Double Trouble Read online

  “For a unicorn, you’re quite tolerant of violence,” the incubus complained.

  “My species goes onto battlefields and eats the dead to prevent the spread of disease and ensure passage to the afterlife. Violence is a part of who we are. And we are not against the use of violence to protect our own. Should you hurt Layla, I will enjoy crushing you to paste and returning your soul to the darkest pit in the nastiest hell I can find.”

  “I see you’ve been ensnared rather heavily. You’re going to have to watch for that, Layla. It will be quite easy for you to enthrall men. It’s something you will actively have to control. Now, of course, if you wish to keep this male for a while, you’re doing a very good job of securing him. If he gets much more interested, you’re going to have to restrain him until you’re ready to enjoy him. That shroud will be a problem. It’s doing a lot more than suppressing your demonic abilities.” The incubus wrinkled his nose and looked me over from head to toe. “Paul, can you add a dampener of your own that can fade on its own over a period of, say, six months? That should be long enough for her to adapt to her powers without killing her unicorn. She’s too young to be developing this quickly, but I suspect it’s because of the shroud. The human elements of our heritage and breed are advancing her long before her time. Usually, our kind develops over a period of a few hundred years. You’re not even a hundred yet.”

  “So, her being in her sixties is correct?” Dean asked.

  “She was born during the emergence, and she was stolen while the first wave of magic brought chaos into the world. Unless I’m mistaken, she was the first child born of this emergence.”

  “She is,” Clarence confirmed. “That is part of why I had difficulty seeing the truth of her past. That much magic converging on Earth makes our vision blurred. Paul helped. She is eighty-six. Should you wish to learn more about her altered development, Emmanuel can help you.”

  “It will be my pleasure. And it will be the pleasure of our family to help bring an end to those who have done this to us. As such, we formally request an exemption from the rules of our war to deal with this matter. I would rather not anger Him over a personal matter.”

  “He will pay no heed to this as long as you target only those who have played a role in this event,” Paul announced. “He has also granted us leave to aid you as we can. This will clear our debt to Juan and balance the scales for all the times your lines have helped ours.”

  “We will consider all debts repaid,” Emmanuel replied.

  “Then we’re agreed. Our ability to act will be limited by His will, but we will not interfere with your activities. Should a greater devil be involved, we will need to know, but we will turn away from such activities.”

  “Warring factions of devils are responsible for this, although Layla is no longer of interest to most devilish entities. Her father, of course, is interested, but the shroud hides her from his sight. That is the true purpose of the shroud: not to prevent her from knowing what and who she is, but to prevent her father from finding her. The devil who stole her has paid already, but our family was unable to find her. We did look. We still do.”

  The angels stilled, and Clarence clamped his wings close to his back. The other two relaxed, and something in the room changed. A weight lifted from my shoulders, one I hadn’t realized I’d carried.

  “He speaks the truth,” the unnamed angel said, breaking the heavy silence. “He loathes when families are broken by pointless feuds and wars. And for all the hosts of Heaven and Hell wage war, it is not a war to be waged by our offspring, not until the End of Days. And for all she is a demon, He has seen her heart and has judged it worthy.”

  “I should be disgusted, but I am unsurprised. That would be my great-grandmother’s doing. You can’t have a goddess who represents love and life in its entirety in a bloodline without having the rare black sheep in a devilish and demonic family.”

  Damn it, at the rate we were going, I’d never get a straight answer out of anyone. “Could you assholes stop being so vague and just tell me who you are, what’s going on, and why you’re even here?”

  “My name is Emmanuel, and your mother is my sister, a succubus who has wed one of Satan’s lieutenants. The feud between the devils resulted in your kidnapping shortly after your birth. You are the first demon born of this emergence period. Until the shroud is removed, I won’t be able to tell which powers of your ancestry have awoken, but I expect you’ll have your fair share of all your heritage. Power tends to grow strong in the first born of every race during an emergence. Your loss was a great blow to my sister and the devil she wed. Their vengeance has changed the very face of all the devil’s hells.”

  “He speaks the truth,” Clarence said. “You are a wanted child, and He knows this. This is part of why He is willing to cooperate. He does not like when families are broken.”

  “He will outgrow that one of these days,” Emmanuel replied, his tone amused. “He still grows into his portfolio. Give Him a hundred years. He will be as much of an asshole as any angel.”

  The angels laughed.

  I frowned. “Isn’t that going to offend Him?”

  “He is not so easily offended,” Clarence replied. “Ours is a twisted family. But you are not any relatives of ours, although there is an angel in your ancestry. Once the shroud drops, he will know his offspring’s offspring’s offspring’s offspring has had a child and you were hidden from him. He will show. That is his nature. He will show angry and ready to wage war, but that is his nature. That is why Paul and Derek have both come. They will be able to prevent any unfortunate misunderstandings when he arrives. I do recommend that you take care, Emmanuel. He will be enraged upon his arrival.”

  “I understand that well enough. Rage over this has been something we have long endured. Anyway, I’m one of those offspring’s offspring’s offspring or however many offsprings it is, so he won’t flip at me. I make no promises about anyone else in the room. I’ll get a hug.” Emmanuel smirked. “And you’ll all be upset because he won’t hug you.”

  “You are a terrible demon,” Clarence muttered.

  “Yes, I’m so terrible for having an affectionate great-great-grandfather. That’s the problem with angels. Once they join the family, you just can’t get rid of them. I really need to ask my great-great-grandmother what she was thinking joining with an angel.”

  Paul laughed. “She loved him, and he loved her enough to conspire with a demon to produce children. That is how these things work. But, we should return to the subject at hand, as we are confusing your niece, who does deserve the truth of this matter. Once we drop the shroud, this room will become very crowded. Her father will surely show, and he will bring her mother, and the angels of her line will also arrive.”

  My eyes widened. “Angels is plural. There’s more than one?”

  “You have six angels in your line. They are all named.”

  Something about Paul’s statement chilled me. “Named?”

  “Michael. Gabriel. Lucifer before his fall. These are only three of the named angels. They are not the angels of your line. Lucifer has never birthed any children and cannot. It is a price of his power, just like He can no longer have any children, although His child’s portfolio passes from human to human every emergence. Right now, His child’s portfolio slumbers. The previous holder of the portfolio did not hold it long before it fled him. He proved unworthy.”

  Emmanuel frowned. “The portfolio fled?”

  “Less it fled, more that it was an echo of what it should have been. We do not know who possesses the portfolio now—or if the portfolio will reawaken this emergence. Times have changed. He only smiles when we ask Him, as even we are blocked from the future’s secrets. His next child already pleases Him. Which worries us.”

  “Why does that worry you?” I asked.

  “He enjoys when the unexpected comes to Earth. As Emmanuel said, He has not yet fully grown into His portfolio. Truth be told, we hope He remains as He now is. This change has been
good for this Earth. It gives us hope the End of Days will take longer arriving. Nothing is eternal, but all beings wish to continue to exist, even us angels. I suspect His next child is not a son but a daughter, which would match well to the devil having a daughter of the spirit if not of the body. This emergence, it appears as though women will change the world. This is not a bad thing. Men have dominated most of humanity’s history. We shall see what comes of change.”

  “Terror,” Juan muttered. “Women are terrifying creatures.”

  Dean laughed. “I can’t say he’s wrong. Our mother is most certainly a terrifying creature.”

  “I’m doing both of you idiots a favor. I won’t tell Mom you said that. You owe me.”

  The brothers sighed.

  “Could we please lay this out for me in a clear and concise manner, one that doesn’t require me to use math or spell anything, please?”

  “We can help you with the knowledge you were denied in your youth,” Paul replied. “Modifying your memories so you have the knowledge of basic written language and mathematics is within our capabilities. Usually, we allow humans to learn such things on their own, but this impairment is too significant for the other challenges you face. It will be done after we remove the shroud and handle the aftermath of so many upset beings teleporting into the same space. I suspect your grandfather will wish to handle your lost education. Also, please do just address him as your grandfather. It gets complicated trying to track the number of generations.”

  “Okay. This won’t offend him?” I asked, not sure how anyone would want to be addressed like that by me without having met me before.

  “No. It will not. Angels take family very seriously. He will call you his granddaughter with pride because you are proof the woman he once loved had lived. She is long gone from this Earth. Her seed of life has yet to be replanted, but I expect she will find herself with a winged lover in her next future. For now, she rests safe in His care. Some souls have active afterlives, some slumber. She rests for now. While your grandfather is willing to wage war without hesitation, his love is equal to his aggression. He is one of the more aggressive angels, a general of His army. That is why there will be trouble for a time. A lieutenant of the hells and a general of His army in the same room will be entertaining for some of us.”

  Emmanuel raised his hand. “I will be very amused.”

  “You will also have to keep your grandfather from attempting to slaughter your brother-in-law.”

  “I’m not worried about it. Elize will be crying and trying to cuddle with Layla, and I suspect my niece will not react well, there will be a fight, and it’ll be chaos. Her father’s parenting instincts will kick in, and he’ll recognize Layla is his descendant and try to calm the situation. If you could try to resist murdering your parents when they come into your space, that would be appreciated. That instinct is your father’s fault, and he’ll be able to teach you how to control it. You do that because you have no idea how to distinguish friend from foe, so you eject everyone from your space.” Emmanuel grinned, and he rubbed his hands together. “Do make sure your dampeners are good, Paul. She’ll have a lot of rogue instincts we’ll have to teach her how to control.”

  “I will make the dampeners last a period of three years with a gradual decay,” Paul replied, “Six months will not be sufficient with her heritage, and we would not wish for her to damage her male in her enthusiasm.”

  Dean sighed. “I’m going to be Layla’s male in this family, aren’t I?”

  “Yes,” the angels and the incubus replied.

  I laughed. “Your family seems determined to call me your mare. We’re even now. If you take me to the art store again to look around, I’ll suggest they should call you my stallion.”

  “You don’t even need to negotiate that. If you want to go to the art store, I’ll take you to the art store.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say to that, and of my options, I picked Xena as the one most likely to offer somewhat reasonable advice on how to react.

  Xena smiled. “Just say thank you.”

  “Thank you, Dean.”

  “You’re welcome. If you would like to hide behind me for the initial chaos, I should be able to withstand a few cranky angels, a devil, and whatever else shows up when the shroud drops.”

  “Perhaps you should transform first,” Emmanuel suggested. “Even a devil hesitates to attack a unicorn, especially when there are other unicorns in the room. Unicorns have a reputation.”

  That sounded interesting. “They do? What sort of reputation?”

  “They hold grudges for longer than most beings, and they are willing to use the weapon attached to their head whenever they’re annoyed. Unicorns decided long ago they weren’t going to participate in the war between law and chaos or good and evil. They also decided they’d bang heads together on both sides if necessary. That’s why they’re battlefield shepherds. They’re neutral more than anything. The whole nonsense about them being pure beings is just that: nonsense. They just look pure and innocent until they’re hungry.”

  “I was warned they had special dietary requirements.”

  “Once the shroud drops, you will not find their special dietary requirements a bother. If anything, you’ll like it. Your heritage makes a matter of souls serious to you, and it’ll appeal to you to shepherd souls to their proper destinations despite needing to take a nibble or two from the body. Your devilish ancestry will make it so you have other tricks to dispose of the bodies and perform your other duties post conversion. And, should your male expire prematurely, you can shake off the conversion at your will.”

  Dean frowned at that news.

  “I can shake it off?”

  “You’re a blend of devil, demon, angel, and a lot of other things. If you’ve got access to your angelic powers, you’ll be able to purge your new unicorn DNA without issue. That’s an angelic ability. You might even be able to teleport in time.”

  “Okay, Dean. I have to give you some credit. You’ve gone and gotten yourself ensnared by one hell of a woman.” Xena giggled. “I can’t wait until Mom finds out you’re dating a daughter of the heavens and hells.”

  Derek pressed the palms of his hands together and held his hands close to his chest as though he prayed. “Actually, she is more like a daughter of Hell. She was just born on Earth because a new demonic seed of life became available to the Lord of Lies. He rewarded his lieutenant, Layla’s father, with the seed. Had no seeds been available, she would have been born a human. But He offered His fallen angel a new seed. That is kin to giving him a new child. He forged a new angel that day, too. I suppose you can consider them sisters. She was the first angel born of this emergence, too.”

  “What does that mean for me?” I asked.

  “Very little. You are a demon, but the Lord of Lies offers his demons many freedoms. It is his nature. You have the free will to do as you please. When the End of Days comes, it will become a battle like none other, and demons, devils, and angels will have to decide what roles they play. There is no record of what must be during the End of Days. Nobody knows except Him, and those are secrets He will hold until all has been lost and the seeds of life are planted anew, and the cycle begins again. But it seems those days will be a long time in coming. You will be able to enjoy your life as you want with your stallion, have your children as you want, and live. I will not tell you if any of your children will become demons, devils, or angels. Some things are best left discovered naturally.”

  “I like that you used the word children. Children is plural.” Dean grinned. “I don’t want a number. Knowing there will be more than one is good enough for me.”

  The angels snorted, and Derek replied, “You will wed a succubus, and they are simply unhappy if they do not have their offspring around. As soon as you get rid of one, you will have another, and truth be told, it won’t be long after they have learned some independence, she will desire another child. You will have many foals, and it will be rare times you do not have one,
two, or even ten running around at your feet causing you trouble.”

  My brows shot up at the thought of having more than one child around while Dean kept grinning. “I like this math,” he replied.

  Juan shook his head and sighed. “You are even worse than Dad.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with Dad. He loves Mom, and he’s always loved us. Dad is a most excellent example of a good father.”

  “He speaks the truth,” Clarence announced.

  Well, that was something. I couldn’t stop my jealousy from surging, but I did my best to ignore it. “And my father?”

  Emmanuel snickered. “Your stallion will be kept busy making sure your family doesn’t take you into custody without him. Devils are not usually all that skilled with social grace when it comes to their offspring’s partners. I’ll try to remind your parents you’ll be more comfortable if they take your stallion along for the trip, too. Especially as you grow more into your powers, you’ll probably get rather unhappy to be separated from him. My sister gets very irritable when she’s separated from her mate. Once a succubus bonds and wants to stick around, good luck getting rid of her. Incubi like me don’t tend to bond as readily, but we can figure out the loyalty thing under the right conditions—or if we have an angelic slave driver around keeping us on the straight and narrow.”

  The angels snickered, and Clarence stretched out his wing and smacked Emmanuel with it. “You would be among the first incubi approached for a triad, and you know this.”

  “I like threesomes a lot.”

  “Of course you do. You’re an incubus,” the angel muttered. “If you had your way, every day would be a public orgy.”

  “This is true. Threesomes make dedication worth it, and there’s little as enjoyable for us as having our way with an angel.”

  Some things I didn’t want to know. Listening to someone who was supposedly my uncle flirt with an angel ranked fairly high in things I didn’t want to do. “Please stop. I don’t care if you want to go bang an angel, but please do so where I’m not forced to listen to it.”