Page 73 of The Fallen
But now that Lilith is here and questioning me, I find my gaze wandering around the room, searching for the pretence of distraction. The flat is small, the living room and kitchen squished together in the same space, the bathroom and bedroomvisible from here, down a short hallway. There’s striped, peeling wallpaper in shades of grey and green and scratched wooden floors. None of the furniture can be any less than thirty years old.
Overall, Lilith’s flat seems drab, pockmarked by mould and splattered with stains that have probably changed colour half a dozen times since they were created. The state of the flat contradicts quite heavily with Lilith herself, who seems impeccably put together, her clothes and makeup simple but well-fitting and artfully applied.
It all screamssafe houseto me although I don’t know why I’d think that. Safe or otherwise, this is a flat anyway, not a house.
Despite her earlier displays of anger, Lilith doesn’t rush me or even appear annoyed by the delay in response. She stands there, towering over me, elbows bent and fingers digging into her sides, watching me expectantly. Her tank top is short enough that when she moves her hands to her hips, it rides up just a little, revealing a swathe of toned stomach. There are tattoos that swirl in intricate patterns over her abdomen. I can only see parts of them, so I can’t decipher the symbols or their meaning, supposing they have any. She’d need to reveal more skin, lower, where her leather trousers cover her up.
“They’re scared of you,” I answer finally.
It’s what led me here, that terror I saw on the other Angels’ faces when they spoke her name in hushed, sometimes frantic tones.
Lilith’s squint becomes slightly less suspicious and a lot more curious. I’m not sure if that’s better.
“Who are you?” she asks. Then when I don’t respond straightaway, her patience slips, and she pushes. “Tell me your name.”
There’s a large window in the living room that looks out onto the cobbled streets below. It was raining earlier, so droplets of water obscure the view. Moonlight still manages to seep in,bathing Lilith in a silver glow from behind. The shine seems as if it’s exploding out of her, giving her wings that appear far softer around the edges than mine.
“They call me Azrael,” I tell her.
You hunt the lost now, It said,your name is Azrael.My Angel.
Lilith doesn’t look satisfied by that, her lips pulling back into a snarl, white incisors flashing in the dark, like razors cutting through shadow. “What’s your real name?” she pushes, angry again for reasons I still don’t understand. When I continue to stare at her, uncomprehending, she blows out a frustrated breath and offers, “I mean, from Before.”
She makes it sound like the plot of a story told in two parts, like one end of a book to another. There was then, something happened, and then there was now. Prologue and epilogue, with Nothing in between.
When I still don’t answer, because there’s no answer I could possibly give, Lilith inhales sharply, like I’ve told her a terrible, no-good, very-bad truth.
“They took it all from you, then,” Lilith muses, a sad downward twinge to one corner of her mouth. She breathes out harshly. Her nose flares. “Those fuckers.”
I don’t ask who “they” are, or what she thinks was taken from me. Not because I’m afraid of the answer. I already know, and the knowing doesn’t change what any of it means, which is nothing. I came from the Nothing, and that is all I have left inside me. I was hollowed out by it, burnt to a husk, a shell scraped clean and raw and empty.
“You’re not my problem,” Lilith tells me as if I’m unaware of that fact.
I dip my chin in a slight nod anyway, so she knows that I understand exactly how little sense any of this makes. My showing up here was an imposition and a mistake.
“I belong to them,” I say even though it feels like my tongue is twisting in the wrong direction by acknowledging that simple reality. The Angels and their possession of me still clings to my skin, slick and hot like a coating of wet tarmac.
Lilith’s eyes snap up, suddenly fever bright and intense, two black suns still blazing from within their core despite everything around them having gone hard and cool.
“No!” Lilith barks at me in reprimand. “Don’t ever say that. They stole you. Stolen things can’t be owned.”
Her show of hostility doesn’t surprise me at this point, but the catch in her voice does, a more fragile emotion betraying some old hurt from a past that I know as much about as I do my Before.
I tilt my head, furrowing my brows at her in contemplation. Lilith clocks my sudden shift in mood, the interest spooling out inside my chest like a quickly unravelling piece of thread.
Regaining her composure, back straightening and face smoothing out into a guarded mask once more, Lilith’s voice comes out steely but not unkind. “What do you want from me?”
“They’re scared of you,” I repeat. “Too scared to come after you. If I’m with you, they won’t be able to come for me either. They won’t try and take me back.”
Lilith stares at me then, shocked at first, but then her expression turns calculating as if she’s running through possible outcomes in her head, a way to tell me no, and what will happen to me when she does. She seems reluctant to let, or at least watch, those scenarios play out to their inevitable conclusion.
It confirms that I’m right. Whoever I ran from will come for me if I’m on my own. I wasn’t sure if I mattered enough, the idea that I am seeming vaguely laughable, but if Lilith thinks I do, then she’s probably right.
“They’ll still come,” Lilith warns on the back end of a sigh. “If they’re motivated enough, they always do.”
I stare up at her, thinking that over.
“Are you scared of them?” I ask, wondering if that’s how it works. Mutual fear. Mutual risk. Battle lines drawn, one only crossing over to the other if conflict is instigated by one side. Keeping me with her would likely constitute an act of war. Stolen weapons. Stolen soldiers.
