Archangel's Heart (Guild Hunter 9)

“I will be happy to give you lessons during your time here,” the Luminata responded with apparent sincerity. “I’m sure a hunter will begin to chafe at being trapped in such a quiet place. No rogue vampires here for you to hunt.”

“Activity’s always welcome,” she replied, handing him the stick she’d borrowed. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning then?”

A nod of Gian’s head. “It will be my pleasure.” He glanced at Aodhan, a gentle disappointment in his gaze when he looked back at her. “You do not need a guard with me, Elena.”

“Aodhan’s not a guard,” Elena said. “He’s a friend—and if I had to guess, I’d say he’s composing a painting in his mind.” She had no such belief, but she knew Aodhan would back her.

Gian’s expression was suddenly suffused with light. “Ah, of course. This is a new environment for him. All artists absorb the new.” He looked in interest at where Aodhan remained by the wall, out of range of their conversation. “Will he begin to create it here? We have supplies—some of my brothers prefer to search for luminescence through art rather than martial contemplation.”

“I’ll ask him,” Elena said. “But I know he spends a lot of time thinking before beginning to create.” Aodhan had told her that once as she was sitting in his Tower studio reading a backlog of Guild bulletins while he just looked out at the stormy skies beyond.

First I must see, Ellie. Only then can I create.

“I will ask my brother Natal to come here tomorrow morning during our practice,” Gian said, and again, he was suddenly standing much closer than he should’ve been, the movement so quiet she hadn’t caught it. “He and Aodhan will have much in common.”

Regardless of the crawling feeling across her skin, Elena stayed in place. She knew Aodhan would be with her in a heartbeat if she gave the slightest indication of trouble, but she wanted to get a handle on Gian. Secrets and lies aside, was he just weird because he was old? Or was he something far more dangerous?

“You’ve led your brothers for a long time,” she said. “Aren’t you tired of it?”

A slight cocking of his head. “You’ve asked about me?” His eyes filling with light, his wings flaring out before closing back in.

“You are the Luminata. I was curious.”

“Yes, of course you would be curious. It is in your blood,” Gian said almost absently.

The words were stones thrown into a still pond.

Elena wanted to clutch at them, claw out the answers she needed. But she couldn’t show her hand. Not yet. Not when she was stumbling in the dark. “Yep. Hazard of being hunter-born, I guess.”

Gian blinked, stared at her for a second as if she wasn’t who he expected, then smiled. “Yes.” A glance up at the sun. “Alas, I must go. It is time for my first meditation—but I look forward to meeting again.”

Saying her good-byes, Elena walked up to Aodhan while Gian left the same way as his previous partner. “Just so you know,” she said, “you’re contemplating creating a new artwork.”

“You did not lie, Ellie. This place does interest me on an artistic level.” Eyes of shattered light met hers. “Gian stands too close to you.”

“Do you think it’s because he’s been here for hundreds of years?” She nudged her head and they walked down the corridor. “His social skills might just be rusty.”

“No.” Aodhan’s response was firm. “He only does it with you, no one else.”

Elena thought of how Gian had stared at her so strangely there at the end. “I remind him of the woman he was involved with.” She’d updated Aodhan on that piece of information after their flight the previous night. “I’d probably stare, too, if I met a man who looked like Raphael. And if the breakup was bad, if Gian’s lover did betray him, it explains why he hasn’t mentioned her.”

Aodhan nodded, but she saw he wasn’t convinced. Neither was Elena: she was just forcing herself to look at every possible angle. She couldn’t allow herself to be unduly influenced by the fact that those tiny hairs on the back of her neck? They’d quivered upright the entire time she was with Gian.

A sudden wind whistled through the courtyard.

Elena shivered, hearing within it a woman’s desolate moan.

* * *

Raphael sat next to his mother in the internal chamber. There was nothing in this room beyond ten armchairs arranged in a circle. On his right was Titus, next to Titus sat Elijah. Alexander had taken the seat directly opposite Caliane. Next to him sat Michaela on one side, Favashi on the other. Charisemnon had the seat between Michaela and Elijah, while Neha sat next to Caliane on her other side, Astaad next to Neha.

The Cadre of Ten was in session though there were eleven archangels in the world for the first time in known history.

“We shouldn’t be here,” Charisemnon said into the quiet broken only by the rustling of Neha’s silver-shot maroon sari as the Archangel of India crossed her legs.

Neha’s hair was in its usual elegant knot and she wore a teardrop-shaped bindi in jewel blue between her eyebrows.

Raphael knew that while Neha may have stopped wearing mourning white, she would never forget—or forgive—the death of her daughter. Regardless of how much he respected her, or how much he missed the relationship they’d once had, he could never forget that simple fact.