Page 58 of A Bloodline Redeemed

When I got to the kitchen, the others filed in before me.I looked back to find Dyre still standing at the foot of the stairs, looking up toward where Hasumi, River, and the kids had disappeared, with a strange look on his face.Something about his expression made my heart ache.

“Dyre?”I called, breaking whatever spell had come over him.“I’m going to need you and Sunshine in a second here.”

He turned and crossed the grand entry with sure, long-legged strides, whatever had been on his mind just now seemingly forgotten.“I have an inkling what you might require of us,” he said darkly.“But have you really thought this through?”

I heaved a massive sigh.“Yes.No.I don’t fucking know.Ask me after I chug some of Ambrose’s special tea.”Then I crossed the threshold into the kitchen, my eyes on Elijah’s radiant angelic aura with its black outline.

From one questionable situation to another, without a single fucking breath between.Just like always.

Chapter 33

Elijah

IstareddownatAtropaBelladonna Lovell’s corpse.She was laid out on the workroom table, not a scratch on her.Other than being a little paler than usual, she looked like she was just sleeping.She didn’t even have the pallor of a normal corpse, at least any I’d seen.She looked… almost alive.All thanks to the preservation spell Dyre had placed on her.

Sighing, I gave in and lowered my mental shields, which I’d been hiding behind since the battle.I tilted my head and “listened” with my newly enhanced power—something none of us had discussed yet—and my soul sight opened up like a third eye.

And damn it, Andy was right.I couldn’t see ghosts the way she could.Not even Dyre could, though I suspected he could hear them or… sense them in some other way, like I was doing now.I couldn’t see Bella’s ghost hanging around chiding Andy and giving her a headache the way Andy described.But I could see the fragment of soul spark that still clung to the witch’s body.And I could see the bright orb of energy that wove through the room, as if the soul was pacing, impatiently waiting for us to remedy the situation, rather than moving on to wherever she should have gone by now.

“Holy spirit of the Divine,” I muttered, not happy about what I was seeing.

I had accused Andy of drinking too much of Ambrose’s “special” tea a few moments ago, but now I was really wishing I had a big steaming mug of it myself.

“You see something, don’t you?”Andy asked, crossing her arms in a way that made her lovely breasts strain the fabric of her t-shirt, and tapping her foot like a cartoon character.I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if smoke started pouring out of her ears, with the way she radiated impatience.She gestured at where the orb was currently floating next to Dyre.

“She’s been yammering about necromancers and angels since we left Magea,” Andy grumbled.“She won’t fucking shut up.”I swear I saw her eyelid twitch.

Ithadbeen a rather… trying day.One none of us had really taken time to process yet.

Dyre was silent.But his sharp gaze watched me like a hawk, waiting.Letting me make this decision on my own, rather than ordering me to do as he wished, the way we all knew he probably could.

I was at odds with myself.On one hand, Bella was Andy’s sister and only living relative, and her soul clearly wasn’t ready to move on.But on the other hand… none of us had fully trusted her when she was alive, her motives were still suspect, and her morals were questionable, to say the least.She had been willing to do some pretty awful things in her quest for victory.

I didn’t question whether I could do it.Somehow, I just knew.I could call Atropa Belladonna’s soul back into her earthly vessel.Something inside me had been altered by the power exchange between us all, by my link with Dyre and Sunshine… angels couldn’t restore the dead to life.We weren’tactuallydeities or messengers of some divine power.But… I wasn’t an angel anymore.Or, notjustan angel.I was a revenant tied to a staggeringly powerful and skilled necromancer,andAndy and Sunshine had somehow formed some superbond between everyone in this house that sent my existing magic skyrocketing to a level that was terrifying.

If the other angels knew about this, knew what I suspected I could do now… they’d hunt me.They’d want me executed before anyone else caught on to what sort of abomination we had manage to create and started trying to make their own freak angels.

I wouldn’t blame the angels for killing me.Power like this shouldn’t exist.

A comforting wash of energy pulled me from my thoughts as Hasumi materialized in the room.

Dyre stopped staring at me at once, turning to the water weaver and biting out, “Where are the children?You left them?”

I arched a brow at his tone.But Hasumi just smiled faintly and sent a feeling of reassurance through the room.“They are safe.Sleeping beside their new kitty.Zhong is watching over them and tending to their every need.I thought I might be needed here.”

Dyre cleared his throat and turned away to stare at Bella’s corpse.“Of course.”

“Elijah?”Andy said with as much gentleness as she could probably muster at this point.She really wasn’t a patient woman to begin with, and it hadbeen a long day.

I squared my shoulders.There was nothing to be gained by dawdling.“Ask her…why.”

“Why?”Andy repeated.

I nodded.“Yes.Why does she linger.Why does she want to live, when she could move on.”

Andy turned toward the orb, which was now hovering near Hasumi.“Well?”she said, putting her hands on her hips.“I know you heard him.”

She narrowed her eyes as she apparently listened to the ghostly voice of her sister.Was this what it had looked like when she spoke to me before I was reincarnated into this body?Then again, I had been able to take on a bit more corporeal form, thanks to my angelic powers and the spell placed on the bestiary, so maybe not.

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