Angels' Flight (41 page)

Dmitri’s response was quiet, his words whispering of age and pain both. “Love has a way of crushing a man until nothing remains. Be careful.”

Dmitri’s words reverberating in his mind, foretelling a future he didn’t want to imagine, Galen spread his wings in a silent call for attention, and took the squadron up into the sky for an air-combat drill, while Dmitri worked with the vampires. Later, they’d merge the two groups, make certain they could function as a sleek unit in battle.

Raphael’s people were good enough that it wouldn’t have been a slaughter if they had gone to war—but neither would they have emerged without massive loss of life. Now that they had the time, Galen wanted to lay a stable foundation, ensuring the next battle would not obliterate Raphael’s forces, leaving him vulnerable to a secondary strike.

“The work will take us into winter,” he said to Jessamy at the end of the day, the sky the dark orange of sunset. “It’ll be too dangerous to fly then.” Angels didn’t feel the cold as mortals did, but flying through the relentless heavy snow that fell in certain parts of the route to the Refuge could crumple an angel’s wings, crashing him to the earth. Depending on the age of the angel and the nature of the injuries, such a fall could be fatal—immortality was not an equal gift, took time to set in stone.

Regardless, it would be an uncomfortable flight, interrupted as it would be by snow and sleet. “If you wish to leave for the Refuge, I can fly you back and return here before the snows.” He knew it was a big thing to ask of her—to remain in Raphael’s territory for a full turn of the seasons, but he wanted her with him, even if she was no longer his. The thought was a huge granite fist in his chest, a heavy, brutal thing.

“I won’t say it’s not a little overwhelming being in the world,” Jessamy said slowly, “but I’m finding I have more strength than I knew. I’d like to stay.”

“You’re certain?” he asked, because he would not have her unhappy, not Jessamy.

“Yes.” Tilting back her head, she watched the bright palette of the sky, striped as vibrantly as a tiger’s coat. “Even the sky is wild here.” A secret smile that tugged at the primal core of him.

But he didn’t follow her when she walked away, didn’t rip the vampire who came to meet her limb from limb. Instead, he flew far and distant, until the sky was an endless blue and he could almost forget he’d left Jessamy with another man.

J
essamy felt herself growing ever stronger as spring passed
into summer, a flower opening to the sun. As she stood on the roof, watching the drills in the air below, her eye followed the solid form and striated gray wings of the man who never left her thoughts, whether she lay awake, or danced in the heated dark of her dreams.

Galen flew in the center of the unit, undoubtedly giving orders in that quiet voice that worked more effectively than any shout. She saw one angel’s face brighten visibly at something Galen said, and knew he’d given one of his rare words of praise. Such words were never flowery. Sometimes all his warriors received was a curt nod, but those small actions and infrequent words meant the world to them, because each and every one knew it was praise earned. Galen didn’t do false flattery.

Yet he told her she was beautiful.

Two days ago, she’d curled into his embrace and he’d taken her on a sweeping exploration of Raphael’s territory, this untamed land of mountain and forest, water and sky. She’d seen a wolf pack stalking a herd of grazing deer; laughed in wonder as a mated pair of eagles joined her and Galen for a long, lazy distance; walked among a field of daises, bold and cheerful.

It had been the first time she’d asked him to fly her since she’d arrived in this burgeoning city, and it had felt like coming home, the scent of him familiar enough to hurt. She hadn’t wanted to release him when they’d returned to the Tower, and he’d held her a fraction too long, too. But though his need had been raw, unhidden, he’d stepped back, stepped away.

Her lips tingled with a hunger that was beginning to claw into her very bones.

“Sweet Jessamy.”

Trace’s silken purr whispered into her mind, reminding her of the evening past. In spite of the fact that Galen had set her free, she’d felt the betrayal keenly—and yet she’d known she must accept the vampire’s kiss. No blood, only a simple play of mouths. Trace was an expert in sensuality, and it had been a pleasant experience, but her heart hadn’t thudded in her throat; her blood hadn’t burned. All she’d been able to think was,
He feels wrong
.

In that instant, she’d understood any male but Galen would feel wrong.

Trace was no fool. Stepping back, he’d put his fingers under her chin and tipped up her face. “So,” he’d said in that voice meant for midnight sins, “you do belong to him.” A wicked smile. “Just as well. I don’t fancy getting my bones broken into tiny pieces.”

Catching a feather that floated down from above, she saw it was white streaked with gold.
Raphael.
The archangel had returned late last night, spent candlelit hours with Galen and Dmitri in his study. It was clear to her that Galen was becoming an ever more integral part of Raphael’s Tower. There was a chance he would not want to return to the Refuge.

If he didn’t…

Jessamy felt nothing but joy at the freedom that had allowed her to see the world, to fly the skies, but the Refuge was her home. Her books were there, the histories she was charged with keeping. And oh, how she missed the children. There were no children in the Tower.

A wave of wind, feathers of white-gold on the edge of her vision as Raphael folded away his wings. “What will you write in your histories about my territory?”

“That it’s a place as wild, and with as much promise, as you.” He was an archangel, but he’d also been her charge once, and sometimes, she found she forgot and spoke to him thus.

Raphael’s lips curved, but there was a growing hardness to his eyes—so
blue
, so extraordinary—that hurt. It was changing him. The politics. The power. “Alexander’s land?”

“Stable for now.”

“And you?” Her eyes lingered on a profile that was becoming ever more savagely beautiful, until, she knew, one day soon, no one would remember the boy he’d been.

“I have a territory to consolidate.” He stepped closer, took her hands. “You are always welcome in that territory, Jessamy—the rooms you occupy are yours.”

He saw too much, she thought, but then, that was why he was an archangel. “The Refuge is where I belong.”

“Are you certain?” He angled his head toward the squadron of angels now diving and cutting in the thin air of the clouds.

Following his gaze, she watched not the squadron, but their commander. Her soul ached with inexorable need, but she knew it wasn’t yet time. “The heart,” she whispered, “can be a fragile thing.” And this love that grew between her and Galen, even in their silence, was even more so.

13

G
alen watched as Trace left the Tower, dressed in the
smudged green and brown clothing of a scout. The vampire was good—Galen could glean no trace of him once he’d blended into the forest. But Trace wasn’t the only one who had noticed Jessamy now that she’d flown down from her isolated perch in the Refuge.

Galen watched, didn’t interfere… and beat Dmitri into the earth on a regular basis.

Wiping off blood from a split lip after their latest round, the vampire shook his head. “I must be a glutton for punishment, to keep coming back for this.”

“No, you’re just determined to be better.” The truth was, the vampire was real competition. Galen left with cuts and bruises more often than not, and Dmitri had even managed to injure his wings a time or two. They were learning from each other, developing into deadlier fighters.

Pouring water over his head using a pitcher set beside a pail of the cool, clear liquid, Galen pushed back his wet hair and said, “I need to get away for a day, perhaps two.” He trusted Dmitri now, knew the vampire, along with Raphael himself, would watch over Jessamy, make certain no man dared harm her.

“Another angel wants to fly her”—Dmitri’s expression was watchful—“except he’s afraid you’ll kill him.”

The pitcher shattered under the force of his grip. Ignoring the blood, he spread out his wings in preparation for flight. “I would never cage her.”

Rising into the sky, he stopped for nothing, flying hard and fast into the coming edge of dusk. Several squadrons passed him, but none attempted to intercept, as if able to sense the black mood that had all but swallowed him whole. Flying as if he was fighting for his life, he raced the air currents until the sky was a bleak emptiness on every side, the land dark and forested below him.

Alone.

After growing up as he had, he’d believed himself immured to such pain, invulnerable to the invisible cuts that could eviscerate. But the love-hungry boy he’d been, he still existed inside the man, and both parts of him bled without surcease at sensing Jessamy leaving him in a thousand tiny steps. Diving down to the ground and the edge of a small stream, he permitted himself to stop, to breathe, to think. Except his thoughts kept circling back to the same thing—Jessamy in the arms of another.

Rage tore out of him in a savage roar that went on and on, having been held inside for far too long. The autumn chill didn’t settle in his bones as he gave voice to his fury, didn’t do anything to quiet the fever in his blood. And when he soared into the air again, he knew he was going back. If he saw Jessamy flying with another man, he wouldn’t murder, wouldn’t rampage, even if it killed him.

He’d simply watch, make certain the other angel didn’t hurt her.

But when he returned, the Tower was quiet, most of its windows devoid of light. No one, barring the sentries, flew in the sky as far as the eye could see, and when he came to a silent landing on the balcony outside Jessamy’s room, he found her door open. He fought himself and lost, entered—to see her walking toward him, as if she’d been about to step out onto the balcony.

“Galen!” Hand rising to her heart, she halted, the misty green of her long-sleeved gown brushing her ankles in a soft kiss.

And he realized he’d been lying to himself. “
I
will fly you.” It came out a growl. “I gave you my word that I’d take you anywhere you wanted to go. Why didn’t you ask me?” Instead of accepting the offer of someone who wasn’t as strong, couldn’t take her as far, keep her as safe?

A pause, and he thought she was holding her breath. Fear? Blooded warriors had quailed at his temper and he’d unleashed it on the one person who mattered more than anything. His muscles locking, he went to back out of the doorway, but she stopped him with a simple, “Don’t you dare leave like that again, Galen.” Not fear.
Fury.

He raised an eyebrow.

“You left without telling me.” Stalking across the fine Persian carpet of red and gold, she shoved at his chest with her hands, the action having no impact on his stability or balance, but sending a shock through his system nonetheless. “I had to find out from Dmitri.”

Galen’s own anger smoldered. “I wasn’t aware my presence was needed.” Or even noticed.

Jessamy had never dealt much with men on an intimate level. The past two seasons had been a revelation. She’d been flirted with, courted, and even kissed. None of it by this infuriating wall of a man who thought he had the right to yell at her. “If anyone should be complaining about being unnoticed,” she said, “it should be me.”

“Leave me alone with Trace for just a moment,” Galen said, the heated words in no way quiet or contained. “I’d pin him to the ground with my sword, rip his skinny limbs off.”

“Very romantic.” She resisted the urge to kick at him. “I am so angry at you.” For teaching her about passion, only to leave her to starve, for showing her the sky, only to use those skies to avoid her, for being so stubborn and so
male
! “You shouldn’t be here. Go away.”

A rustle of wings, that big body suddenly closer. “You’re angry with me?”

The heat of him seeped into her bones, threatened to melt her anger to molten desire, but she mustered up the strength to stand firm. “Very.”

“Good.”

Her mouth dropped open… and he took it, took advantage, his tongue licking intimately against her own as he ignored the preliminaries to demand a raw, wet, openmouthed kiss. Legs about to buckle, she gripped at the thickness of his arms in an effort to stay upright. Galen made a low, deep sound in his chest at the contact, and slipped one arm around her waist, pinning her to him as he marauded. This was no tender caress, no gentle loverlike touch. It was a primal assault on her senses, a rough need that would only be satisfied with her utter surrender.

Gripping the side of his neck with one hand, she flattened the other over the thudding beat of his heart, the rapid pace a tattoo that matched her own. And below… The hardness of him jutted demandingly against her abdomen, barely constrained by his pants and her gown. Gasping again, she found her mouth taken even more thoroughly. More out of passion-drenched desperation than technique, she stroked her tongue into his own mouth.

A sudden, absolute motionlessness.

And then she was being crushed and lifted until her mouth was even with his and he was devouring her like she was a delicacy he’d waited a lifetime to taste. A woman would have had to be stone of heart to remain unaffected, and Jessamy was nothing close to stone when it came to Galen. She sucked on his tongue, licked over his lips, used her teeth in playful bites that made his chest rumble against her breasts, her nipples tight, hard points.

One arm locked around her waist, Galen moved his other hand down to sit proprietarily on the curve of her hip, before shifting down to stroke her lower curves, his touch firm, utterly possessive. Gasping, she broke the kiss to stare into eyes gone a deep, smoky emerald. His lips were bruised from her ravaging kisses, his skin flushed with heat. And his hand…
“Galen.”

He nuzzled at her throat, continuing to shape and pet her with scandalizing thoroughness. “Let’s fly.”