“You look like you haven’t eaten in weeks,” she said, pulling back and giving me the once over. Her eyes flicked over to Zeek and Charis. “Oh, you brought friends? Boy, I didn’t think you had any friends.” Her laugh was boisterous, and she gave each of them the same hug she had given me.

  “What did your momma feed you?” she asked Zeek after releasing him. Her arms had barely gotten around the huge man’s sides.

  “Spinach,” Zeek said, laughing.

  “My, you are a looker,” she said to Charis, the hug for her only slightly more gentle. “Mmmm, demon inside you, eh? I’ll let it slide, since you’re friends with my boy.”

  “I appreciate that,” Charis said, uncomfortable with the woman’s attention.

  “Celia, the big one is Ezekiel, we call him Zeek. The pretty one is Charis,” I said, introducing them. “I assume Rachel isn’t here?”

  She put her hands on her hips and glared at me. “You know full well she isn’t here,” she said. “When has she ever been here this time of day?”

  I had known she wouldn’t be there. As much as I wanted to, right now I didn’t trust Rachel either. What I did trust was that her computer would be safeguarded from eavesdropping and tracking.

  “Okay Celia,” I said. “You figured me out. Actually, I was just hoping I could borrow Rachel’s office for a few minutes. I promise I won’t snoop around into anything I’m not supposed to.”

  She laughed. “Like anyone could stop you if you wanted to,” she replied. “Go ahead, but I’m going to call Rachel and tell her you’re here.”

  I had expected as much. “Of course. Charis, Zeek, if you wouldn’t mind waiting downstairs with Celia?”

  “I’ve got some fresh brewed iced tea,” Celia said. “And I was just baking cookies for my grandson’s school fair, but I’m sure I can spare a few.”

  “Lead the way,” Zeek said. “I could never say no to a cookie.”

  Celia brought them inside, through a simple marble-floored foyer and into the living room. Rachel’s taste had always been understated. Instead of the crowded, ornate decorative taste shared by the wealthy, she had a standard sofa, love seat, recliner and ottoman, a painting of her parents, a fireplace, and not much else. The kitchen was to the right of the living room, and Celia led Charis and Zeek that way while I climbed the steps on the left side of the room.

  The door to Rachel’s office was locked, and I knew it was both protected by angelic scripture that would alert her to anyone entering, and under the watchful eyes of a number of hidden cameras. I figured Celia was probably dialing her right now, so I didn’t hesitate to unlock the door and let myself in. I looked directly into one of the cameras and waved, and then focused on them, pinching off the flow of electricity and disabling them. I knew she would get on me about why I didn’t want her to see what I was doing, but right now I didn’t care.

  Her office was standard fare, a near clone of the one downtown. I took a seat behind the desk and turned on her monitor. The computer was locked, but it just so happened that I knew the password. I had pulled it from the keys once when I had been here with Rachel. I typed it in, and then opened up a web browser. For all I knew, Obi hadn’t gotten away from Cho, but if he had I could only assume he would have sent me a message. That meant SamChan.

  I would have preferred to use a VPN and a darknet to visit the site, but I didn’t have much time if Rachel decided to head home. She didn’t know about SamChan. As far as I could tell none of the Divine did. It made it the perfect resource for secure communication.

  My heart lurched in excitement when I saw the first message subject.

  Don’t cross the lane over the divider

  It had been posted by Oblitrix, two hours ago. I knew it was meant for me. I clicked into it.

  Friends don’t let friends drive blind so txt me

  The string was a code for the phone number. I pulled my cell out and started typing.

  “Still kickn?” I wrote.

  The message came back a few seconds later. “u bet. feelin advntrus?”

  “y cu soon”

  I smiled and pocketed the phone, and then dug into Rachel’s computer to clean out the history and the cache. It wouldn’t stop any serious snooping into my activity, but it would at least cause it to take a few hours.

  I was reaching for the power button on the monitor when I noticed the dead pixel. It was such a tiny, inconsequential thing that most people would never have seen it, and even if they had would never have given it a second thought. I wasn’t most people, because I knew how fastidious Rachel was with keeping things in order, and so I did give it another look. Squinting, I tried to discern it with my eyes, but failing that I forced my will on it, examining the diodes that made up the pixels and looking for one that was unlit. There weren’t any.

  I stared at it for a few seconds, and then grabbed the mouse and navigated over to the tiny dot. I clicked on it. Nothing happened. I waited a few seconds, clicked again. No result. Almost satisfied, I started reaching for the power button again but then reconsidered. I double-clicked, and felt my pulse pick up the pace when a fresh window popped up.

  Staring back at me from the monitor was an icon that was all too familiar. It was replaced a moment later by a login screen.

  I slumped back into the chair, my mind reeling. Rachel was a servant? My pounding heart was breaking at the thought of her deceit. I had known her database had held a message that was intended for me to find, but I had trusted in her, and assumed it had been planted by someone else. Now.. Had she put it there herself?

  What about the ambush I had interrupted? Was I as much of a fool as the witch had said I was? I had thought the demons were there to flex some muscle. What if the ambush was no ambush at all, but a meeting? Alyle had joined up with the angels to fight against me. What if it wasn’t out of self-preservation, but because he was already working with them?

  “You’ve been punked,” Ulnyx said, his rough voice in my head, pushing my confusion closer to rage. I closed my eyes and clenched my fists, trying to make some kind of sense of it.

  “Landon, wait,” Josette said. “You don’t know that. She could be trying to help. Maybe she got her hands on some information, and she was going to share it with you. After all, she has been Touched for many years, and I know her well.”

  I took a deep breath and let my body relax. Josette had a point, and it helped extinguish some of the anger. I looked at the login screen. Maybe she was trying to help, and my dealings with the Divine had left me so jaded I wasn’t able to see it. I leaned forward and started typing.

  First, I tried Rachel’s standard username and password combo; the same one that allowed access to the machine. Of course, it didn’t work. Why would she use the same password for both anyway? I sat back down and stared at the login screen. What would she use?

  My fingers flew along the keys as I put in as many possible passwords as I could think of. I tried her birthday, her parent’s birthdays, and her anniversary. I tried her favorite author and her favorite book, the names of her deceased pets, and even my own name. I had software on my laptop that would have been able to brute force it in a matter of hours, but I wasn’t so lucky here. Instead, I was taking stabs in the dark trying to guess the right key press combination.

  At least twenty minutes had passed when I decided to give up. Time was in short supply, and we needed to go meet Obi. I could always bring him back here and set him on cracking the system if necessary. I typed in one last word, ‘balance’, and watched the red error text pop up yet again. It was worth a shot.

  “Can I help you with something?”

  I had been so involved with the computer, Rachel’s voice caught me completely off guard. She was standing on the other side of the desk, hands on her hips, a stern expression on her face. When had she gotten here? My initial reaction was to push myself back from the desk and start to utter an apologetic explanation. I remembered what Josette had said and I tried to stay calm. Seeing her standing there, her posture accusing me; it didn’t work. My emotions were too raw, and in the back of my mind I could hear Ulnyx calling me a sucker.

  “Yes, you can,” I said, pulling strength into my body and leaping across the desk. I had the demonic blade against her throat before she could react. “You can tell me the password to that little hidden app you’ve got. You know which one I mean.”

  I had nearly shouted, and I could hear the chairs in the kitchen shifting downstairs. It was followed by a herd of footsteps, and a moment later Charis and Zeek stormed into the room, with Celia right behind.

  “Landon, child, what are you doing?” Celia cried, shoving herself between the two Templars.

  “Celia, stay back,” I said, pushing the blade against Rachel’s throat as tightly as I dared without breaking the skin. “I’m sorry, but she’s been keeping some pretty major secrets, and I need her to tattle.”

  Zeek took hold of Celia’s arm, keeping her in place. As strong as she was, she was no match for the massive Templar.

  I pulled the dagger away and gave Rachel a soft shove towards the computer. “Put in the password,” I said.

  Rachel looked at me, fear and tears in her eyes. “Landon, wait. Please. It’s not what you think. I’m not…”

  I was hoping she would defend herself, and tell me I was wrong. Part of me was counting on it. Too bad she was lying. It only made me more angry.

  “Told you so,” Ulnyx said. I came down on him like a vice, pushing him from my conscious stream.

  “Not what I think?” I shouted. “Not what I think? What I think is that you’re a servant of the Beast. Am I wrong? Tell me I am, and remember that you can’t lie to me.”

  I could smell every bit of her fear. I could practically taste it on my tongue. She backed away from me, towards the chair behind the desk. She looked at the ground. “What are you doing here?” she asked me again.

  “I came to borrow your computer,” I said. “I was looking for Obi. I found more than I wanted to. Now answer the question, or I swear I’ll put this dagger into your heart.”

  She flopped into the chair, her eyes downcast. “I’m sorry, Landon. I never wanted to hurt you.”

  She was telling the truth, at least as she believed it. “Then why?” I asked, my surfaced emotions bouncing chaotically. “You’re a Touched; a shining example of what it means to be compassionate and giving and to walk the holy path. You were also like a mother to me. Why would you do this?”

  I could see the tears drip from her eyes and land between her legs, splashing on the leather of the chair. Her hands moved slowly to the keyboard, and she whispered between breaths. “It was no accident I was the one who took you in, after you defeated Reyzl,” she said.

  What? My mind shot back to the day we had met. It had only been a few days, and I was still in a fog. She had found me walking the streets, I had never questioned how or why. We had started talking, and she invited me to dinner. No judgment, no anger, only compassion. Had it all been an act?

  “I was supposed to keep an eye on you, and help you where I could without stepping over the line. The balance is very important to our work. You’re an easy person to care for, Landon. You have a strong soul. There was a time when I began to question what I was doing, because I had grown fond of you. Except, I thought when the time came you would join us. I thought you would go with Rebecca. She loves you, and the way you talked about her, I thought you cared for her too. Don’t you see, Landon? Everyone who cares the most about you - Rebecca, Sarah, and I; we want to set you free, to set everyone trapped in this stupid war free. This is the only way to do it.”

  I walked around the desk so I could see the screen. She began typing in the password, one slow character at a time.

  “You want me to believe you’re doing this for me?” I asked. She thought she was, which made me sick to my stomach. “How could you be, and believe it? You were a servant before you ever met me.”

  I didn’t know if the last part was true, but she didn’t deny it. “None of us are free,” she replied. “We’ve been at war for thousands of years. We will always be at war. I used to believe that I could make a difference. I used to believe that God cared, and would help us win, so that the faithful could rise up and get the heaven that we deserve. I’ve realized that it’s never going to happen. The Beast can happen. Change can happen. I am doing this for you, and for me.” She pointed at Charis and Zeek. “I’m even doing it for them. The Templars think they’re so righteous. Maybe they just enjoy all of this war mongering?” She shrugged. “I don’t. I’m done. It will never, ever end, Landon. Is that what you want?

  She finished typing, and moved her hand to hover over the enter key, waiting for my response. For the first time since Sarah had disappeared, I gave pause, and that pause led me to doubt. What if she was right? I had been tired, empty, and emotionless. I had been acting on instinct, keeping the balance, and feeling nothing. I had sought out the mark, searched for it in hope of finding some kind of salvation. I looked up at Charis, her face a bunched mess of worry at my hesitation.

  What if my path had led me here not to fight the Beast, but to help set him free? My emotions were a tangled nest that I couldn’t sort. I looked back to Rachel, pleading with her eyes, begging me to listen to her reason. I couldn’t deny I had been unhappy, drained by my position in the universe. What if I did free the Beast? What if it destroyed everything? I would be free from the prison I had put myself in. We would all be free of the constant battle, the so-called balance. Did it matter if everything else was gone too, if I wasn’t around to know it?

  My anger began to fade. I leaned in and kissed Rachel on the forehead. “Thank you,” I said to her.

  “Landon?” Charis said. I could feel her power building, preparing to fight me. I turned my head towards her.

  “She’s right,” I said. “I don’t want to always be at war. I don’t want this to be my eternity. I need more than this.”

  Her power kept growing, but she didn’t presume to unleash it. She had seen the essence of who I was, and so she held onto her own doubts. She was still unsure, because she could only know who I was when we had been in the cave. She didn’t know who I was right now.

  I put my hand on Rachel’s chair and rolled her away from the computer. “If you care for me,” I said, “tell me what’s in the file.” I could have opened it and found out for myself. That wasn’t the point.

  Rachel’s eyes met mine, and she smiled sadly. “A list of the owners and locations of all the texts you collected. Each of them has been tasked with keeping the marks safe. I know you have the original sources, but the important passages have been transcribed. They’ve been digitally encrypted and spread throughout the internet, but the keepers have the keys. All except one. That one you can only get from one place.”

  “Lucifer’s Bible?” I guessed.

  She nodded. “The name of the servant who holds it is in the file, and only they know its location. Few of us have ever seen even that much.”

  “Why did you get to see it?”

  “I had to have access, so I could show it to you if need be,” she said. “We’ve planned for everything.”

  Charis’ eyes followed me closely as I moved over to the computer. Her power was still gathered, but I knew now she wouldn’t use it unless I moved on her first. It was a bad decision, because I was sure I could hit her faster. Not as hard, but faster. I had grown up since she had frozen me with a touch.

  My finger found the enter key, and the app unlocked, opening up a spreadsheet that filled the entire screen.

  “The Devil’s Bible is last,” she said.

  I scanned the list as I scrolled. I recognized many of the names, and found others that I knew were replacements to torch-bearers I had been forced to kill. I didn’t rush down to the final entry, stalling a little bit for time while I continued to process everything I was learning. When I reached it, and read it, I wasn’t really surprised. It all seemed so natural, so fitting, so understandable.

  “Landon, what does it say?” Zeek asked. All eyes were on me, waiting for me to do something.

  I looked to Zeek, to Charis, to Celia, and then to Rachel. “It says we don’t know half as much as we think we do,” I replied. “But maybe that’s the point. Everyone has the freedom of choice, no matter what has been prescribed to them. We fight our own wars every day, and we decide our own outcomes. This existence may be imperfect, but it’s the variables that make it worth existing. With every passing moment things can change.”

  In fact, they already had. Maybe we would always be at war. Maybe there was no satisfying all of the parties concerned. Then again, maybe there was. Maybe we had just grown too complacent with the status quo, and all it would take was someone to rock the boat a little bit. Maybe that someone would be me? One thing at a time.

  Charis’ power began to fade as she relaxed her grip, heaving a deep sigh at my words. Rachel’s eyes locked onto mine, and I could feel her fear and sadness.

  “You have a choice, right now,” I said. “Forget about everything that’s gone before. We can make a difference. You can make a difference. It can start right here.”

  “I don’t, I can’t,” she replied. “It’s too late for me. I’ve already sworn myself to the Beast. I can’t escape it.” The tears were flowing more freely now. “I’m sorry, Landon. I’m sorry I lied to you, and tricked you. It wasn’t supposed to be this way, but I’m just so tired.”

  “The Beast is still caged,” I said. “I’ll protect you. Rachel…”

  Before I could react, she shot forward, her hand reaching out and finding the handle of the cursed dagger. She pulled it, getting just enough metal to slice her other hand open. The veins of poison began spreading instantly.