The contours of the skating rink wavered at the edges of Evangeline’s vision as her eyes filled with tears—somehow, despite her grandmother’s assurance to the contrary, she felt that she would not see Gabriella again. Perhaps Gabriella understood her thoughts. She opened her arms and took Evangeline into them, hugging her tightly. Kissing her lightly upon the cheek, Gabriella whispered, “Angelology is not simply an occupation. It is a calling. Your work is just beginning, my dear Evangeline. Already you are everything I hoped you would be.”
Without another word, Gabriella followed Alistair through the crowd. Making their way alongside the ice rink, they disappeared into the chaotic crush of movement and noise.
Bruno took Verlaine and Evangeline by the arms and guided them up the concrete steps to the main plaza, Saitou-san following close behind. They did not stop until they were standing among the rows of flags behind the statue of Prometheus. From above, Evangeline saw the danger Gabriella and Alistair were in: The skating rink had become a solid swarm of creatures, a horrifying congregation that stopped Evangeline cold.
“What are they doing?” Verlaine asked.
“They are walking into the center of the Gibborim,” Saitou-san said.
“We have to help them,” Evangeline said.
“Gabriella was clear about what we should do,” Bruno said, although the worry in his voice and the deep furrows lining his brow belied his words. It was obvious that Gabriella’s actions terrified him as well. “She must know what she’s doing.”
“Perhaps she does,” Verlaine said. “But how in the hell is she going to get out of there?”
Below, the Nephilim parted, making a path for Gabriella and Alistair to walk unimpeded to Grigori, who stood near the statue of Prometheus. Gabriella appeared smaller, more fragile in the shadow of the creatures, and the reality of their situation hit Evangeline with full force: The same passion and dedication that drove the Venerable Father Clematis to descend into the depths of the gorge and face the unknown and the drive to knowledge that had sealed her own mother’s murder—these were the forces that brought Gabriella to fight Percival Grigori.
In a distant part of her consciousness, Evangeline understood the choreography of her grandmother’s plan—she saw Gabriella arguing with Grigori, diverting his attention as Alistair ran to the statue of Prometheus—yet she was shocked by the directness of Alistair’s execution. Stepping gingerly into the pool of water, he waded to the statue’s base, mist soaking his clothes and hair as he climbed to the golden ring encircling Prometheus’s body. Ice must have made the edge slippery: instead of climbing farther, he reached along the interior of the ring and grasped at something behind it. From her vantage directly above the statue, Evangeline could not be certain of the mechanics of the procedure. And yet it appeared that Alistair was unfastening something from behind the ring. As he lifted it free, she saw that he had detached a small bronze box.
“Evangeline!” Alistair called, his voice almost drowned out by the fountain, so that she hardly hear him. “Catch!”
Alistair threw the box. It flew over the Prometheus statue, over the transparent plastic barrier between the skating rink and the concourse, and fell at Evangeline’s feet. She scooped it from the sidewalk and held it in her hand. The box was oblong and as heavy as a golden egg.
Clutching the case to her chest, Evangeline assessed the plaza once more. On one side, the ice rink was blocked by people removing skates with studied nonchalance. The Gibborim had begun to slowly encircle Alistair on the ice. He appeared frail and vulnerable compared to the Gibborim, and when the creatures descended upon him, Evangeline touched the soft woolen scarf he had given her, wishing she could do something to help him escape. But it was impossible to get close to him. Within minutes, the creatures would finish their gruesome business with Alistair Carroll and turn upon the angelologists.
Aware of the dire turn in their predicament, Bruno looked about the concourse for an escape route. At last he appeared to arrive at a conclusion. “Come,” he said, gesturing to Verlaine and Evangeline to follow him along the plaza.
Grigori barked something to them and, drawing a gun from his pocket, put it to Gabriella’s head.
“Come, Evangeline,” Bruno said, his voice filled with urgency. “Now.”
But Evangeline could not follow him. Looking from Bruno to her grandmother, held captive at the center of the ice, she understood that she had to act quickly. She knew that Gabriella would want her to follow Bruno—there was no doubt that the case containing the lyre was more important than the life of any one of them—and yet she could not simply turn and leave her grandmother to die.
She squeezed Verlaine’s hand and, pulling herself away, ran to her grandmother. Down the steps and onto the ice she ran, knowing even as she went that she was putting their lives—and much more—in danger. Even so, she could not just leave Gabriella. She had lost everyone. Gabriella was all she had left.
On the ice, Gibborim held Gabriella at Grigori’s side, one gruesome creature to each of her arms. Gibborim closed in behind Evangeline as she made her way across the skating rink, sealing her path. She could not go back.
“Come,” Grigori said, gesturing to Evangeline with his cane. Eyeing the bronze box Alistair had thrown her, he said, “Bring it here. Give it to me.
Evangeline walked closer until she stood before Grigori. Looking him over, she took in his appearance, shocked at his condition. He was nothing at all as she had imagined him to be. He was hunched, frail, and gaunt. He extended his withered hand, and Evangeline placed the bronze box from the Prometheus statue in his palm. Grigori held it up to the light and examined it, as if unsure what such a tiny box could contain. Smiling, he dropped it into his pocket and, with a sweep of his hand, snatched the leather case from Evangeline.
Rockefeller Center Ice Skating Rink, Fifth Avenue, New York City
V
erlaine knew that the creatures’ wings were tucked under their black cloaks, and he understood the destruction they were capable of inflicting if they were to deploy them. Yet to the ordinary person the creatures appeared to be little more than a band of oddly dressed men performing some bizarre ritual on the ice. They followed Grigori’s orders, assembling around him at the center of the rink, creating an impenetrable wall between Grigori and the angelologists. The orchestrations of the Gibborim would have absorbed Verlaine’s entire attention if it were not for the fact that Evangeline stood surrounded by this dark horde of creatures.
“Stay here,” Bruno said, gesturing for Verlaine to remain where he stood, above the Prometheus statue. “Saitou-san, take the stairs. I’m going to go to the other side of the rink and see if I can divert Grigori.”
“It’s impossible,” Saitou-san said. “Look at how many of them there are.”
Bruno paused, staring out over the rink. “We can’t leave them out there,” he said, his anguish apparent. “We have to try something.”
Bruno and Saitou-san ran off, leaving Verlaine to watch helplessly from his perch. He could hardly keep himself from jumping over the barrier onto the ice. He felt sick at the sight of Evangeline in danger, and yet he could do nothing at all to rescue her. He had known her only one day and yet the thought of losing whatever future awaited him with her terrified him. He called her name, and through the chaos of creatures she looked up at him. Even as Grigori pushed her ahead, steering her and Gabriella from the ice, she had heard Verlaine calling to her.
For a second, Verlaine felt as if he were outside himself, watching his misery from a distance. The irony of his position wasn’t lost on him: He had become the destitute tragicomic leading man watching the woman he loved be swept away by a dastardly villain. It was amazing how love had the power to make him feel that he was both a Hollywood cliché and an utter original at once. He loved Evangeline, this he knew for certain. He would do anything for her.
At the opposite end of the rink, Bruno was watching the creatures. It was plain that he would be vastly outnumbered if he went into the mêlée of Gibborim. Even if the three of them went in at once, it would be impossible to reach Gabriella and Evangeline. From her position at the stairs, Saitou-san awaited a signal to go in. But Bruno, like Verlaine, could see the hopelessness of their position. There was nothing they could do but watch.
A rumbling noise consumed the din of city sounds. At first Verlaine was unable to discern the source of the noise—it began as a soft stirring in the distance and grew in a matter of seconds to the distinct growl of an engine. Scanning the plaza, he saw that a black utility van, identical to the vans he’d found parked outside of St. Rose Convent, was driving over the concourse to the skating rink, cutting a path through the crowd.
As the van approached, Grigori waved the gun at Gabriella and Evangeline, pushing them up the steps. Verlaine strained to see Evangeline, but Gibborim stood on each side of her, blocking his view. As the entourage passed Saitou-san, he could detect a moment of indecision in her manner. For an instant it appeared as if she might push past the Gibborim and tackle Grigori herself. Realizing that she was far too weak she did nothing.
Grigori forced Evangeline and Gabriella into the van, pushing them inside with the gun and swinging the door closed in one quick motion. As the van drove away, Verlaine called out to Evangeline, desperately, his helplessness filling him with anger. He ran after the van, past Christmas lights, past the herald angels with their golden trumpets raised to the black night sky, past the immense evergreen tree adorned with colored lights. The van turned into traffic and disappeared. Evangeline was gone.
The Gibborim dispersed, climbing the stairs and disappearing into the crowds of confused people, sliding away as if nothing had happened at all. When the ice was clear, Verlaine ran down the stairs and walked onto the rink where Evangeline had been. He slipped forward and back on the soles of his sneakers, balancing himself as we went. The spotlights trained over the ice left a swirling polish upon its surface, gold and blue and orange, like an opal. Something at the center of the rink caught his eye. He squatted on his haunches. Running his finger over the cold surface, he lifted a glimmering golden chain. A lyre pendant had been pressed into the ice.
East Forty-eighth Street and Park Avenue, New York City
P
ercival Grigori ordered the driver to turn onto Park Avenue and head north to his apartment, where Sneja and his father would be waiting for him. The wide avenue was clogged with traffic; they moved forward in incremental lurches. The black branches of winter trees had been strung with thousands of colored lights that rose and fell along the median, reminding him that human sects were still celebrating their holiday gatherings. Holding the case, its aged, scuffed leather rough under his fingers, Percival knew that for once Sneja would be pleased. He could almost imagine the pleasure she would show when he placed the lyre and Gabriella Levi-Franche Valko at her feet. With Otterley gone, he was Sneja’s last hope. Surely this would redeem him.
Gabriella sat across from him, glaring with pure contempt. It had been more than fifty years since their last meeting, and yet his feelings for her were as strong—and as conflicted—as they’d been the day he’d ordered her capture. Gabriella hated him now, that much was clear, but he had always admired the strength of her feelings: Whether it be passion or hatred or fear, she felt each emotion with the entirety of her being. He’d believed that her power over him had ended, and yet he could feel himself grow weak in her presence. She had lost her youth and beauty, but she was still dangerously magnetic. Although he had the power to take her life in an instant, she appeared utterly unafraid. This would change once they reached his mother. Sneja had never been intimidated by Gabriella.
As the van slowed and stopped at a traffic light, Percival studied the young woman at Gabriella’s side. It seemed absurd, but her resemblance to the Gabriella he’d known fifty years before—her creamy white skin, the shape of her green eyes—was uncanny. It was as if the Gabriella of his fantasies had materialized before him. The young woman also wore a golden lyre pendant about her neck, the identical pendant Gabriella had worn in Paris, a necklace he knew she would never part with.
Suddenly, before Percival had the chance to react, Gabriella flung open the door of the van, grabbed the case from Percival’s lap, and leaped out into the street, the young woman following close behind.
Percival screamed for the driver to follow them. Cutting through the red light, the van turned right onto Fifty-first, driving the wrong way on a one-way street—but even as the van was upon them, the women evaded it, running across Lexington Avenue and disappearing into a staircase down to the subway. Percival grabbed his cane and jumped through the door Gabriella had left open, pushing himself forward with all his strength. He ran as best he could through the crowds, his body aching with each halting step.
He had never been inside a subway station in New York City, and the MetroCard machines and the maps and the turnstiles were strange and unreadable. He was at a loss for how it all worked. Many years ago he’d been to the subway in Paris. The opening of the Métro at the turn of the last century had drawn him underground out of curiosity, and he’d taken the trains more than once when it was the fashion, but the appeal had worn off quickly. In New York such transport was out of the question. The thought of standing next to so many human beings, all of them crushed together, made him nauseous.
At the turnstiles he paused to catch his breath, and then he pushed at the metal bar. It was locked in place. He pushed a second time, and once again the bar caught. Smashing his cane on the turnstile, he cursed in frustration, noticing as he did how people in the crowd paused to examine him, as if he were insane. Once he would simply have scaled the metal barriers with ease. Fifty years ago it would have been only a matter of seconds before he would have caught Gabriella—who also could not move as quickly as she once had—and her associate. But now he was left helpless. There was nothing to do but get around these ludicrous metal barriers.