Chapter Thirty-Seven
“AND WHEN TRINITY WAS COMPLETE, THE HERALDS FORMED US, MOLDING OUR APPEARANCE AFTER THEIR OWN, AND SET US HERE TO LIVE AND brEATHE AND SERVE THEIR GLORY.”
—THE DIVINE ORIGINS OF TRINITY, THE ARCHIVAL COUNCIL OF THE HERALDIC MINISTRY
Well, it doesn’t.” Dani’s voice is harsh and loud, shaking with barely contained rage. “The future doesn’t forgive him. We don’t forgive him.”
Orion wanders back over to us, flipping through pages without even really seeming to see them. “I wanted answers. Still not sure I was prepared for this.”
I drop into a crouch, slip off one of my gloves, and drag my fingers across the unfamiliar ground.
The soft green blades tickling my bare palm.
The give of the rich-brown dust—not dust, soil—that they’re growing out of.
I’m trying to imagine what it would’ve been like to have been raised with this beneath my feet, and it’s difficult to wrap my mind around.
“He didn’t mention saints anywhere?” I ask Orion as he sinks down next to me.
There are already-drying tear tracks on his cheeks as he shakes his head. “I skimmed pretty quick, but I didn’t see that word anywhere. Or even anything that sounded like it might be a saint. Maybe there weren’t any around when he wrote this.”
I shiver. It’s so much cooler here than out on the Copper Plains. “Then where did we come from…” Where did I come from.
I don’t really say it like a question because it’s not. Not one he can answer anyway. But I feel it on the horizon just ahead, waiting for me.
Trinity’s song, sharp and bright and constant in my head, suddenly wavers and dims, and in its absence, I hear it. The heavy swish of sharp metal wings cutting through the air. The clanking of Archangel feet as they land.
I hiss a warning, and Dani and Orion immediately freeze, dropping low to the ground.
Automatically, I reach for my goggles, only to remember that they were ripped away in the flooded tunnel.
Cursing, I tug the glove back onto my bare hand and crawl forward on fingers and toes to where half the wall has crumbled away and raise my head just far enough up over the broken edge that I can get a clear angle on the open green space beyond.
An Archangel tromps over the ground, crushing plants and flowers beneath its enormous feet, its benevolent metal face scanning back and forth as it moves toward us.
The sight of it makes my stomach churn with hate and disgust and pity, and it’s too mixed together for me to decide which one is strongest. I want to tear apart every angel I see for what they did to Halle, what they took from me, but I also shudder at the idea of touching them now that I know what—who—is inside.
“We must’ve made enough noise to draw their attention,” Orion whispers, his breath a brush of air against the back of my neck.
“They might not know exactly where we are, though.” Dani’s soft murmur comes from right behind me. I didn’t even hear either of them move. They’re both a bit farther back in the shadows, but the half wall is low enough that they can see the automaton lurking not that far away.
I hold my breath, counting the seconds and willing her to be right, willing the Archangel to move on past the ruins.
No such luck.
The Archangel swings toward us, its glowing golden eyes shining like beams right on the partially intact room we’re crouching in.
Its head spins completely around, revealing a second metal mask on the back.
One that’s all twisted, righteous anger, with orange-yellow light streaming from its narrowed eyes and snarling mouth.
“Ah,” Dani sighs. “Shit.”
The Archangel raises its arm, its enraged mask bleeding golden light, and the hand at the end of it starts to change, the pieces twisting and shifting position until it looks less like a hand and more like a—
“Is that a cannon?” Orion bursts out.
I don’t even stop to think about it. I just grab both of them, reach for Trinity’s song, and phase away before the Archangel’s weapon explodes with a blast of energy twice as big and twice as hot as a pulse pistol.
We reappear in an ungainly tangle on the back side of the ruins.
I’m splayed out on the ground, breathing hard, heart pounding and head ringing a little bit.
The air around me tastes like the ozone of a magnastorm, and my whole body tingles with power.
I hadn’t even wondered whether I could do it again—phase more than just my own body. This close to the source of Trinity’s song, to where it has been pulling me all my life, it had been pure power and instinct.
Dani scoots free, clutching at her chest like she might be having a heart attack. “I think I like phasing better when I’m half drowned and unconscious.”
I try to right myself, watching the Archangel spin, readjust. I got us far enough away to put a few more half-ruined walls between it and us, but that’s not going to buy us much time.
“You’re gonna have to suck it up, Morales, because I’m gonna have to do that several more times to get us away from this thing. ”
“Or, hear me out…” Dani hooks a hand into the rucksack on her back and pulls out a small jar of dark, oily liquid, unstoppering the top to pull out a short trail of cloth. “We use the party favor I brought.”
Orion shakes his head. “Val’s right. We should move.”
“It worked perfect with the one back in Concord.” With a flintlock lighter, she sets the end of the cloth on fire and watches it start to burn down. She grins with the same dark satisfaction and slow-boiling rage I saw on her face back at the Old Clock Tower. “Hang on to your asses.”
In one smooth movement, Dani rolls to her feet, cold, vicious delight in every line of her body as she takes a few steps out into the Archangel’s direct line of sight. It shifts toward her with a clank, and she grins at it.
With a whip-fast arc of her arm, she launches the jar at the Archangel, timing it so the fire hits the liquid inside half a second before the jar smashes into the automaton’s arm cannon. Dani bolts back to us, laughing, as a burst of fire and metal shards erupts in front of the Archangel’s body.
A moment later, though, the debris clears. And the Archangel is still standing.
It’s lost its cannon arm and is bleeding drips of naphtha and showers of yellow sparks, but it’s still on its feet. And heading for us. My heart drops into my stomach.
Dani’s eyes are wide and shining with shock. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
I reach for both of them, not taking my eyes off the angel for a single second.
“Now we run,” I say firmly. I’m not risking losing either of them like I lost Halle.
I can get us far enough away. I know I can.
There’s just this one angel, and it can’t be everywhere at once.
I’ll phase us fast enough to knock it off our trail, and then, if I have any energy or oxygen left, I’ll double back and find a way up to the Gate. “Grab on to me.”
“We’re already in it now,” Orion grumbles. He drops his pack on the ground, gripping that vial—the spirit of niter—tightly in his fist. “Dani, you wanted this fight, so you’d better get that crack shot pistol of yours ready. And don’t miss.”
“Orion—” I try to grab him, to hold him back, but he’s gone already, sprinting across the ground closer and closer to the Archangel. I pull out Wrath and Mercy, ready to follow him, but Dani puts an arm out in front of me.
“Stay clear on this, ghoulie.” She adjusts the rear and front sights on her pulse pistol, squinting down the barrel as she raises it to eye level. “I know exactly what he’s up to.”
Orion is nearly right on top of the Archangel now, and as it reaches down to grab him with its remaining hand, he launches the spirit of niter at its body.
There’s a shatter of glass and a distant splash, followed by hissing as the acid starts trying to eat through the metal of the automaton’s chest cavity like it had with the wall plaque.
The Archangel swipes at Orion, catching him across the back as he throws himself forward, rolling beneath its legs.
Dani flinches, almost like she’s gonna bring her pistol down, but Orion keeps moving, crawling away, and the Archangel straightens, preparing to turn around.
Dani steadies her hand, exhales, and fires.
The liquid niter explodes, a destructive wave tearing through the angel’s body, blowing its helmeted head almost all the way off and ripping through joints and naphtha veins.
On impulse, I phase through the destruction, feeling the heat of it even as I move through like a vapor and coalesce on the other side, throwing myself on top of Orion, who’s curled into a protective ball on the ground.
The blast wave is small but powerful, rattling me to the bones, and pain shivers through my body as tiny bits of hot metal slice through the thinner parts of my Butcher kit.
As soon as it passes, I look up, blinking my bleary vision clear.
The Archangel lies in a heap of twisted metal and ruin, its chest cavity so destroyed that I can’t even make out the remains of the saint inside.
Only the bottoms of its legs and feet and its dimly glowing naphtha heart remain relatively intact.
On the far side of the wreckage, I can just make out Dani through the smoke, blood streaking her face from a laceration across her forehead.
But she’s alive and already moving toward us.
Get up, Val.
I push myself to my feet. That much noise and chaos is definitely bound to draw even more attention, and if we don’t move now—
A waver in Trinity’s song. Just like before.
I look at the sky, stomach sinking, knowing what I’m going to see: winged shapes—lots of them this time—emerging from the glowing, stained glass Gate above.