to better defend you if need be, as did Lucian, because he wanted to know the demon’s secrets.
“Your mother is being kept in an abandoned mine not far from here,” Seneser said. His face relaxed and his eyes glazed over as your thrall took hold.
“Do you know which one?” You were already excited at the prospect.
“I don’t know the name of it, but I could find it for you.”
“How did you know we were here?” I asked Lucian suspiciously.
“I have an informant in Miami who said you make regular trips to Las Vegas, and I’d heard rumors that a Belial demon you’d been hunting had turned up.”
I didn’t know who I trusted less, the slippery demon or our brother.
“They could be lying, Vincent. Both of them.”
“I’m not the liar,” Seneser said, appealing to you with an earnest expression. “His master is the liar.”
“Tell me more, Seneser,” you cooed, making sure the demon’s gaze stayed riveted on yours. “Tell me what Azrael has done.”
“Azrael ordered his lover murdered,” Seneser said on a sorrowful note. I’d rather him spit fury than fake pity on my behalf.
“Orlando?” you asked.
“No. The slave boy.”
I froze. He must mean Lior. The room tilted for a moment, and even your visage blurred before me as bittersweet memories of my first love swam in my head, overwhelming my good sense.
“Who’s that?” you asked Seneser, oblivious to my internal struggle.
“Andronicus’s concubine,” he answered. “His handsome war trophy.”
Lior was neither of those things. My defenses went up like a fortress. You shot me a questioning look.
“Where is your proof?” I demanded. Your seduction faltered as Seneser’s eyes snapped open in alarm.
“What?” he asked, confused.
With two fingers, Lucian directed Seneser’s gaze back toward you. You took a moment to soothe the demon with murmurs that fell like a lover’s soft caress. Your energy was waning, and I didn’t want you to exhaust yourself. If what Seneser said was true, even a little bit, I owed it to my departed to know it. When the demon was under your influence again, he resumed his story.
“I was with Azrael and Lena when we visited Andronicus on the Balkan Peninsula, where Azrael told Andronicus that he must unite the Germanic tribes under Roman rule. It was his fate. The seers had foretold it.”
I’d been promised sovereignty over my countrymen and everlasting glory among the gods. Lena and Azrael were there, certainly, and two other divine beings, but their names were not given to me, and they’d been inhabiting human forms at the time.
“What does this matter?” I asked, not wishing to reexamine my past transgressions.
“How did this meeting lead to his lover’s murder?” you said.
“Lena suspected Azrael was acting duplicitously, but she said nothing against him, for she’d been given a similar prophecy. And she trusted Thiran, the other angel in our company, not to deceive her. But unbeknownst to us, Azrael was making a play for power. He’d introduced the idea of a Nephilim army to the Thrones in order to exert control over the Grigori in the earthen realm. Thiran opposed him and insisted angels need not make war against their own kind. Thiran was influential among the gods, for he was wise and modest with a just character. His only fault was that he believed the Roman Empire had become too powerful, while his Potesta brethren saw the empire as their crowning achievement with so many worshippers united under one rule. If the Roman empire suffered a loss, Thiran would be an easy scapegoat, so Azrael set up a plan for sabotage.”
I felt sick with rage. I forced myself to focus on Seneser’s timeline. The Imperium didn’t exist prior to my incarceration. And when Azrael approached me in that hellish Shade Vale, he’d given me the choice: serve as a soldier in his Nephilim army or relinquish my body to become a reaper. After battling corpses for so long, and men before that, I was finished with being a soldier. And without my body, it’d be harder for my mother to corrupt me, so I’d chosen the latter.
“How was Lena involved?” I asked and without you having to repeat it, Seneser answered me directly.
“Azrael orchestrated the murder of a renowned Roman politician by Lucian’s hand, then told Lena he would appeal to the human authorities for mercy if she agreed to cripple your performance in the Germanic campaign. She had to choose between her sons. Lena estimated you to be held in higher esteem among the gods, so…”