Children of the Fallen: Bloodlines (BOOK #3)

Chapter 44: Multitask

Morgan Sinclair

I meant what I said. I am tired of being alone and pushing people away. I'm tired of living by the standards Lucien forcibly imposed on me. He thinks caring for people, loving them is a weakness- a vulnerability and maybe he's right about that but I'd like to think I'm strong enough to be able to protect those I care about. Sure enemies can exploit them, use them against me but all that's going to do is sign their own death warrant. I'll kill them and I'll enjoy it.

I'm going to have to push through a lot. It's hard trying to connect myself to things like emotions and feelings when I've spent nearly half of my life without them- only associating them with pain and misery, or weakness. As someone who has felt weak her whole life I clung tightly to power. This means surrendering some of that power- or really what I was made to believe power is.

I've been incredibly uncomfortable for a while now because of so many things it's actually ridiculous and trying to open myself up to the possibility of feelings and relationships is making everything so much more difficult. I mean when I tried to speak to Chloe I wanted to rip my skin off but I persevered. Until I didn't. She reminisced for all of 5 seconds passing my threshold and I had to leave. I already admitted shit I have never told anyone to her I couldn't now start reminiscing. Baby steps.

The scent of blood and distant low cries pulls me and Grayson apart. Already missing the warmth of his embrace and the feel of his hands on me. My eyebrows pull together before I turn to go investigate, exiting the room. Out of the hallway into the living room/ kitchen area Victoria's over in the living room laying Pierce down on the couch as she breathes unevenly. "Victoria?" I call out.

She turns around to face me, her face puffy and red with tears staining her cheeks still pouring out from her bloodshot glassy eyes. "He's gone." Her voice cracks and right after she says it she covers her own mouth with her hand looking back at Pierce like she's holding back her own sobbing.

I look over at Pierce and my heart sinks at the sight of the hole in his chest. The lack of a heartbeat. Oh God.

I fast walk over to him, refusing to believe it but up close my heart only sinks further. He's dead. Pierce is dead. I turn around to Victoria who has lowered her hand but is standing there staring at his body as tears stream out of her eyes but she only allows out deep shaky breaths. Her eyes flick over to me and she just shakes her head, eyes wide in shock hoping that she'll wake up from this horrid nightmare. She opens her mouth but no words can exit. I step closer to her. "Who did this?"

She doesn't say anything instead she pulls me into a hug, less of a pull and more of a collapse into it. I'm startled for a moment but I quickly get a hold of myself and wrap my arms around her as she clings on, closing her fists around the fabric of my shirt. Her legs don't seem to be holding her up so I'm shouldering her weight to keep her upright. Her breath catches as she presses her face to my shoulder, crying quietly into it. Soon thereafter the door to the house opens back up and Kellan walks through holding a large cooler with Sterling and Chloe following behind. Sterling and Chloe are laughing about something but that stops the second Chloe makes eye contact with me while I'm hugging Victoria. Instantly her face drops and when she looks over at Pierce's body on the couch her face becomes a mix of pure anger and incredible sadness. "Who?" Chloe asks with all the determination in the world.

Victoria pulls back from me, she sniffles gathering herself enough to say, "Jareth is Azrael."

"What?" We all say collectively.

"He's him, he's been Azrael the whole time and I..." She runs her hands over her face sounding like she's out of breath. "Jareth is Azrael he... he killed him." Her voice cracks and shakes as she says that looking over at Pierce's body. "I didn't know what else to do with um... with his body."

Chloe quickly makes her way over to Victoria hugging her. Kellan stands in the kitchen next to the cooler biting his tongue so he doesn't say whatever he wants to say about him being right that she shouldn't have trusted them. I glare at him to ensure he doesn't loosen that hold on his tongue, he only rolls his eyes. It's silent aside from Victoria's quiet cries but the air is thick with grief. Victoria finally steps back, pale and shaky but pulled together enough to speak then tells us all everything Azrael said.

"So he wants us to fight him." Grayson states with his eyebrows pulled together. "He wants a war or a battle."

"He's so confident he's going to win he just wants to be entertained." Victoria says, no longer actively crying but her eyes are still glassy.

"What does he mean by he's ensuring the fight will be interesting?" I ask. "And what am I thanking him for?"Azrael saying that had all alarms going off in my head. What the fuck does he mean?

Victoria shrugs defeatedly. "I didn't ask."

"Fuck that and fuck him." Chloe stands up from where she had sat down on the couch. Her abrupt statement has eyebrows raising. "He wants a fight then let's fight him."

"His lightning put me on my ass." Victoria says. "I could barely move." He's the king of celestials so I assumed he'd have an ability like a high celestial but lightning? I was hoping it was something like Kendrick's where he could heal people real well not fucking lightning. The one high celestial I fought a while back had fire and that sucked but now we have Azrael of all people with lightning. "And his speed is something I've never seen before." Victoria adds on. "Not to mention he can teleport like a celestial witch."

"He's still one person." Chloe says confidently. "Obviously he has an army one that we don't know the extent of, he has nephilim, hunters, and a few witches and lycans-,"

"It sounds like we're fucked." Kellan comments.

Chloe shrugs but narrows her eyes at him. "Maybe we are. Maybe his army overwhelms us and takes us all out and we die. But before we do we're taking that fucker with us."

"So we're worried about killing him and his army and Lucien and Kendrick?" Grayson asks more to himself as he nods slowly.

"Considering that Lucien's slunk back into the shadows and Kendrick is holed up in his palace too afraid of his own shadow, Azrael is the more pressing threat right now but regardless we can multitask." Chloe responds.

"I'm in." I state. "Let's multitask."

I suggested we go to my palace, bring anyone and everyone to mine. He told Victoria to get ready quickly and he'll see her soon, soon is a bit ambiguous so everyone should be grabbing anyone willing to fight. We also need more information, numbers, weaknesses, anything really- which Chloe raised the idea to go after Zade. Even if he supposedly isn't involved there's no way he was entirely ignorant to everything his own brother was doing. Victoria agreed, jumping at the chance to torture information out of Zade and with that look in her eyes, I pity Zade the second she gets her hands on him.

Taking Kellan's truck with the tempered glass, Chloe, Victoria, and I left immediately with Pierce's body to get to New York as soon as possible. Victoria passed out the moment she sat in the car, like her body gave out from the grief and the heartache on top of the lightning. Grayson will head back to his territory to gather people keeping Lucien's dagger in his possession, while Kellan and Sterling wait here for Reid and Bash to come back later today.

Azrael wants a fight, he's going to get one.