He had given up heaven. And by choosing him over Vander or some other human, Ingrid was giving up a part of life Luc couldn’t give her—marriage, children. A family.
Luc didn’t want to lie to her. So he told her the truth about saving Vander’s newly ordained skin and being forgiven, and then turning down his welcome into heaven. When he finished explaining, Ingrid was sitting up, ramrod straight, her mouth agape. Marco had glared at him with disappointment; Gaston with incredulity. Ingrid’s expression was a mixture of both.
“Why? Why would you say no? Luc …” She grasped for words. “You … you can’t want to stay a gargoyle.”
“My decision didn’t have anything to do with being a gargoyle. I couldn’t leave, not with Axia out there, coming for you and the other Dusters. Not with the Dispossessed having just declared me their elder. Staying was the right thing to do.” He circled her wrist with his hand. “I spent over three hundred years just existing. Not living. Not until I met you. Nothing can tempt me away from you now, Ingrid. Not even heaven.”
She eased back and settled her legs over his lap once again. “I don’t know what to say,” she whispered. Luc heard the catch in her throat. “You gave up what every gargoyle must dream of.”
He let his hand glide over her knee, down the slope of her thigh. “I only know what I dream of.” Luc hitched Ingrid’s hip toward him but abstained from exploring farther. He liked sitting here with her, and coalescing would bring that to an end.
A saturating light brought it to an end anyway. Irindi’s white-hot glow engulfed the front room, sucking Luc from his relaxed position on the sofa and flipping Ingrid from his lap. His knees and hands slammed onto the floor in front of the fireplace, razing two piles of Alliance texts. Ingrid uttered a short scream as she toppled onto the floor next him.
“I’m sorry—it’s Irindi,” he groaned to her.
There was no reason for the angel of heavenly law to visit him, nothing to punish. And yet here she was, her voice blowing through the room. The tremor sent a teetering pile of books into a collapse.
“Luc Rousseau,” she bellowed. He waited for it: You have erred. However, Irindi surprised him. “The Order wishes to understand why you have chosen to remain dispossessed from God’s kingdom.”
Irindi’s radiance rolled off her in relentless waves, buffeting him as he practically kissed the floor.
Ingrid’s hand touched his back. “What’s happening? What is she saying?”
The tension in his throat made it difficult to speak. When he did, it wasn’t to answer Ingrid. When an angel was in the room, you paid attention to the angel.
“I’m not finished here yet,” he rasped.
“God determines when you are finished.” Irindi’s voice flogged his eardrums and rattled his teeth.
“He sent me here to protect humans, and I …” Luc searched for a way to explain himself, fast. Irindi wouldn’t give him much of her time. “I understand now. I want to now.”
Ingrid stayed crouched at his side, quiet. He’d always despised being tossed down into a bow and held there. But he’d chosen this. So long as he could stay with Ingrid, he would continue to choose it. Her life would be short compared to the years he’d already known. Even if she were to live into old age, Ingrid’s years would be over in the blink of a gargoyle’s eye. He would take them and cherish them, and whatever came after, he’d deal with it.
“You would sacrifice your own salvation to pledge yourself to the protection of God’s children?” Irindi asked. Had her monotone voice allowed it, he was certain he would have heard in it the same incredulity that Ingrid, Marco, and Gaston had shown at his decision.
“I do,” Luc answered. “I’m sorry, but yes. I do.”
As if sensing the weight of the conversation, even hearing just one side of it, Ingrid leaned her forehead against his back. “I love you,” she whispered.
Luc closed his eyes and basked in those words. She hadn’t said them before now. He expected a perfunctory dismissal from Irindi, the loss of her light, and that would be welcome. He wanted to turn to Ingrid and tell her he loved her. He hadn’t. Not in some time.
“Then, Luc Rousseau,” Irindi said, “stand before me now.”
The room fell dark and cold. The pressure holding him to the floor vanished, along with the glaring light.
Like before, at Clos du Vie, Luc pushed himself to his feet. However, unlike before, there was no warm glow, no magnetic draw toward the angel forgiving him. There was only the wavering light in the hearth from a few logs and a mound of ash.
And a woman.
She stood directly in front of him, her hair a tumble of spun-gold ringlets. Her skin was flawless and pale, and she had a pair of wide, deep umber eyes that made Luc feel as if he were being swallowed whole. She wore a hooded, marine-blue robe. A robe nearly identical to the one Axia had always worn.
“Irindi,” Luc breathed.