Page 63 of Rekindled Prophecy

“You see, she’s much more important than you could possibly imagine.”

Pinpricks of pain stabbed her lower abdomen as Olivier continued his tale. “Kelly has been fun to play with over the years. But I have grown bored with the game. It’s time to take things up a notch.”

His glowing eyes lit up the darkness around them as he beamed with playful glee.

“You see, Kelly was playing right into my hands until thelove of her lifewaltzed in to give her hope.” His sneer clearly expressed what he thought of love. “WHAM! She’s pregnant! It’s a bloody miracle!”

Olivier laughed. The look in his eyes was one of fury, not jest.

“Oh, things could’ve been just lovely – for me anyway – but early indications were that the child lacked a certainquality. Sadly, in walks Abyzou to sit beside her on a plane, and ... the game continues.” Abyzou was an infertile female demon who reportedly inflicted miscarriages to compensate for her own jealousy of not being able to have her own child.

Unthinking, she jumped up to strike at the smug bastard. Out of nowhere, strong hands knocked her back so hard she toppled over the bench. She had not even seen the movement. He was that fast.

“Now, now, dear, sit down and let me finish. It’s rude to interrupt in the middle of a story.”

He held out a manicured hand, the same one he just utilized to shove her, to help her off the ground. Her palm burned as if she had touched a hot grill. Once she was settled back on the bench, he began again.

“Kelly was devastated beyond belief, poor thing. She blamed God. She blamed herself. She blamed everyone but us. Big win for me.” His smile faded into a deep scowl. “I underestimated true love.”

Trying to sound calmer than she really felt, Greylyn swallowed the saliva that had built up at the base of her throat. “So why not just admit defeat and move on? I’m sure your kind have bigger issues than a tiny woman trying to start a family.”

She hoped he would give her an indication, any indication, of what made Kelly so important. Was it because she was Nephilim? A guardian angel in waiting? Both? Neither?

“Oh, darling,” he emitted a deep-throated, sinister chuckle. “Kelly is, shall we say, vital to my plans. If not Kelly, then most definitely the child she now carries. Come on, I know you have felt the power emanating from the baby in her womb. It’s extraordinary!” His incandescent eyes gleamed in the darkness.

He was not wrong. Greylyn had sensed its light even though Kelly was barely in the second trimester. But quite frankly, she had not given it much thought, she had been too wrapped up in saving them both from a mysterious evil that she had not pondered what it meant.

She decided to agitate him on the issue to see if he would reveal anything. “So, why the monster army besieging innocents? You cannot expect me to believe that the great and mighty Olivier has nothing better to do than scare humans on a Saturday night. Shouldn’t you be overseeing a new torture chamber in the west wing of Hell or something?”

He let out another guffaw. Leaning forward, patting her knee again, Olivier positioned his face mere inches from her own. His eyes, sparkling like the Dead Sea in the middle of a raging storm, peered with steel into her own as he uttered his next words. “Kelly and all those supposed innocents in the building behind us were just the pawns to get to you, darling.”

Huh?

He allowed his words to sink in. Her stomach convulsed. Sofia had been right. This was more about her than anything. The others were in danger because of her. Kelly and the baby were simply a ploy. She did not know if she should be relieved or not.

“You see, this game started with you centuries ago. You disappointed me. Took your game piece off the chess board, so to speak. And now others may pay the price for your failure.”

She had disappointed him. How? At no point of time did she recall ever encountering Olivier.

Trying to keep her wits about her, she barely squeaked out, “So now here I am. You can leave them alone. However, if you wanted a face-to-face chat, all you had to do was ask.”

With a devious grin, Olivier stood up and motioned for Greylyn to join him. He took her arm in his again, causing nausea and a headache to surge.

A huge uproar from the demonic army surrounding them pierced the otherwise quiet night. A banshee howled in the distance mixing with the screams from the rest of the monsters encamped around them. Jasper must have broken the imprisonment spell.

Dammit!

Sure enough, several yards away Greylyn saw Jasper and the others slashing and stabbing their way through Olivier’s minions. All the while, he screamed for Olivier to unhand her. She would have laughed at his hero machismo if the situation had not been so deadly.

The overbearing fallen archangel grasped her arm in a steel-rod grip causing intense pressure and pain to shoot down into her fingertips and up to the base of her skull.

Knowing, despite Jasper’s skill, he and the hunters had no chance against this army of demonic thugs, she turned to face Olivier. “Let them walk away. They have nothing to do with this.”

“Oh, dear. This is just starting to be fun.” Flames danced in his eyes.

As if to make the point for her, one of the men, the trucker with the stained flannel shirt and beer breath, let out a screech no human should ever make. The roar of a small group of demons to the far right signaled they had delivered a death blow. Snarls permeated the air, as the victors descended on their prey, along with the repulsive noises of a feeding frenzy.

Flailing her arms and legs around with all her strength, Greylyn struggled to break free of Olivier’s clutches to no avail. His grip only tightened, as the bones in her arm crackled near the breaking point.

---