by Nalini Singh
The light painted the canvas of her skin but it didn’t stick, her hand unblemished when she drew it back. Sorry, I shouldn’t have done that but I felt so safe. A glance at the owls. I think they know this isn’t harmful.
Raphael sliced his wing through the light. There is energy here. A power. It resonated deep within him. But I sense no malevolence.
The sea aurora was moving steadily toward his city. Dmitri, do you have anything?
Jessamy just found a reference to a “dream of light and color over the ocean.” It’s in an ancient text that vaguely mentions Cassandra—Wait. Thirty seconds passed. Here’s the quote: “And in that dream of light and color over the ocean danced the seer’s wings. The two are ever entwined and never together. One of light and dreams, the other of blood and prophecies.” Make sense to you?
I’m afraid it might.
Elena, now close to him, said, “Why the look?”
He told her what Dmitri had just said and watched her work it through. A tiny frown dug its way between her brows. “One of light and dreams, the other . . .” A widening of her eyes. “Shit. Another waking Ancient?”
“That seems to be the unavoidable explanation.”
“Fuck.”
“Yes.” Aegaeon had stirred in Astaad’s territory, Cassandra was in a fitful Sleep at best, and now this. “For the time being, however, it doesn’t appear to be dangerous. I will allow our people to view it as long as they follow the squadron’s orders.”
Angelic silhouettes lifted up from roofs and balconies and streets all over the city as Elena and Raphael flew back. A number of seacraft began to chug their way toward the light.
Dmitri and Venom were waiting on the Tower roof and Raphael angled that way, Elena beside him. The snow on the roof softened the sound of their landing, and the light, when they turned to look back at it, remained as beautiful and as eerie.
Venom came to stand beside Elena, Dmitri beside Raphael.
“I took a call while Dmitri was talking with Jessamy.” Venom slipped his hands into the pants pockets of his deep gray suit. “It was from Charisemnon’s second.” His lip curled up at the mention of the archangel who’d caused the Falling, crashing angels to the ground all over New York. “Images of the light phenomenon have already spread around the world. He called to ask if we believed an archangel was waking.”
Raphael spread his wings, closed them with slow deliberation. “That’s a highly specific question.”
“I pointed that out. Response was that a remote lake in their region has just frozen over—within it are millions of translucent bubbles, the colors intimately similar to our aurora over the sea.” He passed across his phone. “Pure luck anyone found it—a senior angel decided to take the long way home.”
“Wow again,” Elena said.
“Indeed.” The water was a glossy sheet, the bubbles below pristine and perfectly formed. Air caught in ice. “Do they know if this occurred at the same time as the sea aurora?”
A shake of Venom’s head. “I got the impression they discovered it a couple of days ago, but kept it quiet.” No surprise in his tone at such behavior from Charisemnon’s court.
“I can see why they think the two incidents are connected.” Elena handed back Venom’s phone. “Those are distinctive colors in the bubbles and in the light.”
“How many Ancients can the world sustain?” Dmitri folded his arms across his chest. His black shirt rippled in the cool wind coming off the water in the distance.
“We are currently nine. The tenth should be an archangel not an Ancient, but the world will not break if we are three Ancients.” He seemed to recall a long-ago history lesson in Jessamy’s classroom that mentioned a Cadre with three Ancients.
“After that, Ancients who awaken will cause major disruption and chaos unless we lose several current members of the Cadre.” Their powers would be too close together, the energies too violent—and the old tended to be set in their ways, not ready for this new world. “It’ll make the Cascade look like a training run.”
Elena sucked in a breath. “That bad?”
“We survived with eleven before because Mother did not want territory and China is so huge that Favashi was far distant from her. We can rely neither on a lack of territorial desire nor geography with any new archangels or Ancients.” His mother was a unique case in not wishing to rule a vast area.
“You’ve seen how much violence two archangels can do in battle.” Raphael and Uram had nearly destroyed New York. “Now imagine that happening between more than two archangels, the battles taking place in multiple locations around the world at the same time.”
Elena’s gaze returned to the sea aurora. “You can be an Ancient and not be an archangel, right?”
“Yes. But any Ancient who awakens with natural phenomena such as this is an archangel.” The light continued to hang over the sea, seeming to ripple in the wind, a gentle music.
Dmitri’s phone rang. He glanced at it. “It’s Rhys.”
A senior general in Neha’s territory.
He stepped away to take the call, returned to say, “Delhi is glowing. Some kind of bioluminescence. Rhys is sending me images.”
“If this is all the same Ancient,” Elena said, “then I kinda like them already. I mean, pretty lights, cool bubbles in a lake, glowing cities, seems pretty mellow to me.”
Raphael stared out at the water, not certain it was all connected to one Ancient. “The bioluminescence strikes me as different from the two water-based phenomena.”
“Rhys has understatement down pat.” Dmitri flipped his phone in their direction.
“It looks like the aliens came and irradiated everything.” Elena whistled through her teeth.
When Dmitri’s phone rang just as he drew it back, Raphael said, “Which second is it now?”
“Not a second but might as well be—it’s that creep, Riker. I don’t know why Michaela keeps him around. He’s a vicious fucker.”
“He’s also viciously loyal to her,” Raphael said as Dmitri stepped away again.
His second just held out his phone when he returned: on it was the image of an old European city, possibly Prague, backed by a sky in which swirled a slow spiral of stars. A new galaxy being born.
It wasn’t the final portent.
By dawn, New York was in the grip of a huge storm that coated the city in ice, and the list had grown to include intricate crop circles in Titus’s land, a rainstorm in Japan that turned the country a bright magenta, large standing rocks erupting out of the earth in Alexander’s territory—some through the floors of buildings—and last but not least, an impossible blooming of wildflowers across frozen Siberia.
If each represented an Ancient—or even simply an archangel . . . Death. It was death.
38
The vortex of ice finally began to thaw seventy-two hours later, but Elena wasn’t breathing easy. Not only had the bitter cold caused a number of deaths, the volcano that shouldn’t fucking exist had blown with a vengeance. Andreas was in charge of disaster cleanup and his people were still counting the dead.
Raphael’s territory wasn’t the only casualty of the wave of catastrophic events.
Hundreds, maybe thousands, had been washed away in floods in India, while plagues of locusts had poisoned countless people in Titus’s and Charisemnon’s territories. A massive landslide in Alexander’s territory had buried a remote village, while a rampant fire had rioted through the ancient city of Xian, China.
Michaela’s territory was in the midst of a deadly heat wave in the depths of winter, while food crops designed to feed many of Elijah’s people through the winter months had begun to rot and degrade without reason.
With all that going on, Elena barely felt the chill of the drizzling rain as she paced along the cliff-edge of their Enclave land. “What did Astaad say?”
Raphael thrust hi
s hand through the damp strands of his hair. “He just lost two more of his islands under the turbulent water. Low casualties because he’d already given the evacuation order, but a large ship capsized at the same time deep in the ocean. Over forty mortal lives taken by the sea.”
Numb from the constant wave of disasters, Elena went to ask about Japan when her body swayed on a rolling wave. Across the ice-encrusted waters of the Hudson, the Tower moved. “Archangel, the Tower.”
“It is designed according to modern ways of building. It will flex not fall in a tremor.”
Elena jolted as another tremor hit, this one much harder. Lifting off was instinct. She and Raphael headed directly for Manhattan, hitting the edge of the city just as a skyscraper in the distance, its windows a reflective blue, began a stunning and deadly show. Sheets of windows dropped like water to shatter onto the sidewalk and street far below.
Raphael’s wings turned to white fire, Elena flying as fast as she could in his wake, but it was too late to save the pedestrians who’d been under the glass when it first fell. The world wasn’t shaking anymore by the time Elena landed, the entire sidewalk covered with unyielding snow created from shattered blue glass.
It was safety glass, but the amount and velocity of it had been catastrophic. Racing to where she could see an outflung hand with nails painted a soft pink, she began to clear away the glass. Raphael was already pulling another body out of the glass rubble behind the woman.
She barely noticed slicing her hand on a piece of metal wire hidden in the glass debris, the red smearing across the squares of blue. It wasn’t until later, after she’d delivered a small teenage girl to the hospital, that she wiped her palm on the side of her pants . . . and remembered that a cut that wouldn’t heal had been one of the first signs of her “devolution.”
Gut twisting, she lifted her hand to examine the cut.
Her palm was smooth, unmarked by anything except dried remnants of blood. Disbelieving, she pressed down on her flesh. No bruising, no indication she’d hurt herself at all. She was still staring at it when her phone rang. It was Vivek, directing her to another area where someone needed assistance.
New York was built strong, but it also had a bunch of old buildings.
Regardless, it was only two hours later that she and Raphael met in the sky above the city. “It’s not as bad as we thought at first.”
The vast majority of the city had come through with no ill effects. Yellow cabs zipped along the streets, exchanging insults with kamikaze bike messengers, while food carts that had closed up shop after the shake were all back to doing a brisk business.
“I’m more worried about other consequences.” Raphael stared out at the ocean. “Our sensors are reporting a deep-sea disturbance.”
As if on cue, the ocean began to boil . . . and the sky, it turned a violent bruise purple. As they watched, the water parted as if over a great beast from the deep. However, what emerged from that water wasn’t a mythological beast but a slender man dressed in a white tunic and black pants, his hair tumbled dark brown and his skin tawny.
His eyes were a dazzling gray, his bones perfect.
I am Antonicus! Who dares wake me?
Elena winced at the hugeness of that voice.
Showing no outward response, Raphael flew toward the other archangel. I am Raphael and you are in my territory. This land is not yours.
The Ancient stared at him, his gaze flat. You are a pup. He threw out a hand ringed with angelfire.
Easily dodging the bolt, Raphael returned the hit with a bolt of his own. Antonicus managed to evade it, but it singed the side of his tunic. Hissing, the other archangel stared unblinking as Raphael came to a stop across from him. “Why disturb my rest, pup?”
“I do not wish for you to be awake,” Raphael said bluntly, in no mood to go gentle. “A Cascade is in effect and it’s having an unpredictable impact on all the Cadre, even those who Sleep.”
The Ancient’s shoulders knotted, fury distorting his beauty. “I have lived through my Cascade. It is my time to rest.”
“I do not believe this particular Cascade will let you sleep until it reaches its crescendo.” At the same instant, he contacted Illium, asked the angel to join him and Antonicus.
“I am tired.” Antonicus looked around on that absolute statement. “What is this place of steel and glass and towers that touch the sky?”
“I will explain. For now, we have recently had an earth tremor and I must ensure my city is safe.” Raphael realized he’d gotten lucky—despite the initial exchange of angelfire, Antonicus seemed stable enough. “You are welcome in my Tower. We will speak again once I return.”
Antonicus didn’t budge, wings of charcoal gray spread in a hover. “You have eyes such as I have seen on only one other being in all my existence. But Caliane had no offspring when I went to Sleep. She did not even have a mate.”
“Caliane is my mother.” Raphael cut the Ancient off before he could speak further. “My squadron leader will show you to the Tower.” He nodded at Illium, who’d stopped at a respectful distance beyond them.
“Another pup.” The Ancient snorted. “What has the world come to if only the young are awake?” He was yet muttering as he flew off with Illium.
* * *
• • •
At the same instant that tremors hit New York, the sky turned a silver-dusted aquamarine in the depths of the night in the Pacific, as geysers of water shot up from one of Astaad’s newly submerged islands, and the heavens opened up.
It was pure luck he was nearby at the time.
According to Plato, the vampire his oldest philosopher, it was almost as if the bones of the world itself had shifted, putting things out of balance. Astaad enjoyed speaking with his historians, philosophers, and scientists, appreciated the gift of intellect, but he had no patience with such explanations in the midst of a Cascade. He needed hard facts to prepare himself and his people.
The enraged Ancient who erupted out of the submerged island on a roar of sound was Astaad’s exact opposite. Known for his temper and his infamous harem, Aegaeon had been born with a weapon of war in hand.
Astaad, too, kept a harem, but his was a family. His women saw one another as sisters. He rarely took mortals into that harem, but the infrequent times he did, he loved and cared for each to the end of her life—as did her sisters. His harem mourned when one of the family was lost.
Aegaeon’s harem by contrast, had been a place of lust and ambition. Even during his short waking in Astaad’s lifetime, many of his lovers had died at one another’s hands. Aegaeon had rewarded the most deadly members with his favors while discarding those he considered weak.
Sound boomed from the throat of the heavily muscled archangel with skin that held the sunshine, and hair of a shocking blue-green. His eyes were the same blue-green, his fists huge mallets and his bare chest marked with a silver swirl that echoed the pattern in the sky. In his hand was the scythe that had become his weapon of choice, the implement from which he so often released his power.
The wings that spread out behind him were a darker green with streaks of wild blue.
“I am Aegaeon!” he roared. “I am not to be disturbed!”
Astaad wished he weren’t drenched, his tunic filthy from the work he’d been doing to save as many of his people as he could, but that was how things had fallen and he was an archangel. “I am Astaad!” He made his own voice boom, for yes, he was capable of such—he just preferred to be more refined. “You encroach on my territory!”
The scythe caught the silver from the sky, its edge glowing. “Why do you wake me?” Aegaeon’s eyes gleamed hard as gemstones. “I am not ready to wake!”
“We are in the midst of a catastrophic Cascade.” Astaad had no more answers for him than this. “It is why your island is submerged.”
Aegaeon looked down, his hair falling around the squa
re lines of his jaw, seemed to notice the water for the first time. A curl of his lip. “Can you not clear such things?” A wave of the scythe and the water retreated.
“I prefer to save my energy for the lands that remain inhabited.” Astaad would not allow an interloper to make the rules in his lands; he would however, make use of Aegaeon’s penchant for flaunting his power. “My people are dying and islands are being submerged faster than we can evacuate them.”
“Show me!”
Every word out of the man’s mouth was headache-inducing. “Come.”
Aegaeon flew after him without argument, but Astaad knew the cooperation would soon devolve into aggression. Aegaeon was not an angel who would be satisfied with anything but a full territory.
* * *
• • •
Even as Astaad saw the first geyser of water on the island, a wave of sound hit Alexander’s territory while he stood ankle-deep in snow. The clear sky turned into a moonless night, ebony and without end.
“Zanaya is rising,” he said to his second.
Taking to the air, he soon spotted snow-covered sands in the distance from which emerged a mirage of light and darkness, a woman colored in starlight. Waist-length curls of silver washed with purple until it was a hue he’d seen on no other, skin of night, eyes huge dark orbs that he knew flickered with silvery light and lips so plush a man could look at them and think himself lost.
Until she cut out your heart and fried it to eat with her most prized wine.
Shorter than him by several inches, Zanaya wore her sword across her back because of course Zanaya would go into Sleep with a sword. It was her most beloved lover.
Her body was clad in a short wrap that hugged every curve and valley. A glittering starlight creation that covered her breasts and thighs and yet left her more alluring than if she’d been unclothed. Though, as Alexander was personally aware, Zanaya was beyond alluring when bare to the skin.