Trebletwenty, VGiselleH, and Syndicate327, as always, thank you for your reviews! I'm sorry Gabriel and Cariel are being so stubborn and not kissing, but it ain't over till the fat lady sings, right? Give them a little more time!

LILITH'S BACK

Gabriel flexed Loki's might as Fergus slept, conjuring up a bed with a fluffy down mattress and thick quilts. He tucked the human beneath the blankets, skimming his fingers over the side of Fergus' face and offering him a fragile smile. He had always known his time with Fergus would be limited, but he had also always assumed he'd get a full human lifetime with the man. This demonic deal was completely unexpected, and Gabriel silently cursed his brothers for still hounding him. If he hadn't avoided Dundee for so long, if he hadn't left in the first place, if he had just been able to tell Fergus not to worry…

There was no point dwelling on what couldn't be. Gabriel shook his head to clear it of regrets. There were more important things. He had a deadline now with Fergus, only he didn't know how far away it was. Without reaching in physically and touching Fergus' soul (an excruciating process for the human, one Gabriel was not willing to put Fergus through), he had no way of checking for himself. Gabriel would have to wait for Fergus to wake up and ask him.

Fergus looked exhausted. His brow was still furrowed even as he slept, and he was curled up tightly in a fetal position. Gabriel couldn't bring himself to disturb Fergus' rest.

When Fergus woke up several hours later, Gabriel was lying on top of the quilts behind him, pressed against his back. He had covered them both with his wings, his own eyes half-closed as he prayed to his absent Father for revelation for the first time in centuries. He didn't understand. He didn't think he'd ever understand.

"Loki?" Fergus' voice was still heavy with sleep as he groped behind him, his hand searching. Gabriel snapped out of his meditation, catching Fergus' hand in his.

"I'm still here."

Fergus rolled over slowly, in stages, beneath the heavy quilts. First he got onto his back, then he flipped his legs over, then he rolled onto his other side to face Gabriel. The angel smiled, leaning in to press their foreheads together. "I missed you," he admitted, pulling Fergus' hand in against the base of his throat where his core pulsed the strongest. "I made a mistake and had to run before I was caught. I had to avoid the whole city, the whole country, lest my brothers find me."

"The Frost Giants?" Fergus asked, frowning as he tried to remember myths Gabriel had told him decades ago.

Gabriel smiled and nodded, letting Loki's brothers usurp his own in his story. "Yes, Helblindi and Byleistr. I found something of theirs, and they wanted it back. I had to run quickly, so they didn't encase this city in a block of ice."

Fergus continued to frown. "But why so long? And why couldn't you tell me before you left?"

"They're giants. One of their steps is fifty of mine," Gabriel lied smoothly. He had met Loki's brothers several times before, and while they both towered over Loki's much more human form, the three were fairly evenly matched in speed and strength. The laws of physics bent around the gods much the same way they bent around the angels, allowing an envesseled Gabriel to stand on roughly equal footing with his two-thousand foot tall 'brothers.' "I had to outrun them first, to buy myself enough time to outthink them. I didn't dare lead them back to you."

"Did you win?"

Gabriel smirked. "I'm here, aren't I?" The angels hadn't found him, but the lingering grace in the city said that they had looked. He had been right to run. He had to be ready to run again, just in case. "I abandoned their toy at the northern-most part of the world, where they'll have to dig through a world of snow to find it."

Fergus smiled, flexing his fingers around Gabriel's. "You're awesome."

"God," Gabriel answered, as he always did. "Awesome is part of the job description."

"I'm not so awesome." Fergus closed his eyes and tucked himself against Gabriel's chest like he was a child again, like they were just napping on the moors during a warm summer afternoon.

"I don't know about that," Gabriel murmured, reaching up to stroke his fingers through Fergus' hair. "Would I have stayed at your side this long if you weren't?" He could feel Fergus' jaw clenching against his chest and sighed. "How much longer do we have together?" the angel asked quietly. "Give me a date."

"You always thought so much of me," Fergus mumbled. "April 26." He breathed the date against Gabriel's shirt. "Next year."

"April…!" It was already December. Christmas was just a few days away. February was only a few months away. Gabriel had thought—he'd hoped—he'd have more time.

"Like I said," Fergus mumbled, "I wasn't sure you'd come back in time."

"Did you get ten years?" Gabriel asked, easing out from the bed to pace, his wings twitched agitatedly in the air. "That would have just been a couple months after I left!"

"Five." Fergus sat up, leaning against the headboard of the bed and watching Gabriel. The bed was only spared a cursory glance—Fergus was too accustomed to Gabriel creating whatever he wanted to be phased by new furniture appearing in his presence. "Mistress said a soul as tainted as mine wasn't worth the full ten."

"And you bought that crap?" Gabriel shook his head, looking back at the human. "Your soul, Fergus, was worth a thousand years." Five years. Five years was when Fergus gave up praying to Loki.

"To you, maybe," Fergus sighed. "Not to anyone else."

"Was it worth it? What you sold your soul for?"

Fergus shrugged. "Depends on what you consider the trade. For the actual perk as written in the contract? Not at all."

Gabriel paused in his pacing to raise an eyebrow, and Fergus actually blushed. "Fergus?" The angel stepped closer to the bed, always enjoying when he could make the man embarrassed. "What did you ask for?"

Fergus cleared his throat and gestured vaguely at his lap. "Er… marital assistance?" Gabriel raised his other eyebrow, not understanding. Fergus groaned and squeezed his eyes shut. "A bigger prick, okay? Gabrielle was… did you know Gavin Stout followed us here? He lives around the corner from us now, and Gabrielle fucks him like he's her husband! I've interrupted them!" Fergus held up his hand, three fingers raised. "Three times, Loki! That's just the times I've actually caught them going at it! And I thought…" He shrugged. "Why not, right? There's got to be something about him she likes."

"Fergus, you idiot. I could have done that for you." Loki's ability to bend reality included shape-changing abilities, and they weren't, Gabriel had learned, restricted just to him. "Did it help?"

"But you weren't here." Fergus looked away. "And no. Not really. Maybe for a week, but then she wanted to know how it happened, and Gavin overheard, and…" He sighed. "I mostly live here now." He gestured to the shop. "If she wants Gavin, fine. He can have his whore."

Fergus had finally let go of his old crush on Gabrielle, exactly what Gabriel had always hoped for, but this was hardly the circumstances Gabriel had wanted to find him in. The angel sighed, curling a hand around the bedpost and sitting at the foot of the mattress. "What about this place?" he asked, looking around. He had tidied up while Fergus slept, cleaning off the dust and cobwebs before joining Fergus in the bed, but the shop still looked half-deserted. "It doesn't look like you've been working much."

Fergus shrugged. "My soul was as damned as you could get," he said, sagging back against his pillows. "What harm could more witchcraft do it? I used spells for everything I needed, everything they needed. I provided for my family, even after everything…"

"And what do you consider the actual trade?" Gabriel asked, remembering how the man had phrased his earlier answer.

"Death," Fergus answered quietly. "Mistress gave me a death that could not be avoided. It was just… just an end. An end to all of this." He gestured around him vaguely. "There was a finish line, and I just… just had to make it until then."

"Do you still wish for death?" Gabriel asked, not sure if he wanted to hear the answer.

Fergus lifted his head to look Gabriel squarely in the eye, his dark eyes sharp and focused for the first time all day. "Not anymore. Not if you're back."

Gabriel studied Fergus again, looking into the man's soul. Even if he had full use of his grace… no. No, he wouldn't be able to purify Fergus' soul enough to rescue him from Hell. "You're a good man, Fergus MacLeod," he said, lifting his eyes to Fergus', "despite everything. I can't save your soul… but maybe I can save your life."

"How?" Fergus asked, his frown furrowing between his eyes again. "I made a contract. We sealed it with a… we sealed it."

"Contracts can be broken." Gabriel hopped to his feet and clapped his hands together. "Right. First things first. Let's summon us up a demon."

Fergus looked skeptical, but he pushed himself out of bed and rolled up his sleeves. Gabriel found a pair of scissors among Fergus' tailor tools and used the blades to slice his arm open. The man had given him a pained look, but Gabriel just shrugged. "I heal," he assured Fergus, dipping his fingers into his fresh blood and beginning to paint a devil's trap.

By the time Fergus had set up a summoning ritual, Gabriel was putting the finishing touches on his artwork. He looked over at Fergus and gave a nod. Fergus nodded back and crouched over his makeshift altar.

"Vocavi vobis dominam nobis gehennæ." He lit a match, dropping it into the bowl holding the ingredients needed for the spell. "Nos vocare te domina infernum." The ingredients flared up, all other flames dimming suddenly. Gabriel glanced around, feeling the rotting presence of a demon approaching. "Veni nobis regnum damnatorum, adhibenda vobis!"

"You still have a few months left, Fergy." A young girl about six or seven stood in the center of the trap, her head tilted to one side, a rag doll clutched in her hands. She was smiling sweetly, but there was nothing innocent about her milky white eyes. "Who is this?" She rolled her head to the other side, turning her blind gaze toward Gabriel.

"Hello, Lilith." Gabriel gave a little bow to the demon. "I am Loki, pagan god of… well, Fergus. I've been hearing a lot about you."

Lilith giggled childishly, lifting her doll to cover her mouth. "Loki! I've heard a lot about you!"

Fergus slowly rose back to his feet, stepping over to Gabriel's left side. Gabriel didn't look his way, but he did reach out to brush his fingers against Fergus' hand. "I apologize for taking so long to arrange this meeting, Lilith, but it has come to my attention that you've claimed something of mine."

"Have I?" Lilith shook her head, smiling sweetly. "A human soul belongs to whoever claims it first, Loki. Surely you know that."

"No." Gabriel shook his head right back at Lilith. "No, surely you know, a human soul belongs to whoever is strong enough to take it back."

"You know who I am," Lilith scolded with another giggle. "You've called me by name. Lilith. The first demon. The Queen of the Damned. Ruler of Hell. You think you, a human-begotten pagan have enough juice to take on me, appointed by Lucifer himself?"

"Yes," Gabriel answered, reaching with his right hand. "Because you see, I've travelled a lot." His sword slid out of his grace as smoothly as if he'd just used it yesterday, despite having ignored it for over a thousand years lest it attract unwanted Heavenly attention. "I've acquired a few trinkets."

Lilith's eyes were focused on the sword, her smile falling completely off her face. "You… you have that!?"

"He didn't give it up without a fight, I'll say that much. Has a nice weight to it, though." Gabriel hefted the sword and swung it slowly through the air, the tip just barely humming through the inner circle of the trap where Lilith stood. The demon stepped back, her heel sizzling where it touched the Archangel's blood. "So. Let's make a deal."

"A deal," Lilith repeated, swallowing nervously. "I… yes. Yes, I think we can manage that. How about we… Fergus, how about you… FREE ME!"

Gabriel swore as the command burst through the trap, implanting into the man whose soul was owned by the demon in question. Fergus stuttered into motion, lurching toward the trap. Gabriel reached to grab him, but the man was already falling, his hand scuffing the lines, damaging the integrity.

Lilith did all the rest, screaming out of her meatsuit in a stream of black smoke that punched through the weakened trap. Gabriel shouted an Enochian spell, hurling the holy light after the demon, but he only grazed the edge of her cloud.

"God, I'm so sorry!" Fergus rolled onto his back, his eyes clearing. "I'm fine! Go after her! Don't let her get away!"

Gabriel squeezed Fergus' arm one last time, staring into the man's eyes before spreading his wings. April 26. He had four months to find Lilith and make her revoke her claim.