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  Instinctively I shot a bolt of lightning into the bird-thing. It squealed and dropped me about five feet onto a bed of white, fluffy, snow-like stuff, flying off as I tried to catch my breath. This side of the rift wasn’t as cold as I’d imagined, given the landscape, although my breath did send little clouds of gray into the air. The snow was dry, like the fake stuff they use to decorate store windows during the holidays. The air was dry too. I felt like every bit of moisture was being sucked from my skin. Looking down I saw my hands whiten, bones becoming prominent as my flesh shrank against them.

  I panicked, frantically trying to fly up and out of here through the rift before I dehydrated into nothing. Then something changed. It was as if my body were an article of clothing to be shed at will. When I shifted form into a wolf, or hawk, or even a bear it always seemed as if my body vanished and reformed. This was a twisting sort of feeling. Right before my eyes, my hands returned to normal, and the dry feeling vanished.

  I glanced backward, relieved to see the rift still above me. Then I turned around and gasped at what I saw. There were five shapes on the ground — mummies in coveralls and camouflage. Their skin was flaked and pale as it stretched tight over bone. Three had blond hair that stirred lightly in the breeze. Two had short dark hair pressed tight to their skulls. Vacant eye sockets stared at me, teeth shining in a horrific grin between lips stretched tight. Brent had said the bird-things had dragged two hunters through the rift. I’d assumed those two were dead, most likely eaten. This could be them. And the other three must have been others who perhaps fell through on their own.

  It brought home Raphael’s words as well as Brent’s. Was this what I’d see if I went through the other rifts? Were they all dead, as these ones were? I was too late to save these humans and I got the feeling that even if I’d gotten here five minutes after they fell through it would have been too late. This area was clearly not able to support human life, but it did support life of another sort. The bird thing that grabbed me seemed to have gotten reinforcements. As I looked up I saw winged beings with long, thick tails circle closer.

  I should have flown back through the rift and had Rafi close it before these things got out, but curiosity killed the cat, and it probably would end up killing me too. I’d been shot, frozen, burned. I’d fallen off a mountain onto rocks, fallen into a narrow crevasse in the ice, fallen off a sea kayak into the freezing water where a polar bear had tried to eat me. Five thousand years was a long time to live and I never had much in the way of self-preservation instincts. I’d always survived, healing critical wounds quickly. I seemed destined to live forever, unlike that polar bear whose fur still decorated my living room floor.

  So I stayed, shooting a quick glance up at the pulsing gateway to make sure it was still there. The winged-things lost their caution and dove toward me at top speed, their bodies aligning in a V formation as they flew.

  Their upper bodies and wings looked like a half-plucked chicken. They had sparse iridescent feathers, and pebbled pinkish-gray skin. Long hair streamed from their heads in clumpy strands. Sharp claws curled from their hands and equally sharp-looking teeth snapped in their beaks. Their lower halves were like serpents, scaled with a twisting tail and no legs. Every instinct screamed at me to run, but instead I was rooted in place staring at the horrible things because they were naked. And they had boobs.

  Duh. Of course they were naked. I think humans were the only crazy beings in all of creation that needed to cover up their bodies with the skins of others, even in warm climates where body heat preservation wasn’t an issue. Heaven forbid another human saw their reproductive parts. I didn’t understand it. The werewolves didn’t understand it either. If they didn’t run the risk of getting arrested, I’m sure most of them would run around with their dicks flapping in the wind.

  But these five creatures had no dicks flapping in the wind. They did have breasts so large that back home they’d need to special order bras, although it was pretty obvious these women-bird-things had never seen a foundational garment in their lives. It was interesting to see how gravity took a toll on body parts even in other worlds.

  They swooped down, claws outstretched. That’s when I stopped gawking at their boobies and flew.

  I could hear the sound of their wings behind me. Soft dry snow swirled up in clouds with each step. The gate pulsed above me but just as I was about to dive through it, I smashed head-first into Raphael. We tumbled to the ground in a heap, me on top.

  “By all that’s holy, are you okay?” Lavender eyes stared up into mine. “I half expected to find you pecked to death, or standing over a flock of dead bird-things. Either scenario was just as likely.”

  I wasn’t paying attention, since I was trying to get off of him, accidently elbowing him in the face in my haste. “Incoming!”

  That was the only warning he got. The five winged, boobed creatures landed on us like a swarm of insects. Claws dug into my shoulder, tearing through muscle right down to bone. I did the only thing I could think of doing at the moment and grabbed the creature’s bumpy arm, sending a surge of electricity through it.

  Cooked chicken smells wonderful. Electrocuted boob-birds do not. The claws dug in deeper and the creature screamed. It was the most horrible high-pitched sound I’d ever heard. I wouldn’t have been surprised if my ears were bleeding along with my shoulder.

  “Get through the rift. Get through the rift,” Raphael shouted, punching and kicking at two of the bird-things.

  Hey, how come he only had two to fight off where I had three? I continued to electrocute the one and try to shake the other two off my back. Raphael managed to free himself of his two and grabbed onto one of mine, yanking it off me. Unfortunately, a chunk of my shoulder went with it. Before I had a chance to heal, the other one was digging into my thigh while the electrocuted one sank talons into my waist, biting down on the very shoulder the first one had ripped open.

  These things were like a plague — a very determined piranha kinda plague. I could see Raphael was continuing to have problems of his own. I tried the electricity again, this time raising it up a few notches, but the only effect was the horrible odor.

  If lightning didn’t kill these things, what would? Pain was derailing my ability to think, and panic was taking hold. Sadly, beating the boobie-birds with my hands didn’t seem to deter them either. Neither did the stop, drop and roll technique. I caught sight of Raphael out of the corner of my eye. He was barely visible from the blur of bumpy skin and ratty feathers covering him, but it looked like the angel was trying to pry the things off of him and stomp them into the ground.

  “Fucking birds!” the angel shouted. Before I had a chance to laugh at his unangelic language, a blinding light filled the air, followed by a sonic boom. The birds let go, squawking, and something else grabbed me, rising through the air. I squirmed for a moment before realizing it was Raphael, trying to fly us through the rift.

  The rift he couldn’t see.

  “Left, left, left!” I shouted. “No, your other left.”

  I have no idea how, but he managed to clip the edge of the rift, finally sensing it and spinning around with enough force to push us through. Unfortunately, the boobie-birds had recovered from whatever he’d done and followed us.

  They were pissed. Seriously pissed. So pissed that I considered running for it and attempting this again some other time. The only reason I wasn’t flying top-speed out of here was because Raphael had decided to make a stand, yanking a small tree out of the ground and trying to bat the boobie-birds back through the rift.

  The rift he couldn’t see. Which meant all he was doing was whacking the things across the snow and grass. One hit the water’s edge and screeched, its tail smoking and dissolving into a pile of scaly goo.

  Ew. But at least I now knew how to kill them.

  Raphael finally managed to launch one through the rift. One down, four more to go.

  Nope. Five more to go. Damn thing came right on back through the rift, heading straight
for my bleeding leg.

  “They won’t stay. Get them to the water. Drown them in the lake.” I was close to entering full blown, pissed-off-Ahia mode. Bullets and fire hadn’t killed me. It would really suck if these things did, and right in front of a sexy angel too. Determined not to let such an embarrassing death happen, I redoubled my efforts, throwing myself onto the ground, rolling toward the lake’s edge and kicking like a crazy woman. The boobie-birds squawked, only digging in harder.

  This was not looking good. I wasn’t sure how much blood I’d lost, but my left leg, the one with a boobie-bird attached to it, was soaked and cold from the knee down. Out of desperation, I tried the electricity thing again, yelping as the charge cycled through the screaming bird-woman and zapped back at me.

  Wet. My leg was in water. I was right here, I just had to get these things into the water with me. Punching one of them in the face, I started rolling again, feeling the icy wetness move up my leg.

  It worked. The boobie-bird screamed, this time in a very different pitch. Steam rose from her skin, which was expanding at an alarming rate. I ignored the one attacking my shoulder and watched fascinated as she swelled up like a giant, partially-feathered, boobed tick.

  Holy shit these things were ugly. The bloated one let go of my leg and thrashed around in the water, giving me the opportunity to concentrate on the one still gnawing at my shoulder. Stupid thing hadn’t even noticed her friend was like an overinflated balloon. These boobie-birds might be nasty, vicious things, but they lacked any sense of empathy or community spirit toward each other. What creature keeps trying to kill and eat dinner while her bestie is two seconds from exploding into a pile of wet feathers? Bitch.

  Her self-centered attitude worked to my advantage. I rolled again, gasping as I slid off a narrow ledge into deep water. Down I went, my diaphragm freezing in place with the shock of the icy lake. A thousand years in Alaska, and I never quite got over how cold water could feel before freezing.

  One of the advantages of being underwater was that the boobie-bird’s screams were muffled. She’d expanded like a puffer fish the moment we went under and released my shoulder, flailing as she tried to get back to the surface.

  Oh no you don’t. It was my turn to grab the boobie-bird, wrapping my one functional arm around it as well as the leg that wasn’t hanging numb from my hip. I held my breath and watched as she kept swelling. Her skin lost its just-plucked texture and became a shiny, stretched pink-gray. Her eyes disappeared under bulging half-circle eyebrows. The serpent half swelled into a ball of scales. Feathers began to pop from her skin, filling the icy water around us with iridescent color. I held tight as her struggles slowed, determined to see this thing die once and for all.

  Yep, I held a grudge that way. I really didn’t have any problem killing these things. Maybe it was five thousand years of seeing birth and death repeat like an overused laundromat washer. Maybe it was my temper which lately didn’t seem to tolerate human, or other creature, stupidity easily. Maybe I was just a blood-thirsty angel with no morals whatsoever. Either way, this thing was going down. The boobie-bird kept swelling until I felt like I was holding onto a giant, slimy, pillowy balloon. And then it exploded.

  Exploded. As in little bits of skin, bone and internal organs decorating the waters along with the feathers. Suddenly I wasn’t so thrilled. It was probably going to take me forever to get the smell out of my hair.

  I let go of the pieces I was still holding and surfaced, gasping and frantically trying to spit the nasty taste of bloated boobie-bird from my mouth.

  “Ahia!”

  Hands grabbed me, and hauled me out of the icy water. Strong arms came around me and pulled me tight against a warm, muscular chest. I slumped against the angel, hoping that if I played the hurt and injured routine I could stay here in his arms for the whole day. Or at least an hour or two.

  “You okay?” Hands smoothed my wet hair. I felt his lips on the side of my head. This was the life. But as much as I wanted to stay here, we needed to close the gateway before more boobie-birds came through.

  “Yeah. You?” I took advantage of the occasion to do some exploring of my own, running my hands all over him. He had no shirt on. And his wings were still out. If only his pants weren’t on.

  “Physically yes, although I think I’m mentally scarred for life. Did those things have boobs? Giant, saggy boobs?”

  I laughed. “And did you see their hair? What the heck were those things?”

  His arms tightened around me. “No idea. I thought at first they were cockatrice, but I’ve never seen them with boobs before. Maybe I’ve only seen the male ones.”

  He’s seen cockatrice? As in real live cockatrice? Actually there was a more pressing question on my mind. “Did they have dicks? I mean, if they’re called cockatrice, they have to have dicks.”

  “They’ve got the lower half of a serpent. Serpents don’t have dicks.”

  “Serpents don’t have boobs either,” I retorted. “Neither do birds. If the females have boobs, then I demand the males have dicks. And saggy, floppy balls.”

  He chuckled. “If my beautiful angel commands it, then it must be so.”

  I loved this, nestled up against him, laughing about these boobie-birds. He was gorgeous. He had a sense of humor. He’d just called me his beautiful angel. And he was damned handy in a fight.

  And there was something else he was good at. I sighed, pulling my head away from his wonderful, tanned chest. “Guess we better close this rift before more of them come through. I’m sure the next round will be the penis-birds looking for their women.”

  Raphael shuddered, standing up and letting me slide to the ground along the front of his body. “Now that’s a terrifying thought.” The angel walked over to the rift, patting in the air as I watched him.

  “How do you do this? Closing the rift, I mean.”

  “It involves a direct application of a specific type of energy, aligning the patterns from each side them melding them together seamlessly.” His hand vanished as he found the edge. I noticed that his fingers didn’t get bitten on the other side.

  With a wave of power that nearly flattened me, the rift lit up white. Light and colors flashed like strobes in a club, red then purple, orange then green. The rift turned gold, narrowing. And then there was sound — like a combination of church bells and broken glass. White light exploded everywhere, blinding me. I ducked, covering my head as I tensed for the inevitable explosion, but there was nothing. After a few seconds, just to be sure there was no delayed reaction, I poked my head up to look at a very smug angel.

  “So, what do you think?”

  That I so want to fuck you right here, right now. “Not bad for a minor angel,” I teased.

  He grinned, but there was something in the way he stood that made me think the whole process had taken a lot out of him.

  “Want to take a break? We can go grab brunch and take care of the other ones afterward.”

  The angel looked as if he were about to protest the need for a break, then he paused, a sly expression on his face. “Brunch sounds wonderful. I’ll cook while you change out of those wet clothes.”

  Chapter 14

  Raphael

  Thankfully she’d decided to shower and wash the boobie-bird gunk out of her hair because I had an epic brunch to make and not a lot of time to pull it together. I was an angel. And I put that to good use, teleporting all over the place to grab the ingredients I needed. By the time she walked into the kitchen, I had everything set up and was busy frying pancakes.

  I might not be able to make a huge variety of food, but I’d gotten this pancake-making thing down to an art.

  Ahia stopped and stared at the table open-mouthed. She’d put her tank-top on before she was fully dry, and had foregone a bra. I heartily approved. And if I didn’t stop gaping, I was going to burn my pancakes.

  “I’d expected cereal in a bowl, or maybe scrambled eggs if I was lucky. I never imagined this.” She walked over and stuck a fin
ger in the clotted cream, tasting it. “Oh my God, this stuff is amazing. And fresh raspberries? Where did you get those?”

  Score. I don’t care how much they denied it, angels loved food just as much as any human. And since Ahia was an Angel of Chaos, she was more open to indulging in sensory pleasures. I felt myself stir at the thought of all the other sensory pleasures I wanted the pair of us to indulge in. “I know a guy in the lower forty-eight who has an early berry harvest, and there’s an amazing dairy in France. And then I swung by that farm in Virginia to get some of that bacon I was talking about last night.” I flipped two pancakes onto a plate and set it on the table next to the plate of thick, crispy bacon.

  “You are amazing. I never expected an angel would know how to cook.” She sat down, grabbed a piece of bacon and waited for me to join her. “Or eat. I had this vision of angels wearing hair shirts and existing off air and water.”

  “That’s Gabe, my brother. He’s the austere one of the family. I’m different.” Very different.

  She dug in, heaping raspberries and cream on the pancakes and eating as enthusiastically as she had last night. Watching her enjoy something I’d made with my own hands, that I’d provided, was one of the best feelings I’d had in a million years.

  “You have a brother? I mean, I guess angels have to come from somewhere, but I never really thought about angel families, or babies or anything like that.”

  I sat down and started in on a stack of pancakes. “I have four siblings. As I said last night, we’re genderless, but we have preferences. Right now two are in male form, and one is a female.”

  “What about the other one?” she asked, mid bite.

  My chest felt like someone had piled boulders on it. “He’s probably dead.”

  I hadn’t meant it to come out like that — so harsh and abrupt. I could still barely stand to think about Samael, the one most like me, the one I’d not stood beside when everything in Aaru fell apart.