Page 47 of Grave Revelations

He squeezed her hand but continued staring at the angel blocking their path. “Sariel. You made a deal with Samael, and he expects your presence. I care not for your devoutness. I am your only warning. Do not keep him waiting.”

Azazel turned, pulling Rebecca with him.What are we doing?she asked in his mind.

He won’t let us go. They followed a stone path as it zig-zagged down the side of the mountain they’d just climbed.

“Gabriel.” The angel landed in front of him, much smaller this time. “Please. Go in my stead.”

Azazel moved around him as they continued their downward march.

“He has my other half.”

The words halted Azazel, his grip on Rebecca’s hand tightening painfully.

“Circe left the mortal plane more than twenty-five hundred years ago.” Sariel moved around them, his glow dimming as he met Azazel’s steely gaze. “And she has remained in Primoria from the day she drew her last breath.”

Azazel's fingers flinched, his grip loosening, and his gaze darted toward Rebecca for only a moment before he squared his shoulders. “It seems your troubles have been solved then. Take Samael’s offer and be with her in Primoria.”

You don’t mean that, Rebecca thought.

I wouldn’t hesitate to do the same for you.

Rebecca’s breathing hitched. He had already sacrificed himself for her once. She didn’t doubt the sincerity of his words.

Sariel reached for his free hand, but Azazel flinched back. “I know there’s no love lost between us, brother, but you must know I would never wish this upon anyone. You cannot think I would willingly go to such a fate.”

Azazel met his stare, the taller of the two now, and even his wings seemed to stretch higher. “I know your analogous umbra should have been your reason for existing in an unending eternity of pain and death. Yet you left her there for more than two thousand years to be tortured endlessly, then revived, to be defiled, tormented, and killed again. An infinity of punishment for half your soul. Any difference between us spawned from that choice.”

Sariel dimmed further, skin the color of a normal man. His gaze darted from Rebecca to Azazel and back. “Did you see her?” Sariel’s green eyes glistened, liquid pooling at the edge of lashes that matched the curly russet hair atop his head.

Rebecca’s heart constricted. She couldn’t imagine more than two thousand years without your soulmate. She’d been distressed over the few hours Azazel had been banished back to Primoria.

Azazel’s eyes widened, and he turned his full attention to her.

You were distressed? Over me?

Rebecca’s cheeks burned, and she wished that, for at least the millionth time in her long life, she didn’t have such fair skin.

“I remember what it was like to be in Circe’s mind,” Sariel said, snapping their attention back to him.

We will talk about this later.His thoughts were more of a warning than a promise, but another thrill shot through her.

Stop it,she told herself.

“I didn’t see her. But my stay was restricted to very few places. As Samael’s co-ruler, you would have no such restrictions. You could free her from her endless misery.”

Sariel glanced between them again. “Is it as bad as we’ve always been promised?”

“Worse.”

Rebecca squeezed Azazel’s hand again.I’m sorry.

His fingers tightened around hers.Don’t be.

“He can’t have the lance. It would make him too powerful,” Sariel said.

Azazel nodded. “Rebecca will keep it safe.”

Sariel’s gaze darted to Rebecca. “Her?”

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