Xavier’s hands go to my sides where Emil had sunk his magical hooks into me. I flinch. I’m tender. This is how a fish must feel when it’s thrown back for being too small. “Illuminate room,” Xavier says. Teardrops of crystals that comprise the beautiful chandeliers overhead switch on. The white light sparkles over the slate floors, showing thick, white rugs.
He lifts my shirt. We both see giant bruises on my abdomen. He lets it drop, and then leans his ear against my chest and listens. Slowly, he lifts his ear from me and the smile he gives me is beyond intimate. I’m sure the look goes back hundreds of thousands of years. “Nothing sounds off.” His voice is a breathy sound.
I feel as though I can’t hold my head up. I lean my forehead against his chest. He threads his fingers in my hair, holding me. I shift, resting my cheek against his chest so I can see his face. “I killed a human,” I finally say numbly. “I tore his heart out. Owen—his name was Owen.” My hands are still bloody from it. I whisper a magic spell. It cleans the blood from my skin, but not the memory of it.
Xavier’s hand slips from my hair to my back. “I didn’t see a human—”
“Emil possessed him. I thought he was Emil, but it was Emil inside of Owen.”
“If Emil possessed him, then Owen allowed it.”
“And I murdered Owen for it.”
Xavier pauses, and then asks, “What do you think it’ll be like leading an army, Evie?” My mind lurches back to the murderous street I just escaped—a street lined with fallen angels. I shudder. “It’s what you said you want, isn’t it? An army? You’re going to make decisions that will kill angels, humans, and any other creature that chooses to join the fight. You’ve made your friends part of this—insisted they help you in a war they’re wholly unprepared to battle.”
“I didn’t kno—”
“Don’t tell me you didn’t know.” Xavier straightens. “I told you. Get used to this feeling—it won’t go away. When one of them is killed—your family—it will be infinitely worse.”
No longer in the mood to comfort me, he slips me off his lap and stands. He walks past a low glass table and blue silk-covered chairs, to an elegant doorway on the far wall. Pausing, he says over his shoulder, “This is your room. You’ll be safe here.” He leaves me alone, closing the double doors behind him.
With my head in my hands, I come apart. I pull my knees to my chest to hold myself together as I sob. Emil plans to kill everyone I’ve ever loved just to make me watch. I wipe my face on my sleeve and look around my ornate room—a bedroom. There aren’t any windows, but that doesn’t make it any less angel-chic. The walls are stone. Rounded archways and pillars make it look like a palace, but the walls aren’t erected; they’re carved out of rock. The air is thick—entombed. It’s similar to what I experienced while in Brennus’ underground lair in Houghton.
Cool colors of ice blue, chocolate brown, and white soften the look of the room in a decidedly feminine way. A bed juts out from against the wall. Its tall bedposts and massive headboard are caved from alabaster and piled high with white pillows. The white fur-like coverlet looks soft and inviting. Directly across from it, the stone fireplace cradles aspen logs. They crackle with flames in the grate. The scrolling stone supports beneath the mantel are positioned well above my head—I could probably stand in the fireplace with no problem.
I get to my feet, wrapping my arms around me for comfort. There are four sets of doors. I try one set and find they open to a closet filled with my-sized clothes. I frown. The Seraphim intend for me to be here for more than a few days. Good luck with that, I think. I’m outta here as soon as I find the exit.
The next door I open contains an opulent bathroom tiled in a multitude of blue-glass hues. I use the sink and wash up as best as I can. Wiping my face on the towel, I leave it on the immaculate countertop. I close that door and move on to a pair of wooden doors on the far wall opposite from where Xavier exited. When I open them, I’m surprised to find a thick, metal door behind them. It has a hatch-like round lever. Using both hands, I have to throw my back into opening it. The metal is frigid and whines as it scrapes against the metal catch. Shoving the door open, my hair whips around me as the coldest air I’ve ever felt in my life blows it back with enough force to take my breath away.
Stepping outside onto an ice-covered veranda, I look over the frozen railing at the sheer drop that goes on for miles. The veranda is carved out of the side of a mountain, which faces several other rock formations covered by ice and snow. Looking skyward, more balconies pepper the cliff face. The whole side of the mountain has been carved to resemble an ornate fortress. Other than this mountain fortress, nothing exists for as far as I can see. It’s just barren snow-covered tundra and rock formations.
“I wouldn’t advise going far in this weather, not without proper clothing and an experienced guide. The tundra is unforgiving on its best days,” a voice from behind me says. Leonine features meet my stare when I turn.
Cherubim, I think as I look at the angel’s face. His long, golden hair reaches to the top of his light blue wings. His eyes are that of a lion’s, amber irises frame diamond-shaped pupils. He’s wild. I take a step back from him, pressing against the frigid railing. He steps back from me, into my room. Lowering his chin, he almost looks tame. He extends his hand toward me. “Don’t jump. Please.”
“I can fly.”
“The wind here is deceptive. It could slam you into the side of the cliff.”
“How do I get out of here?” I ask, looking around at the bleak landscape.
“Where do you want to go?”
“Somewhere without angels.”
“Does a place like that exist?”
I sigh. “How about somewhere with people?”
“Xavier wants you here.”
“I don’t care what he wants.” I look the Cherub over again and have a nagging feeling. “Have we met? Do I know you?” The wind lifts my hair and blows it around, but I refuse to go back inside with him looming in the doorway.
“We’ve met—in a way. You were barely conscious the last time I saw you—Brennus was more than a little brutal to you in Houghton.”
Images of Cherubim flying alongside Reed’s car on the night Russell broke me out of Brennus’ cave come back to me. “It was you—outside the car that night—as Russell drove. I thought I was hallucinating—”
“I had to speak to you that evening. I wanted to make sure you escaped. I wanted you to know...”
“You wanted me to know what?”
“I wanted you to know that we were proud of you.”
“Who’s we?”
“Heaven,” he replies with a wary smile. Snow flurries around me. I quake from the cold. He sees it. “I don’t want you to freeze to death. Do you mind coming back inside?” He motions with his hand for me to come in.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
He says something in Angel.
“Err...in English?”
“Atwater.” I move inside. He closes the metal door. I hurry across the room to the fireplace, extending my hands to it to warm them. “He’s my responsibility, you know?” I look over my shoulder at him. He leans against the doorframe and studies me, toying with the hilt of a long broadsword strapped in a sheath at his waist.
“Who?” I ask in surprise as I turn toward him.
“Brennus.” His eyes meet mine.
“What do you mean?”
“I was his guardian angel.”
I stiffen. “When? When he was a faerie?”
Atwater nods. “When he still had his soul.”
The ramifications of what he’s saying strike me. My hands ball into fists. “You let Aodh get him!” I accuse.
“I did.” There’s regret in his eyes. It does nothing to alleviate my anger.
“Finn, too?” I ask. I don’t care if he feels bad. He and Xavier should hang out. They both suck at their jobs.
“All of them,” he affirms.
“Why?”
“I�
�ve already said too much,” he replies. He moves to the door where he came in. “I’m glad to see that you’re okay.”
“He’s not okay!” I snarl.
“I know,” Atwater replies before he leaves my bedroom. I follow him. I want to know why he’s here and what he’s planning. It’s about Brennus. That makes it about me, too. We’re irreparably tied to one another by blood. By death. By love. By hate.
“Wait! Where’re you going?” I enter the next room. “I need to talk to you!”
I stop short, almost colliding with Xavier who’s covered by nothing more than a white towel around his hips. My face turns red. I crane my neck up to see his eyes. He blocks my way while he uses another towel to rub the water from the back of his neck. I quickly realize that this room is another bedroom, but decorated in masculine browns. Xavier’s bedroom—attached to mine—like his and hers! I frown at him.
I duck around his outstretched wings, moving past him, out the door and into a circular corridor that’s lined with clear glass pillars. They open into a rotunda—a hive-like arena. Angels of every type fly around in the middle of the open arena—the common space—moving from floor to floor without the need of elevators. No balustrades line the levels above or below, so either one uses one’s wings to fly when stepping off the edge, or it will be a very long way down. The floors above us climb toward a glass-domed sky. Sunlight filters down into the center of the hive, sparkling off the blue glass-tiled floor about a mile or so below us. Atwater blends into the swarm of angels and disappears.
Xavier leans against the doorframe, watching me. I hitch my thumb in the direction Atwater disappeared. “Do you know him? He’s Brennus’ guardian angel.”
Xavier nods. “He was, but the battle for that soul has been lost, hasn’t it?”
“Has it? Has it really?” I cross my arms. “Why would he tell me that then? Why would he seek me out?”
“Maybe he feels responsible for what’s been done to you by Brennus.”
“I want to talk to him.”
“I can arrange that, but later, after you’ve rested.”
“I’d rather talk to him now.”
“You’re tired.”
“I’m not.”
“You were attacked by Emil twice today. You’re cut up, bruised and beaten.” I ignore him. Clutching a glass pillar, I look over the edge at the crazy hoards of angels.
This whole place has been hollowed out of the interior of a mountain. I have a feeling I’m not even seeing a fraction of it. Across the rotunda enormous glass sculptures of angels hold scepters and spears, guarding the threshold to an elaborately carved entryway. A narthex stretches out beyond the rotunda. More hallways on other levels burrow through the rock. The floor that is far below has a maze-like pattern. Xavier joins me at the edge. “It’s a meditation labyrinth. When you walk it, you can feel the presence of God.”
“So this is the army?” I ask, watching a few angels below walk the maze in circular patterns.
“This is some of our army—the ones that follow me. Your father has more.”
“What does Tau plan to do? Will he bring Reed here? Will he attack Emil?” Xavier’s eyes hood before he turns away and moves back into his room. I follow him and close the door behind us. Xavier rummages through his clothes in his closet. I cross my arms, watching him.
“You’re safe here.” Xavier says. “Why don’t you go to your room and clean up—rest. Or we can eat, if you’re hungry—”
“Why won’t you answer my questions?” I retort. With his back to me, he drops his towel. My cheeks redden. “Xavier!” I turn my back to him. “It’s not going to work. I’m not staying here—”
“There’s nowhere for you to go, Evie. We’re surrounded by the harshest conditions on Earth.”
“You can’t keep me here.”
“Actually, I can,” Xavier says, as he walks past me into his room. Luckily, he has managed to dress himself in a long sleeved black thermal shirt. Long slits in the fabric allow for his red wings to be out. His black trousers are military in design. He goes to a side table and picks up a watch. Facing away from me, he straps it on his wrist.
“I don’t want to be here with you.”
Xavier is silent for a moment, long enough for me to regret saying that. I’m not looking to hurt him. I just want him to stop trying to control me. His tone is brittle as he says, “Should you attempt to leave, you won’t like the consequences, Evie.”
“But my friends are in danger!”
“They’re in more danger when they’re with you.”
“I need to warn them!”
“I’ll see what I can do to locate them. I’m not promising anything. They’ve proven to be uncooperative.”
“They were helping me!”
“By keeping you from me? That’s not helping you.”
“You started it! You kicked them out of Brennus’ castle.”
“I said I’d see what I could do. End of discussion.”
I growl in frustration, turning I go to my bedroom, which is only feet away. After I slam the double doors, I unleash my fury on the room. Energy leaks out of me. All the furniture in close proximity to me floats up off the ground. I exhale a calming breath and all of it drops back down with a loud BANG.
“Time to find Reed,” I whisper to myself.
Climbing onto the bed, I sit on it cross-legged. I concentrate on slowing down my heartbeat, which is out of control. The room spins and whirls around me as I create a replica of myself—a clone. My consciousness inhabits her form, and I gaze around at the room; it’s a rainbow of colors and shapes. I’m weary, making it hard to concentrate. Nothing in her vision is crisp, like I’m capable of seeing when I’m not tired. I take a deep breath and listen to the hive of activity all around me—angelic voices have a faraway drone. Giving in to its white noise, I become one with it. Reed, I think his name. I am pulled to the south. I let the energy inside of me go. My clone launches through the wall. She travels in a streak over ice-shrouded terrain. I lose perspective as she increases our speed—we spiral: white, snow-covered earth, blue sky, clouds, mountains, snow, ocean, blue sky, ice, growing darkness, stars, black water, falling through stone—cold, cold stone.
Dominion, I think as I pass familiar floors and artwork as I continue downward.
Several angels spot me as I descend through the fresco-painted ceiling of the chateau’s lobby. Shouts and threats issue from the divine angels closest to me. It’s sort of amusing to watch them stand helplessly by as I continue to descend through the stone floor.
All thoughts of other angels leave me for a moment when I feel butterflies riot inside my clone. REED! My clone slows and drops into a damp corridor outside a thick, metal door at the end of a shadowy hallway. Quickly searching the other end of the passageway, there are two angels posted at the entrance with their backs to me. They haven’t noticed me yet, but they’re the exceptions. On the levels above, there’s a definite uproar of angels. The fact that they couldn’t follow my clone through floors is causing chaos among them. They’ll mobilize and they’ll find a way to be all over me soon.
I follow the butterflies pulling me to a thick steel door. When I pass through it, I find Reed among the ocean of darkness and cold, salty air. He’s dressed only in the blue jeans he had on when I last saw him. His hair is dirty and disheveled—matted in the back with what I’m guessing is his dried blood. Bare-chested, his fierce wings extend at the sight of me before him. His eyes drink me in. Reaching out to touch me—to take me into his arms—he hesitates, realizing that I exist in a clone of light energy, not flesh, sinew, and bone, like him.
“You’re alive,” he states, his voice is raw, like he somehow doubted it. His brow wrinkles in frustration at his inability to pull me to him. He gets as near to me as he can, inhaling the scent of me on my clone.
“What did they do to you?” I whisper.
“It doesn’t matter.”
I glance over my clone’s shoulder at the door. “There
’re coming,” I warn. I look back at him. “How do I free you?”
“Just stand there,” he replies. “I’ll take care of the rest.” His eyes never leave the image of me before him. Shouting and clamoring sounds come to us through the heavy door in echoes, but still, he just stares at me.
“I have so much to tell you, Reed,” I whisper.
His eyebrows pull together. “Where are you now?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. I’m somewhere in the Arctic—in a mountain—a hollowed-out fortress full of divine angels. There are probably thousands of them there.
“Who is with you?” he asks.
“Xavier. I think he’s in charge. He expects me to stay there.”
Reed nods, showing no emotion—I can’t tell how he feels about that. “Stay with him. He’ll protect you until I get there.”
There’s a big BANG against the door from the other side. It makes me turn and face it. Reed moves next to me. “There are a lot of them,” I whisper. I want to grab his hand, but I can’t.
“Good,” he says with a reassuring smile. “I’ll come for you soon—to the Arctic. I just have to do something first.”
“What?’ I ask with apprehension.
“I have to get the boatswain from your father.”
“It’s a key to Sheol. Why do you want it?”
“It’s a weapon, Evie. It harms half-angels—it hurt you. It has different sound frequencies. Some sounds open doors and some sounds maim or kill. I have to retrieve it from Tau so that no one can use it against you.” Scraping against the door causes me to shift from foot to foot in nervous anticipation. Reed is calm—ready for anything.
“There’s something I have to tell you, Reed. There’s another half-angel—an evil one. His name is Emil. He was in my last lifetime with me. He’s—” BANG the bolt is thrown from the door. Instead of finishing my thought, I whisper, “I love you.”
“You are love, Evie.”
The door swings open. Power angels swarm in. They run right through me, scattering my clone’s light. I manage to reassemble the shimmering image of me in time to see Reed jump over several of them and fly through the cell’s door. The door crashes closed behind him as he locks the other angels in the dungeon.
Iniquity (The Premonition Series Book 5) Page 13