The Fallen Queen

  apologize.”

  I continued without slowing my pace. “Fine. You’ve apologized.”

  Vasily stopped me with a hand on my shoulder and turned me to

  face him. “He’s kind and gentle, though he thinks he’s hard. It’s easy to fall for him.”

  I pulled away from him. “I did not fall for him!”

  Vasily ignored my protest. “He makes you feel safe. He didn’t

  realize his kindness to you might be mistaken for something more.”

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  “Kindness!” I laughed, but my voice was tight with tears.

  “Through the harshest blow from his hand, I’ve felt his kindness.”

  When I drew in a breath of surprise, his unfocused gaze fixed on me.

  “Make no mistake. I don’t apologize for Bel and myself, for what we

  are. But what we did was thoughtless. It won’t happen again.” He held

  out his hand. “Friends?”

  “Aren’t you still abducting me? Am I not your meal ticket?”

  The demon leaned close. “Nenny, my little angel, you are the worst meal ticket a demon ever had the misfortune of laying eyes upon.”

  I laughed, and then covered my mouth in dismay at the double

  meaning.

  Vasily clasped my hand and gave it a firm shake. “Friends or not, I

  think from now on we can call it even.”

  §

  Belphagor hung back a respectful distance until we reached the

  hotel room, his demeanor indicating he was as embarrassed as I by the

  events of the previous evening.

  After closing the door, he stuffed his hands into his pockets. “So

  you’re all right? Nothing happened to you? Besides the branch, I

  mean?”

  I shook my head and worked at the scarf knotted beneath my

  chin. “I just… went for a walk.” I was not about to tell him I had

  stumbled upon a fairy mound and danced with the spirits of the trees.

  My garland was gone. Maybe it had all been nothing more than a blow

  to the head. “I suppose I must have gotten lost.”

  He fiddled with the pulls on the chest of drawers. “Listen, about

  what you saw—”

  Pulling off the scarf, I cut him off before this discussion could get

  worse. “It’s forgotten.”

  The tips of his ears turned pink. “Well, if there was anything you

  wanted to ask… ”

  For the love of Heaven, was he about to tell me about the birds

  and the bees? I burst out with the Russian invocation of the earthly

  god the demons loved to say with such irony. “Bozhe moi. No!” I did not need a demon explaining physical relations to me. What Maia and

  I hadn’t managed to pry out of Ola or glean from careless kitchen

  THE FALLEN QUEEN 105

  maids, I had supplemented with observations “in the wild”; it was

  impossible to avoid it if one spent any amount of time in Raqia.

  Behind him, Vasily was trying desperately not to laugh.

  Mercifully, Belphagor changed the subject and occupied himself

  with rummaging through the drawer he’d been fiddling with. “You

  should change out of those wet things.” He pulled out a pair of twill

  pants and a white button-down shirt he’d salvaged from the flat. When

  he held the garments out, a glinting object slipped from between them

  and clattered onto the floor.

  I gasped and snatched it up as he reached for it, and we stared

  at one another perched on our haunches like a pair of dogs before a

  bone. It was a silver locket the size of a ten-ruble coin. Helga’s locket.

  “I’d forgotten I had that.” He offered neither apology nor

  explanation.

  I clutched the chain. “Where did you get this?”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I’m a thief, Malchik.”

  “Get what?” Vasily squinted at us. “What did I miss?”

  “A locket.” Belphagor straightened. “It belonged to her nurse.”

  Vasily’s brow furrowed. “I thought you said she’d paid you

  handsomely. Why would you take her locket?”

  Belphagor shrugged, looking a bit sheepish. “Habit.”

  Slipping the chain around my neck, I tucked the locket into my

  shirt before he could take it back, and got to my feet. “You didn’t hurt her, did you?” I was careful not to say Helga’s name. My flight from

  Heaven seemed dim and unreal, and I could not be certain of what

  had happened when we’d parted.

  The demon folded his arms. “Of course not. She never knew the

  locket was gone. I happen to be a very good thief. It probably wasn’t

  wise to keep it,” he added. “That’s the sort of artifact that could be recognized. But have it if you like. Just keep it out of sight.” He cleared his throat. “If you don’t mind my saying, that garment is definitely not adequate to the purpose.”

  I looked down at the wet shirt hugging my skin. The white fabric

  was nearly transparent. Mortified, I hugged the change of clothing to

  my chest.

  “We’ll need to cut your hair soon,” said Belphagor, effecting non-

  106 JANE KINDRED

  chalance. “It was obvious to your admirer at the lake you weren’t a

  boy.”

  Vasily snorted. “She needs more than a haircut. It was obvious to

  everyone. Even a half-blind demon.” He cocked his head to the side,

  oblivious that my face had blazed scarlet. “How old are you?”

  “Don’t answer that,” said Belphagor.

  “Seventeen,” I said defiantly.

  “Khrystos.” Belphagor dropped into the chair by the desk and

  swiveled toward Vasily. “We don’t need to know these details. Stop

  asking her questions.”

  Vasily ignored him. “Well, it seems you’ve blossomed late.”

  I glared, knowing the look was lost on him, and moved to go

  around him to the washroom. The bed sheet snapped between us,

  yanked from the mattress, and I jumped back in surprise while Vasily

  tore a strip from the sheet.

  Belphagor stared at him, bewildered. “What on earth are you

  doing?”

  “Making a binding.” After defacing the sheet, he lifted me off my

  feet and set me on the bed as if I were nothing more than a doll. I

  sucked in my breath, too stunned to react. He had pushed up my shirt

  and was winding a strip of sheet around my ribs like a bandage.

  When Vasily passed the cloth around me a second time, I swatted

  at his hands. “Let go of me, you devil!”

  He laughed. “Bozhe moi, did she just call me a devil?”

  “She did,” said Belphagor. “And I believe you deserved it.”

  “Hold still,” Vasily insisted at my squirming. “Or I’ll have to do

  this by feel.”

  “Don’t you dare!” I stifled an involuntary shiver, acutely aware of

  his touch, while he braced his hand on my side to pull the cloth tight.

  “Save your protestations of modesty. Believe it or not, you aren’t

  the first cross-dressing girl I’ve ever assisted. Besides, I think I’ve amply demonstrated that your ‘blossoms’ are not the sort I have a taste for.”

  Mortified, I covered my mouth, and Belphagor made a sound in

  his throat as if he’d nearly choked on his own spittle, and leapt from his seat.

  “Vasily! For the love of Heaven!”

  THE FALLEN QUEEN 107

  The genuine horror on his face struck me with such absurdity

  that I had to fight back laughter, but
at a sudden jolt of ticklishness, I squealed anyway behind my hand. Belphagor regarded me as if he

  feared I was having a fit, and it propelled me into full hysterics.

  Vasily grinned, still winding and pulling, while I wheezed and

  gasped for control.

  With a sigh of resignation that only made the hysterical laughter

  worse, Belphagor threw his hands in the air and returned to his seat.

  “When you’ve finished molesting the poor girl to prove you have no

  interest in molesting her, let me know.”

  Vasily held out his hand toward Belphagor. “Pin.”

  At Belphagor’s expression, I laughed harder, barely able to

  breathe.

  “Pin?”

  “Unless you want me to burn the binding closed with my tongue,

  I need a pin.”

  While tears poured down my cheeks, Belphagor produced the

  fastener with an exasperated flourish. I still hadn’t determined whether he conjured these things or was simply an accomplished illusionist.

  Vasily finished and let my shirt fall back into place, while I wiped

  my eyes and tried to pull myself together. “What do you think?”

  The other demon shook his head. “I think the two of you are

  completely mad. But it’s a definite improvement.”

  Still trying to suppress the giggles, I took the change of clothes and bolted for the washroom.

  “Be careful of the glass,” said Belphagor wryly.

  My face prickled with heat once more at the reminder of my

  nocturnal adventure, and I closed the door and leaned back against it

  to catch my breath. Above the binding, the locket sat cool against my

  skin. I had almost forgotten it.

  After wrenching the wet shirt over my head, I held the locket in

  my hand and thumbed open the clasp. Inside was a miniature portrait

  of Azel. My mirth was instantly extinguished.

  I traced my finger against the familiar lines and choked back tears.

  Azelly. He was the only member of my family whose memory was not steeped in blood.

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  Unbuttoning my damp blue jeans while I contemplated the

  portrait, I felt a lump in the pocket: grass stems tied into a knot. I struggled to pull the little bundle out, wondering how I had shoved it so deep. As I retrieved it from my pocket and opened my hand, white-hot light blazed from my palm. The flower of the fern. The blossom was real.

  I thrust the bloom into the locket and snapped it shut, shuttering

  the flower’s fire. My heart was pounding. Had Belphagor and Vasily

  seen the light from beneath the door? I only heard them talking in low tones; there had been no lull in the conversation. Instinctively, I knew I could not tell the demons about the blossom.

  The words the syla had spoken tugged at my mind: The flower

  hides what is unseen. What is hidden is not lost. Fire and ice will protect and bring the lost angel home. I had assumed the lost angel was me, but what of Azel?

  Had I seen his body at the palace on that awful night? I could

  not recall. My shade had left him sleeping. I clutched the locket to my heart. Could he still be alive? Was he the lost angel?

  I dressed hurriedly, tucking the locket into the binding where it

  would be safe, as if by keeping it so perhaps Azel might be safe as well.

  For the first time since that moment in The Brimstone when Helga had

  whispered the words that nearly killed me, it felt it might be something less than misery to be alive.

  As I washed my face, I contemplated the secrets locked against

  my breast. If Azel lived… If he lived, I would find him . And if he did not, I had the syla’s flower. Whoever held the flower of the fern, the syla had said, held power over all. Possessed by Aeval or not, Kae

  would pay for what he’d done.

  THE FALLEN QUEEN 109

  Dvenadtsatoe: Arkhangel’sk

  Early storms had already come to the tip of Heaven when Aeval

  arrived in the Empyrean. Frost wind whipped off the surface of the ice as she and her escort rode over it, sparked by the friction of the horses’

  shoes into a kind of sublimation, evaporating the ice without melting

  it. Kae rode with her; left on his own, he was as empty as a shell of spun sugar, and might crack as easily.

  She was partial to this land beyond the mountain princedom of

  Aravoth where she had first settled in Heaven. Uninhabited by Host

  or Fallen, the frozen plains of the Empyrean had offered stillness and quiet after the yammering stupidity of the world of Man. And she

  preferred the cold. It slowed the blood.

  The season of snow had always been her favorite—one of the

  reasons she’d established her earthly realm in the midst of the primitive settlements of the north. The Unseen World was perfectly suited to

  the climate of the boreal forest, and she found its gentle woodspirits vulnerable to the quickly multiplying tribes of Man. Unlike the fey

  creatures who had populated the rolling green hills of the western

  isles she’d ruled in her youth, her syla preferred not to mingle with the brutish humans. They had welcomed her unifying presence and had

  given her the respect she was lacking… for a time.

  A red glow became visible on the horizon, and Aeval whistled

  for Kae’s horse to stop. The horse, like her addled angel, obeyed her

  without question. In the midst of the quiet Empyrean, an implausible

  river coursed through the ice and snow—the Pyriphlegethon, source

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  of the elemental fire from whence the Seraphim were born.

  She waited for Kae to dismount and come to take the reins. “Keep

  the horses at a distance.” She swung down from her mount, ignoring

  him when he reached up to catch her. Kae looked wounded by her

  slight.

  Aeval pulled down the hood of her white lambskin cloak and

  kissed him in reassurance, placing a gloved hand on his heart to feel

  it quicken at her touch. Like most men, he had a delicate ego, but

  one kiss from her made him docile, as he’d been in the mountains of

  Aravoth.

  Slipping off her right glove, she approached the sharp bank and

  observed the river’s winding path into the indistinctness of mist to

  the west. The Pyriphlegethon had no end and no beginning, ever

  circling the crown of Heaven in its carnelian radiance. It had direction, however, and in that direction, the Seraphim would rise.

  Sitting on the bank with her skirts tucked beneath her, she

  reached into the flow and spread her fingers in a net. Anyone else

  would have lost the hand instantly, but Aeval had learned the secrets

  of the elements. Fire was but one of the four in Heaven’s blood. The

  celestial aether infusing them made the elements more malleable than

  the simple matter of the earthly sphere. She did not so much immerse

  her hand into its flow as direct its flow around her hand. As with the Unseen World, it was all about perception.

  She waited while the molten river swirled around her hand and

  tried to penetrate this intrusive object it could not consume. Tightening in spinning threads, it wound itself about her fingers. Aeval cupped her hand and held it above the surface of the river until the flame within her palm drained away. The five pieces she’d netted snaked above her

  fingertips, the flames dancing wildly in her lifted hand. She held them above the frozen bank long enough for them to take independent

  form that would not be subsumed by the ice, and then cast them upon

  the ground. The five Seraphim t
umbled from her hand like dice and

  then righted themselves and stood tall, white-hot, and solid before her.

  “Three of your brethren failed Us,” she said. “Which of you will

  take responsibility for their cowardice?”

  A single Seraph stepped forward, bowing its head.

  THE FALLEN QUEEN 111

  Aeval rose and circled it, careful to keep the train of her cloak

  from brushing it. “How were your brethren defeated by a mere Fourth

  Choir angel?”

  “Arrogance,” breathed the Seraph, its voice a deep, lamenting

  reverberation that threatened to crack the surface of the ice, many

  hundreds of meters thick.

  “You will serve.” She balled her hand into a fist and stretched her

  arm toward the others, calling their fire to her. Motioning toward the river, she flung her fingers wide and the rest tumbled back into the

  flame. “Take four others more worthy than your cowardly brothers

  who did not step forward with you. Four who will not underestimate

  even so small a quarry. Four who will not fail.”

  The Seraph bowed obediently. “It will be done. There is nowhere

  they can hide from us in the world of Man while they bear the supernal seal.”

  Aeval smiled to herself. The girl had been a fool to keep the ring.

  §

  In the afternoon, the bellboy had news for Belphagor. The gypsy

  woman had returned with Dmitri’s reply.

  Belphagor met her in front of the ophthalmologist’s when he

  stepped out for a smoke. He’d left the angel at the barbershop next

  door while Vasily collected his new spectacles.

  Dmitri’s response was short and to the point: Sorry. Not a good

  time.

  Belphagor folded the piece of paper. “I need to speak to him.”

  He handed her another crystal facet. “We’re friends. Just get me his

  number.”

  The facet disappeared quickly into her tattered coat. “I don’t talk

  to him by phone. Only the network. I can’t help you, Mr. Belphagor.

  There are rules.”

  “Then give him another message. Tell him this is different. This is

  big.”

  She folded her arms, lips pressed together in a tight line.

  Belphagor sighed. “It’s important. I’ll be in Moscow in another

  week.”

  “Then tell him yourself if you’re such good friends.”

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