“You would know all about the Fallen, wouldn’t you, Zaniel,” Harshiel said, his voice thick with the emotion I’d seen in his eyes.
“She is not fallen,” I said, but my voice wasn’t certain.
He went after that sign of weakness just like he had on the practice mat when we were learning to fight. “Your flesh was weak, Zaniel, or were you just not good enough to complete the seduction?”
“What did you just say?” I asked.
“Did he just say you were bad in bed, Havoc? All those fantasies down the drain,” Lila asked, coming to join the outer limits of the loose circle that the squad had formed around the Sentinels.
“Do you spread corruption among all the females you meet?” Harshiel yelled.
“Harshiel, enough!” Suriel said.
“Why do you defend him?”
“I am not defending him, I am stopping you from speaking out of school,” she said.
“Oh, Havoc isn’t just the star in the fantasies among us females,” Lila said, her voice full of sarcasm that Harshiel probably wouldn’t understand, “he’s the favorite in a lot of the male fantasies, too.”
“Don’t help me, Lila,” I said.
Harshiel turned on me. “Have you fallen so low as that, you who once were almost our brother in arms?”
There’d been a time in my life when I would have defended my honor against that kind of suggestion, but that time had passed; love was too precious to deny, even if it wasn’t my kind of love.
“I have been on real battlefields, held soldiers in my arms while they bled and I fought to save them, killed enemies that were trying to kill me. I have been a real solider, a real policeman fighting to keep Heaven and Hell from destroying the Earth, not a hyped-up security guard training for a battle that will never come.”
“How dare you!” he said, taking a step toward me.
I went into a soft fighting stance, hoping that he wouldn’t notice, but I should have known better. We’d both begun our lives with the same training.
Harshiel went into a much more obvious stance, knees soft, hands loose as he raised them to protect his upper body, but not fists, too easy to break your hand that way, elbows and knees were better.
I fell into a stance that almost mirrored his, bouncing a little on the balls of my feet, rotating my neck and shoulders. I realized that I wanted to fight him. I had spent thirteen years using our training in the real world against people who were trying to hurt or kill me. No matter how good your training is—and Master Donel was the best—it’s still not the same as real combat. Training to fight for your life is still not the same thing as actually fighting for it. A few minutes of real violence will teach you things that a lifetime of practice can’t.
“Harshiel, stand down,” Suriel ordered.
“We are here to protect Master Suriel, not to serve some private grievance,” Turmiel said. He started to reach out to grab Harshiel’s arm but seemed to think better of it, letting his hand fall to his side. He looked at Suriel and then at me.
I kept my eyes on Harshiel. He had beaten me regularly as a child. Not as a bully, but just because Harshiel was the best at hand-to-hand. No one but Donel or one of the adult Sentinels could beat him when I was at the College.
I didn’t think of myself as that competitive in that stupid male way that caused so much trouble for every police officer, but suddenly I realized that for the right person, for Harshiel at least, I was that guy. Part of me didn’t like that I had this in me, and another part thought, About damn time.
“As much as I hate to say it, Havoc, stand down,” Charleston said.
“If I said please, Lieutenant?”
“I agree with Havoc; I think tall, dark, and handsome here deserves to get his ass kicked,” Lila said.
“You just met him, Bridges, how do you know he deserves an ass-whooping?” MacGregor the Elder asked.
“A woman knows these things,” she said.
“Zaniel could never beat me before, I doubt that has changed,” Harshiel said. He settled more solidly into his stance.
“That was when we were boys, Harshiel; we’re all grown-up now,” I said.
“You have to take off your shirt when you say things like that,” Lila said.
Officer Minis chuckled and lowered her gun, holstering it. “Yeah, like in the movies.”
Lila nodded. “Yeah, you know, Havoc says ‘all grown-up’ and then he tears off that little bit of a tank top and shows us that six-pack he’s been working on.”
I laughed and relaxed my fighting stance. It was too ridiculous.
Charleston said, “Bridges, stop being a corrupting influence on the new guy.”
“The only corrupting influence here is Zaniel,” Harshiel said, and was totally serious.
“New girl,” Lila corrected. “As a bisexual woman I can tell the difference between girls and guys.”
“Girl is a sexist term; don’t you ever read the gender sensitivity emails?” Charleston said, smiling.
“Nope,” she said.
“I do, and guy is fine, but thanks for the heads-up, no sharing the shower with you,” Minis said, but she was grinning.
“You are making fun of me,” Harshiel said, but stayed in his stance as if Donel was going to come walking by and criticize him.
“Well, handsome, if you take your shirt off, I’ll stop teasing and just admire the view,” Lila said.
“Bridges, enough,” Charleston said, but he was fighting not to smile.
“I do not take my clothes off for strange women.”
“Pity,” Minis said, softly.
“So, do you take them off for strange men?” Lila asked.
“Are you talking to me?” Harshiel asked.
“I am,” she said, but this time she wasn’t smiling. She gave him a look as straight and unflinching as Suriel usually did.
“Stop picking on our guests,” Charleston said.
“Sorry, Lieutenant,” she said, still giving Harshiel serious eye contact. She wasn’t smiling now, as if the teasing was over and she was on to something more solemn, but what? If she had had her own magic and not been a null, I might have worried that she was going to use a spell on him; if she’d been better at hand-to-hand, I’d have accused her of trying to make him fight her instead of me, but as it was, I had no idea what she was thinking.
Apparently Charleston didn’t know what she was up to either, because he said, “Bridges, back away from the Sentinels. They’re going to escort Havoc’s friend Suriel here back to the College, and we’re going to let them do that unless she says she doesn’t want to go.”
“Master Suriel is expected back at the College,” Turmiel said.
“I am expected,” Suriel said, folding her hands in front of her.
“She must come back with us now,” Harshiel said, and he was finally standing up straight and tall again, and not like he was about to participate in training.
“I am a master, you are not, Harshiel; you do not dictate to me,” Suriel said.
“Of course, we do not dictate to you,” Turmiel said.
“Are you refusing to return to the College?” Harshiel demanded.
“No, but I will return because I wish to and because it is my home, not because you drag me back like some runaway child. I did healing work on someone who had been demon touched, which is my job as one of the Chief Infernalists of the College of Angels.”