by Nalini Singh
He landed in front of her with a feeling of inevitability in his gut.
“Xander.” A purr of sound, the language one he hadn’t heard for millennia even before his Sleep. “We meet again.”
“That is my grandson’s name now.”
The sparks of moonlight in her pupils grew brighter. “You jest? You are a grandfather?” A slow seduction of a smile. “I have Slept long.”
“That is a matter of opinion,” he muttered under his breath.
Throwing back her head, she laughed and the sound wrapped around him as it always had, luscious and drugging and Zanaya. “Oh, Alexander, do not say you are not happy to see me. I am crushed.”
She stretched her arms to the sky, back arched and toes digging into the snow, and it was like watching a lioness wake to the sun that even now chased Zanaya’s sudden night from the sky. “It did not snow in this desert when I went to Sleep.” She crouched down, lifted a handful of glittering ice crystals. “Does my Nile yet flow, or is it ice?”
“It’s begun to ice over,” he told the deadly, lovely archangel who’d preferred to be called the Queen of the Nile over any other title. “We are in a Cascade. You are the only Ancient I know who has woken with such suddenness, but there are signs Aegaeon is also stirring. Caliane woke before I did.”
No smile as she rose, regal and so beautiful that he had never comprehended why the world considered Michaela the epitome of beauty. “I will Sleep,” she said, because infuriating and half insane she might be, but Zanaya was also an archangel who’d been beloved by her people—and once, by Alexander.
“I do not think the Cascade will let you Sleep.” He folded his arms with rigid tightness to stop himself from stroking his fingers over her shoulders, down her arms, as he’d done a thousand times in another age. “I will call a Cadre meeting about you, but first, I have to rescue a village buried under ice and snow.”
“Why so bad-tempered, lover?”
“I am an Ancient. Treat me as such or . . .”
“Or what?” A wink, long lashes coming down like a fan. “So, tell me what you’ve been doing since I decided I’d caused enough mayhem for ten immortal lifetimes.”
As if they had not been apart for a hundred thousand years. She had gone into Sleep ten years after their last fight, while he was still half furious and half in love with her. Not because of him. Zanaya had never been tied to the decisions of others and it was part of why she’d so bewitched him.
“I have work to do.” He rose into the air.
She followed with a laugh, her wings rippling black with flecks of silvery white.
That was when the world turned black in a way that was nothing akin to Zanaya’s luxuriant darkness. The silence that descended was oppressive . . . until it was broken by screams that drilled into the ears and shrieked.
“What is this cacophony!” Zanaya yelled. “No archangel I know wakes with such darkness!”
“You do not know her. Her name is Lijuan.”
39
Neha watched Lijuan’s return from a border fort in her own territory, Nivriti by her side. She and her twin had declared a strange, unsteady truce in the face of the chaos fostered by the Cascade and when Nivriti stood with her this way, the peacock hues of Nivriti’s wings nearly touching the white and indigo of hers, Neha remembered all that she’d lost and wondered if it was her time to Sleep.
Everything hurt. Her heart. Her soul.
She was so tired.
But none of them could Sleep now, with Lijuan rising once more. The screaming blackness that had announced her waking had finally withdrawn its suffocating presence from Neha’s lands, but it stayed solid over and around China. “Do you think the people within see any light?”
“I think that one likes to keep her people in the darkness.”
The wind brought scents across the border, all the way to the top of the fort. Tiny hairs rising on her nape, Neha sent out a mental order to her generals to mount a permanent guard across the entire border. She would not be taken by surprise, would not be a prize for Lijuan to claim.
Yet even as she thought that, she knew that Lijuan had come back different from the Cadre. The Archangel of China had already been able to go noncorporeal prior to her disappearance, and now she was back after no real Sleep at all—with the power to opaque her entire territory from the rest of the world.
The black fog hovered over China, only to curve down to meet the earth at the border. As Neha watched, a bird disoriented by the sudden changes in the sky flew into the wall of fog. Its small body tumbled to the earth a heartbeat later. Jumping off the roof of the fort, strands of hair that had escaped her braid sticking to the sides of her face, Neha flared out her wings so she could make a soft landing on the dirt below.
Nivriti was already down. She’d always done that. Tried to be faster, better, stronger. Not that it mattered any longer. Sliding her sword from the sheath at her hip, Neha nudged the bird’s small body out of the danger zone. “Do not touch it,” she said when Nivriti hunkered down, the emerald and cobalt and black of her wings spread out behind her.
“I am not a fool, sister.” Rote bitten-out words, Nivriti’s attention on the dead bird. “It is hard to say if the marks of violence on the body are as a result of the wall, or of the bird’s fall.”
Neha hunkered down beside her sister, their wings overlapping. “See those, Nivi.” She pointed to the wing area.
A hiss. “Cuts. Yet there are no stones on the ground that could’ve done such damage.”
“Lady!” One of Neha’s senior vampires ran toward her, was breathless by the time he arrived. “A dog ran into the dark fog and it fell where it stood. When we dragged it out by the visible hindquarters, it was cut all over and bleeding.”
“Dead?” She had to know if survival was possible.
“All but,” the vampire said. “We gave it mercy.”
“Mercy was the right choice.” She rose to her feet. “Spread the word that no one is to approach the border. I will warn Lady Caliane’s people. If anyone does fall in, haul them out as fast as possible.”
“Yes, my queen.”
Nivriti got to her feet as the vampire ran to action Neha’s orders. “No archangel in history has been able to so surround their territory.”
“Caliane can do it,” Neha murmured. “But Amanat is the size of a large village. To encompass China . . .”
She stared at the dark fog and told herself it was her imagination, that she couldn’t see the trapped and screaming faces of the lost villagers staring back at her.
All those souls imprisoned forever, their teeth and nails Lijuan’s weapons.
40
Talk about hell on earth.” Elena’s mutter had Antonicus shooting her another riveted look. She tried to ignore him. He’d been staring at her since she returned to the Tower.
He should’ve been staring at the screen in front of them—on it was a live broadcast from Neha’s territory, of the border with China. Neha’s second had sent it out to all of the Cadre before Raphael could initiate a meeting about Antonicus.
“Hell is a mortal concept. This is very much an immortal nightmare.”
Elena couldn’t disagree, but that wasn’t why the back of her neck was prickling. Why does Antonicus keep looking at me as if I’m an interesting new bug?
He has no idea what you are and that is a strange thing for an immortal. He ran his fingers through the stormfire of her wings.
Shivering inwardly, Elena said, Stop that. I have to look hard-ass so your new friend doesn’t try to chop me open and examine me.
He is not a friend. Raphael’s features gave nothing away as he turned to the Ancient, his presence remote in a way that reminded her of the archangel she’d first met. “You have been most patient. It is time, however, that we had a meeting of the Cadre.”
“It has been no trouble,” A
ntonicus replied in a language that Raphael could just understand. He knew the other archangel had chosen that language on purpose—because he must’ve already picked up modern English. That was a skill that seemed to sharpen with age and knowledge, as if once the brain had a hundred languages inside it, new ones were simply absorbed.
Antonicus’s eyes returned to Elena.
“Unless you wish to start a war,” Raphael said in the same ancient language, “you will treat my consort with respect. Or she will be forced to excise your eyes from your head.”
Clearly comprehending his tone if not his words, Elena began to play a sharp blade through her fingers.
Antonicus remembered his manners at last—he even had the grace to flush. Raphael knew the change was unlikely to last. Angels this old, archangel or not, had a tendency to believe age gave them the freedom to discard accepted rules of behavior.
“Consort.” The archangel spoke English with a liquid accent. “You are the most unique being I have seen in all my life.”
“Guess you don’t know Naasir,” was Elena’s cool riposte.
Antonicus’s wings opened in a wave of charcoal gray, snapped shut. “Who is this Naasir? Is he like you? An angel-Made?”
Elena’s smile was slow and as sly as Naasir’s. “You’ll have to ask Naasir what he is.”
Amusement slicing through the ice of his anger, Raphael touched her mind. Attempting to break Naasir’s secrets through others?
Never! I’m going to find those answers myself. I just want Antonicus to beat his head against that particular brick wall, too.
“Sire.” Dmitri stepped into the office. “Archangel Neha has convened a meeting of the Cadre.” Words of perfect politeness that gave away nothing of the reality of Raphael and Dmitri’s relationship. His second and friend had met enough Ancients to understand how to manipulate their perceptions where it mattered.
Antonicus paid no mind to Dmitri. The old were often foolish.
“Keep an eye on this feed.” Raphael indicated what was occurring on Neha’s border. “Interrupt us if there is a major change.” With that, he led Elena and Antonicus into the large room set up for these meetings and initiated the link.
Antonicus reared back when he saw Neha’s face appear on the central screen, Caliane’s on the screen next to hers. “What is this? You have trapped the Cadre within these black boxes?” His wings began to glow.
“Antonicus, I would know that voice anywhere.” Caliane, her white leathers dusty and her hair damp, shook her head. “Still acting before you think, I see.”
“We do not have time to explain the modern world to you,” Neha snapped at the much older archangel. “Suffice to say that these are communication devices.”
More faces appeared on the screens around them. Alexander also had an unknown archangel with him. Raphael’s gut tightened. Each waking should’ve sent a wave of color or light or sound across the world, alerting the entire Cadre as to what was occurring. In New York, aside from the disturbance caused by Antonicus’s waking, that had only happened with the death screams that announced Lijuan’s return.
Unless . . . was it possible the others had woken all at once?
He waited for Astaad, his spine rigid. The Archangel of the Pacific Isles was the final member of the Cadre to appear. With him was an archangel with massive shoulders and hair of blue-green. Elena, I need you to go to your Bluebell. I want you with him when I give him some news.
Elena slipped out of the room in silence and without questions, and he knew she’d felt the urgency pulsing through his veins.
He spoke next to Dmitri. Find someone we trust in the village by Lumia. No, someone the Hummingbird trusts. That individual’s task is to keep her away from any news feeds until given further orders. Illium’s mother was at least isolated enough that he could give her time to become used to this turn of events on her own terms before the world started coming at her.
Raphael forced himself to pay attention as Alexander introduced Zanaya, then did his own duty by presenting Antonicus. Astaad was commendably calm in his presentation of Aegaeon.
The Ancient scowled. “I did not intend to wake yet. I have barely Slept.”
A surge of violence inside Raphael that had his hand curling into a hard fist by his side. Better that this particular Ancient had Slept forever.
Raphael, I’m with Illium. He’s exhausted after the training maneuvers he’s been running all day.
Stay with him. No matter what. He couldn’t tell Elena why—this news must go first to Illium.
I won’t budge from his side.
Raphael touched Illium’s mind without effort—all his Seven were permanent imprints in his mind. Illium.
Sire. Do you need me? I’m with Ellie. I was on my way to bed but she lured me over with a full tray of Sivya’s delectable treats.
Raphael hoped Illium’s bond with Elena would help him weather this. I have bad news for you. He gave the younger angel the information with no attempt to soften the blow—there could be no softening it. Your father has awakened.
* * *
• • •
Elena knew the instant Raphael told Illium whatever it was that had put that deadly yet protective tone in his voice. Illium froze in the act of reaching for another tart, suddenly as motionless as a marble statue. Seated beside him, she slipped her hand over one of his brutally clenched ones. He didn’t react, his jaw rigid and his wings held precisely to his back.
Elena just held on.
It felt like forever before he said, “I have to go to Morocco.” Each word was harsh, full of grit.
Acting on instinct, Elena said, “You’re fast, but you’re tired. The jet’s ready.” It was always ready and waiting to go when Elena, Raphael, or any of the Seven were in New York. “It’ll have you at the private airstrip in Morocco in eleven hours.”
Illium’s nod was jagged, his expression dangerously flat.
Raphael, Illium’s heading to Morocco. I want to go with him. There was no way she was going to put Bluebell on that plane alone, not in his current condition. Will my being absent throw a spanner in the works?
That was a question she wouldn’t have asked after first falling for her archangel, but their relationship had grown and matured. It was no longer about her fighting for her freedom and Raphael wanting to wrap her up in cotton wool. She was his consort and not only did he need her by his side at certain times, their enemies wouldn’t hesitate to use her to make a point against him.
Go, he said. Protecting you will snap Illium out of his shock. Aodhan will fly from the Refuge to meet you in Morocco. The current situation with the excess number of archangels will keep the Cadre distracted in the interim.
Elena’s shoulders grew less tight. Aodhan and Illium currently had a rocky relationship, but their friendship was centuries old. It might be under strain, but it wasn’t going to fracture anytime soon. I’ll be back as soon as Illium’s doing okay.
The crashing and ice-kissed sea in her mind, her archangel’s embrace dangerously more powerful.
“I’m coming with you.”
Illium snapped up his head, the blue-tipped black of his hair shifting with the movement. “You need to be here, with the sire.”
“We’ve spoken—it’s fine. I’ll call the flight crew to let them know we’re on our way.”
“Ellie—” Eyes of beaten gold dark with torment and confusion.
“Decision’s made.” She rose. “Do you need to grab clothes from your suite?”
Making a frustrated sound, he said, “This isn’t over,” but left at a run.
She alerted their most senior pilot—the grumpy but brilliant Dougal—then ducked into her closet to grab a change of clothes for herself . . . and saw a brand-new canvas duffel bag sitting there, packed and ready. Her battered old bag that had survived many a hunter trip had been at the Enclav
e house when it went boom.
This one was an identical match, down to the padded shoulder straps.
“Montgomery, I love you more than is natural.” Grabbing the bag and pausing only long enough to throw in her laptop and some underwear, she was out in the corridor when a thought struck her. Raphael. She waited for an acknowledgment of the contact; she wasn’t about to distract him when he was in a discussion with ruthless immortals who’d take advantage of any sign of weakness.
You can speak, hbeebti. Right now, matters are civil and calm and icy. With Lijuan awake, there is no room for these newly awakened ones in our world. It is not their time.
Elena’s skin prickled, his words reminding her of Cassandra, who lived always out of time. The Hummingbird—
It is done, Raphael interrupted. Dmitri has asked one of our toughest warriors in the region to have an emotional crisis. The Hummingbird has a soft heart—she will stay with the seemingly heartbroken warrior for as long as it takes. He has promised to cry if she tries to stir.
We have good people. And the Hummingbird inspired devotion; Illium’s mother was so gentle, so kind, and so broken that Elena’d punch anyone who was mean to her in any way. Good luck with the meeting.
At the rate it’s going, I may be here when you return—Antonicus is orating as if in an amphitheater of disciples, while Aegaeon and Alexander gnash their teeth and Charisemnon snipes.
She blew him a kiss with her mind just as she caught silver blue in her peripheral vision. Illium was back, his bag held in one hand and his facial muscles taut. They didn’t speak as they strode to the nearest balcony to take off. The wind was a frigid slap, icicles still hanging from a multitude of buildings and the Hudson boasting the odd iceberg.
“You should go back!” Illium yelled across the space between them.
“I can’t hear you!” she yelled back in a singsong voice.