Feather (Angels of Elysium Book 1)

by Olivia Wildenstein

  If I hadn’t pushed Jarod to take up this task.

  If I hadn’t let my guard down and allowed myself to be used as a pawn in this power play.

  Oh, Great Elysium, what had I done?

  My wings reappeared, and I curled them around me, wishing they could protect me from all this death, but all they accomplished was hiding the spectacle. I could still smell the bitter cordite; I could still hear the squeal of approaching sirens.

  “We should go before the police get here,” Tristan said, his voice so incredibly calm I wanted to smack him.

  How could he be so unaffected by taking three lives? Because he was used to it?

  I tucked my wings back, bile rising at the sight of the carnage. I looked at Tristan, who was pushing his gun into his waistband, then at Jarod who was staring at my shoulders.

  I blanched.

  Could he . . . could he see my wings?

  My heartbeat strengthened, vibrating against my palate, making the inside of my mouth taste like a penny.

  “Mon Dieu. Mon Dieu,” Sasha’s voice rose from behind me.

  That’s what had caught Jarod’s attention.

  Not my wings.

  Not. My. Wings.

  Besides, if he could see them, then he could touch them, and I hadn’t felt his fingers on my wings. Or had I? My chaotic pulse seemed to have numbed my body and thinned my memory.

  “We wait for the police,” Jarod said calmly, turning his gaze to one of the fallen bodies. “And, Tristan, call the cleanup crew.”

  Tristan’s jaw clenched as though he wanted to protest, but he pulled out his phone and scrolled through his list of contacts.

  They have a cleanup crew on call? How often did this sort of thing happen? I didn’t ask, because I didn’t want to know. I kept my wings tucked but present, finding comfort in their familiar weight. A few minutes later, two cops walked into the restaurant, guns raised.

  “Monsieur Adler,” one of them sputtered.

  The female officer flanking the other cop frowned.

  “Put the gun down, Christine,” the first one hissed.

  Even though it seemed to take everything in her to force her arms to holster the weapon, she did. “What happened in here?”

  I wasn’t sure if Jarod would explain. He didn’t seem like the type to explain.

  “They were bad men,” Layla said, index finger trembling in midair as she pointed at the three bodies. “They attacked Monsieur Adler’s girlfriend. It was self-defense.”

  My cheeks pinked. In the scope of things, being called Jarod’s girlfriend should’ve been the least of my worries. My wings reflexively curled around me as though they could somehow shield me from everyone’s scrutiny, because everyone was looking at me now. Actually, that wasn’t true. Jarod was staring at the broken bottle that lay on the ground, its serrated edges darkened by blood. His and mine.

  Another wave of uniformed men and women came in—police and EMTs.

  “I’ll take care of everything, Monsieur Adler,” the male cop was telling Jarod, who gave him a slow nod.

  I shouldn’t have found Jarod’s ties to the police surprising, yet the scope of his influence didn’t cease to astonish me.

  “The cleaning crew’s on their way,” Tristan said. “Should I call Francis?”

  Jarod nodded again, his eyes now riveted to the crimson splotches tarnishing the shine of my patent stilettos.

  “Leigh, are you riding back with us?” Tristan asked.

  Jarod’s gaze banged against me. “Did you expect her to fly out of here?”

  I blanched.

  Tristan frowned, looking between Jarod and me. “Um, non.”

  It wasn’t my imagination. Jarod sounded annoyed. Was it with me?

  I took a step toward him. “I’m sorry, Jarod. About tonight. This isn’t what—”

  He snorted. “You’re just sorry my trigger-happy associate made you lose your bet.”

  I startled, stopping a few feet from his rigid form. “No.” I shook my head. “I’m sorry I interfered.”

  “You think things would’ve gone down differently?” Jarod asked.

  “Leigh, Leigh, Leigh.” Tristan grinned. “Welcome to La Cour des Démons where justice is restored one bullet at a time.”

  My stomach clenched.

  “Call Francis,” Jarod said. “And give Sasha some money to cover the meals and the damage.”

  Tristan nodded, seeking out the man we’d come to help but had failed. As he gave his statement to the female cop, I stared at Jarod, desperate to understand the source of his anger.

  “Thank you for keeping your promise. And for not shooting anyone yourself,” I said gently.

  Even though it was selfish of me, I wondered if the Ishim would consider his intervention tonight an act of valor. He had neither given the order to kill nor held the gun that stole three lives.

  And he’d protected me.

  How I wished I understood their system better.

  Just as I had that thought, three winged men marched into the restaurant, wringing a gasp from my lungs.

  Angels had come.

  And not just Malakim.

  Chapter 24

  Asher strode over to us, flanked by two gold-robed Malakim. Where Asher’s wings were deployed, the turquoise and copper glittering in the dim lighting, the other two angels had their wings tucked into their backs, only the gilt tips of their feathers peeking out. Unlike the Malakim, Asher wore jeans and a white T-shirt that made his torso appear broader than when I’d seen him in his leathers.

  “Get the souls out of here,” he murmured, nodding toward the bar.

  Cloaked in angel-dust, the Malakim wound around the police, then squeezed in next to the riddled corpses before kneeling and placing their palms on the dead men’s chests. Like honeyed threads, the souls stuck to the pads of the Malakim’s fingers. They coaxed the glowing threads until they detached themselves from the immobile bodies, and then both angels closed their fists and rose.

  It wasn’t the first time I’d watched the Malakim extract souls, and yet my amazement never tarried. My heart gave a hopeful thud that, one day, I’d be able to perform this type of magic. Granted, the angels didn’t deem this magic, but to me, the process felt magical.

  The realization that only two Malakim had come made my gaze return to Asher.

  Asher who was talking in low tones with Jarod.

  I forgot all about the unharvested soul as I noted the familiarity of their interaction. This wasn’t their first meeting.

  Asher’s alarming reaction the night I’d given him my sinner’s name washed over me. He knew Jarod. Personally. Although this shouldn’t have shocked me—the Seraphim were reputedly omniscient—the awareness grated against my wing bones.

  What had Asher told me again?

  Don’t spend too much time trying to reform a Triple. His words trickled through me clear as the night he’d spoken them.

  Tristan sidled up next to me. “I don’t know about you, but I’d really like to break out of this joint.”

  I crossed my arms. “Do those two know each other?”

  “The guy’s some distant cousin. Every time he stops by, he warns Jarod to behave better.”

  Distant cousin? That was the cover Asher used? I supposed no one would be the wiser. It wasn’t as though Jarod would force the Seraphim to spit into a test tube to have his DNA mapped out.

  As though he heard us discussing him, Asher’s turquoise eyes beamed into mine.

  “Tristan, let’s go.” Rigidly, Jarod began to stalk away.

  “Wait,” I called out.

  Jarod halted, his bloodied shirt sticking to his back, and glanced over his shoulder at me. “For what?”

  For me, I thought but then looked at Asher. Had Asher been sent to escort me back to the guild? Since when did Seraphim collect Fletchings from their missions? Was I in trouble?

  “My cousin will see you home,” Jarod said. “Apparently, you two have met.”

  Tristan c
ocked an eyebrow.

  “Small world,” I mumbled, fingers clamping around my forearms, crimping my pebbled skin.

  Jarod scrubbed one hand through his gelled locks, flipping back a curl obstructing his obsidian eyes. “Take care, Leigh.”

  The use of my angel-given name iced me almost as much as his tone.

  It sounded like goodbye.

  As he finally walked away, Tristan tailing him, I told myself that I’d see him again. Sinners didn’t sign off; only Fletchings had that power.

  As long as I didn’t sign off, Jarod Adler would remain my sinner.

  Chapter 25

  “You’re pretending to be his cousin, Seraph?” I snapped as we made our way out of the restaurant after I’d collected Jarod’s fallen jacket. I hadn’t meant for my words to come out reproachful, but I felt blindsided. This wasn’t fair of me, though. Asher had tried to tell me, not in so many words, to stay away from Jarod.

  Asher slid me a look, his eyes impossibly colorful in spite of the darkness of Rue Levert. “I’ve come to know him well.”

  “But cousin?” Lies didn’t cost feathers once wings were filled out, but still, it was in poor form to lie. Especially when you were at the top of the hierarchy and expected to set an example.

  Asher loosed a deep sigh. “I apologize, Leigh, but you’re familiar with celestial policy. We’re not allowed to discuss sinners with Fletchings.”

  I bit my lip and nodded, tightening my grip on Jarod’s jacket. “Am I in trouble? Is that why you showed up tonight?”

  “The Ishim told me they were collecting souls in Paris squandered by a man named Tristan.”

  I searched our darkened surroundings for Ishim or Malakim but found no other angel. No other human either, for that matter.

  “I assumed Jarod would be here,” Asher continued, “and since you took him on, I expected you would be, too.”

  “Which doesn’t answer my question, Seraph . . .” I returned the full force of my stare on him. “Am I in trouble?”

  Asher ran a big hand through his shoulder-length golden locks. “Yes.”

  My mouth went very dry. “How much trouble?”

  “We’re not supposed to influence Fletchings, but, Leigh”—he stopped walking, and my heart climbed into my throat—“you need to sign off.”

  “Why?”

  “Do not ask for I cannot tell you.”

  “Please.”

  Asher scrutinized the graffitied storefront of a hookah shop where fluted glass pipes were coated in a layer of dust so thick it was impossible to guess their colors. “Do you want to ascend?”

  “Of course I want to ascend.”

  He shifted his gaze back to mine. “Then sign off.”

  “Seraph—”

  “I beg you, Leigh, no more questions. This conversation will undoubtedly already get me in trouble.” He scanned the sky as though angels were hovering above us.

  I silently assembled all the scraps of our conversation, trying to puzzle out the reason I should sign off from Jarod. “I can’t die,” I reminded him.

  “If you don’t complete your wings in time, you could,” he answered softly.

  “But I still have fourteen months.”

  His Adam’s apple jostled, which made me realize how it had sounded—like I no longer felt an urgency to ascend. “Perhaps, but this mission has already cost you feathers.”

  Shame made me tuck in my wings. I didn’t think three feathers were that noticeable, but he was an archangel . . . all-seeing. “I’ll earn them back. Jarod’s willing—”

  “Not if you don’t select another sinner!”

  A protective instinct surged within me, which was nothing new. I’d always been protective of my sinners.

  I squeezed Jarod’s jacket against my hardened stomach. “He didn’t shoot anyone tonight. He didn’t even punch anyone. And he protected me. Surely, that will take a digit off his score.”

  “His score cannot change.”

  “But he’s in the system.”

  “And he shouldn’t be,” he shot out, fast and low, gaze skimming the sky and street again.

  Besides the occasional vehicle rumbling past us, we were alone.

  “I don’t understand, Seraph. Are some crimes so unforgivable?”

  What could Jarod Adler have done that merited a permanent score of a hundred? I ran through my years of celestial lessons, sensing the answer to that question suspended just out of reach.

  And then it hit me, robbing me of breath and heartbeats. “He killed an angel,” I said on a gasp.

  But how? Only angel-fire could kill us once our wing bones appeared. And before that, we weren’t allowed out of guilds. Unless a celestial child had escaped into the human world—I couldn’t imagine Jarod killing a child but then remembered he’d earned his score when he was eight. An accident?

  “It wasn’t an accident,” Asher said softly.

  I hadn’t realized I’d voiced my thoughts. “So he did kill an angel?”

  Asher was back to being silent and unhelpful.

  “How is that even possible, Seraph?” I whispered, my voice as thick as the coating of dust on the hookahs. “We’re immortal.”

  “Not all of us.”

  Not all of us? I almost choked on my next breath. “He killed a Nephilim?”

  The fact that the blood on his hands wasn’t that of a child shouldn’t have alleviated my dread, but it did. Nephilim were the black sheep of the angelic race—mortal, wingless, soulless.

  When they ran out of time to seal their feathers to their wing bones, they were pitied. When they voluntarily forfeited their wings, they were considered heathens, worse than Triples.

  Asher neither confirmed nor denied my suspicion, but I could tell I’d assembled the pieces he’d given me correctly.

  “He was eight. Children make mistakes.”

  “It’s late, Leigh. Let me fly you home.”

  I’d only been flown over the human world once before when I’d gotten lost in a sketchy part of Queens. I’d called Eve who’d passed on the message to Ophan Greer. It wasn’t completely uncommon for Fletchings to become disoriented, but it was humiliating. I’d cried so many tears that the city had blurred past me, a mess of leaden concrete and riotous lights.

  Asher spread out his wings, and their breadth and beauty pinned my lips shut, but then I remembered he’d brought them out as a means to an end: getting rid of me and my pesky questions.

  I backed up, Jarod’s jacket folded over my rigid arms, lending my skin some warmth.

  “You have nothing to fear. I will not drop you.”

  “I’m not scared of falling, Seraph.”

  “Then why are you backing away from me?”

  The smell of Jarod drifted from his jacket and replaced the scent of spice and wind gusting off Asher’s skin. “He was a kid,” I repeated. “Surely, his soul shouldn’t be bound to extinction.”

  Asher narrowed his eyes. “He was a child who knew what he was doing. Now, please—”

  “How could he know? Humans can’t see what we are.”

  Asher pressed his lips so tight they lost their fullness. He looked severe then, and it reminded me that I was in the presence of one of the Seven and probably not behaving accordingly, yet no feather had detached itself from my wings.

  Suddenly, Jarod’s nickname popped to the forefront of my mind, and my lids snapped high. “He does know what we are!”

  Asher’s lips thinned some more.

  Humans couldn’t see us; only angels could.

  “He’s a Nephilim,” I sputtered. “That’s how he can see us!”

  Like a slow-moving movie, I recalled the way he’d tracked the feather I’d lost in his bedroom. And at Layla’s . . . my wings had snared his attention not Sasha’s sobs.

  “I never said that,” Asher growled, snapping his wings and rocketing into the starless sky, leaving me alone on that strip of pavement with no phone, no money, nothing but a man’s jacket and my own two feet to carry me home. />
  Had he left because he’d lost patience or because he’d feared revealing classified secrets?

  Stunned and disoriented, I waited for him to take pity on me and return. When he didn’t, I started walking, attempting to remember how we’d gotten to Rue Levert.

  Jarod had warned me this part of Paris was of ill repute, so I was extra conscientious of my surroundings, crossing streets when passersby addressed me too rowdily or lewdly. By the sixth vulgar remark, I put on Jarod’s jacket. And then it hit me to check his pockets. There was no phone, but there was a wad of cash so thick I felt like everyone could see the bulge of it once I’d stuffed it back inside.

  At a taxi stand, I got into a cab.

  “Where to, mademoiselle?” the man asked.

  I hesitated. In the end, I said, “Place des Vosges.”

  I needed to return the jacket to its owner, and I wanted answers. And since Asher couldn’t give them to me, I’d seek them out from the source.

  The source who’d killed an angel-blood.

  My conscience waged a war with itself as the taxi cut through the city streets. Jarod was dangerous, but I was immortal, so no true harm could come to me. Besides, he’d had his share of opportunities to hurt me. Sure, he’d taken great pleasure in making me uncomfortable, but tonight, he’d been almost . . . sweet.

  Besides the gluttony comment.

  The taxi jolted to a stop at a red light. As I stared at diners sitting in a restaurant that spilled onto the sidewalk, a thought twisted inside my mind. I’d once helped a teenage girl quiet her urge to fill her stomach with pounds of food she’d heave up minutes later. Could one of the feathers I’d lost in Jarod’s home have belonged to this girl with destructive cravings?

  If Jarod managed to see the memories contained in feather shafts, then he had angel-blood. But angels didn’t have scores. Not even Nephilim.

  Especially Nephilim since they lacked souls. Yet he was in the system, so he had a soul.

  I growled in frustration because something didn’t add up.

  The cabbie glanced into his rearview mirror. “Everything all right, mademoiselle?”

  No. Nothing was all right. Everything was all wrong. Instead of lying, I said, “Long night.”