When I reached the basement, I placed Angel on a gurney and rolled her to the walk-in freezer installed in my sanctuary. I learned a long time ago that having a place to store inconvenient corpses was necessary for my extracurricular activities. I kissed Angel on the forehead, let my tears drip down on her for a few more moments, and then decided it was time to deal with the situation. I rolled her into the freezer and closed the door as I walked back out and into my armory to get geared up for the upcoming fight.

I don’t need armor or weapons, but the less energy I need to put into healing or body modification, the more I can focus on direct assault. My elven enchanted titanium katanas are unbreakable and razor-sharp with a link to my power directly, allowing me to channel it through them when necessary. My body armor is formed from spider silk enchanted by Maeve of the Fae court, and I have yet to see any weapon that can break through its protection. I have a full array of guns and ordinance, but they are of limited use with supernaturals, and I want to take these guys down up close and personal.

My phone chirped just as I was tightening my final strap for my weapons harness; it was a text from Damon saying his wolves were arriving soon. I walked over to the elevator door and stepped inside to go back upstairs. I attempted to pull myself together on the trip upstairs and collect my thoughts. I was going through a rollercoaster of emotions between heartwrenching sadness at the loss of Angel to the anger at her killers and my worry for Christi and what was happening to her. It was all I could do not to let my power flood out of me and lose control of the inferno of rage boiling beneath the surface of everything else.

As I stepped out of the elevator on the 3rd floor, I harnessed my emotions into a semblance of control. Damon was standing in the hall and looked at me as I approached. He had his phone to his ear and was talking to someone when I made it to him. He hung up the phone and looked me up and down.

“You look much different than I would have expected from our previous encounters,” he said

“I plan to do a lot of killing, so I prepared for it. Of course, I can kill without the accessories, but they make it more convenient and faster. When will the wolf be here?” I asked.

“Any minute. Do you need me to get any backup? I can have half the pack here in 30 minutes. If I contact the council, they will most likely drop anything to send reinforcements if they think it will ingratiate themselves to you.” Damon said.

“That will take too much time. I don't want to leave Christi with them longer than I have to. Besides, I don't know who took here or who is backing them. For all I know, someone on the council may be involved in this.” I said.

“That seems a bit paranoid, doesn't it? Why would the council want your friend's daughter? There is very little to no chance they know what she is. It isn't something you can sense. Weres don't really care one way or the other about Nephilim, but we are pretty much in the same boat as they are as far as alignment. Most of the neutral races wouldn't go after a Nephilim because of the risk of attracting either the divine or the demonic. Nobody can stand up to them.” Damon said.

“I can. When I get her back, she will have me to stand between her and the angelic pricks and demonic bastards. I have dealt with them in the past, and while they can usually escape, they can't beat me. When I am done training her, she will be more powerful than anything other than me and will be able to protect herself from them.” I said with conviction.

“Listen, I heard you are ancient and powerful, but they are on a whole different level than any earthly being. Nobody and nothing is powerful enough to stop an archangel from doing whatever they want. They get their power directly from God.” Damon said emphatically.

“Not my god. And every god I have ever met who has messed with me has learned the error of their ways. I don't play well with other immortals because they think they are better than humans, and I disagree. I much prefer humans to supernaturals in general because the good ones will always surprise you. Most supernaturals treat humans as prey or as less than them, and I don't like it.” I told him

“Are you a god? The way you talk about your power and abilities, it sounds like you are a god. How else could you be so confident against the forces of good and evil?” he asked.

“No, I am most certainly not a god. Gods are generally not corporeal unless they manifest an avatar or possess a human or supernatural. The more powerful they are, the more options they have as far as manifesting. Angels are basically divine avatars with their own consciousness. The Christian god Yahweh is extremely powerful because of the constructed spiritual energy produced by his follower's prayers.

In contrast, the Norse gods are all about on par with an archangel in power. Followers plus prayer equal power when it comes to gods. As the religion expands in influence, the god's power grows.” There was a ding as I finished speaking, and the elevator opened, letting out two large men and a woman. I recognized James from the when he visited with Damon. The wolves were here.

“That was a lot I didn't know. I appreciate it since the council doesn't seem to know, or they didn't see fit to tell me any of it.” Damon said as he waved at the wolves to come our way.

“They know. And thank you, it distracted me for a while and helped me get my mind straight. I am ready to focus now.” I said, grateful for the earlier distraction.

“So you have met James. This is Janessa,” Damon said, pointing at the woman, “and this is Blair. Janessa and Blair are my two best trackers and will be doing most of the work for us.” Janessa was almost as tall as Damon and built like a brick shithouse. As far as Blair goes, he was somewhat underwhelming, maybe 5’6 in his human form, slightly lanky with no noticeable muscle but no fat either. Weres were never fat due to their supernatural metabolism, but I was at least used to them having a lot of bulk because they were generally meatheads. They all nodded at us, entered Angel's apartment, and began smelling around the room, picking up Christi’s toys and hairbrushes and taking long sniffs.

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“I can see you are a little confused by Blair? If he seems different from the rest of us, it's because he is. I thought he was still out of town, but when I called and said I needed trackers, they said he was back, so I had him come. He is a Werepossum their sense of smell is second only to wererats which we do not currently have in the pack. He is also pretty shy, so be gentle.” Damon said quietly to me.

“Werepossum? That's a new one for me. Are there still packs out there trying to create more types of weres? I thought the council put a stop to that with all the deaths and other issues it was causing.” I said.

“There are still rogue factions and packs out there who think they can create the ultimate were. They are experimenting on animals and other supernaturals, trying to cross them. Recently we uncovered a group that is using supernatural children in their experiments where they are trying to combine werewolf DNA with every different type of supernatural creature they can.” Damon said. I could see how angry the subject made him.

“They wouldn’t be buying them at a slave auction, would they?” I asked.

Damon's face snapped toward me, and he asked sharply, “How do you know about that? Do you know where they are doing it?”

“Well, that video I was going to have you look into is of Braman sending kids to a slave auction. They are all supernaturals. I am starting to think all of this is connected, and I hope I am wrong. The one thing we have going for us is that I am pretty sure Christi was taken by her father or the people he works with and not Braman. He had already tried to do it once, and this time, he just waited until I wasn't around and did it. There is also the fact that Braman would have no reason to expect her to be supernatural unless he knows her father is a cambion. Normally there would be no way to combine a cambion with anything else except that Angel dumped half an angel worth of divinity into a baby that was already a quarter divine and overpowered the demonic nature of her blood. I don't understand exactly what is happening with Christi, but I have touched her with my power and healed her with no issues.” I said.

“Sounds to me like both sets of her inheritance are dormant, and she is still basically 100% human,” Damon said. He turned towards the apartment and said to the wolves. “What is the holdup, guys?”

“There are a lot of fucked up smells here, boss. I smell every fuckin thing from demon to fuckin troll in this apartment. Brimstone and fuckin sulfur is everywhere. I can barely smell the fuckin girl over all the other bullshit going on in here. I can track her, but with all this other shit, I don't know how the fuck I am going to keep on the trail if I am following a car in traffic.” Janessa said.

“Wow, she has a finite vocabulary,” I said.

“Yeah, she has no filter. Sorry about that. What about you, Blair? Are you doing any better?” Daman said.

“Despite her crude language, Janessa has a good point. There were a lot of different supernaturals here. It's like they brought an army of random creatures not knowing what to expect. I think I can separate the smells, but if they got in a car, it would be extremely difficult if not impossible to find them.” Blair said.

“Mara, we can try to track her, but it is sounding like we will need more help than my people can offer. I know some mages on the council can use a locator spell with some of her hair to find out where she is much easier than we can find her.” Damon said.

“Fine, let's try it with Blair first, but you can make a call and have them ready if it fails. I don't want to waste the time they would take to get here if Blair and Janessa can find her first. Times like this, I wish I had more than a tiny spark of elemental magic.” I said, frustrated.

“Well, if you guys have the scent, let's get going. I will make the phone call on the way.” Damon said and started heading toward the elevator.

“I will follow you guys from the rooftops and alleys. My outfit and weapons are a bit conspicuous, and I don’t feel like drawing attention to myself.” I said and headed back down the hallway to go back out the window. I scaled the wall and was on the roof in a matter of seconds, watching the street waiting for the group of weres to emerge so we could begin our pursuit and hopefully find Christi.

Blair and Janessa appeared on the street first, and I could see them sniffing around, looking for Christi’s scent. After about a minute, Damon and James stepped out and started talking to them, and they all seemed to get really frustrated before looking up at me on the roof. Finally, Damon waved at me and beckoned me down urgently.

Rather than climbing back down, I jumped and dropped like a rock, landing on the side of the road with a crack in the pavement. Then, standing back up from a crouch, I asked, “What is wrong? Why aren't you following the scent?”

“They masked her scent somehow,” Damon said. “It just stops here and goes no further. So they either figured out how to cover it up, or they had a magic-user with them that used a spell to dissipate it. Either way, it's not good for us. It means they knew you were going to have weres come and scent track her. So someone is either paying close attention to you, or the council has a leak.”

“So you are saying that going to the council for help is no longer an option? Do you know any independent magic users we could use that would keep it private and the council out of it?” I asked.

“The only one I know is in New Orleans, and she is not the most sociable person. I could probably get her to come and help though if I mention it would mean a favor from you in the future….” Damon said.

“NOLA is too far away. It would take hours for her to get here.” I said, starting to lose hope.

“She is a very powerful blood mage, and she can create bloodgates. If I convince her to come, she will be here in less than an hour if she has a connection to Pittsburgh.” Damon said.

“Fine, call her. I will do whatever she needs if she can help us get Christi back. Tell her as a down payment. She can have some of my blood. It will boost her power quite a bit and extend her life almost indefinitely.” I said.

“Ok, I will call her now. Do you have anyone you can trust to come to help us go after Christi? If not, do you want me to call in more of my pack while we wait for Belinda?” Daman asked.

“I have no one. Do whatever you think is best,” I said and walked over to the side of the building and slid down the wall to wait and see if we would get the help we needed or not.