Chapter 72
Aanisa, daughter of Hannah of the Arts, who is the child of Shamilissa of the Weavers and Wing Commander Eragian, and Archangel Elijah, who is the son of General Eventhine and General Rathnael.
—The Naming Book (Archives of the Angelic Library, Refuge)
A year after the wedding, a small blue-eyed face swung down from a branch in the Legion forest to say, “Boo!”
Elena pretended to jump. “Gah!”
Nix grinned…right before a second small voice said, “Boo!” from behind Elena.
Elena did actually jump then…and realized she’d been set up.
Stepping back, she looked between the two miscreants. “It’s not nice to scare your mother, Nixie, and your foster mother, Anise.”
Unabashed, both laughing children swung down to the ground to come and tackle-hug her. Aanisa’s ombre wings—white flowing into soft peach, then a darker hue of the same shade, were a pretty sight against Phoenix’s black with gold.
“We got you, Eh-ma!” Aanisa’s eyes danced; her eye color had eventually settled—into a blueish hazel that Hannah had told Elena came from Eli’s line. A trait that skipped generations but remained in the bloodline—the last one with those pretty eyes had been Aanisa’s great-grandmother.
“Yes, we got you, Mama!”
Smiling at their glee, she went down to their height to get in a snuggle before they—full of childish energy—wriggled away to continue on their adventures in the Legion’s private jungle.
“Thank you for keeping an eye on them,” she said to the member of the Legion crouched in a nearby tree.
“Their laughter fills our home,” was the answer. “We did not know we liked children so much until the child of the aeclari. Now we have Aanisa, too.”
“At least for the month,” Elena said. “That’s when she heads home to her parents—and Nix with her.”
She’d had palpitations the first time Nix had spent any time away from home—and that had been with Lady Caliane, who would level literal empires to keep their boy safe.
As for Nix, he’d waved them off with cheerful confidence as he ran into Amanat to join his waiting friends in a game—because Caliane had extended the invitation to all of the current pack of angelic children.
It had helped that Raphael was having as hard a time.
“But,” he’d said, “we must do this. We both have deep protective urges—I wouldn’t cause them to stifle our son, hbeebti.”
“Yes.” Her stomach had twisted. “Doesn’t make it any easier.”
But they’d done it, leaving Nix with his treasured “Mimi.” Because while they’d taught him “Grandma” for Caliane, like all children, he’d made up his own mind about what he wanted to call her after he became comfortable with her.
None of them had any idea where he’d gotten Mimi from, since it wasn’t in general use in the Refuge, Amanat, or Manhattan, but Caliane was delighted to be his beloved Mimi.
“One forgets how children are,” she’d said. “I recall a great friend of mine being astonished when her grandchild decided quite firmly that she was to be Fifi.” Laughter. “Less of a Fifi I have never known—and how she’d glare if anyone but her granddaughter said it to her.”
Elena and Raphael had stayed in a nearby city for a couple of days, in case their son got homesick, but Nix was in heaven in his grandmother’s city, where he was both spoiled and petted—and treated as just another child.
Cherished, but allowed to run wild with the pet pups of its residents, to have sleepovers with his friends in tents erected by various indulgent adults, and to play battle with the same friends—all safely inside Amanat’s protective dome.
Once in a while, warriors vetted directly by Caliane would even take them out to fly alongside the horses. All had been with Caliane for the long term, but she’d made sure to get Raphael and Elena’s approval on the flights nonetheless.
Tigress had, of course, gone with him to Amanat.
Their astonishing, wonderful Bengal was gone. He’d left them two years earlier during a visit to the Refuge, saying his goodbyes before he walked out into the mountains with Naasir by his side.
“He wants to spend the time to come in the snowy wilderness where he was born,” the chimera had explained to a sobbing Phoenix, his hand tender as he stroked back Nix’s hair. “I will watch over him the whole way, make sure he makes it safely to his favorite sunning spot.”
“Promise?” Nix had demanded through his tears as he knelt to put his arms around a purring Bengal.
“I promise—as I promise to visit with him so long as he’ll have me.” Naasir’s voice had gentled even further. “He says he has had the most wonderful life with you, full of adventure and play. Now he’s old and he needs to rest.”
“W-will he be lonely?”
“No.” A smile from Naasir. “His clan is waiting for him.”
Nix had hugged his pet for a long time, his tears sinking into Bengal’s plush fur, before he’d raised his head and stroked Bengal one last time. “Love you, Ben.” A trembling statement, his lower lip quivering. “I’ll fly to visit you when I’m big.”
Bengal had nuzzled his hand, before turning and beginning to pad slowly away with Naasir, his daughter on his other side. Elena, Nix, and Raphael had followed them all the way to the edge of the Refuge.
Father and daughter had rubbed cheeks at that point, then Bengal had turned to say one last thing to Nix in their secret language that had made Elena and Raphael’s crying boy laugh…after which, Bengal had bounded away, Naasir by his side.
Elena had felt the not-housecat’s tiredness, the age of his bones over the past weeks as he slept in her lap, and had known he’d put on the show of agility for Nixie, so that his young friend wouldn’t worry about him.
Elena’s own tears had fallen hard and fast.
Nix still talked about Ben having fun in the mountains, and Elena would never disabuse him of that notion. She, too, liked to imagine Bengal in his sun spot on snow-dusted rocks, other plush not-housecats sprawled beside him as they spoke in a language secret and primal.
Having Tigress around helped—she’d always been a more playful personality than her sire, and that playfulness both made Nix laugh and made her quite the favorite in Amanat.
She even had her own little cat palace, complete with a velvet sleep cushion and different anklets that the maidens changed out for her at her wish.
Caliane had also welcomed the Legion should Elena and Raphael wish for the warriors from the deep to stay with Phoenix, but they’d decided it was good for Nix to have some distance from their constant presence. The last thing they wanted was for his love for the beings to turn into resentment.
As evidenced by his parents’ calls with Nix over the time he spent in Amanat, he’d loved it.
But he’d also raced into their arms when they returned to pick him up after his two-week-long sojourn. “Mama! Papa!”
It had been a sweet homecoming, his hair tumbled and his fresh clothes already bearing a smear of dirt. Elena’s arms had wanted to hold him tight and never let him go…and that’s why she had to. Because she wouldn’t destroy her son’s bright spark of a spirit by crushing it with her ravaging fear.
So he’d by now stayed with Uncle Blue and Uncle Adi as well as with Lady Sharine and Titus—Shari-grandma and Tito to him.
And, of course, he’d been in paroxysms of delight when he spent a week hanging out with Zoe, Izar, and Nasien after Elena and Raphael left the Refuge to attend an event in Zanaya’s territory.
He could’ve come with them—but why would he when he could learn all about making swords with Zoe, and how to track snow tigers with Izar and Nasien?
Then Naasir had turned up to join their feral little gang, and Elena had just hoped she didn’t come back to any wolf pups.
This next visit, to Elijah and Hannah’s territory, with his best friend, Aanisa, would be another stretching of their ability to allow Nix to fly free—and for their son to become ever more resilient and adaptable.
“It’s a kindness for Eli and Hannah to trust us with their child first,” Raphael had murmured when the other couple left the city after dropping Aanisa off at the start of the summer for a month.
“Most of the time,” Elena had said, even as the shouts of the children’s play filled the air, “I forget how much older they are, but seeing them with little Anise…they’re more stable, less anxious—and far more willing to trust.” Eli had left behind only a small protective detail.
“Your Legion has already proved willing and able to shield her,” the other archangel had said. “And we have long since moved past being simply fellow members of the Cadre.”
Raphael had gripped the other man’s forearm. “We are family, Eli. I will protect Aanisa with my life, as will my consort.”
Like all archangels, Elijah wasn’t an easy man to read, but Elena had glimpsed the startled happiness in his eyes at Raphael’s blunt statement. “Family,” he’d agreed. “I hope you know we will protect Phoenix with the same ferocity.”
Today, Nix scrambled up a tree trunk behind Tigress, Aanisa in hot pursuit.
It was Misha who’d taught them how to climb effectively with wings—and Misha who most often joined them in their climbing games.
Aside from Elena and Raphael, Elena was fairly certain that Naasir and his three boys were the Legion’s favorite adults.
“They see the world like us,” the Primary had once told her, but had given no other explanation.
Elena-mine—rain-lashed seas crashing into her mind—where are the two untamed beasts?
Grinning, she walked out of Legion’s Home to look up toward the highest balcony on the Tower.
But the sky was too bright a blue today, searing her vision, and she couldn’t spot her archangel even though she knew he was up there.
In the trees, of course, she replied as she rose up into the air…
and there he was, the man without whom her world would be incomplete.
“Keir has dropped by for a surprise visit,” he told her when she landed beside him. “He was visiting with Gavriel and Michaela, decided to come see us, too, before returning to the Refuge.”
“That just puts the cherry on top of an already great day.” Smiling at the thought of catching up with the healer, she said, “I wonder if he’ll drop any hints about how the Gavi-Michaela relationship is going?
” As a mother, she felt for Michaela—but as a woman who’d been around Gavi since he was a child, her loyalty was to him.
His happiness came first.