The crowd goes nuts and drags the men and women into the room. Blood starts to flow as they are pushed to the tables and bar top. They join the other people as hungry fangs bite down on them.
I turn my face away, “I can’t watch this.”
Ellie lifts my face to hers, “Remember this, Rayne. Remember this, this time. You must try to.”
I nod, “I will.”
Tears pour from Ellie’s face. I know her heart is broken. She loved him more than the rest of us.
They blow on my face and suddenly I am sitting up in my bed. I gasp for air. Wyatt grabs my hand, “Go back to sleep.”
Something is nagging at me. I run for the picture, wondering if that was where my dream was. I look back at Wyatt and have a bad feeling I should bring him. I carry the picture to him, hold his hand, and touch the star.
As we are suddenly standing on the hillside, Wyatt looks down. He’s completely naked. He covers himself, “What the hell, Rayne?”
I shake my head, “Something is wrong. I don’t know what.”
He looks around the garden as the lady runs from the cottage, “HURRY! THIS WAY!” She screams at us. I pull my pajama pants off and drag my tee shirt down to cover my underwear. Wyatt pulls on my pink fleece pajamas I stole from Stella. He sighs as we run to the cottage. The lady grabs my hand, “The picture has been destroyed. You have to flee to the other side and never come back. If they trap you in here, you will never fulfill your duty.”
I grab Wyatt’s hand and touch the other star. Instantly, we are inside of the lady’s house.
He looks at me in the dark, “What happened?”
I shake my head, “I don’t know. It was a dream. I never remember them.”
“Where are we, I can’t see?”
I smile, “I can. Let’s go. We need to find clothes and shit, all over again.”
He kisses the side of my face as we walk to the door. I turn and see the way my eyes glow in the mirror. It all flashes back. I stop and stare at the silver eyes and suddenly I see.
The words leave my mouth in a whisper, “I was in the basement at Constantine’s castle. I was with my sisters. We walked down a hallway and saw a mirror like this one. Our eyes glowed like mine do. We walked to a room where hundreds of vampires fed on people. No, fae. They fed on fae. Constantine is not on my side. Taking the sword from my heart and his has made him a vampire again. He no longer has his humanity.”
Wyatt holds me tight to him, “What do we do?”
I shake my head, “Go to your parents’ house?”
He shakes his head, “No. The other families will have gone there. They may still believe they have to sacrifice you.”
I look down on the ring on my hand, “We need to go to the garden. We need to hide there until we know what to do.”
He kisses my head again, “We need an army.”
I open the door to the house and step out onto the sidewalk. The cold air hits instantly.
He wraps around me as I shiver, “We will find our army.”
I shake my head, “I don’t know if that’s possible. The antichrist has people doing it for him. I have no one.”
He spins me to face him, “You have me. You will always have me.”
I smirk, “Not that I’m not grateful, but babe, you are one man.”
He shakes his head, “I am more than that and so are you.” He nods behind me.
I turn and there is the blonde from the Air Angel Nazi party. She smirks at me, “Is he going to sprout his own wings this time, or will you be carrying him again.”
I scowl, “He’s only half, he doesn’t have wings.”
She winks at him, “He’s a Van Helsing. They’re angels. So he’s more than half and he has wings. He just needs to pop them the first time.”
I laugh and look at Wyatt. He shakes his head. The angel jumps at him, grabs him, and flies up into the air fast. I look up when he screams. She drops him and as he’s falling to the ground and screaming like a girl, huge white wings burst from his back. They catch a breeze and he shoots off to the right, still screaming. I gasp and then laugh. He lands on the road a hundred yards away. He looks back at the wings and then at me. A huge smile creeps across his lips. He jumps into the air, and of course, he is a natural instantly. He lands in front of me, “This is awesome.”
I roll my eyes, “Yeah, so are your extra-tight, pink fleece pants.”
The blonde angel lands next to him. He shoves her. She laughs, “That’s how you learn.”
His chest is rising and falling as he nods, “Okay.” He is out of breath and still a bit pale, but I can see he is excited. She looks at us, “Ready?”
She jumps into the air without waiting for our answer. Wyatt smiles at me and jumps into the air too.
I follow his pink pants to the palace of the air witches. I don’t look down when we get there. I hate the whole cloud walkways thingy. I hate heights. I hate flying and I hate that they don’t have a regular house on regular ground.
The air witch looks at me, “Your thoughts are so harsh for an angel.”
I cock an eyebrow, “Stay out of my head.”
She bows, “As you wish, sin eater.” She looks cocky. Wyatt looks back at me. I am as always, stunned at the vision of his broad chest, muscles and tats. But adding the wings to the already beautiful man, is devastatingly sexy.
He gives me that grin that makes my stomach tighten, “You like them?”
I nod once. He laughs and struts over to me, “You having the same thought I am?”
I shrug, “Probably.”
His blue eyes light up, “You wanna have sex while we’re flying?”
I make a face, “We are not having the same thought. What is wrong with you? That’s disgusting.” I walk past him, forcing myself to pay attention to the pink pants, and not what I can clearly see outlined beneath them.
He’s worse than the Hamm-aconda.
The white priestess gives me a warm welcome, “Sin eater, we understand you are worried about your army?”
I look at her and smile, “I am.”
She takes my hand and walks me to the edge of the cloud floor. She points below at a hillside. There is a castle made of white on it. I don’t even understand how it isn’t something everyone has seen. It’s huge and obvious. She holds her hand there, “The reinforcements have been awaiting this moment for hundreds of years. Let Lucifer and his little minions gather, they will not touch you!”
She jumps, bursting wings from her back and pulling me with her. We float—well she floats, I dangle until we reach the ground. I drop to the grassy hillside in a heap. She lands like she rode a pillow down. Wyatt does the same. The white priestess gives me a grin, “I hope this is more to your liking.”
I nod, “Thank you.” I point upward, “Sorry about being a judgy whore about the cloud castle. It’s lovely, really.”
She scowls, mouthing the words judgy whore and walks to the castle.
“It is stunning. I wish Mona could see it. It is worthy of a Lord of the Rings reference and beyond what I am capable of retelling.
Wyatt picks me up off of the ground, “You suck at flying.”
I pull my arm from him, “I hate flying. I don’t suck. I just wasn’t prepared for that.” I look down, “You’re wearing girls’ pants, don’t make fun of me until you’re wearing something a little more appropriate.”
He laughs and pulls me along the grassy hillside.
When we get inside of the huge white walls, I am shocked in awe. I stare like a fool in every direction. Thousands of angels, witches, and other things I’m not even sure I can categorize, walk the small city. The castle is the heart and around it is a land like I have never seen before.
“It’s like Narnia.”
Wyatt sighs, “Just don’t say anything that makes you sound stupid, okay? These ones are going to have a hard enough time with the fact you’re actually only a girl from Vermont.”
I fold my arms across my chest and walk after the priestess. The people who see her drop to their knee and wait for her to pass.
She climbs the stairs to the castle with us following along.
When we get inside, I am desperate not to moan in awe at everything I see. It is incredible. The castle is like ivory or something. It glistens and shines at every angle. It’s so clean. It’s weird. Earth witches are not that clean. Air witches are the OCD witches of the world.
She brings us to the main court. A man turns and faces Wyatt and me. He smiles at us like he’s inspecting us. He turns to Wyatt, “Hello, Nephew.” He nods at me, “Niece.”
Wyatt beams, “Michael?”
He nods, “At your service.”
Wyatt gives me a look, “This is…”
Michael walks to me, taking my hand in his, “I am your Uncle Michael. Your parents were archangels with me, long before they fell.” He squeezes my hand, and I have a feeling he is rifling around in my head, like the nixie queen did but without the biting.
I smile, “Nice to meet you.”
He laughs, “You are a strange little thing.”
I scowl and he laughs harder. He looks at the priestess, “Our father has a sense of humor, I will give him that.”
The priestess nods, almost bowing. “I couldn’t agree more, my lord. She is unique, even to her former selves.”