Nalini Singh: Archangel's Blade

Sorrow swallowed. “Do you think I can?”

“Yes.” Sorrow needed someone to have faith in her. “Oh, yes, sweetheart . ”

“Elena wanted to come see me,” the other woman blurted out without warning. “I know she saved me . . . but she has wings.” A shiver that shook her entire frame. “I couldn’t.”

“I’m sure she understands.” Squeezing her shoulder, Honor had another thought. “How much time are you spending alone?”

“I’m never alone.”

“Sorrow.”

“It’s not too bad. My family . . .” Her lip wobbled and she bit it hard enough to leave red crescents in the delicate flesh. “They don’t know about Uram—the story is that I was attacked by a human crazy and infected with a dangerous virus. I thought they’d reject me when the changes started to show, but they’ve been wonderful. Mom would be here every day if I’d let her.”

“Then let her,” Honor said, touching her hand to the girl’s cheek. “Family builds a foundation, one that’ll help you stand, fight.” Honor had never had that foundation, so she understood its value on a level Sorrow couldn’t comprehend.

Nodding, the young woman reached out with an impulsive hug. Honor returned the embrace, happy she was at the point where such sudden actions didn’t cause her to flash back to the pit where Amos had trapped her. As she stroked her hand over the girl’s back, her eyes met Dmitri’s and something unsaid but understood passed between them—Sorrow was no longer simply his to watch over, but theirs.

It was as Dmitri and Honor were driving away from Sorrow’sthat he got the call.

“Dmitri.” The rough male voice brought an ancient memory to life.

“Please.” A lifted hand, the boy’s back bloody from a vicious whipping.

“It’s all right,” Dmitri said, unable to feel pity, his heart stone, but aware this boy was another victim, no threat. “We won’t hurt you.”

“Is she dead?”

“Yes, the bitch is dead.”

“Kallistos.” He pulled over.

A rusty, painful-sounding laugh. “Very good.”

Dead air for several seconds.

Dmitri waited, knowing Kallistos would get impatient—according to the people Jason had in Neha’s court, this vampire, with his face and body that had mesmerized men and women alike over the centuries, had never quite mastered his temper.

“I hold the reins today, Dmitri.” Kallistos’s voice would never be smooth, his throat having been damaged at a critical juncture during his Making, but now it lost the veneer of sophistication. “You’ll do as I say or this rather pretty angel will die a slow and painful death.”

“Tell me what you want.”

“I’m sending you directions. Drive. If I see any hint of wings, I’ll gut him.”

Directions came into Dmitri’s in-box as the call ended. “This is only part of the route,” he said, after giving Honor a précis of the conversation.

“He doesn’t want to chance an angel flying ahead of you.”

Dmitri considered his options, made a call to Illium. “Alert Raphael as soon as he’s back in the city.” The archangel was on his way back from a meeting. “You’re too distinctive, Jason’s gone, and I don’t trust anyone else not to muck this up.”

Illium cursed. “I’ll fly out, meet Raphael partway.”

Hanging up, Dmitri turned to Honor. “Are you armed?”

“Always.”

Punching up the speed, he raced out of New Jersey and toward Philadelphia. More instructions came in as he drove, and it was seven hours later, the sky beginning to darken with the first faint streaks of the time between sunset and true night, that he found himself back in Manhattan. Mouth grim, he picked up the call as it came in.

“Have fun on your little drive?” Kallistos laughed, and it was the sound of metal grating.

Dmitri maintained his silence, guessing Kallistos would believe him to be in the grip of a rage that would disallow rational thinking. It didn’t. Dmitri’s hatred for Isis didn’t blind him—not now, not after he’d bathed in her blood.

“I left you a present.” Kallistos was almost giggling. “In one of the New York properties you own.” The other vampire hung up.

Telling Honor what Kallistos had said, he did an illegal U-turn and headed out toward Englewood Cliffs. Sire, he said, able to speak to Raphael since the archangel was directly overhead. If you and Illium will take these three— he relayed the addresses— I’ll take care of the fourth. He sent through the final address as well.

“We’re taking the closest property,” he said to Honor. “Raphael and Illium will reach the other locations much faster.” Kallistos, he thought, was long gone.

“What are the chances this might be the spot?”

He considered the high fences, the lane in the back that could be used to sneak onto the property. “It’s relatively private, and decaying enough to suit Kallistos’s sense of theater, from what we’ve seen so far.” Increasing his speed, he blew past startled motorists.

If it had been an older angel at risk, Dmitri wouldn’t have felt the overriding alarm he did now, but the one who’d been taken was young, his immortality not yet set in stone. Of course, most mortals or vampires would still be unable to cause him a fatal injury, but Kallistos was older than Dmitri; he had both the strength and the knowledge to murder an angel so vulnerable.

“We’re here.” Dark hair whipped off Dmitri’s forehead ashe took them down a somewhat derelict street, before turning in through a pair of open gates that led to a decaying apartment complex.

“I’m guessing the value is in the land?”

“Millions.” Bringing the car to a halt behind the protective barrier of a pile of rubble, Dmitri got out and opened the trunk to retrieve a stunning blade too big to be covertly carried. No, this weapon was about power and intimidation.

It was, if she wasn’t mistaken, a scimitar. However, she didn’t get much of a good look at it before he was striding back, the weapon held to his side, his eyes flat with lethal intent. “Stay at my back, Honor. Kallistos is most likely gone, but we can’t assume that.”

“I’ll cover you,” she said, not arguing with the order because she knew about confronting your own monsters, and Kallistos was Dmitri’s.

“No, stay literally at my back. A gunshot won’t do me any significant damage, but could kill you.”

The idea of Dmitri bleeding for her made Honor’s hand clench brutally on the butt of her gun, but again, she kept her silence, knowing time was of the essence. “Let’s go.”

He was a sleek shadow in front of her, one who ensured she was never exposed to anyone who might be watching them from the building. Honor didn’t breathe until they’d traversed the open section to reach the door. He went in first, while she kept her eyes forward as she backed in behind him, gun pointed outward.

The only thing that met them inside was silence . . . and a broken angel. The boy—and yes, he was a boy still, his deathly pale face holding the fading softness of childhood—had been dumped on his front in the dusty lobby, his pale brown wings streaked with blood and dirt as they lay limp and crumpled on either side of him.

Wrong, there was something wrong with those wings.

Broken.

It was, she realized, feeling sick to her stomach, the only way to transport an unconscious angel if you didn’t want to use a huge truck and draw unwelcome attention.

“Honor.”

“I’ve got you covered.”

Crouching down, Dmitri touched his fingers to the angel’s cheek.