Today was the second day of the angelic countdown, meaning Silas should be left alone through tomorrow. Hemade a few offhanded comments—one about his warding, and the other about how, even if the archangels spied on him, they’d assume he was behind enemy lines, conning me into loyalty—which triggered a discomfort I wasn’t ready to handle. Thanks to Alessia’s venom, I was invisible, as far as our enemies were concerned.
Inelegant? Perhaps. But it was a good plan.
One of Vexa’s top-grossing songs, “Satan’s Gospel,” had spent twelve weeks at number one, giving conservative talk show hosts something to fearmonger about and angering millions of pearl-clutching churchgoers. If the Lord was going to strike someone down, of course it wouldn’t be murderers or human traffickers; it would be a pop icon. When an angel popped out of nowhere up to harangue her, it would shock and infuriate sixty thousand fans, at modest estimates. When a handsome, horned demon stood up for the singer and swiftly bested his adversary, it would provide the army with someone to side with. Not only was Heaven the bad guy, but they had a good guy behind whom they could throw their weight.
“I don’t think you’re thinking this through.” Silas kept his hand up. He took a cautious step toward me. “Think of all of the lukewarm believers right now. If they see unimpeachable evidence of an angel, particularly one telling them things they already believed about this Vexa LaRue person, it will send them back into the pews in droves. Heaven will experience an attendance boom like never before.”
I looked to the corner of the room, sucking my teeth while I flipped through the outcomes. This was the flaw in my plan. On the one hand, Heaven would look weak when the angel lost in mock battle to the demon. On the other, 2.8 billion people who loosely identified as Christian would have concrete evidence of their faith.
The evening sun dipped between buildings, hitting me in the eye as it found the gap in the skyscrapers. I squinted up at it, eyes hurting as it reflected a brilliant shade of gold on the tall glass building across from ours. My shoulders slumped, ahumorless chuckle sweeping my frustration from me as dry helplessness took its place.
“What?” Az asked, looking up at me from the couch.
“It’s nothing,” I said, still looking at the red-orange glow. “Helios. Inti. Amaterasu. Ra. Surya. Mithras.”
“Sun deities?” Azrames clarified.
It was moot. There were deities in every pantheon dedicated to the sun, including the King of Heaven, who was said to have made the sun stand still for three days. But the religious majority neither knew about nor believed in any other god. Our performance before the siren and her army would wake people up to life behind the veil, but it would keep them in binaries. Heaven would get more worshippers than ever before. Unless…
“Holy shit,” I mumbled. I caught their widened eyes out of my periphery, but I had already taken off for the bedroom.
The men trailed behind me just in time to see me tip my suitcase upside down on the bed, lacking the patience to carefully unpack. I grabbed my laptop and cursed repeatedly as I connected to the hotel’s Wi-Fi.
“Are you going to tell us what’s going on?” Azrames asked.
I didn’t answer. I was already hard at work finding the number for the largest private antiquities museum in Greece. I dialed from my computer and fidgeted as the line rang and rang. I checked the time in the upper-right hand of my computer. Fuck. It was the middle of the night in Athens. There was no way—
A voice answered in Greek. I only knew how to sayhello,goodbye, and how to ask for the bathroom in their native tongue, but I happened to know polyglots were thought highly of in this household.
“I’m calling for Dorian Castellanos. Is he still there?”
“Ma’am,” replied the accented voice, “the hour is very late.”
It wasn’t ano. Emboldened, I pressed, “Tell him MeritFinnegan is calling. I promise you: He will want to hear from me. He’s been waiting for this call.”
Silas and Azrames moved fully into the room. Azrames took a knee by the bed to stare at the screen with me. Silas remained at the end of the bed, frowning down at the back of the computer. We waited in silence as classical music played. Nerves ticked through me. I drew in uneven breaths until the line clicked.
“Merit,” came a smooth, smiling voice. “I had no doubts you’d make us proud, but to hear you’re already aligned with Alessia Clovis? Quick work and powerful allies. The Prince has impeccable taste.”
I heated. I closed my eyes to focus as I said, “I need a big favor. Probably the biggest favor anyone’s ever asked of you.”
The line was quiet for a moment. I exchanged looks with Azrames, his eyes a powerful shade of pewter as a wrinkle of hope crept into his expression.
“Color me curious,” Dorian said at long last.
“How do you and Poppy feel about going public?”
