My smile was ear to ear as I brushed the back of my hand across his cheek and he leaned into it, closing his eyes again. “Hi,” I whispered.
He lifted his hand to mine and gazed back up at me. “Dreaming…again….”
I squeezed his hand tight. “You’re not dreaming anymore.”
His smile was weak, but the sweetest thing I’d ever seen. “Miss…you…Ell….”
“How do you feel?” I asked. I put a palm to his forehead and then tested his pulse on his wrist. His fever had gone down and his heart rate seemed to have returned to normal.
“Came…back…to me….”
I shushed him and kissed him again. “Of course I came back to you. I promised you I would. Do you remember? Do you remember the horses?”
“You…,” he whispered, taking a deep breath between pauses, “found me…in the dark….”
“I did,” I replied. “Don’t try to speak, okay? Just rest.”
He closed his eyes and his brow creased. “No more…rest….”
“Just lie here with me,” I told him. “You’ll feel better soon.”
I worried that the lamp on the nightstand shone a little too brightly, so I switched it off. When I looked up, I saw Ava and Sabina standing in the doorway, watching Will and me, and I wiped at a tear that fell down my cheek. They began to retreat into the darkness of the hallway and I gazed back down at Will as he breathed gently, holding on to me, and I curled myself up tighter against him.
8
I SPENT THE ENTIRE NIGHT SITTING NEXT TO WILL on his bed. He never went back to sleep, but occasionally I did, and I would wake curled in his arms, and for the first few seconds of wakefulness I feared that I still dreamed. But it was real and he was alive and awake and recovering.
“Do you remember the dreams?” I asked him once, my voice slipping through the dark.
His fingers touched my face, tracing the curve of my cheek down to the corner of my lips. “I do. I remember you came, that my mind hadn’t just created you. You weren’t a part of my dreams like everything else was.”
“Somehow I entered your dreams,” I explained. “I think it had something to do with the bond, the magic in your tattoos, or that I’m tapping into more of my archangel abilities. I just don’t know.”
“It’s better to see you now,” he said gently, “with my true eyes.”
I smiled against his fingers. “I didn’t think I’d ever see them again.”
He was quiet for a few moments. “How did you do it? What happened?”
“Rikken’s bite was venomous,” I told him. “We didn’t know how to heal you, but I knew where to start looking. We didn’t have any of the texts about angelic medicine, so I went to the source.”
“Source?” he asked, unsure. Then his eyes went wide. “No. Tell me you didn’t…”
“I found Antares,” I confessed. “In exchange for releasing her from the Earth, she gave me a root from the tree she was bound to and it healed your wound.”
“You went to the Lord of the West?” he asked in that disapproving-Will way of his. “Ellie…”
“Do you love me?” I stared him straight in the face.
“Yes.”
“Then trust me.”
“That was so dangerous….”
“Oh, shut up,” I grumbled and slapped his shoulder gently. “I did what I had to do to save you and I’m not hearing any of your crap about it. Now I’m going to try to sleep a little. I’m in the middle of studying for final exams. You picked a very bad time to almost die.”
He gave me a silly, lopsided smile. “Sorry. We’ll talk about Antares tomorrow.”
“Any chance you’ll forget to scold me about it again?” I asked with a hopeful lilt to my voice.
He kissed the top of my head. “Nope.”
I held on to him tighter. “I’ll remember to bring my armor then. And the swords.”
“I love you,” he said against my hair.
I closed my eyes, my cheek against his chest, rising and falling with his breaths. “I love you too.”
I woke alone in the bed and on the verge of panicking, because I didn’t know where Will was. The house was quiet, so I went through the kitchen and out onto the back porch. Will and Marcus were hanging out down by the lake, the afternoon sunshine gleaming off their hair and skin and the calm water’s surface. I bounded off the porch and down the lawn toward them. They turned to look my way and I let out a squeal of happiness as I leaped into Will’s arms. He caught me around my legs with a laugh and I threw my arms around the back of his neck and kissed him. It was wonderful to feel him again, to feel him hold me tight, to feel his lips against mine. He was warm from the sunlight, and he smelled like Will and felt like Will and he was back to his old self again. My Guardian, my Will.
“I’m still here, you guys,” Marcus grumbled. “Really. I’m going to gouge my eyes and ears out.”
Will set me down and I still clung to him, wringing my fingers around the bottom of his shirt. “How are you feeling?” I asked him.
“Great,” he said, and lifted his injured arm. “Like I’m back to normal.” The bandages were gone and the wound had just about disappeared. There would be no scar, as if nothing had ever happened.
“That’s wonderful! We should take it easy one more night before we get back to work. We shouldn’t take any risks right away.”
He raised an eyebrow at me, flashing a smile between Marcus and me. “How long was I out, again? I like this new you.”
“Let’s just say this new me is a lot more like the old me,” I corrected him.
“In a strange way that sort of makes sense,” he said. Now his smile was all for me.
Later that evening, Marcus left with Ava and Sabina to go patrolling while I stayed with Will. He was restless and itching to get back into the field, but Lauren had come over to help me convince him to relax. As we finished cleaning up dinner, Will stopped, frozen, mid-drying a dish.
I stared at him. “What’s wrong?”
And then I felt that soothingly familiar energy signature, but for Will, the energy was enraging.
I put my hand to his chest. “Will, relax. I can explain why Cadan is here. I’ll go talk to him and tell him that now isn’t a good time. He’s not here for a fight, trust me. He only wants to make sure everything is okay.”
I could hear his teeth grinding together and I got nervous.
“She’s right,” Lauren assured him. “Everything’s fine, Will.”
“I’ll be right back,” I said. “You have to trust me. Do you trust me?”
He nodded reluctantly. “Fine. You get him out of here.”
Relieved to know that no confrontation would occur, I left Will and Lauren in the house and found Cadan waiting on the porch. His expression was curious, but stone-hard, as he stared at the front door behind me. His light eyes and pale gold hair were bright in the moonlight.
“He’s awake?”
I should have known that Cadan would be able to sense us as we had sensed him. “Yeah. He’s good as new.”
“I’m glad for you.”
“Thank you,” I told him. I pulled him into a tight hug. His arms were warm around me. “Thank you so much for everything. I couldn’t have done this without you.”
We parted and he grinned down at me. “You would have eventually. I don’t doubt that. But I’m happy to have helped. I wanted to apologize also.”
“You don’t have to,” I promised. “Whatever happened, it’s in the past and I know you didn’t mean anything.”
“No,” he said sadly. “I’ll never be able to apologize enough for the way I behaved.”
“Well, I forgive you. And that’s all that matters.”
“Ell,” he sighed. “I tried to make you kiss me. You ought to hit me again—”
The front door blasted open and in the same instant, Cadan was sent tumbling down the porch steps to the ground. When I overcame my surprise I realized that Will had just coldcocked Cadan in the face.
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“My turn for that,” Will snarled as Cadan struggled to his feet, cupping his jaw.
“Will!” I cried in anger, turning on him hotly. “What the hell? If anyone’s going to hit either of you, it’ll be me!”
“I can explain,” Cadan said as he held up one hand defensively and spit a glob of blood onto the grass. When his eyes met Will’s, Will disappeared, moving like a flash in the darkness, and he reappeared on the ground in front of Cadan. He hit him again. Cadan’s head snapped around. More blood flecked his shirt.
“Stop it!” I shrieked. “Both of you!”
“What’s going on?” Lauren burst out the front door, shocked and afraid. She gasped when she saw Will and Cadan fighting.
Will’s fist slammed into Cadan’s face and he was thrown to the side. As soon as they parted, I jumped between them and grabbed Will’s shirt as he moved to strike Cadan again, and the demonic reaper whirled out of reach. His wings sprang free, their leathery hide slick and gleaming beneath the moonlight.
“Ellie, this is between him and me,” Will growled and yanked free.
“It sure as hell is not!” I snapped at him. “You have nothing to do with what happened between us. He got a little pushy, I slapped the crap out of him, and he apologized. It’s over, done, finito! It’s none of your business, you idiot!”
Cadan held out an arm and his thin, elegant, rapierlike sword appeared out of a flash of light. Will tilted his head with a derisive smirk.
“Is that all you got?” he asked darkly and held out his own hand. The archangel sword, six feet in length, shimmered into existence.
Cadan’s sneer matched Will’s maliciousness. “Some might say you’re compensating for something.”
Will huffed. “Believe me. I’m not.”
“This is shockingly mature, you morons!” I yelled at them, but they ignored me.
Lauren held my arm tightly with both her hands, clinging to me in fear. I knew what she was thinking. The last fight that happened in this house had killed the man she loved. I was determined to end this before someone really got hurt.
With a roar of rage, Will swung his sword as hard as he could and cut Cadan’s blade in half with a shriek of metal. The tip of Cadan’s sword helicoptered through the air and he took a single step back in shock. Will relinquished his blade and lunged for Cadan. Will grabbed two fistfuls of Cadan’s collar and picked him up off his feet before slamming his back into the ground with a thick thud. Will crouched over him and smashed his fist into Cadan’s face again and again as I screamed uselessly. Cadan wasn’t even fighting back. He was just letting Will beat the hell out of him. I threw myself on top of Will, pulling at his shirt. I grabbed his wrist and held his arm back, using every last ounce of my strength.
“Will, stop! You’re going to kill him!” I shrieked, and pulled him off of Cadan.
We were finally standing and I was still dragging him away as Cadan rolled on the ground, groaning. He spit up a thick gob of blood, his face torn and his eyes already swollen and purple. The bones in his cheeks were working themselves back into their rightful places beneath his skin, fractures mending and sewing themselves. Will yanked away from me but I darted around him, fitting my body against his, blocking him from getting at Cadan again.
“He’s your brother!” I screamed, and shoved his chest hard, knocking him back a step. I gasped for breath and he grew very still while I shook like an earthquake. “He’s your brother, Will. He’s Bastian’s son too, and he saved your life. You’d be dead if it weren’t for him!”
His mouth opened as he stared at me. His arms fell loosely. “What?” he asked in the smallest voice.
“He’s the one who took me to Antares. I couldn’t have saved you without him.”
Will shook his head so slightly the movement was almost invisible. “No. No way.”
“It’s true,” I said breathlessly. “You and I owe him a lot.”
“We don’t owe him shit!” Will cried, casting an angry finger at Cadan. “He is not my brother!”
Cadan struggled to stand, gasping from pain, and he wiped his sleeve across his face, smearing blood. “I wasn’t too keen on the news, either, Brother.”
When I looked back at Lauren, I saw her hands covering her mouth and all the blood had drained from her face. She fluttered back into the safety of the house and away from the angry reapers.
“Are you all right?” I asked Cadan.
He gave me a nod and a shrug. “I’ll live.”
When I turned back to Will, he was staring at me, his green eyes wide and hurt. “Why didn’t you tell me? How long have you known?”
“I’ve known since Bastian told you that you were his,” I confessed. “Cadan had already told me that Bastian was his father. I’m sorry.”
“Why him?” Will gasped. “Why did you go to him? Marcus could have helped you—Ava or Sabina….”
I stepped close to him and put my hands on his arms to try and comfort him, but he was frozen beneath my touch, unyielding. “Because there was no time and he was the only person I knew who had met a Grigori. Please don’t be angry with either of us. As much as you hate him, Cadan risked his life for you. Please forgive him for what happened between him and you.”
“He touched you,” Will said, the words just an exhale. For an instant, he trembled, and his face filled with pain and vulnerability before locking back up again. It was barely a crack in his composure before he sealed it up with concrete. “He tried to force himself on you. I can’t let that go.”
“He didn’t force himself on me,” I said firmly. “He was a little pushy, yeah, but only for a second. He was a jerk, and I handled it. There’s nothing you need to do now. Just chill out, okay?”
His jaw set tight and he glanced up at the sky before meeting my eyes again. “For centuries I’ve watched you with everyone but me,” he said. “Not him, Ellie. Not after what he did to me, to you. I could have protected you the night Ragnuk killed you, but Cadan and Ivar stopped me. Instead of killing me, they kept me alive so that I would see you dead. That kind of malice can’t be forgiven and every time I see his face, I see what was left of you when Ragnuk was finished.”
My eyes started to burn, but I was determined not to cry. “He’s trying to make up for the things he’s done wrong. I don’t expect you to forgive him right now, but please believe that you might be able to one day. You’d be in much less pain if you stopped trying to hate him so much. Be happy to know that you have family and he’s right here. He’s family, Will.”
Will looked over his shoulder at Cadan, who stood stooped over as his face put itself back together. He’d need to eat a lot very soon to make up for the energy he spent in order to heal. It was possible for him to exhaust himself and run out of energy before he was fully healed, and I wondered if Will was thinking the same. He had a pathetic look on his face, a strange mix of remorse and satisfaction, as he watched his broken older brother heal from the assault. He must have been waiting a long time to beat the hell out of Cadan, but now that he had done it, he seemed ashamed of himself—as he ought to be. He looked down at his hands. Cadan’s blood was splashed across his skin up to his elbows.
“If you trust him,” Will said in a low voice, “then I accept that. But it doesn’t mean that I have to trust him too.”
Will moved away from me and went back into the house without uttering another word. When he was gone, I turned to Cadan and winced at his appearance. He was mostly healed now, but blood still caked his face and his black eyes remained puffy. I watched his skin stitch together a gash in his lip and he wiped the blood away with the back of his hand.
“I’m so sorry,” I told him. “You look awful, like you got hit by a bus.”
He coughed up a hunk of red stuff. “I had it coming. He got it out of his system finally, so maybe now we can move past this and focus on what’s important, like stopping Sammael. It’ll be a while before Will is ready to accept me. We shouldn’t push him.”
I nodded, knowing
he was right. This situation only added more stress that none of us needed. “He sure likes to hold grudges, doesn’t he?”
The corner of Cadan’s lip pulled into a tiny smile. “Again, I deserved it. When you’re immortal, time is different. Things that happened years ago still sting like they happened yesterday. Grudges are hard to let go. I understand how he’s feeling and I think we both need to let him feel it. He’ll let go when he’s ready. If he doesn’t, then it’s not like I deserve any better.”
As I let his words sink in, I couldn’t help cringing at the mess Will had left him in. “I should get you a towel or something, help you clean yourself up.”
“Nah. I need to get going. I’m exhausted and just got my ass kicked inside out. And I need to eat like crazy.” His expression softened. “I’ll catch you later, okay? And next time I’ll give you a heads up if I need to drop by. In the meantime I’ll try to gain back my pride by beating up things for information.”
I put a hand on his shoulder. “Let me know if you hear anything interesting, okay? The next step is to find this hallowed glaive and the copy of Antares’s grimoire.”
He gave me a puzzled look. “Why do you still need it?”
“I need to summon Azrael and ask for his help in fighting Sammael,” I said. “If that doesn’t work, then I need to ascend, to become Gabriel again, if it’s possible.”
His eyes bugged. “Well, if you think it’ll give us an edge, then let’s do it.”
“Thanks,” I said. “If I can be at my full archangel power, then I have a chance to wipe out Sammael and Lilith.”
“I’ll find out what I can about any copies of the grimoire for you. Night, Ell.” He winced before spreading his wings and disappearing into the Grim.
Will had mangled him pretty bad and I felt partly responsible. I should have told Will everything, that Cadan was his older brother, that without Cadan’s help, I never could have found Antares in time. Will could have had time to digest the news before seeing Cadan’s face. Perhaps their altercation would’ve been less bloody and traumatic.
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