Angels' Flight(101)

Jessamy’s blood turned ice-cold, as she registered the implications of Galen’s suggestion. If Alexander was dead… but no, how could that possibly be? Only another archangel could have killed him, and such killings were always catastrophic events that sent tremors across the world—archangels did not easily die. They took people and places with them. No poison, no stealthy—

Oh no.





11


“Only an archangel can kill another archangel,” she whispered. “But if he was betrayed by someone he trusted, he could be entombed.” Such a horror had happened just once, long before even Lijuan had been born.

Cut into pieces after being ambushed in sleep by those he considered friends, the archangel’s body had been scattered and buried deep in far corners of the earth. But archangels could regenerate even from ash. This time, the piece that regenerated into the whole man was buried in a mountain range deep in what was now Uram’s territory.

That mountain range no longer existed, and neither did anyone who bore even a single drop of blood related to those who had buried the archangel, the carnage so absolute that no one sane would ever dare such an act again. She swallowed, continued. “I don’t think Rohan would be disloyal to his father”—they had a true father-son bond—“but if Alexander is missing, Rohan may well be running the battle campaign, certain his father will soon rise.”

“Jessamy is right,” Raphael murmured. “But if Alexander has indeed been missing so long, then he is likely to be dead.” A reminder that an archangel regenerated at a speed no ordinary angel could comprehend, and that nothing could keep him contained, earth or rock or water. “If he fell into anshara for some reason,” Raphael continued, naming the deepest of healing sleeps, “and was betrayed to an archangelic enemy, even Alexander may have been unable to fight a burst of angelfire direct to the heart.”

The ability to create angelfire, Jessamy knew, was a rare gift—and a lethal one. Caliane had possessed it, but her son did not… not yet, his power escalating at too rapid a rate to predict anything. “So far as I know, four of the Cadre can call angelfire.”

“Would the victor not claim Alexander’s territory?” Galen said.

“It may not have been about territory.” Raphael blew out a breath. “There are some in the Cadre who would find pleasure and amusement in the game, in the kill, and in watching the resulting disintegration.”

A terrible feeling bloomed in the pit of Jessamy’s stomach. She liked Alexander, though he was an Ancient, with an Ancient’s conceit. He was intelligent, could be kind in the absent way of a being of such power, had led his people well. It sickened her to imagine him killed with such stealthy malevolence. But that was not the worst of it—if an archangel was dead or missing, and no one had informed the entirety of the Cadre, then his territory was currently under the rule of an angel who had no right to rule.

It wasn’t simply politics—it was brutal fact. Archangels ruled because they had the vicious power to control the vampires who were their servants. Without an archangel at the helm, the chances of the more violent of the Made turning feral, driven by the unthinking fury of blood hunger, were catastrophic. “The entire mortal population of his region could be wiped out in days.” Horror was an iron-dark taste on her tongue.

“It also explains why a vampire came to kill you.” Galen’s words were so contained she knew he was fighting rage. “At least some of the Made have noticed and realized the likely true reason behind Alexander’s absence.”

Jessamy’s mind flickered once more to the memory of that unexpected conversation with Alexander. “There was a vampire with him when he visited—she stayed by the door while we spoke, was in earshot. A tall, blue-eyed creature with skin of ebony.” The startling contrast of ice-blue eyes against dark skin was why the woman had remained so firmly embedded in her memory.

“She was a senior member of his court.” One who might just have turned traitor. “If she’s behind this, she may see it as a rebellion against the servitude demanded in return for being Made a vampire”—of a hundred years duration—“but once she turns that key…”

Raphael completed her thought. “She’ll learn why the archangels are so pitiless with some of her brethren.”

Galen and Raphael began to talk of how they might confirm the possibility of Alexander being dead. But Jessamy, pacing back and forth, kept thinking something wasn’t right. Raphael had been correct about her entombing scenario being unlikely given the time that had passed, but even if Alexander had been ambushed, his death still wouldn’t have been a quiet thing. He was an Ancient.

Yet no one had reported any devastation, and surely Jason would have noticed such destruction in the archangel’s lands. Sleeping or awake, Alexander— “He may have chosen to Sleep,” she said, the words spilling out before she’d consciously completed the thought.

The men stopped midword, frowned, before Raphael shook his head. “He had to know if he did it without warning, it would cause chaos not only in his territory, but across the world.”

“Not if he trusted his commanders, especially Rohan.” Galen scowled at the floor, his mind clearly elsewhere. “He may well have gone to Sleep in a secret location, leaving instructions for the Cadre to be informed once there was no chance of anyone tracing his whereabouts.”