Chapter 3
THREE
THING
I turn in rage to Abaddon and, with all six of my arms, grasp him—shoulders, wings, and torso.
I do not lift him into the air or shake him as I long to.
I simply pin him in place and look him dead in the eye as I speak.
“She is terrified and hurt, and it is partially my fault. Now heal her. We both know you owe me, brother.”
Abaddon looks furious, but I do not care.
“Fine,” he barks. “If only so she can answer questions about what she is doing here.”
I let go and turn back to the woman, who is crouched low, moving her blade through the air menacingly as she backs into a room that only leads deeper into the castle, away from the exit. Not that she knows that.
“Take me back to the chateau,” she demands, swinging the blade through the air again as Abaddon approaches.
But he is not intimidated by a mere human weapon. He easily yanks it out of her grasp and crumples it as if it were one of the tin cans Hannah-consort’s food comes in. She makes an upset noise as she watches.
But not nearly as loud as the scream when he touches his palm to her forehead. I hate the sound and wish there was some way to calm her or let her know I’m trying to help her.
Light bursts from the center of Abaddon’s chest, which seems to momentarily startle her quiet.
She launches back from him the next moment. While she is still encrusted with blood, I’m satisfied to see that the gash in her forehead has closed over smoothly.
“Now tell us how you came to be on our land.” Abaddon’s barked-out command is spoken when Hannah-consort asks, “So what’s your name?”
A baby’s distant cry quickly takes her attention.
“Sorry,” Hannah says cheerfully. “That’s our baby, Raven. She must have woken up from her nap. She’ll be fussy if I don’t get in there and nurse her.” Hannah slips through the door at the opposite end of the room to attend to baby Raven.
The woman stares after her, gaze slightly askew, as if this is the most bewildering turn of events since she awoke in the castle.
But of course it is. She’s come to, surrounded by monsters. Abaddon is demanding answers, but we are the true anomaly here.
So again, I step forward. “I am sorry for my rude brother,” I say. “He is afraid of. . . outsiders. He worries for the safety of his baby daughter, you understand. There are always threats from the woods.”
The blonde woman’s bright blue eyes flick to me and then away, but for once, they are not full of terror. Maybe I am getting through to her. “Threats,” she echoes. Then her eyes slice back in my direction. “Let me go.”
“Go where?” Abaddon demands. “Where did you come from?”
“Away from here!” she shouts at him, her hand reaching down to her thighs. When she realizes her blades are no longer there, frustration flashes across her face. “And give me my weapons back.”
To my shock, Abaddon says, “Of course you are free to go. I will show you to the door.”
“You can’t let my consort go!” Remus objects, stepping out of the shadows. “She is fated for me.”
“You don’t believe in fate,” I growl. “Now get out of the way. As our eldest brother said, she is free to go.”
“Oh, so now that you agree with him, it’s eldest brother says so?” Remus mocks. “Five minutes ago, you were ready to tear his head off.”
I advance on my childish, selfish brother, and his tail raises behind him, wings flaring out as if he is readying for a fight.
“Stop it, all of you,” Abaddon shouts. “Female human, follow me. I’ll show you the way out.”
She nods hurriedly, glancing between Remus and me, then moving quickly after Abaddon as he gestures to the door that leads towards the exit.
I follow them to ensure Abaddon leads her to the true door instead of the dungeon for interrogation and to protect her flank from Remus. It is always a mistake to underestimate Remus. And considering Abaddon’s sudden willingness to let her go, I cannot say I trust either of my brother’s motives.
Why I suddenly feel so protective of this small human, I cannot say. But I will not see any more harm come to her.
As we near the door, I become alarmed as another thought strikes me. “She does not have enough coverings.”
Since Hannah-consort gave birth to her daughter, she has become susceptible to the cold again. The temperatures here are quite uncomfortable—even deadly—for weak human bodies. She was only given brief immunity to the cold because of the pregnancy and the hybrid baby inside her.
“I’m sure wherever she is going is close enough,” Abaddon says in the low, dangerous tone he sometimes adopts, “that it will not be a problem. She arrived here in perfect condition, after all.”
Understanding dawns. He is not setting her free out of the goodness of his heart. Which, if he has any, is quite limited, and generally only extends to his wife and baby daughter.
No, he intends to track this woman back to where she came from. Of course. He believes our angel adversary is involved in her sudden appearance.
It might not be a bad plan. If one is strictly mercenary and also doesn’t care if she freezes to death.
Because if the angel is watching, as Romulus’s scryings continue to show, will they be so easily fooled? I doubt it. They will see us coming if we try to follow her back to their nest.
Easier to let the bait freeze to death. If indeed she is some sort of bait and not just a very, very lost traveler.
“Go get one of Hannah-consort’s thickest coats,” I rumble, stepping between him and the woman. “Hand-coverings too. Or she does not go. She will not be safe in the cold.”
The sideways slits of Abaddon’s lion’s eyes narrow, but he must sense my stubbornness on the subject because he huffs in annoyance, then turns to search for the objects I’ve demanded.
I shake my head in frustration at this farce that we are letting her go. What my foolish brother does not want to admit is that while this castle has been frozen in time, the world has moved on. Sped up.
From what Romulus told me when he traveled with Hannah-consort to a modern city, the humans have become quite ingenious during our two-hundred years locked in the dungeon.
My brothers and the birds are no longer the only creatures that can fly.
The humans have found other ways. Curious, I had Romulus bring me back books on the subject.
He is the one of us who can move most seamlessly in their world by covering his brother’s face with a wig and wearing a large trench coat to hide his wings and tail.
I’ve been shy of trying shadow-walking in that modern world, and considering the ease with which that female saw me today in the woods, I’m glad I haven’t. Am I simply out of practice?
Romulus has been getting us the human groceries Hannah-consort so treasures, along with other modern amenities to update the castle. For me, he brings back books. I have learned much these past nine months since I was freed from captivity.
So yes. I know the world has become both much, much larger and also, paradoxically, far smaller. This woman could have easily flown nearby in a small plane or helicopter. No angel involvement required.
I watch her out of my peripheral vision as she stands stoically still, back to the exit, eyes scanning the room.
She might have been startled when she first met me and again when she woke up to find Abaddon crouched over her, but she’s taken the situation remarkably in stride. She seems calm and focused, ready to leave but also prepared for deception.
I hope she can return to her helicopter and leave this place, our existence a strange nightmare phantasm she can simply chalk up to a bad bump on the head.
But then I remember that she came to us covered in blood.
It may not be good that she returns to wherever she came from. She was fleeing through the forest in terror.
“Here,” I say, alerting her before I step forward.
She’s immediately on edge, her entire body going taut. And like that first moment in the forest, I feel a tugging toward her.
I blink and rub my chest, staring at the tiny blonde woman covered in blood who looks ready to tear Remus and me apart if we make even a wrong step in her direction.
I make my offering clear as I hold the weapons I confiscated earlier. “In case you run into any danger out there.”
She looks up at me uncertainly but snatches her weapons back, flipping them expertly in her palms before sheathing them at her thighs again. She doesn’t say anything, just gives me a wary nod.
At the brief interaction, I am overcome by emotion. They are almost foreign, as it has been so long since I allowed myself to feel anything. I’m confused by my fear of her vulnerability and the overwhelming protectiveness I feel for her.
There is some strange connection between this tiny human and myself that I do not understand.
I decide right then and there that I will also follow her when she leaves us, just not for the same reason as my brother. I do not want to follow her to capture some stalking angel. I only want to ensure she is protected from whatever set her running in the first place.
If it was humans who frightened her so badly, they will learn how wrong they were to terrify this small woman, however capable she seems with those blades of hers.
Because I am Death incarnate. And as much as I have determined to change my ways, for this cause—remembering the abject terror on her face as she fled through the woods—I will not mind a little backsliding.