Bad Luck, Baby

26 - Bad Feeling

"Well? What does it mean?" I prompted, as Al pushed his glasses up his nose, ran a shaking hand through his thinning blond hair, and set the book he'd been studying aside.

We'd taken the handwritten journals back downstairs, and sat around the kitchen table, poring over them. Well, Al pored over them while Ro and I waited impatiently for him to finish. He'd said he wanted to be sure he understood completely before he told us anything, but it was hard not to interrupt him when he got paler and shakier by the minute.

"Some parts are difficult to decipher," he hedged, rubbing sweat from his brow. "I've studied Enochian, but—"

"I suggest you spit it out before I tear it out of you with my claws," Ro said mildly, his soft tone more chilling than if he'd snapped.

Al pinched the bridge of his nose. "All right. Where to start... The lettering, I suppose."

He gestured at the symbols on the page.

"This is Enochian. Back in the early 1500s, there was a man named John Dee, who claimed to have received knowledge of an angelic language, directly from angels themselves. This is that language. Since that time, it's been used in ritual magic and for various arcane and occult purposes. Some say Dee was a hoaxer. Others believe the knowledge he received through his medium is imperfect, but genuine. Your father was of the latter persuasion."

Al took a breath and met my eyes.

"Oscar believed that Enochian was a real language, and that it could be used to summon angels. He also believed it was the key to trapping them in this world, and possibly forcing them into service for the summoner. He devoted a lot of time and energy into deciphering it and attempting to correct what he believed were errors."

"How do you know all that?" I asked.

"Because as fascinated as your father was by the prospect of harnessing angelic power, he had another goal, which was to keep that power out of the wrong hands. He was working with Lucian Drake to discover and infiltrate 'angelic cults' and to confiscate their knowledge. Eventually, he got in deep, and he got into trouble."

"What kind of trouble?" Ro asked. His yellow eyes were slits, and his claws dented the fabric of his shirt where he grasped his own arms. He sat very still, but I could sense the tension in him, and imagined that if he were in cat form, the hair on his back would be raised. "Oscar never spoke of anything like this to me."

Al took a breath. "There's a reason for that. I'm getting to it. Anyway, Oscar was convinced that one of the other Thrones was deep into angelic research, and he'd hired me to help him look into it. He became increasingly paranoid, and didn't even trust Lucian, entirely, by the end. He was determined to discover which Throne was behind it, but my suspicion is... they discovered him first."

"All right. So what do the books say?" Ro pressed.

Al swallowed and shook his head. "It's... complicated." He looked at me. "And all you have is my word that what I'm saying is the truth. It's..."

"Just tell me," I said. "I'll decide if I believe you or not."

He nodded and swallowed again, then took a sip of water, setting the glass back down with a shaking hand.

"Oscar's been into this a while—much longer than I thought. Since shortly after he ascended as Ivy, in fact. The Vestigers had discovered a cult of witches who'd been attempting to summon angels. The cult wasn't just summoning angels, though—they were trying to trap one here and harness its power. Apparently, they were partly successful, but only once."

He licked his lips and glanced at Ro.

"As I explained, angels aren't like demons, exactly. They can't take physical form in this world, but—in theory, at least—they can possess a host. Unfortunately, the host's original soul is destroyed in the process. According to Oscar's notes, the cult successfully summoned a lesser angel and trapped it within a human body. After that, things—ironically—went to hell."