18

“That’s not funny, Leda,” Ivy said, furrowing her brows.

I pointed at the photo on her phone. “I saw that woman die in front of my eyes.”

“That’s impossible.”

“Your mother is named Rose,” I told her. “She runs a cheesy psychic readings shop in the city, but she is the real deal. She’s a telepath—a ghost—but she’s been hiding her gift because if the gods found out about her, they would take her away.”

Ivy’s mouth dropped. “How can you possibly know about that?”

“I know because your mom is friends with my foster mother Calli. And because when we paid her a visit in New York, we found her dying in a pool of her own blood. She said a dark angel attacked her.” I shook my head. “No, something else is going on here. You petitioned the Legion to heal your mother’s cancer by turning her into a vampire. When your petition was rejected, she must have taken matters into her own hands. She made a deal with the demons. In exchange for them healing her, she agreed to help them.”

“Help them do what?” Drake asked.

“Build a demon army. And… Oh, shit.” I bounced off the bed, jumping to my feet. “I have to go. Take care of Ivy,” I told Drake as I hurried toward the door. “I’ll be back.”

I ran out of the room and to the stairwell. I took the stairs two at a time, rushing higher and higher. The higher ranked officers of the Legion had their rooms on the top level of the building. Whatever was going on in this war between gods and demons, it went deep. Rose had been turned to their side. What if some of the Legion had too? I had to bring this to the top, to Nero. He couldn’t have been turned. The angel was a stickler for regulations and protocol. To him, disloyalty was a four-letter word. With exclamation points.

Sucking in hot, heaving breaths, I burst into the hallway on the top floor. I ran past doors neatly marked with each officer’s name, silently thanking the Legion for their overly-developed organization skills. Near the end of the hallway I found a door that read ‘Colonel Nero Windstriker’. I knocked on it twice, nice and calm. Half a minute passed—and so did a pair of captains who shot me harsh looks—but Nero didn’t answer. I’d just lifted my fist to knock again when the door across the hall opened and Harker stepped out.

“Leda?” He froze as his eyes met mine, taking in my ruffled appearance. “What’s wrong?”

“I need to speak to Nero. About the mission,” I added quickly as disappointment flashed in his eyes.

“He had to leave the city,” Harker said. “He’s leading another raid on a potential rogue vampire site.”

What wretched timing.

“Maybe I can help you,” Harker said. “I’m in charge until Nero returns.”

I glanced up and down the hall, my mouth tightening. He seemed to realize I was feeling really paranoid about eavesdroppers at the moment because he pushed his door wide open and motioned me forward.

“Please come in,” he said.

I took him up on his offer, following him into his room—no apartment, I realized as I entered a living room that was larger than the dormitory room I shared with five other people. The floors were oak, the windows floor-to-ceiling, and the furniture looked like it belonged in a castle. There were two doors off to the side of the living room. I saw a large canopy bed in one and an in-floor hot tub in the other. Making it high in the Legion certainly had its perks.

But I didn’t have time to stop and admire the opulence. I turned to Harker, who was looking at me like I’d cracked.

“I want to help you, Leda,” he said. “Are you struggling with what happened in the Wilds?”

“What?” I asked, confused until I realized he was talking about the werewolf I’d killed. “No, it’s not that. It’s something else.”

He waited for me to talk, keeping his distance as though he realized I needed my pacing room.

“What if I told you I had a lead on a rogue vampire site inside the city, one that might lead us back to the demons?”

His face was carefully neutral. “How do you know this?”

“It’s just a hunch,” I said. “It might not pan out. But if it does…”

“We could wipe out the demons’ operation in the city.” He nodded. “We cannot allow them to gain a foothold into our world. What do you know?”

I hesitated.

“Leda, you are a soldier of the Legion of Angels. You have sworn to protect this Earth and its people from the demons and monsters. I can help you, but you have to trust me.”

I chewed on my lip, thinking it over. “Ok.” I summarized what I knew about Rose and her deal with the demons, leaving out the part with my brother of course. My first loyalty was still to Zane, Legion or no Legion.

Harker listened to me speak, the perfect audience.

“Ivy’s mother was turned by the vampires, the ones working for the demons,” I finished. “If we find her, we’ll find the demons.”

“She works for them,” he said, frowning as though the idea tasted bitter on his tongue.

“She was dying. In pain. Suffering,” I defended her. “It’s not her fault. We have to save her, not harm her.”

Harker stared at me for a moment, as though he were trying to read my intentions in my eyes. “Ok,” he finally said. “Let’s do it. We’ll save her.”

“Thank you.”

“We learn to deal out punishment here. But we also learn mercy.”

I rushed forward, closing the distance between us to hug him. “We can’t tell anyone in the Legion. They would make Rose suffer for what she’s done.”

I expected him to argue, to tell me I was asking the impossible, but he just said, “This is just between the two of us.”

I squeezed him tightly to me, happy to have discovered that there was something left of humanity after all.

“How will we find her?” he asked me after I let him go.

“With this,” I said, showing him the shipping slip I’d peeled from Ivy’s cookie box.

* * *

Harker and I geared up and went to go pay a visit to Deliverance, the shipping company who’d delivered Ivy’s cookies. Back when I’d been a bounty hunter scouting for information, I’d had to do things like this really indirectly. You couldn’t just walk into the office of the world’s largest delivery company and demand to see their shipping records for the last two days. That was, unless you worked for the Legion of Angels. We had the list in under five minutes, along with a hot cup of coffee and a brownie. I could get used to this.

Unfortunately for us, whoever had sent the cookies had used a fake return address. I seriously doubted that the First Paranormal Police Precinct of New York City had sent Ivy a box of sweets. Harker had the Deliverance receptionist call up the delivery guy for that package.

And that’s how we ended up here outside of Sweet Dreams, the city’s newest bakery. They’d set up shop just a few weeks ago. The delivery guy hadn’t known anything more about the shipping records than Deliverance’s computer system, but he had recognized the cookie I showed him. That triple chocolate recipe with a sprinkle of fairy’s breath was exclusive to one bakery: Sweet Dreams.

Darkness was falling on the city. When we reached the bakery, we found a ‘Closed’ sign over the door, but there were lights on inside. Harker pulled out a tiny piece of metal the size and shape of a beetle. As soon as he switched on the Magitech, the little bug hopped out of his hand and scuttled under the door to the shop.

We watched its progress from Harker’s phone screen, which allowed us to see everything the bug did. The front area was your typical bakery parlor. Rows of sweets sat behind glass counters. Cookies, muffins, cinnamon rolls…a glass dish of candies and chocolates on the countertop next to the register.

A woman wearing a pink-and-white striped apron stood in front of one of these counters. Opposite her were two young couples, holding hands and looking around like at any moment something might jump out from behind one of the counters and kill them. The apron lady tapped her earpiece, as though she’d just received instructions, then she opened the door into the back area, waving the two couples through.

As they disappeared into the back, we hurried to the front door. Using another piece of Magitech, Harker had it open in two seconds. An aroma of baked sweets and flowers tickled my nose as we stepped quickly but softly across the checkered vinyl floor and followed the procession deeper into the building.

Ahead of us, neither the apron lady nor the couples said a word. The couples were still looking around nervously, as though they expected the gods’ wrath to strike them down where they stood. These must have been new recruits to the demons’ army. Of course they were nervous if they were about to betray the gods. The gods weren’t exactly known for forgiveness.

We passed baking ovens and preparation tables, stoves and supplies. The whole place was very sterile—and very, very creepy.

We passed through another door. This one brought us to an area that looked more like a warehouse than a bakery. The walls were covered in sheets of discolored metal, and the ground squeaked like the floor of a parking garage. There were storage shelves all around the room, and it was behind one of them that Harker and I hid as the procession in front of us came to a stop.

The apron lady, who I could now smell was a vampire, held a clipboard in front of her. “Marla and Vincent,” she said, looking at one of the couples. “It says here that you have been on the waiting list to be turned into vampires for nearly a year. And that Vincent—” She glanced at the man. “Is terminally ill.”

“Yes,” Marla said, her voice a hard rasp, even parts fear and determination. “He has only months left.” She squeezed the man’s hand. “And we don’t wish to be separated.”

“I’m sure we can help you with your problem,” the aproned vampire said, then turned to the second couple. “Adara and Jaden. You come from different vampire houses, Adara from House Vermillion and Jaden from House Snowfire. Your lords do not permit unions to vampires outside their walls.”

Forbidden love. So what we had here in these two couples was a regular Romeo and Juliet and yet again a few people stuck at the wrong end of a very long vampire waiting list. The demons were building their army from the desperate and disgruntled, people like Rose and these couples. And this bakery was the front for their vampire-turning operation.

“So how does this work exactly?” the vampire Jaden asked nervously.

“My supervisor will arrive shortly to explain everything,” the aproned vampire said with a sugar-coated smile.

I wondered if any of them knew what they were getting into. This wasn’t just an information evening on The Basics of Insurgence at the friendly local bakery. If they didn’t agree to the demons’ deal, they wouldn’t be walking out of here. Letting anyone go would inevitably lead the Legion to their doorstep.

Except I’d jumped the gun. We were already here. The question was what we were going to do about it. There were only two of us. Harker could easily handle the five of them himself if things turned ugly, but I had a feeling there were more people in this building.

A door opened across the warehouse. Sharp, confident footsteps echoed off the walls as a new arrival strode across the room. As the supervisor came into the light, I realized it wasn’t a demon or even another vampire. It was Rose.

“Welcome,” she declared with a wide smile as a dozen doors opened all across the warehouse, and vampires poured out, surrounding us.