Page 49 of Archangel’s Lineage

I cannot see. I do not know. The river is murky. I just know that it must be him. Let us see what he makes of this world of steel and glass where a once-mortal stands beside an archangel. For this, I think, he has not seen even in his truly immortal lifetime.

His Sleep is deep and not meant to ever be broken. Will he even wake?

I do not know. I can but try.

31

Elena had been watching for Raphael since the instant he told her he was homeward bound. Now, in the post-dawn light, she flew up into the misty air of their city waking to the day, then headed deeper into the territory.

Raphael’s route home was an overland one at this point in his journey, and she was through with waiting, even if that meant hours of flight to meet him. She needed him with a desperation that was a clawing pulse within.

The mist lay cool against her skin, the other angels she saw during her flight yawning or powering down after a night shift, no one in the mood to chat.

Good. She wasn’t in the mood to talk, either.

It was forty-five minutes into her journey that the sun broke through the clouds... and she felt the first whisper of the sea in her mind. Raphael!

He wouldn’t have heard her, her power a mere fragment of his. But she tried again at five-minute intervals. And succeeded on her seventh attempt.

The sea crashed into her mind with a roar of whitecaps. Elena-mine, you are far from home.

No, I’m flying toward my home.

Hbeebti.

The single word enfolded her in his love as he so often enfolded her in his wings when they hugged.

She didn’t reply, couldn’t speak. And didn’t know she was going to break into harsh, wracking sobs when she finally flew into his arms after what felt like eons.

“Elena.” Holding the hover for both of them because her wings had crumpled the instant she wrapped her arms around him, he held her tight and she felt the tingle of electricity that told her he’d triggered his ability to create glamour, hiding them from sight. Her ability to sense it had emerged sometime after he’d given her a piece of his heart.

Her archangel had torn his beating heart out of his chest so she would live.

Safe in his arms, protected from any prying eyes, she cried and cried. She’d managed to keep it together this long, be the strong older sister, the tough eldest daughter, but her heart was bruised and battered and she could finally let go, held in the arms of the only man who had ever understood all the pieces of her.

He nuzzled her hair, kissed the side of her face, and, at some point, flew them down to a lush patch of woodland so they could land in a space quiet and private. She sobbed into his chest as the ocean crashed in her mind, as the scent of Raphael embedded itself back into her skin, into her bones.

She couldn’t speak to him through her devastation, whether by voice or through using her mind, but she was aware of his murmuring words, conscious of the hand he’d thrust into her hair to cradle the back of her head, of the wings he folded around her.

Aware of being loved.

***

Raphael had never seen Elena cry this way. Never.

Through all that they’d experienced together, all that they’d survived, all her nightmares, she’d never so completely shattered. It devastated him. He wanted to rage, to rend and destroy, but that would achieve nothing. He just had to bear the scalding burn of her tears on his heart, the agony of her pain tearing him to pieces.

A stirring in his mind, a voice so old in his head.

Ah, young Rafe. These... these are the tears of the child she once was.

Raphael crushed Elena closer. Go away, Cassandra, he said, not caring if he was being rude. Go to fucking Sleep. We don’t need any more problems. It wasn’t Cassandra’s fault that she saw the future, but he couldn’t deal with portents of doom today. Not when Elena was ripping herself to pieces in his arms.

“Hbeebti,” he said, kissing her temple, her cheek, any part of her he could reach. He wanted to ask her to stop, but that would be for himself, so he didn’t have to see her in this much pain. What she needed was to let it go, pour that old and twisted grief out of her where it couldn’t fester. “I have you. I have you, Elena-mine.”

I am sorry. Cassandra’s crushing age of a voice. I did not mean to wake. But this twilight is the only time when I can be with my Qin.

Angry though he was at Qin, a stab of sympathy pierced his heart. How long had Qin been separated from Cassandra? How many eons had he waited for a miracle that would allow them to be together? Raphael had just spent the minutest fraction of that time away from Elena and it had ravaged him.

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