Jessica Shirvington - Empower

‘Well, don’t expect me to heal you if you come off and land on your head.’ As soon as the words left my mouth I froze, remembering the scars on Gray’s head.

Was that what had happened to him?

Gray’s shoulders shook for a moment before he flashed a knowing smile at me. ‘Not even close, princess. And if I’m not gonna wear a bucket on my head when I fight exiles, I sure as hell won’t be bothering when I ride my bike.’

As he started the engine and pulled out, I knew I’d lost my fight. Gray loved his bike and the freedom that came with it.

I couldn’t deny him that.

We followed Carter’s souped-up Fiat and pulled up behind him a block away from the building. We walked the final distance, spotting a group of about a dozen Grigori huddled together not far from the construction site, as planned. They were beneath a ‘glamour’, hidden from human eyes. It was reasonably constructed but I’d seen better and stronger. It worried me.

Exile activity only seemed to be increasing, and while Grigori were strong and capable, we were limited in number. Although new Grigori continued to come through, it took seventeen years from first being given the essence of an angel before we could embrace our powers, and then even more time to train. Our numbers were simply not holding up. Had the angels not foreseen this problem?

They must have.

And yet I feared that the time when we would finally be overpowered was closer than we knew.

I stayed behind the guys. They didn’t think anything of me pulling on my worn Yankees cap – a gift from Zoe – and moving into the shadows. We were Rogues. Anonymity was our right. And a lot of Rogues had serious trust issues with the Academy.

The senior Grigori running the mission greeted Gray. I recognised Clive and his partner, Annette, from a previous gig we’d taken on a couple of months back – not that I’d ever spoken with them. Clive and Gray shook hands and talked quietly while I looked at the team they had assembled.

Another unsettling feeling swept over me. There were more than a dozen Grigori but the majority were young. Apart from the leading pair, only a few looked prepared.

Gray returned to where we’d been standing at the edge of the pack.

‘Okay, they had a tip-off that this is a tournament site. We have the north entry and exit, which is the closest. We hold the upper level.’

I wondered if this was the same tournament the exiles I’d taken on earlier had discussed. Tournaments had been popping up all over the city lately.

‘How many?’ Carter asked.

‘They don’t know. Intel says it could be a big group.’

Milo gave a toothy grin. ‘Yeah. Bet they’re in there swapping recipes and baking bread.’

The guys chuckled.

‘Why aren’t there more Grigori here? And more senior Grigori at that?’ I asked, grimacing, as I realised my critical observation made me sound a lot like my mother. But London was a big city with an independent Academy. I was surprised they hadn’t sent in a more impressive show of force.

‘Apparently they’re spread thin at the moment with this type of operation,’ Gray said and shrugged. ‘That’s why they called us in, I suppose.’ He glanced at the others. ‘Let’s just do our bit, get our money and clear out.’

We all agreed, and I pushed my unease to the side and focused on the job at hand. Once we received the nod from Clive, we ran towards the northern entrance, which I was pleased to note was the closest, giving us the advantage of first eyes inside. Once the Academy Grigori started to filter into the building, any hope of stealth would be forgotten. They did not value our defensive shields in the same way Rogues – particularly our small group – did.

We slipped in through the side door and down a dark corridor that led towards another door. When Gray cracked it open we heard the sounds immediately, and tensed.

Flesh against flesh.

Ripping.

Beating.

Inhuman growling.

The sounds combined evoked death.

Slowly we stepped through the doorway and found ourselves looking down. The construction works had reduced the building to an outer shell that concealed nothing but a cavernous space.

Floodlights sat in the corners lighting up what could only be described as the exile equivalent of a fight club.

‘Maybe we should just leave them to it,’ Carter whispered, gesturing towards the sparring figures below.

It wasn’t an altogether ridiculous idea. At this rate the number we’d have to face would soon be considerably fewer. In Exile Fight Club there is only one rule: the loser must die. And right then, there were four simultaneous fights going on and what looked like another two dozen exiles divided into two distinct groups, champing at the bit as they waited on the sidelines.

Over the past two years, since the alliances that had been formed between light and dark in their mutual quest to destroy all Grigori had dissolved, out-in-the-open brawling had become common practice. But the ‘tournaments’, ones like this – premeditated, orderly – were new.

For all the benefits, being an angel and incorporeal had one definite drawback – no blood and guts. Dark and light have an eternal rivalry but as angels they are limited in ways that some cannot accept. In human form their eternal fantasies play out. For exiles, earth and its offerings of life and beauty come a distant second to its promise of pain and death.

I pointed to the top of the scaffolding positioned in the centre of the work site. ‘ That’s why we can’t leave them to it.’

Tied to the top of the scaffolding were at least ten humans. Gagged and with their hands tied behind their backs, they were bound to the metal structure, trapped as it wobbled precariously in response to the hits it was absorbing from below.

Killing humans was the aim and prize of the game. The team that managed to take out enough of its opponents to make it to the top and savage the humans won. And somewhere in all that, some sick bastard kept score.

My gifts allowed me to differentiate between exiles of light and dark and this helped to give me a more complete view of the organised mayhem below. Most of the exiles were dressed in fight wear but the styles spanned different eras. Exiles tended to get stuck in the fashion of the time at which they first became human, so while there was typical street wear, there were also army fatigues, Roman-style weapons, ninja get-ups and, of course, for those who insisted on rising above their peers to the end, perfectly pressed suits.

As empirically beautiful as each and every one of these exiles was, this was not some fight scene in a Hollywood movie and there was no sparring. It was a show of extreme violence as they launched no-holds-barred attacks on one another, knowing with complete certainty that every fight would be to the death.

We watched in silence as an exile of dark ripped the heart from an exile of light and those surrounding sneered and hissed with their own hunger for blood. Almost instantly, another exile of light had his heart torn free – and then any semblance of order evaporated as the remaining exiles of light began to randomly attack exiles of dark.

‘Jesus Christ,’ Gray mumbled, taking in the mayhem.

‘On the upside, at least it’s keeping their focus off that lot,’ Carter said, pointing to the group of Grigori moving in on them from the far wall.

‘This isn’t going to end well, Gray,’ I said under my breath. We were outnumbered and out-crazied. ‘I’m going down there,’ I said.

‘Gray,’ Carter hissed.

Gray looked over the carnage below, the humans waiting to be slaughtered on the scaffolding above and then to the young inexperienced Grigori preparing to throw themselves into the fray, before turning back to us. He knew that Carter was worried we’d lose our bounty if I was caught taking matters into my own hands. We’d been ordered to stay on the upper level. But it didn’t take Gray long to see how this would play out if I didn’t do something.