forty-nine
Sunlight pours through the cracks in the bedroom curtains and my eyes flutter open. I’m overly warm, despite the autumn weather. My body hums, my skin alight with a fire that causes no pain.
It was the most restful sleep I’ve had in a long time. No dreams or nightmares, just peace.
The bite mark on my arm no longer stings. I try to lift it to inspect the wound, but a heavy weight holds it down. My head rests on something hard. I tilt it upwards.
Nathaniel looks down at me, a smirk planted on his face.
Did I start cuddling him in my sleep?
Sitting up quickly, I look away to hide the flush across my cheeks. Nathaniel shuffles next to me and swings his legs off the bed.
“What time is it?”
I ask, changing the subject before he has the chance to tease me.
His smile doesn’t waver, the look on his face worse than any comment he could’ve made. “Nearly nine. You were having a very peaceful sleep. I didn’t dare disturb you.”
I was wrong. This is worse.
I groan. Nine. We’ve wasted hours of daylight. “Now I know the cure to insomnia – listen to you speak for more than ten minutes, and boom. Out like a light.”
I grab the boots from next to the bed and lace them up before clipping my belt back on. “What’s the plan?”
Nathaniel stands and searches for the shirt he must have discarded throughout the night. The colour has returned to his skin, the circles beneath his eyes gone. The soft glow that buzzes beneath the surface glimmers in the sunlight. He still wears his jeans, but they hang low, and I find myself searching for something interesting in the room to stare at.
He pauses for a moment before he answers, “Stay alive.”
The houses in this area are nothing but bones and rubble. I try to remember what Queenscliff once looked like, but it’s stained by the image of complete destruction. I imagine that it was a family-friendly neighbourhood, with lots of schools and children riding their bikes in the street. Now it’s a graveyard.
We’ve walked west for a bit over an hour. We agreed that having no plan was the best plan, since we have no clue what we’re walking into. Nathaniel kills Cain while I find Jeremy and free him. Then we run for our lives.
It feels like it’s been weeks since Jeremy disappeared into the sky with the sharp-winged angel. I can hardly remember the way he smells, or what his face looks like when it’s not shadowed with the pain of my rejection. I thought I’d feel more excitement or anticipation as we got closer, but something akin to dread washes away everything else.
We climb over rubble, through trees, along more streets. In between picturing what our surroundings used to be like, I distract myself with thoughts of the impending doom that hangs over humanity like a cloud of shadow. Anything to distract myself from the guilt-laced rope that tugs me towards the love of my life.
Nathaniel’s voice pulls me back to the present. “You know, if you think too hard you may actually hurt yourself.”
“You know, for someone who’s five hundred years old, you’d think you’d be able to come up with a more original joke.”
I turn around face him, my lips curving into a smirk. Truth be told, I’ve come to enjoy this side of him. The playful side. The side that seems so human.
Nathaniel chuckles and falls into step next to me. “What’s on your mind, Slayer?”
“Oh, you know, just impending doom.”
The anxious pit forming in my stomach as we come closer to the warehouse expands with every step.
He stares at me. “There is a way to win the war, you know. It’s not all doom and gloom.”
“I don’t suppose you plan on divulging that information to me, do you?”
I step over a pile of broken bricks.
“I can’t give away all of my secrets at once, can I?”
Nathaniel sighs and stops walking, grabbing my arm. “Do you trust me?”
Do I trust him?
He hasn’t given me any reason not to. In fact, he’s been open with me. Honest about everything. He’s told me so much about himself, about the other worlds.
I return his question. “Do you trust me?”
He stares at me for a moment, and I’m almost certain that his thought process is similar to mine. After all, I stabbed him when we first met, and he invaded my mind.
Before he can answer, I start walking again and change the subject. “How does someone kill an angel?”
“Plotting my death, Slayer?”
He’s smiling, but it fades quickly. “Why do you wish to know?”
“We’re on the same side, remember? Why not just tell me?”
I shoot him a wink.
A sound I’m becoming familiar with escapes the archangel, an exasperated sigh that fills me with joy. “An angel can only be killed by a weapon made in Aetheria or the Darklands. Humans cannot wield such a weapon, therefore it is impossible for a human to kill an angel. Sorry to disappoint.”
I guess I won’t be helping in Cain’s execution, then. “That’s awfully convenient. Does that apply to archangels as well?”
He sighs. “One day your curiosity is going to get you in trouble.”
I nudge his side. “But today is not that day.”
“It takes an immense amount of power to kill an archangel. The kind of power that comes from dipping too far into the Divine. The kind of power that comes from crossing the line.”
He pauses, his lips pulling into a tight line. “No human wields the kind of power to harm an archangel.”
He shoots me a sideways glance as if he’s waiting for me to say something.
I take a deep breath and look away, desperate to avoid the silver in those eyes. “There goes my plan of taking you out in your sleep.”
“Amara…”
My name is strained on his lips, almost like he’s still searching for the right words to say. Then he stops moving, holding out a hand for me to do the same.
“What?”
He only answers by putting his hand to my mouth. He looks around, listening for things that I can’t hear.
“We’re close.”
His voice is only a whisper. In a second, his wings reappear behind him and he pulls his sword from between them. “Let’s go,”
he orders, and I follow.
Rounding the corner, I see the warehouse in the distance. Between here and there are about a hundred abandoned cars with piles of rocks in between. No, not rocks…
Bodies.
We move low and slow towards the warehouse. I scrunch my nose, the stench of rotting flesh overwhelming my senses.
We weave through the cars and step over discarded bodies. Their blood is dry, flies buzzing around them. Bile rises to my throat and I swallow it down. As we edge closer to the building, the smell of rotting flesh only grows stronger.
Please don’t be Jeremy.
The windows of the warehouse are either shattered or boarded up. The building is covered in ash and graffiti laces the walls.
This is the beginning of the end has been painted in red on the black steel door.
We hug the walls tightly and take each step slowly, careful to not make a sound. Stopping next to the door, we peer through the broken window to the left. That’s when we see it – the source of the stench.
In between large shipping containers are more bodies. Piles and piles of lifeless humans stacked one on top of the other.
“What have you done, Cain?”
Nathaniel mutters to himself, the words riddled with disgust. He slides the door open enough for us to squeeze through, tucking his wings close to his back and shimmying his way in. I follow behind with my gun in one hand, the other squeezing my nose to block the stench.
It’s dark inside. Beams of light stream through broken glass, creating eerie shadows that dance with each step. Nathaniel walks ahead of me, his body so large that I can’t see anything in front of him. The shadows play at his feet, reaching for him as he walks but shying away when they near the light that glows from his skin.
We weave through shipping containers, peering into each one and checking for any life, human or otherwise. The warehouse is silent, the only sound a low buzzing from the flies that feast on the decaying bodies.
My heart pounds in my chest, anxiety increasing as my hope fades.
A loud bang snaps our attention towards a shipping container near the back of the warehouse. Nathaniel and I share a look before changing route. He lifts his sword high in front of him, and I do the same with my gun.
With each step I take, my heart feels heavier and heavier. I try to take deep breaths and calm myself, but it only seems to make it worse.
We stand with our backs to the side of the shipping container.
Bang.
Nathaniel spins around the corner to the open door of the container, ready for a fight. I follow closely behind him.
It’s dark, so dark that I almost don’t see it, but there’s movement in the shadows. A large figure kneels above another on the floor, its back to us. It sits as still as a statue. Blood drips from its hands.
For a moment, I think my heart stops beating.
For a moment, I wish it did.
The figure turns around slowly, spinning on its feet and standing. It steps out of the shadows, but they hover by its side.
Blonde curls sit on the man’s forehead, just above his pale blue eyes. A smile crosses his face and he takes several steps towards us. Nathaniel moves in front of me in an instant.
“Amara…”
Jeremy says my name like a blessing, but I hardly recognise his voice. He steps to the side so that he can see me around the archangel, shooting a scowl towards Nathaniel. “You came.”
He doesn’t seem surprised, or relieved, just… happy.
I’ve pictured this moment, played it over in my mind a thousand times over the past few days. I expected to feel happiness rush over me, for all my love for him to come flooding back. I expected to feel an overwhelming need to run into his arms.
As I stare at Jeremy, his hands dripping with blood, the rope that pulls me to him tightens, but it’s accompanied by nausea. I stay put, sheltered behind Nathaniel.
I smile at him, but it’s more nervous than anything. Afraid. “Jeremy?”
His name feels wrong on my lips as I look him up and down.
His face is covered in blood. He wears no shirt and no shoes, with red stains on his chest as well. I wonder if the blood is his own. My eyes trail to the body on the floor behind him, the body that hasn’t moved an inch.
“Are – are you okay?”
The words come out shaky.
He tries to take another step towards me, but Nathaniel points his blade to Jeremy’s throat, piercing the skin.
“Why did you bring him?”
Jeremy glares at Nathaniel, almost growling. Nathaniel returns the same sound.
I touch Nathaniel’s arm to reassure him that it’s okay and he’s not going to hurt me, but the archangel doesn’t budge.
“Jeremy, what happened? You seem… You seem different.”
Different being the understatement of the century. My Jeremy, the Jeremy who makes me coffee in the morning, the Jeremy who pushes my hair behind my ear and tells me I’m beautiful – I don’t see that Jeremy anywhere.
Have such horrid things happened to him in the past few days that he’s lost himself completely?
“Why don’t you ask your knight in shining armour over here?”
He points to the blade that touches his neck ever so slightly.
I turn my attention to the archangel, lowering my gun slightly. “Nathaniel? What is he talking about?”
He ignores my question and continues to glare at Jeremy with nothing but murder in his eyes.
Jeremy chuckles, but it’s not his laugh. It’s something else, something more sinister. “Oh, she doesn’t know yet, does she?”
“Will someone please explain to me what in the worlds is going on?”
Jeremy sighs and takes a deep breath. In an instant, two large wings materialise behind him.
I take a step back, my jaw going slack, my heart stopping.
What the fuck?
No. No, he can’t be.
I was with him. For years! I know him. I know Jeremy, he’s not… He’s… He’s human.
“No…”
The word comes out as a desperate gasp, and I retreat until my back hits the shipping container behind us.
He can’t be…
But he is.
Jeremy is an angel.