Aliah’s eyes flicked to mine and then narrowed into cruel slits of concentrated hatred. I forced myself to remain surefooted without taking a step back, although under the heat of his gaze all my body wanted to do was flinch away.

“Oh right, how forgetful of me,” Aliah murmured, his gaze softening. It wasn’t as though he looked at me with less hatred or malice, it was more like there was a purpose behind his words now that somehow altered the unfiltered line of loathing he had been pouring into me. “I got so caught up in reminiscing that I neglected to introduce myself.”

Sometimes when an Angel was old, like really old and had spent a significant amount of time in Heaven they would have an accent. It wasn’t a strong sound and didn’t affect words obviously, but the gentle strain to each syllable reminded the listener that English, or any Earthly language was not their first. Aliah had the accent, which made his betrayal, his conversion to the dark side much more tragic.

“I know who you are,” I said evenly, although his name and intimate knowledge of one of his assumingly long list of misdeeds hardly counted as anything.

“But I don’t know who you are,” he spat, his features energized with the accusation.

I laughed in response. “Of course you do,” I sneered. “Isn’t that why you’re here?”

“For you?” his eyes followed every line and feature of my body from the top of my hairline to the tips of my toes and back up again, slowly, intimately. I willed myself not to shift under his hungry eyes, but I felt naked in his gaze, completely exposed and it was possibly the most uncomfortable I had ever felt in my entire life. I cleared my throat in a gesture to regain his attention but he was not someone easily affected by others. “Not today, Stella Day. I’m here for you,” his eyes fell to Seth and I had the instinctive urge to step in front of him, to shield him with my body and protect him from whatever Aliah was going to say.

“That’s a good thing, Aliah, I’ve been waiting for this day for a long time,” Seth clipped his words carefully, making sure to enunciate everything.

“So you’re ready to come with me now?” Aliah asked, knowing full well that was not what Seth was implying. “It was unfair of me to ask you when you were so little, when you had so little experience. But now…. now you are a big strong man with the ability to make his own decisions. I’m giving you another opportunity. Give in to the whispers that have threaded themselves around your heart, give in to those desires that keep you up at night…. come with me. Join me.”

Aliah’s voice was like velvet, floating over every word, seducing the listener with his fluidity and promise. I waited for Seth to snap at him, to shout at him or attack him, but instead Seth shifted uncomfortably next to me, before simply shaking his head. It wasn’t the crushing verbal response I was hoping for, but the gesture seemed to provoke the same kind of concrete absolutism.

“You want to, Seth, why not just give in?” Aliah asked, prodding Seth’s patience. “If not for yourself then, how about Seven? She misses you, you know. She often asks about her little brother and wonders if he’s alright. Don’t you hate to disappoint your sister?”

My mouth fell open at the mention of Seven.

Why I expected Aliah to play fair was beyond me, but still, bringing up the beloved sister that

had betrayed your parents and left you to fend for yourself was a little harsh…

“Don’t say her name, don’t ever say her name,” Seth growled, his words low and so menacing I had to look at him to make sure it was still him speaking.

“Why? Is it too soon? The wound still fresh?” Aliah asked, humor returning to his voice.

“Enough of this,” Seth warned. He stood perfectly still, no muscle moving, not even a tick in his jaw. His skin glowed brilliantly in the dark alley, but instead of comforting me this time, it almost frightened me with the intensity of his inner light.

Unlike Angels that still held goodness inside of them, Fallen shone with a different light, their inner goodness having been corrupted. Both Aliah and Saul emanated a dark light that was lighter than the night sky, but had to still be described as darkness. A grayish hue encompassed both of their figures, as if their evil essence seeped out from their skin and infected the innocent air around them.

“Tired of reminiscing already? We just started our walk down memory lane, let’s not give up yet. It might be healthy for you to work through your…. issues. Possibly come to terms with the nightmares? The dark, haunting thoughts….? Maybe even embrace them?” Aliah’s voice had turned sickly sweet and my stomach churned violently against his meaning. Was Seth really struggling against the Darkness?

“Holy hell, you are such a conniving bastard!” The words and accusation slipped out before I could stop myself. Although I meant every word I said, it was definitely not Star-protocol to engage the enemy, especially when I was just calling them names.

To my surprise Seth let out a bark of laughter that rang scornfully in the air.

“Well aren’t you something special?” Aliah’s expression had turned to something like surprise mixed with respect, which scared me more than any of his threats combined.

“I’m tired of this conversation,” I scowled, drawing a short and thin but unquestionably deadly sword from the sheath strapped to my thigh. Skirts had definitely become part of my every day wardrobe now that I needed to carry weapons around. While maybe impractical for the actual battle portion of the evening, they still made access to weapons super easy.

“Now, now let’s be reasonable,” Aliah patronized us patiently after Seth had quickly drawn his own sword from his back strap, hidden beneath his worn leather jacket. “We’re not here to fight, not yet anyway. We just want to talk to you. Besides you might want to wait until your cavalry arrives before you start pulling out the big guns, you kids aren’t quite up to speed to fight at this level just yet.”

“We’ll be the judge of that,” Seth replied, and I could tell he was just as amused as Aliah was. I shook my head slowly at the two mortal enemies practically laughing their way through this confrontation.

Aliah’s white teeth glinted from across the alley and I watched his lips curl into a taunting snarl. “You’re not going to get your revenge tonight Seth, but it’s been so fun catching up. Let’s do it again soon.”

Saul barked a laugh next to him, and I began to wonder if the evil had made them deranged. This was the craziest, least productive conversation I’d ever had.

Before I could even contemplate the night too closely though, the sky above our heads was lit up with an incredible light that uncovered every space in the narrow alley. Saul shielded his eyes against the blinding brightness, but Aliah stared straight on, unblinking and unflinching.

Seth and I never took our eyes off the two Fallen however, our training wouldn’t let us. I felt them as they landed around us, Serena and Nate, Jupiter, my parents. They had joined us, gotten here as fast as they could to fight this battle with us. I felt more than saw their surprise that we weren’t engaged in fighting yet, although I also knew they would be relieved. Fallen were difficult enemies to begin with, put it to test with our inexperience and young age, and the likelihood of victory had looked bleak.

“Welcome ladies and gentlemen, how good of you to finally arrive,” Aliah held out his hands cavalierly, his smile turning to a seemingly genuine gesture. He was perfectly handsome, almost so much that it hurt to look at him. And even with the dark glow of evil casting dark shadows across his masculine features, he still seemed to retain some of the light from heaven, as if once upon a time he had been so good and so pure that no matter the amount of Darkness poured into his soul, it would never erase the light he once lived in.

The thought made me sick to my stomach.

“Aliah,” Serena hissed. I felt the Angels around me bristle at the sound of his name. “What would bring you out of the pits of Hell to grace us with your presence?”

“Hell doesn’t hold me yet, Serena,” Aliah’s eyes narrowed angrily.

“It’s only your master then? Not yet your home?” Serena’s fiery antagonism punched through the night and my respect for her instantly grew in large amounts. I couldn’t deny the sinking, drowning feeling of fear I felt as Aliah reacted to her words, yet she stood behind me unflinching and proud.

“I serve no master,” Aliah promised in a deathly calm voice. “That is why I chose this path, or don’t you remember? There is no authority to order me around or send me to my death. I am my own god.”

“So Lucifer holds no authority over you?” Serena taunted. “The Elders must have lied to us as children then.”

“Enough,” Aliah snarled. “We are not here to fight you tonight. My only purpose was to reunite with an old friend and make a new one.” He gestured his hand towards Seth and then me.

“You might not be here to fight tonight,” my father announced with the strong voice of an Angel Warrior, “but we are.”

“I wish I could oblige,” Aliah replied wistfully and then two things happened at once and so quickly I didn’t have time to react.

The first was that I felt an evil presence surround us. My head whipped around to find the source, but nothing seemed out of place except for our group gathered in the alley. My eyes quickly fell to the Angels surrounding me but all eyes stayed forcefully glued on Aliah and Saul, no one seemed to notice anything else out of the ordinary. The presence was strong though, strong enough to send a chill shuddering over my body and the hairs on the back of my neck pricking painfully with fearful anticipation.

The second thing that happened was when I turned my head back to warn the Warriors standing with me about a rear assault the words were taken from my mouth in a violent swoop. Aliah had wrapped his arms around me and taken off for the skies before I could even decipher what had happened. We flew upwards faster than any Angel I had ever heard of, eating up the space between Seth and those who had come to save us and wherever Aliah was planning on taking me.

Saul had kept pace for a few short seconds, just long enough to rip the sword out of my shocked hands before he took off in another direction. Aliah had wrapped his hands and arms around me in a very intimate, caressing way, his hot breath irritated my neck as he held my body close to him in an iron tight grip. I felt violated and nauseous. His suffocating evil seeped into my skin, leaving a chilling paralysis. I struggled against him, but the harder I fought, the more Darkness he injected in to me.

I had let myself get kidnapped and now I was weaponless and in the mercy of the worst evil on Earth.

Awesome.

“You’re different than what I expected,” Aliah whispered indifferently in my ear. I shouldn’t have been able to hear him with the whipping, violent wind as we careened through the sky, but his words sunk into my skin and slithered over my body, grating themselves deep inside my bones. I would never forget this conversation, I knew that instinctively, it would haunt me for the rest of my life, however long that lasted.