She reached out, touching the side of Kim’s face.
He shivered, wishing for more, pathetically unable to say so.
“You’re right, Kim—I enjoyed being with you. But you’ve got it all wrong if you think I’m ready to sit on a throne, in Heaven or Hell.” She tossed her blood-red hair over her shoulders. It was as long as a curtain, tangled by the rain. “Don’t you get it? I don’t know anything but my dreams. I don’t know how to trust anything besides them. I never said anything about changing that. I don’t think I can.”
She didn’t even know what she was saying.
The cathedral seemed to be falling apart around them, mirroring Kim’s sudden need to break apart everything that stood between them. He could tear that angel limb from limb. Watch the universe collapse for the simple satisfaction of crushing his wings.
“If it’s a choice I have to make,” Angela whispered, “then I also need to make it on my own.”
She leaned forward to kiss him.
Kim turned his head, not wanting her to notice the anger in him, but against his will, her lips caressed his softly and he groaned inside.
Ever since she’d taken the Grail, Angela had changed.
Like she’d found a piece of herself and was fast becoming whole again. Right now, it appeared Kim wasn’t one of those pieces, and he was being discarded, set aside.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered to him. “Thank you. For everything.”
As if it could erase all that had taken place between them.
“I’m sorry,” she said one last time.
Oh, yes. So was he.
“Time to learn a little respect.”
The demon’s wings buckled, snapping and creaking under the force of Troy’s ambush, the weight of the cloth. In an instant they plummeted, Naamah’s sword cutting through the white satin—just far enough for Troy to wrench it out of her knife-riddled hands.
It smashed against a wall.
The shards of the demon’s blood liquefied, raining down to the floor.
“Why do you bother?” Troy hissed over the storm, more angry and irritated than afraid. She knew better than to intentionally damage sacred objects, but like all demons, Naamah lived with a curse and enjoyed it. Her race respected nothing and feared nothing, partly because she had nowhere left to go but up. “Why did you let the witch summon you?”
Naamah dropped from underneath her shroud, blasting Troy backward with a burst of crimson light. “Summon? You think and talk like the ignorant rat you are.” She hit the floor, steadying herself with a hand, and gazed up at Troy, smiling triumphantly. “As for my reasons—I think you can sympathize. The moment the Archon opens the Book will be the moment of Hell’s renaissance, Jinn. Not every demon worships Lucifel with their hearts as well as their words.”
Traitorous scum.
“Or do you have a soft spot for our soon-to-be-dethroned Prince?”
Now her presence made much more sense. Naamah, and the demons who mouthed loyalty to Lucifel yet kept her caged, wanted another god. One much more easily manipulated. Troy folded in her wings, preparing to descend and finish what she’d begun, grinding her teeth together in frustration. Naamah’s tattoo was reappearing, its swirls of black ink pooling near her shoulder and neck.
A jolt of silvery lightning swept in their direction.
The smell of flowers and flesh pounded Troy in waves, overwhelming her other senses.
Israfel had finally joined the battle.
Twenty-eight
The Eye with which I see myself is the Eye through which the All sees me.
—MEISTER ELMHART, A Delineation of Transcendence
Stephanie stumbled to her feet, tears washing out her vision.
In so many ways, the hurt couldn’t go any deeper. She had proven what a worthy daughter she was, tried to help her mother, and in return had been forced to huddle like a wounded, useless puppy. Naamah no longer understood her little protégé, at least not in the way Stephanie had intended. Maybe the demon couldn’t fathom that Stephanie had reached a point where Troy was less of a danger to her than to Naamah. Or perhaps it was Naamah’s version of pity, though right now their intimate conversation during Halloween night rang strangely false. Naamah had acted cold, and yet, here she was, screaming for Stephanie to stand back and save herself.
If Stephanie was the Archon, that was only logical.
But it was hard to get past the way Naamah had looked at her ever since the angel’s kiss.
She wiped her mouth, spitting some blood into her palm. Glass had cut her lip and her throat burned from the sizzle of energy toying with the air. She’d tried going over in her mind what had taken place between her and Israfel after their embrace, only to realize that another unsettling lapse of time had passed. Stephanie had remembered nothing until the world was collapsing around her, and it was too late to stop it. She was responsible for part of that collapse—wanted it even—but she’d never meant for it to go this far.