Archangel's Prophecy (Guild Hunter #11)(82)

Amanat itself had no landing strip, but Caliane had ordered her people to create a landing strip not far from the city—a place where Jessamy could land out of sight of other human eyes. In his mother’s home, she could walk in freedom. The people of Amanat were loyal to Caliane beyond anything Raphael had ever seen, would never reveal the secret of Jessamy’s twisted wing.

No, he corrected himself, he’d seen such loyalty with Lijuan, too. Both archangels whose people looked to them as goddesses. The difference was that Caliane did not consume the life force of her people . . . but his mother had sung thousands of souls into slavery, and she’d once executed every adult in two neighboring cities. It had led to hundreds upon hundreds of child-sized graves, the children of the dead struck by a heart-sorrow unknown to immortals.

So perhaps Lijuan and Caliane were more alike than they knew.

Elena, her heart forever bruised from the loss of her own mother, saw Caliane’s rise as a gift. Raphael’s feelings were more complicated. He was glad his mother was sane again, but part of him watched always for the madness.

“It is held together by bolts and screws,” Galen was muttering. “How can that be safe?”

Wrenching his mind back from thoughts of madness and murder, Raphael clapped Galen on the shoulder. “You will have to get used to it one of these days. The people who service the plane which carries my own consort on long journeys have deemed Jessamy’s plane safe.”

“My arms would be safer.”

Listening to Galen, no one would guess that he was the one who’d placed the order for Jessamy’s custom-built plane with extra cockpit space for her wings, as well as an extra-wide door for ingress and egress. Till then, Jessamy had been borrowing the far less comfortable plane of the vampire pilot who’d taught her to fly.

Another time, Raphael might’ve used the knowledge of Galen’s contradictory actions to nudge his weapons-master into laughter, for they were not simply liege and warrior, but today, tension knotted his tendons and crackled through his veins, his eyes drawn toward Sara and Deacon’s home. He hadn’t realized how often he and Elena spoke mind-to-mind until he could no longer reach the steel and wildness of her.

Reminding himself of the silent message she’d given him about this night, he took a sip of the twenty-five-year-old Scotch that Galen had brought as a gift. It had no impact on his archangelic system, but the complex and smooth taste was pleasing. “Did you notice anything else while you were in the region?”

“Yes,” Galen said, his eyes on a small squadron of angels silhouetted against the glittering nightscape of Manhattan, on their way to relieve the guards at the lava sinkhole. “Lady Caliane says that a number of vampires and angels previously resident in China have resettled in Japan.”

“Is Favashi playing power games?” If so, it was an act of true madness. Caliane was an Ancient content with a tiny territory and who’d offered Favashi her assistance. A young archangel struggling to enforce her rule over a large territory could ask for no better ally.

But Galen shook his head. “Caliane’s people weave like smoke through the landscape, and, per their reports, these new residents are scared, their only aim to move out of Favashi’s sphere of influence.”

Raphael knew a significant number of strong angels and vampires who’d once served Caliane had quietly resettled in Japan after fulfilling their obligations under any contracts they’d signed in her absence. An archangel’s madness could be forgotten with far more ease by her warriors and courtiers than by the son she’d left broken and bleeding on a lonely field far from help.

“Leaving aside the age and strength of those who oversee various parts of Japan for my mother, Caliane is far more terrifying in power than Favashi.”

“But Lady Caliane is gentle with the people under her care,” Galen said, for he had only ever known this Caliane. Raphael’s weapons-master had not yet been born when Caliane’s madness painted Raphael’s world in pain. “Her punishments can be harsh, yes,” Galen continued, “but she only ever metes them out when the crime deserves it. She does not seek to seed fear in the veins of those who call her their liege.”

That, too, was true. Prior to her madness, Caliane had run a stable and peaceful territory renowned for its art and its scientific discoveries, her court a place that often hosted other archangelic guests. “Elijah has told me of empty towns and villages, where it appears the residents abandoned their lives and left without warning.”

“Such can’t be explained by the immigrants.” Galen’s brow was heavy. “Their numbers are limited—and it’s not poor mortal or vampiric villagers who have moved in. These are people with wealth and power enough to get out without being noticed.”

Jason, he said to his spymaster. Will you join us? He had no interest in Favashi’s games right now, not with one of Elena’s feathers lying healthy and shedded in his pocket, but those games could not be ignored.

Archangels who destabilized could take down millions with them.

When Galen filled in Jason—Raphael had already told him of Elijah’s news—the spymaster said, “I will return to that corner of the world.” His face gave nothing away. “I focused on gaining as much information about her army as I could. Clearly there are more shadows I need to penetrate.”

“You have just come home after a long sojourn, Jason.” His spymaster had walked alone for hundreds of years, even in the midst of the Seven, his aloneness a ghost he couldn’t shake. It had taken a princess from Neha’s court to pierce the veil.