Iniquity (The Premonition, #5)(44)

“There’s nowhere for you to go, Evie. We’re surrounded by the harshest conditions on Earth.”

“You can’t keep me here.”

“Actually, I can,” Xavier says, as he walks past me into his room. Luckily, he has managed to dress himself in a long sleeved black thermal shirt. Long slits in the fabric allow for his red wings to be out. His black trousers are military in design. He goes to a side table and picks up a watch. Facing away from me, he straps it on his wrist.

“I don’t want to be here with you.”

Xavier is silent for a moment, long enough for me to regret saying that. I’m not looking to hurt him. I just want him to stop trying to control me. His tone is brittle as he says, “Should you attempt to leave, you won’t like the consequences, Evie.”

“But my friends are in danger!”

“They’re in more danger when they’re with you.”

“I need to warn them!”

“I’ll see what I can do to locate them. I’m not promising anything. They’ve proven to be uncooperative.”

“They were helping me!”

“By keeping you from me? That’s not helping you.”

“You started it! You kicked them out of Brennus’ castle.”

“I said I’d see what I could do. End of discussion.”

I growl in frustration, turning I go to my bedroom, which is only feet away. After I slam the double doors, I unleash my fury on the room. Energy leaks out of me. All the furniture in close proximity to me floats up off the ground. I exhale a calming breath and all of it drops back down with a loud BANG.

“Time to find Reed,” I whisper to myself.

Climbing onto the bed, I sit on it cross-legged. I concentrate on slowing down my heartbeat, which is out of control. The room spins and whirls around me as I create a replica of myself—a clone. My consciousness inhabits her form, and I gaze around at the room; it’s a rainbow of colors and shapes. I’m weary, making it hard to concentrate. Nothing in her vision is crisp, like I’m capable of seeing when I’m not tired. I take a deep breath and listen to the hive of activity all around me—angelic voices have a faraway drone. Giving in to its white noise, I become one with it. Reed, I think his name. I am pulled to the south. I let the energy inside of me go. My clone launches through the wall. She travels in a streak over ice-shrouded terrain. I lose perspective as she increases our speed—we spiral: white, snow-covered earth, blue sky, clouds, mountains, snow, ocean, blue sky, ice, growing darkness, stars, black water, falling through stone—cold, cold stone.

Dominion, I think as I pass familiar floors and artwork as I continue downward.

Several angels spot me as I descend through the fresco-painted ceiling of the chateau’s lobby. Shouts and threats issue from the divine angels closest to me. It’s sort of amusing to watch them stand helplessly by as I continue to descend through the stone floor.

All thoughts of other angels leave me for a moment when I feel butterflies riot inside my clone. REED! My clone slows and drops into a damp corridor outside a thick, metal door at the end of a shadowy hallway. Quickly searching the other end of the passageway, there are two angels posted at the entrance with their backs to me. They haven’t noticed me yet, but they’re the exceptions. On the levels above, there’s a definite uproar of angels. The fact that they couldn’t follow my clone through floors is causing chaos among them. They’ll mobilize and they’ll find a way to be all over me soon.

I follow the butterflies pulling me to a thick steel door. When I pass through it, I find Reed among the ocean of darkness and cold, salty air. He’s dressed only in the blue jeans he had on when I last saw him. His hair is dirty and disheveled—matted in the back with what I’m guessing is his dried blood. Bare-chested, his fierce wings extend at the sight of me before him. His eyes drink me in. Reaching out to touch me—to take me into his arms—he hesitates, realizing that I exist in a clone of light energy, not flesh, sinew, and bone, like him.

“You’re alive,” he states, his voice is raw, like he somehow doubted it. His brow wrinkles in frustration at his inability to pull me to him. He gets as near to me as he can, inhaling the scent of me on my clone.

“What did they do to you?” I whisper.

“It doesn’t matter.”

I glance over my clone’s shoulder at the door. “There’re coming,” I warn. I look back at him. “How do I free you?”

“Just stand there,” he replies. “I’ll take care of the rest.” His eyes never leave the image of me before him. Shouting and clamoring sounds come to us through the heavy door in echoes, but still, he just stares at me.

“I have so much to tell you, Reed,” I whisper.

His eyebrows pull together. “Where are you now?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know. I’m somewhere in the Arctic—in a mountain—a hollowed-out fortress full of divine angels. There are probably thousands of them there.

“Who is with you?” he asks.

“Xavier. I think he’s in charge. He expects me to stay there.”

Reed nods, showing no emotion—I can’t tell how he feels about that. “Stay with him. He’ll protect you until I get there.”

There’s a big BANG against the door from the other side. It makes me turn and face it. Reed moves next to me. “There are a lot of them,” I whisper. I want to grab his hand, but I can’t.