Angelology

by Danielle Trussoni

  “I had always feared that it would be Angela—her resemblance to Percival was so strong. But I believed that even if the worst happened and she became like him physically, she would transcend him in spirit.”

  “But my mother wasn’t like me,” Evangeline said. “She was human.”

  Perhaps sensing the conflict raging in Evangeline’s thoughts, Gabriella said, “Yes, your mother was human in every way. She was gentle, compassionate. She loved your father with a human heart. Perhaps it was a mother’s delusion, but I believed that Angela could defy her origins. Her work led us to believe that the creatures were dying out. We hoped for a new race of Nephilim to rise, one in which human traits would overcome. I believed that if her biological structure was Nephilistic, it would be her fate to be the first of this new breed. But it was not Angela’s destiny. It is yours.”

  As the train rattled to a stop, and the doors slid back, Gabriella drew her granddaughter close. Evangeline could hardly make out Gabriella’s words. “Run, Evangeline,” she whispered urgently. “Take the lyre and destroy it. Do not fall prey to the temptations you feel. It is up to you to do what is right. Run, my darling, and do not look back.”

  Evangeline rested a moment in Gabriella’s arms, the warmth and security of her grandmother’s body reminding her of the safety she had once felt in the presence of her mother. Gabriella squeezed her once more and, with a small push, released her.

  Brooklyn Bridge—City Hall station, New York City

  Percival took Gabriella by the arms and pulled her from the train. She was light in his grasp, her wrists thin and breakable as twigs. She had never been a match for him, but in Paris she’d been strong enough to put up some resistance. Now she was so feeble, so unresisting that he could harm her without effort. He almost wished she were stronger. He wanted to watch her struggle as he killed her.

  The terror in her eyes as he dragged her along the platform would have to suffice. When he clutched her collar, the tiny buttons of her black jacket broke free, scattering across the concrete of the platform like so many beetles fleeing the light. Her exposed skin was pale and wrinkled, except where a thick pink scar curved along the upper edge of her breastbone. Once he had reached a darkened stairwell at the far end of the platform, he threw her down the steps and bounded after her until his shadow cut across her. She tried to roll away, but he held her to the cold concrete floor, pinning her with his knee. He would not let her go.

  He placed his hands over her heart. It beat quick and strong against his palms, the pulse as rapid as a small animal’s. “Gabriella, my cherub,” he said, but she would not look at him or speak to him in return. Yet as he slid his hands across her tiny rib cage, he could feel her fear: His palms became wet with the sweat that coated her skin. He closed his eyes. He’d been starving for her for many decades. To his delight, she turned under him, twisting and writhing, but there was no point in the struggle. Her life belonged to him.

  When he gazed upon Gabriella again, she was dead. Her great green eyes were fixed open, as clear and beautiful as the day he’d met her. He could not explain it, but a moment of tenderness fell over him. He touched her cheek, her black hair, her small hands encased in tight leather gloves. The kill had been glorious, and yet his heart ached.

  A sound drew Percival’s attention to the platform. Evangeline stood watching at the top of the stairs, her spectacular wings extended from her body. He had never seen anything like them—they rose from her back in perfect symmetry, pulsing in rhythm with her breath. Even at the height of his youth, his wings had not been so regal. Still, he, too, was growing stronger. Exposure to the lyre’s music had given him renewed strength. When he possessed the lyre for himself, he would be more powerful than he’d ever been before.

  Percival approached Evangeline. His muscles did not cramp; the bite of the harness no longer slowed him. The lyre was cradled in Evangeline’s hands, its metal gleaming. Fighting an urge to snatch the instrument from her, Percival measured his movements. He must remain calm. He mustn’t frighten her away.

  “You have waited for me,” he said, smiling down at Evangeline. Despite the power her wings gave her, there was something childlike in her manner. She was hesitant as she met his gaze.

  “I couldn’t leave,” she said. “I had to see for myself what it means—”

  “What it means to be one of us?” Percival said. “Ah, there is much to learn. There is much I will teach you.”

  Drawing himself up to his full height, Percival placed his hand on Evangeline’s back, sliding his fingers on the delicate skin at the base of her wings. As he pressed the point where the appendages met her spine, she felt suddenly vulnerable, as if he had hit upon a hidden weakness.

  Percival said, “Retract them. Someone may see you. You must only open them in private.”

  With Percival’s instruction Evangeline retracted the wings, their airy substance collapsing as they slipped from view.

  “Good,” he said, leading her along the platform. “Very good. You will understand everything soon enough.”

  Together Percival and Evangeline made their way up the stairs and through the mezzanine of the station. Leaving the neon behind, they walked outside and into the cold, clear night. The Brooklyn Bridge lifted before them, its massive towers illuminated by floodlights. Percival searched for a taxi, but the streets were deserted. They would need to find a way back to the apartment. Sneja was surely waiting. No longer able to contain himself, Percival eased the lyre from Evangeline’s grasp. He held it close to his chest, basking in his conquest. His granddaughter had brought him the lyre. Soon, his strength would return. He only wished Sneja were there to witness the glory of the Grigori. Then, his triumph would have been complete.

  Brooklyn Bridge—City Hall station, New York City

  Without the lyre, Evangeline’s senses returned and she began to understand the spell the lyre had cast upon her. She had been captive to it, held in a mesmerism that she only fully comprehended once the lyre had been taken from her. Horrified, she recalled how she had simply stood by as Percival killed Gabriella. Her grandmother had struggled under his grasp, and Evangeline—who was near enough to hear the exhalation of Gabriella’s last breath—had merely observed her suffering, feeling nothing at all but a removed, almost clinical interest in the kill. She’d noted how Percival had placed his hands upon Gabriella’s chest, how Gabriella had struggled, and then, as if the life had been sucked from her, how Gabriella had become perfectly still. Watching Percival, Evangeline understood the pleasure he’d taken from the kill. To her horror, she longed to experience the sensation for herself.

  Tears came to her eyes. Had Gabriella died as Angela had? Had her own mother struggled and suffered at Percival’s hands? In disgust, Evangeline touched her shoulders and the flat of her back. The wings were gone. Although she remembered clearly that Percival had taught her to retract them and that she had felt them settle under her clothing, resting lightly against her skin as she’d tucked them away, she was not quite certain that they had existed at all. Perhaps it had been a terrible nightmare. And yet the lyre in Percival’s possession proved that everything had happened just as she remembered.

  “Come, assist me,” Percival ordered. Unbuttoning his overcoat and then the silk shirt beneath, he revealed the front of an intricate black leather harness. “Unbuckle it. I must see for myself.”

  The buckles were small and difficult to unfasten, but soon she had worked them open. Evangeline felt that she might be sick as her fingers brushed her grandfather’s cold, white flesh. Percival stripped away his shirt and let the harness fall to the floor. His ribs were lined with burns and bruises from the leather. She stood so close to Percival that she could smell his body. His proximity repelled her.

  “Behold,” Percival said, his manner triumphant. He turned, and Evangeline saw small nubs of new pink flesh scaled with golden feathers. “They are returning, exactly as I knew they would. Everything has changed now that you have joined us.”

>   Evangeline watched him, taking in his words, weighing the choice before her. It would be easy to follow Grigori, to join his family and become one of them. Perhaps, he had been right when he said that she was a Grigori. Yet, her grandmother’s words echoed through her mind: “Do not fall pray to the temptations you feel. It is up to you to do what is right.” Evangeline looked beyond Grigori. The Brooklyn Bridge rose against the night sky. It made her think of Verlaine, how she had trusted him.

  “You are wrong,” she said, her anger uncontainable. “I have not joined you. I will never join you or your murderous family.”

  Evangeline lunged forward and, recalling the intense feeling of insecurity she’d felt when Percival had touched her at the base of her wings, grasped the soft flesh on his back, took hold of the wing nubs he’d taken such pride in showing her, and thrust him to the floor. She was surprised at her strength—Percival hit the concrete hard. As he writhed in agony at her feet, she used her advantage to hoist him to his stomach, exposing the nubs. She had broken one of the wings. The torn flesh oozed a thick blue fluid. The flesh hung agape, and a great wound opened where the wing had been, allowing her to witness the gruesome collapse of his lungs.

  As Grigori died, his body transformed. The eerie whiteness of his skin dimmed, his golden hair dissolved, his eyes turned into black vacancies, and the tiny wings crumbled to a fine metallic dust. Evangeline bent and pressed her finger to the dust and, holding it aloft, so that she could see the glittering grains sparkle against her skin, she blew it into the cold wind.

  The lyre lay tucked under Percival’s arm. Evangeline eased it away from his body, relieved to have it in her possession even as the hypnotic power it might cast terrified her. Overcome with disgust at the sight of the corpse, she ran from Percival’s body, as if it might contaminate her. In the distance the intersecting cables of the bridge wove across her line of vision. Floodlights illuminated the granite towers that rose into the frigid night sky. If only she could cross the bridge and find her father waiting for her to come home.

  Climbing the concrete ramp, she emerged on a wooden platform that brought her to the pedestrian walkway at the center of the bridge. Holding the lyre close, she ran. The wind hit her full force, thrusting her back, yet she struggled forward, keeping her vision trained on the lights of Brooklyn. The walkway was deserted, while a stream of cars sped by on either side of her, their headlights flickering between the slats of the guardrail.

  As she reached the first tower, Evangeline paused. Snow had begun to fall. Thick, wet flakes drifted through the mesh of cables, alighting upon the lyre in her hand, upon the walkway, upon the dark river below. The city stretched around her, its lights glimmering on the obsidian surface of the East River as if it were a single dome of life in an endless void. Scanning the length of the bridge, she felt her heart break. No one was waiting for her. Her father was dead. Her mother, Gabriella, the sisters she’d grown to love—they were all gone. Evangeline was utterly alone.

  With a flex of her muscles, she unfurled the wings on her back, opening them to their full span. It surprised her how easily she could control them; it was as though she’d had them her whole life. She stepped up onto the railing of the walkway, girding herself against the wind. Concentrating on the stars glinting in the distance, she steadied herself. A gale threw her off kilter, but with an elegant twist of her wings, she kept her balance. Stretching her wings, Evangeline pushed away from the solid world. The wind lifted her into the air, past the thick steel cables, and up toward the abyss of sky.

  Evangeline guided herself to the top of the tower. The pavement far below had been blanketed in a layer of pure white snow. She felt strangely immune to the freezing air, as if she’d gone numb. Indeed, she no longer felt much of anything at all. Gazing at the river, Evangeline drew herself inward, and in a moment of determination she knew what she must do.

  She brought the lyre between her hands. Pressing her palms around the cold edges of the base, she felt the metal soften and grow warm. As she added pressure, the lyre grew less resistant in her hands, as if the Valkine had reacted chemically with her skin and had begun a slow dissolution. Soon the lyre began to glow with a molten heat against her flesh. In Evangeline’s grasp it had transformed into a ball of fire brighter than any of the lights glowing in the sky above. For a fleeting moment, she was tempted to keep the lyre intact. Then, remembering Gabriella’s words, she thrust the fire forth. It fell like a shooting star to the river. Its light dissolved into the inky darkness.

  Gabriella Léví, Franche Valko’s brownstone, Upper West Side, Manhattan

  Although Verlaine wanted to be of assistance to the angelologists, it was clear that he hadn’t the training or the experience necessary to be of much help and so he stood at a remove, observing the frantic efforts to locate Gabriella and Evangeline. The details of the abduction replayed in his mind—the Gibborim swarming the rink, Gabriella and Alistair descending to the ice, Grigori’s escape. But as he withdrew into himself, his thoughts grew strangely still. Recent events had left him numb. Perhaps he was in shock. He couldn’t reconcile the world he had lived in the day before with the one he had now entered. Sinking onto a couch, he stared through the window at the darkness beyond. Only hours before Evangeline had sat at his side on that very couch, so close he could feel her every movement. The strength of his feelings for her baffled him. Was it possible that he had met her only yesterday? Now, after so little time, she filled his thoughts. He was desperate to find her. To locate Evangeline, however, the angelologists would have to pin down the Nephilim. It seemed as impossible as grasping a shadow. The creatures had virtually disappeared at the skating rink, dispersing into the crowd the instant Grigori had left. This, Verlaine understood, was their greatest strength: They appeared from nowhere and evaporated into the night, invisible and deadly and untouchable.

  After Grigori had left Rockefeller Center, Verlaine joined Bruno and Saitou-san on the main concourse and the three of them fled. Bruno flagged a taxi and soon they were speeding uptown to Gabriella’s brownstone, where they were met by a van of field agents. Bruno took over, opening the rooms at the top of the house to the angelologists. Verlaine watched his gaze stray intermittently to the windows, as if he expected Gabriella to return any moment.

  Soon after midnight they learned of Vladimir’s death. Verlaine heard the news—delivered by an angelologist dispatched from Riverside Church—with an eerie feeling of equilibrium, as if he’d lost the ability to be shocked by the Nephilim’s violence. The dual murders of Vladimir and Mr. Gray had been discovered not long after Saitou-san had escaped with the sound chest. The bizarre state of Vladimir’s body, left charred beyond recognition, not unlike Alistair Carroll’s, in what Verlaine was beginning to see as the Nephilim’s signature, would surely be reported everywhere the next morning. With one angelologist dead and two missing, it was clear that their mission had ended in disaster.

  Bruno’s determination only increased after learning of Vladimir’s death. He began barking orders at the others while Saitou-san stationed herself at the gilded escritoire and made phone calls, requesting assistance and information from their agents on the street. Bruno hung a map at the center of the room, divided the city into quadrants, and dispatched agents throughout the city, taking every possible approach to finding a clue about Grigori’s whereabouts. Even Verlaine knew that there were hundreds if not thousands of Nephilim in Manhattan. Grigori could be hiding anywhere. Although his Fifth Avenue apartment was already under surveillance, Bruno sent additional agents across the park. When it became clear that he wasn’t there, Bruno went back to the maps and more fruitless searching.

  Bruno and Saitou-san each voiced theories, one more unlikely than the next. Though they didn’t let up for a moment, Verlaine sensed that they were getting nowhere. All at once, the angelologists’ efforts to locate Grigori seemed pointless. He knew that the stakes were high and the consequences of not finding the lyre incalculable. The angelologists cared about the
lyre; Evangeline hardly registered in their efforts. Only now, sitting on this couch they had shared the previous afternoon, was he struck by the truth of the matter. If he wanted to find Evangeline alive, he would have to do something himself.

  Without a word to the others, Verlaine slipped into his overcoat, took the stairs two at a time, and ducked out the front door. He inhaled the freezing night air and checked his watch: It was after two o’clock on Christmas morning. The street was empty; the entire city was asleep. Gloveless, Verlaine shoved his hands in his pockets and began trekking south along Central Park West, too lost in thought to notice the biting cold. Somewhere in this bleak, labyrinthine city, Evangeline waited.

  By the time he’d made his way downtown and had begun moving toward the East River, Verlaine had grown increasingly angry. He walked faster, passing blocks of darkened storefronts, turning possible plans over in his mind. Try as he might, he could not reconcile himself to the reality that Evangeline was lost to him. He cycled through every strategy to find them he could imagine but—like Bruno and Saitou-san—he came up with nothing at all. Of course, it was insane to think he might succeed where they had not. In this haze of frustration, the scars woven over Gabriella’s skin rose in his mind and he shuddered in the miserable cold. He could not allow himself to entertain the possibility that Evangeline was in pain.

  In the distance, he saw the Brooklyn Bridge illuminated from below by floodlights. He recalled Evangeline’s nostalgic attachment to the bridge. In his mind’s eye, he saw her profile as she drove them from the convent toward the city and shared the memory of childhood walks with her father. The purity of her feelings, and the sadness in her voice, had made his heart ache. He had seen the bridge hundreds of times before, of course, but suddenly it had an undeniable personal resonance.

  Verlaine checked his watch. It was now nearly five in the morning and the faintest hint of light colored the sky beyond the bridge. The city seemed eerie and still. Headlights from the occasional taxi flickered over the bridge’s ramparts, breaking the gauzy darkness. Runnels of warm steam coiled in the brittle air. The bridge rose stark and powerful against the buildings beyond. For a moment he simply looked at it, this steel and concrete and granite edifice.