“What do you mean evolved?”

“I don’t really know because I don’t understand it myself,” I admitted. “I just have this feeling… See, the elemental didn’t have as many powers as the vampire and werewolf just now did. It’s like they’re gaining more powers as time passes. Even in the fight, they gained more powers as the minutes sped by.”

“The vampire couldn’t put out my fire, and then he suddenly could. Their magic was growing in front of our eyes.”

“And you let two highly dangerous supernaturals, who have managed to steal magic, free in my city?” Harker said coldly.

I frowned at him. “They didn’t give us much choice.”

“There is always a choice.”

“Yeah, the choice was to run, or to stay there and fight and let my team and Charlotte die just like the two poor soldiers who came before us,” I snapped. “Is that what you wanted?”

Harker bit his lip. I was pushing him too hard. I was betting on my theory that he needed me alive more than he needed to vent. Actually, his patron god was the one who’d told him to keep me alive, and I was reminding him that I knew all about that.

“You are resourceful,” he finally said. “You always find a way to cheat death.”

And there he was letting me know that I’d escaped death in Nero’s trials. Boy, this verbal sparring match was sure fun.

Or did he know about the trials? Maybe I was just being paranoid. The information surrounding the Gods’ Trials was kept confidential, even from angels. Especially from angels.

“That’s just what I did. I cheated death by not throwing my team into death’s jaws,” I said. “There was nothing we could have done had we stayed there. Nothing we tried did more than annoy the vampire and werewolf.”

“Actually, that’s not true,” Alec spoke up. “You managed to hurt the vampire with your elemental spells.”

“I’d hardly say that hurt him. Maybe it stung him. In any case, it wasn’t enough. I still couldn’t hold him off.” I shifted my gaze to Harker. “The vampire and werewolf would have killed us, and then they’d still be free. The only difference is we’d all be dead too.”

“Your spells still worked better than anything else we tried,” Alec persisted. “The vampire survived a bullet to the head. He didn’t even wince. But he hurt when you hit him with your magic. How did you do that?”

Speak a bit louder, why don’t you? I wished I were a telepath so I could send Alec a mental message to shut up. I did not need him drawing attention to this. The Legion didn’t want soldiers with dark magic and light magic. They believed dark magic belonged in the demon’s army. And that you couldn’t have both at once; that you could only give up one to have the other.

“I didn’t do anything special.” I shot Alec a smug smirk. “I just train more than you do.”

Alec snorted. “That’s the truth. I thought I trained a lot. But, woman, you don’t do anything but train, train, train.”

“Of course I train. I’m dating an angel. Training is good for my sex life.”

Ivy gaped at me. Drake coughed. Harker gave me a guarded, neutral look. Alec, however, looked at me like I was his hero. Nerissa chuckled under her breath.

I decided a change of subject was in order. “How is your patient?” I asked Nerissa.

“She’s traumatized, of course. But she’ll live.”

Ivy was holding the witch’s hand, speaking soothing words to her.

“She might need those memories wiped, though,” Nerissa added.

“No,” said Harker. “I need to know what she knows. I need to know how supernaturals have managed to steal magic that is not their own.”

“However it happened, I don’t think they can control it,” I told him. “Not entirely, at least. It is driving them mad.”

“This isn’t the first time something like this has happened,” he said. “About twenty years ago, the demons gave magic to a group of Earth’s supernaturals. They couldn’t control it. They went almost primitive, just like you described.”

“This isn’t demons,” I told him.

“How do you know?”

“Ivy didn’t find any demon marks on the bodies.”

“That just means demons weren’t possessing them,” he said. “Demons could have still given them magic.”

“The source of their magic—the elemental, the vampire, and the werewolf—was light magic, not dark magic.”

His eyes hardened. “Is there any point in asking you how you know that?”

“Light magic and dark magic both hurt when they hit you, but they feel different. They buzz at a different frequency as they tear through your body.”

Harker looked at me like he didn’t buy it.

But it was true. Light and dark magic did feel different. Plus, I’d seen the difference using dark magic against the vampire and werewolf had made. It had hurt them when my light magic had done nothing.

“Their powers come from light magic. I can feel it.” I looked at my team. “Tell him.”

“Much as I want to comply, they didn’t feel any different to me. Light or dark, I can’t tell the difference.” Drake shrugged.

“Same,” said Alec. “I believe you, Leda, but I didn’t feel it. I didn’t even know there was a difference.”

“There is a difference,” Harker said to my surprise. “But only angels can feel it.”

Alec leaned back and looked at my back to check for wings. Or maybe he just wanted an excuse to stare at my ass.

“Oh, that’s right.” I snapped my fingers. “I forgot to tell you all that I became an angel when no one was looking.”

“Really?” A spark of hope flashed in Alec’s eyes. He was obviously excited by the idea of me as an angel.

I frowned at him. “No. Of course not.”

“Let’s focus.” Harker gave me a chiding look. “You’re sure their magic was light magic?”

“Why don’t you hunt them down and let them hit you? Then you can see for yourself.” I grinned at him.

Harker rubbed his head, his brows drawing together with strained patience. “Not now, Leda. I’m not in the mood for insubordination.”

“I’m not insubordinate,” I protested. “I’m just wicked.”

A smile broke Harker’s mouth, despite himself. He covered it up immediately, but I’d already seen it.

“Maybe you should ask the gods where these renegade supernaturals got their powers,” I suggested.

Harker frowned. I was pushing him too hard. But it was the truth.

“I know you are not accusing the gods of causing this,” he said quietly.

“Do you know of anyone else with the power to give the supernaturals these abilities?”

Harker bit his lip. He knew I had a point. But he stubbornly persisted in his denial. “It makes no sense. The gods are our protectors. They would not do anything to endanger the Earth’s citizens.”

He was wrong about that. Centuries ago, the gods had turned the Earth into a battleground between them and demons. They’d released monsters onto the Earth. They’d raised an army, the Legion of Angels, giving us powers to counter their enemies. And fight their battles.

I’d stood in the gods’ court, played their games, seen them bicker and make rulings based solely on their mood at the time, or based on how most to annoy the gods they were fighting. And I’d watched them discuss humanity with all the indifference of a farmer speaking about the animals he raised for slaughter. They absolutely would do this if the situation suited them.

“Regardless of who is behind this, we need to put a swift end to it,” declared Harker. “When the demons struck last time, the Legion killed all the tainted supernaturals infected by their power, but not before the death count was in the thousands. We need to head this off sooner this time.”

I remembered what Nero had said, that Harker was under pressure to prove himself, to prove that he could be an effective angel. He couldn’t afford a catastrophe in which thousands of people died.

“You are good at tracking people down,” Harker said to me in an ode to my days hunting down criminals. “Find the tainted supernaturals.”