“The courtier is no weakling and had often been in the presence of an archangel,” Caliane continued, “but she shook when she spoke, sweat rolling off her, her eyes unable to meet mine.”
Raphael’s wing brushed the back of Elena’s chair. “Afraid enough to leave China, yet enthralled with her mistress?”
“I believe she worships her idea of Lijuan while being terrified of the truth of her.” Caliane finished off her mead. “The courtier’s estate was in a rural region. Most of the people around her were poor farmers. She did not much notice when they began to go missing—especially as the vast majority were mortals.”
No huge surprise there. Even Elena’s archangel didn’t always see the value of mortal lives. He’d come a long way from when they’d first met, but from an immortal perspective, mortals were fireflies—pretty things that blazed bright for a heartbeat before disappearing forever.
“Then,” Caliane said, “members of her own household began to go missing. At first, she believed they’d run away, but when one of her most trusted staff members didn’t return from a walk, she decided to investigate.”
An angel winged his way high above, keeping watch over Amanat’s borders.
“She found ghost villages, their people gone in the midst of living their lives. Pots left on stoves that had burned out, washing partially hung, gardens half harvested with the harvest left to rot in the open air. A baby’s bottle filled and left standing to curdle, a bag of foodstuffs gone putrid on a kitchen counter.”
The chilling recitation raised the tiny hairs on the back of Elena’s neck.
“I will say this to her credit—she didn’t turn tail and run at the first village. She went to five villages one after the other. She found not a man, woman, or child in nearly all of them.”
Elena sat up straight, exchanged glances with Raphael. “Nearly all?”
“In one village, she discovered living people so emaciated it was as if they were made of dust. When she attempted to speak to them, they gave her blank looks and continued to shuffle about their business. The tasks they were doing appeared to be repetitive—familiar movements that didn’t need input from their minds. She says they achieved nothing, but continued to repeat the motions.”
The candlelight caressed Caliane’s face. “You have spoken to me of how Lijuan fed on her people during the last battle, how you found one of her half-absorbed angels in the aftermath. It appears she is now doing this from beyond Sleep.”
“This confirms she is not in true Sleep.” Raphael’s voice was grim. “She must’ve gone deep enough that her power is no longer detectable by the rest of the Cadre, but not so deep that it will be a long waking.”
“She’s glutting herself,” Elena said. “Our worst-case scenario.” So many vanished people, all absorbed into her flesh. What would that make her when she rose?
“The unfinished ones may be from a day when she fed so much she could no longer finish them off,” Raphael said.
Elena’s fingers grew bone white around the stem of her goblet. “It could’ve been at the other end, Archangel. Early tests to work out how she could absorb and hoard power long-term.”
Two pairs of eyes as dazzling as crushed sapphires crashed into hers.
“If you are right, hbeebti, the war that is coming will be for far more than territory.”
“An archangel who can hoard lifeforce stolen from others . . .” Caliane’s jaw worked. “She will be an unstoppable, rapacious power that consumes the world.”
The dark echo of Cassandra’s voice in Elena’s head, ancient beyond compare.
Goddess of Nightmare.
Wraith without a shadow.
Rising into her Reign of Death.
28
Elena and Raphael left for China in the pitch-dark hours before daybreak.
The two of them caught the jet to the border of Lijuan’s territory, then dropped out of the specially designed hatch. Raphael went first, so he could catch her if her wings didn’t emerge, the glittering white-gold of his feathers brilliant in the dawn sunlight. The fire had begun to calm down, his wings mostly solid until he wanted them to be otherwise.
The frigid air rushed past her face as she dropped, the sensation of freefall exhilarating until she was brought up short by the lightning storm of her wings. Folding them back, she dropped even farther, Raphael by her side.
Dougal needed to maneuver the jet for his return flight to Japan without worrying about catching them in his drag, and they had to be able to see the details in the landscape.
At first glance, all appeared as it should be: lush green fields, small homes with smoke puffing out the chimneys, angels in the sky. Every single one of those angels acknowledged Raphael when they spotted him. The squadrons that currently patrolled China had been created out of soldiers taken from the armies of all of the Cadre. Including from the two previous Archangels of China.
The vast majority of Favashi’s people had chosen to stay when given the option to stay or go. They were determined to husband the territory for their liege. Lijuan’s people had joined the squadrons for much the same reason. Had to be some tension there, but this was as much their home as it was for Favashi’s people. It helped that they were all ordinary angels. Lijuan had taken her deadly generals and commanders with her.
Population density increased the farther they flew inward. Small villages turned into towns turned into cities. Raphael, I think I should land. Her body was starting to protest the long stretch in the air without a break, but one thing had become clear today: her endurance had increased from pre-chrysalis levels, as had her speed.
On the hill in the distance. It is far from any of the houses. Remember—any sign of illness, and you rise.
Elena made the landing without problem, then refueled with energy drinks and snacks she carried in the pack strapped to her back. It was designed to fit like a normal angel’s pack, flush against her spine. Otherwise her wings would’ve burned right through it, destroying her supplies in the process.
Raphael stayed close by, circling the town at the foot of the hill; Elena could see people scurrying about like ants. That type of scuttling fear? It came from the knowledge an archangel had his eyes on them—which was the whole point of the archangelic patrols: to remind mortals and vampires that the Cadre of Ten had the country in its sights.
The sky crackled with golden lightning that had all movement in the village coming to a quivering standstill.
Putting her hands on her hips, she looked up. Showing off?
A single demonstration can forestall catastrophic bloodshed.
Rested, she pulled her backpack on, then took off with startling ease. As if the more she used these wings, the stronger they got. Weird when there were no muscles involved, but she wasn’t about to look that particular gift horse in the mouth.