“I’m not sure what would have happened if you’d simply struck, without that condemnation,” Nicodemus continued, “but it would seem that in the moment of truth, your intent was not pure.” He twisted his shoulders in a sudden, sharp motion.

Karrin screamed, briefly, breathlessly.

I struggled against the Genoskwa’s crushing grip. I might as well have been a puppy, for all the effect my best efforts had on the thing. I gathered my will and flung a half-formed working of power against him, but again, the energy grounded itself harmlessly into the earth as it struck him.

I could do nothing.

Nicodemus twisted Karrin, tilted his head to one side, and then drove his heel against her knee with crushing strength.

I heard bones and tendons parting at the blow.

Karrin choked out another sound of pain, and crumpled to the ground, broken.

“I was afraid, for a time, that you actually would leave the Sword out of it,” Nicodemus said. He bent and recovered the Noose calmly, fastening it around his neck as casually as a businessman putting on his tie. “Survivors of Chichén Itzá—and there were more than a few, in part thanks to your efforts—describe your contribution to that conflict as impressive. You were obviously ready and in the right, that night. But you were never meant for more. Most Knights of the Cross serve for less than three days. Did you know that? They aren’t always killed—they simply fulfill their purpose and go their way.” He leaned down closer to her and said, “You should have had the grace to do the same. What drove you to take up the Sword, when you knew you weren’t worthy to bear it? Was it pride?”

Karrin shot him a fierce glare through eyes hazed with pain and tears, and then looked over at me.

He straightened, arching an eyebrow. “Ah, of course,” he said, his tone dry—yet somehow filled with venomous undertones. “Love.” Nicodemus shook his head and picked up his sword with one hand, and the Coin with the other. “Love will be the downfall of God Himself.”

Karrin snarled weakly, and flung the broken hilt of Fidelacchius at Nicodemus’s head. He snapped his sword up, flicking it contemptuously away from him. The wooden handle landed in the Carpenters’ yard.

Nicodemus stepped closer to Karrin, dropping the point of his sword again, aiming it at her. As he did, blackness slithered down his body again, onto the ground, his shadow spreading out around him like a stain of oil over pure water.

Karrin fumbled backward, away from him, but she could barely move with only one arm and one leg functioning. The wet sleet plastered her hair to her head, made her ears stick out, made her look smaller and younger.

I kicked at the Genoskwa through the red haze over my vision. With Winter upon me, I can kick cinder blocks to gravel without thinking twice. It was useless. He was all mass and muscle and rock-hardhide.

“Face it, Miss Murphy,” Nicodemus said, keeping pace with her. His shadow swarmed all over the ground around her, surrounding her. “Your heart”—the tip of his sword dipped toward it by way of illustration— “simply wasn’t in the right place.”

He paused there, long enough to give her time to see the sword thrust coming.

She faced him, her eyes fierce and frightened, her face pale with pain.

And the front door of the Carpenters’ house opened.

Nicodemus’s dark eyes flickered up at once, and stayed focused on the front porch.

Michael stood in the doorway to the house for a brief moment, leaning on his cane, surveying the scene. Then he limped down the steps and out onto the walk leading from the front porch to the mailbox. He moved carefully and steadily in the sleet, right up to the gate in the white picket fence.

He stopped there, maybe three feet from Nicodemus, regarding him steadily.

Sleet struck and melted into rain on his flannel shirt.

“Let them go,” Michael said quietly.

Nicodemus’s mouth turned up at one corner. His dark eyes shone with a dangerous light. “You have no power here, Carpenter. Not any longer.”

“I know,” Michael said. “But you’re going to let them go.”

“And why should I do that?”

“Because if you do,” Michael said, “I’ll walk out this gate.”

Even where I was, I could almost see the blaze of hatred that flared out of Nicodemus’s eyes. His shadow went insane, flickering from side to side, surging up the white picket fence like an incoming tide chewing at a stone cliff.

“Freely?” Nicodemus demanded. “Of your own choice and will?”

A critical point. If Michael willingly divested himself of angelic protection, there would be nothing his bodyguards could do. Angels have terrible power—but not over free will. Michael would be helpless.

Just like Shiro had been helpless.

“Michael,” I grated. I was under some pressure. I sprayed a lot more spittle than I thought I would. “Don’t do it.”

Michael gave me a small smile and said chidingly, “Harry.”

“There’s no point,” Karrin gasped, her voice thin and breathless, “in you dying too. He’ll just come after us again, later.”

“You’d both do the same for me,” Michael said, and looked up at Nicodemus with that same quiet smile.

And then the sleet just . . . stopped.

I don’t mean it stopped sleeting. I mean that the sleet stopped moving. The half-frozen droplets hung in the air, suspended like millions of tiny jewels. The slight wind vanished. The howling dog’s voice cut off as abruptly as if someone had flipped a switch.