A Hunter Under The Mistletoe: All Is Bright / Heat of a Helios

The large black SUV rumbled, silent as a wraith, through one of Las Vegas’s poorest neighborhoods. Apartment houses had the look of the abandoned or the damned, and the few souls who loitered in front suggested both. Rafe fought an inward shudder at the evidence of such poverty and despair. He wasn’t immune to the plight of those who lived mere blocks from the Archangel and they had several programs in place to ensure they didn’t further contribute to such problems.

But none of that stilled the inherent frustration that such horrible conditions existed next to the opulence and refinement of the Strip.

“Strange place, our hometown.”

Gabe’s comment was a funny mirror to his own and Rafe shifted his attention from the street. “I was thinking along similar lines.”

“Beauty and horror, wrapped up in one big package.”

“The universe does love balance.” Rafe murmured the words, and Gabe picked up on them quickly.

“Dad’s preached yin and yang for years. Nothing exists alone.”

“Just like us.”

The thought lingered in his mind, emotional ballast he was never fully able to shed. Even during each period of renewal, when his thoughts should be on rebirth and rejuvenation, he was innately conscious of the weight and responsibility that rested on his shoulders.

Their father had seen to that. For all his joviality and easygoing nature, Michael Stavros had always impressed upon them their duties and their responsibilities. Their people guarded the gates of the ancients. And while the Stavros family had made their life in Las Vegas, acting as protectors in the human world instead of taking up arms at the gates, they knew the path to the ancient world.

The Stavroses understood their destiny wasn’t the Archangel or Las Vegas or even the lives they’d live to the fullest. Their legacy was the fire they carried inside, born of the earliest times and entrusted to them by the very gods that ruled over the heavens, the earth and the lower realms.

“Are you prepared if there are Hunters in here?”

“Yes.”

“Your Rejuvenation came early.”

“And?” He shot his brother a dark look, the subject still a sensitive one.

For his part, Gabe ignored the attitude and plowed forward—his style since birth. “Any ideas why?”

Rafe had no clue and that nagged nearly as much as the fact that it had come upon him so early. They were creatures of the earth. Driven by the cycles of nature as surely as the moon and the tides. Yet instead of his Rejuvenation at the winter solstice, it had come upon him with unexplained prematurity.

A few days here and there were normal. Shedding one’s mortal form through the most ancient of fires took time, and pending overall mood, health, age and attitude, the process could take a few days. But nearly a month early?

Hell, he hadn’t been so misadjusted since puberty.

Gabe pressed on, oblivious—or uncaring—of the lack of response. “You haven’t said much about your date. Were you successful in persuading the beautiful Evangeline that she saw nothing last night?”

“No.”

That lone word hovered there, shimmering in the air between them as vivid—and lethal—as his own fire.

“What are you going to do about it?”

“I’ll be damned if I know.”

“No, you’ll be damned if you don’t do something about this.”

The dark snarl in his brother’s words matched his mood and Rafe had no interest in another lecture. They’d been down this road already. Hell, he knew the stakes and knew what was at risk. He didn’t need a freaking lecture to boot.

“Gabe—”

“We don’t know this woman. She’s a possible threat and now she’s bound and determined to nose around because you couldn’t be bothered to take care of yourself.”

“Lecture me one more time, little brother, and I’ll—”

The words died in his throat as Rafe stared at the flophouse before them. Enormous flames licked the walls, spiraling toward the sky as people spilled onto the lawn, disgorged from the smoke.

“What the hell?”

“The fires of hell, more like.” Rafe watched the flames as they crawled up walls, something seeming to pulse in the atmosphere around the degenerated apartment. A light, sickly-sweet scent on the air caught his attention and before he could check the impulse, Rafe was out of the car and across the lawn.

A woman and her children limped from the home, a baby squalling on the woman’s arm as two kids hovered around her legs. Snagging the children under each arm, he screamed to the woman, “Run!”

Fear and exhaustion painted her features, yet in that moment, he saw understanding.

“Now! I’ve got them!” Rafe held the children beneath his arms, their screams echoing in his ears as smoke filled the air around them. The smaller child, a little girl, kicked hard at his leg but he ignored the stab of pain, moving—always moving—away from the house.

Noise, great and hulking, hovered in the air around them, but it was the transitory moment of silence that had him taking his next move. On a hard push, he pressed the children into their mother, a few paces in front of them, then leaped on top of the family.

The air nearly rent in two as the apartment house exploded behind them. A great cracking sound filled the air the briefest second before heat engulfed them in thick waves. Rafe channeled his own inner fire, the move as natural as breath, and used the power in his own frame to press back against the wild conflagration behind them.

Power poured from him, thick, wild waves of fire that pressed back on the demonic blaze that continued to eat the apartment house. Smoke billowed everywhere, choking the air, and still, Rafe stayed where he was, his body a living cover for the shaking woman and her children beneath him.

Slowly, he felt the atmosphere shift, the immediate danger fading as the initial explosion died, the rapidly disintegrating building giving less and less fuel to keep the blaze aflame. The woman beneath him shifted, her eyes going wide as she caught sight of an area over his shoulder.

“But…you’re on…fire!”

Rafe shook his head, using her disorientation and fear to his advantage. Pressing her face to his shoulder, he let his own power fade, only letting go of her when his fire had fully winked out. “Shh. It’s okay.”

The woman scrambled from underneath him as Rafe sat back on his heels. Smoke still filled the air, but other than the soot that covered all of them, his clothing was intact.

“I don’t understand.” The woman scrambled up, her fear fading as curiosity and determination lit her features. “You were on fire.”

“It was behind us.”

“No. You—” She broke off as her crying children tugged and pulled at her, their keening wails diverting her focus. Rafe used the momentary distraction to his advantage, waving over several paramedics.

Gabe followed close behind, his hand extended to pull Rafe up, his face dark.

“Not here.”

His brother shook his head. “My thoughts exactly.”

It was only when they were back in the car that Gabe spoke. With a hard toss, something thick and metallic thudded into the SUV’s cup holder.

Rafe eyed the piece, a brass token with the distinctive marks of a swirling sky, wrapped around an all-seeing eye. “Son of a bitch.”