Welcome to the Kali Sweet Chronicles. Sweet Malice is the fifth book in the Kali Sweet Urban Fantasy series and will be released to retailers in February 2025. I’ll release a chapter twice a month here in my Magic Bites Membership, and I look forward to reading your comments! *Please note that these are UNEDITED and some story elements may change before the official book release in February. Enjoy!
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Sweet Malice, Kali Sweet Urban Fantasy Series
©2024 Misty Evans
Chapter Seven
Cole and I ended up at a bar and grill. We hit the restrooms to clean up as best we could before ignoring the stares of the patrons and staff and grabbing a booth in the rear.
He’d been my training coach, sparring partner, and friend for so many years that we fell into an easy silence as we consumed copious amounts of food. After three servings of ribs and a side of pasta, I pushed my plate back, unbuttoned the top of my pants, and looked over the dessert menu.
He wiped grease from his fingers and polished off his second order of fries. When I decided on my selection, he took the menu from me and scanned it. “Mission review?”
Most of the time, we reviewed what had happened after such an encounter, along with the outcome, for future reference. By analyzing what had gone right or wrong, we could tweak our approach to the next one.
I caught the waitress’ eye and signaled her. “I was dumped on my ass at the fairground, where some ancient evil went down and created a portal.” She scurried over, and I ordered the tiramisu while she collected the remnants of our meal. Cole ordered the triple-layer chocolate cake with a side of ice cream, and we waited for her to leave before I resumed. “We fought hellhounds, walked through disgusting sludge, and will probably have nightmares from the plague of beetles that attacked us.”
He sucked down the last of his soda. “Plus, we encountered a demon trap, a psycho Fallen, and the ever-lovely St. Michael tried to blow us up.”
“Worse than all of that, we lost the package Lucifer sent us after.”
“A total cockup. What did we learn?”
He was ever the strategist. “Michael wants to kill us?”
“We already knew that. What else?”
I fiddled with the corner of my napkin. “He got to the first person on our list before we did. Either he’s booby-trapped all of the Fallen, or he knew that’s where we were headed.”
“You’re sure he’s behind all this?”
“His magic is different than Lucifer’s, different than ours. It sets my teeth on edge and beckons me to it simultaneously. It’s unlike any other I’ve encountered and has a unique signature that I recognize. Yes,” I said, with a nod, “his brittle magic was all over it. What I can’t figure out is why the other magics were as well. I assume the demonologist was experimenting with various ancient powers to raise demons, and maybe he tangled himself up with Lilith.”
The waitress returned with our desserts, and we dug in. “No word from Lucifer yet,” Cole said around a mouthful of cake and ice cream. “What do you want to do after this?”
I wanted to return to the Institute and check in with Damon. Pick his brain to ask if he’d encountered anything like this during his stint collecting Fallen.
Zayfeer had seemed genuinely surprised at what had happened, and Lucifer hadn’t warned me to be on the lookout for his brother attempting to sabotage any of my missions. It all added up to Michael’s new strategy, but he had to have insider information.
Would I find others on my list tainted with his magic? My best bet was to tap into a different resource to learn more about the big, bad archangel. “Let’s hit Sweet Investigations. After that, we can pick a random Fallen on the list and track them down.”
“What’s at Sweet Investigations?”
“Not what, who.”
“Aphrodite?”
My goddess friend was working at the Institute these days. I shook my head. “Sophia.”
We paid and left a generous tip. In the parking lot, Cole looked over the variety of cars. “Which one should I confiscate?”
I pulled the ring out from under my shirt. We’d walked through the small town of two thousand residents to get here, but I wasn’t keen on walking all the way to Chicago. Boosting any of the sad options before us wasn’t enticing, either. “Let’s try this instead.” I grabbed hold of his arm and slipped the ring on my finger. “Sweet Investigations.”
A sharp blare sounded in my head, my vision flashed electric blue, and my stomach lurched as I was sucked into a portal. A heartbeat later, Cole and I landed ass over demon balls inside my office. The lights automatically came on, and the wall of screens came to life.
“Welcome home, Kali,” my virtual assistant purred in her phone-sex voice. “Hello, Master Cole.”
He grinned like the Cheshire cat. “Hello, beautiful.”
Sophia, named after the goddess of wisdom, had been programmed by my tech guru, JR, to refer to everyone as master or mistress. I’d requested she not use those monikers, especially with me, but Cole got off on it, so I let it stand with him.
“How may I assist you today?” she asked.
Cole made himself comfortable on the sofa as I took the desk chair. “Give me a list of ideas about what would happen if the archangel Michael teamed up with the mother of demons, Lilith.”
There was a long pause before she responded. “The question lacks logic and defies possibility. An archangel cannot perform evil, and a demon cannot perform miracles. Please restate.”
Cole chuckled. She wasn’t wrong. The likelihood of two such entities working together was impossible when applying the rules of this world with logic. When it came to magic, however, nothing was impossible.
I mentally tried to rephrase the question but couldn’t come up with anything in the form that she wanted. My silence prompted her to offer her own suggestion. “Would you like me to create a list of what the archangel is capable of, along with a separate one for the demon, so that you may compare them?”
I didn’t think that would answer my questions, but it was a starting point. “Sure. Go for it.”
On the two center screens, lists began to form. Cole sat up to read them, and I scanned the lines as quickly as Sophia typed them out. She filled the first with the most common facts known about the archangel. Some of those were well-known, but I read a few new ones as the list scrolled by.
Lilith’s list was less populated, but what struck me was that both archangel and demon mama had been there at the beginning of humanity.
While both archaic and modern texts placed them in opposite camps and, therefore, made them enemies, they were nonetheless beings directly associated with each other. Their common threads were Lucifer and the Garden of Eden.
Over the next hour, I asked Sophia dozens of rabbit hole questions to see if I could find any other places they intersected. “A scholar of antiquities and lost ancient texts claimed in 1881 that he had uncovered writings in a lost tomb that contained a powerful spell to raise the night bird, commonly referred to and known as Lilith, using an angelic set of symbols originally given to Eve by an archangel.” Sophie’s voice continued to purr as if she were reading porn to us. “His claims were never verified, the text disappeared, and his body was found crucified in his office. Several scholars he’d spoken to about the discovery claimed the Catholic Church silenced him and stole the document. Their claims were never verified, and the Church denies any involvement.”
Easy enough to verify in my mind. “The scholars who spoke out against the Church, what happened to them?”
A brief pause. “One died in an accident, a second committed suicide. The third disappeared on a trip to Jerusalem.”
Cole raised a brow. I nodded. Conspiracy theories were entertaining, but I’d tangled enough with Rome and the Holy Catholic Church to know when their fingerprints were all over a denial. “Any chance you can get specifics on that spell?” I asked Sophia.
“There is no known copy of the contents available.”
I knew it was a long shot. “Give me a list of any spells to conjure Lilith that use archangel sigils, symbols, or runes that you can find and send them to my phone.”
“Yes, Kali. Sending them now.”
I stood and headed for the door, Cole following. “You think Michael gave Eve a spell to raise Lilith from Hell?”
Versions of Hell were as plentiful as the cultures that believed in them. I paused and considered that I had a source who’d been there at the creation moment. Picking his brain might yield results but might also end up with me baking in the fiery Pit. “Possibly.”
“Why would he do that, and why did she want to? Wasn’t Lilith Adam’s first wife?”
Good question. “Little is known about Eve, but angels and demons are two sides of the same coin. There are many texts and archaeological findings that have been misinterpreted and re-purposed over and over again. Lilith is another entity that has been built up and dismantled by many cultures under many names, but she was there in the beginning when things went down. While she’s typically associated with Satan, a.k.a. Lucifer, who knows what kind of relationship she had with his brother before the whole war of Heaven took place?”
Sophia spoke up. “Kali is correct. The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew and Aramaic. The New Testament was written in Greek. Each society has evolved, and their stories have been updated to fit the evolving intelligence and cultural norms. Translations are filled with errors and influenced by their authors. Some nuances are mistranslated or changed to suit the author’s agenda. All deities have morphed over time or been replaced by others.”
“What about asking Salmad?” Cole asked. “He could research his old parchments. Stuff that’s never been uploaded to the internet.”
It was a solid idea. I pulled out my phone, saw the file Sophia had sent, and texted the priest. When I finished, I randomly chose our next Fallen from Lucifer’s list—a couple in Canada. I took Cole’s arm and slipped on the ring. “How do you feel about hockey?”
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I wish I had a Sophia. Don’t miss what happens in next week’s episode!