Angels of Darkness

moon ladling silver over us both. I could feel his rapid heartbeat, the heavy suck and release of breath as he gasped for air, but for a moment what astonished me most was the sheer radiant warmth of his body. I knew, but I had forgotten, that angels’ blood ran at a higher temperature than a mortal’s, to keep them warm when they flew at high altitudes. I was so cold that I wanted to burrow in, practically dig for shelter against his skin.

Instead I waited another heartbeat, until I was steady on my own feet, and then stepped back just enough to free myself from his arms. His wings still lingered on my shoulder blades, the feathers tickling my throat.

“You did it!” I exclaimed. “Were you scared? Are you excited? What did it feel like?”

“Terrifying. Exhilarating. I thought I would fall—there at the beginning—I couldn’t get the height, I thought I would crash down, but I didn’t. I caught the updraft, and then I remembered, I remembered all of it, as if it had only been a day since the last time I flew—”

“You went pretty far,” I said in an encouraging voice. “Maybe a hundred yards out and almost as far up. Could you tell how much distance you were covering?”

“No, but I think with practice I could,” he said. “Or maybe I could devise some kind of numerical system— flying at a steady rate for a count of five hundred would mean I had covered a certain set mileage—”

“That sounds like you want to keep trying,” I said.

“Yes! There are a lot of things I could experiment with. Pressure, for instance. The air feels different when you reach a certain altitude, so if I make careful assessments of how it feels at different levels, I’ll be able to tell how high I am.”

I couldn’t help laughing. “That’s ambitious for someone who hasn’t even been aloft for almost two years!”

He grinned. “I know—I must start slowly and build up my strength and gauge how much I really can do. But—I can’t describe to you—just the sensation of being in flight—I have missed it so much.” He came closer and his voice took a deeper tone. “And I have you to thank for giving me the courage to fly again.”

Oh, no, no, no. I could not have gratitude and earnestness from an angel. I was not used to that from anybody. “Think how relieved I am that this night went so well,” I told him. “If you’d come crashing to the ground and snapped one of your wings—well, that would have been my fault.”

“I wouldn’t have blamed you,” he said, still in that serious manner.

“Are you joking? You’d never have stopped blaming me!” I exclaimed. “You’d have spent the rest of your life in some attic, sitting in the dark and cursing my name, hating me even more than that angel who wouldn’t help you fly when you first lost your sight.”

He took just enough affront to step back a pace; the last feathers of his wing slipped silkily from my shoulder, leaving me even colder than before. “But unlike that old friend, you were exceptionally helpful,” he said, and his voice had the slightest edge. “I had counted on you to keep calling, but I hadn’t expected songs. And such songs! ‘The Shy Angel-Seeker of Sweet Semorrah’? The last time I heard that piece sung, I was keeping very questionable company.”

“You’re keeping questionable company now. You just didn’t realize it before.”

“Oh, I realized it,” he replied. “I just haven’t had much latitude in my choice of companions.”

I snorted in amusement. “Well, I don’t mind if you make fun of my song selection,” I said. “Just don’t make fun of my voice. You can’t expect a mortal to sound like an angel.”

He looked surprised. “In fact, I was impressed with the quality of your voice,” he said. “Am I wrong, or are you an angel’s daughter?”

And then I did the stupidest thing. Instead of answering, I caught my breath, as if he had offered me the gravest insult, then turned around and practically ran for the stairwell. I had closed the trapdoor, not wanting the blind angel to put a foot wrong as he tried to land, and now my frozen hands couldn’t pry it up fast enough. With a pouncing motion and a swirl of feathers, Corban caught my arm and hauled me to my feet before I could escape.

“Moriah—I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to offend you,” he said.

“I’m not offended,” I grated out through chattering teeth. I tried to jerk free but his hand tightened automatically. High body heat and exceptional strength—oh, angels had far more than their share of advantages. “I’m tired of the conversation.”

“You’re cold,” he said in a wondering voice, suddenly registering the temperature of my skin. He lifted his free hand to wrap around my other arm. “Why didn’t you say so before?”

“Well, first, I was watching you fly. Then I was hearing you talk about how much fun it was to fly. Then I was arguing with you. So there hasn’t been time.”

Unexpectedly, he released me and then drew me against his chest once more. His wings overlapped behind me, a plush cocoon. “We need to get you warmed up.”

“We could do that inside,” I suggested. It was hard to make that sound convincing when I was snuggled up against him, luxuriating in the heat of his body.

“In a minute,” he said. “Why don’t you like to talk about the fact that you’re an angel’s child?”

I had braced myself for the question, and this time I had my armor on. “Why might that be?” I said in a scathing voice. “Oh, maybe because my mother was an angel-seeker. That’s not something to be proud of. Maybe because I was one of the hundreds of children abandoned every year by women who don’t want to be burdened with the care of a mortal child. Maybe because I don’t want your pity or your disdain.”

He was silent a moment. “And how did you come to be at the Gabriel School?” he asked finally.

I laughed and tugged myself free. Jovah’s bones, but it was cold up here once a person stepped outside the protection of an angel’s wings. “Only the latest stop in a highly adventurous life,” I said. “I’m going downstairs. Your dinner’s probably cold by now, but I’d think you’d have built up an appetite.”

This time the recalcitrant door opened without a hitch, and I was quickly down the curving staircase into the blessed warmth of the attic. Corban, who had clearly learned to navigate the steps without being able to see them, was right behind me.

“Are you going to stay and eat with me?” he asked.

“No. I’ve been gone too long as it is.”

“Are you coming back tomorrow?”

I wanted to and I didn’t want to, and the fact that I wanted to really made me not want to. But I hated the idea that someone else might come to the Great House and discover the blind angel. “I suppose,” I said ungraciously. “Someone has to look after you.”

“Can you come back earlier or stay longer? The more I fly, the more I can build up my strength.”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “I’m just sneaking over here now.”

“Sneaking? Why?” he asked.

“Because no one knows there’s an injured angel hiding in the Great House,” I said tartly. “I thought that was on your command. We’ve all been warned away. People think the place is haunted, so everyone’s afraid of the house anyway.”

“So why did you start coming over?”

I let out my breath on a gusty sigh and offered a partial truth. “Because I’m the kind of person who always goes where I’m not allowed,” I said. “I thought you’d have figured that out by now.”

He was smiling slightly. “I have. I just wanted to hear you say it.”

I made an infuriated sound at the back of my throat. If I was as irksome to others as the angel was to me, I finally understood why some people despised me. “So, yes, I suppose I’ll be back,” I said as I made my way toward the door.

“And we can practice flying again?” he said.

He sounded so excited, so hopeful, that I couldn’t bear to give an equivocal reply. “Yes,” I said. “You can practice flying again.”

CHAPTER 4

When I entered the kitchen the next evening to help clean up after dinner, everyone fell