Corson

“There you are!” I didn’t glance at the fallen angel, Caim, when the raven landed beside me.

The ebony bird stood at least three feet tall and weighed about a hundred pounds. With a flutter of wings and a ripple of movement, the raven went from ambling beside me to a full-sized man between one step and the next. At six-two, Caim was almost as tall as me and lean in build.

The fallen angel was the last creature I wanted to see right now. No, second to last, I decided. I preferred Caim to Raphael.

Caim the Fallen, or Raphael the Golden, as many whispered of the two very different angels. The two angels had proven their loyalty to Kobal, River, and the rest of us, but my hatred and distrust of angels were ingrained in me from birth.

I especially didn’t like the angels who remained in Heaven. They were content to let the rest of us deal with the mess they helped to create when they threw Lucifer and his followers out of Heaven six thousand years ago. Lucifer would have destroyed Heaven if he’d been allowed to stay there. Without Heaven, Earth and Hell would have crumbled too, but the angels should have dealt with their shit instead of dumping it on the rest of us.

I tolerated Caim more than Raphael because he displayed his emotions, whereas Raphael was often as emotive as stone. I also knew that Caim hadn’t chosen to follow Lucifer, not really. He’d gotten caught up in the battle the angels waged while in Heaven, and he’d been made to pay for it.

“Here we are,” I murmured and glanced at Wren. She continued to walk ahead of me, her shoulders back, and her chin high.

The rainbow colors in Caim’s black eyes swirled as he studied her. Those same colors shone within his black hair and onyx wings. The foot-long silver spikes at the top of his wings were visible over his shoulders, while the spikes at the bottom nearly touched the ground as he walked.

Unlike most of the other fallen angels who had regrown bat-like wings after they’d shorn them off, Caim’s wings had regrown with feathers. Despite those spikes and their ebony hue, his wings remained more angelic in appearance than the other fallen angels. Caim believed his bond to the raven he could transform into had allowed his wings to regrow as they had.

“We’ve been searching for you both for two days,” Caim said.

“We were gone for two days?” Wren looked back to ask Caim.

“Yes.”

She shook her head and focused forward again. When the motion caused her braid to fall off her shoulder, and tumble down her back, Caim’s eyes narrowed on the bite I’d left on her neck. My low snarl drew his attention quickly back to me. His mouth pursed to hold back his laughter.

“You’re a bigger asshole than Raphael,” I told him.

A laugh burst from him, and he did a small skip step away from me as I contemplated wringing his neck.

“Never have I denied it,” he replied. “It seems we’ve been searching in vain; we should have allowed you two to remain alone.”

“No, you shouldn’t have,” Wren retorted. “Where are the others?”

“They’re about five miles straight ahead as the raven flies,” Caim replied, but he didn’t take his eyes off me.

“Is everyone okay?” she inquired.

“We lost Malorick to a barta demon, but everyone else is fine,” Caim replied.

Malorick had been the telepathic demon Kobal assigned to work with our group. “I assumed he was dead when he didn’t reach out to me to learn where we were.”

“Yes, his death was inconvenient timing on his part,” Caim stated, and I almost smiled.

“You’re all assholes,” Wren muttered.

Caim shrugged. “So was Malorick. We were concerned about you two.”

“No reason to be,” Wren replied.

“I can see that, now, but it’s not like the two of you to take off,” Caim said and grinned at me. “But some things are always unexpected, and it seems you two might be disappearing a lot more often.”

When I took a step toward him, he danced back, chuckling as he moved. “We fell into the trap of the ouroboros,” Wren said. “And no, we will not be disappearing more often.”

Caim’s eyebrows shot up, but this time, he wisely chose not to make a sarcastic reply or appear smug. He actually looked troubled as he gazed between the two of us. “Is the ouroboros dead?” he finally inquired.

“Yes,” I replied. “Go back and tell the others we’re fine and we’ll meet up with them soon.”

Caim nodded and unfolded his wings. With a strong flap of his wings, he rose to hover above us. “There is something ahead you might enjoy,” he said to me. He was halfway into the sky before he transformed into the raven, released a loud caw, and swooped low over the trees.

“What do you think is ahead?” Wren inquired.

“It could be any number of things,” I replied, “but if it was a trap or something waiting to eat us, I doubt he’d give us warning if he wanted us dead.”

I kept my attention focused on our surroundings as Wren walked before me. I preferred her back with the others, where she was safer, but once we rejoined them, she would go out of her way to avoid me again. I’d seen and heard the panic in her earlier; I had no idea how to ease it though.

“The people who care about me die. The people I care about die.” The anguish in those words had torn at my heart. I didn’t want my Wren to know such pain, but I couldn’t take it from her. She’d lost too many, witnessed far too much death, and seen too much horror in her life. I could never fix that for her, but I would make sure she had a better future.

I suspected Wren believed that by becoming my Chosen she risked opening herself up to a lot more heartbreak, and I couldn’t tell her she wouldn’t be. I was stronger than many demons, faster, and I’d lived a lot more years than most, but there was a chance I might one day lose a fight and die.

Wren could have convinced herself it was simply sex between us and nothing more, but not after I’d claimed her. Sex was one thing, feelings were another, and Wren’s heart had been trampled more times than she’d ever acknowledge. She would do everything she could to protect herself from having that happen again, even if it meant shutting me out and denying herself.

“You claim to know me so well, yet you don’t even know my real name.”

Her words replayed through my mind. I tried to recall everything she’d said to me and everything I’d learned about her, but not once had Wren said her name was anything different, and no one had ever called her anything other than Wren. I would have remembered if they had.

Was she lying to me about her name, or was it something she never mentioned to anyone? Did she recall the name she’d been born with?

“Wren—”

“I don’t want to talk right now.”

I ran a hand through my hair as I watched her walk with a stiffness that was unnatural for her usually fluid body. I’d tried speaking with her a couple of times since leaving the second safe house, and each time she’d replied with the same crisp response. Space was what she required, but I couldn’t slip away and let her be until I knew she was safe with the others.

My eyes dropped to the enticing sway of her hips, but I tore my attention away when I realized I was becoming aroused again. I’d been told what a Chosen did to and for a demon, but I hadn’t expected this unrelenting desire for her.

Arriving at a boulder, I climbed up behind her as she made her way carefully over the rock. Coming over the top, I caught Wren when she stumbled back, and her mouth dropped. My eyes shot to the forest; my talons lengthened as I prepared for an attack. When I saw what had caused the shocked expression on her face, I retracted my talons before I got us both killed.