Chapter 25
It will be all right, Misha. I promise.
—Dmitri to his Firstborn (So very, very long ago, before Raphael’s Ascension and after Dmitri’s Ruin)
The next few minutes were a bedlam of hugs, dropped jaws, and congratulations.
The first thing a beaming Elena said after everyone had calmed down, was, “This stays in this room. Our next stop is the Refuge. We’ll make sure Venom and Holly are in on that celebration, then we’ll drop by to see Illium and Aodhan, and Vivek.”
“What about Misha?” Janvier hooked one arm around his bent knee. “Kid’ll be pissed if he feels left out. I mean, I know he’s technically an adult these days, has grown out of clawing sofa legs, but he might regress.”
Once, Raphael would’ve glanced at Dmitri to see his reaction to that precious name, but that had been hundreds of years ago, soon after Misha, Izar, and Nasien had been born.
Dmitri was the one who’d named Misha.
“I was ready,” he’d told Raphael, his voice rough with memories of a little boy who’d adored his father so much that he’d tried to stow away in Dmitri’s market cart so he could spend the whole day with him.
“And Naasir, he’s a huge fucking piece of my heart.
It felt right that one of his boys carry my boy’s name. ”
Today, Raphael said, “Misha’ll understand that we had to tell Naasir first—he is, after all, the head of their little pack.”
Elena’s favorite tiger creature had turned into one hell of a father.
“Our baby will grow up in New York,” Elena said to a question from Jason, who now wore the mien of a spymaster already shuffling pieces on the board to best protect the child of his archangel.
“We’re taking Keir and Nisia’s advice to stay in the Refuge for the first year—me and the baby full-time, with Raphael flying in and out—but after that, we’re coming home. ”
“Galen was raised in Titus’s court.” Dmitri glanced at Jason. “Not the child of an archangel, but an angelic infant all the same. I’ll talk to Titus’s people, see how they ensured his safety while allowing him to grow into the barbarian he is.”
“Are you sure, sire, Elena?” Sam asked, the black-tipped brown of his wings held with warrior attention even though he was seated.
Raphael knew why he was asking—the reason angelic children were nearly always raised primarily in the Refuge was because angelkind needed to be seen as all-powerful by the masses, even more so when it came to the strongest vampires.
Any hint of vulnerability could lead to rebellion, which would end—inevitably—in streets drenched in red.
Mortals and vampires would never win a fight against angelkind, not with archangels in the mix. They’d die in their thousands. Better not to put temptation in their path.
Raphael didn’t disagree with that line of thought; it wasn’t an arbitrary one, but one learned through painful, bloody experience. However—“It can be done.”
He sat forward in the armchair he’d taken, Elena having perched on its wide arm.
“It will require methodical but not intrusive security. As important will be dissemination of the warning that vengeance for any harm done would be so far off the scale that it would be beyond nightmare.” Raphael had no mercy in him when it came to those who harmed children.
And his own babe? He’d burn down the world.
“The Legion would make this easier,” Ashwini murmured, still playing absently with the trailing end of the lime-green vine she’d used as cover earlier. “Especially if they arrived close to the birth—hard to miss the warning signal that’s seven hundred and seventy-seven unkillable warriors.”
Raphael’s temple didn’t pulse. He felt no sense of a large presence on the horizon awaiting to emerge…no sense that his Legion lived again. “Are you attempting to tell us something, Ashwini?” he asked on a withheld breath.
“No. I wish I was, but that was just me hoping.” She grinned. “I did, however, see a bassinet beside your bed a week ago.” A tap of her temple to show where she’d seen it, even as Janvier spun around to glare at her.
“Sugar,” he said, “you are keeping secrets from your Janvier now?”
Ashwini stroked her fingers through the thick chestnut of his hair, the glints of copper within brighter after weeks of summer sun. “No woman spills news like that.” She shot Sivya and Montgomery a grin. “Also, I wasn’t the only one in the know.”
“An archangel and his consort’s home is inviolate,” Montgomery said with perfect butler grace, while sweet, shy Sivya hid her laughing face in her hands.
As Raphael took in the people gathered around him and his consort, he knew that while his father was dead and his mother in Sleep, he sat with family. I hope to see you again, Mother, he said deep in his mind. I hope to introduce you to our child.
In going to Sleep when she had—at the realization of a hovering madness—Caliane had regained his trust in a way he’d have believed impossible. She’d not only stood by her word, but given up her reign itself to keep that word.
Elena’s hand sliding into his, the silver-edged gray of her gaze holding an understanding that needed no words.
Lifting her hand to his mouth, he pressed a kiss to her knuckles. Together, hbeebti. In this adventure and all that come.
Always, Archangel.