“You lied to me!” Ali yelled as she backed away. “You are a demon, you are Baaltazhar... Larsen doesn’t exist!”
Larsen insisted and kept walking towards her offering her his hand.
“I didn’t lie to you...” His smile widened. “You named me Larsen. You don’t remember? It was many, many years ago...”
Larsen laughed softly and slipped a hand over Ali's. She didn’t move. She just watched him, stunned at his words, while he smiled at her with satisfaction.
“Leave her alone!”
Kaliel tried to intervene and the demon hit him with fire. Kaliel's wings cracked painfully. He rolled across the floor, out of breath. However, Larsen didn’t take Alanis.
“You'll come back with me whenever you want” he said. “Just call me by my name and I'll come. I will always be close to you...”
Larsen moved his hand and shadows swirled around him. Darkness enveloped him. His smile was the last thing they saw before he vanished completely.
Alanis ran to Kaliel and knelt beside him. One of its wings was wounded.
“What were you doing here?” Kaliel reproached her.
“Asking the right person about the Maleficat” she said as she helped him up.
The question was what did he do there?
“You came for me?”
He looked at her up and down.
“Why did you leave?” Without me he’d have wanted to say.
“You were hurt and I couldn’t wait anymore...” Ali said without looking at him.
She pulled his arm to help him stand up. Then she shook off her clothes to avoid his gaze. Then the brush of his hand on her arm demanded her attention. There was something broken in the back of his eyes, the green shadowed. Kaliel looked broken. Vulnerable. As Alexander had said but now she could see it too.
“Promise me you won’t do it again” he said.
Go alone or go with Larsen? Or kiss him? Why had she done that? Would Kaliel have seen them? Surely that was what Larsen - or Baaltazhar - wanted.
“Okay” she said. “We have to go back to Salisbury”.
Kaliel nodded. He surrounded Ali with his arms and both were thrown into the sky. The cold lashed Ali's face but she didn’t intend to shelter. She didn’t want to wait another day. It would take only a few minutes to get there flying. After that there would be time to rest in the shelter of a home, when she recovered her father and knew that both were safe. Was he feeling a similar cold, lying in some cell, wetter and darker even than that night?
Suddenly, she noticed that the trajectory of the flight oscillated. Kaliel seemed unable to keep his balance in the wind currents. They fell and then recovered height, to be diverted to the side again. She turned as much as she could and noticed that Kaliel's wounded wing lost control. He clenched his teeth and then they felt the crack. His wing bent at an abnormal angle and both began to fall spinning. Kaliel held her tighter as he tried to regain his balance. Their wings rose and fell almost uselessly. It was no longer a matter of avoiding the fall but of cushioning the blow. The ground was approaching them at full speed. With a last effort, Kaliel managed to make a detour into a forest. The branches received them as open arms. She lost Kaliel when they hit the top of a tree. She bounced several times and tried to cling to the branches as she fell with her eyes closed. Finally, the pain ended with one last thump on the ground.
Kaliel hurried to her, full of scratches and leaves. She could barely see him with the faint lunar reflection seeping through the trees. The speed with which he helped her stand up warned her that they were in danger on the ground.
“Forgive me” he whispered. “We must find where to hide, soon”.
Soon. The urgency of this last word made her skin crawl. They were unprotected, in the middle of a dark forest and Kaliel was wounded. Suddenly she felt as if all the sounds around her were amplified. They were definitely not alone but nothing assured her that animals were the only ones that accompanied them...
“Let’s go” whispered Kaliel pushing a hand on her back.
The pain of falling became more intense as they continued to walk through the forest. Minutes later they found the markings of a path that climbed up a slightly steep terrain. They followed it until they saw the faint glow of a fire coming from a window.
“We have no choice but to ask for help” Kaliel said. “Hopefully I'll have healed in the morning”.
Ali was shaking, too cold to protest even if she didn’t like the idea. She followed Kaliel to the small stone house but although they knocked on the door nobody came out. They surrounded it then until they discovered that one of the windows remained open, with the wooden leaves hanging from their hinges. Kaliel glanced at it cautiously and then pulled a short sword from one of his boots and handed it to Ali. He indicated her to follow him before entering the house.
A weak fire burned in the fireplace and there was half-eaten bread on a nearby table. The owner should be nearby. Holding the sword high, Ali walked towards the kitchen. There was food distributed on the counter, as if someone had been about to cook.
“Smells like blood” Kaliel murmured behind her.
Ali turned instead holding the sword more firmly. There was a table with only one chair that was dropped. They both approached and saw the man lying face down on the ground. She knelt by the body to turn him over but he was already dead. They discovered the puddle of blood at the same time as the tooth marks and heard that growl.
The vampires fell from the ceiling showing their fangs and their mouths covered with blood. There were enough to fill the kitchen and corral them. They then fell on Kaliel, who got rid of the first ones as cleverly as ever. However, he was clearly tired. Ali did the same and managed to knock two down with the sword before Kaliel fell under the weight of five more vampires. One of them tore his shoulder and, to her surprise, he began to bleed again.
Something inside Ali trembled. Had not he recovered since the accident in the gun room? Had he definitely lost his immortality? Alanis rammed the vampires who attacked Kaliel and they in turn threw themselves on her. Kaliel tried to get it out but she simply showed them her open palms and looked for that fire that came more and more easily to her orders. The five burned at once to ash and the rest of those who watched recoiled in horror. Then, as if the instinct was more powerful than the reason, they came back to attack her. The fire swirled around her arms and came out with a force that was dragging her forward. The vampires moaned and turned, too late. Only one survived and ran to the door.
“Don’t let him go” Kaliel exclaimed, still on his knees.
Ali tried to incinerate him but she failed and Kaliel threw his sword to him like a lance that went to give to the center of the back of the vampire but this one continued moving away.
“Damn!” mumbled standing up. “Will return with more...”
Then, he plucked four feathers.
“What do you do!?”
Ali followed him out.
“I avoid that they can approach” he said while he nailed a feather in each corner of the yard. Then he quietly recited some incomprehensible words until the feathers sank into the earth with a glow impossible to look directly at. A beam of light remained bordering the house. “They’ll not find the house and if they do they won’t be able to enter”.
Kaliel came back inside and dropped to the floor in front of the fireplace. He stirred the almost extinct embers with a metal rod and threw another piece of wood to revive the fire.
“Tomorrow I can fly and we'll get away”.
Ali watched him. She brought some blankets and cushions that she found and placed them on the floor to sit next to him.
“You feel cold?” She asked raising her eyebrows.
He nodded. He understood what that meant. Although a little, he was also bleeding. Neither of them said it. They stared at the fire as it rose.
“Forgive me” he murmured after a few minutes.
“Larsen hurt you”. Ali shrugged. “You don’t have to apologiz
e for that”.
“Larsen?”
“Baaltazhar…”
“I didn’t mean that” Kaliel said and suppressed anger. “I mean what I told you that day”.
“Oh, forget it”.
Ali stirred nervously. That day.
“Sabrina told me...”
Ali turned to him instantly. His wings had disappeared and he seemed even more vulnerable, with the shoulder of his sweater torn and the blood drying. But he kept, like everyone else, that angelic perfection that made her heart skip a beat just by seeing him. The glow of the flames danced in the gold of his hair.
“And I'm sure I didn’t fall for Charlotte” he continued.
“I was stupid. Please, forget it...”
“I can’t. That happened more than three hundred years ago but I was punished just two years ago. I also remember everything and it’s supposed that part of my punishment was forgetting”.
A chill ran through Ali's skin as she remembered what she had seen in Kalo's house.
“Maybe it's a common punishment” she murmured.
“What do you mean?”
“When I let Kalo enter my mind to find a happy memory...” Ali stopped to check, as she thought, that Kaliel looked at her almost without breathing. “We found them blocked by an angel...”
The glint in Kaliel's eyes flared like flames as he sensed the same thing she had refused to believe possible... What she had discarded, not as a real memory but as the memory of a dream.
“I could see only one of those memories” Ali continued. “One of when I was fifteen years old and I was with a person. I didn’t understand why but apparently that was my happy memory and, in fact, I was very happy. It was then that Kalo appeared and told me it was you when you were still an angel...”
“Fifteen years...” Kaliel repeated with an empty look.
“Two years ago”.
Several minutes passed in which neither of them spoke. The more they thought about it, the more sense it had.
“That would explain why you have no angel” Kaliel paused “... and why I couldn’t stop thinking about you since Mikah sent me to look for you...”
Ali felt that her heart stopped. She wasn’t able to look at him or she couldn’t contain the desire to cry.
“That would explain that feeling I had to know you before” he continued. “It would explain that inexplicable need of you, to protect you, to keep you close and then the fear of you being hurt or being taken away from me... And why I kissed you and then I told you those things because I knew I was about to ruin everything but… I don’t care anymore”.
Ali swallowed that lump in her throat and turned to look at him.
“When I saw you in that memory and I felt so happy, I knew that, somehow, at that moment, I loved you. Then it seemed absurd but I couldn’t stop feeling it. It hurt me to know that you couldn’t afford it and I didn’t have time to worry about broken hearts... Neither do I have it now. Not until I find my father”.
“What if it's true? If all this time was you and me?” He said leaning towards her.
“Then it’s better for you to get away from me if you don’t want to lose your redemption”.
Ali repented as soon as she said it. Why was she rejecting him when she wanted him more than anything? Was she afraid? Then she leaned forward and kissed him.
Kaliel ran a hand behind Ali to draw her closer and she, in turn, threw her arms around his neck. She kissed him softly, feeling the warm contact of his lips, and then, more intensely. At last she could touch him, caress his face, sink her fingers into his hair. That was a longing that wasn’t satisfied with a kiss but grew with each of them. He pulled his lips away and began to kiss her face. The hand on her back gripped her more firmly while the other parted a strand of hair. His lips brushed her ear and down her neck, causing a tremor that ran through her body. Ali pressed closer to him, searching his mouth again until she found it. Then she kissed him fiercely until they had to separate, panting for air.
“You’ll lose everything...” Ali whispered.
“I can’t stop the fall anymore” he said. “I don’t want to”.
Ali kissed him briefly.
“I wonder what happened when they punished us” murmured Ali brushing her lips close to his ear.
He trembled. He loosened himself completely and let the weight of Alanis knock them over the blankets.
“Nothing” he said.
With a quick movement, he turned until he left her on the floor. Kaliel leaned on one of his elbows and straightened slightly above her.
“They couldn’t have made me forget something like this”.
Alanis laughed. She grabbed his sweater and tugged Kaliel until he fell on her and continued to kiss him. His lips burned feverishly over hers, as did the skin of his arms beneath the torn fabric. Leaning on one of his arms, Kaliel caressed Ali's cheek with his free hand and slid it to the nape of his neck to attract her and to kiss her more strongly. She grabbed his hair in response. She let her hand slip under Kaliel's shirt and feel his skin burning. She was also suffocated by the sudden heat.
“Wait” she said as she pushed him away a little to take off her coat. “Being next to the fire doesn’t help much” she commented shyly before the uncertain look of Kaliel. “It's okay. Take this off, it's full of blood”.
Ali pulled the sweater over his head, leaving his hair tousled. Kaliel smiled and she knelt to kiss him, this time with more tenderness. He slid his fingers down the bare skin of Ali's arms. There was a kind of wistful fascination in his eyes and the smiles were completely erased. She could feel it too. That tacit agreement, dancing in the silence like the flames, that they could no longer stop it. Desire flooded her senses and she let him brush his hand under her blouse as she kissed him urgently. It wasn’t enough. With a gasp she got rid of her blouse and returned to his lips as if she couldn’t breathe without them. He pushed her back to the blankets and took off his shirt as well. His trembling fingers wandered in circles on the skin of her back until he found her bra and managed to detach it. The warmth of his skin against hers was delicious.
Kaliel slid his lips down the line of her jaw and began to kiss her neck. A moan escaped from Ali. Her whole body trembled at the feel of his teeth tugging gently on her lobe. His lips continued to descend to meet her chest. Her heartbeat went off and she couldn’t breathe normally anymore. He also seemed agitated while Ali slid her hands to take off his pants. Then they rushed to get rid of the rest of the clothes and kicked it away to resume the kisses with despair. Alanis' fingers sank into the skin of his back almost to scratch it. He bit his lips gently and gave her a wild look to let her know what he wanted. She wrapped her legs around him, pulling him closer to her and seconds later she felt that pain breaking through her. She let out a moan of pain by throwing her head back. He stopped but that wasn’t what she wanted. She pushed her hips forward and kissed him again. He pressed again. It hurt less each time until the pain was replaced by a sense of overwhelming pleasure.
The silence seemed to deepen. Their breaths were all they heard. Waves of burning pleasure ran all over her body. She stopped kissing him, no longer able to control the rhythm of her breathing. Each time he pressed the feeling was stronger. It dominated her entire body. He also succumbed to its effect and lost control. Their wings reappeared and unfurled trembling. This time there was fire burning at their tips. Then, the feathers began to fall engulfed in flames around him. Kaliel also noticed but didn’t stop. Fear mingled in the frenzy of his eyes. Ali didn’t stop either although she saw the fire spreading through his wings until they completely illuminated their faces. She hugged him trying to figure out if it burned him but he tensed under her grip and began to move faster. That sensation flooded her again, of fire and pleasure, more and more intense, each moan more audible until the last one shook her whole body and left her without air. The rest of the feathers fell on fire. Kaliel tensed and then dropped out of breath. Ali reached out to grab a last feather that f
ell spinning in flames. This faded to meet her skin. There was nothing left.
Ali turned to him in panic. However, Kaliel's features radiated tranquility. He gave her a faint smile and kissed her.
“No one has come to destroy me” he said.
“But they have stripped you of your immortality!” Ali was distressed.
Kaliel wrapped her in his arms.
“If we are mortal, I have a lifetime to repeat this moment until death...”
She barely kissed him and rested her head on his chest. The complete peace she felt was only interrupted by an incessant feeling that they were forgetting something. But the heat, satisfaction and exhaustion ended up beating them and both were dragged into a light sleep.
She didn’t know how long she was asleep. That idea that didn’t quite take shape was like a hand that scratched the walls of her mind until it became impossible to bear. Then she understood it. She woke up suddenly with a panicked wail.
“The guards!” She exclaimed.
She jumped up and began to dress.
“What?” Kaliel's eyes snapped open. “Oh, of course!”
They both dressed as fast as they could and hurried out of the house. The moon was high. There was still a lot of night ahead and, indeed, Kaliel's feathers had burned like the others.
Something, like a mass of black smoke emerged from the darkness. The shadows expanded and twisted around them. Alanis ran to Kaliel's arms and he grabbed her. There was nothing he could do now. The mass of darkness gathered in front of them forming an almost human figure of great height.
“Your fall has been heard all over the world” the ghostly voice murmured as he raised a bony hand to Kaliel. “They're coming for you...”
29
Memories
A black feather came out of Kaliel's pocket to the bony hand. The specter opened its wings and returned it to its place.
“Kalo?”
Kaliel's tone exuded relief. Ali felt Kaliel's body loosen under her hands.
Suddenly, other masses of darkness crawled from the forest in their direction.
Dark Temptation Page 23