Angel of Storms (Millennium's Rule, #2)(11)
“Just… to say goodbye,” she said in Fyrian. “Could you send messages to my family? Tell them where I’m going, though I don’t expect they’ll believe it.” He inclined his head. She looked at the king and switched to Schpetan. “And send my thanks to Grasch and the weavers and to wish Betzi and Captain Kolz a happy life together.” He nodded and smiled. She turned back to Valhan. “That is all.”
“Then there is no need to delay,” he said. He stepped closer and took her hands. His skin was cool. So this is what an Angel’s touch feels like. She looked up and saw that his gaze was fixed on a distant place far beyond the room’s walls.
Then everything turned black.
Her senses adjusted almost immediately. The lack of magic that her mind sensed was so complete that it no longer tricked her eyes into perceiving darkness. Yet her mind instinctively searched for it, in vain, and she recalled Sa-Mica’s story of the Angel removing magic from so much of the world. Had he taken the rest? Looking past the Angel she saw Schpetan priests standing open-mouthed with shock.
“Take a deep breath,” Valhan instructed.
She did as he bid, and as her lungs filled to capacity light began to imbue the room. Looking around, she saw amazement on the faces of the king, his guests and even Sa-Mica. All were fading before the light. But it was not a dazzling brightness. It was as though the world around her was being bleached white–fading like a tapestry would over the centuries if those years were speeding by in a few breaths.
The Angel remained solid and vivid. The more her surroundings faded, the more conscious she grew of him. When all sign of the room had retreated into a uniform white, he was all she could see apart from herself. And feel. She looked down at their hands. His fingers were so pale against her brown skin. His hands were slender but masculine. Was he listening to her thoughts? She averted her eyes, looking out into the whiteness and discovering she could see shadows. Shapes formed and anticipation grew as she realised she was about to see the realm of the Angels.
Only then did she wonder if this meant she had died.
CHAPTER 4
Would it matter if she had, if the result was the same? At least it had been painless. Before she could fully absorb the implications, the Angels’ world emerged from the whiteness and demanded her full attention.
It was very odd indeed.
An immense cliff wall stretched into the distance, strange trees sprouting sideways out of it. Looking down, she saw that the wall continued far below them, and excitement was overtaken by dizziness and an instinctive fear of falling.
Then the scene turned and the wall became land and the trees, though still oddly shaped with fan-like branches, were growing in a normal vertical direction. She was surprised to see the land was dry and burned-looking–a wasteland that did not look welcoming even to someone who had grown up in a desert.
Warm air surrounded her. The ground pressed against the soles of her boots. Her lungs shuddered and she found herself dragging in deep breaths, fighting off sudden dizziness. The Angel was unaffected. He surveyed the land with eyes narrowed, then straightened, his shoulders relaxing as if relieved of a weight. Perhaps the mortal world is hard for Angels to bear, she thought. He did not let her hands go. He waited and when she had caught her breath she saw black lines flash around him. The wasteland began to fade, but this time much more quickly. Whiteness returned, then a new landscape appeared. This time water stretched from horizon to horizon, brown and flowing in a slow and unstoppable mass. Rocks and slim trees emerged here and there, giving the impression this was a flood, not a sea. Yet she didn’t fall into it when air surrounded her again. Something invisible under her feet supported her weight.
She was not breathless this time. The flood faded. The next place that emerged was bleak and frightening, contorted black rock protruding from glowing rivers of thick, red fluid. Searing heat assailed her for an instant before the hostile place began to disappear.
From then on the views improved, ranging from forests to fields and then, to her surprise, they arrived within a wide flat space surrounded by buildings and populated by hundreds of people. Are they the dead? she wondered. Looking closer, she was disturbed to see beggars in the crowd, and men and women struggling with heavy burdens. Surely this could not be the Angels’ realm. Unless… Unless these people are being punished for a misdeed in their life. The priests had always hinted that the Angels would be kinder to the kindly, so perhaps they dealt more cruelly with the cruel.
She expected to feel the stone pavement beneath her feet, but instead, while the view was still half visible, she and the Angel began to move across it. They passed right through people, then the buildings surrounding the square, then rose above the tops of buildings, rapidly gaining speed. She felt no sensation of motion, however. They reached the edge of the city and shot out into a great patchwork of fields.
Low mountains shadowed the horizon ahead. Rielle noticed a three-storey building several times larger than the main temple in Fyre. The Angel headed towards it. Once again they passed through walls, this time slipping into the interior of the third level. As they moved from room to room Rielle glimpsed elaborately decorated and richly coloured furniture and walls. Men and women looked up, clearly able to see some shadow of the Angel and Rielle passing, yet they did not appear surprised. In one room a woman lounged on a seat wide enough that five could have rested upon it with her. She was extraordinarily beautiful, and was eating something from a gold bowl using a long-handled spoon.