by Jane Kindred
at will, training it along his flesh to do what he pleased with it, but these creatures simply burned. They seemed entirely composed of a
hot and pliable substance, like gold poured from a crucible. When they touched his flesh, it boiled.
They had touched it repeatedly, holding him down against a chair
in the kitchen. Listening to them move wordlessly through the flat, he couldn’t be certain how many there were. They touched everything,
overturning baskets and upending desks and tables, flinging drawers
from the bureaus and scattering the belongings of the occupants. Yet
nothing burned except Vasily.
He knew of course what they wanted, though they didn’t speak.
When he remained silent, the Seraphim stroked his flesh—what was
left of it. He hadn’t wept since Belphagor; only Bel could extract such emotion from him, and only with Vasily’s consent. When that bond
had been broken, Vasily had armed himself with stoic indifference.
72 JANE KINDRED
But he was weeping now, if it could be called weeping with tear ducts
seared away. Perhaps wailing was a better term.
It wasn’t concern for protecting Belphagor or that little brat of an
angel that stayed his tongue. It was the principle of the thing. If he gave in to the persuasion of a Seraph and broke faith with an accomplice,
he was no better than the Host believed him to be.
And he was fairly certain the angel wasn’t the only thing they
wanted. The demons he’d been with at The Brimstone had probably
ratted him out and named him as a Liberationist. If the Seraphim
wanted more names, he wasn’t about to provide them.
He arched away from the touch of a Seraph at his chest and gave
voice to his pain. Next to the intensity of their torment, it was almost a pleasure to scream. The Seraph leaned in close and brushed the back
of its hand against Vasily’s cheek. He attempted to turn away but it
grasped his jaw.
“I’ve nothing to tell you,” Vasily gasped. “Can’t you get that
through your fucking head?”
In answer, the Seraph forced open his mouth, brought its own
mouth close with the intimacy of a kiss, and exhaled. The hot air of a smelting furnace seared into Vasily’s throat and lungs.
§
Belphagor had come to a decision while the metro sped beneath
the Neva. He’d considered, briefly, handing the angel over to the
Seraphim. They were almost certainly at the flat, and Vasily was almost certainly at their mercy. That thought alone was enough to make him
agree to turn over a whole host of fugitive angels and say thank you
for the privilege.
But despite his lack of integrity in most matters, he took stubborn
pride in his word. If he took money for a service, that was the service he rendered, and he had promised to hide the girl from those who
wanted her dead. In any event, his name was now in the minds of the
Seraphim. No amount of flight or hiding for his own sake would be
sufficient to save him.
Only one thing was more important to him than his word or his
own hide. He was willing to risk both to protect Vasily. But if he could keep the angel safe at the same time, he was honor bound to try. So he
THE FALLEN QUEEN 73
would wager on the long shot. If he failed at the former objective, the latter would be his legacy: the demon who saved the last heir of the
House of Arkhangel’sk.
He debated whether to tell her about the arrival of the Seraphim
if she hadn’t heard his whispered conversation with Vasily. In the end, it seemed the most effective way of keeping her out of the literal line of fire.
The girl stared at him without expression.
“They aren’t here to rescue you,” he admonished. “You understand
that, don’t you? They were sent to execute you.”
She nodded and shrugged.
“Stay here in the station until I come back. If I don’t come back
in ten minutes, you run.” He pressed a piece of paper into the angel’s hand. On one side in angelic script, he’d written a name and an address of a woman he’d once lodged with in the suburb of Pushkin, and on the
other he’d written an introduction in Russian to Yulya Volfovna. The
human woman was entirely off the grid with regard to the network. It
was the safest thing he could think of.
Belphagor took the charmed stone from his pocket. “If we don’t
find one another again, you’ll want this. It’s a callstone. Your nurse has the other. She can call whoever holds it.” He laid the blue-green
alexandrite in her palm and gave her a billfold full of rubles.
The girl stared at the objects. “You’re not coming back.”
“I will if I can. I fully intend to.”
She tucked the items into her pockets and gave him her usual
unreadable look.
“Ten minutes.” Belphagor pushed open the glass door marked
“Vikhod.” He didn’t care to look long at the angelic blue gaze. It was like being stared at by his own conscience.
The shades were drawn on the third-floor kitchen window. Not a
good sign. Belphagor took off his jacket. With a smooth shrug, he rolled his shoulders to release his wings, but kept them tucked close. His only advantage was that he knew the Seraphim were inside. Unfortunately,
they also knew he was coming.
After employing his usual tricks to open the triple set of locks on
the outer doors of the flat, he took a kerchief from his pocket. Folding
74 JANE KINDRED
it into a narrow band, he placed the kerchief over his eyes and tied it behind his head. Then he stood and waited. Seraphim were not known
for their patience, and nothing escaped their notice. The double panels of the inner door flew open and Belphagor smelled the stench of
burning flesh. Behind his blindfold and his tightly closed eyelids, he could still see the glare of seraphic radiance.
There was a moment of silence, and then what could only have
been the hiss of seraphic laughter.
“You’re looking for the girl,” said Belphagor.
The laughter ceased. “You will give her to us.” It was not a voice
heard with one’s ears, but a burning inside one’s head, as if written on the slate of the brain in a deep, subsonic tenor.
“My friend and I lost her, as I’m sure he’s already told you.”
“‘Friend’ tells us nothing. His opportunity has passed.”
Belphagor felt the heat of the Seraph’s touch before it reached
him, and he held his breath. The Seraph snarled when its fist passed
through empty space. Belphagor exhaled and materialized behind it.
As an airspirit, he had at least a trick or two up his sleeve.
“I came here in good faith. Once we found out who she was, we
planned to turn her over to you for the reward. Believe me, losing her was not part of the plan.”
“You lie.”
“The angel was spooked by the local police. Why would I bother
to come to you with such a story if it wasn’t true?”
“We remember the nature of your truth, suka.”
The invective was hurled so violently inside his skull that Belphagor
clutched his head, giving the Seraph the opening it needed. He yelled
and flung out his wings at the blistering against his shoulder. There
was no longer any hope of this situation ending amicably. Belphagor
had no intention of going back to a Russian prison. When the Fallen
committed transgr
essions in the world of Man, the Seraphim made
certain they were punished in the world of Man.
His wings poised in a protective cone, Belphagor twisted up
against the hot, stifling air, stirring up a vortex of wind in the tiny flat. Books and papers, along with small pieces of furniture, spun into the funnel. The chaos provided him a momentary advantage, but the
THE FALLEN QUEEN 75
Seraphim closed in around him, forming a sphere of containment with
their triple wings of fire.
Belphagor’s flesh began to cook. His only option now was to
start a conflagration. If he was lucky, he might escape in the ensuing destruction. More probably, he would go down with the building, but
he would go down a free demon.
With a painful wrench, he switched directions, spinning the fire
of the Seraphim out into a white-hot spiral that strafed the walls like the sun ejecting a sudden flare. Seraphic flame licked up the tinder of hanging tapestries, curtains, and wood paneling. The Seraphim roared
in fury. They did not appreciate having their power directed by a lesser being.
The whipping funnel of superheated air and seraphic accelerant
was now an entity unto itself. Belphagor dropped to one knee and
covered himself in the wings of his element, bowing his head to wait
for the flame to consume him.
The flame did not come.
It took him a moment to realize what was happening. The vortex
had broken through the roof of the complex, and the air around him
was charged with electricity. The light, previously almost blinding
even behind his bound and shuttered eyes, had dimmed, muted by
an oppressive presence gathering overhead. Streaks of light flashed
around him in rapid succession. The building was engulfed in a
miniature twister.
The whirlwind roared through the apartment, moving past him
without drawing him into its grip. It was growing rapidly, the base of it seeming to stretch the width of the apartment itself. Lightning struck beside him, electrifying the edges of his wings and setting his hair on end. A deafening crack split the air.
The wind ceased, and he was drenched in warm rain. Belphagor
lifted his head and retracted his wings. The blindfold was soaked
against his eyes and he yanked it down to see the angel standing before him. The self-contained columns of rippling water that were her wings
were crossed above her head in an ironic shelter from the pouring rain she had engendered. Where the Seraphim and their acidic flame had
dominated the apartment, there was now a spiral of charred gouges in
76 JANE KINDRED
the floors and walls, steaming when the rain struck them.
Somehow, the angel had vanquished the Holy Seraphim. It defied
logic. The Order of Principalities was at best a minor celestial power, ruling only by shrewdness and not by strength. There was no earthly
reason the angel ought to have been able to vanquish the Seraphim.
Not that one could truly vanquish a Seraph. They were beyond
the laws of both Heaven and Earth. They sought Heaven’s fugitives
in whatever sphere they might take refuge, nothing more needed to
transport the Seraphim than their own will. But one whose will was
stronger than theirs had sent them packing.
A moan came from the kitchen and Belphagor jumped to his feet.
Someone else in the flat had survived.
Belphagor knelt on the scorched linoleum where Vasily lay beside
a toppled chair, afraid to touch the firespirit and make his discomfort worse. It was hard to tell where the weeping, blistered flesh ended
and what remained of the wooden chair began. Severe burns covered
nearly every inch of Vasily’s chest and shoulders, and a near-perfect
handprint, like a child’s art project in grotesque hues of black and red, decorated his face. The scalded rubescence of the rest of his features had every sign of the hot breath of the Seraphim. From the way he
wheezed with each shallow inhalation, the inside of his body must be
equally inflamed. There was probably nothing to be done but make
him comfortable, though how was another question.
“Vasya, you idiot,” he murmured.
Vasily’s scorched lips moved and Belphagor leaned down to try
to hear him. “You’re the idiot.” His voice was barely a breath. “Can’t believe you lost her.”
“I didn’t lose her.” Belphagor didn’t know whether to smile or cry.
“Do you think I’d just give our meal ticket up to the Seraphim?”
“Your meal ticket’s right here.” The angel stood dripping in the
doorway to the kitchen, her wide eyes fixed on Vasily. Behind her, rain still poured into the half of the flat that had lost its roof.
“I told you to wait until I came back,” said Belphagor.
“You weren’t coming back.” She spoke softly, her voice tinged
with dismay, though her words had the calm detachment of supernal
training. “The Seraphim are subject to the House of Arkhangel’sk. I
THE FALLEN QUEEN 77
thought they might listen to me.”
“Listen to you?” Belphagor shook his head, amazed at her
naïveté. “That’s not quite how I’d characterize what just happened.
And whether they ‘listened’ to you or not, I can guarantee you they
won’t stay away for long.”
“Go,” said Vasily. The single syllable prompted a brutal fit of
coughing that nearly left him unconscious.
“He needs water.” The angel crouched down with a cup filled
from the tap while Belphagor’s attention was on Vasily.
With a trembling hand, Vasily reached for it, but Belphagor
grabbed the cup before he could take it.
“Not that water.” The water in St. Petersburg’s taps wasn’t fit for
consumption—human or otherwise. He jumped up to get the pitcher
of water boiled the night before.
When Belphagor turned back, Vasily had grabbed the angel’s
empty hand. The girl was staring at the charred, peeling skin as if
stunned by a high-voltage current. Radiance danced between them in
a violet arc, and she stumbled to her knees, the peculiar light flitting from her skin to his like burning oil on the surface of a river. She tried to pull away, but the magnetism of their opposing elements seemed
to lock them together. Wide-eyed and helpless to stop it, the angel
watched the radiance consume Vasily in a halo of violet luminescence.
Where the strange light flowed along the ruined flesh, it seemed
to impart moisture to the tissue, transforming it from the inside out.
Vasily clutched the angel’s fingers, slipped between his, and gasped
at the radiance penetrating his scalded airway. Inhaling deeply, he
exhaled a shimmering amethyst mist.
When their hands finally moved apart, the radiance evaporated.
Each damaged cell had been restored.
§
Three tongues of flame danced in the queen’s palm. On the
balcony of her boudoir, Aeval held them up before her in the soft
gloom of dusk and watched them flicker and whirl: the essence of the
elemental fire that ruled the blood of the Second Choir. It was the first of the celestial elements she had learned to control, and in it, she could scry the progress of the Seraphim.
78 JANE KINDRED
The flames flared suddenly and then wavered and spun,
extinguished into a spiral of ash. Aeval cried out in disbelief. Someone had van
quished her Seraphim.
She crushed the useless dust in her fist, nails digging furious
crescents into her palm, and flung the ashes across the sparkling
surface of the gazing pool in the garden below. All these months spent cultivating the Seraphim’s allegiance, and now she would have to wait
until they regenerated to find out just how they had managed to fail
her.
If they’d destroyed the supernal family themselves in the first
place, there would have been no need to hunt the little tart. The
Seraphim were one of many factions who had been only too eager to
see the principality deposed. They had been happy enough to hand
the mantle of Heaven to Aeval, but none of them had been willing
to step up and take decisive action. It had fallen to her to arrange the killings and to employ her silly, besotted angel for the task. And he
had managed to botch the job.
The essence of peasant magic still lingered about the empty shroud
in the mausoleum. Someone had helped the girl put a simulacrum
in her place and escape. Somewhere among Aeval’s devotees was a
traitor. But the errant angel must be dealt with first, before anyone in Elysium was the wiser.
It should have been a simple matter for the Seraphim to track the
ring. The problem ought to have been remedied by now.
Aeval stepped back into the boudoir and drew the doors together
with a snap. It was time for a trip to the North Country. She would
have an answer for the Seraphim’s failing even if she had to rip them
from the elements herself.
THE FALLEN QUEEN 79
Devyatoe: Firewater
from the memoirs of the Grand Duchess Anazakia
Helisonovna of the House of Arkhangel’sk
We fled St. Petersburg before the destruction of the apartment
house brought the authorities, having waited as long as we dared for
Vasily to regain his strength. One of the dead demons had owned a
motorcar, and with the help of Vasily’s elemental skill, Belphagor had used what he’d called “hotwiring” to start it.
Vasily appeared whole after what had passed between us, but his
vision had not recovered and he was still too weak to stand. Exactly
what had passed between us, I could not explain, any more than I
could explain how the elemental water of my radiance had dismissed
