Page 15 of The Morning Star
Then nothing. Just me squatting down in the middle of a blocked-off street, my hand on a greasy, oily smear of black. I looked up and around at the passing humans, at the police tape, the parking meters, the little grassy park down the street with a fountain. There was nothing here that looked at all like what I’d seen in that weird vision, but I’d felt him. I’d seen him. And there was a lingering intuition that he was close.
Although close could be halfway across the state, or right in front of me. Just in case, I continued to look around, but there was no young punk on a bench holding a feather, only two middle-aged blonde women sitting by the fountain, a businessman talking on his phone as he walked by, a harried teacher herding six preschoolers, and a really ugly guy half-hidden by an awning, watching Gregory and the gate guardian. I frowned, feeling that strange connected sensation again—there for a split second, then gone.
Hey. I knew that guy.
I stood and walked around some singed, parked cars, but by the time I got to the other side of the street he’d gone. Weird. What was he doing here?
“Cockroach? Are you ready?”
I turned to find Gregory crossing the street toward me. The gate guardian had returned to her post, and was texting on her phone and drinking a soda. I looked back to the awning. Gone.
Or maybe not.
“Yeah, I’m done.” I headed over to Gregory feeling that creepy feeling you get when someone’s watching you. I concentrated, trying to see if I could recapture that connected sense again, but it slipped away.
Gregory went down some steps toward the waterfront. A few blocks away was the market, and a sweet coffee shop I’d always loved to frequent. At least, I hoped it was still there. It had been a while since I’d hung out in Seattle.
“Let’s not tell the others about the energy signature on the remains,” I spoke up. “Not until we’re sure it’s him. No sense in getting everyone worked up.”
“I was thinking the same,” he agreed.
We headed down another set of steps, then the angel stopped at the edge of the market and stared out into the Sound. “This all falls on your shoulders, Cockroach.”
“Find the Ancient responsible for these murders and neutralize him,” I said, knowing exactly what he meant.
The archangel hesitated. “Let’s begin with finding out exactly what’s going on, then discussing a plan to handle it once we have the facts.”
“Because you don’t think I can handle this without backup?”
“No. There are other, more personal, reasons I need to be involved in this.”
Ah. Because he feared that the energy signature on that dead enforcer was what he thought it was. He feared that Samael was alive, and that his brother was systematically killing angels.
I felt the caress of his spirit-self. “If it’s him…I don’t want him to kill you, Cockroach. You’ve integrated a portion of my spirit-self. Our joining means that I carry your energy signature just as you carry mine. I worry that if you confront him, he’ll best you and kill you because what you mean to me is obvious to anyone with wings and he will want me to suffer.”
I winced, hating that Gregory was imagining his brother this way. And I knew although he had faith in my ability to handle myself in a tough situation, he feared my sword might abandon me for its original owner, and that I might hesitate to kill the brother of my beloved.
I feared the same.
Chapter 5
I made some excuse to Gregory why I couldn’t return with him—something about wanting to buy fresh salmon and TP the Space Needle—then I headed down the side street where I’d seen the Low, hoping I could still find him.
Lows don’t leave much of an energy signature because they don’t really have much of one to begin with, so this was a bit like a bloodhound trying to trail with a plastic bag over his nose. I took to walking the few blocks around the gateway, checking out stores and eateries in hopes of spotting the guy. He had to be here for a reason. He’d been clearly watching us and the gate guardian. He didn’t realize I’d seen him, so there was a good chance he’d still be hanging around. Unless he’d gotten whatever he’d come for and moved on.
So I didn’t look completely suspicious, I did buy a few pounds of salmon.
After a few hours of wandering around I finally spotted him in a souvenir shop down by the waterfront, putting pennies into one of those machines that squashes it flat and imprints some touristy crap on either side. I walked up behind him and slapped a hand on his shoulder.
“Gimlet!”
The Low jumped about a foot in the air, whirling around so fast he practically knocked the coin machine over. Mangled pennies spilled from his hand. How many had the demon been shoving through that machine? Such a weird obsession didn’t mesh well with the thought that he had been spying on us. Although right now, with his bulging eyes, crooked teeth, and fists full of pennies, the Low didn’t look like he was capable of spying, or anything more nefarious than robbing a piggy bank.
“Iblis!” For a second I thought he was about to hit me, then he jerked out from under my arm and squatted down to pick up the fallen pennies. “Why are you in Seattle?”
I knelt down to chase one of the coins that had bounced under a display table. “Buying salmon for dinner. Why are you in Seattle?”
He held up a penny. “I’m collecting these. So far I have Bogota, Juneau, Copenhagen, Baltimore, because Columbia, Maryland didn’t have any tourist penny machines, Dakar, Bangkok, and now Seattle.”
