Garden of the Gods (The Immortals Series Book 3) by S.M. Schmitz Read Free Book Online

vulnerable to the same kind of weapon, and you’ll be able to anticipate what kind of blade will kill them.”
    Colin picked up one of the daggers and examined its blade. It looked identical to the other daggers’ blades. “How are we supposed to tell them apart?”
    Luca pointed to the hilts. “They are all different and that’s the easiest way to tell your daggers apart. You’ll only have one knife, so there’s no confusion there. The blade on the dagger you’re holding is an alloy. This other one has an iron blade. The knife is a carbon steel alloy.”
    “ I have no idea what this guy is talking about ,” Anna thought as she studied the weapons on the table in front of her. That just made her even more nervous. If she couldn’t even follow the conversation about blade types, how was she supposed to fight these demons?
    But Colin quickly assured her he felt just as lost.
    Luca seemed to pick up on the O’Conners’ confusion and smiled at them. “Don’t worry. It’ll make sense tonight when we go hunting.”
    That didn’t help Anna’s nerves at all.
    That evening, Luca led them through some of the narrow London streets as they went on their first hunting trip. Being new, they would have to try to get whatever demon they found out of the city because Colin and Anna wouldn’t know what they were doing and Luca would need to be able to instruct them.
    It was still winter in London and it was cold and damp, and Colin’s old habit of immediately worrying about Anna’s health almost stopped them from leaving their flat altogether. As soon as he stepped outside and realized how much the temperature had dropped, he turned around to get Anna back inside. Colin already had visions of starting a fire and making her some tea and piling warm blankets on top of her.
    Anna smiled at her husband and put her gloved hands on her hips. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t immortality mean I’m immune to the illnesses you used to worry so much about?”
    Colin sighed and locked their door. “In my defense, I was obviously right to worry about them.”
    Luca was already waiting on the street and he looked up at Anna and grinned. “You had consumption, right? That one kills plenty of healthy people, too.”
    Anna decided she really liked Luca.
    It took them less than half an hour to find a demon preying on some of the miserable souls in the city who were also ravaged by the effects of tuberculosis. Sometimes, it was a family member who was desperate enough to barter his soul or sometimes, it was the sick person himself. When Luca pointed out the sensation from the demon’s presence, Colin and Anna both realized this was nothing new to them. They had both felt this before. Having never known what caused it, they’d assumed there was some religious significance to it, but they’d also assumed everyone experienced those moments of sensing that something was out of place in this world.
    Anna inched closer to Luca and whispered, “We’ve felt this our whole lives, but this is the first time either of us has actually ever seen a demon. Why is that? Is that part of The Angel’s gift?”
    Luca shook his head but kept his eyes on the muddy brown beast at the end of the street. “You’ve always been able to see them. Sometimes, people just don’t believe what their eyes are seeing or sometimes, they disguise themselves as humans. But they move remarkably quickly, as well, so it’s possible you sensed them but never had the chance to see them.”
    Colin knew The Angel had promised they would be faster and stronger, but as he watched the demon creeping past windows at the edge of the street, looking for a person at the right moment of hopelessness, he was filled with self-doubt. And he really wished The Angel had let him do this on his own so that his wife wouldn’t have to get involved in hunting creatures of Hell.
    Anna reprimanded him for thinking that and reminded him they had five hundred years of this life to