“I’d rather feel… something,” I answered.
“Oh you will…” He glanced behind me at Stephanie. “Believe me, it will be the greatest pain of your existence. Now.” He rubbed his hands together. “Direct me to the blood. If you would.”
Mumbling out a curse, I clapped open my hands. “No need.” The blood from downstairs spread between my fingertips, the different flecks of colored dust spread around the table. A possibility only because the blood was mixed with Angel blood.
Sariel stumbled backward.
“I think that means he didn’t know,” Alex whispered loudly.
“Don’t Angels know everything?” Genesis mused out loud.
“Do I look all knowing?” Sariel fired back. “Believe me, life would be so much easier if I saw every angle. I see three and a half.”
“Three and a half?” Genesis asked. “Three and a half what?”
“Sides.” Sariel picked up the dust between his forefinger and thumb, rubbing it together as the red parts of the blood stuck to his fingertip, clearly wanting to bond again with its true purpose. “I see every side, but half of a side is missing. It keeps me loyal.”
Alex coughed wildly, and I shared an amused look with him while he shrugged his shoulders.
“The Demon…” Sariel sighed. “Are more trouble than they are worth.”
“And we keep them around because… why?” Alex yawned. “Just say the word and I’ll go all Siren on their asses.”
“I think they’d enjoy that way too much,” Ethan teased.
“No.” Sariel dusted his hands together. “We do this the right way. There’s no need to start a war, and there certainly isn’t any need to exterminate an entire race just because they’ve been bad. Think of what would have happened with Dracula.” All eyes turned to Ethan.
“Horrible example,” Ethan grumbled.
“Cassius, since you’ve discovered the answer to your little riddle, your thirty days are now over.” He snapped his fingers. “You are fully restored and are ordered to immediately investigate, with your mate’s help, the sudden influx of Demon.”
“And the Angel blood?” Mason asked. “Where the hell are they getting it?”
“Cease from cursing in my presence,” Sariel snapped. “And if I knew I’d tell you.”
A wry grin widened Alex’s mouth. “That damned missing half side of things…”
Sariel shot him a withering glance, and the grin faded.
“So, it’s only us then?” I braved the question. “Just me and Stephanie?”
Silence answered us, and then, “You have your orders. Keep me updated.”
He moved away from the kitchen, as his wings disappeared, replaced by a leather jacket and dark-wash jeans.
“So he uses the front door now?” Alex asked.
My skin prickled with awareness. It was too easy.
The entire thing was too easy.
And if there was anything I’d learned in my time on earth, it was that things were never as easy as they seemed.
“Wait here,” I whispered to Stephanie, following Sariel out the door.
His footsteps crunched against the gravel and then he stopped, lifting his eyes heavenward as stars shone down on both of us. Only I was still blanketed in darkness—the light couldn’t shine on a Dark One.
We weren’t given the honor.
Only Angels.
Pure bloods.
“There’s something else, isn’t there?” I asked.
Sariel pointed up to the sky. “How many do you think… look down on us… wish for more than their existence? None. I would venture none. Do you know why Cassius?”
More riddles. Just my luck. “No. No, I do not.”
“Because their purpose is to shine, not to have an opinion or feelings. They rest in the occupation they have been given, and they excel at it.”
“Yes.” A few more stars twinkled down, casting a light glow across Sariel’s face.
He turned to me, his eyes white. “Ask your question, son.”
“A vision…” I nearly choked with the horribleness of it. “Stephanie saw the future, a future, she was killing me. You stood behind her.”
Sariel didn’t look surprised, if anything, his shoulders seemed to slump, his glow, defeated. “Yes.”
“I die by her hand?”
“Futures… can change,” he said in a chilling voice. “Though I’ve only seen it change once with an immortal.”
“Once?”
His eyes went white again. “With you… your future changed the minute you saved the girl from death. Your future was certain, set in stone, until you chose.”
“I’ve always had free will.”