I’ve been considering how best to utilize it.
Elena met those eyes of endless blue, of an archangel whose heart was no longer in any danger of turning cruel.
He spoke again, the cool winds of him a caress across her senses. We will not abandon him, Elena. Aodhan says as you did—that Laric is dying slowly here. A dangerous pause. The boy is afraid of being shoved out for interrupting the “serenity” of this place with his scars, so he rarely ventures out now.
That idea didn’t just magically appear in his head. It had been planted there by men who searched for luminescence in unkindness. “You’ve done an amazing job with Ibrahim,” she said aloud to Laric and it wasn’t just talk—Ibrahim was breathing easier, his color better. “Especially since you’ve only had a little training.”
Laric wrote again on the notepad. The damage is not so bad. He will heal. He seemed to accurately read her shock at that description of Ibrahim’s injuries, because he added, No signs of weapons being used. Nothing to cause damage deep on the inside.
The hairs stood up on Elena’s arms.
38
Taking the notepad, she walked over to show it to Aodhan and Raphael. “Fists and kicks, that skews personal to me.”
“Someone in a rage.” Aodhan’s voice was quiet but his shattered eyes were shards of ice. “As the sire said, he had to have been kicked after he was down; fists alone wouldn’t have collapsed one side of his body or pulverized his arm.”
A rustle, Laric coming to hover awkwardly nearby.
When Elena waved him closer, he came. It was only once he was part of the circle that his hands began to move. Aodhan watched, his face increasingly grim. “He says he’s certain it wasn’t undirected rage—the injuries are too closely grouped for that. One side of Ibrahim’s body was targeted. Particularly his arm.”
Elena stared at the ground with a scowl, trying to focus her thoughts. “Why that arm?” She raised her head. “I mean, I could understand targeting both arms if it was about him giving us the map, or if it was punishment because he touched something out of bounds, but one arm?”
“Not something.” Firelight flickered on the top arch of Raphael’s wings, and then those wings were white flame.
She heard Laric suck in a breath, stagger back a step, but when the fire stayed confined to Raphael’s wings, he came back in a show of unexpected courage.
“You touched Ibrahim on that arm.”
She stared at Raphael, his words vibrating inside her skull. “That doesn’t make sense. I belong to you. Everyone knows that.”
His smile was coolly satisfied, his wings flickering back to normal as quickly as they’d switched to flame.
Making a face at him, she said, “And you belong to me, Archangel.” She gave him a smug look of her own.
Laughing, he put a hand over his heart. “I would wear your brand on my skin, Elena-mine. Even if it meant searing it anew each day when I woke.”
“Ahem.” Elena pointed to the wing that bore the bullet scar. “You already wear my mark, Archangel.”
He unfolded his wing, smiled in open satisfaction. “So I do.”
Laric had been turning his head back and forth as they spoke.
Elena could all but feel his flabbergasted surprise at the conversation. Apparently, everyone expected archangels and their consorts to walk around being otherworldly and powerful, not act like the lovers they were. Though, at least with Elena, there was an expectation that she was apt to be a little odd, since she’d once been a mortal.
It was Hannah who held the capacity to surprise the heck out of everyone: Elijah’s consort was nowhere near as flawlessly ladylike as even Elena had once believed. If she’d really thought about it, she’d have realized the truth long before she and Hannah became friends. No artist ever walked in a straight line. And no warrior as powerful and as intelligent as Elijah would so deeply adore a woman who was a graceful ornament.
“Regardless of the fact you are mine,” Raphael said, folding back his wing, “it is too much of a coincidence that Ibrahim was beaten so badly within hours of interacting with you in a way that, to a jealous eye, would’ve been unacceptable.”
“If you’re right, then they must hate you.” Her knife was in her hand between one breath and the next, the hilt a familiar hardness. “Whoever it is must want to annihilate you.” She bared her teeth. “Good thing you’re an archangel.”
Raphael’s responding smile was as lethal. “Yes. As I do not believe this is one of the Cadre, I am in no real danger.”
Glad her lover was such a tough and dangerous opponent, Elena put both hands on her hips. “I agree—I don’t think anyone in the Cadre is carrying a secret torch for me,” she said dryly. “Which leaves one of the guards or escorts or the Luminata. I know who I’d bet on.”