Illium gave a silent nod.
Not arguing, Suyin flared out her wings. But before she took off, her voice silvered into Aodhan’s mind. An angel who can bring laughter to the darkest time? Such a being is a gift, Aodhan. I see more and more why you have called him friend for these many centuries.
20
Yesterday
Sharine knew something was wrong with her. Her mind hadn’t been the same since . . . since . . . She let the memory float away, focused on trying to paste together the broken fragments of her thoughts.
“He doesn’t ask as much anymore,” she said, her eyes on the small blue-winged boy who was doing drills in the air with his class of fellow young angels. Learning to use their wings more precisely, learning to land with more control.
“His youth is a mercy,” said the archangel who stood by her side, his hair a familiar midnight hue and his eyes as blue as the heart of a sapphire she’d seen once.
Child of her closest friend in this entire world.
Her friend who had gone quite, quite mad.
A moment of clarity that whispered of her own madness, and then it was gone, slipping away like a wisp of mist from her grasp. “He learns new things, makes new friendships, doesn’t stand any longer at the edge of the Refuge waiting for . . .”
“That’s good.” Caliane’s son nodded at the children. “I see Aodhan beside him.”
“Always.” She smiled. “They are so different, but they are the best of friends.” Her smile faded as she experienced another moment of clarity. “My boy has always wanted to be a warrior. But I know nothing of this. Who will give him his first sword? Who will teach him those things that—”
A big hand closing over her one, the touch gentle despite the power that burned off him. “You need not have any concern on that score, Lady Sharine. I will ensure Illium has all that he needs.”
A stirring in the back of her head, an echo of a time she couldn’t quite see now. “Did I hold you once?” she asked, staring down at their linked hands. “Did I stroke your broken wings and tell you it would be all right?” It seemed impossible that she could’ve done so for this archangel strong and so much taller than her.
Raphael’s voice was solemn. “Yes. More than that, you loved me at a time when I was a beast with a razored spine, unwilling to allow anyone close. You will always have my loyalty.”
She looked up at him, smiled. “Raphael. My oldest boy.” Raising her hand, she waited for him to lower his head, then stroked his cheek. “Caliane will be so proud to see who you’ve become. As Aegaeon will be of his boy.”
An alteration in Raphael’s expression that she couldn’t read, but all he said was, “Your pride is the most important to him. He looks to you even now to see if you witnessed his latest achievement.”
Sharine laughed and waved at her son.
Illium’s responding smile lit up her world, until the fragmented edges of her mind almost came together, almost became as they’d once been, almost . . . “My pride in Illium will never be in question. My son is a light in this world.”
21
Today
Illium landed sometime around five a.m., after ensuring the other nightwatch sentries were all happy for him to take a break. He needed to eat; his body required extra fuel as a result of his long flight to China. It wouldn’t harm him to go without, but it would slow him down a fraction and he wanted to be at full speed in this land.
When he saw that Kai was one of the two staff members in charge of the late-night meal station for those still awake and/or working, he smiled at her. The person with her, a vampire of a certain age, sniffed. “Don’t trust this pretty one, Kai. He breaks hearts all over the world, I hear.”
Kai’s eyes went huge at the plain speaking, but Illium grinned. “Such lies you tell about me, Li Wei.”
The small and pretty woman who looked around twenty-seven, but was actually nine hundred years old with the tendencies of a strict school matron, huffed. But he caught the smile in her dark eyes. He and Li Wei had met for the first time some three hundred and fifty years past, when she’d held a position in Neha’s high-court kitchen.
On an errand for Raphael, he’d landed late into the night and had snuck into the closed kitchen desperate for a snack. Two minutes after he entered, Li Wei had busted him poking through her cupboards, delivered a sharp reprimand, then made him the best sandwich of his life—with a side of a cold potato-spice soup for which she’d refused to share the recipe no matter how much he begged.
The woman was so good a cook that she could pick and choose her employment.
It surprised him that she’d chosen to come to this place so unstable when he’d always seen her as efficient and warmhearted, but also stodgy in terms of her preferences.
“Hungry, are you?” she said now, and passed across a roll she’d filled with layers of delicately flavored meat, caramelized onions, and more deliciousness. “Eat, skinny boy.”
Illium liked her a whole lot. She’d lived long enough that she had no time for anyone’s bullshit. Next to her, Kai—despite her innate confidence—was a fragile bloom barely budded, to be treated with care. He spoke to her as he ate, learned that her entire family had survived the fog.
“Our village was in a valley where the fog didn’t seem to be able to reach,” she said. “It hovered above us like a horrible cloud, but it never dropped.”
“Hell, that must’ve been terrifying.” Illium couldn’t imagine the kind of fear her family and the others with them must’ve experienced.
But Kai shook her head. “We didn’t know, you see. What the fog was doing. We thought it was a bad storm—so bad that it had cut off all communication with the outside world. It was only after that we . . .”
She took a shuddering breath. “Later, when the archangel flew away with her army, she didn’t call us up. We think perhaps she didn’t know us because the fog didn’t touch us.”
It was an excellent theory, the fog an extension of Lijuan’s power.
“More?” Li Wei asked after he was done, and had chased it all down with a tall glass of water.
“No.” He grinned and bowed over her hand. “I thank you for the sustenance, my beauteous Li Wei.”
“Ha! Off you go, you scamp.”
He left with a light salute for her, and a soft smile aimed Kai’s way. While he was assisting with the sentries so they could take more breaks, he had no official assigned area. He decided to use that freedom to check on Aodhan, having not seen his friend for the past hour.
This place . . .