Free Fear to Tread by Lucy Blue

summoned back to his apartment by the mobile phone that had magically appeared in his pocket the same way it always did when he had need of it. In the old days, a putti or other lesser angel would have come to fetch him, but the new human technology made things easier. Was Michael watching over him, sending other angels to intervene if he and Laura got too close? Other angels called on him for help every once in a great while, but it was hardly a common occurrence.
    When he walked in, he found four angels gathered around one of the long couches, two cherubim in the white robes of their heavenly office and two seraphim like himself, bloodied and dirty from battle. “Here he is,” one of the cherubs said, a willowy blonde female. “The Evening Star has come.”
    He drew closer and saw another seraph he knew, Malachi, lying on the couch, pale and covered with blood. “What happened?”
    “A half-demon,” the cherub said. He recognized her, too—Serena. She had been a guardian of the throne of heaven as long as he had been a guardian on earth. In the great family of angels, she was his sister. “Malachi tried to destroy him.”
    “I have to go back,” Malachi said. “I have to save her…” He broke off, his face twisting as he gasped in pain.
    “Hush now,” Serena said, kneeling beside him. She pulled back the blanket covering his chest, and the other cherub let out a tiny shriek. His chest had been ripped open and his heart pulled to the outside in a gruesome parody of an icon of a bleeding-hearted saint. The gash had been burned back together in a demon’s parody of healing. The flesh and bone would have to be reopened and the heart put back inside—an agonizing, dangerous procedure, even for an angel.
    “I can heal him,” Caleb said.
    “No,” Malachi said through gritted teeth. “Serena can heal me.” His face was slick with sweat. “You have to go after the monster.” He grabbed Caleb’s wrist. “You have to save the child.”
    “The creature has control of a village,” explained one of the other seraphim. “A child there prayed for an angel to save them.” He looked heartbroken. “A child of perfect faith.”
    “But I failed,” Malachi said. “Now the monster knows I was summoned and means to punish the mortal who did it.”
    “The girl’s faith has never wavered,” Serena said. She had the clean robes and pure silver eyes of one who rarely left the plains of Heaven. “Her soul will pass on to the Light. Martyrs are hardly uncommon. Perhaps her death will bring others to the Light.”
    “Enough,” Caleb said, silencing her with a glare. A week ago, he might have said the same. Now he thought she sounded cold and cruel.
    “He won’t kill her,” Malachi said, his grip tightening on Caleb’s wrist. “He’ll hurt her.”
    “He won’t,” Caleb promised. “Who will show me where?”
    “I will,” the second seraph said, and his companion nodded his agreement.
    Caleb clasped hands with each of them in turn. “Thank you.” He turned to Serena. “Heal him. We’ll be right back.”
    “Caleb, wait,” Serena said. “Malachi doesn’t know what he’s asking of you. He doesn’t know the danger you’re in now.” Michael apparently hadn’t sent them, but it was obvious his visit to the seraphim encampment was already old news. “This monster he speaks of is half-human with at least half a human soul. In spite of all his evil, he is protected. If you lose your temper and destroy him on the human plane, you will fall.”
    “You would rather this child be abandoned?” he asked. “One more martyr?
    She blushed. “Go then. Just be careful.”
     
     
    Laura rubbed the last of the oil from the soft bristles of her varnishing brush and put it in the jar by the sink. Four of Jake’s paintings were now laid flat on sawhorses to dry. Like coffins, she thought before she could stop herself.
    She had been at it all afternoon—through the windows she could see the dark. She pulled on