Page 41 of Princess of Bael

“Ashmedai—”

“I’ll do you one better, Ezra,” Ashmedai said, cutting off Azrael. “Lord Zebulon will introduce you to one of the Dark Provenance members that helped Evangeline create the list.”

I cocked a brow. “Or you could point me in Evangeline’s direction, and I could go directly to the source.” Seemed more efficient to just ask the Fallen Angel my questions rather than go through an intermediary.

“Ah, you see, I would, but she’s currently lost in Hell,” Ashmedai murmured, sounding entirely unapologetic about it.

A chorus of “What?” followed.

Which merely made Ashmedai grin and say, “I believe we’re done here, hmm? Alastor takes Lucía. Bael takes Johanna. Morax fucks off back to his realm and stays there. I keep Trudy. Ezra and Kayla figure out how to find balance in their relationship and hopefully a path forward for us all by tracking down whoever wrongfully inherited Kristina’s powers, and we meet again in nine years for a war.” He glanced at Zerak for that last part. “Yeah?”

“Nine years,” he confirmed.

“Sound,” he murmured, wrapping his arm around the Nephilim. “Until then, I recommend steering clear of the Shadow realm.” With another of his blinding smiles, he disappeared, leaving Azrael cursing behind him.

He vanished in the next second, his intention to follow the Archdemon clear. Azrael, the Angel of Death, was also Evangeline’s father. And it seemed that no amount of aging or superiority could keep a dad from trying to protect his progeny.

Morax grunted. “I don’t recall agreeing to a damn thing.”

“You’re just as charming as I remember,” Valisa muttered.

“How is finding Kristina’s killer going to help curb the coming war?” Dariel asked incredulously, ignoring them both.

“The fact that you have to ask only proves your lack of qualifications for the job,” I said, unable to help the jibe. Because the answer was rather obvious to me—taking back Kristina’s power and placing it in a worthier source could right the scales.

In other words, I needed to re-create the missing link to the Divinity.

Which required me to track down her assassin, as he or she had absorbed her essence—it was the only way to permanently slay one as powerful as Kristina.

And the longer we allowed that third party to wander around with power that did not belong to him or her, the more likely the veil would fracture ahead of schedule.

Hence, Zerak’s countdown.

I looked at Zebulon. “Where is this member with details on the Nephilim?”

“Nashville,” he answered immediately.

“Take us to him.” It wasn’t a request but a command.

One that Zebulon responded to with a subtle nod of his head.

“That’s it?” Dariel demanded. “We just let him run off again and fuck it all up more?”

Mietek leveled a look at him. “Under the right conditions, Ezra will prosper. He just needs to come to terms with those conditions anduse them.” Those last two words were for me, and they served as a reminder of what he’d said just yesterday.

Use her.

He wanted me to absorb Kayla’s energy to bolster my own. I gave him a subtle nod, telling him I understood. But that didn’t mean I agreed to do it.

Using Kayla as a pawn was what had started this mess.

Doing it again would just worsen everything entirely.

“Right, then. Now that everything’s sorted”—Alastor held out a hand for Lucía—“shall we, sweetling?”

He clearly hadn’t heeded her warning about the nicknames, something that surprised me because I knew just how deadly Lucía could be with a blade.

“And what? Just leave Kristina here to rot?” she demanded, standing of her own accord. “Absolutely not.”