by Nalini Singh
The wildfire seared at the oily black of her power, but it was stuttering, almost overwhelmed. Knowing he couldn’t fight Lijuan and heal at the same time, Raphael blasted out with angelfire and managed to wing Lijuan, just as Jason sent his black lightning slamming into the other archangel. Neither hit was serious and Lijuan could have kept coming after him, but for some reason, she retreated—possibly, he realized, because her own power was starting to fade.
Her hair and eyes had both changed to oily black during the battles, but now he realized they were back to their usual shade. Lijuan, it seemed, wasn’t as all-powerful as she liked to make people believe and that was something they could use. Landing on a Tower balcony, he kept his feet by sheer strength of will as the battle raged within his body, Lijuan’s black poison attempting to shut him down, while the wildfire fought back.
He couldn’t fall, couldn’t allow his troops to see how badly he was injured.
Managing to make it inside, he caught Dmitri’s eye, saw his second understood what was happening, but Dmitri didn’t betray it by so much as a flicker of an eyelash. “Lijuan’s forces are pulling back,” he said. “I expect intermittent fighting throughout the night, but we should rest our troops in groups.”
Raphael spoke through a haze of red. “Numbers.”
Walking over so their words wouldn’t be overheard, his second said, “More than half our forces are dead or too severely injured to recover anytime soon. The others are exhausted, even our strongest. I predict Lijuan’s forces will launch an all-out offensive with the dawn—we have no other surprises to throw in their path and they know it.”
“Authorize the use of the rocket launchers come dawn,” Raphael said, but they both knew it wouldn’t be enough. “The cargo planes with the reborn?”
“Lifted off two hours ago,” Dmitri said, then lowered his voice. “Go. Heal. We’ll finish this discussion later.”
“Watch over my city, Dmitri.” He left the war room with agony searing up his spine, making it to his and Elena’s private Tower suite with teeth gritted. Collapsing on the living room floor on his front, he clenched his jaw to stifle the violent scream that wanted to erupt from his throat. A single sound and his entire fleet would realize how close they were to losing the city.
43
“Elena,” came Dmitri’s voice in her ear, “the fighting has lessened in intensity. You can stand down for now.”
Frowning, she tapped the reply button. “I’m fine, Dmitri. Pull some of the others.” Her mortal friends were showing worse signs of exhaustion—while she might be a baby immortal, she was still an immortal and it had an impact.
“You need to get back to the Tower.”
Ice trickled down her spine. “Understood.”
Flying directly to her and Raphael’s Tower suite after timing her flight to avoid the sporadic bursts of continued fighting, she entered through the locked balcony doors by using her palm print. “Raphael!”
She shoved the door closed because she knew he wouldn’t want anyone to see him like this and ran to go down on her knees by his side. For a second, she was afraid he was dead, but then she saw the rigid muscles of his arms, his hands fisted tight and his spine locked, and knew he fought a battle against Lijuan’s poison.
Not knowing what to do, she just stroked her hand through his hair over and over. “I’m here, my love. If you can hear me, reach for what you need inside me.”
She felt nothing, Raphael’s body locked in combat against a vicious enemy. The feeling of helplessness was terrifying, but she refused to surrender. Instead, she kept stroking his hair, her other hand closing over one of his fists, and swallowed the tears of rage at the pain of her mate.
Time passed at the pace of a snail’s crawl. Elena was barely aware of what was happening outside, but she felt the shudder as either Lijuan or one of her generals managed to hit the Tower. When it wasn’t repeated, she guessed it had been a general and that either Jason or Illium had managed to head him off. A while later, who knew how long, she heard Dmitri’s voice in her ear.
“If you can speak to the Sire, tell him Naasir and his team just successfully decapitated one of Lijuan’s strongest generals by stringing a wire across two buildings on their side of the line. He might not die, given his strength, but he’s out of the fight.”
Elena shared the news with Raphael, not knowing if he could hear her. “Those three lunatics are in the heart of enemy territory and they’re doing damage,” she said. “God, I bet Ash will have some stories to tell after this is over.” Leaning down, she pressed a kiss to his sweat-soaked temple, the dragon mark pulsing with a glow.
As if, she thought, it, too, fought the poison.
Another blow made the Tower shudder some time later. “Dmitri?” she asked, touching the communications device.
“A general we took down yesterday appears to have recovered. Aodhan has managed to shove him back and is keeping him busy for the time being.”
Elena frowned, thinking of the casualty lists she’d seen. “The general with the white wings, yellow primaries?”
“Yes. He shouldn’t have recovered after Illium’s blade cut him almost in half, but he is whole.”
Skin chilling at what that might mean, Elena decided to keep her silence on that piece of news until Raphael had fought this battle. “Come on, Archangel. The bitch can’t beat you—you’ve sent her scuttling off to lick her wounds time and time again.”
His body shuddered under her touch, his muscles going lax.
“Raphael?” she said, scared by the sudden change. “Archangel?”
Fists opening, he pressed his palms down on the carpet and turned over onto his back. His face was sharper, the bones of his face more prominent. His body, she thought, had burned itself up in an effort to fight the poison. “I’m here,” he said, chest rising and falling in harsh breaths, one of his hands reaching to intertwine with hers.
Bringing their clasped hands to her mouth, she pressed a kiss to the hot burn of his skin. “It’s gone?” she asked, seeing no obvious signs of the poison.
“Yes, but the wildfire is almost completely depleted.” He squeezed her hand. “In you, too, Elena. There are mere flickers in both of us now.”
“What about your capacity to create angelfire?”
“The sources from which I can draw are now farther and farther away—I could take it from the generators but it would mean the Tower going dead for a relatively small boost. My ability to generate power within myself is being hobbled by the fact my energy is constantly being redirected to heal.” His eyes held her own. “Lijuan retreats because she doesn’t like to be hurt, but there’s a good chance I won’t be able to cause her any real harm in our next engagement if I fight as I have been doing.”
A strange calm descended over Elena. They hadn’t spoken about this, but she’d always known it was on the table. “You have to get closer,” she said, even as, below the calm, horror clawed its way across her soul.
A nod. “If I can get close enough to grip any part of her, I can release every last flicker of angelfire and wildfire inside me. If a single fragment reaches her heart, I don’t think even Lijuan could survive it.”
All those words, but he was talking about blowing himself up. “I’m coming with you.” She pressed her fingers to his lips. “I have some wildfire left inside me, you said—we have to give it our best shot.”
His expression was gentle, the arms he held out to her strong. Going into them, her head on his shoulder, and his wing below her body, she lay in quiet with her archangel and she wasn’t afraid of the darkness that awaited. Whatever death held for her, she’d go into it with Raphael by her side.
Something slammed into the Tower moments later, blowing out the windows of their suite and covering them in a coat of splinters.
• • •
An hour later, and with dawn at least another sixty min-utes away, Raphael knew they had to move. The Tower had taken heavy structural damage despite their deflective effor
ts. Lijuan hadn’t risen, but her generals were all recovered and at full strength, while his strongest aerial fighters—Illium, Aodhan, Jason—were battling through crushing fatigue to repel the blasts.
Once more, Raphael had to fight his instincts to go out there, join in the effort. If he did, he’d lose what little strength he’d regained, and Lijuan would have no impediment to her next attack. As it was—“Naasir.” He jerked up his head as the vampire ran into the war room, bleeding from a massive wound on his face.
Elena ripped open a sterile packet from the first aid supplies and pressed the heavy cotton dressing to the vampire’s face to soak up the blood. Not pushing her away, which told Raphael how badly he was hurt, Naasir went to his knees, Elena beside him, but the vampire’s silver eyes were locked on Raphael. “Lijuan is absorbing power,” he said. “All her injuries are healed and she now works to bloat herself with energy. Come dawn, she’ll be as powerful as when she began the battle.”
“How?” Raphael asked, as Elena pulled the dressing off to expose a raw gash, a flap of skin hanging down over Naasir’s cheekbone, bone and muscle exposed.
As she grabbed the small butterfly bandages that would keep the flesh in place while Naasir healed, the vampire spoke of horror. “She has truly become an Archangel of Death. I saw her slit the throat of one of her fighters herself, to the point of near decapitation—she then thrust her face into the bleeding gash and seemed to feed.”
“Because she couldn’t get any more creepy.” Elena continued to pin Naasir’s flesh together, and it was only when she nudged the vampire forward a little that Raphael realized Naasir’s spine had almost been cleaved in two. The fact the vampire had been able to run, much less stand, spoke of his strength.
Now, he gave a feral grin, clearly amused by Elena’s words. “It takes her twenty minutes at least to drain the life out of one of her people. The fighter I saw was a mummified husk when she was done; that was when she moved on to the next volunteer, her face a mask of blood.” He growled without warning, eyes flashing.
“I’m sorry.” Elena continued to work at his back. “I need to pull the flesh together or your spine will be exposed to the air and it’ll take longer to heal.” Not stopping in her task despite the constant low-level growl, Naasir’s fingers claws, she said, “That’s how she’s been fixing her generals.”
Raphael nodded, considering why Lijuan hadn’t done this earlier. Likely because it, too, was a limited power, something she could only do once within a certain period. Not that it mattered—because the fact was, he couldn’t hope to defeat a full-strength Lijuan in ordinary combat, not after she’d worn him down to a threadbare edge.
Rising to his feet, his back held together by larger bandages that worked the same as the butterfly ones on his face, Naasir turned to offer Elena a hand. She took it and he hauled her up. Then, grabbing her around the waist, he lifted her up and brought her startled face close to his own.
Raphael?
He won’t hurt you.
Elena made a squeaking sound as Naasir nipped her sharply on the chin. “I’ve decided I won’t eat you,” he said, putting her down on her feet before turning to Raphael. “Lijuan’s forces have harried ours over the night hours, but most have rested. They will launch a major offensive with the dawn.”
“Thank you, Naasir. Go and feed—we’ll move very soon against the enemy.” He couldn’t afford to give Lijuan any more time to glut herself with power.
The vampire left with a curt nod for him and a grinning and unexpected snap of his teeth for Elena. Seeing the expression on her face, Raphael almost smiled. Naasir would’ve no doubt fascinated and confused her for some time to come, but his consort wouldn’t see the end of this day if they were to stop a monster. “It’s time, Elena.”
Should they succeed in their final act, Lijuan’s forces would still outnumber the Tower’s, but Raphael’s people were smart and they thought for themselves, while Lijuan’s were tied to her. If Raphael and Elena took her out of the equation, not only would her generals lose their power, the enemy’s entire command structure would collapse. He had every faith the members of his Seven would utilize that fracture to hold on and claim victory. “We can wait no longer.” And it wasn’t only New York at stake—fighting had broken out in the Refuge an hour past, and Raphael knew whatever happened in his city would end the battle in the Refuge, one way or another.
A frown, Elena’s eyes going to his temple. “You’re rubbing the mark.”
Dropping his hand, Raphael stared at it. “I did not realize.”
“Does it hurt?” She brushed her fingers delicately over it.
“No, but it pulses.” Like a heartbeat. “That pulsing has increased in strength over the past hours.” Shaking his head, he cupped Elena’s face, a cut under her eye and across one cheek, her arms bearing countless nicks from the exploding windows and earlier skirmishes. Her body, too, was nearly at its limit, its ability to heal sluggish.
“I do not like that your colors are hidden.” She’d found some brown dye, used it on her hair and wings in a bid to keep Lijuan from immediately realizing who it was that flew beside Raphael.
“It’ll wash off with a couple of soapings. I’ll do it after we take care of Lijuan.” Nothing less than total confidence in her tone, though they both knew they might soon share their final kiss. “Knhebek, Raphael.”
“You are my heart.” The amber in the ring she’d given him glowed pure and beautiful as he took her mouth, passionate and with as brilliant a heart as his warrior.
• • •
Twenty minutes later, he stood on the cracked but still hold-ing balcony outside the war room and met Illium’s and Jason’s eyes, Elena by his side. The two angels would run interference in the hope Lijuan didn’t realize Raphael’s intent until it was too late—both could well lose their lives.
“Whatever price we pay this day,” he said, “whatever the outcome, know that I am proud to have had your loyalty.” On the mental plane, he made sure his message reached Aodhan and Dmitri, who even now watched their backs, and Naasir, who fought on the ground. The others would make sure his words were passed on to Galen and Venom, the two locked in battle as the peace of the Refuge was splintered with violence. “It is a point of great honor in my life.”
Both bowed their heads, but it was Jason who spoke. “The honor is, and will always be, ours,” he said, as Aodhan deflected another fury of blows aimed at the Tower. One got through, the balcony shuddering.
All four of them instinctively adjusted their stance to keep their feet.
“Did you manage to see Mahiya?” Elena asked his spymaster, and it was the question of a consort.
Jason’s face betrayed none of his emotions as he inclined his head, whatever had been shared between him and his princess, who’d worked in the infirmary throughout the fighting, a private matter. Raphael hoped it wouldn’t be the final conversation the two would ever have, for Jason had earned his happiness. To have it stolen from him, a bare heartbeat after he’d found it, would be a great unfairness—but as they had all learned in the preceding days, sometimes good did not prevail, evil triumphant.
Today, they’d do one final thing to change that, turn the tide. The ordinary fighters were ready to start the attack the instant they took off, forcing Lijuan’s forces to move before they were ready. Rocket launchers would be used to take out groups of enemy angels, his remaining winged fighters instructed to do everything in their power to create those groups by pushing the enemy together.
Those fighters understood that it was likely they, too, would die in the blasts. “If I take five of them with me,” one of his commanders had said, “it will be a sacrifice well made.”
Turning to Elena, his pride in his people absolute and the mark on his temple pulsing so hard that it seemed impossible no one else could see the movement, he said, “Ready, hbeebti?”
Elena notched a bolt into her crossbow. “Let’s go kill that murderous bitch.”
Snapping
out their wings on her vow, Raphael, Elena, and his men were about to fly out through the bombardment that continued to shake the Tower when a bloodied angel came to a crash landing in front of Raphael, his blood splattering on the thin layer of snow. A crossbow bolt was embedded in his stomach.
“Azar.” Raphael knelt beside the advance scout, Jason beside him, while Illium took off to assist Aodhan in deflecting the blows now aimed at the balcony on which they stood.
“What are you doing here?” Jason asked the fallen angel. “You were stationed on the edge of the city.”
Gripping Jason’s hand as Elena called for the medics, Azar’s mouth bubbled with blood, the fluid crimson against his gleaming black skin in the dull light of the time before dawn. “I couldn’t get through on the communication lines, Sire. And you had to know.”
Raphael connected with the scout’s mind to make communication easier. While Raphael was always open to his Seven, Azar wouldn’t have been able to initiate such contact, especially from a distance. What do you have to report?
Another assault force, the slim angel said, green eyes dark with pain, for while angels could heal many wounds, those wounds did not hurt any less. On the horizon, perhaps five minutes behind me. I left as soon as I spotted them, but they are so fast—a dangerous assessment from a scout known for his extraordinary speed—they gained on me with every wingbeat.
Raphael looked at the devastated city around them, the Tower’s smashed walls and splintered windows, considered the number of fighters injured or dead, and knew his people simply could not survive against another fresh force, no matter how huge their hearts. Estimated numbers?
Hundreds, Sire. They flew in the most perfect fighting formation I’ve ever seen.
44
Handing Azar over to the healers, Raphael shared the information the scout had flown through enemy fire to deliver. “We go now and we do as much damage as possible to give our people a chance,” he said, as realization formed a layer of grim ice in Dmitri’s expression, his second having stepped out onto the balcony.
