Deep in the darkness, I dreamt of her.

Maggie.

Her hair was ash-grey. Her face, once a canvas for someone who had been pretty in her youth, was like plaster dust, pale and flaking. Her body had been pushed inside the living room wall of our old council flat, until just her head and arms were still visible. She reached for me and as I watched, the print of the gaudy floral wallpaper crept along her upper arms and over her throat, until her skin was no longer skin, but dry, peeling paper. I wondered, if I picked at a loose corner and pulled, would she disintegrate? Crumble to nothing but dust in the air?

Her eyes – once the glazed-over eyes of a well-practised junkie – were wide and staring, alive with horror and fear. I liked her eyes like that. I liked seeing her pain. I liked knowing that she was suffering.

She reached for me again, fingers grabbing, clawing at nothing, and I pushed, not with my hands, but with the same thought in my head.

Again.

Again, and again and again. With each word, repeated over and over, she sunk a little deeper. Flesh and bone and muscle melded with brick and plaster.

Finally, when there was very little of Maggie Brogan left, she began to scream and, as she did so, birds of every shape, size and colour flew out of her mouth.

The macaw. The cockatoo. The rainbow-billed toucan. The scarlet ibis.

They flew in circles around me, filling the room with a stream of incandescent, bright colour, their triumphant song resounding in my ears and I stood in the centre of their storm, my arms held aloft, feeling the brush of their feathers upon my fingertips.

It was the most beautiful sound I had ever heard.

The birdsong and my mother's screams.

*

'Oh, little pig, little pig,' the voice whispered in my ear. 'Let me come in.'

Soft skin touched my face. A finger running gently down my cheek.

'Or I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house in.'

Cool air – a sharp, hard blow of breath – hit my eyeballs and the darkness faded instantly. I gasped as everything came into focus in one fell swoop, with Juliette's grinning face the first thing my dry eyes saw.

The angle wasn't right. I remembered her being tall, one of those gazelle-like, willowy women who belonged on a fashion catwalk, and yet I was looking down at her as if I were the taller one. I blinked, and the small motion made my eyes feel gritty and sore. I wanted to rub at them, massage them with my fingers, but when I tried to move my hands, I realised I couldn't.

Juliette took a step back, evidently amused as I began to struggle against whatever held me.

In a panic, I looked around me.

I was suspended a metre or so off the ground, tilted forward slightly, with my arms stretched out either side of me, my feet together. The air gripped my wrists and ankles in a tight bind, as if my hands and feet had been swallowed by an icy void. I could feel them if I wriggled my fingers and toes, but the sensation was like moving them in congealed liquid, which in turn, made nausea swell deep in my stomach.

The room I was in reminded me a little of the rooms inside the Basilica. It was huge and vast, with a high, arched ceiling, and the floor was a complex pattern of black and white marbled tiles. There were no windows and only one door which was straight ahead on the far side, a huge double wooden affair, intricately carved with a myriad of faces that were staring right back at me. Just below the high ceiling, a breath-taking sea of sparkling glass orbs were buoyant in the air, bright light emanating from each one. They appeared to be attached to nothing, no power cords or cables powered them, and the faceted crystal glass splintered and fractured radiant beams of light around the great hall.

Apart from that, the room was empty, save for myself and Juliette, who stood in front of me, hands propped jauntily on her hips. She was as beautiful as the first time we had met, aside from the cruel smirk and the haughty look in her eyes.

Catching my gaze drift down to the emerald-green velvet ballgown she was wearing, she smoothed out imaginary creases in the full, ankle-length skirt.

'You're thinking it's too much, aren't you?' she said, tilting her head to one side. 'Of course, you are. I can't imagine you've ever had call to wear something as grand as this in your life. But, needs must and besides, I think it's rather stunning, don't you?'

She gave a twirl, followed by an over-exaggerated curtsey where she lowered herself right down, holding the skirt delicately between her fingertips and glancing up at me as she did so, that mad grin still in full force.

'Where am I? Where's Addi?' I said, glaring at her. I tried straining against the invisible binds again, knowing it was probably pointless, but my desperation to be free overwhelmed every rational thought.

Juliette laughed, a maddening sound that made me wish I could ram my fist into her face.

She stepped closer again, tapping her finger against her pursed lips, pretending to be deep in thought. 'Hmm, such a caring little piggy, aren't you? Or should I say foolish? You know, you really should have been a good girl and listened to Ethan, but no, like all your kind, your arrogance and misguided faith in yourself meant that you fell into our trap so very easily. Honestly, it couldn't have been more perfect.'

Reaching up, she brushed a lock of my hair behind my ear, her brow furrowed in mock-concern as she stroked my head, her lips jutting out in a little pout. I tried to wrench my head away, but she grasped my chin and pulled me back to face her.

'It's pathetic really,' she continued. 'I mean, in some ways, I do understand it. You had a choice. One of your own kind, or one of ours? You're going to choose your own kind, which, let's face it, is how it should be. Personally, I couldn't possibly contemplate choosing a human over a Shedim. Why would I? It's quite a ghastly thought, to be honest.' She gave a shiver, before narrowing her eyes as she looked at me. 'Still, I must admit, there was a part of me that wondered if you would choose the human. After all, Ethan is... how can I put this? A creature of many, rather delicious talents.'

She slicked her tongue along the edge of her top lip and gave a pleasurable sigh.

I didn't want to think about that now, about them. I wanted out of these binds. I wanted Addi. I wanted Ethan, but I knew I'd probably blown my chances with him. Juliette was right. I should have listened to him. I shouldn't have let my feelings for Addi drive me headlong into their trap, but as soon as I'd set eyes on him, as soon as I'd seen his face, I knew nothing else was going to matter. Just as they had known.

Fuck you, Brogan, fuck your stupidity and your recklessness and fuck that heart in your chest that beats so hard when you wish it wouldn't.

'What have you done with Addi? I said, through gritted teeth.

Juliette rolled her eyes as if I was the most tiresome thing she'd ever encountered. 'Goodness me, how on Earth has Ethan put up with you for this long? Five minutes in your company and I think I would have thrown you into a dimensional hole and sealed it up. I couldn't have coped with your incessant questioning. It's really rather irritating.'

'Incessant questioning?' I said. 'I've asked you twice.'

'Which is two times too many already,' she snapped, the grin twisting into something resembling a frozen grimace. 'Our kind does not have to answer to yours. As far as I'm concerned, the maledicti are good for one thing only and the sooner you get used to that idea, the better it will be for both of us. Not to worry. Once you have been processed, you won't be asking these annoying little questions anymore. In fact, you won't be talking at all. I, for one, will look forward to the silence very much.'

'So that you can fill it with the sound of your own voice?' I sneered. 'I bet that will be fucking scintillating.'

She drew back sharply as if I had reached out and slapped her, but quickly covered her anger with another fake smile.

'My, my,' she whispered. 'You are more alive than I gave you credit for. Here I was thinking that all your many disgusting vices had left you dead inside. No wonder Ethan kept you for himself. He does so love a spirited maledicti. It's becoming quite a disturbing habit of his, you know. The first one, goodness...' She shook her head. 'A frightful creature, you really have no idea. She thought so much of herself. But, she was beautiful for a human, I'll give her that. Very different to you, of course.'

Her eyes raked over me, a clear look of disgust on her face.

'That one, I could almost understand on account of her obvious charms,' she said, pulling her long dark tresses over one shoulder and smoothing down the lengths with both hands. 'He's a lovesick fool for a pretty human, much like his father was. It's a sickness in the family. Yet that particular girl was just so... repulsively weak inside. It turned my stomach to have to speak to her. Even I was appalled at how easily swayed she was, at how willing she was to betray him.'

I swallowed hard, my breathing shallow and harsh in my throat. 'She betrayed him? How? Why?'

Juliette paused. She was relishing this. 'She was such a selfish little piggy, that one. It didn't take much, to be honest. Blake looked into her soul and saw what her greedy heart desired more than anything and hey presto, she was ours, hook, line and sinker. One promise to give her what she wanted, and she promised to give us what we wanted.'

Quid pro quo.

'Which was what exactly?'

Juliette smiled, a lazy lust-filled smile that sparked fire in her eyes.

'Why, Ethan, of course. We wanted Ethan.' A shadow passed over her face. 'Obviously, it didn't work out quite the way we had hoped. Ethan can be rather perceptive, I'm afraid. It turns out she didn't have him wrapped around her little finger as much as she thought she did. I would like to say I was sad for her, but in all honesty, I would have done it myself if he hadn't.'

'Done what?' I asked.

Turning away from me, she grasped her skirt between her fingertips again and, humming a tune, she moved her feet in time to her song, waltzing across the monochrome tiles as if she were dancing at a ball.

'Juliette, what did Ethan do?' I said, louder, my voice echoing up to the high ceiling.

Stopping mid-dance, she glanced over her shoulder at me. 'Silly little piggy. What do you think I meant? He killed her, of course. I believe you'll find what's left of her embedded in the walls of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Quite fitting really. I've always felt there was a certain artistic flair to Ethan's powers.'

She took up the dance again, this time, holding up her arms as if she was waltzing with a partner, her skirt swishing and swaying around her legs as she moved.

'You're lying,' I said, weakly. But she wasn't, and I knew she wasn't.

She's gone now. She's been gone a long time.

There'd been something about the way Ethan had said it, a finality to his words, like he hadn't just been talking about someone who was just not part of his life anymore. She was gone, and he'd done it. He'd killed her. Had I been stupid to forget what he was? Foolish to ignore that dark side of him I'd always seen lurking just under the surface?

I took a deep breath.

No. No. I'd seen him. I'd seen the real Ethan. I'd seen the demon and I wasn't afraid of him. Whatever had happened in New York, whatever this maledicti had done, I knew he wouldn't have killed her unless he'd been left with no choice. I recalled him talking about Blake's people hunting him in New York, and how he'd killed them. Maybe this woman had been caught in the crossfire? Maybe she'd just been in the wrong place at the wrong time?

Focus, Brogan. Forget her. Remember Addi.

'Are you going to tell me where Addi is?'

Juliette stopped suddenly, and without a word, she ran straight at me, her skirt billowing out around her legs. I flinched, expecting her to lash out, but instead she came to an abrupt halt right in front of me and, standing on her tiptoes, she draped one hand around the back of my neck and leaned close, until her cheek was touching mine and her mouth was brushing against my ear.

'Mary had a little lamb, it's heart was black as coal, it crept into her room one night and ate her filthy, human soul,' she whispered, finishing with a giggle and drawing back slightly to look in my eyes. In hers was nothing but malice and madness.

How had Ethan ever let himself go near this woman? Just breathing the same air as her made my skin crawl. She was insane, truly fucking insane. I was starting to think an evening with Rosier would be better than five minutes with Juliette and my fear for Addi's safety was increasing by the second.

Before I could say anymore, there was a thunderclap of noise and the large double doors suddenly began to open. Juliette pressed a chaste kiss to my cheek and grinned. 'Party time,' she squealed and flew to the centre of the room, positioning herself like a grotesque ballet dancer, with one arm curved above her head, the other curved in front of her stomach.

As the doors opened up fully, a man marched into the room, followed by many others who fanned out either side of him, filing into the great hall, their many footsteps clipping against the tiled floor. My head spun with panic as they crowded into the room, lining the walls. They were mostly men from what I could see, although some women were among them, and all of them gave off an air of military swagger. They were soldiers. Demon warriors. A dark force ready to battle with the Angels.

Every now and then I thought I saw the flash of those obsidian eyes like Ethan's, but there were so many faces that I was losing control of my composure as the panic threatened to consume me. They were all looking at me as I hung there, unable to do anything but bear the weight of their intrusive stares, feeling much like – as Juliette had called me – a pig, dangling from a slaughterhouse hook. I swallowed hard, focusing on the man who had led the army into the room.

He was tall and lithe, dressed all in black, with cargo-trousers, black heavy lace-up boots and a black crew-neck vest top that showed off his well-toned arms. Around both wrists he wore matching hematite chain bracelets and his glossy, black hair was tied back in a Samurai-style topknot. His face was thin and angular, but handsome, and he carried himself in a way that demanded attention as he strode confidently towards where Juliette stood.

As he reached Juliette, she dropped her hands to his shoulders and pressed her mouth against his. He accepted the kiss, I noticed, with a small hint of disdain and he pulled back almost instantly, dismissing her attentiveness with a glance at me over her shoulder. She spoke in a hushed tone into his ear, flourishing it with a coquettish giggle and looking back towards me as if she had just told him some fabulously-funny joke. His face, however, remained impassive. Stepping around her, he approached me, stopping just a couple of metres away, clasping his hands behind his back as he studied me in a way that reminded me a little of how Ethan would sometimes look at me.

'So,' he said, finally, a hard glint in his eyes. 'You're the one who's lured Ethan from his hiding place, after all those many years of voluntary hibernation?'

There was no repulsion in his stare, no visible sneer of disgust as was Juliette's way of regarding me, but more a thoughtful contemplation, almost as if he was seeing something she couldn't.

I said nothing in response, returning his unwanted curiosity with a glare of my own.

'Interesting,' he mused, rocking on the balls of his feet slightly. 'Berith tells me you have a mouth that runs wild on you and a tongue as sharp as a cobra, and yet you remain silent.'

'Yeah, well, Oscar's full of shit, as is your girlfriend over there.' I nodded to where Juliette stood, who stuck out her bottom lip in a fake-sullen pout and curtsied again. Bitch.

A chorus of laughter rippled through the waiting crowd of demons, but the man in front of me appeared unmoved by my outburst.

'He also said that you were headstrong, foolish and took risks that were practically suicidal,' he said. 'If you had any idea who you were insulting right now, you'd perhaps let that sharp tongue of yours remain firmly in its place.'

'Oh, sorry,' I said. 'Remind me who I'm insulting again? The woman that Ethan dangled off a bridge wearing nothing but her birthday suit? Or the man who's spent years sending his best warriors after Ethan, only to have them returned in pieces? You are Blake, I assume? Or are you another low-level demon scumbag that I haven't been told about yet?'

The room descended into an uneasy, cold silence. I was crossing the line. Jumping right over it with my middle finger held high. I was being everything Oscar had told him I was and more besides, but if he was pissed off by my insolence, he didn't show it. There was not one ripple in the façade of his features. Not one tremor in his expression that told me he was about to push my face into one of the walls and crush me into the brick.

Pressing his thin lips together, the man gave me a small perfunctory nod. 'You assume correctly, Miss Brogan, I am Blake, although I am also known as Azazel. You may refer to me as either. It sounds as if my friend Ethan has been telling stories. What else has he told you, I wonder?'

'Nothing that made me think he considered you a friend.'

'I can imagine,' Blake replied. 'However, that as it may be, we would like him to consider us as friends.' He looked around at the other demons, before turning his gaze back to me. 'We would like that very much. No one benefits from solitude, Miss Brogan, not even the darkest of souls like Ethan Drake. We all need friendships, bonds, companionship even. To walk this life alone is indeed a great sorrow, wouldn't you agree?'

'I suppose it depends on who wants to walk with you. If Ethan chose to be alone rather than join you, I guess that speaks volumes about the kind of friendship you offer.'

Behind Blake, Juliette's grin widened, delight dancing in her eyes. Blake himself cocked his head to one side, holding out his palms.

'What we offer,' he said, 'is the future. The promise of a new world. A better world. We offer truth. The abolishment of the old masters. A world in which mankind can live free of the constraints of the tyranny and lies of the Angels.'

'Well that's fucking noble of you,' I remarked, shaking my head at him. 'Mankind doesn't even know it's been manipulated all this time. How can you free us from something we don't even know exists? And what happens when you do? What happens when you pull the rug out from under our feet? Will you be our masters? Because, without meaning to insult, your girlfriend over there doesn't seem to have a very high opinion of humans. She thinks we're nothing but animals and not worthy of your kind. So, what are you going to do? Replace one set of manipulative evil bastards with another?'

I caught a spark of something in his expression then. A touch of fire. Irritation. Anger, maybe. Something that told me I'd made a dent in the cold-as-fuck barrier he liked to raise around himself.

'I can see why you might have reservations, Miss Brogan. You have only just learned the truth about the world in which you live. It must have been a terrible shock to you,' he said, without one ounce of empathy in his voice. 'These things take time to fully digest, I can understand that. But, once you understand, once you really understand, then you will come to think like we do. In time, you will see that relinquishing the Angels of their Throne is the only way. The first to Fall knew this. It was Lucifer's dream to make that become a reality, and now, in his demise, it is our responsibility to carry that legacy forward and prevail for the good of all.'

He stepped closer, looking into my eyes and when he spoke, his voice was softer, the hard edge to it suddenly washed away. I wanted to look away from the intensity of his stare, the way it seemed to bury deep inside. I wanted to close my ears to the cajoling tone in his voice.

'Surely you must see that what the Angels have done to your world, the way they have stood at the helm since the beginning of time, the way they have let you all languish in darkness and lies, is unjust and unfair?' he said, offering me the first smile I had seen from him, the first hint that he could look anything but cold and unyielding. 'They could have given you autonomy. The right to guide yourselves. They could have let you find your own path. Mankind deserved more. Lucifer saw that and questioned the Angels right to rule and he and the rest of us - his most ardent followers - were cast out, cursed, hunted. They tried to crush our spirit, just as they have crushed mankind's. We will undo their wrongs and give back what they have stolen from you.'

I stared at him. At all of them. I'd heard this story. I'd learnt all about the injustice meted out by the Seraphim and their army, and yeah, it was screwed up and wrong. I got that. I hated it, of course I did. But I also knew what Ethan had said about Blake, and for all the noble sentiment in the world that Blake claimed to have, there was a reason Ethan had spent years avoiding this bastard. He didn't trust him. In fact, he'd gone out of his way to ensure Blake didn't get what he wanted, even risking his own life to hide the one thing he treasured in the whole world – Lucifer's Gospel.

'Wow,' I said with a smile of my own. 'You're like a modern-day Robin Hood. I'm not sure green would be your colour though. Look, this is all well and good and I applaud you in your endeavour to not be such total bastards as the Angels, but the problem is: I know what you do. I know what you do to people like me. To the ones who see your world. You collect us. Process us, or however the fuck you do it. You can't stand there and make out like you're our saviours when I know that you eat our souls for a living.'

'That is an unfortunate necessity,' he said, raising one of his hands and gesturing with his index finger as if scolding a child. 'Being cast out weakened us. Consuming the souls of the maledicti and those who see our world is the only way we can regain some of that power.'

'By killing us?' I scoffed. 'You think you're better than the Angels? The way I see it, you're just as bad as they are.'

Blake's eyes narrowed, his brow creasing. 'Kill you? Whatever made you think we kill you?'

I stared at him, confusion clouding my head. 'But, I thought...'

'We don't kill you. Those of you who see our world are far more valuable to us than that. What would be the point in killing you?'

Hope swelled in my chest. I wanted to believe him, because if he was speaking the truth then it meant Addi still had a chance. Yet, why would Ethan have lied about it?

'Okay, if that's the case, then I want to see my friend. Where's Addi?' I said.

Blake took a step back, locking his hands together behind his back again. 'You will be reunited with your friend. I give you my word.'

My mouth dropped open. 'Just like that?'

'Of course,' he said, with a shrug. 'I am not a monster, Miss Brogan, no matter what Ethan might have you believe. You will see your friend soon enough. Friendships, bonds, companionship, as I said, these things are important to us all...'

High above Blake's head, a small glass orb of light was flickering.

I looked up, feeling the first prickles of dread creeping up my neck.

Seeing that my attention had been drawn elsewhere, Blake craned to look upwards too, his gaze finding the tiny light that was blinking on and off. He looked at it, expressionless, only a slight arching of his brow showing a vague interest in the flickering light.

The others began to stare too, following the direction of their leader's gaze. I noticed how some of them didn't seem quite so unfazed by the blinking orb. They looked instantly on guard, their bodies tense and alert, and some even appeared scared, their eyes widening with tinges of fear.

The tiny glass orb stopped flickering, but the light it emitted began to burn brighter and brighter still, until finally with a loud pop, it burst, sending a small shower of glass down to the floor. Blake side-stepped the sharp splinters as they fell like ice crystals close to his feet.

All at once, the sea of sparkling orbs began to flicker furiously, the frantic lightshow filling the whole room with pulses of radiance and shrouds of shadow as the lights blinked on and off.

Everyone was on edge now, everyone was on high alert.

Everyone except for Blake and Juliette.

'What are you doing?' I hissed, desperately straining against my invisible binds. 'Why are you just standing there? The Angels are coming! They've found you!'

Blake remained where he was, indifferent to my warning, but Juliette stepped around him to stand in front of me again, dragging her gaze away from the show with some reluctance. She ran the backs of her fingers down my cheek in an over-dramatic caress, before holding my chin between her thumb and index finger, tilting her head to one side in the same way she had when she'd found me in Davey's house.

'Goodness,' she marvelled, staring into my eyes. 'You really don't have any idea, do you? Such a silly piggy you are! That is not the Angels.'

The lights began to burst, deadly shards of shattered glass exploding above everyone's heads. I pulled my chin out of her grasp and bent my head into my chest, screwing my eyes shut and bracing myself for the lethal rain-shower to hit, waiting for it to pierce my skin with a thousand cruel needle-sharp fragments. When it didn't, I dared myself to look up, gasping as I saw the shards of glass suspended in the air, like a shimmering blanket of crystal.

I'd seen this before. That night when Ethan had rescued me from the hospital, when he'd fought with the Dominion in the street. The glass from the streetlights had frozen in the air right before the Angel had appeared. Right before he'd told me to run.

I held my breath, my heart hammering frantically.

A huge, bone-melting explosion simultaneously seemed to suck the oxygen from my lungs and shake the whole room like an oncoming earthquake. The voices of the demon army rose up, sharp, clipped tones issuing orders to stand their ground, to be ready, to recreate the light as quick as possible, which some of them did, working together to deftly replace some of the orbs that had been destroyed.

The air in the centre of the hall shuddered violently, deep waves appearing as if it was water, a whirlpool of chaos erupting from the very heart of the maelstrom. Then, with a sound that tore at my ears, the air ripped in half, like a hurricane tearing through the room and a great maw of unfathomable darkness opened up right in front of my eyes.

Someone was screaming now, and it took a moment for it to hit me that Iwas the one who was screaming. I was screaming as I stared wide-eyed into the blackest chasm.

Something was coming. Something monstrous.

'It is him,' Juliette cried out, her face in rapture, her eyes aflame with a mad exultation. 'He has come home to us. He is here!'

As the room stopped juddering, as the hurricane stopped howling, the dimensional void disappeared, collapsing in on itself like a blackhole and, as the crystal dust settled all around us, and the lights began to come back on, I saw that what now stood in the centre of the room, wasn't a monster at all.

It was Ethan.

Ethan was here and, as my eyes met his, I saw instinctively why every single member of the demon army were now aiming their deadly hands directly at him.

He was the eye of the storm. The chasm. The chaos.

Ethan was the unfathomable darkness and suddenly I wasn't so sure that I knew him at all. 

***