even if every vampire in the city surrendered to bloodlust, he’d gain control within hours at most, but to do so, he’d have to slaughter hundreds of the Made. “Go.”
As the vampire left, clutching broken ribs and fighting not to dribble blood on the pristine white of the carpet, Raphael turned back to the window. The sentence was just, but it would likely break a mind as weak as the one that had just scuttled out of his office. Any other punishment would’ve given encouragement to others who might seek to betray me. Reaching out to speak to Elena was not a conscious decision.
Raphael?
I sentenced him to be buried alive in a coffin-sized box, he told his hunter with the heart of a mortal. He will be fed enough to be kept alive and whole, but he will remain in that box for ten years.
Shock, worry, pain, he felt the cascade of her emotions like blows.
I’m sorry, Raphael. I’m sorry he put you in a position where you had to make that choice.
In spite of her earlier words, he’d expected her to be horrified by what he’d done, for this was not something she could have expected. It was not a human punishment. But he’d forgotten that she was a woman who’d survived a monster, who understood that sometimes there were no easy choices.
Come to me after your talk with Sara. I would hold you.
Fifteen minutes later, there was a flicker of midnight and dawn on the horizon as his consort dropped down from the clouds not far from the Tower; Il ium’s distinctive wings remained in shadow. The blue-winged angel had an open affection for Raphael’s hunter, and he’d let it go—would continue to let it go . . . so long as Il ium never forgot that Elena was mate to an archangel. I have her.
Sire. The angel cut away in another direction.
Wait. I received a message for you earlier today.
A questioning silence.
The Hummingbird wishes to see her son.
Quiet, such quiet. I will go to her.
No. She is coming to New York.
He felt Il ium’s shock. The Hummingbird seldom left her secluded mountain home, and even then, it was only to go to the Refuge. We will watch over her, Illium. Have no fear of that.
The Hummingbird had saved Raphael from excruciating pain when she’d found him on that forsaken field where Caliane had shattered his body like so much glass, and for such would’ve earned his loyalty. But Il ium’s mother had gone beyond that—she’d shown a broken young boy incredible kindness at a time when his whole world was fal ing apart. There was little Raphael would not do for the Hummingbird.
Sire, I must—
Go, Raphael said, knowing the angel needed time to get his mind around the news. She arrives in a week’s time. He was walking out onto his private balcony as he spoke, switching the mental connection. Come, Elena.
I can’t land there. I’ll brain myself.
He almost laughed, and he had not thought he could do that after the sentence he’d just delivered. I will catch you.
That she didn’t question him after that, simply changed trajectory so that she flew into his arms ... it broke him. Then it reformed him anew. “Elena,” he whispered into her hair as he crushed her to him.
She wrapped her arms around him, his fragile consort with her incredible wil and her refusal to surrender. “Tel me,” she whispered.
And he, an archangel used to keeping a thousand secrets, told her.
10
Evening shadows lay heavy on the horizon when Elena walked out across the lawn behind Raphael’s—their—home, heading for the edge of the cliff beyond the trees. After leaving the Tower earlier that afternoon, the intimacy of those moments on the balcony a tight warmth in her chest, she’d cal ed a delighted Sam using the Web link in the library.
“El ie!” His grin had stretched from ear to ear. “You didn’t forget me!”
“Of course not.” Laughing as he bounced in his seat, those wings that looked too big for his body rising and fal ing in excitement as loose black curls tumbled over his forehead, she’d asked him how his day had gone.
“Father took me flying again!”
Since Sam had been forbidden from using his wings for another month, his father had begun to carry him up into the sky in his arms, his love for Sam a fierce thing no one could miss, in spite of the fact that he was a man of few words. “Was it fun?”
An enthusiastic nod. “He can go so fast.”
Their conversation had lasted half an hour, with Elena exchanging a few words with Sam’s mother as wel . The tiny angel with hair of the same lustrous blue black and wings of dusty brown streaked with white, stil touched her baby with protective care, but she smiled just as often—and for the first time, Elena truly believed that the smal family would be okay.