Free Eternal Rider by Larissa Ione Page A

the desk. “Maybe you could have mentioned that earlier? You know, like about two thousand years earlier?” He cursed, not waiting for her or Reaver to say something idiotic like,
you know the rules
. “Humans are fragile. Easy to kill. If one of them takes on the
agimortus—”
    “That’s not the main problem,” Reaver said.
    “Being easy to kill sounds like a big fucking problem to me. So what else is there?”
    “Humans aren’t meant to host it. It’ll kill them. A human would, at most, have forty-eight hours to live.” Harvester smiled, and it was almost a relief to see her back to her sinister self. “And FYI? Pestilence knows. Expect him to step up the killing of Unfallens so Sestiel is forced to use a human. And then watch your world crumble, Horseman.”

Four
     

     
    Reaver stood alone outside Ares’s house staring blindly at the distant olive grove, his helplessness eating at him. There were so many freaking rules when you were an angel, and Reaver was more aware of that fact than most.
    He’d broken a strict Heavenly rule once, and he’d paid the price, had spent a couple of decades as a fallen angel. Then, during a near-Apocalyptic battle a couple of years ago, he’d sacrificed himself to save humanity, and he’d earned his wings back.
    For a while, being fully winged and no longer scorned by his Heavenly brethren had been awesome. He was a battle angel, one of God’s warriors, and he’d spent his days slaughtering demons. He’d also been assigned as the Horsemen’s
good
Watcher. That had been cool, too, even if he was forced to deal with Harvester on a regular basis. Watcher was a prestigious position, and Gethel, the angelwho had previously been assigned, hadn’t seemed to mind being rotated out of the duty.
    Reaver hadn’t known why he’d been given the task, but now, with a new Apocalypse on the horizon, he was beginning to suspect that this was a test. A test to make sure he could be trusted not to break any rules no matter how dire things got for the human world.
    Leaving behind the tang of the warm salt breeze, Reaver flashed to Reseph’s lair in the Himalayas. It was difficult thinking of the easygoing Horseman as Pestilence now, especially when Reaver strolled through the cave and the remnants of Reseph’s life: bean-bag chairs, a margarita blender, open bags of chips, and clothes strewn about the place.
    Reaver wandered through the cave, seeking any evidence that Pestilence had been here recently. Hellrats the size of woodchucks scurried under his feet, their gaping mouths lined with multiple rows of needlelike teeth, their forked, black tongues flicking in the air. These were Pestilence’s little spies, and they would report back to him that Reaver had been here.
    But not if Reaver could help it.
    Smiling grimly, Reaver made a sweeping gesture, and power sang through him, creating an invisible wave of holy fire. The rats disintegrated, their squeaky screams echoing off the walls. Holy fire was awesome. Too bad it only worked on low-level evil.
    Still, as an angel, he had an arsenal of weapons at his disposal. The Horsemen did, as well, and if they could locate Deliverance, they would have two weapons in one… because the dagger had a use they didn’t even know about. Problem was, neither he nor Harvester could revealwhat they knew. To do so would be a violation of divine law. And Reaver was never going to break a rule again—even if not doing so meant an end to the world.
    Gathering his thoughts, he circled the living room, trying to find a way to help Ares, Thanatos, and Limos without actually helping. They were running out of time, and he didn’t need to read all the celestial, biblical, and prophetic signs to know that. He felt it in the tremor shaking his soul.
    Tremor
. Frowning, he stopped pacing, but impact shocks continued to shoot up his legs. A dense malevolence thickened the air, the ground shifted beneath him, and suddenly pebbles were raining down from the