by Nalini Singh
“How come you like candy corn?” she asked Izzy, as the wind tried to tug her curls out from the braid in which she’d contained them.
Izzy looked at her with blue eyes so clear, they were like sunlight on water. “Why not?”
“You’re an angel?”
“So?” He took a big handful. “Everyone likes sugar. Mmm, sugar.” Stuffing another handful into his mouth, he spoke around it, his words garbled. “Must have more.”
Talu laughed and threw a piece of candy corn at his head. His blond hair was curly too, but nowhere near as wild as hers. Her best friend, Nisha, teased Talu about her having a crush on Izzy, but she really didn’t. He was her friend, and a lot of the time, he treated her like a big brother. He’d even warned her not to let Jakob get her in trouble. She’d had to roll her eyes at that because Jakob wasn’t bad; he just got silly sometimes because he wasn’t used to being one of Honor’s kids yet.
He’d only been in Honor’s foster program six weeks and he thought if he got into trouble or did something wrong, they’d throw him back on the streets—so he was trying to make it happen fast. Because hope hurt when it was stomped on. He didn’t yet understand that once Honor took a kid as her own, she didn’t let go.
They were safe here.
“Izzy?”
Those pretty eyes looked at her with a smile inside them. Her own eyes were brown, just like her skin. She liked her eyes. They reminded her of her mom; she’d always called Talu her “mini-me.” The memories made her smile, especially the ones of how her mom had so often thrown up her hands in despair at getting either of their hair to behave.
That was when she'd break out the fruity-smelling curl stuff and they’d go out with their hair a “beautifully wild halo” around their heads. Her mom’s words.
“What is it, Talu?” Izzy asked when she didn’t say anything.
She bit her lower lip. “Will you come with me to visit my mom?” The city had buried the person Talu most loved in a shadowy corner where there was no sunlight, but Talu took her flowers and balloons, made sure her grave was neat.
Her mom had hated mess.
Izak closed his hand over hers. “Want to fly there?”
Swallowing the knot in her throat, she made a face at him. “You can’t fly me. I’m too big.” She wasn’t fat, but she wasn’t skinny either. On the streets, she’d been hungry a lot. Then Elena had found her and brought her to Honor and everything changed. Jakob did naughty things because he was scared; Talu had eaten too much, afraid it would all disappear.
After a year and a half, she knew it wouldn’t, but the extra food was still sticking to her.
“Are you calling me weak?” With that insulted statement, Izzy dropped off the edge of the balcony, his wings arrowed in to make him sleeker in the air.
“Izzy!” she called after him, but he’d dropped so fast he’d disappeared out of view. Face falling, she ignored the candy corn. “I’m sorry!” But the wind whipped away her words.
Sitting with her elbows on her thighs, her chin braced in her hands, she tried not to cry. She’d wanted to introduce Izzy to her mom. She knew her mom wasn’t in that grave, so cold and dark, but it felt good to go there, to speak to her.
“Eeee!” The sound was ripped out of her as someone came up behind her and scooped her up in their arms before dropping off the balcony. “Izzy!” She wrapped her own arms tightly around his neck.
He laughed, his blonde curls windblown. Then he turned and swept around a skyscraper with sleek precision. Heart thumping, Talu realized he was in no danger of dropping her. She pushed at his shoulder. “You’re strong, you faker!” He’d been making her fetch things for him after convincing her he was still healing.
His grin lit up his eyes. “Hold on.”
They dived.
Talu screamed but it wasn’t in fear. Her eyes watered from the wind, her plaid shirt pulling up at the back. “This is so fun!”
Izzy turned again.
Ducking her head against his neck, Talu blinked away the wind-driven tears. When she looked back over Izzy’s shoulder, it was to find wide-eyed people waving at her from inside an office building. She waved back, sure her smile was big and funny and excited.
When Izzy said, “Which way?” she understood what he wanted to know.
She told him.
They landed at the cemetery ten minutes later. Her mother wasn’t buried in the city itself. There wasn’t enough land and they’d been poor. This place only put a small square in the ground to show where people were buried, but Talu didn’t need the marker now. She knew exactly where to find her mom.
“Mom, you’ll never believe it!” she said, coming down on her knees beside the plot and beginning to pick out the small weeds that had sprouted in the two weeks since she’d last visited. “I flew with Izzy!”
Izzy started to help her clean up the weeds, also gathering up the remnants of the balloons she’d brought last time. “She screamed like a girl,” he told her mom.
Threatening to throw some weeds at him, Talu laughed. “I did,” she admitted. “It was so exciting!” She took out the tiny bronze fairy she always carried with her and placed her near her mom’s name—every time she saw that fairy’s smile, she felt a warm feeling deep inside her.
She spoke all about her adventure in flight, remembering midstory to introduce Izzy. “This is my friend, Izak, but he said I can call him Izzy. He’s not my boyfriend,” she whispered when Izzy went to throw away the things they’d cleared from around the grave. “I’m studying hard. I don’t have time for boys. I’m going to be a doctor I think. I’ll make you proud, Mom.”
Her eyes got all hot and wet.
Returning, Izzy knelt beside her, his wing sweeping along her back and his arm around her shoulders. He tugged her close to his side, held her while she sniffed and missed her mom. “It doesn’t hurt so bad now,” she said to him. “I know she’s happy because I’m happy. I have friends and a safe place to sleep.”
“You don’t just have a safe place to sleep, Talu. You have a home.”
She smiled. “Yes. I have a home.” Pulling back, she wiped off her tears using the back of her shirt sleeve, then dug into her pants pocket. “You want to help me blow up some new balloons?”
“Sure.”
They sat in the sun for a long time, sometimes blowing balloons, other times just talking. A few other people came to the cemetery during that time, but though they looked startled at seeing Izzy’s wings spread out on the green of the grass, they didn’t interrupt. Except for a little boy who just wanted a balloon and to pet Izzy’s wing.
It was a good day.
Copyright © 2016 by Nalini Singh
A Walk on the Cliffs
Author’s Note: This vignette stands alone, so you can read even if you’ve never read the Guild Hunter series.
For series readers, “A Walk on the Cliffs” fits into chapter 6 of Archangel’s Shadows. It shows a hidden moment between two characters who help run the household of the Archangel Raphael: Sivya, the angelic chef who runs the kitchen, and Montgomery, the vampire who is Raphael’s butler and who ensures the rest of the staff work together as a seamless unit.
I hope you enjoy!
A Walk on the Cliffs
By Nalini Singh
Sivya was filling the last of the éclairs with cream when Montgomery walked back into the otherwise empty kitchen. Her heart skipped a beat even though she told herself she was far too old for such foolishness. At a thousand years of age, she was no green girl to lose herself over a man. She was a chef of exquisite skill who had the running of an archangel’s kitchen…and she still had to fight the butterflies in her stomach when a certain butler walked into the room.
“The sire and the Guild Hunter will not be needing their dinner till later,” Montgomery said now, his black hair neatly combed and his suit—the same shade—as pristine as when he’d started the day. The white shirt he wore underneath was also as crisp, his black tie precisely in place.
Sivya looked down at the flour-dusted and chocolate drizzled shirt sleeves she’d pushed back to her elbows, thought of the fact her pale blonde hair was falling out of the haphazard bun into which she’d knotted it, and flushed.
Then she remembered how a junior member of her staff had accidentally sprayed cocoa powder across most of the room. They’d all laughed and the sheepish young vampire had cleaned up the mess but for the cocoa dust that had gotten on the light, light gold of Sivya’s wings—she’d intended to wipe it off after she finished with the éclairs, now realized she must look like a child who’d been rolling around in the dirt.
Her blush intensified, wings rustling as she tightened them.
Dark eyes lingered on her face, Montgomery no doubt wondering why she was turning red though she was far from the oven. “You made extra of the sweets.”
“Oh, it’s just as easy to make a big batch as a small one,” she said, looking down at the chocolate glazed tops of the éclairs because it was difficult to hold his gaze when she couldn’t know what hers might reveal. “And they’ll go in a heartbeat once I fly them over to the Tower.” There were a number of young angels stationed there and they not only had stomachs that didn’t end, they were far from home and could do with a little spoiling now and then.
A certain more senior angel also had a weakness for her éclairs. She always boxed up three or four for Aodhan, made sure they got to his quarters.
“You’re planning to fly to the Tower?” Montgomery asked in that English-accented voice that always made her breath catch.
“Yes, now that these are done.” Glad that he didn’t seem to have noticed anything odd in her behavior, she added the final drop of cream, then began to wash out her tools. She wasn’t one of those chefs who was pedantic about making sure everything was put away as soon as it was used, but she liked to straighten up after finishing a task. “It won’t take me long, and most of the dinner preparation is done.” The sire and his hunter mate were never difficult to please.
When Raphael had first taken a mate, Sivya had worried that the new mistress of the house would want to make changes in the staff, but the Guild Hunter was a warrior akin to her archangel. She appreciated the experience and skill of the men and women who worked in this home, and left them to see to their duties without interference—though she never forgot to thank them. And as the Guild Hunter was honest to the core, her compliments meant a great deal to the staff.
“Perhaps Mayim can fly them across after she returns from her break.”
Surprised at the suggestion that her assistant take the éclairs to Manhattan—Montgomery knew she enjoyed stretching her wings with such small tasks—Sivya glanced up. And found herself looking directly into the rich brown of Montgomery’s eyes. “W-was…” She cleared her throat. “Was there something else you needed me to do?”
His expression didn’t change as he said, “I would ask for your company for a walk in the evening air.”
Sivya’s brain stopped functioning for a minute. Lifting a hand to her unraveling hair, she went to say something about freshening up when Montgomery took a single step forward. “You look lovely.”
Flustered into a smile at the unhidden admiration in his tone, she reached back to undo her apron, then pulled it off. Her hands shook as she placed it on the counter. “I’m sure Mayim won’t mind delivering these.” Covering the éclairs with a fine mesh cloth, she faced the vampire who made her feel as much a hopeful fledgling as the young angels at the Tower.
He held out an arm bent at the elbow.
Heart thundering, she slipped her arm through his, conscious of the muscled strength beneath the fabric of his suit. Montgomery might choose to serve his liege as a butler, but she knew full well he was more than capable with a blade; she’d seen him practicing many times in the quiet hour before true dawn.
And yes, she always watched for far longer than she should.
Blood rushing through her ears, she walked with him through the folding glass doors she kept open when she was in the kitchen. Her wings brushed his back since they were walking so closely together. “Oh, I’m so sorry. The cocoa dust will get over your suit.”
“It will brush off.” He placed his free hand over hers to keep her close when she would’ve put distance between them, the warmth of his skin surging into her.
She flushed again, but at least they were outside now, the soft night darkness a forgiving cloak. “I’ve been thinking of a new menu for the next time the Guild Hunter invites the Seven for dinner, or at least those of the Seven within reach at present.” Food was the one thing she knew and the one thing about which she could always talk—even when her nerves were twisted into a hundred small knots.
“What have you decided?” Montgomery’s voice was deep and resonant, a calm confidence to him that was innate.
Sivya told him, knew she was talking too much. She couldn’t stop. Montgomery was younger than her but he was the most centered and together person she knew. Nothing shook him. Even when the sire’s mother had flown unexpectedly into the city, he’d kept his head, ensured Lady Caliane was treated with all the courtesy due to her as an Ancient and as Raphael’s mother.
He was the reason the sire’s home ran like clockwork.
Sivya knew her value, knew her skill as a chef was of the highest caliber. She also knew she ran an efficient and joyous kitchen. But she couldn’t do what he did, which was to make certain all the pieces of the household ran together to create a seamless unit. Sometimes, as she watched him take care of multiple urgent issues without once losing his cool, she wondered if he’d been born with that calm, steadying center on which the entire staff relied.
“It’s a wonderful menu,” he said when she finally stopped for breath.
Sivya bit down on her lower lip to still another deluge of words as they turned to face the glittering lights of Manhattan in the distance, the Hudson River a rippling dark mirror in between.
She had been with Raphael since the day he set up his first true home here and the energy and beauty of his city still sometimes caught her by surprise. Montgomery had joined the household later, ten years after he became a vampire.
At the time, he’d technically been working off the century of service required of all mortals who became vampires. However, from the first, the sire had given him the respect due a man of his skill, and in return, Montgomery had given Raphael his absolute loyalty.
Sivya was deeply happy he’d chosen to remain in Raphael’s employ even after his mandated term of service was over. She had always enjoyed working with him but over the past year…well, she’d begun to realize that Montgomery wasn’t only a distinguished butler, but a handsome man who made her feel things she'd never before felt.
“You’re quiet,” he said, his thumb stroking gently over the back of her hand. “Is something the matter?”
Tiny prickles of sensation spread from his touch, across her skin, through her nerves, into her veins. “I don’t want to talk your ear off.” Montgomery never said anything that didn’t need to be said. Not like Sivya. She could chatter all day long about a hundred small things.
“It gives me great pleasure to hear the things you say. You’re filled with so much joy it spills over to everyone in your vicinity.”
Her thundering heart, it just melted at the sincerity of his response. Daring to turn, she looked at the clean line of his profile. She lived in the home of an archangel but it was Montgomery who drew her eye and tonight, she could look at him without fear that he’d catch her staring.
Then he turned to her and her breath, it froze in her chest all over again.
Holding her gaze, he moved his arm so that her hand slipped out. He caught it as it fell, lifted it to his mouth and pressed his lips to the back of it, his eyes never breaking contact with her own. The caress made her shiver. “Will you walk with me tomorrow, too, Sivya?”
Chest rising and falling in a jagged rhythm, she nodded. “Yes,” she whispered aloud, to make certa
in there would be no misunderstanding. “Yes, Montgomery. I’ll walk with you again tomorrow.”
His lips tilted up, his eyes warming from within, and all at once, he was as young as she felt tonight.
Her own smile bursting out of her, she said, “Will you eat a bite of my éclairs?” Vampires couldn’t process much solid food, but a bite wasn’t out of the question.
“I always do,” he said to her surprise. “Why do you think your count is always off by one?”
Startled into laughter, she leaned into him as they walked back to the kitchen arm in arm.
Copyright © 2015 by Nalini Singh
An Unexpected Guest
Author’s note: If you haven't read the Guild Hunter series, this story is full of spoilers - but it does stand on its own, so if you don't mind spoilers, happy reading. For Guild Hunter series readers, this is an incident that was mentioned in Archangel’s Heart but never described.
An Unexpected Guest
By Nalini Singh
Elena ran her hand through Raphael’s hair, then across the muscled breadth of his shoulders. “Now, what did I tell you?”
Her consort did that thing he was starting to do—he smiled. Except this smile was more than a little wicked. “Do not be scary,” he said, managing to mimic the stern tone in which she’d given the order.
Scowling at the violently powerful archangel who was her eternity, Elena pointed a finger at his magnificent chest. “No joking. You will do your best to be non-scary.” As far as most mortals were concerned, he couldn’t ever be totally non-scary.
He was an archangel, power fused into his very cells. He had the ability to topple skyscrapers, destroy entire cities, crumple empires. He would never be anything but Raphael, the Archangel of New York. But, extraordinary as it was, he was also Elena’s.