The Virtue Of My Dark Angel, Dark Angels of the Apocalypse Book 3

Chapter Four: Virtue’s Vice

Bethany..

She thought he might try to slip away in the night, so she had a hard time getting any real sleep. Every time she’d nod off, she’d jerk back awake, afraid he might have taken off. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had done that to her. It was how her mother had left when she was very young.

Barbatos was a Demon of many skills; she was beginning to learn, but he had absolutely no interpersonal skills.

Or maybe he just really didn’t like people.

Either way, she followed him as he continued stiffly onward, fended for herself, with Ginger’s help, when he hunted and cooked his dinner over a fire, and huddled up with Ginger across her legs to keep her warm as she leaned against a tree when it appeared he wasn’t going anywhere else for the night. And somehow, managed to deal with him glaring at her through her fitful periods of sleep.

By morning, her eyelids felt swollen and heavy, but she wasn’t about to admit defeat. The moment he moved, it was as if Ginger had clued into what she was doing, and he leapt off her legs with a soft chuff, and she was on her feet in the next instant.

“Relax. I’m just going to relieve myself. Unless you feel you must accompany me to do that as well.” The Demon grumbled, and Bethany blushed, but let her tired body slide back to the ground. Ginger looked between the two of them, and seemed torn about where his duties lie. Barbatos jerked his chin.

“I won’t try to sneak away. Your duty is to your pack. Protect and guard her in my absence. You have my word that I will return.” Barbatos told Ginger solemnly. Strangely enough, the wolf settled down at Bethany’s side as if he’d understood every word, placing his head on her knee as she began to doze.

“Be careful.” She yawned, but didn’t catch the sharp-eyed glance Barbatos tossed her, because she was already falling asleep.

When she woke next, it was because he was handing her a cloth-wrapped bundle with a grunt.

“Left-overs. Time to get moving, unless you intend to be left behind.” He grunted. Bethany looked at the carefully wrapped meat in her hands, accompanied by wild carrots and mushrooms, and nearly teared up.

“Thank you.” She whispered, then was forced to jump to her feet as Barbatos began to stride out of the deconstructed camp.

Bethany held the wrapped bundle close as she nibbled from it. When was the last time anyone tried to take care of her for a change?

This Demon might act like he wanted rid of her, but he sure was going about it the wrong way.

Barbatos..

He set a punishing pace.

Yes, this trip had originally been about relaxing and enjoying his favorite past-time. Maybe bring home some fresh venison for himself and Drew to enjoy.

Drew

How was Drew going to react to this?

Just thinking about him made Barbatos feel guilty.

Which was ridiculous. Barbatos didn’t feel guilty.

But Drew had been the first one, the only one, in a long time, that had made Barbatos slow down. He was Barbatos’ dirty little secret. None of his brethren knew about Drew, about the human he kept, and that’s the way he liked it.

Drew made Barbatos feel good. Feel happy.

Drew was the human who helped keep him sane.

But now.. Now the girl followed behind. With his Mark. Never giving up. Even when he’d pushed her past her limits.

Barbatos sighed.

Drew was going to kill him.

He spared a glance over his shoulder to see her huffing along, still struggling to keep pace. The wolf that protected her was keeping an eye on both Barbatos and his human packmate. The girl’s red, sweaty face gave him a bit of a twinge of guilt.

He might like to profess to hate slavers, but wasn’t he here basically acting like one towards the girl? Driving her to exhaustion? And beyond?

No. He decided, firming his resolve and continuing on. He’d given her multiple chances to turn back. In fact, he had tried earnestly to run her off. Yet still, she followed. If this was the path she chose, then so be it.

Still, he found himself scouting for a good camping place for the night, subconsciously trying to find a comfortable place for her to rest, and a comfortable place for her to rest. And all the while he was consciously trying to deny it, especially as he was forced to admit he had many good hours of daylight left to travel by, if he so chose.

A simple glance behind him, however, at the girl struggling to keep her feet as she stumbled after him, showing her to be clearly exhausted and nearly asleep on her feet despite her upright position, had him discarding any such ideas.

He probably would never admit it, but he was impressed by the human girl.

Bethany..

Bethany damn near fell flat on her face when Barbatos announced they were stopping for the day. She was so tired, in fact, that it took her longer than she'd care to admit to realize he had suddenly included her in his plans by saying ‘we’.

It made her uncomfortable, that abrupt change in attitude, so she forced herself to her knees, only to realize enough time had passed for Barbatos to start setting up camp around her. He was slowly feeding a fire, a fresh carcass beside him, slices of meat already prepped and added to a skillet he had pulled from the supplies he carried with him. Though honestly, Bethany had seen him cook on a rock when he was in a hurry, so she wasn’t certain why the sudden change in routine.

Something fishy was going on.

Was he hoping she’d relax her guard so that he could slip away in the middle of the night?

If so, he had another thing coming.

Bethany’d been on her own a long time.

Well, on her own with Ginger.

She learned quickly how to trade off swift, dream-confused naps with her furry friend, that may not be as restful as she’d have liked, but would keep a person alive in dangerous territory.

More than once she’d been snatched from sleep by Ginger’s bark of warning, and had been on her feet running before she was truly even awake. It was disorienting, and she was pretty sure she had broken her ankle falling from a tree that way once, already on the move before she was truly conscious. She had forgotten she’d pulled herself into a tree to sleep because she’d been trying to stay out of reach of Hounds* and other predators. That had felt like the longest recovery, because she couldn’t afford to stop running long enough to rest and heal.

Of course, if there were ever any people worth trusting..

But she didn’t have to worry about trusting this Demon.

He’d bound her to him. Bound himself to her.

Oh sure, things could go terribly wrong in all sorts of ways with that terrifying thought. But Bethany couldn’t move past the idea that, if they were gonna, then why was he running so hard and so fast from her?

Why was he acting like the prey instead of the predator?

So she found herself watching him warily, and sleeping fitfully. Every noise he or Ginger made had her half rising to her feet in alarm, until finally he sighed and approached her with a shake of his head. His palm slid down over her forehead and eyes before she could blink in alarm and darkness swallowed her up.

Bethany’s eyes popped open and her body shot upright with a snap, causing Ginger, who had been resting with his head on his paws, to come to his feet with an alarmed bark. She fought off the dizziness and exhaustion that clung to her like sticky spider webs. She nearly stumbled, regaining her balance by letting her body fall into a crouch and placing a palm on the ground to steady herself as her eyes searched her surroundings for danger. Ginger pressed himself against her thigh, a soft growl rumbling from his red-furred body. It took Bethany a little too long to process the Demon sitting at the fire, stirring a pot. Everything around her was dark, but his eyes shone. And he had a tail. Possibly two.

Said tails slowly waved back and forth in time with the stirring hand. Bethany’s mind was making a lot of quick leaps she wasn’t quite ready for, having just had the world skip forward without her, so Bethany just blurted the first thing on her mind.

“Why didn’t you leave?” If she hadn’t been sure she was facing the same Demon, she could no longer deny it once his eyes flicked up to meet hers. They nailed her in place. So animalistic, and yet, if she saw that look in an animal's eyes, she would think it was wounded. “You had plenty of time.. Opportunity..” Bethany waved an arm broadly, and Barbatos stared, tails slowly flicking, then went back to his pot like he hadn’t heard.

“You needed rest.” He stated, and she blinked. What did that have to do with her question?

“What did you do to me?” Bethany asked the next pressing thing on her mind. She felt alright, other than some residual soreness from forcing herself to keep up with the Demon, but as far as she could tell, he hadn’t touched her. Other than whatever he had done when he swiped his hand over her face and caused the world’s longest blink.

“You needed rest.” Barbatos asserted with a sigh, like they’d already had this conversation. Hell, maybe they had. She talked in her sleep. Had woken herself up doing it more than once.

“Right. Evasive non-answer it is then.” Bethany muttered, then scooted closer to the fire. Barbatos’ eyes tracked her every move, and suddenly she did feel like the prey. “Umm.. thanks for waiting, I guess.” Barbatos shook his head again.

“You would have just kept following.” He responded, his voice a monotone.

“Well yeah, probably.” She wasn’t going to deny it, it was the truth, but the way Barbatos’ head shot up suggested even he hadn’t expected her answer. He tilted his head ever so slightly and nodded.

“Your persistence is what made me offer you this grace period. No use fighting the inevitable.” And with those lackluster words of praise, he filled a carved bowl that he handed to her, and then began spooning stew directly from the pot to his own mouth himself.

“Thank you.” Bethany held the bowl aloft as Barbatos lifted a brow in her direction. “For the meal.” She didn’t even bother to hide her ogling at his twin tails as she sipped her stew. Hadn’t he had only one before? What were they? Lion? Leopard? Some sort of reptile and feline mix? One thing was for sure, they were different now than what she saw before. There were definitely some dark-opal-looking scales scattered amongst that smooth velvet, she was sure of it. She chewed a chunk of meat and considered it absently, tossing Ginger a piece of meat out of her bowl when Barbatos’ attention abruptly darted upward. With a snarl, he sprang into action, but not quickly enough to prevent the fire from smoking out as rain suddenly pelted them from above. The storm was as heavy as it was surprising, and Bethany cursed as she tried to quickly swallow down the rest of her food before it could get too watered down. At the same time, she tried to kick dirt over the smoldering fire while the smoke choked her and made her cough so hard she saw stars. In the end, she accomplished nearly none of the things she wanted, and just choked herself on smoke with tears in her eyes.

“Enough, enough. The food’s ruined.” Bethany heard Barbatos gripe. She backed away from the fire as he plodded through the smoke to grab the pot of stew and throw it out into the dirt. Ginger greedily darted forward and began gobbling up the pieces that bounced among the soil and grass.

“Ginger, no!” Bethany yelled and ran forward herself to try to grab the wolf, but he evaded her grasping hands, making a desperate battle out of snatching up food particles while staying just out of reach. Each time she nearly had her hands on him, he pranced away and snatched up another mouthful, dancing around her as if he was having the time of his life.

“Leave the beast be.” Barbatos groused, successfully ending the excessive smoke from the fire while Bethany panted, already tired from the chase.

“Was there anything in there that would hurt him?” Bethany worried, chewing her lip, as Ginger trotted off to lick his chops under the cover of a tree. He seemed quite self-satisfied.

“IF the beast hasn’t figured out what’s safe for him to consume by this point, he deserves what’s coming to him.” Barbatos sniped. Bethany straightened, her ire already up, now increased due to the threat to her furry baby.

“Oh no you did not.” Bethany snapped, turning on Barbatos with a finger pointed at him so swiftly that even he jerked slightly. “Nobody said he wasn’t domesticated. I don’t know how much of his wild instincts he’s got left, from living with me. He’s had a human looking out for him for too long to just trust his own god-given nature to take over at this point, and I don’t even know how much a wolf family would have taught him that I didn’t. Plus, I have no idea what he’s mixed with that could have dumbed him down some, no offense Ginger baby. So don’t you go sitting there telling me if he’s not smart enough to stay away from foods that make him sick then he deserves to die, because even humans are known to eat and drink things that make them sick even though they’re supposed to know better! Tell me the first thing humans didn’t do is start up home-made alcohol again when the apocalypse happened, or are you going to sit there and act like you don’t know, lookin’ like you do?!” Bethany would have continued her tirade, but Barbatos’ growl cut through the sounds of her yelling and Ginger’s barking along, and was loud enough that even the forest around them seemed to hold its breath.

“First of all, little human, do not make assumptions about whether or not I drink.” Barbatos snarled. Bethany’s head jerked back slightly.

“Doesn’t the fact that you’re arguing the point mean-” Bethany crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes as she began to point out the Demon’s ridiculous sensitivities to the topic, but this time, his growl actually hurt her eardrums.

“Second, that’s enough from the both of you. You’re making entirely too much noise, or are you trying to bring all three worlds down on our heads?” Barbatos gritted out. Bethany couldn’t help it, her mouth fell open and she gaped at him like he’d lost his mind.

“Excuse me?” She shrieked.

Barbatos..

He was beginning to regret not leaving this annoying female behind. He gritted his teeth as she raged at him, though he supposed one had to admire her tenacity. Still, she had started by insulting him. Though if he understood the gist of her complaint, she felt the argument had started when he insulted her wolf companion, or as she put it, ‘wished him dead’. Barbatos was impressed that, number one, she had such great lung capacity, and number two, she truly did care for the beast. It made him reevaluate her once more, staring at her from his place across the banked fire, tails twitching, head c****d. She truly was strange.

And yet, there was some small part of him that wondered.. What would it feel like to have that amount of her concern centered on him? Call him greedy, but he wanted that for himself. To experience her sole concentration, love and desire. To be the center of her world. Not even Drew had that single-minded devotion.

The thought of Drew forced his thoughts to a halt. It was just the Mark drawing him nearer to Bethany. He must remember to distance himself from such thoughts.

Not that he’d promised Drew that he’d be exclusive in his affections. Drew knew Barbatos just wasn’t one to hold much affection for others. Especially humans. Well, Angels too, he supposed. Damn it, Demons either. Just, anyone in particular.

Truth was, Barbatos was just generally unlikable and hated everyone.

Drew had never asked him to be faithful because, well.. To be fair, there really wasn’t much to worry about with Barbatos. Besides, he was a f*****g Demon. Who asked a Demon to be faithful?

Barbatos sat on his haunches, watching the girl yell and become more red-faced by the moment, when the familiar tickle in the back of his neck swelled into a full-blown surging sensation that bordered on pain. The base of his skull felt like it was on fire, and his vision fractured like shattered glass, each little broken pane dizzily showing him the same area in a different location in time and space as the cracks bled the light of his Virtue around the little snatches of vision, damn near blinding him. He could chase down any and all the paths, but right now, all the future ones were screaming the same thing.

Barbatos was on his feet and had wrestled the girl to the ground before she could register his vacant stare. He was, however, unable to hide his squint of pain.

His Demonic nature did not get along with the Virtue that had followed him when he had been Exiled from his Homeland. The lips beneath his hand moved, and in several iterations of the timeline, the girl bit him, making him wince at the perceived pain, merely a ghostly mirage in real time.

In this timeline, she merely cleared her throat and asked again “Are you alright?” in a harsh whisper.

“Company.” He replied gruffly. How long had it been since he’d had a female this close, and why was this one getting under his skin so badly?

Abruptly, all of his shattered vision was filled with her. Each broken sliver registered her concern-filled face, her entire focus finally on him. Exactly as he had wanted.

“That is not what I asked.” Some of the slivers said, while others merely reached for his face, finally seeing his vacant eyes, his grimace of pain. But further shards still, showed him horrors to come. The horror of her face splattered with blood and frozen in death.

Or perhaps those were visions of possible pasts. Barbatos suddenly couldn’t tell. He couldn’t see anything else but her.

Above Barbatos and Bethany, something cracked and her eyes widened at what she saw over his shoulder, not only in the current timeline, but in several adjacent ones as well.

Barbatos’ head throbbed.

It was time for them to move.

*Author’s Note: In this case, we’re referring to Hell Hounds. Of course, Bethany would just shorten it to Hounds on us to make it confusing. We have briefly been introduced to Hell Hounds in a previous book. We don’t know too much about them, other than the Demons brought them with them and use them as hunting dogs or fighting dogs, in particular to hunt down humans or enemies, or to fight with the same. Unfortunately, as commonly happens with neglected pets, some went rogue when their masters ignored/abandoned or abused them after coming into the Human Dimension, which means, of course, that on occasion, it’s possible to run across stray, vicious Hell Hounds, singularly or in packs. It’s uncertain which is worse, a ‘Hound accompanied by a Demon, or one without.