Son of Saints: A Dark YA Fantasy Adventure: Renegade Guardians: Book Two

by Kyra Quinn

  She didn’t need to attend temple or pray to anyone to see the immorality of her plan. Her throat tightened, and she fought back the urge to reach out and caress Morrigan’s cheek. Morrigan had always tasted the darkness in her kiss. She’d always known she gave her heart to a monster, but she’d loved Aster through every one of her darkest nights. Only a heartless demon would toy with her emotions further and break her heart yet again.

  Aster had more blood on her hands than most demons. She’d committed far worse sins than deception or using someone for her own ends. Wrong or not, she’d do what she had to and deal with the fallout later. If any of them had a later to discuss.

  Her breath caught in her chest. She leaned in inches from Morrigan’s parted lips, hovering over her. Every shred of decency she had left urged her to stop, to go downstairs and remove the curse she’d so expertly applied to her lips while Morrigan freshened up in the washroom after their tumble between the sheets.

  She didn’t need to do it. Morrigan adored her. She had proven her devotion a thousand times over. Anyone with their head screwed on properly would thank Cimera for creating a soul as loyal and affectionate as the one she’d found.

  But the slightest risk posed too much of a threat to their safety. With only a fractal of her soul gem left, she needed to ensure she could convince Morrigan to do her bidding if a situation arose that called for magic. Love was too fickle of an emotion to gamble the fate of Astryae on. She squeezed her eyes closed and pressed her tainted lips to Morrigan’s. A small tear leaked from the corner of her eye and slid down her face. She held the kiss and counted to thirty, long enough to ensure the spell of adoration seeped into her bloodstream. She half hoped Morrigan might wake or pull away, but the poor naive girl slumbered through her own bewitching.

  When she felt certain the spell had drained from her own lips and into her victim, Aster pulled her mouth away and rolled over onto her side to face the opposite wall. Tears burned her eyes, but she refused to grant them permission to fall. Even by her own standards, her need for control had turned her into the monsters she had once feared.

  * * *

  Aster tossed and turned for hours before surrendering any hope of sleep. Her stomach churned as she listened to Morrigan doze a few inches away. She pressed her fingers into her eyelids, but the tightness in her chest remained. What would happen if Morrigan ever discovered the truth? Could she undo the spell before anyone discovered what she’d done? How could she ask anyone to forgive such a betrayal?

  The longer she remained pinned to the mattress, the more her dark thoughts threatened to consume her. Aster shot Morrigan one last glance. Heat tingled her cheeks, but she slid off the mattress and tiptoed from the room before Morrigan woke to notice her absence. She crept downstairs on weak knees that left her wobbling like a toddler. She slunk into the kitchen to prepare a cup of tea, though no amount of chamomile could soothe her troubled soul.

  When she reached the shadowy kitchen, Aster decided against the noise and mess required to prepare tea. Instead she lit a candle until the tiny flickering flame bathed the room in a gentle glow. She crumpled into a chair at the table and waited for her thoughts to slow. She bit her fist and stared into the distance. What had she done? How could take advantage of the only person to ever accept and love her? She slouched forward and buried her head in her hands, swallowing the lump wedged in the base of her throat.

  Bang! The windows and walls of the maisonette rattled. Aster jerked upright, her eyes darting around the kitchen. A pale crimson glow emanated from the far corner of the room. Aster sprang to her feet, her heart racing.

  “Who’s there?”

  “A-A-Aster…” a familiar voice rasped.

  Aster’s heart plummeted into her stomach. Her head spun until her body weakened so much, she worried her legs might collapse. Bitterness filled her mouth. She crept forward, her limbs heavy.

  She found Madre crumpled in a pile on the tiled floor. Her smashed and bloodied nose whistled with each short, ragged breath. Angry purple bruises rimmed her both of her bloodshot, teary eyes. Dried blood covered her wrinkled face and dress, her eyes glassy. She rolled onto her side and coughed until her body quaked, bloody mucus flying from her lips and onto the floor.

  “No,” Aster whispered. Tears burned her eyes, but she blinked them away and shuffled back. “It’s not possible—”

  “Aster, p-p-please, you must listen,” she panted through chalky lips. “Dozens of angels attacked the c-c-coven.”

  The tears she’d worked so hard to resist poured down her cheeks. The knots in her stomach twisted until it hurt to breathe. “No, no, no…”

  “Yessss,” Madre said. She pressed a fist into her stomach and moaned, her face pinched. “It’s time, Aster. They’re coming for us all.”

  “Please,” Aster cried to any god who might hear her pleas. “Please, this can’t happen.”

  Madre grimaced. “But it has. I tried to s-s-save them, but my magic wasn’t enough. They burned the Grove to the ground. No one survived.”

  “Wait here while I fetch Lili. She can heal you—”

  Madre’s arm trembled as she reached for Aster’s hand. She squeezed her eyes shut and said, “You must s-s-stop them, Aster. Astryae needs you.”

  Aster tried to ask what more she could do, but Madre didn’t seem to hear her. Her eyes remained closed. No words escaped her throat, but Aster could read the words on her lips as well as a book. Stop them. Save Astryae.

  Aster dropped to the floor and wrapped her mother’s icy hands in her own. She pressed them to her lips and kissed each palm. She bawled into her mother’s fingers, her vision blurred. Her throat itched to scream, but her heart shattered in silence.

  Madre’s lips ceased to move. Her body went rigid. Aster couldn’t bring herself to let her go. Her tears had long since dried up, but the tightness in her chest and muscles remained. She had lost the only family she had left in under five minutes. The coven laid in ruins. Madre would never chastise her use of blood magic again.

  When the first light of morning forced its way through the blinds, Aster rose to her feet and pushed her hair away from her tear-stained face. She blew Madre a final kiss, her hands shaking. Her heart pounded in her ears as she cracked her knuckles and shot a glance at the front door. The angels would pay for this mistake in blood. She would avenge her coven if it took every remaining piece of her magic and soul.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  The Spark

  Chaos can only simmer for so long before it boils over and spills onto Astryae, tainting all it touches.

  -The Sacred Texts, 13:13

  Too many people. Aster’s cramped space wasn’t built to house so many bodies at once. I enjoyed the company at first, especially how every hour flew by with spirited conversation or activity to distract me from Viktor’s absence and the conflict yet to come. No matter what room of the house I stopped in, I always had someone to talk to or something to do.

  But the charm wore off after hours of tense debate over our next moves. I craved space and solitude, things I couldn’t find in the seclusion of my bedchamber. With Seth and Remiel added to the mix, I struggled to hear my own thoughts over the roar of conversation.

  I had consumed a fair amount of the wine with the others, but the warm tingle in my blood only fueled my need to escape. The constant barrage of conversation split my head in two. Enough tension existed between Aster and Remiel to fill a room and suck the air out. Everything from the color of the walls to the ticking of the clock grated on my nerves. Too many people. Too much noise.

  The moment Aster and Morrigan disappeared upstairs I’d flown from the front door like a bird freed from a cage. A brisk breeze nipped at my skin. I scurried down the snowy streets with my hands shoved into my coat pockets, the last minutes of sunlight shrinking away for the evening. Relief flooded my chest despite my lack of plan. For the moment, at least, I could breathe.

  But the further my feet carried me from Aster’s street, the more
my relief morphed into something darker. So much innocent blood had already been spilled in the name of war. How much more would spill before the madness ended? How could they protect the entire world from the devastation of a holy war?

  “This is where gods are supposed to come in,” I muttered, glancing towards the sky. “Cimera is supposed to protect the lives she created. Rhayer is supposed to lend his strength to the warriors protecting this land.”

  But the gods abandoned us long before my birth. They couldn’t—wouldn’t—help us. Our best hope of survival remained in our own strengths.

  Old habits, however, proved harder to break than expected. I missed the prayer beads I’d worn around my neck each morning we went to Temple. The small wooden beads, all carved with symbols said to honor the gods, had offered the comfort of a security blanket or the embrace of a close friend. The gods had answered none of my prayers, but they provided a sort of catharsis. The realization they didn’t care and no one listened to our prayers left me empty inside.

  I followed the winding street with little thought, my hands still deep in my pockets. Snow sat piled on either side of the shoveled streets, but a thin layer of remaining ice meant fewer steam coaches traveled than most days. As my feet marched across the slick pavement, an old rhyme from my childhood popped into the back of my mind.

  Little boys with weapons and toys are marching off to war

  Little girls with lace and curls are shielded from the gore

  By the time the boys arrive it’s already too late

  For when death arrives to claim a soul, no one can fight fate

  Cold air filled my lungs until they stung. I wanted to pray to Cimera, to Rhayer, to Osius or Anja or anyone who might listen to our pleas. But even if they hadn’t left, I had a sneaking suspicion they’d have no interest in my prayers. In their eyes, my mother’s blood in my veins rendered me tainted. An abomination unworthy of existence.

  I hadn’t intended to wander to one of the several Temples in Carramar, but I stood outside the iron gates surrounding the rounded marble building. The metal bars were cold as I wrapped my hands around them and gazed towards the small congress gathered in front of the open glass doors. The Sisters and Ministers of the Temple wore plush crimson robes and jeweled prayer beads. Their flock wore their finest dress clothes, as if they anticipated a royal ball after the final prayer.

  I didn’t approach the Temple or pay false homage to the long-gone gods. Instead, my eyes fluttered shut as a different, darker prayer formed on my lips.

  “Samael—Father—hear my prayer. If you are interested in finding me, here I am. Come and get me, you worthless bastard.”

  I waited for what felt like an eternity, frozen with my eyes squeezed shut in front of the Temple. Nothing happened. No voice appeared in my head to answer, not even a rustle of the wind. I opened my eyes and scoffed. He’d ignored my existence for the last eighteen years of my life. Why had I expected today to turn out any different?

  * * *

  The gaslamps lining the streets flickered to life as darkness overtook the sky. Still, I didn’t return to Aster’s. I knew I shouldn’t tempt fate, knew everyone’s worry would increase the longer I stayed gone. It was childish of me to keep them waiting. But for once, I didn’t care about what Aster or Remiel thought or how much they’d lecture me when I returned.

  The women from the alleyway drifted back into my thoughts. I hadn’t intended to kill them, but I hadn’t put forth much effort to stop myself either. Their magiya continued to flow through me. I could feel my powers tingling down my arms and into my fingertips. My selfish needs and desires didn’t excuse what I’d done. I had killed two women not because I needed to, but because I could.

  I had no destination in mind when I left the Temple. For at least an hour, I wandered in a slow circle around the building on the off chance my Archangel father graced me with his presence. He never made an appearance. It didn’t surprise me—it seemed nothing had the power to anymore—but it added fuel to the fire raging inside of me.

  Viktor had said the war was inevitable. Nothing we did could stop its arrival. His certainty had sent a cold panic through me. All I pictured was the devastation the war would leave in its wake. There’d be bodies in the streets. Hundreds of homes and lives destroyed forever. I’d wanted to do whatever possible to protect our home and the people we shared it with.

  But something had shifted inside of me within the last few weeks. I could feel it. My powers had grown, but so had the darkness inside of me. It twisted around my every thought until I no longer knew where I ended and where the hunger began. If I didn’t slow its spread, it would soon consume me.

  As I rounded a corner and meandered through the outskirts of Carramar, I wondered if letting the darkness take me might work out for the best. I’d witnessed first-hand what sort of twisted magic Daeva and Zanox controlled. Whatever powers the Archangel Samael might possess, the shadows were nothing to dismiss. What would happen if I allowed them to take me under, to twist my soul until it was as black as my mother’s?

  The outskirts of town had little in common with the noise and movement of the marketplace. Most of the boxy buildings around me appeared residential. Candlelight danced through a few of the frosted windows, but darkness filled most of the modest homes. Smoke poured through two of the narrow chimneys jutting from poorly shingled roofs. In contrast to the grand towers and generous clusters of gaslamps scattered throughout the more populated parts of Carramar, the outskirts resembled a long-forgotten graveyard where the spirits slumbered in peace.

  My eyes swept over the snowcapped rooftops and gardens. Aside from homes, only paltry temple covered in dead ivy and a wooden building with the word ‘slaughterhouse’ painted along the right wall occupied the neglected section of the city. I pivoted left, planning to wander back towards the shops and find a tavern to drown the rest of my worries in. A whoosh of wind against the back of my neck caused my leg to freeze mid-stride.

  A calloused hand grabbed my arm and dragged me away from the cluster of houses. I tried to scream, but no sound left my gaping mouth. I thrashed and twisted, trying to pull away. The grip around my arm tightened until my hand became red and swollen. A sweaty palm clamped over my mouth, muffling my cries for help. He yanked me towards a boxy stone building and up a set of stone steps through an open set of heavy gold doors.

  My captor had pulled me into a small private temple nestled between two rotted snags. The place of worship sat empty, the clusters of candles scattered throughout the room unlit. Marble pillars adorned with paintings of Osius and the Gates of Judgment supported the domed ceiling. Moonlight spilled through the stained-glass windows, casting fractals of colorful light onto the stone walls. Towards the back of the room, a wide oak table sat atop a raised platform. A marble statue of a cloaked figure clutching a scythe towered over the table. The stone depiction of Osius chilled my blood.

  “Lilianna, is it? What a beautiful name for such an atrocity.”

  He released my mouth. Feathery onyx wings fluttered behind him. His cold blue eyes burned into my skin. He fixed me with a murderous glare and cocked his head, daring me to respond with anything but screams of terror.

  “Are you Samael?” I asked, my mouth dry. I scanned his face for some familiar feature, but the only thing we appeared to have in common were the black feathered wings protruding from our backs. Thin platinum hair covered his oval head. He stood at least a few heads taller than me, his muscular body draped in thick onyx armor. He almost reminded me of a taller Remiel, until I noticed his shimmering gold eyes.

  “I am the Archangel Zachariah.”

  The name didn’t stand out as familiar. “Why are you here? Where is Samael?”

  “Samael sends his regards, but he has more important business to attend to. Wars take far more time to plan than they do to execute. He requested I take care of this little mistake for him.” The angel reached behind him and retrieved a pair of heavy iron cuffs linked by a thick chain he’d teth
ered to his belt. He dangled them from his finger and grinned.

  I stiffened, forcing myself not to flinch or react to the angel’s taunts. “I’d sooner die than go anywhere with one of you murderous monsters.”

  Zachariah clicked his tongue. “That seems unfair when we have heard reports of a fallen angel in your new circle of friends. Be a good girl and come along now, Lilianna. Your father would like a word with you.”

  The angel unsheathed his sword, the steel engulfed in a blaze of pale blue flames that mirrored Remiel’s eyes. The angel released his grip on my arm to grip the handle with both hands.

  The moment his grip loosened, I dove for the ground and rolled to the side the way Aster had taught me when we trained together. His sword swooshed through the air, the wind pushing my hair back. He growled and swore through clenched teeth. He twirled his weapon in his hands until the flames spun and danced, but the heat of his glare remained locked onto my face.

  I curled my lip, my fist shaking. “He shouldn’t have waited eighteen years.”

  Zachariah’s smile fell. He slashed his sword through the air a few inches from my face. “I will not ask twice.”

  Viktor’s voice appeared in the back of my head, urging me to flee. Aster’s daggers remained strapped to my upper thigh, but I couldn’t imagine them doing much damage to an Archangel. How had I spent weeks training to fight and kill all manner of foes but never once thought to inquire how to kill an angel?

  The angel tossed the shackles to the stone floor. He rolled his neck until a sickening crack echoed through the temple. “I was told to bring you back alive, but inches from death should suffice.”

  He flicked his wrist, and the doors slammed shut. My eyes widened. If Zachariah could manipulate objects with a flick of his wrist, what unexploited powers did I have lurking beneath the surface? A small seed of hope bloomed in my chest. Any chance I had was slim, but it was better than having no chance.

  “This only ends one way for you, child. No matter what dark magic you cast, the bounty on your head will never lift. There is nowhere in Astryae you can hide from us. No matter what devious tricks you try, you cannot outrun fate.”