Chapter Thirty-Eight
They had stripped Harshiel out of his shirt so they could see his back, but the very darkness of his skin made it harder for them to see if it was bruising badly, blood rushing to the surface.
His usual upright posture in the chair was strained.
I could see the tension in his shoulders and his hands gripping the arms of the chair as he tried to not hunch over the pain.
I’d hurt him and hadn’t meant to, or had I?
Charleston was right; if I hadn’t meant to hurt him, I wouldn’t have punched him like I had, so why had I done it?
I honestly had no idea which made me feel worse somehow.
I started to say I was sorry, but he spoke first. “I did not know you were injured, Zaniel. It is not honorable to strike an opponent in an injury that I did not give them.”
“It’s all right, Harshiel, you could not have known.”
“Is it true that it was a demon that clawed you?”
“It is true,” I said, falling back into the rhythm of the language I’d grown up with instead of just saying yes.
“You fought a demon hand-to-hand and kept him from killing you?”
“I did, or I would not be here to speak with you.”
“And I used the wound against you in a fight; I am ashamed of taking advantage of such a thing.”
I started to touch his shoulder, then stopped, because I wasn’t sure how he’d take it. “There is no shame because you could not have known I was injured. I am the one who should be ashamed; I should not have hit you the way I did, such a blow should be saved for life-or-death battles only.”
“I thought you would be slower, less able because you left Master Donel’s training, but you were fierce and fought well.”
I bowed my head, putting my right hand over my chest, fingertips lightly touching my opposite shoulder. Falling back into the old gesture without thinking. “I am honored that you found me a worthy opponent.”
He tried to bow his head in return, but stopped the gesture halfway, frozen in pain. “Most worthy.”
“As a worthy opponent may I ask you to see a doctor, so that I will know that I have not injured you too badly?”
He raised his dark face toward me but had to finish the gesture with just his eyes, as if even that small movement hurt.
I touched his shoulder then and fought not to touch the side of his face.
When we were children, I had loved how dark his skin was compared to mine, but especially compared to Cosmiel; she’d been a natural redhead with the palest of skin to offset her green eyes.
At seven, I had marveled at all the colors we came in, and it had been one of the hardest things to learn in the outside world that it was considered racist to remark on skin color.
I had been raised to believe that our differences made us beautiful, and no matter how wrong some things at the College had been, it hadn’t all been bad; in fact some of it I wanted to teach to my son.
Harshiel was studying my face as if he was trying to read my thoughts, and then I realized he could read my mind.
I’d touched him enough for him to be able to know what I was thinking.
It was one of his gifts, but only with close contact.
He couldn’t read someone across a room or across the world like others at the College.
It was one of the reasons he’d been trained to fight, because if he could touch you, he had a chance of literally picking your brain.
“Zaniel,” he said, and reached up to put his hand over mine where I touched his shoulder. “If you missed us so much, why did you stay away?”
“Because I could not have all of you and leave the College,” I said.
His palm and fingers were rougher than they had been the last time I’d felt his hand on mine.
We’d both lifted more weapons, more weights, touched more of life.
I felt the loss of not having been there for each other, but then I stopped my thoughts, let myself sink into that stillness that we’d been taught.
If you didn’t want someone reading your mind or emotions you could prevent it by simply not thinking, not feeling.
It was like the empty mind of meditation but reached in an instant.
When you deal with angels, blanking yourself for a fellow human is so much easier.
He pulled back first and then we let each other go, but the eye contact stayed. Frenemies, Charleston had called us, but that wasn’t exactly it, more brokenhearted friends.
Suriel said softly, “I am not the only one who missed you, Zaniel.”
“I did not miss him,” Harshiel said, looking away, but the lie was too obvious, or too late.
“The angels hear you,” Turmiel said, which was something we said at the College if you thought someone was lying.
“And the angels will heal me if I am worthy of it, I have no need of human doctors.” He started to stand but had to grab the edge of the nearest desk.
I caught his arm and steadied him. He let me help him for a moment and then glared that hatred back at me, but now I was even more puzzled by it.
He tried to jerk away from me, but the movement hurt enough that if I hadn’t been there, he’d have fallen.
“Please, Harshiel, let them do more tests; I could not bear it if something happens to you because I had been too zealous.”
“You were not zealous, you fought to win, as we are taught.” He looked around. “Turmiel, help me.”
The other man came but his dark eyes had widened; evidently Harshiel still didn’t ask for help very often. Turmiel came to take my place at his side, so he could keep standing.
“You are obviously too hurt to do your duty as Sentinel,” Suriel said.
“I have failed you,” he said.
She shook her head. “You have not failed me, not yet, but if you cannot move without Turmiel’s aid, then I am without either of you at my side.”
“Tell him to go to the hospital,” I said.
“We must all be back inside the walls before dark,” Harshiel said. The wording was odd, not back to the College , but inside the walls .
I looked from one to the other of them, trying to figure out what I was missing.
“If you collapse for need of a healer before we get to the College, that could keep us all out after dark,” Suriel said.
“If I am too weak to serve the angels as Sentinel, then I will take whatever fate awaits me.”
She touched his bare arm. “No, Harshiel, no.”
He looked where she touched him as if her pale hand against his muscled dark meant far more than just the hand of a friend.
For the first time I wondered if there was more than friendship between them, or if he wished there was more—did Suriel feel the same?
I had a moment of thinking what it would be like to be near to someone you wanted, loved, and be forever denied.
I had proven that I was not that strong long ago. Had they been stronger?
She dropped her hand away from him. “We will need a car to take us home, you can’t walk far like this.”
“Maybe we can give you an escort to make up for the poor hospitality?” Charleston said.
“We would gladly accept,” Suriel said.
“Zaniel cannot be part of that escort,” Harshiel said; his voice had fallen back into the growling warning again.
“On this we agree,” I said.
He frowned at me, still leaning on Turmiel. He could not stand unaided—that wasn’t good. How badly had I hurt him? I was angry and disappointed in myself for the loss of control. I knew better.
“Are you really going to refuse medical treatment?” paramedic Roger asked.
“I will return to my home,” Harshiel said.
“Fine, if you start peeing blood then your kidneys are ruptured. If the pain gets really severe, maybe same thing.”
“Are you trying to frighten me into going to your doctor?”
“Wouldn’t dream of ruining your chance to martyr yourself on some kind of macho power kick,” Roger said.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
Paramedic Sam said, “Maybe you don’t, but I hope your healers at this College of yours are better than our hospitals.”
“They are far superior,” Harshiel said. He took in a deep breath and stood a little straighter. His grip on Turmiel loosened, but he leaned against the desk almost like he’d sit on the edge of it.
“I’ll help escort them,” Lila said, as she came to stand beside Harshiel, as if ready to catch him if he fell again.
She was looking somewhere around his abs, which were a little compressed as he sat.
I suddenly saw him from Lila’s perspective as a very in-shape, athletic man and she was single.
I tried to remember if I’d ever mentioned that Angel Speakers were celibate.
It probably hadn’t come up in conversation.
I had a moment of debating on letting her pursue him, or saving them both the trouble.
If he hadn’t been hurt I’d have been tempted to let Lila try, but he was hurt and .
. . I moved toward her, planning to say something, but the paramedics moved in again with more warnings and notes for the healers, and Turmiel caught my attention.
I let him lead me to the side of everything. “Master Donel requests a favor if you are willing.”
“For Master Donel, anything.”
“His sister is alone in the city now; everyone has moved away, or passed away. He would like someone to check on her. If she is in need, could you leave a message at the College?”
I was startled because we gave up all birth family when we became an Angel Speaker, but Turmiel was part of Donel’s family of birth so maybe that changed things, but in the end it didn’t matter. I said the only thing I could say. “Of course, what is her name, and do you have an address?”
“Only her name,” he said.
I wrote down the name, both the Americanized version she’d been using when Turmiel had come to the College of Angels at age seven and her original first name when she and Donel arrived from the Philippines as children.
Turmiel only knew the last address of his own mother and siblings, not his aunt, but he’d been seven; you memorize your home address, not everyone else’s.
I put the information in my phone and had barely gotten it when Harshiel almost yelled, “Turmiel, we are leaving.”
I reached out and clasped Turmiel’s arm above the leather bracers on his wrists, so that we gave the greeting of Sentinel brothers-in-arms. It was strange how quickly I was falling back into old habits. “Give my best to Master Donel.”
He clasped my arm and said, “I will.”
“And please tell me how Harshiel is. If I’ve truly injured him I’ll never forgive myself. It was careless.”
“I will find a way to let you know, I promise.
I wanted to hug Suriel goodbye, but there was no chance to say any other goodbyes; they were ready to go and that was that.
Harshiel was determined to be gone and Suriel couldn’t seem to find an excuse to delay.
Lila and Old MacGregor drove them back to the College.
I realized after they left that I hadn’t warned Lila that Harshiel was celibate.
I hoped she didn’t flirt too hard with him on the drive.