Jim Butcher - Mean Streets

"No, " she said plaintively. "Please, don't pull away. I have something to show you. "

The desperate look on her familiar features rendered him powerless and he allowed her to pull his hand closer.

"A gift of our union," she said, and placed his hand upon the warmth of her stomach.

Remy stumbled back with a gasp, dispelling the eerily real vision. The palm of his hand tingled strangely, and he flexed his fingers.

"A gift of our union, " he heard the vision's voice say again.

But the mystery of the words was quickly dispelled by a bloodcurdling cry that echoed through the storage space.

"Sariel?" Remy called out, running in the direction of the scream.

As he grew closer, he could hear the unmistakable sounds of a struggle, and the Grigori leader's voice raised in anger. He came around a pallet, stacked high with wooden boxes, to see that Sariel had caught his prey, and had driven him to the ground. The man struggled weakly as Sariel's fists rained down on his face.

"What are you doing?" Remy yelled.

Sariel raised his fist to bring it down again upon the man's swollen and bloody features, but Remy caught his wrist. The Grigori's head spun toward him, insane fury burning in his cold gray eyes.

"Enough," Remy commanded.

Sariel tried to pull free of his grasp, but Remy held fast, pulling the Grigori off of his victim.

The mysterious man moaned, bubbles of blood forming upon his lips.

"Who is he?" Remy asked, letting go of Sariel's wrist and kneeling beside the man.

"The one responsible for killing Noah, I would assume," the fallen angel answered with a snarl. He was rubbing his wrist where Remy had gripped it.

"Could he be one of Noah's employees?" Remy asked, patting the man down, looking for some form of identification.

"As far as I know, Noah had no employees," Sariel answered. "The old man enjoyed his isolation. He shut this rig down years ago."

"Who are you?" Remy asked the man, gently slapping his cheek to rouse him, but Sariel had done an exceptional job in beating him unconscious.

Some of the man's blood got on Remy's hand and he felt the divine power of the Seraphim, locked away deep inside him, stir with familiarity.

"He's one of us," Remy stated, wiping the blood on the leg of his pants. "He's an angel." He turned to look up at Sariel.

But the Grigori wasn't paying any attention. He was instead staring into the shadows around them.

"What's wrong?" Remy asked.

Sariel raised a hand to silence him, head tilted. Listening.

At first, all Remy could hear was the raging storm outside the rig, but then he, too, heard the sounds.

Something rustling in the shadows.

Sariel immediately stiffened.

"We need to go," he said, his hands already moving through the air as he began to weave a magickal passage, a means for them to escape.

Remy stood, attempting to see what was there in the darkness, half expecting his dead wife to step from the shadows. “What is it?" he asked, as what little light they had within the warehouse space was suddenly extinguished.

Sariel didn't answer, continuing to focus on conjuring the magicks to take them away.

Remy was about to demand an answer when the passage began to open, a swirling vortex even blacker than the darkness that surrounded them.

Sariel bent down, hauled the unconscious angel up, and dove through the doorway to safety.

Remy paused. His curiosity got the better of him. He allowed the divine power within him to emerge, channeling the angel fire just enough to illuminate his hand and dispel the encompassing gloom.

Something squealed as if in pain, fleeing into a pool of shadows.

It appeared almost human.

Almost.

Remy exited the magickal passage into the safety of an ornate ballroom. He knew this place, the grand room where Sariel and his Grigori held their countless parties. From the outside, the building located in the area of downtown Boston known lovingly as the Combat Zone appeared abandoned, run-down and decrepit. But in actuality, it hid one of the more opulent nests that the Grigori had scattered around the world.

"What the hell was that?" he asked, stepping back from the gradually diminishing supernatural doorway, eyeing the bubbling darkness in case whatever it was he had seen on the other side decided to follow.

"Your true nature is showing," Sariel spoke. At first Remy had no idea what the fallen angel was talking about, but then remembered his hand. Its golden flesh still burned with the power of the Seraphim.

his fist, he pulled the fire back. It didn't want to go, but Remy was persistent, and the divine power finally bent to his will. It was becoming harder to suppress his true nature since the near Apocalypse, but as of now, he was still its master.

Humanity reasserted, Remy flexed his fingers. The flesh of his hand was bright red, like the shell of a cooked lobster, but already it was beginning to heal.

"It appears what I feared most has become a reality," Sariel said ominously, wiping liquid darkness from the front of his suit jacket. His gaze was also fixed on the dissipating magickal passageway.

The unconscious angel moaned on the floor.

Remy approached him. "As soon as he comes to, we'll see what our mysterious stranger here can tell us about what Noah was up to on that rig."

The other Grigori suddenly entered the ballroom in a line, as if responding to a silent command from their leader. They pushed past Remy and swarmed around the unconscious angel.

"There you are," Remy said. "I didn't think you were home."

"We're always home," one of them growled, as they picked up the stranger from the floor and began to carry him away.

The Grigori didn't care much for Remy, and truth be told, the feeling was mutual.

He started to follow the parade, but Sariel blocked his path, placing a hand against his chest to stop him.

Remy looked down at the offending hand, and the Grigori leader quickly removed it.

"They will see to him," Sariel said. "But we must talk."

Remy watched the Grigori pass through a doorway with their burden.

"Then let's talk," he said.

At the end of the ballroom was a large wooden door leading into Sariel's sanctum.

Remy followed the fallen angel inside, the Grigori leader closing the door behind them. He gestured for Remy to take a seat in one of the high-backed leather chairs on either side of the unlit fireplace.

Remy sat, eyeing Sariel as he removed a diamond-shaped stopper from a crystal decanter.

"Scotch?" he offered.

"Sure." Remy didn't feel much like drinking with the angel, but the Grigori always had very good scotch.

Sariel poured one glass and then another, replaced the stopper, and carried the two tumblers of golden fluid to the chairs.

"Thanks," Remy said, accepting his drink.

The Grigori took the chair across from him, casually crossing his legs. He took a long sip from his scotch, then leaned his head back and closed his eyes.

Remy sipped his drink. He hadn't been wrong. The Grigori still had some of the best scotch he'd ever tasted. It made him think of Steven Mulvehill, his closest friend, and how jealous he would be right then.

But Remy doubted the homicide cop would have appreciated the company. The poor guy tried to steer clear of the weird shit, as he liked to call it.

"You said you wanted to talk," Remy said, breaking the eerie quiet.

"I was just appreciating the silence," Sariel said, swirling the golden liquid in his glass. "Before the impending chaos."

"Now that makes me think you know more about what's going on than you've shared," Remy said before taking another drink of scotch.

"I wasn't sure before," Sariel said apprehensively. "But now, there can be little doubt.” The angel gulped the rest of his drink, then stared into the empty glass.