Page 14 of Angel's Vengeance

A flicker of surprise—or was it something like hurt?—tightened Neela’s features.“Because he can’t.”She paused, and damn if he didn’t see an inferno to rival what the mortals thought of hell burning in her eyes.“As I said, his goal was to get into the Empyrean, but as a being of the shadow realm, he can’t abide by any light, be it celestial, solar, or otherwise.So, he needed something, or someone, who could do both.During one of the earlier conflicts with I’m guessing your kind, he acquired an item from the battlefield.I never knew what it was, but the story goes that he fused that, along with a part of himself, into the dark magic he cast to create me.”

She lifted a lock of her shockingly golden, tightly coiled hair.“But I didn’t come out looking like he intended.Whatever that item was that he found, well, it didn’t agree with his powers or plans, apparently.While it’s true that I can go out in light where other charmers can’t, that’s where the extent of my abilities ends.I have no powers, and magic doesn’t work on me.I have no gifts of the mystics, no innate strength of the elite, and certainly no skills that would be of use to the apex’s order.My sire had one shot with whatever he’d procured on that battlefield, and in the end, all it got him was a powerless immortal demon whose only talents are her abilities to sunbathe and serve as Cyro’s constant reminder of what he could have had and lost.”A tightness settled around her shoulders before she lifted her chin.“But don’t worry.He’s since perfected the formula.”

“And he can’t kill you because only angel fire can truly destroy a charmer.”The words left Rhode’s lips before he could think of their ramifications.It wasn’t until the other angels all rose from their places and flashed warning looks that he realized his misstep.

He didn’t want to kill her, at least not yet, but hell if they knew that.

Hell if he truly did, too.

“Yes,” Neela answered, acting for all the world like Rhode hadn’t just poured a bucket of chum on her in a sea of hungry sharks.“So I finally ran away.”

That had his ears perking up.

Iron took a step forward but never let Rhode wander too far into his periphery.“You ran away, and I take it Daddy noticed when you didn’t show up for dinner on time.”

She scoffed.“More like I ran away because I saw something I shouldn’t have, decided I wanted zero part of it, and thought it was time I took my chances among the mortals.And let me be perfectly clear about something.”Her gaze snapped to Rhode’s, and he had no choice but to listen.“Just because Cyro and his band of merry assholes can’t kill me doesn’t mean I can’t be hurt.”

Two thoughts slammed into his mind simultaneously.The first was the regrettable lament that, of all the beings in existence, he’d somehow bonded with one whose colorful vocabulary could rival Chrome’s.The second, and far more concerning, was the tunnel of terror that her words scraped through his chest.

...can’t kill me doesn’t mean I can’t be hurt.

Had she been hurt?

Was she hurt like me?

All at once, his mind spun out of control, whirling through the bevy of blurs that made up his core memories, the ones he had trained himself to stay far away from lest his mind revert to what he’d worked so hard to escape.

Violence roared in his ears, and those sputtering flames of angel fire tried to punch through his veins, but without their fuel, they could only wail at his insides until his head threatened to explode.Around him, words were said, dialogue exchanged, some murmurs that rang vaguely of agreements inwe’ll continue this tomorrowtones.

“...he’s got another item, something he calls a relic ...trying to pull the same shit as he did with me, but this time, he’s convinced he’s figured it out.”

The din in Rhode’s mind sputtered to a halt, but his muscles only tightened further.

“No,” he whispered through clenched teeth.

But the others didn’t hear him.They were too focused on Neela and the gavel her final words struck them all with.

“The relic is a piece of the Empyrean’s gates.Cyro believes that, once he casts the dark magic needed to fuse parts of himself with a part that contains verified celestial magic, he’ll be able to create a new race of charmers, one that is no longer subjected to the dark alone, is just as powerful as he is, and can enter the heavenly realm once and for all.”

Chapter7

If there was one thing Rhode never quite managed to get used to, it was the infuriatingly perfect temperature of the angels’ underground den.Chalk it up to years of living in a petri dish that would make even the most flourishing of mold spore colonies turn their noses up, but temperature-controlled climates still made him itchy.Hidden beneath New Hampshire’s White Mountains, the den was a veritable cavern-turned-fortress that was a marvel of geothermal and solar energy engineering.Hot water reservoirs, floor-to-ceiling generators, underground turbines, and a matrix of exhaust pipes made it so that, despite the granite around them, every room was a perfect ambient temperature.

And that was less than ideal when all you wanted to do was torch the first thing in sight and let the stifling air choke off the screams threatening to punch through your chest.

“Yup.Okay.See you in the morning, then.”Titan pocketed his phone and grabbed a beer from the fridge.“Brass is at Molly’s place with Neela.She’ll be staying in the guest room at the apartment for the time being.Bronze and Steel will be patrolling the grounds for the rest of the night in case any more charmers show up.Neela felt pretty certain they’d continue to look for her, but without those other ones you guys smoked being able to get a message back to home base, she doesn’t see how they could find her easily.We should be good for a bit.”

Thetsssof the can tab popping open echoed off the stone walls, but it only served to rattle Rhode’s nerves even further.Even the rhythmic rise and fall of Titan’s throat as the beer slid down the angel’s gullet felt like an oily caress over Rhode’s skin.

Titan lowered the can and extended a finger.“You want to know what’s weird?”

Iron swept his arm in front of him.“You mean weirder than the shitstorm that was the last few hours?”

“Funny.”Titan tossed a beer to Iron, who caught it and opened it up one-handed.“But yeah, weirder than that.Turns out, Neela didn’t have a game plan beyond getting the heck out of Dodge.”

Tungsten folded his arms over his chest.“You’re certain?”

“Yup.She mentioned to Brass and Molly how her main goal had been to get away and that she didn’t want to figure out her second step until she’d managed to take the first one because that was hard enough.Didn’t go into details about that ordeal, though.From what Molly said, the woman’s beat and went to bed as soon as they showed her a mattress.”He laughed softly to himself.“I think we all can appreciate that kind of exhaustion.”

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