Infinite: Ignite, #3

By Erica Crouch

There are infinite ways to die, and the fates are calling for blood. After evading Azael since her betrayal, it’s finally time for Pen to stop running and face her desperate brother. But she won’t have to challenge him alone: the rebel army of New Genesis is ready to stand strong and fight to secure the future they believe in. 

As Azael spirals deeper and deeper into darkness, and Pen grapples with her new leadership role, a familiar name rises to power whose decisions have the potential to rewrite everyone’s future. Dangerous secrets, silent traitors, and unraveling fates means that time is running out. There’s no telling who will survive the final battle.

In this thrilling conclusion to the Ignite series, Pen and Azael return to finish what they started over a millennia ago.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Erica Crouch
• Release date: Jun 16, 2015
• ISBN: 9781927940389

Book preview

Infinite

Erica Crouch

Book 3 in the Ignite Series

A PATCHWORK PRESS TITLE

Infinite (Ignite, Book 3)

Copyright © 2015 by Erica Crouch.

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and plot are all either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons —living or dead—is purely coincidental.

First Edition.

ISBN: 978-1-927940-38-9

Patchwork-Press.com

More by Erica Crouch

Madly, Deeply

The Empath

Polaris Awakening (Lyra)

Ignite Series

Ignite (Ignite 1)

Entice (Ignite 1.5)

Incite (Ignite 2)

Engage (Ignite 2.5)

Coming Soon

Mostly Marceline

Cut (Undying 1)

Dedicated to the girls who don’t think they can do it.

You can. You always could.

"But, first, whom shall we send

In search of this new World?

Whom shall we find sufficient?

Who shall tempt with wandering feet

The dark, unbottomed, infinite…"

—John Milton, Paradise Lost

Prologue

Lilith

LIAR. I FLEX MY FINGERS to stop from slapping the deception from his mouth, from beating away his ugly words. I’ll choke him with it if this is a trick. I’ll kill him right here if this is some kind of manipulation meant to turn me into some sort of supplicant begging for mercy.

Azael delivers the news in the White Garden. The Lilim, he tells me—my children, my blood—are gone. Gone. Such a cold word, so innocent next to the truth of it all. Lucifer annihilated them; it was a calculated genocide. And here I thought we were trying to separate ourselves from the ways of Heaven. Yet, not even a few weeks in, Lucifer’s already performing cleansings of his own. Why am I not the least bit surprised?

He’s always been so pliable, so influenced by the ways of old. Returning to Heaven will melt him back into the form he was. It’s already affecting him. His sanity is slipping faster than before. Unspooling like the snagged knit of a sweater. Someone simply needs to choose the right thread to tug a little harder and he’ll pull apart completely.

He said they would get in the way, Azael says, and I put my thoughts of Lucifer on a momentary hold.

Wipe my face clean, listen to his excuses.

They were a temporary move in a more permanent plan, he says, looking away. Because he can’t face me with this information. He’s weak, not a liar—not now, with this news. How I wish he were a liar.

I see. Every muscle in my body is taut, ready to strike. I just need a target. Azael’s not important enough for my detestation to destroy. He may think he is, but he’s a boy. An unquestioning, mindless soldier.

They would cause more problems needing to be fixed, left without a guardian, he says, and I flinch, flex my fingers into a fist.

I was their guardian. I was their mother, and he took me from them. Lucifer brought me here, to Heaven. If he had truly needed someone to watch over the Lilim, I would have been permitted to stay with them. Which means that the Lilim were never intended to survive once he got what he wanted. This was the plan all along; he just couldn’t let me catch on, lest I refuse my help. To create children only to destroy them? A waste. I never would have done it.

He’s a coward for not sharing his plans. A blind, writhing worm. I’ll cut him to pieces and bury him.

I’ll bury them all.

Azael keeps talking—won’t stop talking. He needs to know when to plug his mouth up and stop the stream of words. His tongue gets him in more trouble than it should. If he were smarter, he’d realize that.

The war is not over yet, Azael, I say, pulling my legs off his lap.

Shoulders back, chin up. I will not let this stand. This is perhaps Lucifer’s greatest mistake of his pathetic, paltry life. He’s kept me as a close ally, but he’s set me on fire. I will burn from the inside out, turn to ashes in this very garden, if I allow him to continue as he pleases.

He is not worthy to lead, to walk on the backs of others. He won’t touch me ever again.

The war is far from over.

When Azael asks if I am okay, I swallow my laugh and stitch myself up. What a tiny question.

Am I ever not?

At least he’s smart enough to not ask a second time.

Lilith, the first wife of Adam. First trophy of Lucifer—that’s what they see me as, the lot of them. A wisp of flesh, lithe movement through the shadows, and soft susurrations in Lucifer’s ear. Quiet, obedient, understanding. A follower.

They couldn’t be more wrong.

When Jeremy comes back into the garden, a plan begins to form. His fervent grin, his shaking fingers—he is all too eager to do anything I ask of him. The crown he made me sits back in my bedroom, the thorns rusted with his blood from weaving together the vines. He called me his queen; he understands. He sees what the others do not.

In the sweetest voice I can muster with murder on my mind, I offer to help Jeremy pack, freeing up Azael to prepare for their trip down to Earth, to find and kill his sister. The relief is clear on Azael’s face. Obviously, he doesn’t want to have to spend any more time with Jeremy than he has to; he doesn’t realize what he has with this child. Jeremy can be quite useful, when correctly utilized. Give him a purpose, a function to serve, and then heap on the praise. He’s a very willing and enthusiastic servant.

Before Azael even finishes giving me permission—as if I needed it—I’m walking out of the garden, towing the boy behind me.

Jeremy is a silent follower, only the uneven rhythm of his footsteps sounding behind me. He asks no questions as we pass the door to my bedroom. Never once does he pause, not even as I push my way through the double golden doors of the throne room. When I lift my finger, asking him to stand guard just inside the room, he nods and stands still, striking what I assume is supposed to be an intimidating pose. But he’s rod thin, sickly pale, and his eyes are sunk into sockets so dark that his face looks like a decaying skull. I smile and turn.

Lucifer’s lounging on the throne, his archangel sword leaning carelessly next to him. The sharpened end of the sword is dug into a notch in the ground, one he carved himself after sleepless nights of paranoia. He locked himself up in here and chipped away at the perfect marble floor, muttering about his brother, his Father, his destiny. Unstable doesn’t even begin to cover it; no wonder he felt Jeremy would be such a help to Azael. Great minds and all that.

He doesn’t bother to straighten when I come in. But I feel his wet eyes all over my body, taking in the curves under the silky, white slip I’m wearing. I shouldn’t have chosen the white one today.

Lilith, Gus says, startled.

I didn’t notice him there, standing beside one of the columns. He blends in perfectly with them. Maybe, if the angels return, they’ll encase him in a new one. He’ll stand still and be boring for all of eternity. Just another part of the architecture. He’d love it, I’m sure.

There’s a chaos of books around him. Lucifer’s paranoia is particularly strong today, then. You wouldn’t notice the madness if you don’t know just where to look. I see it in him, behind his eyes—the calm a little too practiced, the boredom electrified with something close to fear but not quite. It’s also in his fingers, the way they twitch, fiddling with the vial of his brother’s soul. Sad.

One more pill to swallow and it will be done. I force my muscles to loosen enough to move again, practically breaking my bones so I can curtsey low.

My lord, I say to the ground in order to hide the chagrin burning my face. If I look at him, I’ll set him ablaze.

Lilith, Lucifer says, and he gestures me forward. Gusion is checking the fates. Again. He says they are unchanged, but I suspect otherwise. I can feel them rewriting themselves. I can feel Him changing them. He doesn’t like that I’m here, on His throne. He wants to destroy me.

I bite down on a sneer. God is the least of his problems. He should be begging his Father for mercy now, while he still has the chance to try to repent. I doubt it would do him any good.

See anything new, Gus? I ask, turning to him. My eyes are hard, and whatever he was about to say, his fingers splayed over a page filling with dark, black ink—the words shrivel on his tongue. I suppose not.

Lucifer gestures me closer still. Another mistake.

Say you bring news, Lilith? Are they finally dead?

I don’t care to remind him that he hasn’t even dispatched Azael to Earth yet. Instead, I slink nearer, use my body to distract him and give me closer proximity. I’m standing between his spread legs, my knees knocking against the seat of the throne.

You’ve destroyed enough, I purr.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Gus take a step toward us, but I cut a glare at him and he freezes. As Lucifer’s eyes lose focus and he fidgets with the vial of his brother’s soul, whispering to it, I warn Gus in a hushed hiss.

It can be one body or two, Gus. It all depends on what you do next.

His eyes are wide, and he looks between Lucifer—oblivious—and me. Then he thinks better of coming any closer. Looking down at his feet, he raises his hands in surrender. Gus is smarter than I gave him credit for.

I return my attention to the lunatic on the throne. Reaching out a hand, I push Lucifer’s white hair back. It’s grown long, and I curl it behind his ear, pull my nail across his cheek. It draws the smallest amount of blood, and it’s all I can smell. Lucifer closes his eyes as the thin trickle of blood tickles down his cheek. He lets out a heavy, tired breath. The bitter crimson scent begs me forward, asking for more

More more more.

In time.

You are blind, I whisper.

Lucifer’s eyes meet me, clearing for a moment. He looks moderately affronted, but then the strap on my dress slips, and he looks away. His hand tightens on the vial of Michael’s soul.

And your greatest error, I say, pulling back slightly, wrapping my hand around the hilt of the sword at his side, was trusting me enough to let me get so close.

With a quick movement, I slide back, out from between his legs. I hold the archangel sword level with his chest. Lucifer freezes, every small, restless movement of his settling as he takes me in—the truth of myself, not the shadow of who he believed I was, of who everyone was happy to think of me as.

Not a pretty, quiet thing who let the men around her do what they wanted, when they wanted. But a snake, coiled and ready to strike.

I played a good game, but my opponents were hardly a challenge to best. It’s been too easy to gain their trust, to learn their secrets. To figure out their weaknesses—of which there are many. Too many to accurately tally.

"You think I am the helpless one. Man’s first wife, saved by the devil and spirited away to Hell, where she was reborn. But you forget, Lucifer, that I walked away from Eden. On my own. You just happened to be there. You, I say, my voice sharp, were convenient."

I’ve made you everything you are, he says. His breath rasps from his throat, dry and painful.

What a mistake you made, then, I say. Because you raised me to kill you. And I might have allowed you to live if you had not massacred my children.

I eradicated them, he has the audacity to say. They were a disease.

You are the disease, and Hell will be all the stronger without you. I push the sword closer to him and he backs up in the throne.

His casual posture disappears, and he presses himself against the back of the chair, but there’s nowhere to go. Nowhere left to run.

I smile, thrilled to see fear flash over his features. Always keeping one hand steady on the sword, I slip out of my dress. Straps over my shoulders, shimmying the fabric over my hips so it puddles at my feet, kicking it away, over toward Gus, whose hands are still raised. No one moves—not Jeremy by the door, Gus by the windows, or Lucifer trapped on the throne.  No one takes their eyes off me. This, I think, is what it’s like to hold all the power in your hands.

To decide who lives, who dies, and when: I love it.

Never understood the power of kings, I say. My hair hangs loose down my back, tickling against my skin when I tip my head to the side, inspecting Lucifer one last time. Everyone knows it’s queens who truly rule the world.

One tiny step back and he thinks he’s free. But I only needed the room to swing, to leverage the secret strength I possess and slice his head clean off his body. As he slumps down, dead, I descend on him. I don’t need the sword for this—I toss it across the room, and Jeremy laughs from the door. Gus drops his books.

The great throne topples over as I launch myself at his body, as I tear into his chest. I rip up the bones of his ribs, searching for his heart. My nails make easy work of the muscles under his flesh, but there’s nothing there. Nothing. I let the fury consume me for a moment longer, and then I collect myself.

Breathing heavily, I stand from his decimated body. I tell Jeremy to right the throne and move Lucifer behind it. I don’t want to look at him anymore.

Gus stares at me, and the page beneath him spells out the scene that just occurred. Even from across the space, I can see the dark, angry stains on the page—the warning he got of my betrayal. And he chose to keep silent. To let it happen. Because of this, I’ll let him live. For now. His loyalty may prove useful, even if it is loyalty borne of terror and the selfish desire to survive. I can work with his fear.

You will serve me now, I tell him, or your head can join his behind that throne. Understand?

He nods.

Better go check on Azael, I say. He’ll be wondering what’s taking me so long.

Again, he nods, and he starts to move out of the room. Before he leaves, I grab at the piece of fabric in his pocket. I suppose some of this blood on me has to go. Then I push him out of the room.

Jeremy helps me clean the blood off my face, his fingers cold and shaking, his face beaming with excitement. His smile, crazed and goofy, splits his features in two. My queen, he keeps saying. So reverently, so honored to have seen me rise. My queen, my queen.

When the blood is mostly gone, I step back into my dress. I scoop up the vial of Michael’s soul and spin it in my fingers. I’ll give it to Azael. Maybe he can do something with it.

I turn to Jeremy and take his chin in my hand. Smiling, speaking to him gently, I say, Azael must not find out what happened here.

No, he says. A secret. Our secret.

Right, I say. Our secret.

We leave the stench of the throne room and meet Azael at the entry of the palace. I bat away his questions—his pressings to stop by and inform Lucifer of his departure. He’s too easy to redirect, too easy to guide down the path I want him to walk. It hardly takes any misdirection. I almost pity his ignorance. But not quite.

With a kiss, I send him back to Earth still believing he serves Lucifer. The poor, loyal fool.

Chapter 1

Pen

THERE ARE INFINITE WAYS TO die. I’m not sure just how I’ll leave this life, but I have a sinking feeling that it won’t be much longer until it happens. London is cold and desolate—the perfect landscape for my death. My brother is waiting.

Our team from New Genesis is small and silent as walk to the Tower of London, toward Azael and his small army. We take care to stay close to buildings, hiding ourselves in the darkest of the shadows. We won’t risk such easy exposure—there’s no guessing at where Azael has guards posted at lookouts or how far out they may be able to see us coming from—but it’s a tedious journey on foot. Each step we take over the frozen ground sounds like we’re walking on a thin piece of glass that shatters under our weight. The tinkling noise would be as enchanting as music if it weren’t so ominous. Every footstep threatens to give us away to anyone who’s paying attention. We’re not seen, but we’d surely be heard.

This, I think, looking at the back of the group toward Kala, is why we fly.

I try to roll away the tension at my shoulders. I’m not mad at Kala. She’s one of the reasons we’re here to try to retrieve Michael’s soul in the first place. And I’m not mad at Ana, who’s walking just ahead of Kala, eyeing me with a curious intensity—I still don’t think she trusts me.

Mad isn’t the right word for the jangle of energy that has me on edge. It’s nerves. The atrocious anxiety of finally seeing Azael again. My brother, who wants me dead. My brother, who gathered a host of demons whose sole mission is to find Michael and me and deliver us to Lucifer.

Michael glances back at me and offers me a tight nod, and I try to smile back, but I can’t manage it. We have to succeed here, in retrieving the piece of his soul Azael’s in possession of. If we don’t get it back, there’s no telling what else Azael will do with it. He’s already compelled Michael a few times now. That kind of control over Michael, especially when we’re in the midst of New Genesis, is dangerous. He’s a weapon in the hands of a madman, waiting to be detonated.

The ice under my feet groans and cracks, and I stifle a curse at the noise. At my side, Eli looks equally annoyed at our progress on foot. It would go so much faster if we could just—

It’s up here, on the right, whispers the redhead angel who drew us a map of the fortress. She points to a stone wall, her eyes widening as she takes in the structure again.

I wonder how long it’s been since she’s seen the Tower of London. What is it like seeing something that’s remained almost untouched after years of change and progress raged around it?

Michael nods. This is it. This is what I saw.

In his vision, he means. The flashes he got of Azael’s location were brief, but they were enough that Ana felt confident in gathering a group of volunteers to fly to London. It was enough that she sent word to an angel, Zo, to get eyes on the perimeter—and that cost the angel her life. I don’t think Ana will ever forgive herself for that.

So Azael is staying in the bloody fortress. I should have guessed he’d take up residence in some place so ostentatious. He was never one for subtlety. How he would hate the state of disrepair the compound of New Genesis sits in.

Remember the plan, I say, moving to the front of the group and taking Michael’s hand. Michael and I will go in first. Give us a few minutes, and then you guys—I turn and indicate Kala and Eli—can follow.

We figured it would be safest if Michael and I enter first and start searching out his soul. The rough rundown of the layout we got is enough to know the best places to search—and I know how Azael thinks, where he would consider hiding something so precious to him and his plans. Michael… Well, I’m hoping that, once we’re in, he might be drawn to wherever Azael is keeping his stolen prize. Maybe he’ll feel the pull of his soul the closer we get. Or maybe Azael’s shielded it well, like he forgot to do during his compulsion when he ordered Michael to strangle me.

Our plan is smart, but it is not without risk. It won’t take much for it to go wrong, and there are so many unknown variables. That’s what sets Ana’s jaw forward with doubt, what keeps our group in an anxious sort of silence. I’m worried about Kala joining Eli after Michael and I sneak in. They’re supposed to be searching out what weapons Azael’s gotten ahold of. After we saw how he mutilated Zo, they were quick to volunteer to strip him of the power to do it again. I don’t bother reminding them that he could do just as much damage with just his hands.

I bite my tongue, looking at Kala. She’s not the right one for this job. She can’t fly on her own, so she’ll have to walk across the lawn inside the walls of the fortress. There’ll be no way she can stay as silent as she needs to be. Doubt must flash across my face, because Kala squares her shoulders at me and narrows her eyes, that small temper rising to meet my skepticism. She doesn’t take well to her competency being questioned or even momentarily considered as anything less than stellar.

We’ll be fine, Kala says. A brief smile, and then her face settles into the seriousness of a warrior.

I forgot how much action she’s seen. She’s saved my life before in battle; I have to trust that—if it comes to it—she’ll do it again. She doesn’t need two wings to shoot an arrow.

Just go, Kala says.

Michael and I survey the Tower from the wall. The windows glow golden with lights—from torches, I assume. There’s no power anymore. The deep freeze took care of that.

Strangely shaped shadows move around inside, pulling thin and stretching long across the walls. They look like ghosts, like wraiths, like souls being dragged unwillingly out of a body. We watch the shadows and attempt to count the number of soldiers Azael has with him.

There’s one in the courtyard. Not a shadow, but a beautiful girl with short hair who impresses me with the fluidity of her movements. She swings from the tree to the ground and then climbs the side of the tower up to a window, where she disappears for a moment. Then she comes flying through the dark opening, jumping down to the ground and barely slowing her fall with her wings. She hardly makes a sound.

There are two—at least two—fighting somewhere within the walls. The clash of their swords rings loudly across the lawn, and every now and then, their profiles move in front of windows and then out of view again.

There’s Jeremy. My skin gets all prickly when I see him again, remembering how he looked the moment I snatched his life away. Now, he’s pacing in one of the towers, his movements stuttering to a start and stop. He’s gotten worse, I think. The way his fingers twitch, how he keeps turning around in a circle and talking to himself. There’s no one else in the room with him that I can tell, yet he’s holding a full conversation, complete with wild gesticulation.

Four, I say to Michael.

That’s what I’m seeing, too.

Plus Azael, but I haven’t—

My stomach jumps to sit in my throat when I catch sight of a silhouette moving throughout the fortress. It starts by a high window to our right and then travels left, moving around the sparring pair of swords. Then it stops in the doorway that looks out into the courtyard.

It’s dark, and the cloud cover is as thick as ever, but I still manage to make out his features.

Azael. He looks older, more tired. Angrier. His sharp-featured face is even more angular than before, his cheeks gaunt, dark circles deep and bruised under his eyes.

Standing in the doorway, he cuts a fearsome figure. He’s stringy with strength—not bulky in the slightest, but he’s definitely stronger than he was before. I don’t know if I’d still be able to hold my own against him as well. Not after the days I’ve neglected keeping up with my conditioning when he’s obviously been training again, like he did during the first war.

I notice that his fingers keep traveling to the pocket of his pants, almost unconsciously. His tell. His hands were never able to keep up the lies his mouth told. I press my palms harder into the stone, letting the smooth coldness settle my nerves and silence the ringing in my ears at the sight of my brother. He’s so different; he’s exactly the same.

What’s happened to us?

When Azael turns to go back inside, I nod at Michael.

He may have the piece of your soul on him, I say. He kept touching his pocket. His tell.

I saw. Michael pauses, does another visual sweep of the space. We should look other places first. If we go in and straight for him—

It’ll send up a signal. I know.

I push myself up and swing my leg over the wall. Michael follows. We slide to the ground as quietly as possible and then remain perfectly still, waiting for any sign that we’ve been spotted.

All remains quiet, save metal clashing and animalistic growls of the swordsmen fighting in the distance. The girl in the courtyard has climbed through the window she was scaling, hidden from sight. She has yet to reappear.

The wind lifts around us, but nothing else moves. We’re safe—we haven’t been spotted or heard. Let’s keep it that way.

I make a subtle hand signal and Michael and I begin to move, creeping across the courtyard, sliding our feet over the ice when it’s thick enough to not crunch under our step and letting our wings carry our weight when it’s too thin. When we’re in the center of the yard, we come across the glass pillow sculpture Michael described. At least we now know that the vision Michael saw was accurate; Azael didn’t alter that at all. Which means it had to have been a mistake that Michael was able to see where Azael was staying.

If Azael had known that opening his mind up to compel Michael would mean the connection went both ways, he might not have done it at all. Or if he’d suspected that it might reveal where he was staying, he would have abandoned camp. Moved on to somewhere safer—unknown. Exposing his location like he did was the first mistake he made, and I plan to make the most of it. Who knows if he’ll screw up again.

Once he knows we’ve taken what leverage he has over us—Michael’s soul—I’m sure he’ll be especially careful. My brother won’t let anyone show him up twice. He hardly allows it to happen once. The weight of our mistakes in Eden still hangs over him.

I look away from the weird glass sculpture to search the