Chapter One
“Ha!I made youbleed,you worm.”
Hawkyn glared at his opponent as he dabbed the back of hishand against his mouth and came away with blood.Yup, Cipher had given him asplit lip all right, and he cursed as Razr, their sparring coach, ticked off apoint for Ciph.
Cursing again, Hawkyn launched at his blond Unfallen angelbuddy, landing a heel-first kick in the guy’s gut.As an Unfallen, an angel whohad been kicked out of Heaven but hadn’t completed his fall, Cipher didn’t havethe powers of either a True Fallen angel or a Heavenly angel, but somehow, hestill managed to be a powerful force.
The bastard.
“Point to Hawk,” Razr called out.“It’s a tie match.Take abreak, you two.We’ll start round three in fifteen minutes.”Razr shot Hawkynone of hissignatureI’m-a-dick smiles.“Maybe you canfinally pull your head out of your ass and win a match.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Hawkyn muttered.“I didn’t get enough sleeplast night.”
Cipher reached for his bottle of water on the nearby benchas Razr headed toward another pair of sparring opponents who, like Hawkyn andCipher, were clad in black sweatpants and white tees that showed every drop ofblood and sweat.
“Don’t tell me you finally got laid?”
“Hardly.You know the law.”Hawkyn hadn’t felt the erotictouch of a female in hundreds of years, and even then, sex had been more of amomentary escape from a shitty existence than something meaningful or evennice.
But that had been back before he’d been ripped from thehuman world and thrust into the angelic one, the one in which Memitim had toswear an oath of celibacy.Supposedly, abstinence made warriors more dangerous.The demon Hawkyn had killed just yesterday would probably agree.
Son of a bitch, he was horny.If he didn’t earn his wingssoon to free himself from the idiotic rules Memitim had tofollow—includingcelibacy—he was going to explode.Sometimes he thought that the Memitim who hadnever had sex had it better, because once you knew what you were missing...
“Sowhat kept you up?”Cipherpoured water on his head and shook it off, his blond hair, longer and twoshades darker than Hawkyn’s, flinging a rain of droplets like a dog after abath.
“The newest Star Trek series.Have you seen it?”It was alie, but he wasn’t ready to share the truth with Cipher.
The guy was his best friend, but Cipher didn’t fullyunderstand Memitim business and didn’t seem to want to learn it.What he didknow he seemed to have absorbed via osmosis or some shit.
“Star Trek?”Cipher scoffed.“A new Star Wars series wouldbe worth losing a sparring match over, but Trek?No way.”
Hawkyn laughed.“Did I tell you I was Nimoy’s Memitimguardian back in the sixties?And you know my brother Reynaud.He wasShatner’s.Linsef was Nichelle Nichols’.”
“What?You’re kidding.The actors were Primori?They neededto beprotected?From what?The Gorn?”Cipher laughed.Hard.He always thought his jokes were funny.
The Gornwereno laughing matter.Lizard warriors.Hardcore.
“Dude, Star Trek played a role in history,” Hawk shot back.“The vital people involved, starting at the top with Gene Roddenberry, were allwatched over.”
“Hey, boys.What’s going on?”Suzanne, Hawk’s youngersister—by a few centuries—stopped near the bench, her wavy brown hair pulledback in a headband, her arms full of yellow squash from the nearby garden.AllMemitim who lived here had jobs that kept the place running and them out oftrouble, and Suzanne had been assigned as cook.Hell,she’d begged to take shifts in the kitchen.
Hawkyn gestured to Cipher.“This fool is trying to convinceme that Star Wars is better than Star Trek.”
“It is,” Cipher said.“And not just better.More popular.I’ll bet Han Solo is more recognized around the world than Spockis.”
Blasphemy.Hawkyn threw up his hands in disgust.“You’redelusional.Even if you’re right,and you’re not, you can’t argue thatStar Trek didn’t have a much bigger impact on human society than Star Wars.Aninterracial kiss seen around the world.Communicators thatinspiredcell phone design.Even medical equipment got a boost from Star Trek’sdiagnostic beds and scanners.”
Cipher rolled his eyes.“It’s called technology.Humanitywould have come up with that stuff eventually.”
“Yeah?”Hawk wiped sweat off his brow.“I haven’t seen NASAname a space shuttle after the Millennium Falcon.”
“Okay, guys.”Suzanne attempted to wave her hands in atime-out gesture but nearly lost her load of veggies.“Knock it off.I have aquestion for you, Hawk.”
“Whatcha got?”
She juggled with her squash as she turned over her right armto expose the single, circular Primori mark, aheraldi, on the insideof her wrist.
“Declan’s mark keeps alerting me to danger,” she said, “butwhen I flash to him, there’s nothing happening.I’ve waited for hours for thealert to shut off, I’ve searched all over his immediate vicinity for any kindof threat, from human snipers to demon assassins, and there’s been nothing.I’ve heard that sometimes our very firstheraldiscan be glitchy.Doyou think that’s what’s happening?”
