She caught a flash of the blood memory, and for a moment she saw him as he had been: as Michael, Protector of the Garden, the one who had claimed her for his own, back when the world was new. She remembered his strength and his power, but most of all she remembered how she had been drawn to his innate sense of justice, his goodness, the pure light that emanated from his soul. He was the chief archangel of the Lord. He had triumphed over the dragon, had thrown Lucifer and the rebel angels out of Paradise. The Hand of God.
He had chosen earth over Elysium to be with her.
For the length of her immortal life she had felt worthy of his love, had returned and reflected it. But something had changed between them ever since Florence in the fifteenth century. And since then, in every cycle, she had grown distant from him. She did not know sometimes what she loved anymore: the man or the myth. The angel who had led the armies of Eden or the boy who was lying in this bed, looking sickly and pale, and yet so dear to her heart still.
So dear to her still.
But she was tired of living in the past, tired of being in the dark. She wanted him to be the light that he was, to be the angel whom she had loved with all of her heart, when nothing had ever come between them.
“Tell me what happened, my love,” she begged. “Help me to come back to you.”
“Yes, yes. I will tell you everything.”
Allegra bent down and kissed him on the lips. It was the first time she had kissed him this way in this lifetime. They had been saving this for their bonding—for their return to each other.
Charles circled Allegra’s waist, and she let him pull her down to the bed.
FORTY
The Key of the Twins
Schuyler came back with a second pot of tea to find Jack contemplative and Catherine continuing to eat her biscuits.
She poured them each another cup, trying to think of what to say to Catherine that wouldn’t be rude or offensive. How was it that she had been sent to warn the gatekeepers—when perhaps she should have been warned about them. Aside from Lawrence, the Order of the Seven was a motley crew: Kingsley, the Silver Blood; Catherine, the baby killer…. Schuyler’s mind whirred. There was more. “There’s a healer here… a Venator from Amman. He says he is your brother.”
Catherine frowned. “My brother?”
“Yes.”
“What else did this Venator say?”
“He said the Coven in Amman is destroyed, and that a Silver Blood was behind its destruction, as well as the destruction of all the Covens. And he told us he knew what you guarded. Forgive me—that’s why I thought he was your brother, because he knew your secret.”
“I would not trust this Venator. He is no brother of mine.
my brother died in the War of Heaven.”
Schuyler thought hard. She had accepted that Mahrus was telling the truth, and even went so far as to think that he might be Onbasius, the healer from Rome, who had been part of the Order of the Seven and a gatekeeper himself. But of course that wasn’t right, because of what Allegra had told her from the beginning: one gate per family. No. Mahrus was not Onbasius and no keeper; and according to Catherine of Siena, he was a liar.
Schuyler told Catherine of what the Venators had learned—that Mimi Force had been attacked by the blood spell in the glom, and that the Nephilim had targeted Deming as well. The Venators told her they had never discovered why the Regent had been attacked, but she thought it might have something to do with information they’d found in Paul Rayburn’s files—notes concerning a star key that unlocked one of the Gates of Hell. She asked Catherine about it. “The files said that the star key unlocks the Gate of Promise. Have you heard of this key? Do you have it?”
“They have the translation wrong. It is called the Key of the Twins, not the Key of the Star,” Catherine said. “Easy enough to get it confused. Nephilim aren’t known for their deep intelligence.”
“So that’s why they attacked Mimi…. They thought she was the key somehow. And Deming, because she was a star-born twin. They were searching for meaning, trying to make things fit,” Schuyler said. “But why would they need a key if they’re already using humans to bring women through the gate?”
The gatekeeper hesitated for a moment before replying. “I suppose if you are Allegra’s daughter and worthy of the secret of the seven, you will find out soon enough anyway.”
“There’s more that my mother didn’t tell me?”
Catherine put her teacup down so it rattled the saucer.
“The Gate of Promise is a bifurcated path. It leads to two different locations. This one, in Giza, guards the underworld. The other is hidden from me. I do not know where it is or where it leads. But I do know one thing: whoever holds the Key of the Twins is the true keeper of the Gate of Promise.”
FORTY-ONE
Secrets of the Underworld
Thoroughlyravished,Mimithoughtshewouldneverfeelso tired or spent or satiated. Every muscle in her body ached. She was bruised with kisses and lovemarks, but there was a pleasure in knowing they had enjoyed each other utterly; that they had more than made up for all their time apart in discovering new and secret delights. She had to find her breath; she was panting. They could do this all day and night, and she had a feeling that, at least in the near future, this was exactly what they would do. Love was like a drug, a physical addiction. She wanted Kingsley near her at all times, wanted to feel his skin next to hers, to know he was real.