“Don’t waste your time looking for an escape route. The only way out of here is up.” He pointed towards the opening above them. “These tunnels lead deep into the cliff face. And I wouldn’t want to meet the beasties that live amongst them with my hands tied,” he said, motioning towards her fastened hands.
Fia chewed on the meat but said nothing. Each piece scraped against her throat and felt too heavy to swallow. She breathed through her nose and silently counted her breaths. She wouldn’t show weakness to such an arrogant waste of space.
“Your wings,” she finally said, throwing what was left of the drumstick away from her and wiping her hands on her knees. “You made them?”
“I found them,” he said, biting at a piece of the same dark meat, spitting mouthfuls of food as he spoke.
“Found them? Oh, you mean you stole them. Got it.” Of course he’d stolen them. “Why do something for yourself when you can steal it from someone else, right?”
Her captor shrugged. “The wings are a more convenient means of—”
Something rumbled from deep within the cave, a tunnel beyond the reach of the firelight.
“One of your beasties?” Fia asked, already on her feet.
“They’re not my beasties.” He was on his feet too, her dagger in his hand.
“Untie me, I can fight,” Fia said, thrusting her bound hands towards him.
The cave shook, and a roar echoed through the tunnel. “Untie you? So you can attack me again?”
“You said it yourself, I have no way out of here without you. Untie me and I’ll fight,” Fia sidestepped towards her belongings as she spoke, her bow and arrows within reach. “I’m not going to fire an arrow at your back, I’d rather shoot one at your face.” She smiled as sweetly as she could manage.
The cave shook again, and the mercenary looked from Fia to the darkness of the tunnel. “Wait here, if I can lead it this way, we might both stand a chance of surviving.” With her dagger, he slit the rope binding her wrists and ran off into the darkness.
Fia didn’t hesitate. She grabbed the winged suit from beside the fire and fastened it on as best as she could with her throbbing wrist. It was heavy, almost too heavy to stand, and she fumbled with the straps to fasten her bag and her quiver from a loop at her waist. Her heartbeat drummed in her ears as her fingers slipped across the buckles.
Another roar echoed from the darkness. She grabbed her bow in her good hand and sucked in a breath as she looked up into the night air. Now or never.
She rolled her shoulders, expecting the wings to push open wide, and nothing happened.
“It’s coming this way,” she heard her abductor call from somewhere in the darkness.
Shit. She had no idea how to work the suit, and it was so heavy she had to fight the instinct to sit. She flung her arms wide, hoping the gesture would somehow animate the suit.
Nothing happened. And then the mercenary burst through a tunnel in the opposite direction from which he’d left, puffs of dirt and loose rocks billowing after him.
His eyes widened when he caught sight of her, but he didn’t stop. “Jump as soon as I reach you,” he shouted and threw himself into her so hard it almost winded her. His arms slammed around her middle and as she jumped, she felt him fumble with something, and the copper wings stretched wide and pulsed, pushing them upwards towards the night sky.
“What do I do?” Fia asked.
“Don’t crash.” He pulled at straps and pushed at things on the suit Fia hadn’t noticed before.
They breached the cave, and Fia couldn’t hide her elation as the wings beat rhythmically against the air and the wind whipped at them. They were soaring. And they didn’t stop soaring.
“I said don’t crash,” the mercenary called out. “Lean back towards the ground. Tilt your weight,” he said, tugging against her.
But it was no use. The moment Fia tried to lean forwards they were spinning, tumbling through the sky. Her abductor lost his grip, and in an instant, he was sucked away from her.
Fia fumbled for the straps at her shoulders and waist, trying to feel for any switches or buttons he might have pressed, but it was no use. She tried to angle herself towards a treeline, hoping the canopy would soften the blow, but she knew her chances of survival were slim.
A flash of grey caught her eye, and she hit the first branch with a thud that knocked the air from her. Then she hit another branch, and another, some scraped at her face and tangled in her hair, some jutted into her ribs and pierced through skin. She knew the worst was yet to come, with the winged suit dragging her down and down through an impossibly tall tree.
But the impact she was expecting never came, instead, she cried out in pain as a wing hooked itself against part of the tree and her arm was wrenched with it. She kicked against branches but couldn’t free herself. Her dagger was gone, along with the mercenary. She’d dropped her bow, not that it would have been any use. All she had was her last few arrows and her backpack swinging wildly from the belt at her waist, more weight dragging her down.
“Ugh.” She thrashed at branches with her free hand, but it was no use. Whatever adrenaline she’d had that had helped her fight through the pain and pull the wingsuit on was gone, and searing agony throbbed through her whole arm.
A flicker of grey caught her attention again, and then grey wings, and a pair of grey eyes, examining her own.
“Hold on,” the angel said. He held a strong arm around her waist and supported her weight as he unhooked her from the tree with the other. His hair was almost silver, a flop of hair that swooped to one side and revealed black roots beneath.
Fia tried to say something, but she was still winded, and she could taste blood. An angel.
The angel flew down to the forest floor, and carefully set her down against the moss.
Fia pressed her good hand against her side, and as she pulled it away, saw that it was slick with blood. Not good. She was certain it wasn’t the only wound either, and already felt weak from the blood loss.
“Here, let me help you. I’m a friend of Alexander’s. I’m Dante,” the angel said, as he helped her to lie down amongst the moss.
“You’re here with Alexander?” Fia asked. Her throat tightened at the sound of his name, and she tried to sit up, but nausea held her to the spot.
“Hasn’t anyone told you?” Dante’s grey eyes flickered up to meet hers. “There’s no easy way to say this. Alexander is dead.”
Chapter Fifteen
Fia
T he word echoed in Fia’s head. Dead. She’d passed out not long after Dante had found her, somewhere between him telling her Alexander was dead and losing more blood. She tested her fingers and toes first. Still working. Still all there, as far as she could tell. Her fingers dragged against moss, but she was too drowsy to push herself up.
Wind blew lightly through the trees, a soft rustling crescendo building around her. Dead. He can’t be… I… I would have felt it… Mira said so. Fia pressed her palms against her eyes. She felt as if she was going to be violently sick. He can’t be dead. Her insides were like liquid, her hands like ice. I would feel it… I would know. She managed to roll over onto her side just in time to throw up all over the grass beside her head.
Something halfway between a sob and a howl escaped her as she wiped at her mouth. Tears blurred her vision, but she was aware of someone close by. She hauled herself up to her elbow just as Dante sat beside her.
“Here, drink this,” he handed her a flask, probably made of animal hide if Fia had to guess. “It’s water.” He threw ash over the vomit, and Fia looked away, breathing in deep lungfuls of air between each swig of water.
Her wrist was no longer throbbing. She flexed it gently—it was fine. She dragged a hand across her ribs and felt the padding of bandages beneath her crusted clothes and winced as she pressed too firmly at one of them. “You did this?” she asked Dante.
“It’s been a while since I’ve healed anyone. I’m a little out of practice, so you’ll have to excuse the cru
deness.” He swiped a few strands of silver hair from his eyes and for a moment Fia was reminded of her ex, Henry.
“Thank you. I thought I… I guess I lost a lot of blood,” was all she managed. She counted her breaths, slow and steady. One, two, three. It was all she could do to keep herself from throwing up again. Dead.
The breeze picked up and ruffled the grey feathers of Dante’s wings, and Fia felt an icy shiver down her spine. He healed you. If he was trouble, he wouldn’t have healed you. What could she do, anyway? She certainly couldn’t run. There would be no use trying to fight him—she’d watched Alexander crumple an arrowhead against his bare chest.
“You’re cold. You were too hot before, I put the fire out. Here.” He struck two flints together and a fire sparked to life. “You did indeed lose a lot of blood.” His forehead creased into a frown, and orange sparks reflected in his grey eyes.
In the dim light, Fia noticed smears of blood along his arms and a white tattoo that snaked its way up his arm and across his chest, resting on his heart. Her mind was heavy as if each new thought that tried to form was wading through quicksand. Healed. “You healed me? How?”
Dante looked at his hands, and Fia couldn’t read his expression. “You’d call it magic, I suppose.” He raised an eyebrow. “But it was not sufficient, I’m afraid. You’re still injured and will need time to heal before you can travel.”
Fia slowly sat up and took in her surroundings. Another forest. Her head throbbed. “Where are we—Ashar?” It had all happened so fast. Arion, the attack. Now Alexander. Arion’s death she could believe, she’d seen it with her own eyes. But Alexander… this felt different. She breathed in the scent of the pine trees and looked up at the canopy. The stars were beginning to fade, and she couldn’t see the moons anymore. How had so much happened in a single night?
“We are on the northeast coast of Ashar. That Himeran reprobate—”
“The guy who kidnapped me? What happened to him?” She still had no idea why he’d followed them, either.
Dante clicked his tongue and his eyes darkened. “I believe he perished.”
Fia sucked in a breath. “Perished, as in dead? Don’t you want to go check if he’s out there somewhere, so you can heal him?”
“I saw you as I was crossing the water from Estesh. The Himeran was pulled away from you towards the cliffs whilst you spiralled towards the treeline. I could only save one of you, and I had to make my choice quickly.” His gaze was steely cool, and Fia couldn’t read his expression. “Try as we might, we angels cannot save everyone.”
But Fia was only half listening. All she could think of was how wrong it all was. Arion, Alexander. It couldn’t be real. We lose it all in the end. That’s what she’d said to Arion, only a few hours before. She looked at her hands. It was as if everything she’d ever touched wilted and died. One, two, three.
“Fia?” Dante touched a hand lightly to her arm, and she looked up to meet his gaze again. I don’t remember telling him my name… did I? His expression was gentle, his face smooth and youthful, but his eyes were the colour of a stormy sky, like rolling clouds with flecks of silver lightning when they caught the light.
“Sorry, I… I wasn’t really paying attention. Thank you. For healing me. I really mean it.” She tried to control the shake in her voice, the tears that threatened to spill over with each word. She could barely sit up. “Your tattoo,” she said, flicking her chin towards him. “Does it mean anything?”
Dante sighed and threw a twig into the fire. “It tells the story of Terah, the fire mother.”
“Gabriel’s sister? From Ohinyan’s creation story?” Fia knew the story. Well, at least the version she had been told by Kharsee, leader of Noor’s coven.
“On Earth, she has many names. Eve. Gaia. Isis. Freya. The daughter of the phoenix created most of Ohinyan and Earth.” He looked at the fire as he spoke, his wings folded perfectly behind him in that way all angels seemed to sit—in a way that defied physics and made their wings seem too flexible for flight.
“I thought Ohinyan was created as a prison for Erebus… after Terah begged the phoenix not to destroy him,” Fia said flatly. It hadn’t been that long ago that Kharsee had told the story. Fia had thought about it many times since. The image of Terah crying over the loss of Ahriman, Erebus’s father, who she looked to as her own father, it had stayed with Fia.
Dante clicked his tongue again. “Inside the dust from a dead star, and formed Ohinyan around it?” He raised an eyebrow, waiting for her response.
“Um, yes, exactly.”
He stood and cleared a space on the opposite side of the fire. “I need to try again, with the healing,” he said, as he kicked aside pinecones and leaves. “You might be more comfortable here.”
Before she realised what was happening, Dante had paced back over to her side of the fire and scooped her up in his arms to carry her to her new bed.
“Wait, you can’t—put me down, now.” She pushed against his chest in protest. Alexander had carried her many times, but it had felt different, somehow—he wasn’t a stranger, and Dante was.
The angel laid her down in the new makeshift rest area, away, Fia presumed, from her pile of vomit. “You didn’t seem to mind before.” He flashed her a grin as he stepped away.
It was Fia’s turn to scoff. “I was barely conscious. You don’t—you can’t do that again, okay?”
“I apologise if I’ve offended you, but you are still badly wounded, walking would not be advisable until I’ve spent some more time trying to heal your wounds. May I?” He inclined his head towards her torso.
Fia felt her jaw tighten and her chest flush with frustration. “Fine. Tell me about the fire mother.” She didn’t want to think about her injuries. Or about Alexander. She couldn’t allow herself to believe he was gone.
Dante knelt beside her and rested his hands against her stomach. “The daughter of the phoenix was known as the fire mother because she breathed life into everything she touched. Not because Ahriman taught her his dark ways, or whatever story the witches might have spun to you. Erebus and Terah were in love, and Gabriel didn’t like it. Things were already fraught between the phoenix and Ahriman, and Gabriel’s lies only fuelled their fight.”
“They were in love? The son of darkness and the daughter of the phoenix?” Fia watched Dante’s hands as he worked. If he was a threat, why go to the effort of healing her? A dull light fell from his hands across her stomach, and she felt her insides warm. Her head still throbbed as she leaned back and looked up at the canopy.
Dante cleared his throat. “It’s not… it’s not working fast enough.” He raked a hand through his silver hair.
The wind rustled through the trees again, and Fia couldn’t quite see his face from her horizontal position.
“They were very much in love,” he finally said. “Erebus wasn’t like his father. Not in the beginning. He had his father’s gifts, but they shared little else. Erebus and Terah wanted to create a new world together, a world of true balance. But Gabriel had other ideas.”
Fia thought of the story Kharsee had told her, so different to this one. Before she had chance to ask a question, Dante moved his hands back to her stomach again. “I’m going to try again. But I need to concentrate more. You can sleep if you feel the need to. This may take a while.”
Questions turned themselves over in Fia’s thoughts, but each time she drifted back to Alexander. Dead. She silently counted her breaths until the quiet of sleep overtook her.
***
Fia opened her eyes to the familiar sound of the wind rustling through the trees. The half-light that hung over everything told her it was morning, and the scent of something cooking had her biting back at her nausea.
She tested the strength of her hands and rolled her ankles. So far, so good. She carefully pressed at her ribs. No pain flared at her touch. She pushed herself upright.
“Good morning.” Dante smiled at her from beside the fire. “Breakfast?” He scooped up a waxy-l
ooking leaf with two cooked eggs, yolk facing up, and rolled it up tight before placing it inside another leaf and passing it to her. “Don’t eat the outer leaf, it’s too bitter when it’s uncooked. The one around the egg is quite pleasant though.”
Fia’s stomach gurgled in protest, but she knew it would be foolish to refuse food out in the middle of nowhere. “Um, sure, thank you.”
“Your injuries have mostly healed, as far as I can tell. Your ribs were the worst and one particularly bad wound in your leg.” He held an egg wrap of his own in his hands, but he didn’t eat it.
Fia swiped a hand across her legs with her free hand, feeling for anywhere there might have been a snag in her hiking trousers. There were many. She’d suffered a lot more injuries than she’d realised. “Thank you.”
“And I’ve repaired your wingsuit so that you can continue your journey.”
“My… my wingsuit? Oh, you fixed the wings?” Fia glanced around their makeshift camp. Behind her, along with her backpack and quiver sat the wingsuit. “I actually, um. They aren’t mine. I don’t know how to use them, as you’ve witnessed.”
Dante flicked his hair to one side and grinned. “I can teach you if you’d like?”
Fia had dreamt of flying many times, even before she met Alexander, but much more frequently since she’d returned to Earth. Most of the dreams involved flying with him or looking for him. Dead. The thought of flying as he could, it was a connection to him, a piece of him she could learn for herself. “But how do they work? What powers them?” she finally asked.
“Something between science and magic.” Dante had finished his breakfast and rubbed his palms against his linen trousers. He was barefoot and bare chested, like all the male angels she’d met.
Magic. “How do you know so much about magic, how do you… where did you learn it? I didn’t think angels could do that kind of thing.” She’d seen an entire army of angels fight against the renegade Makya and their mercenaries, and not one of them had used magic. Alexander had never once suggested they could. But then they set people’s spirits free, so that had to be a kind of magic in itself, didn’t it?
The Eternal Dusk (Daughter of the Phoenix Book Two) Page 12
