Chapter 1
“Angel Eyes”
The Jeff Healey Band
~~~

A Dark, Deserted Truck Stop,
Halfway Between Here and There,
Wondering What Just Happened. 

AZRAEL’S EYES FLAMED a furious blue. In one blink, he disappeared from the cab’s passenger seat. In a split second, he reappeared by the driver’s door, ripped it right off the truck, and flung it to the pavement. Before Jake could get his mind around that little trick, Azrael snatched him out of his seat, and hurled him across the empty parking lot with so much force, he might well have continued traveling a half mile or more, had it not been for slamming into the trunk of an enormous oak. Hard.

This was a learning experience of the eye-opening kind, except for the fact that his eyes were squeezed tight in response to fear, shock, and excruciating, back-meeting-tree-trunk pain. Perhaps he couldn’t be killed outright—he was a bit cloudy on that issue, in spite of earlier reassurances—but clearly, breathtaking agony was still on the table.

He’d had no idea Azrael possessed that kind of power. Yeah, he knew the angel was very old—possibly an archangel—but it seemed they were careful not to reveal too much about themselves, certainly not to those being recruited to help them on a more or less trial basis. The ferocious strength Azrael had just displayed left Jake stunned.

Still groaning, he slumped to the ground at the base of the tree, desperate to catch his breath. He blinked away the red haze clouding his vision, only to wish he hadn’t. Azrael loomed larger and more ominous with each long stride in his direction. The angel had somehow acquired a colossal, glowing sword, which he brandished overhead, and his heretofore pale blond hair floated this way and that around his face, blindingly bright—and looking far too much like flames for comfort.

With a thunderous roar that shook the very ground beneath them, Azrael’s voice shattered the silent darkness. “You quit? You quit? You cannot quit, you ingrate! You have been accepted into a cadre of potential emissaries. There is no such thing as quitting!”

Apparently, angels of Azrael’s rank came with built-in loudspeakers featuring a volume capacity rock stars would weep to possess. Jake clapped his hands over his ears, praying he wouldn’t feel blood seeping between his fingers.

It was all he could do not to curl into a fetal position, arms crossed over his head, to await the smiting that was surely coming next. Not that he was precisely certain what-all smiting might entail, but it was bound to be a painful way to die. Again.

~~~

JAKE’S FIRST DEATH—which he had really hoped would be his last—hadn’t been easy.  Maybe no death ever was, but drowning had been a cold, terrifying experience. At least he’d had the satisfaction of knowing the woman he’d jumped in to save had been pulled from his arms and into a boat, even as he slipped below the surface and drifted down to the silty river bottom. The last thought passing through his mind as his world went black around him was his fervent hope she wouldn’t waste a single day he’d bought her.

The next time Jake had opened his eyes, he’d discovered to his utter astonishment that he hadn’t died at all. At least, that’s what he’d thought at first. Instead, he rested on a warm, comfortable, and gloriously dry bed in the hushed stillness of a room painted the soft purple-gray of an early evening sky. Looking back on it afterward, he wondered if perhaps it had actually been the sky he’d seen around him, and not walls at all. But at that moment, he’d assumed he was in a hospital room, having been rescued from the dark depths of the murky river just in the nick of time.

If only.

~~~

Cowering in Terror,
At That Still-Dark, Still-Deserted Truck Stop,
Halfway Between Here and There.

AZRAEL STOPPED ADVANCING. Jake squinted against the brilliant white glare that surrounded the angel towering over him.

“Do you have to be all bright like that in order to kill me?”

Cocking his head to the side, Azrael bellowed, “What?”

“It’s like staring into the sun. Go ahead and cleave, if you want to, but can’t you do it without first making me blind as well as deaf?”

Azrael grimaced. “Better?” He’d turned the volume down a hundred decibels or so, and the fiery aura surrounding him faded.

Jake nodded. “Okay. Cleave away.”

“You are not making an ounce of sense. Why do you keep going on about cleaving?”

“Off the top of my head, I’d say it’s because that big sword you’re swinging around looks like it was designed for cleaving all over the place.”

Azrael stared at the sword in his hand as though he’d never seen it before, and couldn’t imagine why he was holding it. In a nanosecond, it whooshed out of sight, faster than Luke Skywalker’s light saber.

To Jake’s amazement, Azrael flushed flamingo pink. His golden curls fell back into place around his face, and his size returned to something less monolithic in nature. For a moment, the angel looked as though he might even apologize, but he appeared to think better of it. Instead, he drew himself up straight, squared his shoulders, and cleared his throat.

“I am not going to cleave you in twain, Jake, but do not try my patience again. Perhaps you and I need to have a serious discussion. We do not seem to be . . . on the same page, I believe you would say.”

“A discussion? Is that angelspeak for telling me I can’t quit?” Jake tried to stand, but gasped as his back refused to follow through on that idea.

Azrael scowled. “Emissary in training or not, you are still too fragile. This will have to be corrected.” He waved a hand in Jake’s general direction, and the pain disappeared at once.

Jake scrambled to his feet. He preferred to face Azrael eye to eye, even though it didn’t increase his chances of being able to defend himself from the angel at all. The few bits of power he’d been given would be all but useless against that kind of strength, but standing still felt better than cowering on the ground at the feet of an infuriated behemoth.

“Is the pain gone?” For a fleeting moment, Azrael looked genuinely concerned.

“Mostly. What now?”

“Now we talk. I have put a Pass By compulsion on the entrance to this place, but it would still be more comfortable and quiet in your truck.”

Jake turned to follow Azrael back to the semi, then froze in his tracks. “What the—? You found time between all the thundering, and glowing, and . . . and . . . sword-waving to put the door back on?”

“Nonsense. I was focused on you. The door took care of itself.”

“Huh? What’s that mean?”

“It means your truck heals almost as fast as you do.”

“I heal fast? Since when?”

Azrael’s expression flip-flopped between anger and frustration, finally compromising on irritated resignation. He stalked across the parking lot, and Jake trailed behind, painfully aware he’d just had a narrow escape. Maybe more than one.

A hardheaded temperament and big mouth had gotten Jake in trouble throughout much of his life, and it looked like it would still be a problem in the afterlife, as well. He’d have to work on that—assuming Azrael did not accept his angry resignation.

“What exactly does a ‘Pass By compulsion’ do, if that’s not forbidden knowledge?”

“Knowing what one does is not forbidden. Performing one at your current status level is. Therefore, all I will tell you is that as long as you and I are here, drivers will not notice the exit road and will pass by.”

“Hence, the name.”

“What?”

“Never mind.” Jake shook his head. For a liaison angel, Azrael didn’t seem to understand humans all that well, especially their senses of humor, but antagonizing him wasn’t smart. It might be time to shut up, and let the big guy speak his piece. And he would. As soon as he sorted out one or two more things.

“It’s just that it sounds a lot like a spell, you know. The kind a witch or a wizard would use.”

Even without the towering size and flaming hair, the expression on Azrael’s face halted Jake in his tracks. Those blue eyes appeared frosty before, but now they morphed into something akin to shards of turquoise ice. For the first time, Jake truly understood that the expression, “if looks could kill” was not merely theoretical. Maybe he’d finally gone too far.

He took a step backward, and held up his hands in what he sincerely hoped was a placating gesture. “Sorry. No offense. I just never thought about all the things an angel of your, um—caliber—might be able to do. Is there no limit to your power?”

“No.”

“No? Just, no?”

“No, there is no limit to my power. It comes directly from on high. You would do well to remember that, Jake. And to keep in mind that while my power is unlimited, my patience is not. Get in the truck.”

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There you have today’s offering.
Stay tuned for Chapter 2 tomorrow!

THE EMISSARY