Hell's Angel: Guardian Angel Book 2

My eyes were still puffy and sore when I woke up. Max snored away in my bed, taking up about 80% of the blankets and all of the pillows. A tiny smile curved my lips up in nostalgia. She was a reminder of my normal life, before I found out about Vega, when my biggest concern was how to get a staff writing job and not be single forever.

I carefully padded out of the bed and out the room. The hardwood floors were unnaturally warm on my bare feet, magic of Arcadia, and I moved silently to the kitchen in my striped pajama bottoms and a lime green T-shirt. The house felt empty until I reached my destination. Loki sat on a stool at the counter with his head cradled in his hands like he had a headache. Betrayal stabbed into me and my eyes welled up again, this time from fury. With my teeth clenched, I practically growled at him. “Why are you still here?”

His head shot up and he looked almost as bad as I felt. He was paler than before and had bruises under his bloodshot eyes. His pitch black hair lacked the shine it used to and stood up in shambles, not sexy at all. His expression was apologetic and there was pain there, but I couldn’t bring myself to forgive him just yet. His voice was hoarse when he spoke. “Lyra, I am so sorry. Please, you have to understand that I had nothing to do with Freya’s plot.”

“But you wanted him gone,” I raged. “On some subconscious level, you wanted to get rid of Michael. She said it was for you.”

“She twisted it around! Was I jealous of how close you two were? You bet. I hated watching you together because I was worried you would love him instead of me, but I would never intentionally do something that would hurt you.”

“I hate damn love triangles. They’re so cliché. But this isn’t even about us right now. Vega wants a war. I’ve pissed her off enough that she’s going to launch her strike against us- against me. We need Michael to fight.”

“You’re a warrior, too, Lyra. And my brother and I are here.”

“I don’t care how good a titan you are. Fighters don’t get any better than my mother- I mean Thesis’- angels. He’s been at this a lot longer than any of us. How are you planning to lead an army of soldiers when you are part of the reason their commander for centuries was just given to the enemy?”

He ran a hand through his hair, something he’d probably done a lot throughout the night. “You are right, Lyra. I’m sorry about everything that happened and that I can’t fix it. Tell me what I can do to make you stop hating me.”

I sighed. I couldn’t even deny to hating him right now. “I don’t know, Loki. For now, though, I need you out of my house. Andromeda can find you a place to stay in the city, but I need time away from you.”

He closed his dark eyes against my words and he winced like he’d been shot. I honestly didn’t like hurting him, but I just couldn’t handle what had happened. He looked at me with such sorrow but he nodded and turned to leave.

When I turned back toward the hallway, Maxine was there. She wore some of my sweats, which were a little wide on her, and one of my large shirts and she’d jammed her feet into some fuzzy socks. She quickly pulled me into a hug and stroked my hair. “So, what now?”

I pulled back and let out a big breath. Leave it to her to get to the point. “It’s going to be a busy day.”

Even though we were the same height, I was curvier than my very slender sister, so my custom-made clothes were slightly big on her. She settled for a blue, strappy, knee-length sun dress with a pair of my size 8 sandals. As for me, I wore a brown tunic with a lacy neckline, pants that hugged my legs in black leather, and some brown ankle boots. Dressed, I led her to the arena. It was jam packed with every single resident of Arcadia, despite the early hour.

“Whoa,” my sister breathed.

My warriors were an eclectic lot, men and women throughout history. Some were dressed in modern garb while some still wore more traditional outfits from their old homes. King Arthur, for example, still strutted around in a suit of armor and a red cape.

“You get used to it,” I muttered back. She followed me along the side wall to the stage at the front of the room. The room was like a massive auditorium, or maybe a sports stadium with tiered seating going up about 100 yards. There was a plush recliner, my throne, and a stiff-back chair empty next to it. Andromeda, the gatekeeper and basically Vice President of the city, sat on a sofa with her husband and an open spot for my sister. Other than the seats, there was a podium and a giant TV so everyone in the room could see what was going on up front. Like I said, eclectic.

Andromeda waved Max over and she left my side almost nervously. I couldn’t blame her. I walked regally up to my armchair and sank into the cushion, shooting a stomach-twisting look at the empty seat that would have held Arcadia’s true guardian- my guardian. The room got silent as I settled into my chair and I yanked my gaze back to the crowd.

Andromeda moved to the podium. “As you all know, Vega openly declared war on Queen Lyra when she forfeited her humanity. Yesterday, she made a strike that lost us Michael.”

Murmurs went through the entire room. There was panic and anger and it looked like most of the people here were ready to charge into battle at that moment. Good. Andromeda tried with no success to get everyone to quiet down. She shot her mother in the first row a helpless look and I rose to my feet to bail her out. This wasn’t her great idea anyway so she shouldn’t have to deal with the crowd. She looked relieved as she sat back on the couch and the room finally settled down when I took center stage.

“Vega has Michael.” My voice rang out clearly all the way to the back. “He sacrificed himself to protect me. She’s wanted him since she first saw him in the City, and now she’s also taken our best defense against her titans. She will make her move soon. And if she doesn’t, I’m not just going to sit around and let her get away with trying to hurt everyone that I love. This fight is starting now. Orion, Perseus, Joan, and David come up to my manor to discuss strategy. Everyone else, I suggest you be ready for what’s coming. That’s all. Thank you.”

I’d never had the stage presence my sister did, so where her time in front of the camera would have made her able to explain the situation better, I was curt and to the point. Thousands of heroes left the arena after the short, five-minute meeting, all talking in nervous tones. Max, Andromeda, Cassi, and Randall met me at the podium, all looking very worried.

“What are you going to do?” my best friend of twenty years demanded.

“I’m getting ready for war. Are you guys going to come help or not, because my generals are already on their way to my place.”

“You want all of us there?” Max asked nervously. I think having me around made this all a little more bearable and I doubt she wanted to be on her own. But I didn’t think she was quite ready to be in the middle of a war meeting.

“Of course. You’re all my family. I’m going to need that support of I have any chance of defeating Vega.”

My generals looked so odd seated around my glass-top kitchen table. They bowed from their seats when I walked in, greeting me as the queen. In the City, I was a princess among the gods, but I was the queen to the Arcadians and I liked to think that I was a pretty decent ruler. The four warriors before me smiled reassuringly, but I knew they were ready for battle. They were some of the best among a city full of soldiers.

Orion, the hunter, was from Ancient Greece and looked like Robin Williams when he comes out of Jumanji. His hair and beard where medium length, dark brown, and curly. He had dark green eyes, wore a tunic that I was pretty sure was made of buffalo hide cinched at the waist with a leather belt. He never went anywhere without his bow and arrows. I met him for the first time in this life when he saved me from Draco the dragon when Vega had set him on me at one of my mother Loral’s parties.

Perseus, Andromeda’s husband and another Greek hero, looked so much more normal next to the seven-foot bowman. His hair was a dark black and cut short and he had hazel eyes equally brown and green. He was tall and well-muscled, but more chiseled than most other men. He fit into the modern era in his jeans and green T-shirt. He was a kind man, but I remembered from my past lives what a fearsome fighter he could be.

Next to the two Grecians sat Joan of Arc. She was one of the few women here, but her faith and skills as a military leader made her a saint in the Catholic church. She was pretty with her light complexion, rosy cheeks, naturally red lips, and light brown eyes. Her mahogany hair was in a single braid that fell over her shoulder to the top of her right breast. She was a mix of modern clothes in her dark wash skinny jeans and red long sleeve V-neck shirt, and classic with the breastplate with a French insignia and sword strapped to her hip.

Last at the table was David, King of Israel. He was one of the oldest residents in Arcadia, a warrior from some three thousand years ago that had defeated one of Vega’s titans, a giant, when he was still young. I still don’t know how a kid got rid of a titan; the Jewish and Christian stories don’t quite mesh with his ever-changing account of the event. He seemed to be in his mid-thirties with thick black hair that curled at his ears, brown eyes, and wide shoulders. His hands were rough and he had several scars that told the story of how many battles he’d been in. Unlike most others, he stuck to formal wear like the navy button up and slacks.

This sort of thing was really more Michael’s speed than mine, but I had to step up since my bitch of a sister had him in her sadistic clutches. I sat at the head of the table as my true family filled in this spaces before me. Several hours of extensive planning passed and I still wasn’t satisfied with a results. My warriors and I were able to shell out a plan, but it was really more defensive than offensive and I didn’t want to wait around for Vega. There was no way we were going to go after her halfcocked, but I wouldn’t have us just sitting around and her army attacked. I sighed and dropped my head onto the table, the smooth glass cooling my cheek.

“The problem is,” Joan started, “that we have no way to get into her Hell. What good are those Norse titans if they can’t get us to Vega?”

Max made a small squeaking noise and her hand poked up like she was going to answer a question in class. “Um, I might know how to get there.”

Cassi’s jaw fell open and her pretty brown eyes almost popped out of her head. She wasn’t the only one shocked by my sister’s declaration. There was no way that Maxine would make up that little tidbit, but I didn’t know how she’d get my entire army to a completely different plane of existence. She was human!

“How?” Randall asked, finding his voice before any of the rest of us.

“When she took me there, I got really sick and I felt like I was on fire. I overheard her saying that her whole dimension was warded against anyone other than her and the titans. Even someone called Thesis slow-roasted- my words- when she was there. I only saw the dungeons in her palace and they were kept at, like, a hundred degrees and lit with her blue fire. Hell isn’t what I would’ve imagined. I guess the only way in or out was what she called the bridge. When we went to meet you, she took me and the snake- which is apparently the real devil- to this big room where she flipped a switch and neon colors lit up the walls. When we took a step, it was like being in a kaleidoscope. Right before we poofed at that creek, I saw the end of the bridge. It was really weird because it was like looking through a fish tank, but it was the Catholic church by Hyde Park. This end of her bridge is in Logan.”

“Shit,” I murmured. “When this all starts, home is going to be the first place she goes. We have to stop her before she can start destroying this world.”

“How?” my oldest friend asked again. He was starting to sound redundant.

“We have to break the wards first, so we send in the only two who won’t be affected by the fires and brimstone of the titan plane.”