Grace and Glory

by Armentrout, Jennifer L.

  I froze as my eye shot to where he floated.

  “And when Lucifer explained to him that giving life was beyond him, that he is not the keeper of souls, he demanded that Azreal himself answer to him,” Peanut continued, but there...there was something a whole lot wrong with his voice, and not just the fact that he’d referred to Grim by his angelic name, which was weird all on its own. It had...strengthened, becoming less airy. Gone was the singsongy way he normally spoke.

  “Azreal didn’t answer, because he knew there was no reason to. There was nothing he could do. You were beyond him.”

  The tiny hairs all over my body rose. “You’re starting to creep me out, Peanut.”

  His head tilted to the side. “I think you’re going to be way more creeped out by the time this conversation is finished.”

  Skin pimpling, I stood so that the bed separated us. “What’s going on?”

  It could’ve just been my wacky eyes, but the window behind him seemed less visible through his head. “You know what people get so wrong about God? That He is an absentee father. That He doesn’t care for His children, watch over them meticulously, day in and day out. That He doesn’t interfere in small ways—ways often and easily overlooked. That random choice to turn left instead of right on the way to work? The unexpected decision to stay home or stay out late? The unplanned trip or phone call, purchase or gift? None of that is random or unknown. That is God, doing what a good parent does. Stepping in when they can and knowing when there is nothing they can do. I never really understood how God could do all of that—be willing to do anything and everything to be near His children and yet be able to walk away.” His shoulders seemed to lift in a sigh. “There are always so many rules, Trinity, so many expectations, even for God, and most assuredly for a chief prince.”

  A shiver skated over my skin. No. There was no way—

  Peanut looked over at me, and yep, his face was definitely more solid. “You were right, you know? When you said there had to be signs that something had gone terribly wrong with Gabriel. That there had to be signs.”

  I stepped back, bumping into the wall.

  “And there were. You were also right when you said you were a loophole. A weapon that could be snuck past the oath to harm none. At least in the beginning that was all that you were, but then I learned just how and why God could and would do anything for His children.” A smile formed. “That sometimes even God bent the rules.”

  I was completely flattened against the wall, my heart pounding so fast there was no question I was very much alive.

  “An archangel cannot remain on Earth and among souls for any real amount of time. There are too many responsibilities and too many consequences. The presence of one would draw too much attention from all manner of things,” he said, and the barest white glow started to appear in the center of his chest. “But just like God, I could not walk away from my own creation. My flesh and blood.”

  The glow from the center of his chest washed across the rest of his body. Heavenly light pulsed an intense white—the kind of light I knew souls saw before they passed on. It was warm and bearable to look upon, to witness.

  Peanut changed.

  His body lengthened and his shoulders broadened. The mop of brown hair lightened, turning to the color of the sun. His features hardened, shedding the fullness of youth I was familiar with. The old Whitesnake T-shirt turned to a white sleeveless tunic, and the ragged jeans became linen, pearl-hued pants. And his skin...it continuously shifted through the shades of human skin before settling somewhere in between.

  “So,” he said in that voice that didn’t belong to Peanut. “I did what I could to watch over you.”

  My father, the archangel Michael, stood before me.

  “Holy shit,” I whispered.

  He laughed—he actually laughed, and it was a strange sound, one familiar and yet unknown. It reminded me of Peanut’s laugh if that laugh had grown up.

  “I am not surprised by that response.”

  My eyes felt like they were about to pop out of my head. “You... There is...” I shook my head. “Is this real?”

  He nodded.

  “But where is Peanut?”

  Those all-white eyes warmed. I didn’t know how that was possible, but it was, because they did. “I am Peanut.”

  “That’s impossible. Peanut was a teenager. He is a teenager, and he died in the ’80s—”

  “At a Whitesnake concert, after climbing to the top of a speaker tower and then falling to his death?” he finished for me. “Have you ever heard of anything more ridiculous?”

  Well, no.

  “Let me tell you, humans have found incredibly bizarre ways to die, and there was one who died that way. Except he was older, and the story of his death amused me. It stuck with me for many years.”

  “The...story of his death...amused you?”

  “It did, so I borrowed his death.” His head tilted—oh dear God, it tilted in the way it often did when Peanut looked at me. “You should sit down.”

  I couldn’t move. “Peanut wasn’t real?”

  “Peanut is real,” he corrected. “He is, well, a figment of me. A manifestation or projection of me, when I was a...younger, vastly more annoying angel prone to all manner of things.”

  “Like creeping into the bathroom when Zayne showered?” I screeched like a full-blown pterodactyl.

  “When you say it that way, you make it sound perverted.”

  “Because it is perverted.” Oh my God, why would I even have to explain that to anyone, let alone an archangel?

  “I was curious about the man who I knew would own my daughter’s heart. Wasn’t like I looked where I shouldn’t.” He shrugged. “Besides, there is nothing in this world we have not seen a million times before.”

  “Somehow that makes it all the worse,” I murmured.

  One side of his lips curled. “It is so human of you to imply that there is a sexual motivation behind literally everything. Newsflash, Trinnie,” he said, and every muscle in my body seized. He sounded so much like Peanut. “It’s not.”

  “I think I need to sit down.”

  “You do.”

  I didn’t. “You would watch me sleep! The way you would talk? The things that came out of your mouth.”

  “As I said, Peanut is a figment of my youth,” he explained. “I was quite obnoxious as a young angel. Ask Lucifer. He can confirm that.”

  “But all the ’80s stuff—”

  “The ’80s always amused me. The music. The hair.” He paused. “The leotards. Very interesting decade that proved, well, you haven’t seen it all when you think you have.”

  Oh God.

  Peanut was my father.

  My father was Peanut.

  I did sit down then, right there, on the floor. “Is it possible that I had, I don’t know, a stroke, and that explains all of this?”

  “That doesn’t even make sense.” A moment passed and my father peeked around the bed. “Would it be easier for you to see me as Peanut? I can change back into him. I just cannot maintain the projection for very long.”

  Understanding struck me upside the head. “That’s why you were always disappearing! Even back in the community. I just thought you were off doing...ghost things.”

  “The projection requires my attention. Not a lot, but enough that it can be a distraction. Do you want me to change back to him?”

  “No. That would...that would be even weirder, and I don’t think I can deal with that.”

  He nodded and then sat at the foot of the bed. He was silent.

  I wasn’t. “What about the whole purgatory thing? When you said you were sucked into it?”

  “That did happen when Zayne Fell. Not to me, but to those who hadn’t moved on.” He rested his hands on his knees. “I thought it would be important for you to know the impact of hi
s Fall, even if it was temporary.”

  Okay. Well, impact known. Not sure what that changed, and for some reason, that seemed like a random, nonsensical thing a parent would try to teach a child.

  “You avoided Zayne after he Fell, because he would’ve known, wouldn’t he?”

  “He wouldn’t have known it was me, but he would’ve sensed something was not quite as it seemed. That would’ve been an unnecessary complication.”

  “And Gena? She isn’t a ghost. It was just an excuse for why you couldn’t be around.” It became clear. “Because of Gabriel being around? Was that why you were...gone more than you were here?”

  He nodded.

  Another thing struck me. “My mother—”

  “She is at peace,” he answered quickly. “Happy and comfortable.”

  My heart was pounding again, and I wasn’t even sure if it slowed down. “Do you see her?”

  “I do,” he said, surprising me. “I like her. She was not chosen at random.”

  “She wasn’t?”

  Michael shook his head. “No.”

  I started to ask more questions about that, and then decided, in that moment, I didn’t think I could handle hearing about my mother and father’s love affair.

  I could only deal with so much.

  There was something I needed to ask. “Why has she never visited me?”

  “It is the same reason why Zayne’s father did not see him when he was in the Heavens,” he said, and I jolted. “Because she knew you would not be able to let her go. You would be stuck, and that pain, that grief and that love and want would’ve trapped her. She wouldn’t do that to you.”

  A knot formed in my throat. “Does she know how sorry—”

  “What happened to her was not your fault. She never thought that. Not for one second, and she would be furious if she knew you believed that.”

  Tears blurred my eyes. She totally would be furious.

  “The actions of others caused her death. You were just a chink in that chain, just like her. It was those who wielded that chain who are at fault. Deep down you know that.” His voice softened. “But sometimes no ownership in the end results is worse than the guilt of being the cause.”

  Ugh.

  He sounded so...so wise, and it was weird and wonderful, but mostly weird.

  I swiped at the tears. “Why?”

  He seemed to know what I was asking. “Because it was the only way I could have any relationship with you. The only way I could know you.”

  The knot swelled in my throat. “And Zayne?” I asked hoarsely. “You made sure he could Fall so he could be with me.”

  “It was a small gift I could ensure.”

  A small gift? A wet laugh left me. “And the stars? That was you.”

  He nodded.

  “And you...you are the reason why I’m alive right now.”

  “Partly.”

  I blinked. “Partly?”

  “I had help from a certain human with a new lease on life.”

  “The Crone,” I realized.

  Michael inclined his head. “The potion she gave you didn’t just bring Zayne to you. It bound you to him. Similar to the Protector bond, but stronger. You carry a part of his essence in you. As long as he lives, you live. You are marked.”

  I pressed tingling fingers to my chest, to where the strange scar had taken shape, right where the light that had come from Zayne had hit me. Suddenly I remembered the look Tony had given the Crone when she told me I needed to draw my own blood.

  My wide eyes shot to where Michael sat. “I...I didn’t die, then?”

  He shook his head. “You were weakened and slipped unconscious while the bond repaired the damage done.”

  “But I thought an angel blade could kill anything?”

  “The bond between you and Zayne supersedes all.” He paused. “Well, almost everything. If you were decapitated, then...”

  I blinked slowly.

  “You have his lifespan, Trinity.” Those all-white eyes bore into mine. “You do understand what that means?”

  My heart skipped a beat. “I’m... I’m immortal?”

  He smiled then, and there was a catch in my chest. There was such familial fondness in the curve of his lips. “You are as immortal as any angelic being is.”

  “I won’t...age?”

  He shook his head again. “Most angels stop aging once they reach a certain maturity,” he said, which explained why so many of them looked like they were in their late twenties. “But you stopped aging the moment the bond was forged.”

  All I could do was stare at him, and I did that for probably several minutes as I tried to work my brain through the fact that I would not grow old and break my hips while Zayne remained young and gloriously broken-bone free. Not aging past nineteen meant I would probably be carded for, like, eternity—

  Oh my God, like for an actual eternity. Or until my head was chopped off, Highlander-style, or until Zayne... I wasn’t going to even go there. There were far worse things than never looking older than I did now.

  Like dying now or by old age, in Zayne’s arms—“Wait,” I exclaimed, pulling my legs up to my chest to stand. “Do I have two bodies now? The one that was back in that field and this one now?”

  A perplexed look settled into Michael’s features. “You have the strangest mind. You don’t have two bodies.”

  “Then does Zayne know I’m here?” I asked. “Because I died—or passed out. Whatever. I was with Zayne.”

  “You were, but I simply willed you here.”

  “You simply willed me here?” I repeated dumbly. “Like I went poof?”

  An eyebrow rose. “Yes.”

  “Oh my God, Zayne must be really freaking out!”

  “Probably.” He said this like it was no big deal. That people poofing out of people’s arms happened every day.

  And the fact that he could just will me from one location to another was another mind-boggling fact. “Is that something all archangels can do?” I asked, thinking if that was the case, then why hadn’t Gabriel just willed me to his location?

  “You are of my flesh and blood,” he said, and I wished he’d stop saying it that way. “That is why.”

  Made as much sense as any of this did. I scrubbed a hand down my face, over my eyes. My eyes. My stomach dropped as I lowered my hand. I was almost afraid to ask, but I had to know. “Will my eyes continue to get worse?”

  “Would it change anything if they did?” he asked. “If you’d known that the bond meant an eternity of darkness for you?”

  “No.” I didn’t even need to think about that. “Being blind isn’t worse than death. Having this gift of life—of a life longer than I can even comprehend—with Zayne is so much more than being able to see. I can learn to live without my vision.” And Zayne would be there to help me. “I can’t learn how to come back from the dead.”

  “Your mind.” He shook his head, laughing softly. “The bond stopped your aging. I cannot be a hundred percent sure, as this is not something ever done before, but it may have also stopped the deterioration of your eyes.”

  “Really?” I whispered, a wave of prickly shock washing over me.

  “It’s no magic cure. Your vision will not improve, and from what I understand about your particular genetic disorder, there is no guarantee of complete blindness,” he said, and he was right. There wasn’t. RP often progressed differently for each individual. I was kind of surprised he knew that.

  Then it struck me that he did know because Peanut had known everything about my disease.

  And he was Peanut.

  I might pass out.

  “Or it may get worse, Trinity. Your aging has stopped, and what that does genetically is beyond even me. It is unknown, as are other things, such as your ability to conceive—”

  “L
et’s not talk about that.”

  He frowned. “Conception is a simple matter of life, Trinity. It’s nothing to be embarrassed by. Do you think I’m unaware of your recent scare?”

  “Okay. Whoa. Let’s just not go there. I don’t think my brain could process it.” I shuddered, but my brain had already gone there. Grim knew when he spoke to Zayne and I. He’d said that a child between us would be a Trueborn, but that was before. I hadn’t understood what he meant then, but I did now.

  That was before I had taken in a part of Zayne’s essence—before the bond. “What am I now?” I asked. “Am I still a Trueborn?”

  “You are,” he confirmed. “But you are also something else entirely. Something new and without labels. You are, as you’ve said before, a very unique snowflake.”

  A shaky laugh left me as I tipped my head back against the wall. I’d said that multiple times to...Peanut. All of this was a lot—a lot of good, but still a mega truck ton of stuff. I looked over at him, throat feeling swollen all over again. “I don’t know what to say other than thank you, and that seems inadequate—”

  “A thank-you is not necessary. This is not a reward for fulfilling your duty. This was simply the only way I knew how to show you that you are not just a weapon. You are Trinity Marrow. A warrior both mentally and physically, with questionable tastes in food, but spot-on when it comes to television. Except for Supernatural. I do not like how they portray me. But you are many things, including my daughter.”

  Oh God.

  Tears crawled up my throat, welling in my eyes. “Don’t be like this—like a father.”

  “I don’t understand.” Confusion filled his voice.

  “It’s easier to think of you not caring or just being displeased with everything in general,” I blurted out in a rush. “Because then it doesn’t seem so unfair that you can’t be my father. I’m not missing out. You’re not missing out, you know? Because you’re going to leave after this, right? You can’t stay here. I won’t have you.”

  “No, I cannot stay here.”

  Tears snuck through, dampening my cheeks. “And Peanut?”

  He moved then, kneeling beside me. Carefully, he reached out and brushed the tears away. “I don’t think you need Peanut any longer.”