LEGION (PAPERBACK)

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Serena Blake stopped in front of the door, raised a hand, and hesitated.

Heavy silence filtered through from the room on the other side, the stillness echoed by the oppressive hush shrouding the LeBlanc estate. Serena knew what awaited her beyond the door. She steeled herself, rapped her knuckles on the wood, and called out a warning.

“I’m coming in.”

Stale, muggy air washed over her as she crossed the threshold, carrying with it the faint odor of human sweat.

Artemus Steele’s bedroom was dark, the curtains at the windows pulled closed against the daylight. She navigated the floor and stopped when her foot knocked against something. She looked down, the nanorobots in her retinas adjusting to the dim lighting.

The tray of food Callie had brought that morning lay untouched, as she’d suspected it would be.

Serena sighed and walked around the bed.

Artemus was a shadow where he sat on the hardwood floor, his back against the foot of the four poster and his legs stretched out before him. Jacob Schroeder slept with his head on the angel’s lap, his body curved into a tight ball and Smokey clutched snugly in his thin arms. The rabbit opened a heavy eye and looked at her blearily before closing it once more.

Artemus continued staring into space, as if he hadn’t registered her presence.

“You need to eat.”

Her command got no reaction. Serena stayed still for a moment before making a frustrated sound and raking a hand through her hair. As a super soldier, she shouldn’t have felt exhausted. Except she did.

She had never experienced the bone-deep tiredness that came with having her heart shattered into a million pieces and sharing that grief with so many others.

“You aren’t the only one who lost Drake, Artemus. I did too. And so did everyone else.”

Her voice remained steady despite the knot twisting her stomach. She couldn’t give in to her emotions. Not again. It wouldn’t bring Drake back and it only made Nate feel helpless in the face of her anguish.

Artemus stiffened slightly at her words. Faint lines marred his brow.

“He was my twin,” he said stonily. “My blood.”

“And he was my lover!” Serena snapped.

“Did you love him?”

His question made her eyes widen and drew a sharp breath from her lips.

Artemus had raised his head and was glaring at her accusingly.

Serena paused and swallowed. She knew it wasn’t her he was angry at.

“Yes.”

“Did you ever tell him?”

Artemus’s words shot through her like bullets tearing into her broken, bleeding heart.

“Yes.” Her reply came out a whisper. “Once.”

“I never did,” Artemus muttered. “It’s too late for me to say it now and for you to repeat it.”

Anger quickened Serena’s pulse at his callous words. She would have closed the distance between them and punched Artemus in the face had it not been for the sleeping child in his arms.

“That’s it!” she grated out. “It’s been two weeks since we got back from Rome. You need to quit being a mopey asshole and talk to us!”

Serena strode over to the windows, grabbed the edges of the curtains, and pulled them open with a brisk motion. Blinding light flooded the room, exposing the dust motes filling the air and covering the furnishings.

Artemus swore and raised a hand to shield his face. Dark stubble covered his jawline and upper lip and his golden hair was dull and greasy.

Jacob squinted before blinking at the brightness, his face swollen and his eyes red and puffy from crying. He sat up slowly, his expression numb and his arms tightening around the limp rabbit.

Drake wasn’t the only one they’d lost in Rome.

Solomon Weiss, Jacob’s adoptive father and the fallen archangel Sariel turned demon, had been Jacob’s gate. He’d sacrificed himself during their last battle to stop that gate from opening.

Serena hardened herself against the young Guardian’s forlorn look.

“The three of you stink,” she said in a hard voice. “Go have a shower and come downstairs.”

She grabbed the tray of uneaten food and stormed toward the exit.

“Don’t wanna,” Artemus mumbled, his tone low and petulant.

The rabbit’s eyes flashed with a crimson glow of defiance.

Jacob clutched Artemus’s arm, his face similarly sullen.

Serena stopped on the threshold and arched an eyebrow at the angel and the Guardians clinging to him. “You either shower and get dressed on your own or we’re coming up here to do it for you. It’s your choice.”

Artemus’s outraged snarl followed her out of the bedroom.

“How the hell is that a choice?!”

Serena’s mouth stretched in a flinty smile as she navigated the corridors of the mansion. That was the first hint of genuine emotion Artemus had shown since their return from Europe. She sobered as she went downstairs and put the cold food away.

What had happened in the cave deep under the Vatican gardens and the monastery where Artemus and Drake’s mothers had once sought refuge was something none of them had gotten over yet.

It was thanks to Jacob’s divine beast and Artemus’s new sword that they’d managed to defeat the army of nigh-indestructible Nephilim Beelzebub had raised to tear open Jacob’s gate and capture Drake. Having thwarted Beelzebub and Samyaza’s efforts to drag Drake to Hell, they’d tasted victory for the briefest of moments before everything had been ripped from their grasp.

Belial’s appearance had shocked all of them. None more so than Artemus.

Though they knew Ba’al’s leader to be one of the most powerful demons in existence, they hadn’t anticipated that he’d turn up personally to complete the task his associates had failed to execute.

They would have lost Artemus too that day had Sebastian, Daniel, and Otis not intervened to stop him from following his brother into Hell. But it was Drake who had ultimately saved his twin by cutting off his right wing and forcing him to let go.

Artemus’s blood had grown cold and congealed in thick puddles beneath him before they’d managed to drag his body from the edge of the chasm where Drake had disappeared, his voice raw from screaming and his face streaked with tear marks.

He’d fallen into a state of shock shortly after, his body growing cold as ice and his gaze vacant. It was in that condition that they’d maneuvered him onto the private jet that had borne them to Chicago, their senses too raw still from their latest encounter with Ba’al to wish to travel through one of Sebastian’s rifts.

The Vatican was still in the midst of dealing with the aftermath of the battle. They’d blamed the destruction the rise of the Nephilim had wreaked on the capital and the Holy See on the earthquakes that had rocked the region that night. So far, the world continued to believe that false claim.

As for the giant sinkhole that now occupied a significant portion of the Vatican gardens, not even Persephone had been able to stop the media from getting their hands on the shocking images of the jagged chasm and broadcasting them to all seven continents.

No one but they and the Vatican agents who had fought beside them knew the borehole was a result of Artemus and Drake bringing down the roof of the cave onto their enemy.

Serena was still frowning when she strolled inside the TV room a short while later. She stopped and studied the figures slouched and draped on various pieces of furniture.

“Seriously, you guys are almost as bad as him.”

Callie Stone sniffed. She was huddled next to Nate Conway on the couch, her eyes suspiciously red. Leah Chase bit her lip and glared out at the garden, her gaze glistening and her fingers white around Haruki Kuroda’s hand on the window seat.

Daniel Lenton stared blindly at the open bible in his hands where he leaned against the wall beside them, his face miserable. Sebastian Lancaster and Otis Boone were attempting to play a game of chess at a low table to the left without much success.

“Did they eat?” Nate said quietly.

“No. The three of them are being stubborn.”

“That is nothing new.” A muscle jumped in Sebastian’s cheek. “But the child at least should be made to consume some food. He is still young and he used a lot of divine energy during the battle.”

“I suspect he might bite us if we try,” Serena drawled. “And Smokey will have something to say about it too.”

“That pup is too obstinate for his own good,” Sebastian grumbled.

Gravel crunched faintly out the front of the mansion.

Serena tensed.

“It’s only Elton and Barbara,” Haruki murmured. “They said they’d drop by again today.”

“There’s more than two people out there,” Otis said morosely, his gaze on the chess pieces before him.

LEGION SERIES
Blood and Bones
Fire and Earth
Awakening
Forsaken
Hallowed Ground
Heir
Legion