Redemption Song (Daniel Faust #2)(34)
I let her sit me down. I wasn’t sure where to begin, so I started with a name.
“Sullivan.”
Emma’s eyes narrowed to slits. Black pupils sank under swirling splotches of dark copper.
“Suulivarishisian? What do you know about him?”
I lifted my shirt and showed off his handiwork, the angry welts that crisscrossed my chest and back.
“He said something about Caitlin I didn’t like,” I said with a shrug, dropping the shirt. “So I felt obliged to defend her honor. Didn’t work out too good.”
“You’re lucky he didn’t kill you. No, you absolutely cannot see Caitlin tonight. She can’t see those marks. That’s a calculated insult on his part, telling her she’s not strong enough to defend her own property. She’d go into a rage.”
I held up a finger. “Pretty sure I’m not anybody’s property.”
Emma shook her head, near frantic, looking like she was trying to follow three trains of thought at the same time. “I forget you’re not one of us. Too ignorant to know when you’re being honored. Not the point. Where did you see him? Where is he right now?”
“This ‘Redemption Choir’ outfit you guys are so worried about? He’s their leader. And I saw him in a fortified compound about a hundred miles north, but I’d bet they’ve long scattered by now.”
I gave her a rundown of the fun and games, from meeting up with Alvarez to my little shootout at Our Lady of Consolation.
“That’s ridiculous,” she said, frowning. “A route allowing someone to bodily travel from Earth to hell and back? That’s like you, physically, stepping into an electrical outlet and riding a power line until you feel like hopping out again. One realm is solid matter, one’s spirit. They don’t interact that way.”
I shrugged. “Well, Sullivan believes it, or at least his followers do. Maybe it’s just a new angle on his scam?”
“It’s not a scam. Well, not like you’re thinking. Sullivan believes every word he says, Daniel. He’s mad as a hatter. He was exiled from our court for being an insufferable rabble-rouser. The Court of Night-Blooming Flowers gave him sanctuary, and eventually they kicked him to the curb too. That must have been when he started the cult. Operating without sanction here on Earth, building a following of cambion right under everyone’s noses.”
“Wait. So he actually thinks he’s helping these people? He’s f*cking with their heads, Emma. He’s teaching them to hate themselves just because they were born different from everybody else.”
“And he hates himself even more deeply,” she said. “He’s merely sharing his disease. I’m embarrassed to say he’s a member of my choir, though a degenerate one. When I want something that someone else has, I take it. If I cannot take it, I strive for it. Work toward it. My envy makes me strong. Understand?”
I nodded, looking more certain than I felt.
“Sullivan envies things that cannot be taken. He covets the colors in flowers, the notes in songs. Other people’s experiences, their lives, not anything tangible. He developed this fixation on humanity about a century ago. It’s only gotten worse with time. A single, driving, all-consuming obsession. And of course, since humanity is the pinnacle of perfection in his eyes, this absolute ideal he’s built it up to be in his fevered mind—”
“Then what he is, or any part of it, has to be the exact opposite,” I said. “Filthy and impure.”
“Exactly. He poisoned his own heart, long before he started infecting the cambion with his self-loathing madness.”
“How does he know Caitlin?”
Emma sat back, taciturn. She folded her hands in her lap.
“Come on,” I said. “You know I’ll find out, one way or another. You’re her friend. I’d like to hear it from you.”
She sighed. “A long time ago—and I mean a long time—Caitlin and Sullivan were an item. Their relationship was…problematic. You do understand that Caitlin is atypical of her choir, yes? The sons and daughters of Lust aren’t renowned for having a lot going on between their ears. Most of them end up as arm candy or playthings for more powerful demons, and they’re happy for their lot.”
I frowned, trying to remember something Caitlin had told me. “Isn’t Sitri from the Choir of Lust?”
“He’s the rare exception that proves the rule, as is Caitlin herself. When she was young, though, Sullivan was enraptured by her looks, and he claimed her for his own. He didn’t expect she had a mind and a backbone to go with her beauty. He didn’t like that very much. He enforced his will with the back of his hand. She was young, she hadn’t yet come into her full power, and she lacked the strength to free herself from him.”
Just when I was starting to pity Sullivan, I found myself hating him again. “What happened?”
“She refused to be his victim. And she grew strong. She worked quietly, bettering herself, learning the potential of her bloodline, while making social connections in Sitri’s court. Sullivan served under the prince, you see, as a minor cabinet minister. One day, when she was finally ready, she sprung her trap.
“She confronted Sullivan before the prince’s throne and the entire gathered peerage, with documented proof of his failures and lapses in duty. She petitioned that he be stripped of his rank—and that it be granted to her instead, as her proper spoils for uncovering the truth. Sullivan went berserk and physically attacked her on the debate floor.”