It was apparently quite tedious to carry several hundred crates of ammunition up the hill to the library.

  Azazel and Kate were watching members of RICA and the FBC unload truck after truck with a certain glee. Ramsey, Ramirez and their respective bosses had tried to leave their underlings to do all the heavy lifting while they negotiated with the demons. The head librarian had other pns. Every member of the two organizations present would help carry those crates. Of course they had to do it by hand, motorized vehicles weren’t allowed on library grounds.

  On his way to the library, Oliver stopped to ask a question. “Hey, what’s with the dudes in suits and the boxes?”

  Kate chuckled. “Two paranormal intelligence agencies did a little fuckup and now get to pay the price. All of these are full of-“

  “Full of none of your business, civilian.” That was the director of the Federal Bureau of Control John Beringer.

  “Full of blessed ammunition designed to be used against demons. Do not interrupt me again, mister Beringer. It is also not up to you to decide what our associates know or not.”

  “This is a matter of national and international security, ma’am.”

  “Objectively, yes, you’re right. It is a matter of security. But you can stand there and watch me try to give a fuck and the only thing that will happen is that you will not carry any crates as we ordered. We have already id out the consequences for that.”

  Beringer got ready to argue but Kate raised a finger and an eyebrow causing him to just grumble and return to his task.

  Oliver shook his head. “Fuckup sounds about right.”

  “I’ll tell you the entire story if you’re still here in a few hours, once we’re done with them.”

  “A few hours… hm… let’s push that a little ter and we get some dinner as well?”

  “Good pn.”

  “I’ll see you ter then. And have fun with whatever you’ll do to these guys.”

  “Oh, we will have loads of fun, don’t you worry.”

  Oliver nodded approvingly. “Good, good.” He wandered into the library.

  Beringer, Ramsey, Ramirez and the director of RICA, George McAllister, all sat exhausted in their chairs in one of the conference rooms in the library. Agent Clemetine Muller sat on the demonic side of the table, much to the surprise of her superiors. Inquisitors Death and Wrath blocked the door, just in case someone decided to do something stupid.

  With Kate at her side, Azazel looked around the room with a pleased expression. “I don’t think I need to tell anyone why we are meeting like this. Still, I will remind everyone here that the inquisitorium had previously considered the possibility of your actions and what punishment would be fitting. My predecessor’s opinion was that your actions st week constitute an act of war and rejection of the protections granted to you by the Treaty of Celestis in accordance with section three of said treaty. The punishment for acting against us after rejecting the protections would be total eradication, as proposed by former High Inquisitor Athena. Even if I am to disregard her opinion, you broke your end of the treaty. It is, as you say, open season to hunt humans now. As the wronged party, we still have to accept your wrongdoing and that is where you are too damn lucky for your own good. Without me or the other young demons, this would have been the end. But we have connections to humans and enjoy things humanity does. It is the decision of the inquisitorium to treat this incident as involuntary, as you acted under orders of an angel, and to ignore your free choice to do so. Your actions must still be punished, but the protections for the greater whole of humanity remain intact. Any questions before I move on?”

  All four men exchanged meaningful gnces. McAllister decided to speak what everyone had on their minds. “We are grateful that you are not punishing innocents for our mistake. I am certain all four of us here are very clear on our involvement and have no further questions. I would still like to ask that you consider not simply killing the members of our organizations, many of them had and still have no knowledge of our involvement with archangel Gabriel and our actions against you. Among those that knew, Agent Muller was not alone in filing a compint. She was informed of our actions after the incident st week and acted immediately to mitigate any further mistakes on our end. Please keep those facts in mind.”

  “Thank you for the eboration, director. It is obvious to us that you did not act with malicious intention. None of you did. We will not execute anyone. Instead, everyone who knew about the deal with Gabriel and didn’t compin will be removed from your organizations. That includes all of you, obviously. Before you get to enjoy your newfound free time, I need a list of all your employees and their compints. We will then pick your repcements. Rica, the FBC and all agencies like them are supposed to be neutral. A third side that cooperates with both the heavens and Hell but doesn’t act against either if one of them decides to do something stupid. Humanity’s voice at the table, not some tool to be abused.”

  Ramsey spoke up as Azazel paused. “May I offer a suggestion, High Inquisitor?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Agent Muller’s position as direct liaison to you is more than necessary. In fact, I would like to suggest that she becomes my repcement and that she will be assigned a team. The FBC should also field such a liaison. One reason we decided to accept Gabriel’s deal was a ck of communication with you. We could not gauge your disposition towards us and had no real way to gather intelligence in that direction. You know that we only learned about this pce a few years ago, a disgrace on our part to let something this obvious slip past us. I do not want to ask you to be more open with us, just that we should have the dedicated channels through which you can be if you so desire.”

  “Kate, you have worked closer with Agent Muller than I have. What do you think?”

  Kate smiled and shrugged. “I have nothing bad to say about her and yes, I think she would make a great superintendent. And I agree with your suggestion. On a personal note, because we will likely never really speak again, I understand why you did it. Why you sided with Gabriel. I understand why you wanted the Null Dagger. And I don’t think you are a bad person. We may have had our differences, but you have my respect for sticking to your ideals. I am just sorry it all came to this.”

  Ramsey smiled. “The respect is mutual. I have come to regret much since our st meeting and I hope that my work at RICA wasn’t entirely negative. For what it’s worth, I deserved getting my nose broken by you.”

  “I am sure your work had positives. Maybe it will be a bit of soce to know that none of you are banned from this pce, if you want to come here and speak to us for whatever reason, our doors are open.”

  “That is a relief. I’m sorry. I truly believed we did the right thing.”

  Azazel spoke again. “Did you know anything about Gabriel’s motivations?”

  “No, I didn’t.” He looked at his superior.

  McAllister closed his eyes and shook his head. “He told me what I think he also told our American colleagues. He said Lilith was a threat to humanity and the knowledge she was imprisoned for could cause the treaty that protected us to be dissolved. If we didn’t choose a side before that would happen, we would be vulnerable. As a gesture of good faith, he offered us the blessed alloys needed to create weapons to use against you.”

  “I see. I suppose he didn’t go into any further detail?”

  “No.”

  “Thank you. I will have to debrief all of you privately, as I will have to do with every member of your agencies, but for now there is only one more point to tackle. We will confiscate every magical artifact in you have. I assume you understand.”

  McAllister simply nodded. Beringer looked at Ramirez, who decided to respond. “We understand, but I don't know if our government will. There has been a push to gather more magical items to secure our international, and I quote using that word even though I disagree, superiority in magical affairs. I expect pushback.”

  “Thank you for the warning, but your government will be left no other choice. To be blunt, your cooperation today is what saved your lives. If any of you had acted in actual malice against us, your punishment would have been death. I will not be so lenient on any other government officials trying to stop us from enforcing our demands. Librarian Apollyon has already demonstrated that other demons are not as merciful as I am by killing city councillor Weston st year. To finish this, instruct your people to not leave the city until I have debriefed them. They should all have talked to me before the day is over. You may go.”

  The four men left the room as the two inquisitors stepped aside. Clementine didn’t. “High Inquisitor, I would like a private word with you.”

  “Sure. Kate, can you leave us for a moment?”

  Kate nodded. “Of course. And thank you again for letting me be part of this.”

  “It is your library, it is only right that you see what we decide in here. Besides, you are the one dealing with RICA the most. I wouldn’t want to do anything to them that you disagree with.”

  “Fair enough. Still, it’s nice to be included. I’ll leave you both to it.”