by Cate Corvin
The razor was drawn carefully over the scars, opening up his back and revealing where his bones had been sawn neatly away. Wayland dropped the bloodied knife on the table and picked up the first wing, aligning the raw edge of the ebonite with the open wound. “Hold this.”
I found myself releasing Tascius and supporting the weight of the wing as the smith poked around inside his back, pulling out tools I had no name for and muttering words that had an oddly incantatory quality.
With the heat, the coppery scent of blood, and the smith’s chanting, the room started to seem fuzzy at the edges, like something was blurring the edges of my sight. I peered closer and saw dark threads growing from the ebonite, weaving into Tascius’s glistening red muscles and fusing to the bone at the smith’s prodding.
It felt like hours before the ebonite stopped moving, seemingly inert and woven into Tascius’s back as though he’d been born with it.
But the work wasn’t over.
“Next one,” Wayland said, wiping sweat off his forehead and leaving a smear of blood instead. “Keep it steady, woman.”
He pushed the wound open and took up the second wing. I held it against my stomach, keeping it steady as the smith began the long work of bringing them together for a second time. My head was pounding, my breath shallow, and I blinked when I realized the smith had stopped chanting.
He pinched the skin together around the wings, reaching for a needle and thread.
“No, wait,” I said, my voice sounding like it came from a thousand miles away. “I can heal him.”
The smith looked at me with glittering eyes, and jerked his head for me to proceed.
I steeled myself, reaching inside for the white fire of healing. It knew Tascius intimately, loved him as much as I did, and I hardly needed to prod it to leap into his skin and swim through his veins.
I frowned as it crossed over. It looked like the very edges of the cuts in his flesh were already healing, even though I knew he healed slower than that-
The glimmering light of my fire concentrated in his back, bringing the open flesh together, knitting it around the wings as the ebonite joined smoothly to his skin.
When the fire finally died, its work finished, I felt like I was going to pass out. I took a gulp of air, but it was super-heated, and tasted of blood and metal and only scorched my lungs.
“It’s finished,” the smith said, leaning heavily on the table and looking over Tascius’ blood-stained back. “I will never make anything finer.”
“But they’ll work?” I asked, gazing at him with red-rimmed eyes. Even blinking felt gritty in this heat.
“They’ll be exactly like what the poor bastard was born with. Feathers from angels, pure ebonite- fuck it all, they’ll be better.”
I folded Tascius’s wing against his back, feeling the silky glide of living metal under my hands, and pushed back his hair from his face, hoping he’d been unconscious for most of the pain. “It’s done, friend. You’re whole again.”
His eyes slowly opened, clearing as he looked into my face.
The wings shot out wide, and Wayland yelled, grabbing for a falling hammer before it hit the floor. “Get him outside!”
Tascius heaved himself off the table and I took his arm, folding his wings to get him through the door of the hut.
The broad muscles of his back were twitching, contracting under his flesh as he adjusted to the new weight on his back. I stroked his spine and he shuddered, pulling his wings in to frame his shoulders.
“Does it hurt?” I whispered, wondering if something had gone wrong.
Tascius shook his head, his silver hair falling loose down his back. He turned around and I tensed, a strange, unnerving thought popping into my head: with his build, that silver hair, and those white wings, he looked exactly like an archangel. I wouldn’t have batted an eye at seeing him in their ranks in Heaven.
“I feel… perfect. Like they were always there.” He paused, then extended them, holding them taut.
The pure white of the feathers reflected the red light of the lake, and then he pulled them back in.
“Well, are you gonna use them, or just stand there gawking?” Wayland slithered from his hut, a bottle of whisky in hand. He slugged back a quarter of it as I watched.
“Thank you so much,” I said fervently, and he waved me away.
“It was my pleasure. I don’t get to work on wings as much as I’d like, and you brought back my mirror.” He sounded gruff and took another swig. “Now go use them. I didn’t make them for you to just stare at, and I’ve already made my share of pointless trinkets this week.”
I dashed back to Tascius, dancing around him. “Let’s go fly. Come on, big friend, it’s time.”
He grinned at me, and we linked hands and practically ran through the tunnel.
When we emerged on the other side, I eyed the sharp spires of rock doubtfully. What if Wayland was wrong, and Tascius fell when they failed?
He spread them wide. They didn’t shake or quiver, as solid as if he’d been born with them. “Catch me if you can.”
Then he shot upwards, the massive wingspan beating the air.
I gave him a few seconds of a head start just for the pleasure of watching him fly. There was the jolt of feeling like I was back in Heaven, seeing one of the archangels descend like comets, then I spread my own wings and took off after him.
No matter where he came from, he was whole now. That was all I cared about.
I chased him down the mountainside, swooping out over the desert after him. He slowed down, flying like he’d had wings all his life, and I was going so fast I overshot when he stopped.
Before I could turn around, he was on me, wrapping me in a bear-hug and pinning my wings to my back. He was big enough to carry me along, and I squirmed in his grip, wrapping my arms and legs around him.
Before Dis came into sight, he lowered to the sand, dropping us on top of a dune.
“It’s… so much better than I imagined,” he said. His cheerful grin lit him up like the sun. “I knew I was missing out, but now, I can’t believe I went so long without.”
I remembered that he’d never flown at all, even when he’d had wings as a child. His mother had been forced to keep him in a cage or keep them bound.
This was his first taste of the open sky.
“Well, nothing will take these away,” I said, fluttering upwards to give him a kiss. “No more unicorns.”
“Just when I was starting to like the thing.” He couldn’t stop flexing his wings, testing every angle and seeing how it felt. “I can’t believe you thought giving me wings was worth more than the sword.”
“Of course they were.” I mock-punched his arm. “You’re whole, you’re everything you were meant to be. The sword can wait.”
“But-”
I put a finger over his lips. “For me, the happiness of my mates will always come first.”
I just had three more to make it up to and prove that I was a good choice.
He just kissed my finger. There was a sheen to his midnight eyes that hadn’t been there before, brightening them, and an almost incandescent aura around him.
Now that the Nephilim was whole again, he would regain the unstoppable strength and healing of his kin, but it came at the cost of making his angelic lineage extremely apparent. These wings looked natural since he’d been born with white wings. Whatever his mother was, angel blood was dominant in his veins.
If Heaven tried to claim him as their own, they’d have to get through me first.
30
Melisande
I laughed all the way to the Nightside, playing with Tascius as we flew.
Demons from the upper Circles looked up as we soared overhead, drawn by the sight of white wings. Several warriors gathered below even as we flew on, clearly expecting attack by an archangel.
We didn’t have eyes for them. All that mattered was that he was complete now, that he could share the sky with me the way he was meant to.
&
nbsp; His wings took on a pearly luminescence in the twilight of the Nightside, the opposite of my wings, which seemed to absorb light. I stroked his feathers as we landed inside the gates of my arena, amazed at how they were exactly like real wings.
I wanted to tell Wayland he was the greatest smith who’d ever lived, but his already-inflated ego might explode to epic proportions.
As soon as we hit the ground Tascius scooped me up, bending me over backwards in a long kiss.
I dimly realized we had an audience. A knot of silent Chainlings surrounded us, and my happiness curdled in my stomach as Tascius lifted me upright.
“What is it?”
The Chainlings were silent, their tension palpably radiating in a cloud. “My Lady… the Prince of Wrath has returned.”
One of them pointed inside with a shaking claw.
My mouth fell open, my chest suddenly feeling hollow, then I turned and raced for the arena doors with Tascius on my heels.
None of the warriors were present. Vyra stood in the middle of the arena, her arms wrapped around herself and eyes wide. Haru leaned against the wall, watching her from the corner of his eye. His sword was half-unsheathed, ready to cut through any intruders.
Vyra spun at the sound of my footsteps.
“Where have you been?” Her voice was tight with strain, and I didn’t think her eyes could get any bigger, but they defied me and opened even wider when she took in Tascius’s brilliant wings. “Belial came back.”
“When?” I stepped up, grabbing her shoulders. Belial had been here? I could almost smell his spicy scent on the air, imagining him so close.
“Only an hour ago,” she said, her gaze drifting back to Tascius. She seemed unable to keep her eyes off his wings. “Melisande, he…”
“He what?” I stroked her hair. She looked completely shocked, like she’d seen something horrible. I couldn’t regret going to the smith, but what had happened in my absence?
“He was covered in blood from head to toe. I’ve never seen him so bloody, unless he just came back from the wars…” She shuddered. “Blood everywhere. He left it on the floor.”
She pointed at small red splashes congealing on the obsidian floor.
“He brought-” Her voice cracked, and she swallowed hard, looking miserable. “Oh, fuck, Melisande, I don’t know whose they are, but… it’s not good. Where did you go? Did you see him on the way? I haven’t seen Azazel or Lucifer for hours. They just vanished, and then Belial came in, dead silent, and he was carrying-” Vyra’s voice failed her again.
She was shivering. I rubbed her arms, and Haru rose off the wall, drifting nearer. His tails were twitching in unease, and his ears were laid flat against his head.
Vyra gave him a sharp look that stopped him in his tracks.
“Did you see him?” she asked me again.
“No, we were… at the smith’s…” I trailed off as I caught sight of what everyone was freaking out over.
Belial had mounted his prize over my throne.
My eyes traced the graceful curves of the familiar shape, the breadth of them, the sheen of a thin layer of gold.
An angel’s wings.
They were gilded, every feather perfectly limned, but I knew that beneath the gold the feathers had been a pure, icy white.
“Oh, what have you done?” I whispered, and Vyra shook her head.
“This could mean war,” she said quietly. “Heaven won’t let this go unpunished.”
I drifted closer, taking in the sight of those wings pinned to my wall like the spoils of war. They framed my throne perfectly, a halo of warning.
Fuck with me, and my man will cut off your most precious parts and give them to me as decoration.
A wild, almost feral smile split my face and I started laughing. There was a note of hysteria in it, but if those wings belonged to one of the fuckers who’d allowed Gabriel to push me...
“Melisande.” Tascius’s hand slid over my back. “We need to find Belial.”
Even if this brought the wrath of Heaven down on us, we were its equal. Let them bring it. We’d send them back in tears, if we bothered to let them keep their wings to fly home with at all.
I shoved a hand against my mouth to stop myself from laughing, and suddenly it wasn’t funny at all anymore. The bubble of emotion popped, and I knew what Vyra said was true.
Belial had killed a fucking archangel.
This was going to mean war.
“Yes,” I said, forcing myself to turn my back on those wings, even though I could’ve spent all day feasting on the sight of them. “Let’s go. Vyra, if Lucifer and Azazel come back, send them to the Brightside.”
She nodded, casting another fearful look at the wings on the wall. Tascius and I pulled the doors shut behind us and we exploded into the air, putting only a small amount of care into avoiding the abyss.
My breath was ragged as I took in the full ramifications of it. He’d left to murder an archangel, and if he was covered in blood, that hopefully meant he’d healed, that he hadn’t been permanently injured.
And all the signs had been right there. The swan-like feathers on Wayland’s table. I hadn’t thought twice… feathers from angels.
I sneaked a look at Tascius’s wings, and wondered how many feathers had been harvested from the wings on my wall.
His face was taut. Maybe he was considering the same thing.
I jerked when a presence almost ran into me, and stopped dead in midair, beating my wings to keep my height.
Lucifer descended in front of us, his stoic face fixed on Tascius’s wings as the Nephilim drew up short and circled back to me.
“So this is what Wayland created from the ebonite.” Lucifer was utterly toneless. It was like trying to read a blank wall; there was nothing there to guess at.
“Yes,” I said, refusing to look away. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, or ask, but this was worth it, Lucifer.”
He gave no hint that he heard me, looking over the new ebonite wings with distant eyes.
“You can be angry at me all you want later,” I snapped, hating myself for taking this tone with him. “But we need to get to Belial, now.”
Lucifer raised an eyebrow. “Does he have something to do with the destruction of our plans?”
I bit back a curse. He had every right to be enraged; but I hated this distant coldness, the judgment, how un-Lucifer-like he was.
He seemed every inch the Morningstar in this moment.
“No, but he left a pair of gilded angel wings on my wall.”
That brought him up short; some of the iciness left his features, and his eyes widened. “When?”
“An hour ago, Vyra said. She’s completely losing it; I need to know if Belial is okay, and which angel he killed.”
Lucifer swore, his lips drawing back in a grimace. “Fucking hell. Let’s go, then.”
I heard the unspoken addendum: but this argument isn’t over yet.
As much as I wanted to prove that I could be trusted, I would fight tooth and nail to make them see that healing Tascius was the right thing to do.
I felt it in my bones.
The same way I felt the fresh wave of tension radiating from Belial’s arena. The Overseers were silent on the battlements, weapons at the ready. The imps were hiding under doorways and windowsills.
I dropped to the street as Azazel materialized in a fog of smoke and stars. “Vyra sent me,” he said tersely.
God, but it hurt the way they spoke to me like a stranger, no matter how much I deserved it. I pushed aside the sensation and strode towards the tall, familiar doors. They were unlocked, the chains unstrung, and the Overseers guarding it drew their spears upright as I approached.
They were trembling.
Everyone was terrified by what Belial had done.
They didn’t stop me as I pushed the door open. Tascius followed me, his hand on my back, and I strode forward into the darkness.
Belial hadn’t lit any lanterns. The emptiness of the stands, a
fter so many nights of seeing them packed with screaming demons, was more than a little unnerving.
It felt like a ghost town.
“Belial?”
My voice rang through the empty arena, and the scuff of a foot on stone was the only sound that returned my call for several eternal seconds.
“I’m home, angry angel.” A faint light kindled in the darkness, illuminating aquamarine eyes that were full of madness. “Did you miss me?”
He stepped into the light, and I saw that Vyra was right; every inch of him was coated in blood, but he didn’t look hurt. He held out his arms, giving me the insanity-tinged smile I knew so well.
“I did,” I breathed, and ran across the arena floor, uncaring of what he’d done.
Whatever it was, he’d done it for me.
I slammed into him, wrapping my arms around his neck and breathing in his spice-and-whisky scent. He was here, real and solid, and he made the rumbling purr that made my knees weak.
“Do you like your pretty tokens?”
He whispered the words in my ear, and the sensation of his lips moving against sensitive skin made me shiver.
“They’re very beautiful.” I raked my fingers through his hair, fire flowing through me now that he was close. “Did you make their owner suffer?”
Belial laughed, his hands roaming over my back and hips. “Oh, he suffered. He begged for mercy before it was over.”
“What have you done, Belial?” Lucifer’s voice rang through the arena, bouncing off the walls. I tightened under the coldness in his voice, feeling like some part of that rage was directed at me, and Belial looked down at me when he felt my tension, then back up at Lucifer’s faintly-glowing form.
“No more than he deserved,” he said, with a tone that made this all sound like a normal, pleasant conversation. “You could almost say I was kind enough to be doing him a favor. He’ll be making atonement for his own sins right here, in my little Circle of Hell.”
“Whose wings were they?” Lucifer wasn’t going to be put off by him.
I was dying to know the answer, but part of me was exultant. Belial had reached into Heaven, pulled down one of those bastards for himself, and made them pay.