Angel-Seeker (16 page)

He shrugged and gave her a grin. “Well, you almost got a better look than you bargained for,” he said. “Ten minutes earlier—”

She blushed even more deeply. She was willing to be forward, as Faith had told her she must be, but it was still embarrassing to be perceived as being so bold. “No, I didn't realize—everyone else has been—their rooms have been empty—”

He yawned widely and scrubbed a hand over his eyes. “Everyone else no doubt didn't have a headache from drinking too many bottles of wine last night,” he said. “If I'd been better behaved, I might have climbed out of bed at a more reasonable hour, too.”

“I'm sorry, angelo,” she said, finally able to tear her eyes away from him and cast her gaze to the floor. “Next time I will most certainly knock.”

He laughed. “Next time? So you're going to become my personal laundress, are you?”

“No, I—I just meant that the next time—if I'm sent to your room with clothes or towels—”

He strode forward a few paces, his bare feet making light slapping noises on the wood floor. She heard the sibilant glide of his wings trailing behind him, an eerie and chilling sound. Her skin prickled into goose bumps. “I was just teasing,” he said softly, coming to a halt directly in front of her. “You look so little and scared.”

She glanced up quickly, to see him smiling down at her. This close to him, she could see a faint pocking across his cheekbones, a harshness to his skin that she somehow found appealing. Along with
his weary eyes and air of exhaustion, the scarred skin made him look weathered but enduring, an indomitable creature who had withstood much and emerged strong. “I'm not scared,” she said in a faint voice.

He laughed and continued to smile down at her. “No, don't you just look like the bravest girl! Cowering here in my doorway. What do you expect me to do? Shout at you for bringing me clean clothes? Beat you about the head? It was an honest mistake, that's all. You thought you were stepping into an empty room. And instead you got—me.”

“I didn't mean to disturb you, angelo,” she said.

“What makes you think I'm disturbed?”

She risked another look up at him and saw him waiting for her reply. She wished briefly for Faith to be standing beside her, whispering encouragement in her ear. All she could think to say was, “I just arrived in Cedar Hills a few weeks ago, angelo. I am not entirely sure what might—disturb—an angel and what might not.”

At that, he actually flung his head back and laughed even louder, to the point that Elizabeth hoped no one was in the room next door, hearing the sound and wondering what in Jovah's name might be so amusing at this hour of the day. “No, you certainly haven't learned much in your few weeks here if you haven't figured that part out yet,” he said at last. “I could show you a thing or two about disturbing men, but I'll bet you've learned some of those on your own.”

“Angelo?” she said, not sure what to reply to that.

He opened his mouth as if to explain, but there was a rough knock on the door. “Hey! David! If you're not still asleep, you lazy dog, get out here and come have breakfast with us. Or lunch, more like it.”

“In a minute!” David called back. “I have to dress.”

“Quickly, then. We'll be in Lael's room.”

Elizabeth proffered the shirts with a formal gesture. “Your clean clothes, angelo,” she said.

He lifted them negligently from her arms. “Thanks for your service, kind lady,” he said. “Will I see you tomorrow?”

“Will you—well, I'm here most days, down in the laundry—”

He smiled. “Will I see you—somewhere else? Up here, perhaps, delivering more clean clothes?”

“If you have something that needs to be washed, certainly I'll make sure it's returned to you.”

“I should be here tomorrow afternoon,” he said, turning away and heading back toward the water room. “Bored, no doubt. I'll answer the door myself—” He looked back at her over one bare shoulder and one arched wing. “That is, if you bother to knock.”

She made a little bobbing motion with her head, signifying compliance or respect or remorse, even she wasn't sure. “Yes, angelo. Tomorrow, angelo. Just bring your dirty clothes down to the laundry room on your way out today, and they'll be ready for you tomorrow.”

He was still laughing when she let herself out of the room and stood there in the hallway a moment, trembling. But, remembering that friends of his were awaiting him down the hall and that he might come bursting out of his own room any moment, she hurried back downstairs as quickly as her dancing feet could take her. She spent the rest of the day dreaming of love and adoration amid the sultry, oppressive fumes of starch and linen.

But David was not in his room the following day.

Elizabeth stood outside his doorway a good ten minutes, knocking at intervals, an armload of towels and trousers held carefully before her. He might be in the water room; he might be (unlikely at this hour) sleeping. She waited another few moments and knocked again.

No answer.

So she unlocked the door and stepped cautiously into the room, to find it completely untenanted and extraordinarily disorganized. Her heart grew both heavy and bulky in her chest, cumbersome with disappointment, and she moved clumsily across the room as if searching for the missing occupant. But he was clearly not here. Had forgotten the assignation, it seemed, or had remembered it but been forced to abandon it—when he was sent out this morning by Nathan, perhaps, to pray for sun over a river city. In any case, he was not here. She smoothed a neat place into the coverlet on his bed and laid the clean clothes there.

Perhaps he had just been teasing again,
she thought as she stepped out of the room and locked the door behind her. Laughing to himself.
See that silly girl, angel-seeker, no doubt—let's have some fun with her
. Or maybe he simply had not remembered the conversation. Girls must gape at him every day, his handsome scarred face, his sweeping wings with their faint bronze sheen. He flirted with all of them and forgot them. That might be it. She just did not know how the game was played. She had only been in Cedar Hills a few weeks, after all.

Nonetheless, she was devastated, and she moved as slowly as an old woman when she returned to the laundry room to work for the remaining hours of her shift.

She had told no one but Faith of her triumph on the previous day—thank the great good god—so there was no one but Faith to tell of her failure. Not that Faith needed any telling. The truth was plain on Elizabeth's face the instant the friends met in the dining hall at Tola's.

“What happened?” Faith whispered, sliding into the seat next to Elizabeth's.

“He wasn't there.”

“Oh, is that all?”

Elizabeth glanced over at her quickly. “I think he forgot me. Or never meant anything by it at all.”

Faith shrugged and spooned some potatoes onto her plate. “He was probably called away. Sent to Semorrah or Luminaux. And even if he did forget, which he probably didn't, it just means he hasn't remembered you yet. You haven't made that extraordinary an impression on him. But you will. Wait till he sees you again.”

“I don't want him to see me again. I'm so embarrassed.”

“This is not the time to be embarrassed,” Faith said firmly, ladling potatoes onto Elizabeth's plate, too, and passing the bowl over to Ruth. “This is your future you're protecting. You have to be outrageous. Next time you see him, you must do something or say something that will make him remember you.”

They were claimed by the general conversation then, but Elizabeth spent the next few hours, off and on, thinking about what Faith had said. And what she could do to make herself memorable to the angel David. Nothing occurred to her that evening, but she knew the advice was sound. Her future was at stake. She must be bold and notable.

But the following day, it was clear no laundress was going to draw anyone's attention at the dorm. The angel Obadiah had returned after a weeklong absence, wounded, delirious, and escorted by strangers. It was not just the dorm but the whole city that was in an uproar.

E
lizabeth heard the news the minute she got to work, for the angel had arrived not half an hour before. He had been brought in by some Luminauzi merchants who had taken a leisurely route around the Heldoras, peddling their wares at small towns all across Jordana. They realized, as they saw an angel fall from the sky one afternoon, that they had acquired far more valuable cargo than their dyed silks and gem-set baubles, and they had made all haste to the hold.

Elizabeth barely had time to hear the details of how the Luminauzi caravan had pulled into Cedar Hills, and how Magdalena had instantly spotted the broken shape of the angel sprawled in the back of one wagon. Chaos and confusion had ensued, no doubt, but Obadiah had ultimately been carried here, to the room he had called his own for only a few days. And here, said Doris, he would be nursed back to health.

“
Double
the load on us, you'll see, for a sick man uses twice the bedding a well man does, and think of the visitors he'll have,” Doris grumbled. Privately, Elizabeth thought she was as excited as everyone else to have such events occurring under this very roof. “People rushing in and out all day—well,
we
won't even have the worst of it; the cooks and the housekeeping staff, now,
they'll
be run ragged, just you wait.”

A breathless figure burst through the door, indistinct through
the coiling steam. “Please,” a girl panted. “We need more cloth for bandages.”

Doris whirled to face her, instantly professional. “Plain strips? How wide?”

“I don't—some very narrow, I think, to bind his fingers, and some—wider ones, I suppose, for his leg, but I don't know—”

Doris pointed. “Elizabeth. That cabinet against the wall. Get an assortment and take them up to the angel's room.”

All the other women watched with envy as Elizabeth hurried across the room, quickly snatched up a selection of cotton strips, and followed the girl out of the laundry room and up to the second floor.

The sickroom seemed overfull of people, Elizabeth thought, glancing around quickly to see as many details as she could. The blond angel lay, pale and motionless, on the bed in the middle of the room. His wings hung limply over both sides of the bed, looking as rumpled as soiled linens. One dark-haired angel sat beside his bed, mopping his face with a damp cloth, and two other angels milled about the room, whispering to each other and glancing over at the hurt man. A middle-aged mortal woman sat on the other side of the bed. Her efficient air and general confidence led Elizabeth to suspect this was a healer. The angel showing such compassion for the fallen Obadiah was, she was fairly certain, Magdalena herself. The girl whom Elizabeth had followed into the room was nowhere in sight, but splashing from the water room made it clear she had gone back to a task she had merely abandoned for a moment.

No one looked up when Elizabeth walked in, so she spoke in a carrying voice. “I brought the fresh bandages,” she said.

The healer looked over and smiled. “Good. Bring them here. Do you know how to set a bone?”

Elizabeth felt her eyes stretch to their widest. “Set a—I can't do it myself, but I've helped hold a man when someone else set it,” she said. That was true, too; on the farm, workers were forever being hurt, and Angeletta would no more aid in the doctoring than she would labor in the kitchen. Elizabeth hadn't liked it much either, clinging to a cursing, sweating, smelly man while a splint was put in place, but she had considered it basic human kindness to help ease a man from his misery.

“Oh, thank you,” Magdalena said in a soft voice. “I can't do it—I just can't—”

Elizabeth didn't ask why the other angels or the girl washing out something in the water room weren't able to aid the healer. She just placed her pile of bandages within easy reach of the healer's hand and stepped up to the bedside. “Where's he hurt? What would you like me to do?” she asked.

“His left arm and three of his fingers are broken,” the woman said. “I want to start with the small bones.”

“However did you manage to get so hurt in so many places?” Magdalena wailed, but in a soft voice, pitched to cause an invalid no stress. “For your leg is a mess and there's a tear in your wing—”

Elizabeth had thought the angel barely conscious, so she was startled when he answered in a low, breathless voice. “I told you. I fell from the sky—and I must have landed on my arm. That part is—rather hazy.”

“You did not wound this leg falling from the sky,” the healer observed. “
That's
a burn mark, I'm certain.”

“Yes,” Obadiah said faintly.

“A burn!” Magdalena exclaimed. “But—Obadiah—how could you—what did you—”

“I'm not entirely sure. I need to—talk to Nathan.”

“What? You'll tell him secrets you won't tell me?”

A smile lit the pale, handsome face. Elizabeth thought him very attractive, even in his present sorry condition. “I will tell—you, too. When you are both here—and I don't have to tell the story—twice over.”

“You just look so battered,” Magdalena said in a worried voice. “I am so concerned about you.”

“He'll be fine,” the healer said briskly. “But we've got to get these bones set. You—are you ready? What's your name, girl?”

“Elizabeth. Yes, I'm quite ready.”

It took them the next hour to splint and wrap the broken bones of the angel's forearm and fingers. By the time they were done, he was tense with the stress of withstanding agony and covered in a light film of sweat. While they worked, the splashing girl and one of the angels left, and two more visitors arrived and departed. The healer ignored all of them, so Elizabeth did as well.

“I can't say—that your ministrations—have made me feel any better at all,” Obadiah panted when they were done.

The healer permitted herself a small smile. “No, I imagine you feel much worse at the moment. But I'll give you something for the pain, and I would think you would feel better by morning. You angels are lucky. You have no idea how long it takes a mortal man to heal.”

“I'll stay with you,” Magdalena said.

He turned his eyes her way, not moving his head from the pillow. “I'd rather you didn't,” he said. “I just want to sleep.”

“Then I'll come back later tonight.”

“Yes—I'd welcome that.”

“I'll bring Nathan, so you can tell us all your secrets at once.”

The healer turned her serious gaze on Elizabeth. “You. Elizabeth. You work in this building?”

Elizabeth nodded. “In the laundry room. Yes.”

“Can you come back and check on him from time to time? Make sure he doesn't have a fever and that his bandages have not come loose?”

Could she? She would be elated to do so. “Certainly,” Elizabeth said coolly. “And if he does have a fever, what should I do?”

The healer was laying an assortment of pills and potions on a bedside table. “One of these for fever, a teaspoon of this for pain. Only two more doses of each by day's end, though. Can you remember that?”

“Yes.”

“Can he eat?” Magdalena asked.

“Broth. Soft foods,” the healer said. “For a day or two. After that, anything he wants. I imagine he'll be plenty hungry by then.”

“I'm hungry now,” he said in a whisper.

“No doubt, but right now you're likely to throw up everything we pour down your throat, so we'll just be cautious,” she replied. “Is there anything else you need? If not, I'm clearing this lot from the room, and you should sleep as long as you can.”

He moved his head weakly on the pillow, an attempt to shake his head no, Elizabeth thought. “I need nothing I can think of. Sleep. I am so happy to be here I cannot tell you—”

The healer rose, and Elizabeth jumped to her feet. Magdalena more reluctantly stood up. “I hate to leave you,” the angel said, looking down at the patient.

“Go,” he said. “I'll see you later. Thank you. All of you.”

Elizabeth gave the healer a little nod and said, “I'll check on him,” and the healer nodded in return. Then Elizabeth stepped from the room, trying to move with the measured gait of someone who could be relied on to watch over a sick man, a wounded
angel,
with the closest attention. Once out into the empty hall she paused for a moment and had to squeeze down her squeal of delight. Then she ran back downstairs toward the laundry room to tell everyone there every scrap of information she had obtained in the overheard conference of the angels.

Three times that day Elizabeth returned to the sickroom to check on the angel. He was asleep the first two times she stole in, so she lay her hand tentatively across his forehead to check for fever. The skin of an angel was hotter than the skin of a mortal—she knew that already, mostly because of some very revealing things Shiloh had said—so she was not too concerned when his flesh felt a little warm against her fingers. Still, she wet a cloth and wiped his face with cool water, then checked his bandages to make sure all was well.

The third time she crept inside, he was awake. It was late afternoon, and her shift would soon be over, but she did not want to leave again without a final visit. He resettled himself on the bed as she crossed the room and gave her a faint smile.

“You're back,” he said in a thready voice. This afternoon he was lying on his side, and his wings spilled behind him, down the edge of the bed and onto the floor. She could not help thinking of the down stuffing pouring from the hole in a torn mattress.

She gazed at him, convinced that he looked more flushed than he had when he was sleeping, which might not be a good sign. “How are you feeling?” she asked. “I haven't been able to tell if you have a fever.”

“I am hot enough to say yes, I think,” he said, so she put her palm on his forehead. Yes, even by angelic standards, his body seemed overwarm. “And every separate bone feels broken, and each individual muscle is bruised.”

“Well, you haven't had any medicine since this morning, so let me give you some drugs. You'll feel better.”

“I'll fall asleep again.”

She gave him a small smile. “That might make you feel better, too.”

He moved restlessly, though not very energetically, on the bed. “I feel like I have been—sick or sleeping—for days now.”

She had picked up a pill and a glass of water, but if he wanted to talk a few moments before she administered the drugs, she was more than happy to oblige. “Why, when did you first get wounded?”

He appeared to think for a moment. “Five days ago? Maybe six? I am tired of lying about helplessly.” He smiled up at her again. He seemed like a man whose face was formed for smiles. “Though I have not minded the part about being nursed by pretty girls.”

“If by that you mean me and the angela Magdalena, I thank you for the extraordinary compliment,” she said.

He gave a weak laugh. “Yes, but—someone else helped me, too. When I was first injured. Or I might not have survived.”

Now there was a tale Elizabeth would have liked to hear, but she didn't think the angel would be confiding any secrets to her. “Where did you get injured?”

“In the desert. Outside of Breven.” He looked at her, then looked away. “I was very fortunate to find help.”

“They say it was Luminauzi who found you and brought you here.”

“Luminauzi—yes—who else would help a fallen angel?”

Which was a strange thing to say, so Elizabeth assumed he had acquired delirium along with the fever. “Here, you'd better take this,” she said, holding the pill to his mouth and following that with a glass of water. “How about the pain? I've got some kind of powdery mix here I'm supposed to give you if you're hurting.”

“Yes—I think a powdery mix is just what I need right now.”

She frowned. “Would you like me to bring the healer back again? Do you feel worse?”

“No—no worse—just no better. I
hate
being such a pathetic creature!”

She could not help smiling. “Well, I'm sure you're magnificent when you're feeling whole.”

He laughed shakily. “I am—at any rate—not as contemptible as I am now.”

“I can't imagine anyone would think you were contemptible ever,” Elizabeth said softly. “Here. Drink this, and maybe you'll feel better.”

He obediently pushed himself up on one elbow and swallowed the glassful of medicine. When he lay back on the pillow, he gave her a smile of great sweetness. “Thank you, Elizabeth,” he said. “Isn't that your name?”

She felt such a flutter in her blood that she almost could not keep her hold on the glass. An angel calling her by name! “Yes, angelo,” she said with assumed calm.

He appeared to be straining to keep his eyes open, and then he gave up and let the lids fall. “Come by tomorrow and see me again,” he said drowsily. “I will feel better then, I assure you.”