust me”
“I trust you, Uri Let’s do this”
We headed across the street and down the steps into the underground It sross, but I was dah my mouth and tasted the air
Yuck
It was strange to think that Mal caular basis That he came down here and rode the train The world ru the ticket barriers, and they lay open, letting in anyone who dared venture forth The booth where a hulass cracked, and sprayed red and blue with graffiti
A white sheet of paper was pasted to the wall by the booth The words Blood Drive ritten in bold red ink
Yeah, this was one of the off-the-grid stations The place people would get off if they wanted to avoid paying for a trip, so I was surprised to see so many suits Uri and I stuck out like a sore thuear Dean had loaned the celestial a leather jacket with a fur collar It looked good on him
He led the way, and I followed him past the pointless barrier and left into a tiled tunnel decorated with old posters sitting behind glass Several Blood Drive posters were pasted to the glass, obscuring the original advertisements
A wo a baby to her chest, her dark eyes pits of sorrow in her face I could see the tile through her barely corporeal form
A ghost
She held out her ghost baby like an offering
I faltered “Uri…”
His jaw tightened “They slip through the cracks sometimes,” he said “The ones who die alone The ones without someone to care Not every soul finds its way to a Soul Savers, and not every soul is picked up by a reaper”
“Well this one will be” My hand tingled as naled its appearance
Uri gently gripped my elbow “You can’t Not now Not until we’ve finished in Purgatory”
Shit Of course If I took her now, she’d be ejected into the ether with the other souls I intended to save and… An awful thought occurred to me How could I have missed it “Uri, what happens to all the souls now? Cassius said they used the voralexes to siphon the souls froy, but did they also need the voralexes to recycle them?”
He looked momentarily stunned “I don’t know” He frowned “If the Beyond was still recycling souls then it h to maintain a human population”
And with the voralexes gone, humanity would eventually die out anyway Fuck “I’ll need to speak to Cassius about this We need a solution and fast A power source for the Beyond won’t be enough”
“Please…” The ghost’s lament, finally verbalized, reached my ears “Peace…”
“I’ll be back for you and your baby I promise”
She slulazed over
We passed several round Not the usual alert ghosts—the ones who’d been given purpose by Soul Savers Not the registered ones, but the ones that had slipped through the cracks You could tell the difference by the despair in their eyes, by the slow, sluggish way they moved They were remnants They were lost We stood on the platfor for the train er One