by S. M. Reine
And he cared that Levi was still trapped there.
“It’s probably better for both of you to come,” Uriel agreed. “I won’t be able to help you once we’re inside. You’ll be on your own. I can’t guarantee anything. Do you understand?”
Summer shook off his warning. “Yeah, yeah. Fine. Whatever. Let me write a note to my mom real quick.” She scrawled a message on the whiteboard by the door (“gone to town for supplies”) and then seized his elbow. “Take us to New Eden.”
Uriel spread his wings, and they flew.
“Careful,” Uriel hissed. He slammed Abram against a white stone wall, hand over his mouth, and peered around the corner.
Abram froze under the angel’s grip, the hair on the back of his neck standing on end at the contact. Uriel felt less like another man and more like grabbing a live electric wire. And that was with his wings hidden. Abram couldn’t tolerate it for longer than a few seconds, so he shoved the angel’s arm off of him.
Freeing himself of the physical contact barely helped. Now that Abram was in an ethereal city, everything gave him that sickening feeling of being half-submerged in a pool of electricity.
They stood on one of Shamain’s side streets. The city was an abandoned husk without the angels to maintain it, but, judging by the amount of light and shadow splashing on the road behind them, they had inhuman company now—angels wandering through the ruins of their dead city.
Summer waited against the opposite wall. The light of flapping wings reflected in her wide eyes. She was excited, on an adrenaline high, but nowhere near as miserable as Abram.
“Move,” Uriel said, grabbing Summer by the collar and dragging her onto the street. She was almost as tall as he was, but she still had to take two steps to match his.
The street was empty now, leaving a clear path over the twisting bridges, past the canal, to a brilliantly glowing building beyond. It was twilight in Shamain, which didn’t provide enough illumination to keep Abram from tripping on uneven cobblestones as they hurried down the road.
They weren’t far from where the temple district had been before it fell. The streets were a wreck here, albeit a gorgeous wreck. The columns looked graceful even when tipped against each other. The bare trees looked like they were waiting for spring, not dead.
“Once we pass through the gate, I can’t help you,” the angel muttered, eyes flicking between the shadows as they rushed over a bridge. The canal underneath was dry. “I can show you the building but not the room where he’s being kept. If they catch me with you—”
“I know,” Abram snapped. Uriel had already gone over this a dozen times.
Summer touched the angel’s arm. “Thank you,” she said more gently.
He rested his hand on hers for a brief moment. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. This is a huge help.”
Uriel just shook his head and led them to the gate.
It was an archway three times as tall as an angel and twice as broad as their wingspans. Black veins curved around the pillars. The symbols rimming the base glowed. Crates were scattered in the square surrounding the gate, guarded by three angels.
It took Abram a moment to notice a fourth angel working behind the gate. It looked like he was erecting a second structure, though this one wasn’t in the shape of a door. It was some kind of machine, judging by the large stone cogs.
Surprise jolted down his spine when he recognized the glow of crimson magical runes on the machinery. It wasn’t angel magic.
“That was definitely not here when I visited Shamain before,” Summer said.
Uriel pulled them behind a cluster of bushes, dropping to his knees. “Yes. It’s a recent addition, since they’ve shut down almost all the other entrances.”
“What’s with the gears?” Abram asked, jerking his chin toward the fourth angel.
“War machine,” Uriel said vaguely. He seemed too distracted watching the door. “We want to wait for a break.”
“A break in what?” Summer asked.
The light within the gateway flashed brightly. A pair of angels stepped through and the guards immediately began outfitting them with sabers and armor from the crates around the square.
“It should be empty on the other side for a few minutes,” Uriel said. “There shouldn’t be anyone to notice that I’ve come back with unexpected guests.”
It only took a few seconds for the angels to be outfitted, and then the newcomers took to the air, flying toward the gaping hole to Earth.
Uriel stood. “You’re my prisoners, by the way.”
“I’ve seen that movie,” Summer said, although she allowed Uriel to take her arm. “It never works.”
“It will work.”
Abram clenched his jaw when Uriel grabbed his arm, too. His vision blurred around the edges. His head ached.
He didn’t think there was a chance in hell that the guards would be stupid enough to let them through, but they didn’t question Uriel. They nodded at him as he walked Abram and Summer to the door.
“For the pool,” Uriel explained to the guard on the right. “They’re from the Apple.”
The guard had already gone back to rearranging swords within the crate. “I understand. Safe travels.”
Safe travels? “What does that mean?” Summer whispered as they approached the gate. The air grew thicker, humming with power. Abram felt like they were walking in slow motion.
“It means that you need to hold on to me and not let go until we’re on the other side,” Uriel said. “No matter how miserable you feel, kopis.” That was addressing Abram specifically. Had he been so obvious about his weakness?
He steeled his spine. “I won’t let go.”
“Easier said than done.” Uriel swallowed hard. “I’m sorry. I really am.”
They stepped through.
For an eternity, there was nothing.
Abram’s thoughts and breath were suspended, extending toward infinity without motion. He saw nothing. He felt nothing.
And then he shocked back into his body standing at the edge of a roof, and it was only his quick reflexes that saved him from falling off the side. He gripped a pillar in both hands and looked down to realize that he couldn’t see the ground under the building. It was so far away that it disappeared into mist.
“Wow,” Summer breathed, steadying herself on Abram’s arm. Her fingernails dug into his bicep.
He had forgotten that she hadn’t seen New Eden. He tried to see it as she did—not as someone who had been kidnapped along with the pack, but someone who was coming on her own terms as a rescuer. It wasn’t quite as frightening to know that they were there by choice…but only barely.
They stood high over the city, on one of the tallest buildings in view. New Eden spread below them, carpeting the hills in shiny skyscrapers, solariums, greenhouses, and canals. He expected that this was how Shamain would have looked if it had been built several centuries later. The sleek lines were ultra-modern. No Romanesque columns here.
His kopis senses were screaming at being surrounded by so many angels. He easily picked out a dozen swooping from skyscraper to skyscraper in a glance—about a dozen more angels that he’d ever wanted confront at once.
“Horrible, huh?” Abram asked.
“I guess,” Summer said. Her eyes shone with the light reflecting from the sky. It was eternal dawn, faintly pink and gold rimmed with midnight blue. “I mean, the way they made it is horrible, but this is…”
“Horrible,” he said again.
The fact that they had made something this gorgeous out of something so awful made it worse, not better.
Abram wondered if the pillar under his fingers had been grown out of anyone that he knew.
Uriel stepped up beside them, seemingly unbothered by their distance from the ground. The breeze rustling through his wings was an echo of the wind in the trees. A feather was plucked free and spiraled into the sky.
“That’s the hospital,” he said, pointing at a tower nestled ag
ainst a cliff, mirrored on either side by waterfalls. “Nash is still healing in there.”
“But awake,” Summer said.
“Yes. Awake.” Uriel glanced over his shoulder at the doorway behind them. It was glowing bright again, like someone was about to come through. The angel extended his arms. “Hold on to me. I’ll take you to the land above the tower.”
Reluctantly, Abram took one wrist, and Summer grabbed his opposite shoulder, careful not to obstruct the motion of his wings.
Uriel stepped off the building.
Abram gritted his teeth as they swept through the air, squinting his eyes against the wind. The city rushed past them. Uriel kept low, almost low enough for their feet to brush some of the taller buildings, but he hurtled so quickly that it was all nothing more than an indistinguishable blur.
With a few flaps of his wings, they were across the city.
Solid earth met Abram’s boots. He jerked away from Uriel, rubbing the pins and needles out of his hands from where they had been in contact.
“Wow,” Summer said again.
Uriel had meant it when he said that he’d take them above the tower. They were on the cliff between rivers, looking down at the geometric roof of the hospital. It was a long damn climb to get down there. At least five hundred feet. And without gear.
“Uriel—” Abram began, turning to face the angel.
He was gone.
Summer smoothed her hair down. It had gone frizzy from their brief, rapid flight. “We better go quickly. We’re too conspicuous up here.”
She was right. There were angels not too far away—less than a mile. And standing up on the cliff, they were bathed in some of the brightest light available. It wouldn’t be long before someone realized that there were visitors in town that didn’t have wings.
Abram squared his shoulders and swallowed hard as he looked down at the hospital again.
Long damn climb.
He wasn’t afraid of heights. He wasn’t. He’d climbed the waterfall at the sanctuary before. But hell, that had been over the lake—if he’d fallen, he’d have just ended up wet. If he fell now, he’d have a long time to think about how much he fucking hated angels before he hit the trees at the bottom, and he doubted they were nearly as fluffy as they looked from up here.
Summer dropped to her belly on the edge of the cliff. She kicked off her shoes. “Last one down has to kiss Nash as soon as we find him.”
Abram’s left eye twitched. “No.”
“Well, you’d better be faster than me, then.”
She vanished over the side.
Thinking all of his favorite swear words, Abram swung his legs over the side. Considering that she turned into a wolf, Summer climbed a lot like a monkey, slipping down the craggy, mossy rocks as though she had been born with suction cups for hands. She was already a dozen feet below him.
He flipped onto his stomach and slid down.
Abram didn’t look at the building underneath him. He focused on finding the next handhold, primarily using his arms to lower himself. Rocks scraped against his shirt.
He could hear Summer humming a merry tune just to his left and a few feet below. Humming. She was enjoying this.
Abram climbed faster.
Summer might have had shapeshifter strength on her side, but he wasn’t a kopis for nothing, and he soon drew level with her. He risked a look down below. The hospital roof was growing. It was semi-transparent crystal and carpeted by creepers—maybe enough to soften the landing, definitely enough to make footing slippery if he wasn’t careful walking across it.
They drew within a hundred feet. Seventy feet. Summer was beating him.
Abram released his handhold and fell.
He hit on all fours, landing on a springy mass of vines. They were crushed underneath his weight. Silvery sap oozed from them.
“Cheater,” Summer said, dropping beside him.
“Sore loser.”
“Werewolf lover.”
Abram gave her a hard look. They hadn’t talked about his relationship with Levi, but it was no shock that Summer knew. She knew everything. “Angel lover.”
“Guilty,” she said, beaming. “Now let’s find my horrible boyfriend so we can find your horrible boyfriend, huh?”
Seven
JAMES LURCHED TOWARD consciousness. Once he managed to open his eyes again, he saw that Stephanie was crouched over Lincoln, attempting to resuscitate the deputy. Rylie hung back, gnawing on a thumbnail that was definitely a thumbnail rather than a claw. Her eyes glistened with tears.
She noticed James straightening and gasped.
“Are you okay?” Rylie asked.
He felt like he’d just been squeezed through a sieve molecule by molecule. “Fantastic,” he croaked, holding out a hand. “Some assistance?”
The girl hefted him to his feet and brushed off his shirt. His entire body seemed to creak as he straightened. It had been a long time since he had felt quite so sore, so…human. And somehow, James had gotten something that looked like ash on him—ash, or soil.
He glanced around, looking for a source. He was startled to see that the circle of power was gone, leaving no hint of the ink that he had spent almost an hour drawing. The only sign that there had been a circle at all was that the floor was clean.
And beyond the perimeter, the basement was…blooming.
Fresh green grass carpeted the cement, dotted with tiny white wildflowers. The floor had been flat underneath, but there were small hills in this grass, each one holding a cluster of denser flowers.
“The bodies,” Rylie said by way of explanation.
He felt like he was going to be sick. “How long did that take to grow?”
“Just a few seconds,” she said. “You weren’t out long at all.”
“Help, please,” Stephanie said tightly. “Rylie, can you perform CPR? Just the chest compressions.”
“Yeah, sure. I spent a summer as a lifeguard.” Her cheeks burned bright pink. She looked embarrassed to have not thought to help herself. To be fair, if James had just watched a dozen bodies sprout into an indoor field of wildflowers, he probably wouldn’t have been thinking of chest compressions either.
A quiet humming drew his attention to the glass sphere on the altar.
There was bright white smoke inside. James hefted the orb in both hands. It wasn’t burning, but pleasantly warm. It was hard to imagine that something glowing so pleasantly could cause so much destruction.
His head filled with a high, whining buzz when he touched it. Use me, the sphere whispered to him. Let me work miracles.
He had to be imagining that voice. It seemed to come from everywhere.
“So much power,” he murmured.
More power than he had ever dreamed of having before.
Enough to tear a hole straight to Eden and save Nathaniel?
The orb went silent when he held it against his chest. Without its hum, he realized that the entire world had gone quiet. There were no more battle sounds outside the shattered basement windows—just the soft pattering of rain.
“Elise,” he said, both aloud and with his mind. Elise.
She didn’t respond to him.
James climbed the basement stairs, long grass brushing his ankles. He stepped over a mound to reach the door. “Where—are—you—going?” Rylie asked in time with her chest compressions.
He didn’t respond. He shoved through the door, ran out of the living room—also carpeted in grass—and stepped onto the street.
There was no more fighting here. The wildflowers were brighter and more colorful on the surface, growing in clusters of pink and violet from the largest hills, as if the color of the meat in which they had taken root. James swallowed down bile, clutched the sphere harder, and ran for the fissure.
As he drew closer, he heard screaming again—a shockingly comforting sound. The sphere seemed to warm at the sound of it.
Use me. Let me work miracles.
The grass ended two blocks from the f
issure. His vision shifted again as he passed its edge, letting him glimpse the cables of power all over again.
The fissure was a blight on the face of the Earth, even more so when he could see how it fit into the grander universe. It was a festering wound carved between the dimensions that would never heal on its own. The black pylons gripping the earth looked like the jagged teeth of a huge, overgrown parasite.
Earth and Hell weren’t meant to be smashed together like that.
And Earth also wasn’t meant to be a battleground like this—angel sparring with demon, six brutes piling on one enemy at a time, yet incapable of inflicting significant harm. None of the demons were strong enough to hurt the angels. Not with their spears, not with their guns, and not when the light from the angels’ wings prevented the demons from phasing.
The battle was a horrible clash of energy. It made the whole universe sick, just like the poison had sickened Lincoln’s life force.
It was wrong. It was all wrong.
The only thing that looked right was Abel. Everywhere he stepped, the world healed just a fraction, restoring the natural vibrancy of Earth. It shocked James to see the threads blossom under Abel’s massive paws. When he bit an angel’s wing at the base, ripping it free of the shoulder blade, the universe sighed in relief. The angels didn’t belong there. Their power was wrong. Abel was making it right.
It was a beautiful thing to see, yet even Abel’s glory was dim in comparison to who was behind him.
Elise.
Her aura was a hundred times bigger than her physical form. In much the same way that Volac’s body had been merely a puppet concealing a vast creature, Elise’s form was only a fraction of her power. She was as big as the energy in the orb. She stretched beyond time, seeming to straddle Earth and Heaven and Hell for one endless heartbeat.
James had never seen her looking so alien. He had never seen her so beautiful, either.
Then he blinked, and she looked normal again. Just a woman flushed with battle. Seemingly unable to phase as she sparred with two angels, her falchion meeting their flaming sabers in a deadly dance.