Chapter 36
Gavriel
Devastation raged like an invisible fire through my soul.
I managed to hold myself together just long enough for Feather to slip free of Sanctuary.
Then I fell to my knees, keening. My heart pounded, my limbs suddenly lead-filled.
And my wings, that had already ached and burned, felt as if they were being pulled, torn away from my back.
I felt as if I were being unmade.
I wished I were.
With Haneul also now gone, I could feel the presence of others again. I sensed the approach of dozens of Protectors and Guides, but I couldn’t face them. Not like this. Not yet.
Gentle hands wrapped around me. Perception. “Where can I take you?” he asked.
“The cell below,” I managed to say. “The one I was…” Perception shushed me, and half carried me to the nearest hall.
I couldn’t fly, but the doorway to the cells wasn’t far, and at least no one else was walking this way.
We were left alone as I fought to hold the pieces of me together. Why did it hurt like this?
Perception spoke the word to open the door, and we descended together. “Show me?” he murmured. I battled the sudden impulse to run back to the gate and hammer on it with my fists, beg someone to open it, to allow me passage.
“Not yet…” I let out a long, shuddering breath. The pain in my body was excruciating; I just needed to be alone.
“You should not be alone, Gavriel,” Perception answered, though I wasn’t certain if I’d spoken aloud, or if he’d gotten strong enough to hear my thoughts.
I grasped his arm, and used a tiny thread of my remaining strength to bolster his new connection to Sanctuary. “You’re fully ascended now. I should have done that before.”
He stood, his wings extended, the power of Sanctuary coursing through him, weak as it was. Tears of joy fell from his eyes, and I remembered the moment when I had felt that same thing—as if I had found my purpose.
“I should have recognized your potential before today,” I admitted. “You are a true friend, and have the best heart left in this realm.”
“Yours is the best heart,” he replied, his smile dimming.
“I have no heart left.”
I sighed and trudged down the hallway to the door I’d been using for the past day and a half, while Mikhail and Righteous cared for Feather.
Cared for very thoroughly. I’d fought not to hear their lovemaking, their emotions echoing throughout the realm.
Fought not to listen at the door, to tear a hole in the fabric of Sanctuary so I could see them.
Join them. Love like theirs was the reason this level had been created, to grant some measure of peace from the relentless waves of sensual bliss, as well as the sound itself.
I hesitated at the door, dwelling on what was inside. Knowing it was self-flagellation to enter. But it was the only place I could be alone, could let go of the iron control I had on my emotions.
Where I could mourn and suffer without anyone else hearing.
“I’ll wait outside,” Perception offered as I spoke the most powerful word I knew in High Angelic, one rarely used, and walked through the door. I felt his gaze on my side, the deep wounds I’d hidden beneath a shirt and a robe, that still bled sluggishly.
The day before, I’d done the very thing I’d so recently forbidden Mikhail to do.
I’d cut pieces of my own form away—small, feather-shaped scraps of flesh that no one might notice as long as I stayed clothed—to muster the energy to reinforce one of the cells below.
To make it a miniature fortress within Sanctuary.
To make this place safe for the tiny demon I had grown to love in a handful of days.
No, not just safe. Impenetrable.
The room itself was ten paces square, with a low ceiling strung with gauzy white fabrics.
But that was the only white I’d placed in the chamber.
Precious deserved a room as unique and perfect as she was.
And making it into a tiny pocket of paradise was a gift I could give her…
and perhaps a small way to atone for the way I’d treated her mother.
Her mother. My mind still whirled at the revelation.
Perception had approached me the day before and quietly shared the story of Feather’s inadvertent naming of Sanctuary’s youngest Novice.
I smiled ruefully at the memory. The One Ring, indeed.
Only Feather could have created that powerful, adorable devil by mistake.
I had hoped to tease her about it, someday, after she had forgiven me for being the cruelest ass in all the realms.
But now? Now I might never have the chance to apologize to her, let alone enjoy an easy camaraderie. My heart pounded painfully at the thought, and I forced myself to focus on my surroundings, breathing slowly.
The room was a soothing, cheerful space.
I’d painted the walls lavender and deep purple, with silver stars scattered across every surface, to match Precious’s hair and eyes.
In one corner sat a crib stuffed with bright pillows and soft comforters, all dyed in vivid shades of blue, green, and indigo.
I’d even fashioned a mobile, with shining golden feathers that swung gently above the crib.
The feathers, when they moved, hummed lullabies that I had composed centuries upon centuries before.
I extended my left wing slightly, moving to expose the raw patch of flesh that remained where I’d cut those small feathers away.
It had been a ridiculous idea, excising my own soulfire to make a child’s toy, but the act had been as joy-filled as it had been agonizing.
It had felt like the sort of sacrifice a guardian might make.
I could have been that… A guardian, even a father figure or an uncle to the miraculous imp. My heavy sigh set the mobile into motion, and a few perfect notes spiraled through the empty space above the crib.
Now, to know that Precious would never see it, never hear those songs? That I would never have the chance to watch her grow or show her our realm… I thrust out my chin to stop the tears that welled, a trick I’d learned in the early years of my lonely vigil for Arabella.
I pressed a hand gently against my side, feeling the blood and ichor soaking through my robe.
After I’d made the mobile and crib, I’d cut out tiny scraps of my flesh to make the rest of the furniture, spinning the soulfire with a rough-voiced song of creation into all the shapes a nursery would need.
There were small sofas, cushions, a table with rounded edges, a larger bed sized for an adult, and—most importantly—a box I’d funneled a larger portion of my pure being into, and changed with an angelic word of power.
It was filled to the brim with fruit and cheese, and would never become empty, not for thousands of years.
I knew Precious could make her own food, but someday, I thought that might change. And for anyone else who wanted to spend time with her here, while I did what I had planned—while I shaped Sanctuary into a safe enough haven for her to live freely within it—the box would provide sustenance.
I stared at the furnishings and toys, but my mind blurred my vision until all I saw was Feather’s face as she left. The pain and longing… for me? How could she want my friendship after all I’d done?
What was she doing now? Was she safe? Had they reached the Celestial Realm? Was she thinking of me at all?
I pressed my hand roughly into my bleeding side to derail the obsessive thoughts that were flooding my mind. I had to stop desiring her. She was lost to me. She always had been.
I lowered myself to sit on one of the small sofas, perversely proud of the softness of the velvety fabric.
It was almost the same texture as my wings.
Mikhail had said for thousands of years that creation was the closest he’d ever come to knowing pure joy.
Rafe had also tried to show me how much pleasure could be found in all the arts.
As I had made this, I’d finally understood what they meant. Shaping this place, thinking of it, and bringing it into being, had been incredibly rewarding. Even if the experience at times had been more bitter than sweet—my closest friends, the ones who knew me best, thought me a monster.
I’d been gutted when I’d read the thoughts on the faces and in the minds of the battered, brave crew of misfits on the podium the day before. That Feather thought me capable of murdering a child in her arms, even after I’d sworn on my wings never to be cruel to her, seemed fitting.
I’d only ever hurt her. Why would she trust me?
And Mikhail… Well, he had been with me on Earth.
He’d seen me intent on destroying the child, so he had a right to doubt me.
But he’d forgotten the promise I’d made not to harm her, and had looked at me with suspicion and shock.
I deserved that as well. I had damaged something in our friendship, and the seeds of that hurt had borne bitter fruit in that moment.
But Sunny and Righteous knew me as a fair ruler of Sanctuary, I’d thought.
Yet even Righteous had seen my approach and gathered himself to protect the baby and Feather.
When Sunny swore to take care of the child, her weak attempt at deception had only cemented how far I had fallen in her eyes.
I’d known Sunny would never hurt the baby when I handed her over. I believed in her innate goodness.
But she didn’t believe in mine. They all saw me as cold, unfeeling.
I’d let them think the worst. They needed to care for Feather, not me. I’d left them alone and gone to conduct my interviews with Tradition and the Guide leadership.