Chapter 10
…one must have intellectual challenges or one fades away into ennui, and that’s a waste of near-immortality, is it not?
—Mr. Walter Battersby to Holly Chang (Unexpected Wisdom from a Broker to the Immortal Rich)
It wasn’t until much later, after Eve had showered and grabbed a snack from the premium bottled blood Montgomery stocked for guests, that Elena’s sister said, “How’re you handling it, Ellie?”
She leaned against Elena’s potting table inside the greenhouse, her defined arms visible in the dark gray of her tank top.
Her snug-fitting jacket, created of armored fibers interlaced with discarded communications wires, lay forgotten on a wooden bench tucked in between a small flowering cherry and a miniature Japanese maple—both trees were permanent elements of the greenhouse.
Elena had shaken off her earlier sickening fear, but the impact lingered in her bones, in her heart. “Past the first shock.” She began to deadhead a plant that had ended its show for the season.
Eve waited, no longer the young girl who’d known nothing of the tragedy of her father’s first family.
“I worry,” Elena admitted, fighting against instincts that wanted to see Eve as the child she’d been when they’d first met. That wouldn’t be fair to either one of them—and it would spit in the face of the bond they’d forged over hundreds of years of sisterhood.
“Logic doesn’t have much impact on that kind of visceral fear.” Elena had literally killed her personal monster, chopped off his fucking reborn head. And still he whispered in her ear when her guard was down. “I know it’s irrational, but…”
“You know what I think?” Eve came over to wrap one arm around Elena’s waist, lean into her as she’d done when she was young. “Your fear is evidence of who you are—and that’s not a jaded immortal for whom nothing matters. Things matter to you, Ellie, and always will.”
Elena slid her wing over Eve’s back, her throat thick. “When did you get so wise, Evie?”
A pause. “I’m not,” Eve said at last. “But I want to be like you, Ellie. I never want to be jaded or flippant like so many of the vampires I see. They take nothing seriously, just coast through existence. I don’t want that.
I want things to matter to me all my life.
I want to feel, to experience, to be alive. ”
In that moment, Eve sounded more like her much younger sister than she’d done for centuries. Putting one arm around her, Elena hugged her tight. “I can’t imagine you ever coasting.” Eve was too much a force of nature. “But I’ll check you if I ever sense it—and you do the same to me.”
“Deal.” A long inhale as they drew apart, Eve taking up her previous position against the potting bench, while Elena continued with her deadheading.
“How’re you enjoying being in charge of Illium’s ground troops while General Siu is on Refuge leave?
” Raphael had the feeling that Illium was testing Eve out in preparation for a significant jump in rank and responsibility, but that was a conversation they’d had in private.
Elena wasn’t about to put the possibility on Eve’s shoulders and stress her out.
“I wasn’t sure he made the right call, to be honest.” Eve hitched herself up to sit on the potting table.
“But I like being the boss bitch.” A grin.
“I’m not insufferable, I promise. My friends would soon set me straight if I was—but yeah, turns out I’m good at overseeing ops, keeping the troops in line and on target. ”
Elena pointed her planting snips at Eve. “I could’ve told you that the first time I saw your homework. Jeez, I’ve never seen so many neat charts and cross-references.”
Eve cackled, a sparkle in her eyes. “I’m throwing you an organized-to-the-minute baby shower when it’s time, by the way. My niece or nephew deserves to be celebrated.”
“You’re going to spoil them, aren’t you?”
“Nah, that’s for Lady Caliane and Lady Sharine. I’m going to back them against their parents and make sure they get away with mischief.”
Elena put down the snips. “I’m so glad you’re here, Eve. You’ve never told me why you decided to become a vampire, but I know part of it was because of me.” So she wouldn’t be without family as she walked into eternity. “Thank you.” Words too small to encompass all she felt.
But Eve shook her head. “Sure, I wanted to be there for you, Ellie, but I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t have this need inside me to see the future unravel.
” She swung her legs. “Amy, she always wanted the white picket fence and the two cute kids and devoted husband, a pet or two. She was so happy with her life.”
Elena nodded. “She told me once that she’d had a life far more amazing than she could’ve ever imagined.” Elena’s half sister had been eighty-eight at the time. “That if she had a regret, it was that she hadn’t married Maynard the first time he’d asked, instead of making him wait two more years.”
I was scared he didn’t really love me. Not enough.
Another ripple of pain caused by Slater’s murderous acts. Jeffrey had loved his second wife—Eve and Amy’s mother, Gwendolyn. But not like he’d loved Marguerite. His daughters had known. It had bruised Amy’s heart, made her hesitant to take the risk of giving her love to a man.
But Maynard loved me from the first day he met me to the day he took his last breath, Ellie. He loved our daughters just as much. He healed me in ways he didn’t even know—and, oh, what a life we had. What a beautiful, astonishing life.
“That sounds like Amy.” Smile soft, Eve touched her fingers to a nearby bloom of delicate pink.
“Me? I always had this itch under the skin, a frustrating awareness that my body wasn’t strong enough to see and do all I wanted to see and do.
If you influenced me, it’s only in showing me another pathway. ”
Their eyes met.
“I’ve had a dazzling immortal life, Ellie.
The only thing I need at this point is to find the love of my immortal life—but I’m content to sow my wild oats until I do.
” A mischievous Eve smile. “After all, Raphael didn’t fall for you until he was a thousand five hundred.
I am but a spring chicken in comparison. ”
Their laughter filled the greenhouse, the plants rustling as if they smiled with the two Deveraux girls who had come through time with their love for each other a bright flame.
* * *
Raphael kept himself well away from the Enclave house that day, aware that Elena needed this time with the sister Raphael had first met as a child. “She was bright and courageous even at ten,” he told Dmitri where the two of them stood beside a remote section of the Hudson.
Raphael had flown there, while Dmitri had driven his precious red Ferrari.
The sleek machine hovered quietly over the long green grass just beyond the trees that overhung the river, a mechanical panther that Dmitri had designed.
Raphael’s best friend had taken up automotive engineering at some point in the last half millennium.
“Have to keep the mind fresh,” he’d said. “Also, Honor says I need a hobby.” A scowl. “She doesn’t think beating you to a pulp once a week qualifies.”
“I believe you were the one who was pulp last week.” Raphael had considered his own life. “Do you think I need a hobby?” The demands of an archangel’s life were myriad and complex, but…none of them could be counted as a hobby.
A chuckle from his best friend. “Come help me with the prototype. We can both tear out our hair.”
That was exactly what Raphael had done. The afternoons he spent in Dmitri’s garage while the two of them attempted to figure out a technical issue on Dmitri’s newest design reminded him of how they’d been young men together once, carefree and open to anything.
Today, his friend said, “I’ve always liked Eve.
” He slipped his hands into his pockets, having come from the Tower still dressed in a formal black suit that featured the diagonal panels, invisible side closures, and mixed media fabric popular this decade.
“I’m hearing rumors Illium’s thinking of bumping her up to general. ”
“So am I. Far as I can tell, she has the full support of the troops under her—and her strategic game has improved by magnitudes.” Eve had come to Illium’s team as a solo hunter, so it was unsurprising that it had taken her time to settle into her position as the leader of a group.
“So.” Dmitri glanced over, his dark eyes astute. “Something’s up.”
Raphael crouched down, picked up a small stone, and skipped it over the water.
And considered how to tell his closest friend a piece of news that might devastate him. Because Dmitri had once cradled his own babes, proud and happy.
Misha and Caterina, two innocents who had been their father’s heart.
When he rose back up, his entire chest felt caught in a crushing vise. “My friend,” he said, “I am to be a father.”
Dmitri’s pupils expanded as he sucked in a breath…and then he was giving a shout of joy as he hugged Raphael with such ferocious warmth that it made Raphael’s eyes burn.
“Fuck!” The other man thumped Raphael’s back, his grin in his voice. “Fuck! A kid! Raphael!”
Grinning himself as Dmitri drew back, Raphael thrust both hands through his hair. “I barely believe it myself, but Nisia assures us that it is true.”
“How far along?”
“Not far.” He stretched out his wings, then folded them back in. “Dmitri, I am…no longer on firm soil.” He was an archangel, confident and powerful, and used to knowing what to do. But this…
Dmitri squeezed his upper arm. “Welcome to fatherhood. It’s a wild ride.” Naked emotion in his voice.
“I’m sorry,” Raphael began, his mind full of memories of a bright and loving little boy who’d pelted down the path to meet his father. “I would not—”
But Dmitri shook his head. “It’s all right, Rafe.
You don’t have to worry about me—finding Honor started me on the road to remembering the joy I shared with my children, and not only the horror of their passing.
Then to have Naasir’s cubs as part of my life?
It reintegrated so many of the broken shards.
“Holly helped, too, funnily enough. She’s so prickly and independent, but all these years later, even though she’s full grown and a CEO, she still comes to me and Honor for advice, or just to vent.
” A depth of affection in his voice that Dmitri gave to very few people.
“Last week, she curled up in that corner chair in my office for a full hour and plotted how to outwit her fashion house rival.”
The wind riffled through his hair, lifting the dark strands before whispering away. “Now, I get to be the uncle you once were to Misha and Caterina.” His smile reemerged. “I’d like to share the news with Honor.”
“We’d never expect you to keep it from her.” When he and Elena had spoken of who they would tell, they’d both agreed on this point. “Just keep it between the two of you—and Nisia—until Elena’s further along.”
Dmitri nodded. “With the cubs grown, I’ve missed having children close by.” His grin was of the man who’d both disciplined those cubs and taken them on adventures across rivers and up mountains that had them ecstatic. “You’ll stay in New York?”
“We haven’t talked about it, but I can’t imagine leaving Elena and our child in the Refuge, only to see them in short bursts.” He started to laugh. “I also think my consort would shoot me in my other wing should I even suggest such a ridiculous notion.”
Dmitri threw back his head at the reference to the shooting that had forever altered the pattern of feathers on Raphael’s left wing.
“I can’t wait,” he said, before hauling Raphael into another back-slapping embrace.
“I’ll order the baby gates—I’m pretty sure your kid is going to be as much trouble as the cubs. ”
The idea of a small babe—his and Elena’s babe—toddling around the Tower…Raphael returned Dmitri’s embrace with a huge smile on his face.