What in all the Virtues was he thinking?
Tajael was perched on top of Charlotte’s physics machine, next to the paper crane in its box, watching the workers toil to make the device run. Or more specifically, a certain part of the device called the “virtual harmonic resonator.” They were having no luck with getting it to function, and Tajael had plenty of time to ponder the vast foolishness of his actions the day before.
“Can I take you out for tea?” He was not here to date Charlotte. Nor join in her nightly pleasure sessions. Or befriend her. All of these were so far from true Guardianship, so close to conjuring a host of Sins, the only explanation was that he’d lost his mind already.
He habitually unfurled his wings to check: still white.
He understood how it happened. She’d discovered the muffins with Hank, and Tajael had panicked. Every body signal she gave off said she was pained—hurt by his action, one he had thoughtlessly taken without foreseeing the consequence. His automatic and overwhelming urge was to comfort her. To soothe that pain in any way possible. It was a reflex for a Protector Class angeling, but if he were honest, it went far beyond that.
Every word he spoke to her was Truth. He did want to be friends. He wanted her to know him, to remember him, to be reminded of him. He watched her place the small paper Guardian Angel by her bedside, and it flushed him with pleasure. Not as much as she experienced later that night… but he didn’t cover his ears, either. He knew she was thinking of him. He heard her call out his name in the throes. And as heated as that made him, as much as his body reacted—heart racing, mouth dry, his male organ tight with need—he couldn’t feel wrong about giving her that pleasure, if only from a distance.
He told himself: she needed it. She deserved it, with all she had been through. In Truth, the line between what he desired and what he thought she needed was dangerously blurred. And her obvious attraction, her open-hearted excitement for their date at the end of work today… it thrilled him in a way that was sure to spell doom for him, sooner or later.
Either his restraint would hold until she accomplished her science breakthrough—or he would be tempted one action too far and Fall into the shadow realm. He’d halfway made plans for that already, Truth be told. If he were to Fall into shadow, he would lose Charlotte and all hope for redemption. But he would join the war as an insurgent shadow angeling, fighting against his own kind and the demon-infected humans haunting the streets. He would not be able to officially Guard her anymore, but he would watch over her nonetheless, and keep her safe in any way he could.
In short, he was hopelessly lost.
It was nearing the end of the day, and the tension in the lab had built to breaking. Charlotte stood back and donned ear protection, along with the other engineers. One tapped a touch screen with a series of commands, and the resonance device started to hum. It slowly ramped up in intensity. Nothing like angelsong, but loud nonetheless. So far, nothing they’d accomplished felt anything like magic to him—no reverberations through magical space, in any event. Just a bunch of loud clacking and thrumming and whining and other mechanical and electrical sounds that spoke of human ingenuity… but not of extradimensional energy.
Or magic, as Tajael knew it.
He truly wondered what it would mean should Charlotte succeed. Angelkind existed to love and protect humanity. While humankind could commit evil acts that made shadow angels look like amateurs, humans also had wondrous accomplishments of art and science. Which would this invention be? Were the fae right to fear them? In his heart, Tajael couldn’t believe it. First, because the fae were the immortal enemies to the angelkind, and he refused to believe they could be on the right side of this. Second, God created humanity to know him. Tajael didn’t know the how or why of it, but that purpose thrummed through him. If humanity took a step toward the angel realm, perhaps that was exactly as they were intended to do. But mostly, he couldn’t believe anyone as pure of heart and soul as Charlotte, someone who shone with soul-brilliance even with all the wrongs done to her, could be the architect of something that was anything other than good at essence.
He had started this Guardian assignment as a duty to his faction leader and angelkind, but now? Now, his duty was to her and her alone. And the larger purpose she served. If he could prostrate at her feet and pledge himself and his life to serving and defending her, he would.
Instead, he would be taking her to tea.
He almost laughed at the preposterousness of it. But he didn’t have an auditory shield up—he was too curious about all their plans and machinations. Although the cacophony in the lab was such that he was tempted to raise one. A few seconds later, it cut quickly, the motors winding down with a distinct whine. By the groans and soft curses from the humans, he gathered it was another failure.
“All right, everyone take five,” Jimmy said. Charlotte was the brilliance behind the experiments, but he was the leader in the lab.
Charlotte pursed her lips and was the first one out. While the others wandered to the snack area, she headed straight for the restroom, which was outside the office and down the hall. He zipped ahead to make sure it was empty. Normally, he would leave her some privacy, but this time, when she entered, she went straight to the sink instead. Her fists pressed into the small tiles of the counter, and he could see the tears welling up in her eyes.
It tormented him.
He couldn’t simply appear in the women’s bathroom to comfort her. He was left helpless to watch as she pounded her fists, then scrunched up her face, then finally covered it with her hands. He could hear her sobs and see her shoulders heave up and down.
He vowed he would fix all this… later. When he had her alone. After work. Suddenly, all his doubts about the foolishness of befriending her, of taking her to tea, flew away. If he could give her some small measure of comfort in person…
A pop in the air and a small flash of light echoed throughout the bathroom.
Holy angels of light…
Oriel had appeared at his side, causing Tajael to nearly jump out of his skin. His angel blade was half drawn before he realized who it was. Charlotte was looking all around the bathroom, but she couldn’t see them with their cloaking. Oriel was close enough to be inside Tajael’s magical cloak—and thus they were visible to one another. Tajael sensed when Oriel quickly raised an auditory shield around them.
Which left Tajael free to vent his anger. “For the love of magic! Do you want me to stick a blade in you? You could have been shadowkind.”
“I know, I know.” But Oriel was distracted, watching Charlotte. “Is she ill?”
“Merely upset. As am I. With you.”
Oriel chuckled, but his humor died when he saw the Wrath on Tajael’s face. “My friend, I wouldn’t barge in on your Guarding without cause.”
“Well, let’s have it, then.” Tajael was afraid Charlotte would be done with her momentary retreat, and he didn’t want Oriel tagging along for the rest of the evening. Especially if she’d had enough of work, and it was time to leave.
“You seem distraught.” Oriel’s expression trained back on Tajael.
“As I just said.”
“Perhaps I could spell you again. Markos is unaware that I’m—”
“No, I do not need a break. I need you to explain yourself and be gone.”
Oriel frowned and leaned back a little.
Tajael realized the harshness of his words. “I’m sorry. Please, Oriel, just tell me your purpose.”
“Well, my purpose was to bring news.” Oriel frowned deeper. “But now I’m more concerned for you.”
“I am fine.”
Oriel appeared vastly unconvinced.
“All right, I am not completely fine,” Tajael admitted with a sigh. “In Truth, Patience is not my strongest Virtue at the moment.”
“And Chastity?” Oriel asked with a pointed look at Charlotte.
It caught Tajael off guard enough that his mouth worked without an answer for a moment too long.
Oriel’s eyebrows rose.
“I struggle with that as well,” Tajael ground out. An understatement to be sure. “I’m not at my finest. I recognize this, Oriel. But I’m committed, without question, to protecting my charge.”
“Even from yourself?”
Again, his friend left him speechless. Was he a danger to Charlotte? No. He felt sure of that. If he were lost in Lust, uncontrollable in Wrath, or any other loss of Virtue sent him tumbling into shadow, he would have the presence of mind to flee. To run from her. Of this, he was certain.
“Especially from myself,” he said with conviction.
Oriel’s expression opened further, but he gave Tajael a slow nod. “I am glad to hear it. For we have lost one Guardian already.”
Tajael’s shoulders dropped. “Who?” Even if he didn’t know the angeling personally, he already felt it as a strike against his heart.
“Naphtali, Patience Faction,” Oriel said. “She was on loan to Markos. Did you know her?”
“Only by reputation.” Tajael frowned. “She was at least three hundred years old, wasn’t she? And Guarding most of that time, I thought.”
Oriel nodded. “And yet she Fell.” It was a warning. Tajael could hear it in his voice. He was barely a hundred years with nowhere near as much Guarding experience, at least not officially. Then again, he’d been to the shadow realm, and his Penance time after that, whereas most angelings knew little more than the Dominion in which they lived.
“Did she Fall from Lust?” Tajael asked, although he was sure of the answer.
“The temptation of her young scientist was too much.” Oriel arched an eyebrow at Charlotte. She was splashing her face with water.
Tajael frowned. “What happened?”
“She kissed him.”
“Just a kiss?” Although Tajael remembered that was all it took for his friend Erelah to Fall. She made her way back, but still… she was made of more Virtuous stock than Tajael.
“Apparently.” Oriel frowned. “Markos has sent another female in her place.”
“He’s doing it on purpose. Tempting them.” Tajael seethed, Wrath threatening him once again. It was one thing to ask an angeling to take such a risk voluntarily, to test the limits of what might be possible for angelkind in this new day, but as a duty? With these particular human scientists so in need of Guarding?
“I’m afraid you’re right about that.” Oriel sighed, his gaze drawn to Charlotte. She was drying her face and hands now. “She is beautiful, inside and out, Tajael. Her soul shines like the sun. Tell the Truth. You desire her.”
“Yes,” Tajael growled. “But I have control of it.” He hesitated, but he should tell someone. In case the worst happened. “I’ve revealed myself to her.”
Oriel’s expression was truly shocked. “You what?”
“In a human guise,” he quickly explained. “She had need of rescue. It was that or reveal myself entirely.”
Oriel’s shock tempered a little. “A wise decision.”
“I like to think so.” Tajael hesitated, but if he told Oriel of his near-brush with Falling with Charlotte, then maybe it would ease his friend’s mind. “We’ve also kissed.”
Oriel’s face morphed quickly to horror. “And your wings?” he asked, aghast. Tajael unfurled them, so Oriel could see they remained white. But instead of looking relieved, he only frowned. “Have you had sex?”
“No.” Tajael glared at him. “The kiss was sufficient to school me in the dangers. But I was able to pull back. To remain in the light.”
Charlotte strode toward the door to the bathroom.
“Duty calls,” he said to Oriel. “Trust in me, my friend. I have it under control.”
Oriel opened his mouth to say something more, but Tajael was already making haste to follow Charlotte before the door swung shut, so Oriel was cut off when Tajael moved out of the auditory shielding. If Oriel wished to follow him, he could, but after Tajael trailed Charlotte back to the lab, his friend still did not make himself known. Perhaps he trusted Tajael at his word.
He only wished he was as wise as he pretended.
“Okay, what’s next?” Charlotte asked once they were all back in the lab.
“Next, we go home,” the leader said.
“Home? But we can still try—” Charlotte cut off at his raised hand.
“We’re not giving up, Dr. Netherman. But everyone’s tired. We’re just making mistakes at this point. The resonator is taking power and generating fields. We’ll fine-tune it from there. Starting tomorrow.”
“Right. Of course.” Charlotte looked abashed, as if she were personally responsible for pushing them. But Tajael had seen the eagerness on all their faces.
The workers quickly filed out, relief and fatigue pulling down their shoulders.
Charlotte lingered behind with the leader. “Do you really think—”
“It’ll be fine,” he reassured her with a smile. “Promise. We just need some clear heads, that’s all. I’ll see you in the morning.” He followed his workers out.
Charlotte stayed behind for a moment, looking wistfully at all the equipment and cabling and computers crammed into the small laboratory. Then she peered up at him, where he was perched on top of the machine. It startled him for a moment, then he realized… she was looking at the paper crane in its glass box. “We’re going to do this,” she vowed.
I know you are, he answered in his head. She couldn’t tell him about her work over their tea, but he could reassure her, regardless. Give her the encouragement and confidence she needed. And the idea that they would speak again soon, face to face, sent a thrill of excitement through him. He hovered over her as she gathered her purse and during the long elevator ride down, but as soon as she was in the sedan with her personal driver, Tajael went aloft and scouted ahead. He was sweeping for demon-infected humans, naturally, but he was also scanning the restaurants and shops along the way. He needed a place to take her for tea, and he’d never bothered to notice the stores before.
Charlotte’s car didn’t stop for her ritual visit with Hank, but then it was growing dark, and he was already curled up in his tent.
Just as Tajael spied an electric blue sign up ahead that looked promising—Only the Bean—he sensed something that brought him up short, stalling him out mid-air above the Seattle downtown streets.
Shadowkind. Holy angels of light—
Up ahead, in the lobby of Charlotte’s apartment building, there was a shadow angeling. Had they found her? Was it coincidence? No matter. Tajael drew his blade and sped ahead. He didn’t bother with the turnstile, simply opened an interdimensional door and reappeared inside. The angeling wore glamour—appearing as an ordinary businessman returning home from work, lingering in the lobby over a newspaper—but they immediately knew each other. Tajael rushed him before he could cloak and make the fight more difficult. He plunged his blade into the shoulder of the dark angeling, but more importantly, he grasped hold of him to wrench him away from the lobby. They reappeared on the top of the twenty story apartment building. There, the shadow angeling broke free, tumbling, shedding his glamour and unfolding his obsidian-colored wings. He bared his teeth—filed to points—and Tajael instantly recognized the inky markings on his chest…. for they matched his own.
Elyon’s Regiment.
Tajael’s heart seized. Did Elyon know Charlotte lived here? “Why are you here?” Tajael demanded, hoping the angeling might simply spill the truth. “Not enough entertainment in the shadow realm?”
“I’m here to have light angels for dinner.” He growled and charged, blade first in a fury of feathers and bared teeth.
Tajael caught him in an upward stab, sinking his angel blade deep before twisting away. Still, the shadow blade caught him, grazing across his chest, spreading shadow magic in its path. Tajael’s blade was as deadly to the shadow angel as his dark blade was to Tajael—but Tajael’s strikes were deeper, and he’d scored twice now.
The shadow angeling staggered a little… then charged again.
Tajael surged toward him as well, veering suddenly upward just before they collided. He somersaulted midair, coming back down for a strike through the back that sent the angeling to the roof in a heap. He had no wish to end this angeling’s life, but he also couldn’t risk letting him live. He would bring others, and Charlotte would be threatened. Before the shadow angeling could rise again, Tajael leaped and landed on his back, grinding him to the roof. Then he severed the head in one fast swipe.
Tajael staggered back, his own shadow wound still burning across his chest. It would heal, although it would likely sicken him for a while and take time. He needed to return to Charlotte—she had to be home by now—but he also needed to dispose of the body. That would attract even more attention. With grim determination, he seized hold of the head and body both and twisted through an interdimensional door to Markos’s Dominion. Tajael deposited the body on the floor of the training room—Markos could do as he willed with it—then he returned to Charlotte’s apartment. He was bloodied. His angel-blade was drenched in shadowkind blood. But he was cloaked and ready to resume his Guarding duties.
Charlotte wasn’t there.
Panic seized him, but he had no sense of time—had the battle been merely seconds or minutes? He twisted and reappeared on the street. There was no sign of the sedan. Either it had come and go or… he quickly searched the elevators and lobby, but she was nowhere in the building. Then he backtracked along the path the car usually took, twisting along Seattle’s streets… nothing.
Holy mother of magic… he could not have lost her. Not unless this was a trap. Not unless the shadowkind knew she was there and lured him away, sacrificing one of their own to snatch her. It was possible, but… why not take her in any of a hundred other ways? Why not flood in with a garrison and overwhelm him? If they knew who she was and where…
The whole thing made no sense.
He backtracked again, starting at the last point he saw her, entering the sedan with her driver. Then he carefully searched from there, checking each side street. Perhaps she just made an extra stop. Maybe in search of something before meeting with him for tea. He went aloft to see higher, blinded by the night and the streetlamps, trying to check every street and parkway and side alley…
In a rush that sent his heart lurching, he spied her sedan. It was parked down a dark alley, barely lit. He twisted until he appeared right next to the car, but then froze in place.
The driver, dressed in his dark suit and white shirt and thin tie, had Charlotte bent back over the trunk of the sedan. His full body pressed against hers, his face buried in her neck… but her face… her face was the picture of ecstasy. His hands gripped her as a lover would—one holding the leg she had hooked around his back, the other fisted in her hair, holding her head to the side to give him access for his passionate devouring of her neck—but it wasn’t the man’s hands that convinced Tajael of what he was witnessing.
It was Charlotte’s whimpers and soft cries. The yes, oh God, yes, that he’d heard so many nights coming from her bedroom.
Tajael staggered back, struck as if by shadow blade to the heart. Why would she… she’d never mentioned a longing for her driver, but… as his mind searched for an explanation, as he watched them grapple on the car, as he listened to their fevered moans… the Envy and Wrath welled inside him. They were so sudden and so intense that he could scarce believe their power. A red haze formed in front of his eyes.
He should flee.
These Sins washing over him, these emotions set loose, they were too powerful for him. He should leave before he caused any harm. In his agony, he barely noticed the man lifting his mouth from her neck. She gasped as he wrenched her head so he could feast on the other side.
Feast.
The haze cleared, and Tajael saw the Truth—this was no sexual encounter; this was a murder. Tajael dropped his cloak, and with a warrior’s cry, he shot forward and yanked the vampire free from Charlotte’s body. Then he threw the vile creature against the opposite wall of the alley, where it smacked with a crunching of bones compounded when it fell to the hard-bricked ground. These vampires… they were the source of the demon uprising. The fae had enhanced their venom to transmit a demon virus, and it was this, along with the shadowkind, that made the uprising near impossible to control. Tajael took to wing, lofting up and drawing his blade, then plunging down to slay the creature, nearly cutting it in half with the power of his stroke. Vampires were technically immortal creatures, but they were much closer in strength to their cousins—the witches and shifters—and thus readily slain. It had been so long since he’d encountered one, he’d forgotten the sexual arousal they evoked in their victims—and in themselves—when they fed. It was part of their wickedness that they rendered their prey senseless with pleasure so they would not resist.
Tajael turned away from the body at his feet… only to see Charlotte crumple to the ground.
Holy magic. He dashed to her side, sheathing his blade and lifting her from the dirt of the alley. “Charlotte!” he couldn’t help crying out, but her eyes were closed, her mouth slack, and the blood… it was everywhere. Gushing from the puncture wounds on both sides, there was no telling how much the vampire had taken before Tajael reached her. He quickly held a gentle hand to each wound, healing those shut so she wouldn’t lose anymore, but her pulse was weak. What’s more, she was almost certain to be demon-infected now. In Truth, he could sense it in her. Luckily, the venom was still working through her system. It had not yet roused the latent demon that lay inside. That was how the fae’s evil plan worked. They evaded the treaty that said they could not harm humanity directly by devised this magically enhanced venom. It didn’t harm humanity… it only brought out the worst of them. Surged up the demon within, whichever tendency was most powerful, though latent.
Tajael didn’t know what demon might lurk in the dark recesses of Charlotte’s soul, but he wasn’t giving it a chance to take hold. And since the venom was still fresh, he wouldn’t even need his blade.
He just pressed his mouth to hers and breathed.
The rush of pleasure of the life kiss was profound. His entire body felt as if it were floating—hers pressed to his but otherwise, his feet scarce touched the earth. She responded quickly, and he could sense the nascent demon essence, still bound with the venom, fleeing her body. She grabbed hold of him as she surged back to consciousness. He was still breathing life into her, still gripping her head to hold it steady, his hand at her back to hold her close, the length of his body pressed against hers… including the hardness of his erection pressing into her soft flesh. She pulled at him, bringing his mouth more tightly against hers, breathing in the life-energizing and body-enervating energy that a life kiss brought. He gave her more than she needed. More than he should. He would continue this and give everything to her… he knew he would. He was as enthralled with it as she.
He had to force himself away from her mouth.
But he didn’t go far.
He stood with her in his arms, pressed against him, both breathing hard into each other. His toga revealed most of his chest, and her fingers dug deep into his bare flesh. Her eyes were wide and dilated, cheeks flushed with the pleasure of the life kiss. The shock on her face was complete—it was clear she didn’t expect to awaken in his arms, but equally clear that she had no desire to move away.
Then her hands slid up to his face, and she pulled it back to hers. Her lips pressed against his, hungry and consuming. He shouldn’t kiss her back. He didn’t dare. But with her hot and demanding lips on his, he was powerless to resist. He moved against her without volition. His body responded. His lips eager. Her mouth opened to his, and his tongue danced with hers, and the rush of that intimate touch, warm and wet, made his desire soar. He pulled her body harder into his. His hands skimmed her curves. He wanted to touch every inch of her flesh with his fingers. They were on fire with sensation. His mouth ached with the sweetness of her. He knew how this was done. He’d watched humans and angelings grapple and explore and plunge their bodies together, but he’s never felt it… not this way.
Not this need that eclipsed everything.
It would consume him.