Eve fluttered her golden wings again, which had Asher’s lagoon-blue gaze zeroing in on them. Two girls, who were feathers away from completing their wings, gravitated closer to Eve. Out of the Fletchings with wing bones, only five could tenuously qualify to become Asher’s wife, lacking thirty feathers or less. They would still have to hurry, but scaling the fabric between the realms was an achievable prospect.
Asher turned slowly to behold the others—those who had no chance of ascending, those with whom I should’ve been standing.
“When I was a Fletching, I longed for my voice to be heard in Elysium but found no one to listen. Thus, after being sworn in by the Seraphim Council, I stated that my intention was to become your voice, the link between this realm and ours.”
I tipped my head to the side. Could a man be attractive, powerful, and compassionate? I’d never met one who ticked all the boxes, yet Asher seemed to tick all three, which not only surprised but also intrigued me.
“All of this to say that you will be seeing a lot of me.” He tossed another beautiful smile our way. “You must all be tired of hearing me speak”—I doubted anyone could tire of listening to such a beguiling voice—“and desperate to dig into the marvelous offerings the Ophanim have provided for my visit, but I will add one last thing. One criteria that is dear to me. This is for my prospective consorts.” He looked in Eve’s direction again, since all the eligible Fletchings had crowded around her. “I want my partner to travel with me. To accompany me. To work alongside me. To join her voice to mine”—his gaze surfed over the assembly again—“and to all of yours.”
I suddenly wished my wings were fuller or that Asher’s nuptials were a year out instead of a month.
“Are you saying you’ll cancel the century-long ban to travel back to Earth?” Celeste’s voice rose over the silence.
Asher searched the crowd for my friend. And so did I. She was still standing at the back of the Atrium, leaning against the wall, one raised black boot stamping the honeysuckle.
“I meant after the customary century,” Asher amended.
The courtyard filled with hushed whispers.
“Is he for real?” I heard Megan—one of the eligible angels—ask Eve. She’d clapped her hand over her heart, her skin as bright as a firefly’s.
The three others had their wings displayed for all to see, although I suspected it was mostly to garner Asher’s attention.
Asher who was still concentrated on little Celeste.
“I need to find my next sinner,” Eve announced. “Want to help me pick who to save, Leigh?”
I turned to her. “I thought you didn’t want to come back to Earth?”
Eve lifted her long black hair, tucked her wings in, then let go of the silky rope, which settled like ink over her gilt-tipped feathers. “I want to become an archangel’s wife. If I need to go to Earth, then so be it.”
An arm threaded through Eve’s. “I’ll go to the Ranking Room with you,” Megan offered.
Eve turned so that Megan’s arm fell away from hers. “No offense, Megan, but our interests are no longer aligned. Or rather, they’re too much so. Same goes for the three of you.” Her gaze narrowed on Phoebe. “I mean, the two of you since Phoebe can’t compete.”
Even though Phoebe’s long blond bangs obscured half her face, I noticed her eyes growing larger. “Why can’t I compete? I’m only missing twenty-one feathers.”
“Honey, you’re a hybrid,” Eve said matter-of-factly. “The Seraphim Council don’t accept hybrids. Neither as archangels nor as consorts.”
Phoebe’s orange feathers bristled. “Surely, Asher’s more modern.”
“Seraph Asher.” Eve snapped her fingers under Phoebe’s chin. “Show him some respect.”
A blush mottled Phoebe’s cheeks.
“Seraph Asher?” Eve’s voice resounded over the hubbub of conversations filling the star-flecked courtyard. “Is the position open to hybrids?”
Asher’s brow furrowed. “The position?”
“Of consort,” Eve added with the aplomb of someone meant for the highest tier of power.
“Unfortunately, only Verities are eligible.”
Phoebe’s smile wilted from her lips as well as my own. Why must our world be so strict?
Maybe, Celeste was right . . . maybe, I should attempt to qualify. Our eyes met and held over Eve’s golden wingtips. I knew hybrids often incurred disdain and denigrations from Verities. I’d lost count of the times I’d told someone off for disparaging a hybrid’s lackluster plumage or inferior calling.
“Leigh?” Eve’s voice carried my attention away from Celeste. “Are you coming?”
I nodded.
Not only was I coming, but I was going to pick out my next sinner, because hybrids deserved the same respect and chances granted to Verities, and perhaps, my voice could obtain this for them.
Chapter 4
The holographic image of a pigtailed teen sucking on a lollipop illuminated Eve’s profile. “She’s perfect, isn’t she?”
I stopped flicking through prospective sinners to read the description below the moving picture of the high schooler whose skirt was so short I was surprised it wasn’t a sin unto itself.
PENELOPE MOREL (11 days)
Prone to bullying.
2
Eve’s gold dress glimmered as she spun on her stool. “Right up my alley.”
Footsteps echoed on the pale stone floor, and then the curved glass doors of the Ranking Room slid open. Megan and Lana settled opposite us at the quartz bar that ran the length of the circular room, then pressed their palms into the panels of glass embedded in the stone to switch on their holo-rankers.
As rays of light burst from the square panes, Eve squashed her palm against her own. Penelope’s shifting image stilled, and a hum whirred from the desk as Eve’s hand was scanned. A second later, a beep dinged, and the words ASSIGNED TO EVE FROM GUILD 24 materialized over the three-dimensional picture like a stamp.
Her breathing seemed to ease after that. She leaned toward me to look at the holographic profile I’d brought up. “Eww. Thanks, but no thanks.”
“What?” I glanced back at the shifting picture of a muscled, tattooed convict who’d earned a score of eighty-six for having assaulted four women.
“Never.” She shuddered. “I’m leaving this type of sinner to the boys. They’re better equipped than us to deal with them.”
“I wasn’t—he wasn’t . . .” For her.
“Try to find me sinners who don’t look like walking nightmares, okay?” Eve said.
It was silly—I was missing so many feathers still—but the desperation that had tinged Celeste’s gaze had fanned my desire to compete.
“He wasn’t for you,” I admitted.
Truth was, he wasn’t even for me. However frantic I was to complete my wings, I didn’t have the backbone to help a human like the one before me lower his sinner score. Besides, deep down, I believed the truly terrible sinners merited Abaddon and the years of torture their heinous crimes netted them.
The system displayed his name, current address, and the length of time he’d been in the Ranking System: 124 months. It also displayed how many points he’d earned back in that time—1—and how many Fletchings had signed up to help him—3. What it didn’t display were the names of those Fletchings. Since the man’s sinner score had gone down by a point, I imagined one of my peers had been successful.
I felt Eve’s gaze swing to my face. “You wanted to take him on?”
I palmed my knees through my silky dress. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
She shifted on the pebbled leather stool. “I thought you wanted to be a Malakim, Leigh.”
Although I was still holding out hope to become a soul messenger, my ambition was selfish. If I could help Celeste and other hybrids earn the same rights as Verities, then—
A beep resounded against the curved walls and domed glass ceiling. One of the girls had picked a sinner. I didn’t look over my shoulder to see w
ho’d found their next mission. I just kept staring into my friend’s unblinking eyes.
Eve leaned forward. “Well, then, let me help you find someone who’s not going to endanger your virginity.”
My heart stilled.
She rested her hand on mine and squeezed my fingers. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
Relief curled through me. Relief that Celeste had been wrong about Eve. That my friend truly cared about me.
She began to scroll through the feed but then sucked in a breath and sketched a name with her fingertip across my glass panel. “I have the perfect sinner for you!”
My holographic feed flickered, and the face of a man with a bladed jaw, unruly dark hair, and eyes so black they seemed made of sin and starlight appeared before me.
My stomach dipped and lifted, tightening at the sight of such a beautiful, dangerous face. I slashed my finger across the glass panel to scroll down to his description.
JAROD ADLER (201 months)
Leader of La Cour des Démons.
Two-hundred and one months? He’d been in the system seventeen years? How could that be when he didn’t look much older than I was? I flicked my finger across the image to bring up his score.
100
My stomach paused its strange contortions. “He’s a Triple?”
Eve’s arched eyebrows slanted as she also studied him. Since she’d brought up his profile, I imagined it wasn’t her first glimpse of the sinner.
“What is La Cour des Démons?”
“The Court of Demons,” she translated.
“I understand French, Eve.” Understanding every tongue was an angelic prowess. “What I meant was, what does this demonic court do? Terrorism? Mass murders?”
As she studied the Triple’s hooded eyes, she said, “It’s just a prettier word for the Parisian Mafia.”
My lips pulled apart. “He runs the mob? How is he safer than a rapist?”
“Because that’s the one thing he’s not.”
“He’s surely murdered people, Eve! Or ordered their deaths.”
Gazes prickled the back of my neck.
Eve flashed a hard stare at the two Verities behind me. “Not innocents.”
Forcing myself to calm down, I murmured, “How do you know so much about this guy anyway?”
“Because I met someone during one of my missions who took him on. So, I looked him up. He’s a Triple because he runs the Court of Demons. All you have to do is get him to cancel one operation—like make him reconsider extorting some high-rolling businessman or get him to help one person—and you get a hundred feathers. How hard can that be?”
“All I have to do?” A snort scraped down my nostrils and made them flare. “Eve, he’s been in the system seventeen years.” I flung my hand toward the number of Fletchings below Jarod’s sinner score, my fingers cutting through the three-dimensional projection. “One hundred and thirty-one people have tried to reform him. One hundred and thirty-one, Eve. And his score hasn’t wavered once, which means that none of them succeeded. I’ve never seen a profile like this. There’s obviously something very wrong with this man.”
Unruffled by my outburst, Eve said, “If anyone can do it, it’s you, Leigh. The Fletching who never fails.”
I had never failed a sinner, but I’d also never taken on a Triple one-hundred-and-thirty-one others had been incapable of reforming.
I stared at the holographic portrait of Jarod Adler again, the dark eyes framed by lashes so thick and curled they seemed pasted on. Could I truly alter this man?
Eve’s soft hand wrapped around mine again. “At least, try. If I have to lose Asher to anyone, I’d rather it be you”—she tipped her pointy chin toward the back of the room—“than any of them.”
I pulled my lip into my mouth and slid it between my teeth.
“Besides, what do you have to lose, Leigh? If you can’t reform him, just come back here and pick someone else. No harm done.”
No harm done, but time wasted. Plus, he was in France. I’d need to move to the Parisian guild for the duration of my mission.
“If my dad did it, you can too,” Eve said.
I side-eyed her.
“And France has the best food.”
“I’d be going there to work, not to sample French cuisine.”
“You’ll need food to keep your energy up during your mission. Plus, have you ever been to Paris? It’s gorgeous in the spring.”
I frowned. “When did you go?”
Her gaze returned to Jarod’s. “Two years ago. Around the time you were helping that crack addict get clean.”
“That crack addict has a name: Abigail.” She was a mother of two who sank so deep she lost her kids, her apartment, and her job. She was barely conscious the night I’d found her curled up on a sidewalk in Alphabet City.
It took months to get her clean, but she’d succeeded, and even though she hadn’t gotten her children back, she’d found stable work that put a roof over her head.
Eve flicked her hand. “They all do.”
Did she remember any of the names of the people she’d helped?
“If you don’t want this guy, then let’s scroll through other profiles.”
Before common sense could slap me upside the head, I yanked my hand out of hers and flattened my palm against the panel. I’d give Jarod three days, and if I got nowhere with him, I’d abandon my mission and incur the forfeiting cost of two feathers.
The machine whirred to life, scanning my handprint before emitting a shrill beep and inscribing my name over Jarod’s, cementing my fate with his.
The realization that I was taking on a Triple hit me like pounding rain, soaking into my marrow, making me shiver fiercely.
Eve hopped off the stool. “This calls for some Angel Bubbles.”
Which was just a fancy term for sparkling orange-blossom water. Alcohol was forbidden on the premises and outside guilds as well. Consumption of substances that altered the brain or body’s performance was majorly frowned upon and cost feathers.
I turned off my holo-ranker, then slid off my stool on legs that felt devoid of blood and bones. I stumbled, catching myself on the seat Eve had just vacated. Before I could remove my hand, the Ranking Room vanished, and I found myself standing in front of a little girl with tears streaming down her face.
I’ll g-g-give it b-b-back, she stuttered.
You already took the slime kit out of its packaging, Amy. You can’t give it back. I heard Eve’s voice, which sounded different, younger, a bit nasal.
I was reliving one of her missions . . .
B-b-but she had sooo many p-presents.
Which were all hers. Not yours. Now, write that letter, and we’ll go give it to her together.
She’ll tell everyone in sc-school.
Should’ve thought of that sooner. As the little girl rubbed her streaming eyes, Eve let out an annoyed grunt. Come on. I don’t have all day.
The image faded into another, this time a bustling primary school hallway. I watched Amy carry the letter to another girl her age, the sheet crinkling in her hands. After handing it over, Amy curled her fingers into fists and dashed away. I dashed after her. Or rather, Eve did. We found her locked in a bathroom stall.
No more stealing, okay? Or I’ll have to come back. You don’t want me to come back, now do you?
N-no. I’ll never steal again.
Good girl.
The gray peeling paint on the bathroom wall crumbled away.
“Eve!” I gasped as I raised my hand off her disintegrating feather.
“What?”
I tipped my head to the sparkling dust. “You lost a feather.”
She stared at the levitating dust until it spangled out of existence. “So I did.”
“How? Why?”
She lifted her gaze to mine. “It’s the first time I want something that might not become mine.”
Guilt crimped my heart. I didn’t want to lose my friend over a man, Seraphim or not. “I didn’t rea
lize jealousy was a sin,” I found myself saying.
“That’s because you’ve never truly been jealous.”
I’d always disliked the orangey shade of my hair and envied Eve’s elegant figure. Weren’t longing and envy the same as jealousy?
Chapter 5
After leaving the Ranking Room, I didn’t return to the festivities for Angel Bubbles. I didn’t feel in the mood to celebrate. If anything, my upcoming mission had my stomach so knotted I felt sick. Sensing my unrest, Eve walked me back to our bedroom and helped me fold three days’ worth of clothing inside a roomy handbag.
“What’s the name of the person who told you about him?”
The leather belt Eve was rolling unspooled. “Why?”
“I was hoping I could ask them why they didn’t succeed.”
She wound it back up, then slotted it inside my bag. “They said Jarod Adler was rude and unreceptive.”
I frowned. “Most are at first. Can I still get the person’s name?”
She shook her head. “Sorry, but it would be a breach of confidence. No one wants to parade around their failures.”
I sank down on my bed next to my overflowing bag. “Am I crazy? I feel crazy.”
Eve sat next to me and draped her arm around my shoulders. “You’re ambitious, not crazy.”
I rested my cheek against her shoulder. “Don’t ascend before I get back, all right?”
“I’m missing thirteen—fourteen—feathers,” she said. “I’ll still be around a while.”
“You’re so good at this you’ll get them before the week’s even over.”
“Unlikely.” For a minute, neither of us spoke, then she said, “But if I do complete my wings before you get back, I promise to stop by the City of Lights before ascending.”
“Or you could take on a French sinner next?”
“Or I could do that.”
I filled myself with the scent of neroli that had fragranced her skin since she’d discovered the perfume her first year out into the human world. “A Triple . . .” I whispered, because it still didn’t feel real.
After a quiet moment, she said, “Whatever happens, remember that I love you, okay?”
Feather (Angels of Elysium Book 1) Page 3