Page 65 of The Morning Star
“A two-billion-year-old Low. Show me your true form. Show me what you looked like when you were an archangel in Aaru.”
He grinned, his teeth orange. “Can’t do that, silly imp. Demons gots to have corporeal form here or they die. Angels too.”
I leaned back, growing bored with his dancing around the truth. “You’re old. You avoid the other Ancients and the angels. You’re far more powerful that you let on, and your acting sucks. That ‘I’m just a stupid Low’ shit doesn’t fly. Knock it off and show me your original corporeal form. And tell me who the fuck that pretty boy is mowing down the West Coast with an army of demons.”
Gimlet sighed and morphed before my eyes into an angel—an angel with white-blond hair, ice-blue eyes, and golden-tanned skin. The wings held tight to his back had tattered feathers of silver and black. His energy was cold and clear, a sharp contrast to his oldest brother’s heat. It was complex, the spirit-self that carried it scarred and damaged almost beyond recognition. But in spite of all that, I recognized him. It was there, that unmistakable something that clearly made him an archangel, that made it obvious he was related to the others. He was a little bit of Rafi, a little bit of Uri, a smidgen of Gabe, and a whole lot of my beloved Michael only in reverse. He made that guy in LA look like a cheap knock-off. He was eye-wateringly beautiful—so beautiful that it felt like all the air had been sucked out of the room as I looked at him.
Oh, and he was buck naked.
“So… Better looking than my imitator?” He ate another handful of Cheetos, the orange coating marring his gorgeous mouth. No, I lied. Nothing could mar that gorgeous mouth, not even orange Cheeto dust.
“Yes, you are.” I really couldn’t say more. It was difficult to do anything but stare at him and try to keep from drooling all over the mattress.
“The angels loved me like this, you know. They all turn up their noses at sensory intercourse, but get one of them alone and it’s game on.” He grinned as my gaze took in every inch of him. “Pretty sweet corporeal form, huh?”
I needed to get a grip on myself here. “Must be hard to get anything done with all the staring in the mirror.”
“It’s not all looks, you know. I’ve got the moves to back it all up.” He arched an eyebrow then reached down and gave himself a long stroke. “I’m much better in bed than my brother.”
I tore my eyes away from his lap and snatched the bag of Cheetos out of his hand. “I doubt that. What the fuck have you been doing for the last two-and-a-half-million years? Running around Hel as a Low? Seems hard to believe for the angel who fell because of the sin of pride.”
He shrugged. “Pride is overrated. I ditched that shit a long time ago. Two-and-a-half-million years ago to be precise.”
“Is that so?”
“Yep.” He snatched the Cheetos again, and pulled a bottle of beer from the six-pack with the other hand. “After we fell, I went through those five stages of grief, then I decided I was done. I tossed the sword and walked my ass right out of Hel. I haven’t been Samael, the Iblis, an archangel, since then. I’ve been Apollyon, Beelzebub, Lucifer, Old Scratch, Old Nick, but not Samael.”
“And you’ve never wanted the sword back?” I pressed. “You’ve never wanted to be the Iblis again, to lead the demons in Hel, to serve on the Ruling Council?”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” He laughed. “Call it retirement. That shit got me nowhere except banished with rotted wings and so many scars my own family probably wouldn’t recognize me. I’m done. And I’m never touching that fucking sword again.”
I didn’t push him anymore because I sensed a really deep wound under his flippant words.
“So without ever touching the sword again, give me a bit of information here. Who is the dickhead running around claiming to be Samael, and why haven’t you smited his ass for daring to impersonate you? Or who you used to be before you retired and decided to be Gimlet the Low.”
“I haven’t smited him because this whole thing is funny.” He grabbed the bag back. “I’ve got no idea who it is, and I don’t really care. Michael will kill him soon enough. He’ll go flying out there all pissed off with his sword and chop the guy into little bitty pieces before he ever realizes it’s not me.”
I winced at the bitterness that burned around the edges of his casual tone. “Michael would hold back if he thought it was you.” Actually his brother would probably refuse to fight him at all, would bare his neck to the stroke of Samael’s sword as some sort of apology for what he’d done. But I didn’t tell him that because the asshole in LA wasn’t Samael, and the real one didn’t have a sword or apparently any interest in any sort of revenge on his brother. “Now, stop being a dick. And don’t eat all the fucking Cheetos.”
“I am a dick. It’s how I roll.”
He held the bag out of my reach, cramming a huge handful into his mouth and spilling crumbs onto my bed as he spoke. In anyone else it would have been disgusting, but this angel was so damned gorgeous I was pretty sure he could do anything and it wouldn’t be disgusting.
I gave up on the Cheetos and just drank my beer instead. “Yeah, I get that, Gimlet. What about the note? You’re the one who left it on my table. Are you working with this fake-Samael? Did you somehow instigate this whole thing?”
He laughed. “The note? That was pure inspiration. That fake-Samael asshole assigned some poor greed demon to deliver it. The guy was pissing himself, because he knew the moment he showed up at your door with that note, he was as good as dead. So I offered to deliver it for a price. And of course I embellished on it a bit. I had to make it sound less ranty and more like it actually came from me. Got you off your ass though, didn’t it?”
It had. “And the fire demon in Seattle? Was that blast meant for you or for me?”
“You. But I know Coapt, and was worried he’d put a few puzzle pieces together. Well, that and I didn’t want him to give you too much information. What’s the fun in that?”
I’d gone into this hoping I could talk him into helping us, and maybe into reconciling with his brothers. But I was getting the impression that Samael wasn’t going to go along with either of those two ideas.
“So what’s your game plan? Run around disguised as a Low for the rest of your life, hope none of your siblings recognize you, let some asshole Ancient impersonate you and destroy all life on this planet?”
“Yeah. Pretty much that.”
I stared at him, hoping to intimidate him into elaborating. I should have known better.
