Archangel's Kiss(58)

 
 It just came out. "I helped kill an archangel. I have no need to prove myself."
 
 Neha rose, her movement as sinuous, as silky as that of the pythons she kept as pets.
 "Give me your mind."
 
 Elena was suddenly drowning in the scent of rain, of the sea, as Raphael lifted a hand filled with angelfire. "No one will touch Elena. It's Anoushka's mind you should search."
 
 There was a blur of movement overhead and then Aodhan was landing beside Elena, though, given his angle of descent, it would have been far easier for him to land between Michaela and Raphael. The angel was covered in so much blood, it had turned his diamond-bright wings to rust. But that wasn't what chilled the whole courtyard to silence.
 Aodhan had a vampire in his arms. That vampire was missing all his limbs. But he was still alive.
 
 Elena fought not to show her horror. The last time she'd seen a vampire in that condition, the man had been a victim, tortured for days by a hate group.
 
 "Sire." Aodhan placed his burden on the stones. "I was detained by Anoushka's Master of the Guard. His mind holds the truth."
 
 From the look on Anoushka's face, there was no denying the vampire's identity. Elena saw it only because she was looking directly at the Princess-a spark of pain, of loss. The angel actually felt something for this vampire. But not enough. Rising, she picked up thekukri in one of those reptilian snaps of movement, and threw it at the vampire's neck.
 
 Raphael caught it by the blade, his blood dripping onto the vampire's ravaged chest.
 "Favashi, Titus, take his mind."
 
 The quiet Persian archangel closed her eyes. The big, black archangel did the same. It took less than a second.
 
 "Guilty," Favashi whispered, speaking to Neha. "Even if Astaad forgives the murder of his concubine, even if Titus forgives the killing of the female from his lands, even if Raphael forgives the torture of his man, the attempt on his mate's life, you cannot save her."
 
 "She broke our supreme law." Titus's voice was incongruously soft for such a big man, the slabs of muscle on his chest gleaming around the steel gray of his breastplate.
 
 "The abuse of a child," Astaad murmured in an almost academic tone, stroking two fingers over his small, neat black beard, "may be the only true remaining taboo we have.
 Cross that line, and we may as well surrender to the darkness that stalks us all."
 
 "The boy isn't dead," Neha responded.
 
 "Murder or vicious assault, the penalty is the same-and the child was so close to death as to make little difference." An archangel with iron in his voice and eyes of golden brown. Elijah. "The worst is that she didn't do it alone. She taught others to savor the pain of an innocent."
 
 "She planned to take other angelic children once she became Cadre," Favashi said, her tone sorrowful but unbending, "to rule her angels by keeping their young hostage."
 
 "Witnessed." Titus's soft voice.
 
 "Even I," Lijuan murmured, a hint of surprise in her tone, "did not go that far." Her eyes almost disappeared in daylight. "What have you birthed, Neha?"
 
 What happened next was a blur. Michaela moved her hand in a brutally hard gesture. It took a second for Anoushka's head to fall off her body, her blood fountaining in an arterial spray. Wet hit Elena's face, her clothes, but she forced herself to stand her ground as Neha rose with a scream, her nails elongating and turning black even as Michaela continued to make those lethal slashing motions.
 
 Sweet mercy.Anoushka was being cut apart piece by piece.
 
 Moving at a speed no mortal would ever reach, Neha clawed Michaela's face, leaving a spread of black. Michaela slammed her hand to Neha's chest, shoving her back. The black marks on her face turned a noxious, putrid green. . . . then drew back, as if the poison was being rejected. By the time Neha got to her feet, Michaela's face was whole again, the poison dripping to scar the square-cut pavings of the courtyard.
 
 Neha twisted toward her daughter, anguish in her eyes. "She's old enough to-"
 
 Angelfire, cold and blue, engulfed what remained of Anoushka. Elena stared at the hard line of Raphael's face, without mercy, an archangel passing judgment. It shook her to the core, the speed of the execution, but she didn't disagree with it-the image of Sam's crumpled and bloody body would be with her forever.
 
 Neha's scream rent the air, so piercing it was somethingother , something beyond comprehension. The Queen of Snakes, of Poisons, went to her knees in the courtyard, tearing at her hair with the clawed tips of her hands. Raphael stepped back and met Elena's gaze. It was time to go. They left on foot, all of them, even Lijuan. A silent show of respect.
 
 No one spoke even when they reached the blinding light of the main courtyard. It was empty, the first time Elena had seen it that way in all her time here. Shadows blotted out the sunlight an instant later, a heavy cloudbank rolling in from the east. Looking up, she felt a chill crawl down her spine.
 
 It wasn't over.
 
 Elena entered their rooms behind Raphael, with Aodhan bringing up the rear. Jason had made a rare daylight appearance to take Anoushka's Master of the Guard to healers, leaving Aodhan free to return with them. "Sire," the angel said after they were behind the closed doors. "I'm injured." It was a calm statement.
 
 Elena watched as he peeled off his bloody shirt to reveal a gash so deep he'd been all but been cut in half. "Jesus. How the hell did you fly to us?"
 
 Aodhan didn't reply, speaking to Raphael as he came to stand in front of him. "I may be a little slow tonight."
 
 
 "Stay," Raphael said, raising his hand, that warm blue fire ringing his palm.
 
 Aodhan's face showed emotion for the first time. Panic, rage, fear, it was a twisting viciousness in his eyes. But he stood in place, let Raphael touch him, his flinch not noticeable unless you were looking very carefully. Raphael removed his hand a few moments later. The gash no longer looked as raw, as red.
 
 Relief flooded Aodhan's expression but Elena wasn't sure it had anything to do with the fact that his wound was well on the way to being healed. She didn't speak until after he'd left to return to his own room. "He doesn't like being touched."
 
 "No," Raphael confirmed, pulling off his own shirt and wiping his bloody hands on it.
 
 Wondering what-orwho -could have damaged an immortal so much that he flinched from even the most casual of touches, Elena began to remove what weapons she had left.
 "Good thing I brought spares." Checking her thigh, she saw that while the wound was still pink, it didn't need a dressing. "Shower?"
 
 "Yes."
 
 It wasn't until they'd both showered and were sinking into the wet heat of a desperately needed bath that she said, "You're the reason Sam is recovering faster than anyone expected." Her heart overflowed with a fierce kind of pride.
 
 "I've evolved," he said, his eyes holding an almost lost look. Blue fire ringed the hand he lifted out of the water. "The gift is new, weak-I couldn't heal Sam fully, though I returned many times."
 
 "But you sped up the process." Moving to cup his face in her hands, she touched her forehead to his. "The scales are balanced, Raphael."
 
 "No," he said. "They will never be balanced. I must never forget what I became in the Quiet."
 
 She thought of the swiftness of the justice meted out tonight, thought too of the thin line between power and cruelty, and knew he was right. "Well, one thing's for sure-if you hadn't been there tonight, I'd be dead."
 
 His eyes turned that forever, endless blue that made it seem as if she was falling into another universe. "You must never let Neha touch you," he said, gripping her nape, pulling her even closer. "I was only able to stop Anoushka's poison because it was on the surface. Neha's is a thousand times more venomous."
 
 She didn't resist his touch, sensing a fear the archangel would never admit aloud. It did something to her to know that her life mattered that much to him. Part of her, a part that was still that scared young teenager standing on the doorstep to the Big House, was so afraid that he'd tire of her, that her love wouldn't be enough.
 
 "So many nightmares," he whispered, stroking his hand up her back as she straddled him.
 
 "She left me," Elena whispered. "She loved me, but she left me."
 
 "I'll never leave you, Elena." A glimpse of the archangel he was, used to power, to control. "And I'll never let you go."
 
 Other women might've rebelled against such a claim, but Elena had never belonged to anyone. Now she did, and the knowledge began to fix something broken inside of her.
 "Two-way street, Archangel," she reminded him.
 
 "I think I enjoy being claimed by a hunter." Hands on her hips, strong, demanding.
 "Come, take me inside. Make us one."