Angelus (14 page)

“So that gem
is
an eye, after all,” Nina said, her words saturated with suspicion. “Whose?”

Sophia turned and looked back at them now. She seemed about to say something but must have thought better of it. Instead she sighed and patted the Kirin's muzzle.

“I don't know,” Angela said. And it was the truth, though for some reason the answer still sat uncomfortably with her. It still felt too much like a lie.

“Things haven't been much better back here in Luz,” Nina continued in a quiet voice. “As you can see, there's an eerie stillness to the air. It's too cold, but there's no more snow, and we never see the sun despite the hours passing every day. And now there's a city in the sky among the stars. Angels arrive here after traveling from their city to ours. They've killed most of the crows and birds in Luz for sport, Angela. Fury and I can't travel openly anymore. Worse, they took all the human souls still in Luz with them back to Heaven. No one knows why, but Fury and Juno and I think the Vermilion Order are responsible, and that a few officials in Luz made some kind of black deal with the angels—or perhaps with Lucifel—in order to survive whatever comes next. I don't really want to know what the Devil plans to do with all those human souls, but our focus has been returning them somehow. Father Schrader was being very helpful for a while, but that's changed. He doesn't say much anymore. I wonder sometimes if he's been bribed into lying low. Or worse . . .”

Angela swallowed, trying to digest all the awful information. “So we don't have many friends on our side?”

Nina sighed heavily. “There's Juno—and according to Juno, there are also the Jinn who recognize her as Queen of the Underworld, as few as those Jinn might be. Other than that . . .”

“What about Israfel? Has anyone seen him at all? He went to Heaven too, and I was told he was possibly imprisoned.”

Nina shook her head grimly.

Angela slumped back to the frozen ground. She needed to think, but her mind had blanked over. Faced with a situation like this in the past, Angela would have turned to ice much like the soil. She would have said that this was a problem too
great to involve her. Luckily, the wiser Angela was in charge forever now.

This has to end. Maybe if we find where all those poor human souls have been taken, we'll also find a way to reach Lucifel.

And then what would Angela do?

I want and need to change everything. But until Sophia is opened . . .

“I understand,” Nina said softly. Tears glistened at the corners of her eyes.

“What?” Angela said.

Nina sat down beside her. “I understand why you're hesitating, Angela. If what you told me about opening Sophia—I mean, the Book of Raziel—is true, then I know how you feel. It's not fair. I get it. And I'm sorry for you. But there must be a way out of all of this.”

“The only way is by entering Luz,” Angela said, shaking her head in frustration. “We can't hide in this cemetery forever. I'm sure in a day or two at the most, we'll be found. But at least in the heart of the city, we can hide and lay low as long as necessary while we figure things out. Or until we're caught. The hardest part will be figuring out a way to travel without being seen.”

Nina seemed to think this over. “So . . . what you're saying is that we need to enter the city through a passage no one else uses or hopefully knows about?”

Angela looked at her keenly. “Nina, the priests and novices know this city inside and out. There can't be a path they haven't discovered by now.”

“But there are areas of Luz they avoid or don't dare to use for everyday travel. The canals beneath the city, for instance.”

Angela gave Nina a long questioning look. A strange shiver ran through her.

“There is someone who can help us. She'll know where to go next,” Nina whispered.

And though Angela wanted to stay optimistic, perhaps the cold had reached too far within her for Nina's words to do anything but chill.

Angela hadn't enjoyed the idea of leaving Sophia and the winged Kirin alone, no matter how briefly she and Nina would be gone. The darkness of the trees was different from the darkness of Hell. There was more life in it, and Angela didn't trust a gloom that grew anymore.

She crept through the naked trunks, following Nina's lead and slapping aside branches and twigs as they traveled. Away from the protection of the Kirin's blazing-warm body, Angela now felt the cold like a knife piercing through every pore of her skin.

Sophia was right. It was madness for Angela to walk around slowly freezing to death. But there was no time to take dangerous detours for clothing, so Angela forced her numb feet forward, step by step until she was sure they were turning purple.

It was a relief to approach the light of a bonfire blazing in the middle of Memorial Cemetery.

The priests and novices who'd chased Angela had returned to burn branches and logs and keep vigil until morning, per
haps in the hope that she'd return. Even Angela knew no one would risk entering the trees while they feared a Jinn hunted outside the ring of the bonfire's protective light.

Angela crouched onto the soil, resting her hand on an icy rock.

Nina had taken the shape of a crow again and glided down from the branches to settle on her shoulder.
Wait here,
Nina's voice echoed in Angela's mind.

Feathers fluttered as she lifted from Angela and vanished into the darkness of the woods.

A few minutes later, she returned with a long scarf and a pair of shoes hanging by their laces from her beak. Angela whispered her thanks and took both, smothering her neck and mouth behind the scarf and quickly slipping on the shoes. She was only slightly warmer, but even that made a great difference. At least now she could walk without hurting her feet so badly. She searched the small camp again, trying to understand why Nina had brought her back here.

This way,
Nina said to her, and she strutted into the trees.

Angela silently followed. They both paused before a clearing where a woman with thick red hair and heavy shawls sat on the frozen ground. She stared up at the stars, her arm wrapped around a little girl gathered to her chest. Nina flapped her wings, settling on the ground behind them. The little girl turned, saw Nina, and turned around again to tug on her mother's sleeve.

The woman stood, calling to a tall novice sitting close by. Their conversation was muffled, but the woman continued pointing at her daughter, making frustrated gestures with her arms. The little girl looked at the novice with a pitiful, tearstained face.

Finally, he nodded and pointed at the trees.

As the woman brought her daughter into the undergrowth, Angela recognized her. She'd been present when Angela, Sophia, and the Kirin had burst through the mirror. Except then she'd been on her knees, trying to scream as hands clapped over her mouth. She was much taller up close, and had an earthy beauty about her, with her clanking necklaces piled on top of one another, peeking above her heavy scarves. Her daughter's rosy cheeks were the only sign that either felt the cold.

This must be the woman Nina said could help us. She looks like a fortune-teller . . . and she's a blood head like me. How did she manage to evade the Vatican police for so many years?

Angela remembered that occult practitioners and fortune-tellers were outlawed in Luz.

She stood as the woman and her daughter came closer. The woman caught sight of Angela and gasped. Her hand instinctively grabbed for her daughter and dragged her backward, away from Angela. Her heavy-lidded eyes were now wide as dinner plates.

A flutter of wingbeats and a heavy weight on Angela's shoulder signaled Nina's return to her perch.

Angela,
Nina said,
this is Gloriana Cassel and her daughter, Tress. I used to work for Gloriana part-time at her curiosity shop in Luz. She used to help me understand my dreams and psychic abilities . . . as much as she could, anyway. She owned the mirror that the priests used to bring you into Luz.

“Hello,” Angela whispered awkwardly.

Gloriana said nothing at first. She scanned Angela from top to bottom with her sultry eyes, focusing on Angela's green left eye in particular. Her face had paled considerably. “So—you're safe,” she said at last.

Angela nodded. “We—that is, Nina and I—have come for your help. I need to enter Luz, but I can't be seen for reasons I'm assuming you understand.”

Gloriana stared at Angela as though a ghost stood in front of her.

Angela cleared her throat nervously and continued. “Nina said that you know a way around the main paths leading into Luz.”

“Why do you wish to even enter the city?” Gloriana said softly.

Angela paused. The answer seemed so obvious to her. “Our odds of survival here are worse.”

“Do you think so?”

Gloriana allowed her words to linger ominously. She still examined Angela as if she could see through to her bones. At last Tress mumbled something and buried herself in her mother's skirt, her little arms and hands trembling. She was clearly afraid of Angela.

What about Angela was so different now? In her eyes, she looked the same as when she attended Westwood Academy in Luz. Yet everyone paused now and treated her with deference. Was it the way she walked or stood? Was it something in her voice? She couldn't see it or understand it, and that frightened her even more. Had Hell changed her that much?

Angela took a step closer, and Gloriana and her daughter just as quickly shuffled back. “Listen, are you going to help us or not?” Angela demanded. “I've made up my mind, so if you won't help—”

“Do you know the Netherworld?” Gloriana said. She must have noticed how her fear was confusing Angela. With difficulty, she took a step closer again, forcing Tress to follow her.

Yes, Angela remembered the terrible human Netherworld. There, with the angel Mikel's help, she'd encountered her dead parents for the last time. The angel Azrael had then attacked her before she'd freed the souls that had been imprisoned by him, which had nearly kept them from their prophesied role of fighting by Angela's side in the future. The memory of him was enough to set her teeth chattering again.

I wonder if that's why Lucifel sent angels to steal the souls left in Luz. That could even be the reason she's hoarding them away in Heaven. To keep them away from me!

Angela also found it hard to understand why Mikel—Lucifel's rebellious angelic daughter—had been so helpful at the time and then had suddenly disappeared from Angela's side when she was needed most.

Maybe she hadn't been much of a friend after all.

Yet it was hard to forget the pain in Mikel's face when she spoke of her dead angel father Raziel, and that was enough to temper at least some of the suspicion and disgust starting to boil within Angela. She hadn't seen evil behind Mikel's strange eyes. But she'd seen despair, and that could be terrible enough. Angela knew all too well what could happen to a soul that had lost hope. The more she considered past events, the more Mikel's face haunted her. In the end, Angela had never discovered who told the demons that she was in Luz, beginning an avalanche of misery for all concerned. And she'd never figured out how Python knew enough to lure her into Hell. Perhaps Mikel had been the informant. Perhaps she loved Lucifel and clung to her for a reason Angela might never understand.

It certainly makes sense. Look at how the Vermilion Order is suddenly hunting me down. Lucifel's shadow has entered Luz. Perhaps Mikel is only her herald.

“I can see by your face that you have experience with the Realm where the dead walked,” Gloriana said, interrupting Angela's thoughts.

Angela looked back at her again. “Yes, I do. But the Netherworld has been emptied since I left it. If it even exists anymore.”

“It doesn't,” Gloriana said. “But listen carefully to what I'm about to tell you. Whereas Azrael, the angel of death, lorded over the Netherworld, his twin, Kheshmar, chose to reside in the outer darkness beneath Luz. She is the one who can help you reach Lucifel. Perhaps she can also help you with Raziel's Book. She used to be one of Raziel's guardian Thrones.”

“Do the priests know she exists?” Angela said, realizing that she was now down to whispers. “They knew about the Fae Tileaf and used her cruelly.”

“Yes and no,” Gloriana said. “Those who were foolish enough to search for Kheshmar never returned to Luz's upper levels. The priests abandoned all thought of communicating with her after stern warnings from the angelic Realms.”

“Then how do you know about her?”

Gloriana seemed taken aback for a moment. That was when Angela saw it—a glint of yellow light behind Gloriana's eyes. It was the same as the eerie light behind Kim's.
Gloriana was not only a blood head, she was half-Jinn
. No wonder she could communicate with creatures from the Realms so easily!

Now Angela was the speechless one.

“Have you figured out my secret?” Gloriana said gently. “It's true. My father was a human, and my mother was . . .”

Rustling erupted in the naked canopy overhead. Two eyes gleamed at Angela from the darkness.

Juno, Troy's niece, had arrived.

Angela returned to regarding Gloriana carefully. Gloriana's mother, then, was a Jinn like Troy and Juno. What had happened to her? Why had Gloriana survived and most other half-Jinn did not? Kim had been certain he was the only half-Jinn human in the world, and the demons had also confidently thought so, using his unique half-bred hands to free Lucifel from her cage in Hell. Angela could only imagine how this news that he wasn't alone in the world would change everything for him. The more Angela thought about him, the more her soul felt like caving in on itself.

She had been in such a panic to get Sophia to safety, she'd forgotten that he remained in Hell, waiting for her. What would he say to her when they saw each other again? Angela wanted him to be happy, first and foremost. Kim hadn't deserved the cruel life handed to him. He'd allowed his heart to turn entirely to Angela's welfare, even when it caused him great suffering. And now it would look like she'd abandoned him.

If only he were here right now. Somehow, everything wouldn't be so hard if I knew he was safe.

She could only hope that Troy wouldn't find him and follow through on her stalled assassination mission.

Angela?

Angela shook her head. Nina's voice had interrupted her thoughts and now she felt the tears running down her face.

Angela, why are you crying?
Nina pressed, her voice tightened by concern.

Everything inside of Angela broke for a moment, and then it put itself together again. She shook her head, wiped away her tears, and looked at Gloriana sadly. It was better to ignore Nina's anxiety, before the guards keeping
Gloriana and her daughter captive grew suspicious. It was obvious they'd pretended Tress needed to relieve herself in the bushes. “Tell me, then, how I can find Kheshmar and enter the lower levels of Luz,” Angela said. “Before it's too late.”

Gloriana nodded. “Leave Memorial Cemetery by using the main gates. They'll be lightly guarded. Most of the priests believe you'll try to escape on that beast from Hell by entering Luz's skies. Be careful, however, that you stay out of sight of any angels. There are eyes everywhere now. Once out of the gates, go left, and down a long tunnel that empties into the uppermost of Luz's lower levels. You'll find a large storm grate there. Lift the hatch and enter the water. It will take you down to the canals.” Gloriana looked Angela up and down again. “Of course, you'll need better clothes than what you're wearing now, but either way, you're bound to get soaked at first.”

Nina croaked gently.
Angela, there's no way I can follow you into the water as I am now.

I know,
Angela said back to her in her thoughts.
Don't worry, we'll figure something out.

She remembered Juno who sat still and silent in the trees, suddenly invisible. Angela took a deep breath.

“Eventually, you'll come to two statues,” Gloriana continued. “Pass through them. After that . . .”

“Yes?” Angela said eagerly.

“Well, nobody knows,” Gloriana ended. “As I mentioned, no one has ever returned from that point. But you're the Archon. Perhaps you will succeed where all others have failed. We can only pray. This leads me to a question I hope you'll answer for me. Why does the Book of Raziel remain unopened?”

Angela lowered her head. “It's complicated, but . . . it can't be opened right now.”

Gloriana shook her head and sighed.

Nina flapped her wings, acting as if she wanted to say something more. Wisely, she ultimately stayed silent. She settled with them into the pressing quiet.

“Well,” Angela whispered, “thank you for your help.”

“I'm happy to help you,” Gloriana said. “I always knew the Archon would choose to be our salvation, not our Ruin. Even if my entire life was lived solely for this moment . . .” She caressed her daughter, who peeked a little more bravely at Angela from behind her mother's skirt. “For my daughter's future, at the very least, it's worth every danger.”

Shouts echoed in their direction. The novice guarding Gloriana and her daughter must have become suspicious by now.

“Good luck to you,” Gloriana said. “We'll pray for your success, Angela Mathers.”

She knows my name,
Angela thought to herself. Then she thought of entering the freezing cold water beneath Luz, and the canals, and meeting Kheshmar and she understood her earlier shivers for what they were.

As if sensing Angela's growing distress, Tress burst suddenly from her mother's side and ran up to Angela. She held out a long snow-white feather that looked as delicate as paper-thin porcelain. Angela recognized its size and shape.