Page 80 of The Fallen
With no other option available to me, I’m forced to accept her uninspiring explanation, for now at least.
“The dagger?” I ask, eyes flickering down to her pocket where the handle is still sticking out and knocking against her seat belt.
My wings barely fit inside the car at first, but then Lilith pushed the seat back when she saw me struggling. She did it wordlessly and then turned away again as if that small act of silent assistance meant nothing to her, and I wonder what it must be like to exist in a life where acts of service are freely given and devoid of either consequences or expectations for remuneration.
Lilith’s right hand jerks on the wheel, fingers flexing outwards, an aborted movement to grab for the dagger. I’m not sure if she heard my question as a threat, or if any mention of the dagger would prompt a similar response regardless. She seems vaguely annoyed by her own, possibly instinctual, reaction.
When the other Angels mentioned Lilith, they muttered words like “warrior” and “killer” alongside her name. I know there was a war between Angels once, but I know nothing else about it, why it started or even who was directly involved. When Lilith was speaking to Michael, she spoke the name Lucifer. I’d never heard of him before. If the Angels I hunted with knew of him, they were too afraid to speak that knowledge aloud.
“It’s special. We call it a bronze dagger because of how it looks, but that isn’t what it’s made from,” Lilith tells me. “A friend forged it a long time ago and left it with me for safekeeping.” She closes her mouth with a sudden click, her jaw clenching slightly like she’s trying to cage further information behind her teeth to stop it from escaping.
“What did it do to Michael?” I ask, pushing for more despite the warning signs from Lilith that I should back off this subject.
“Sent him back where he belongs,” Lilith says, and there’s a finality to the statement. It’s clear from the whipcrack intonation of her voice to the foreboding blank expression on her face thatshe won’t be offering anything more about the dagger, no matter what I ask.
“Does he?” Memories of whispered claims and possessive touches fill my mind. Lilith spares me a quick glance, uncomprehending, so I add, “Does he belong where you sent him?”
Lilith contemplates the question for a handful of seconds before sighing wearily and switching her full attention back to the road. “If he doesn’t,” she says, “he’d never admit to it.”
She sounds resigned to it and a little heartbroken. I want to ask her what it takes to break the heart of the first Demon if only so I can resolve to never be the cause of it myself, but I let the moment pass and lapse into quiet. It isn’t silence, there’s too much movement and noise for that, but there’s a fragile serenity to the aftermath of our conversation that settles me.
My craving for the lost has abated since I cut ties with the other Angels, like our hunger fed into each other, making it bigger and stronger when shared. But when those flames ignited by my hand, it was as if the fire that burned them to cinders and ash also took root inside my stomach, scorching the need for soul flesh out of me. It hasn’t gone completely; I can still feel the vestiges of that dark, insidious hunger deep and ravenous in the bowels of my gut, screaming and clawing for satiation, but it’s not enough to trigger the sort of ferality I’m certain Lilith would find difficult to excuse, no matter how empathetic she’s been thus far.
Lilith takes us out of the city and onto a ferry bound for England, using our ability to move between planes of existence to avoid being seen by the humans checking peoples’ passports. It’s not something I need to do too often, despite my wings and eyes. Most humans are very good at coming up with their own explanations for strange things. They assume my wings are acostume and my eyes are contacts, and anything else innately bizarre about me is put aside in favour of reason.
I lean beside Lilith against the boat railing, looking out at the grey ocean as we cut through it from one island to another. Lilith doesn’t protest or pull away when I eclipse the space between us and press my arm against hers, mine bare and hers covered by her leather jacket. It feels smooth and cool against my skin, coldness seeping into my body, made more noticeable by the icy wind blowing around our hair, and I have to absorb a tiny shiver in reaction to it.
I’m startled by the sensation, and it takes me a second to understand why. It’s the first time I’ve been affected by temperature when I haven’t gorged on soul flesh, and even then it would need to be extreme, even the sensations of scalding hot and freezing cold were muted, barely more than ghosts in comparison to what humans feel.
Lilith notices my shiver and the sharp gasp that expels from my mouth following it. She looks at me with veiled concern, but lets it go when I shake my head once, quickly, not at all prepared to discuss this revelation with her yet.
“There’s a place we can go that’ll be safe, for a while at least,” Lilith tells me instead, and it’s obvious she’s trying to distract me from my roiling emotions. It calms me further that she’s trying to offer more of that unspoken and unrequested assistance than the contents of the attempt itself.
Lilith’s hair is thick enough that the wind, as strong as it is out here, struggles to shift her larger curls. There are small wisps of dark hair around her face that batter against her cheek insistently as if seeking entry. I get the unfamiliar urge to reach up one hand and brush them back behind her ear. I resist it at first, thinking Lilith will find it odd, but then I tell myself it’s okay. If Lilith can move my seat back, I can protect her face from persistent stray curls.
Lilith does seem surprised when I catch the edges of her hair with the tips of my fingers and swipe them behind her ear, but she doesn’t stop me or appear disturbed by the action. My fingers graze her cheek and jaw as well as the shell of her ear. Her skin is warm to the touch despite the weather, her blood hot and pumping through her veins.
My hand stills when I drag it back, stopping to fit the curve of my palm and fingers around her face. I brush my thumb across her cheek, letting the feel of her soft skin run along mine, like I’m smoothing out wrinkles in a silk scarf.
Lilith tilts her head, leaning into the touch. She meets my eyes with a steady, expectant stare. She sucks her bottom lip into her mouth, biting down on it briefly before releasing it again as if in reprimand, a gush of something liquid hot pooling in my stomach at the sight. Her lip has a sheen of spit now, and a far more powerful urge pushes me to lick that shine from her mouth, to use my teeth on her lip myself to find out if it feels even better to use my own on her than to see her do it to herself.
I’ve watched humans, countless numbers of them, touch each other like that. I didn’t think too much of it at the time. Mouths on pulse points, teeth scraping across hot, spit-slick skin, hands grasping, yanking, roaming, squeezing. None of it was mine to ache for. Those things were as distant to me as the stars in galaxies untouched by humankind.
When my eyes zero in on Lilith’s mouth and stay there, she inhales roughly.
“Az,” she breathes out, sounding unsure for the first time. But even so, she stays where she is, and I begin to seriously question if Lilith is incapable of retreating from any battle once she’s stepped onto the field.
You don’t know this about me. But I like to finish what I start.
A flush of exhilaration works its way through me like a wave of rippling fire, so strong and wild that it compels me to back down first. Unlike Lilith, I have a history of not staying the course, and I might feel shame over that if it weren’t for fact that it’s brought me here, to where I am now, away from the Angels and leaning on the one person who might be able to keep me safe.
I let go of Lilith’s face, sliding my palm and fingers down her neck and collarbone, nails scratching along the hollow of her throat before removing them from her skin entirely. I turn my head, facing forward again, chin tilted down so I’m looking at the foamy water bubbling up along the edges of the boat.
Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a flicker of emotion on Lilith’s face that might be disappointment, but it’s too fast for me to be certain.
Lilith doesn’t bring it up, though, which is a mercy, but that causes its own claws of disappointment to cut across my stomach lining.
When we’re off-loaded onto British soil, Lilith takes us to nearest train station, insisting it will be the fastest way to get where we’re going, a place called “Danger City.” We settle in a nearby café whilst we wait for our train, and Lilith takes advantage of my new discovery of tea by buying us a few cups. She picks out a piece of chocolate cake as well, bringing back two forks in case I want to try it.
