Archangel's Sun (Guild Hunter #13)(72)

“Though I loved this painting, I loved him more.” And so she’d given it to him, to gift to his friend. “She wasn’t a very powerful angel and she now Sleeps, so I can’t ask her to confirm, but I would assume Charisemnon saw it at some point and liked it enough that she gifted it to her sire.”

“Does it cause you pain to see your work in such a place?”

“No. Perhaps there was one here who needed hope and beauty in the darkest time. If so, I’m glad that they could look up and see the sunrise.”

“I should’ve guessed that would be your answer—no one who doesn’t possess a heart could paint with such glory.” She hesitated before blurting out, “One day, I hope to be able to purchase one of your pieces.” It was a thing of sweetness how this honed warrior admitted her dream, with a stifled excitement that had her lifting a little on her toes.

Sharine had lived a long and creative lifetime, but she tended to gravitate toward large canvases such as this one. Some were even bigger, covering entire walls. Her current project—a secret hidden in a light-filled warehouse Tanicia had organized for her on the edges of Lumia—was an image of Raphael, Elena, and their Seven with the gleaming skyscrapers of their city.

She intended to make it a gift to the archangel with eyes of devastating blue, this son of hers that she hadn’t borne. But the scale of it meant it’d take her years to complete. That tended to hold true for the majority of her work. The intricate piece that currently hung in Lumia had taken her a full half century.

Such was why, though she’d had a steady output for much of her lifetime, her pieces were beyond the reach of ordinary angels. It didn’t help that the passage of time and natural disasters had damaged any number. By the time she completed one piece, two more may have been lost or destroyed or just become brittle and fragile due to age.

“I’ll make sure you have one of mine,” she said to Kiama. “I ask for payment in the form of you sitting for me.”

“My lady—” A sucked-in breath. “I didn’t mean to—”

Sharine squeezed her forearm. “Hush, child. Not only do you have a face and a presence that make me itch to sketch you, I like you and I give my art to those I like.” She’d gifted Raphael a piece on his ascension to the Cadre, and as for Illium and Aodhan, she’d done countless studies of them throughout their childhood, several of which they’d “stolen” with her laughing permission.

She was wealthy, she supposed. Money had never really been the reason she created, but, thanks to Raan, she had a powerful financial support structure that meant she’d never have to seek a patron. That support structure took the form of two old angels who’d withdrawn from life except for what they did for her—not only did they husband her finances with fierce protectiveness, they acted as the conduit through which others might acquire her work.

Sharine had come to realize that they’d stayed awake so very long because she was broken and they were too loyal to Raan to abandon her. She’d decided to go to them as soon as she could, thank them with all her heart, and tell them they could lay down to rest without worry. She was no longer lost; they had more than honored their friend’s memory.

Sharine knew herself well enough to accept that she’d never be the right person to manage her finances or the sale of her art, but she knew how to get good people. All she’d have to do was mention it to Raphael and he’d send five scrupulous and talented candidates to her door.

Kiama yet had a stunned look on her face as they continued on, but she pointed out the spots where they’d found the bodies, her stance always that of a warrior on alert. “The dead included mortals, vampires, and angels,” she said first of all. “From the smell and the extent of the decomposition, they’d been dead for some days before we found them. But the decomposition was . . .”

The other woman frowned, lines carved into her forehead. “There is a way that flesh rots,” she said at last. “The flies come to lay their eggs, then the maggots are born. There is a progression.” She looked around the room again, her eyes intense. “Here, things were just . . . wrong. When touched, it felt as if the flesh had liquefied from within, the decomposition going from the inside out.”

A hard swallow. “I made the mistake of prodding one of the bodies with my sword—I wasn’t doing it to be cruel, but because I thought I saw movement and wanted to ensure I wasn’t setting myself up to be attacked by a reborn.

“I was careful not to push hard but the skin erupted as if it was so taut all it needed was the barest nudge, and liquid flowed out of the body. A greenish slime that got on my boots and caused such a pungent odor that we had to evacuate the room for an hour.”

The soldier’s breathing had turned unsteady. “Before we evacuated, I and the warrior-scholar standing next to me both saw insects swimming in the slime. That was the movement that had caught my eye—a massive nest of insects within the body.” Hand on her stomach, she shuddered.

Sharine couldn’t blame her. Her own skin was crawling.

“We were lucky that the sire was with us. He used his angelfire to cremate the body and reduce the insects to dust.” She indicated one of the scorch marks Sharine had noticed. “I don’t want to know what those insects would’ve done had they been able to burrow into the body of one of our own.”