A Little Piece Of Heaven

“I…..seriously think….you’re overreacting.”
Lilith tried to take a breath and not look into Jimmy’s furious gaze as he dangled her four inches clear off the floor. The hand around her throat didn’t loosen and she could blurrily see that Syn didn’t look like he would be interfering anytime soon. Deciding on a change of tactics she frantically tried to locate Claire and spoke telepathically.
“Call him off. Please. I can explain.”
“Jimmy.”
Claire spoke the single word with authority causing him to drop Lilith into a coughing pile on the floor and turn to face her. The room was a shambles, the atmosphere now full of anger rather than the jollity and companionship of before. Syn was still shirtless, Zacky behind him and she was reminded again why people feared them. Matt had locked the door, Dani protectively held behind him as Raven shrunk back, grateful to be between Johnny and Stefanie. They all stared at Lilith, waiting to hear what was behind her confession.
“Let’s hear this, you know what a fucking trouble magnet she is.”
“Quit sticking up for her, any shit at our door is always down to Lily.”
Lilith herself had managed to massage a little feeling back into her windpipe and allowed them to talk over her head while she slid up the wall and locked eyes with Syn. He looked beyond pissed and was now radiating with the urge to possibly snap her neck like a twig. Given a choice between that and burning for a millennia she would go with him every time. Jimmy was now back staring at her and that was almost worse.
“I didn’t know Mikey had anything to do with Gerard, he was just a guy I knew back in the twenties. They tried to raise Patollo and managed to fuck it up so that body Mikey is so keen to put the god into is actually Gee…well kinda, he’s still floating around. When you tried to break the binding spell they knew something was up and that was Gee who came home before and not me. Now he knows you know.”
Zacky put a hand up, confused by the slightly garbled explanation but now seeing why they had been pulled into things. If this Gerard knew Lilith before then she had been an obvious target when he fell foul of black magic.
“So you’re saying he possessed you ?”
“Sure, binding spells don’t have any effect on me but he’s got a god’s power burning him and Mikey up. Means they can possess a body quite easily.”
She winked at Syn, unable to resist goading him.
“Good kisser huh ?”
“Shut up. This guy knows we’re going to destroy his god so he’s going to be coming after us again. I say we go on the offensive. Matt ?”
Both Matt and Jimmy nodded, there was no chance they were going to be caught unprepared this time and not when they could take the brothers by surprise. Dani looked across at the big spell book and then back at her sister before raising her hand and fixing her with a stare.
“Hang on, you said its in your head and one of us is going to die.”
Lilith shrugged and attempted a small smile. It was definitely in there, whispering such tempting things and showing her them all strewn dead over the floor and her standing over them with Zack’s blade in her hand….
“LILITH. Explain !”
Johnny looked a little surprised at his own outburst and Lilith pulled away as he shook her, putting some distance between herself and them before realising Matt was right behind her. There had to be a tactful way of explaining this so they wouldn’t want to take her head off but it was currently escaping her so she merely rolled her eyes.
“I made the mistake of baiting Gerard once he had made you think I was free of the binding. Logically he had to let me go. What I didn’t think of is that he dragged me down in that hole and gave me to Patollo. Now the bitch is in my head too and if we don’t raise him I’m gonna burn with the two other bitches.”
Now there was genuine silence as that little gem sunk in with all of them. Lilith took the moment to shift away from Matt and into Syn’s arms. He hesitated but wrapped them around her waist and rested his head on hers. Stefanie and Dani moved to where Claire was already leafing through the big book, the need for an answer even more urgent now. Jimmy picked up a half empty bottle of whiskey from the floor and took a long slug as the boys pulled out chairs and set to thinking, only Zacky realising that as usual, Lilith was leaving something out.
“The dying part ?”
“Well there is a way to stop Patollo but…well, it’s dangerous. Claire’s probably got it figured out already.”
Claire looked up and didn’t exactly like what she saw, the evasiveness was bad enough but Lilith was still not letting her into her head. Something else was going on here and for the first time ever she felt a shiver of mistrust. Zacky could feel her nervousness and was now staring at Lilith with something approaching suspicion.
“The only way we found so far would be to bring in a fallen angel to face up to the demon once he’s raised. We don’t know any and not that many are powerful enough to face down a god of the strength of the one we’re facing.”
Lilith pulled away from Syn and picked up another bottle of vodka before walking over to where Raven was standing between Stefanie and Johnny. She paused, one hand moving a strand of hair from the young woman’s face before glancing back at jimmy. He too could feel something different in her and was immediately on alert, not liking where this was going.
“Sure we do. She just doesn’t know it yet. I knew there was something about Raven when I met her but I didn’t figure it out until Mikey fucked with my head.”
Syn put himself between Jimmy and Lilith as Raven looked at the others and realised they were now studying her intently. It was ridiculous, she had been just a normal person until the reaping and now she was like them. Jimmy protectively gathered her to him and then looked down at her, studying her too.
“Don’t be stupid. I’m no angel, fallen or otherwise.”
“You are. You’re full of so much power and you can probably save me.”
Raven shivered, drawing closer to Jimmy as Claire pulled Lilith back and shook her hard. There might be some truth to what was being said but there was a real danger that Raven would die trying and she wasn’t about to let that happen without trying to find another way.
“Too dangerous.”
Lilith tipped her head, not liking the way any of them were looking at her and wondering what the fuck was going on. She had thought they might at least look like it was an option and had a nasty sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach which wasn’t helped by even Syn remaining stone faced. She glared and stared straight at Claire.
“So you’re going to let me burn ? Let’s get this straight, there’s no coming back from this. No hell, no other dimension. NOTHING.”
“I never said that, we can find another way.”
Jimmy and the boys let the girls stare each other down, seeing how Dani had gravitated towards Claire while Stefanie was standing next to Lilith. Raven was now frankly terrified and half listened as Matt conferred with Jimmy, Syn and Zacky listening and watching in case an actual fight broke out.
“We can’t risk them raising Patollo.”
“You’re asking me to let the woman I love die ? Again ?”
Syn looked furiously at Matt and then back to where Lilith was once again staring at Raven. He wanted to know more about how Lilith just knew and what it would mean if they could release the potential she could see trapped in Jimmy’s lover. A fallen angel was topped in power only by a god, they could control the earth and the sky and shape them to their will and restore balance. To know that all that power resided in one girl…
“No but we can’t just put Raven in front of a god.”
“We can at least see if it’s true.”
Raised voices broke out on both sides of the room until finally Dani conjured a miniature rain cloud over their heads and soaked everyone. The ice cold water only fell on them, the room remaining untouched until everyone had calmed down and sat back on the floor, all of them staring at each other and the spell books until Lilith spoke again.
“Gerard and Mikey think I will sell you out and work with them to save my skin. I won’t, I don’t like being used and that god will kill us all the minute he’s free anyway.”
“I want to help you.”
Everyone turned to look at Raven, the quiet steel in her voice telling them that arguing was pretty much useless although Jimmy was determined to try. A desperate fear ran through him that he had found his soulmate and now risked losing her although he knew that he was asking Syn to risk the same. Claire nodded slowly, still not comfortable.
“You don’t know what you’re risking. We have no idea how to release the angel in you in time and what it would entail to fight Patollo.”
“Then we need to find out.”
Syn looked out the window, the first blush of dawn on the horizon and realised that they needed a way to buy some time and keep the enemy guessing. He looked across at Zacky before patting Jimmy on the shoulder.
“We need a diversion and I know just how to provide it.”

Notes