Page 5 of Conquest (The Four Horsemen #1)

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Conquest sat up straighter on his sofa, uncaring that his laptop fell to the floor, when he felt it; a shift in power too big to be normal.

It had come from further south, the sunny beaches of Florida.

It was like a blip on his radar, burning bright one instant and gone in the next.

War opened a single eye from where he was lying on the opposite sofa. “What was that?”

A power surge like that could only mean one thing. “Archangel,” Conquest murmured. An Archangel had come to Earth.

War half sat, using a hand to hold himself upright. “Not Uriel,” he said.

“Unfortunately, no,” Conquest said. It was too bad, he enjoyed ruffling the ice Archangel’s feathers. Uriel was still pissy over the fact that Conquest had stolen his bow, and refused to return it. As if he would give up such a precious bargaining tool. Besides, it was a special kind of poetry whenever he got to shoot Uriel with his own weapon.

“Then who?”

It hadn’t been a presence he had recognized. Conquest pushed his energy out, tried to sense it. But he couldn’t, it was just gone. Not even a flicker of energy left behind. How unusual.

“Replacement for Michael?” War wondered.

“No,” Conquest disagreed. “They’ll still be waiting for him to resurrect.” It was taking him longer than was normal but Conquest knew he would be back. Michael had too much to live for.

Conquest summoned Victory as War summoned Feud.

“I’ll let Famine and Death know we might have contact,” War said, as he mounted his flaming mare.

Conquest nodded. Perhaps now they would get some answers about their summons, since none of their investigations had turned up anything so far.

Conquest was outraged that it took him three days to find his quarry, even with the help of his mare. By that point, he was beyond ready to unleash the full wrath of his power on the unknown Archangel that had somehow found a way to block him.

Not even the idiot Uriel had managed to do that.

The fact that the Archangel wasn’t actively looking for him was worrisome. What would they be doing on the Mortal Dimension if not to make contact with the Horsemen? Famine had been sure Diablo hadn’t summoned them and Conquest believed him. That only left God. But if the Archangel wasn’t here for them? An Archangel on Earth was too rare not to have an important purpose.

The uncertainty infuriated Conquest. When he found this elusive Archangel he had no intention of talking to it; he would send its bloodied and broken wings back to its Master. In pieces.

Conquest found it sitting on a bench along the many paths of the winding beach. It was staring raptly at the expanse of blue crisp water.

The first thing Conquest noticed was that it was no Archangel. Hell, it was barely even an Angel. Conquest couldn’t sense anything about it. No wonder it had taken him so fucking long to find it. He’d never seen anything, living or dead, with such a disturbing lack of aura energy. It seemed almost deliberate. Conquest would have thought it was deliberate but another disturbing thing he had noticed was the lack of wings. He didn’t know any Angel, no matter the ranking, that would ever elect to have their wings removed.

What the fuck was this thing?

Conquest approached, making no attempt to hide it. He stood a mere foot behind it, and the Angel didn’t appear to notice him.

Conquest narrowed his eyes at the strange creature.

Its hair was the purest black he had ever seen, glimmering almost blue in the sunlight. It was long enough to curl a little around the bottom of its ears. It was wearing the generic Angelic robes, and looked so small on the bench, hunched in on itself.

It was dirty and disheveled, and the most pathetic sight Conquest had ever seen. He sneered. It wasn’t even worth the minuscule amount of energy it would take to kill it.

Conquest stepped so close to the Angel that he could smell it, could slip a hand around the delicate neck and snuff its life out with one twist. With so little ethereal energy, that might even be enough to finish it.

Conquest bent closer, his breath teasing at the Angel’s ear.

Not even a twitch. Even the weakest of Angel-born would have noticed him by this point.

What was God playing at, letting something so weak roam, unattended, on Earth? If a Demon had found it, it would have been in for a world of pain.

“Baby Angel,” Conquest whispered.

The Angel jumped. Honest to Christ startled.

It rose in an instant, whirling to stare at the spot where Conquest stood.

Conquest got his first proper look at the Angel that God somehow thought would bring him to his knees.

It was short, roughly five-five, possibly five-four. Its feet were bare and filthy. Its black hair was sticking out at ridiculous angles from its delicate face. Impossibly bright blue eyes that were dilated in what Conquest could feel was pure, heady fear.

In that moment, on a whim, Conquest decided he was going to keep it. He would have fun breaking this toy. He wouldn’t send the wings back - couldn’t anyway, since it didn’t even have any. Such a crying shame.

He would send God’s precious child back to him eventually; twisted, battered and irrevocably tainted.

The Angel squinted, like it was unsure what it was seeing. Even now, when the Angel knew something was there, it still couldn’t properly make him out.

Conquest almost pitied it. He knew what the Heavens would have been like for one such as him. To give them their due - much as it disgusted him to do so - the Archangels weren’t known to be cruel without provocation. Uriel was a mean motherfucker but he always had a reason. The Angels, however? So many of them were spineless, disgusting leeches of immortality. It was rare that any were worthy of becoming a higher-level Angel, let alone an Archangel. They were merely Demons in a white outfit.

Conquest gathered his energy and flickered into being, for the Angel’s eyes only.

Its eyes widened as Conquest appeared, but its retinas weren’t burnt out and it didn’t die in burning agony. Conquest wouldn’t have been surprised if it had though, it was so close to a human form.

“Conquest,” it whispered in horror. “How did you-”

Conquest circled the bench, amused when the Angel took a step back. As though that would somehow save it. Where did it think it could go? It didn’t have wings so it couldn’t fly away, though that wouldn’t have done it any good. Its lack of power also meant the chances of it summoning the teleporting fog were precisely zero.

For all intents and purposes, it was practically mortal.

Conquest grabbed the Angel’s upper arm, his entire hand fitting around the slender muscles. He tugged it closer, smelling the curve of its neck. It didn’t bother to struggle, telling Conquest that maybe it wasn’t as stupid as it looked.

Conquest couldn’t sense its memories, couldn’t pick up even a hint of anything below the surface. He tugged at the power of his crown as he tried to get inside the Angel’s mind. It was suspiciously blank, and there was a barrier Conquest couldn’t get through.

He sneered as he shoved it away. “What are you?”

“An-an Angel?”

Conquest wasn’t so sure of that. God’s stink was all over it, and he rarely bothered to mingle with the lower ranks of the Heavens. No other being was powerful enough to block someone’s mind from him like this. “Your name, what is it?”

The Angel shook its head and took a step back, slipping on the sand beneath its feet. Conquest could feel the unsteady beat of its heart across the distance between them. It was terrified and Conquest was enjoying himself immensely.

“I’ll give you one guess what will happen if you don’t tell me.”

“It’s Raziel,” it blurted out.

Raziel. An interesting name. Not fit for an Angel of this caliber. He wondered who had named it. “God has protected you, why?”

“What?”

“One guess,” Conquest reminded it. He was not in the habit of repeating himself. If the Angel wanted to learn that the hard way, so be it.

Raziel took another step back. The sand was too unsteady and it fell backwards. It stared at Conquest in horror.

“Well, up you get,” Conquest cajoled. He tilted his head, studying it as it scrambled to its feet. If it was always this clumsy then Conquest could understand how its robe had gotten so dirty. The Mortal Dimension wasn’t the cleanest place in the universe.

Raziel’s eyes flickered left and right, as though looking for an escape route.

“Now, now,” Conquest said mockingly. “Don’t run yet, we’ve only just met.”

“Are you going to kill me?” Its voice was shaky and breathless. A sweeter sound had never been heard.

“Oh no, baby Angel, I’m not going to kill you.”

When Conquest was done, the Angel would merely wish that he had.

He twisted his powers of persuasion around the Angel’s small frame. “Go to sleep,” he whispered.

Conquest caught the Angel in his arms as its eyes slid closed and it dropped.

* * *

Raziel jerked awake, gasping for air. He glanced around frantically, panic setting in.

His gaze caught on the silver scale pendant hanging on a chain and hovering over him. He kept looking up to find light blue eyes watching him calmly. They were framed by an angular face with flawless skin, high cheekbones and shoulder length brown wavy hair.

It took his brain a moment to connect the image to the pendant. Famine.

“Steady your breathing. It’s just from Con’s power, it will ease.”

Con? Conquest?

Did Conquest bring him here to be tortured and killed by the Law-Giver? If Raziel could have picked his ending this wouldn’t have been it. If he was to die, couldn’t it have been nice and quick?

Raziel struggled against the hands holding him down. His head turned to find eight eyes of various sizes staring at him. He screamed and scrambled to his feet, retreating until his back hit a wall.

The hideous creature was still staring at him. It looked like a spider but it couldn’t be. In all of Raziel’s studies he’d never heard of one that big. And it only had six legs. He still wasn’t entirely sure the Archangels hadn’t deposited him in some obscure dimension at the ends of the universe.

“Your new toy is a bit skittish,” Famine said wryly.

“He’s pathetic.”

Raziel jumped as Conquest materialized beside him. He looked almost exactly the same as he had when Conquest had first revealed himself. Insanely tall, though most beings were in comparison to Raziel. His face was round, with a chiseled jaw that reminded Raziel of the Greek statues he remembered seeing in a book. His black beard was neatly trimmed, and his hair was thick and swept to the side. It had a slight kink in it that made Raziel think something invisible was sitting on it. Most likely his Focus, his black glass and white crystal crown. Raziel had seen pictures; he wondered if it looked as beautiful in person, though he doubted he would ever find out. Conquest’s grey eyes were cold and frightening, and matched the single stud in his left ear.

The only difference was that Conquest was no longer wearing the sharp and jagged black, white lined armor, with the sweeping black cape. He was now wearing a crisp suit. The black jacket was open, the white shirt doing nothing to hide the bulk underneath.

Raziel knew that the Horsemen were not to be trifled with but he had never truly understood why until that moment. The figure beside him was larger than life and Raziel felt exceptionally small. Smaller than he’d ever felt before.

The same deep-seated fear he’d felt on the beach flooded him.

God had said that they would intervene if any of the Horsemen found him. So how was he here, with no rescue in sight?

The spider moved toward him and Raziel screamed again. He bolted around Conquest to put him between them. Raziel didn’t care how horrific Conquest was, there was no way he could be worse than that thing.

“You’re going to hurt Paul’s feelings,” Famine said. “And that would hurt my feelings.”

“You don’t want to hurt his feelings,” Conquest rumbled.

Raziel wrapped trembling arms around himself, hunching over and backing further away from Conquest and the spider. This couldn’t be real. This couldn’t be happening. He couldn’t be here. They’d said they would intervene. They had promised.

Conquest stepped out of the way and Raziel was face to face with the giant spider, Paul. What kind of name was that for a monster?

“Move, and I’ll kill you,” Conquest said.

The spider reared its legs up and pressed them against Raziel’s forearms. Raziel squeezed his eyes shut, terror keeping him frozen in place.

The giant pedipalp feelers were so close to Raziel’s cheek he could feel each individual, tiny hair. A tear slipped from the corner of his eye and the feeler touched it, the tiny hairs brushing against him.

Raziel whimpered, wishing that someone, anyone, would just kill him now.

The feelers moved away, and the pressure from its legs disappeared. Raziel opened one eye tentatively and trembled violently with relief when he saw that the spider had moved back to Famine, curling around his leg.

“Guess you pass,” Famine said.

Pass? Pass what? And if he hadn’t? Would Paul have eaten him?

Raziel’s stomach let go and he threw up.

“Well, that’s disgusting,” Famine said. “I’ll leave you to clean this one up, Con. Call me when you’re ready?”

Conquest inclined his head.

The black teleporting fog enveloped Famine and Paul, and when it dissipated they were gone.

Raziel was terrified to look at Conquest. What was he going to do to him now?

Movement out of the corner of his eye caused Raziel to jump backwards. He tripped over his robe and fell to the floor. A strange purple stream of light hit the mess Raziel had made and it disappeared. Raziel stared in disbelief at Conquest.

Conquest stepped forward and Raziel tried to scramble backward. A boot on the hem of his robe stopped his movements.

“Stand up.”

Raziel stared up at the Horseman defiantly, hoping that his face wasn’t betraying how petrified he was. He was shaking so badly he was unsure if he could actually stand.

“If I have to ask you again, standing will be the least of your problems,” Conquest warned.

Raziel swallowed hard and pushed his palms against the floor to heave himself up. His arms wobbled and he fell forward.

The next moment he was yanked roughly to his feet and slammed into the wall so hard his teeth rattled.

“Why are you here?” Conquest asked.

“Wh-what?”

“God sent you. Why?”

Raziel shook his head. “No.” He already knew how this would end. There would be no rescue; he was going to die. Blurting out secrets that weren’t his to tell wasn’t going to save him. He didn’t have any secrets, of course, but Conquest didn’t know that.

“No?” Conquest drawled. He crowded Raziel against the wall. “Raziel. Let’s play a little game. You tell me what I want to know,” he leaned in close, pressing his cheek against Raziel’s, “and I don’t hurt you.” He curled a hand to lay menacingly around Raziel’s throat. It wasn’t pressing hard enough to restrict Raziel’s breathing, but Raziel knew that it was just an illusion. Conquest had him exactly where he wanted him and he knew it. They both knew it. “Are you ready to play?”

“I don’t-I don’t know-they didn’t-” Raziel stuttered. He didn’t know anything. No-one even spoke to him in the Heavens, why would they tell him their secrets? Why would they gift him with the kind of knowledge that a Horseman would want?

“Wrong answer.” Conquest squeezed and Raziel let out a broken sob. “Try again. Why did they send you?”

“They-they wanted me to report back.” Please stop hurting me, he wanted to beg, but he knew that would only make it worse. He had heard stories about the Horsemen, knew what they were capable of.

“Report what?” Conquest asked slowly as he eased his hand.

Raziel worried that he was going to be sick again. How could an Angel who had never eaten a thing in his entire existence get sick? What had he even thrown up? “Anything. Everything. They didn’t-”

Conquest released his neck and tipped Raziel’s chin up, forcing him to stare into liquid grey eyes. “Why did they send you?” he murmured, frowning.

Raziel kept his mouth shut; the question hadn’t sounded like it had been directed at him. It was more contemplative than curious.

A strange purple stream of light wrapped around Raziel and his eyes widened as something cold sunk deep inside him and pulled tight.

“A tether,” Conquest said. “If you try to run I will find you, no matter where you go.”

Raziel bitterly wondered where Conquest thought he was going to go.

“And if you’re expecting the Archangels to find you?” Conquest blew softly on the top of Raziel’s head. The cold sensation washed over Raziel again. It settled inside Raziel’s mind this time, pulled tight and then disappeared. “They’ll never find you while I’m alive.”

“You aren’t all powerful,” Raziel blurted out. He blanched and snapped his mouth shut, his teeth rattling.

“Oh?”

It might have been stupid to say it, but Raziel was right, he knew he was. The Horsemen had been defeated in the last war. They had caused untold destruction and the Archangel Michael had been murdered, but Raziel knew that ultimately the Horsemen had been forced to retreat with Lucifer.

Raziel just had to hold out, just a little while, and they would come for him.

“Come with me.”

As Conquest moved away from him Raziel felt a tug in his gut, jerking him forward.

The tether. Conquest had literally tied them together.

He tripped as the tether forced him forward. He struggled to stay upright and catch up with the Horseman.

“Let’s see if you’re right.”

Raziel didn’t want to see. He didn’t want to be here. He wanted to go home .

He’d thought being alone and lost had been bad.

This was infinitely worse.

* * *

Conquest took Raziel through the fog to a busy street in Phoenix, Arizona. Raziel dry-heaved as he tumbled out behind Conquest.

If Conquest didn’t know any better, he would say that had been the Angel’s first time travelling through the fog. But it was the only way between dimensions, so he’d had to have made the trip before at least once.

Raziel squinted at the sun, and raised an arm to shield itself from it.

It was so weak, how much of it was truly immortal?

He wondered how long it would take to break it. Not long, he surmised quickly. Pity. He did so enjoy drawing it out.

Conquest touched a finger to his crown and let his power pulse outward as he searched.

There.

Two Angels. Their auras told him they were barely a thousand years old. Mere children. Conquest was going to enjoy this.

Raziel was quiet and obedient, trailing behind Conquest as he strode through the streets towards his prey.

There were so many mortals scurrying about, the overpopulation of the Earth never more obvious than when Conquest was in the cities. He hated every fiber of it. The mortals had never been fun to play with; they were far too fragile. And he didn’t need to come here to find any Angels or Demons to fuck with.

Conquest pulled his energy down, forcing Raziel to an abrupt stop. The Angel cried out and flailed. Conquest ignored it.

Conquest walked right up to the Angels. They were perfect carbon copies of each other; blond hair, white robes, snooty expressions on their faces. The arrogance of the Angels was becoming a problem with the younger generations. Conquest was surprised that Uriel hadn’t stamped it out of them yet. He was probably waiting for he perfect moment.

“They-they can’t see us?” Raziel asked.

“Expecting them to help you?” Conquest asked, amused. “Even if they could see you, they can’t save you. They could never hope to match me.”

He flicked his energy over them, pulling out the finer details of their aura. Gifts of Nature, dull green wings. Well, well. Michael’s Angels were still being produced? Wasn’t that interesting, considering the Archangel wasn’t around. It meant he wasn’t truly dead. Or another Archangel had taken his place. Conquest dug deeper, pulling out some of their memories.

No, they were definitely Michael’s.

He wasn’t surprised to find Raziel in some of the memories, nor of the treatment he had endured. Cruelty wasn’t just for the Demons that roamed the Hells. He bet Raziel didn’t even understand why they treated him like that. It had nothing to do with his lack of power and everything to do with the fact that God’s stench was all over him. Jealousy was a powerful motivator for any creature. Angels were just as susceptible as anyone else.

“You don’t know that,” Raziel said weakly.

Conquest chuckled. “Most Angels aren’t worth the wings on their back. And the ones that are? I find them, and they die.”

“No, you’re wrong. They’re chosen because they’re good people. Because they have kindness, and heart and-”

“They’re chosen,” Conquest interrupted, “because of their potential to wield power. If you think your God isn’t interested in amassing power then you’re a fool.” He’d heard the ‘Angels are pure’ rhetoric more times than he could count. They spewed their brainwashed lunacy at him, and he enjoyed listening to them scream while he instructed them in all the ways they were wrong. It was a relationship of balance.

“Then why did he raise me?” Raziel asked. The touch of bitterness to his tone wasn’t a surprise.

“Why indeed?” Conquest drawled. He agreed with Raziel; he was weaker than any Angel Conquest had ever encountered, including the newborn Angels. Which meant God had a purpose and it irked Conquest that he didn’t know what it was.

He would find out.

Raziel flushed, his cheeks stained red, and looked away. Conquest tilted his head, tasting Raziel’s aura. There was anger there, of course, but also some shame and self-loathing.

Conquest gripped Raziel’s chin and forced his head to the side. He rubbed his thumb over the section that had gone red. It was warm to the touch. Such a mortal reaction.

The red began to spread down his throat and under his dirty robe. Conquest traced it with his fingers, tugging the robe down, ripping it, to see where it led.

“Please,” Raziel whimpered.

“Please what?” Conquest asked, fascinated at the way that the red continued to spread across the Angel’s pale hairless chest.

“Please don’t hurt me.”

Conquest smirked. Oh, he was definitely going to hurt the pathetic Angel. But not right now. Right now, he had a better idea.

“Do you know them?” Conquest asked. He had seen a number of Angels speaking to Raziel in the memories he had just seen. So many nameless faces, so many Angels who thought they were better than what they really were. Did Raziel remember them, or just the way that it had made him feel? Emotions were stronger than memory, as were smell, taste, and touch. Memories faded faster than senses did.

“Wh-what?”

Conquest raised a brow and looked to where the two Angels were still conversing. What they were doing on the mortal plane was anyone’s guess; if they were monitoring someone, or some thing , they did it from the Heavens.

If they had been more powerful, Conquest might have cared.

They weren’t, and he didn’t.

“I-yes,” Raziel admitted.

Conquest began to walk away. “Perfect.” He let go of the power he was using to keep Raziel concealed, and the Angel popped into view of the other two Angels. “Go on,” Conquest cajoled, as he stopped farther away to observe. “Ask for help.”

“ Raziel?” Angel One exclaimed. “What are you doing here?”

Raziel sobbed in relief. “You can see me? Please, you need to get me out of here.” He grabbed at the robe of Angel One and he was roughly shoved away.

“Don’t touch me.”

“No, you don’t understand,” Raziel said frantically. He glanced at Conquest, who smirked at him.

Conquest summoned Uriel’s bow and notched an arrow in it. Raziel’s eyes widened at the sight. Conquest didn’t know if it was because he recognized the bow or if it was just the weapon itself that was bothering him. It wouldn’t surprise Conquest if Raziel knew it was Uriel’s - despite the fact the Angel wouldn’t even have been human when Conquest had stolen it - simply because Uriel was still whining about it.

“Get out of here,” Angel Two said. “We’re here on important business.”

“We all need to get out of here! Conquest is here and he’s going to kill us all!”

Angel One snorted. “The Horseman Conquest? Like he’d bother with you.”

“Besides that, we aren’t afraid of him,” Angel Two said. “We have Archangel Michael’s powers; we’re invincible.”

Conquest laughed loudly. They were proud to have muted versions of Michael’s power? That hippy wannabe had the least volatile Gift of any Archangel. And he wasn’t even around to teach them how to wield it properly. If Conquest were fighting Michael he might think about it first, but these two? Child’s play.

“ Please,” Raziel begged. He pulled at their robes. “Now. Let’s go! He’s right there!” He pointed to the spot Conquest was standing, watching silently. “ Right there!”

The Angels, to their credit, did turn to look, but of course they couldn’t see him.

“You’ve finally cracked. I bet the Archangels just left you here to die. Go do it somewhere else,” Angel Two said snidely.

“The Horseman isn’t here. We’d know,” Angel One said arrogantly.

Conquest lifted Uriel’s bow and let go of the arrow. It lodged so far into Angel One’s forehead that it almost went all the way through.

Raziel screamed as blood sprayed over his face. Such a sweet sound.

Angel Two stared in wide-eyed horror, backing away slowly. “What the…?”

Conquest strode forward. He flung the bow away, and it disappeared into the fog. He summoned his glaive and twirled it around in his hand, once, twice, before he dug the blade deep into Angel One’s back and through to its stomach. He then lifted straight up, ripping through bone and muscle, splitting the top half of its body. He finished it off with a slice through the neck. The head landed in front of Raziel and he fell in his haste to get away.

Angel Two opened the fog. Conquest’s glaive slicing it at the knees stopped its attempt to retreat. The fog dissipated and the body went forward through where it had been. The calves and feet of the Angel stayed upright, cut at a perfect thirty-degree angle.

“Stop!” Raziel moaned. “Please, stop!”

“I thought they’d be a match for me, Raziel. You said so, remember? I was just looking forward to a good challenge,” Conquest said mockingly. He pressed a boot to Angel Two’s chest, forcing it to cease its pathetic movements to get away. He stuck the pointed end of the blade of his glaive into Angel Two’s head and ripped it clean off its shoulders. “They’re lucky they didn’t have their wings out, or this wouldn’t have gone so quickly for them.”

Raziel buried his bloodied face into his knees, curling into himself. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he sobbed.

“A gift,” Conquest said viciously. He pulled the head from his glaive and tossed it to the Angel.

Raziel shook his own head frantically and crab-crawled away. He stared at Conquest, stark terror in his eyes. “If you’re going to kill me just do it, please!”

“You say ‘please’ an awful lot,” Conquest said. He wrapped his energy around Raziel’s small form and lifted him upright. With a flick of his hand Raziel flew straight into Conquest. Conquest roughly gripped his hair and pulled his head back. “What makes you think that word works on someone like me?” He bent until their lips were only a hair’s breadth apart and relished in the shiver that ran down the Angel’s spine. “I like it when you beg.”

“I’m not afraid to die.”

Conquest trailed his nose across Raziel’s cheek, smelling the lie. To be honest, at this point killing the Angel was most likely the best option. He had no use for him, and he was already broken by his own powerlessness. But God had touched the Angel, which meant somehow it was important, and that was worth something to Conquest.

His gaze trailed down the Angel’s slender form. The way Conquest’s power held him meant he was dangling a fair distance from the ground. His tiny feet were ridiculous. And filthy.

The Angel wasn’t a Warrior, had probably never even seen battle. He was breathing heavy, his chest rising and falling at a rapid pace. So mortal, so afraid.

“You aren’t going to die just yet, baby Angel.”

Conquest opened the fog and tossed him through, following behind.