“She’s inside, bella…I mean Kelsey,” Marcus said with a sad smile. “I’m sorry. It will take me weeks to change the habit.”

We were standing in the small waiting room of Henri’s mini hospital. There were only three beds, an exam room, and an autopsy room, which got used way more often than the rest of the rooms.

Luckily I’d managed to talk Trent and Gray into staying outside, giving them the “let’s not spook away the only person who might help us” excuse. I didn’t need any more testosterone or masculine martyrdom. I’d gotten a ton of the former from Trent, who wanted to go after Nemcox, and the latter from Gray, who’d decided he should be the one to face the angel if it came down to it.

I was intent on ignoring them both. After all this was done, I was sitting down with the queen, a bottle of tequila, and some nachos and asking her for advice on how to deal with two men. The sex was awesome. I wasn’t sure about the rest of it yet.

“Don’t worry about it. I was thinking earlier that it’s weird to be in the apartment without you.” And now it was awkward to be here with him. I couldn’t get comfortable with Marcus any way I went. I still loved him, but it wasn’t the same. The passion I’d felt in the beginning had softened to something like friendship. And yet I can remember so vividly how this man had made me feel—loved and wanted and beautiful for the first time in my life.

And it had nothing on the passion I’d felt the night before when I’d been between Gray and Trent.

“Somehow I don’t think you had time to worry too much about it,” he said wistfully. “Don’t blush. I’m happy for you. I can see how calm you are. You’re facing something terrible and you’re perfectly confident. That is what I wished for you, for you to understand and accept your power. To know that you deserve the power you’ve been given and that you’re worthy. You should expect to be cared for by the men who love you.”

I was getting teary. “You could have warned me that once I was all healed and stuff I would leak a lot.”

He smiled, a brilliant expression, and held out his arms. “Your emotions are a part of you, bella. They’re another beautiful part of you, and I’m glad you can embrace them fully now.”

Because of him. I hugged him close, the scent of him bringing back memories of how well he’d loved me. “I wished I’d been a little less stellar a student on the feelings part because it hurts to let you go.”

He sighed and his arms tightened. “It does, but it also is right. I can see how you need Trent. I know he doesn’t know it yet, but I believe Grayson needs him as well.”

I pulled away reluctantly, but knew it was time. I couldn’t help but think about the fact that his dragon reacted to Trent, and not in a platonic way. “Trent wants to go with me if I sign the contract.”

He reached out and brushed away the tears I’d shed. “You won’t. I’ve thought about this and realized that I believe in you. I believe you need to protect your father, but you’ll find a way out or someone will do it for you. You weren’t meant to descend. You were always meant to bring light to our plane. I am going to do something I haven’t done in a long time.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m going to have faith.” He stepped back and somehow he seemed calmer as well. “I’m going to believe that things work out for a reason.”

“What happened to Marcus and who are you?”

He smiled again. “I don’t know. I feel better than I have in a long time. You’re going to think it foolish of me, but I think that painting in Daniel’s office is some kind of magic meant for me, meant to lift me up.”

“Is she getting closer?” If he needed a girl in a painting to make him feel better, then I would cheer for her.

“She is, and I can’t wait to see what happens,” he admitted. “Sometimes, it’s the little things that bring us joy. I’ll be sad when the story is over, but it’s reminded me that life is worth living. After this, I believe I shall travel for a while. There are parts of the world I haven’t seen in many, many years.”

“Could take you fifteen years or so to see all of it properly.” In fifteen years, Evangeline would be of age.

He shook his head. “No, it will be twenty at least. Then we should know.”

He would give her time to mature, to be able to make her own decision. “I promise I’ll watch after her in any way I can.”

“And I will keep you in my heart.” He bowed in that formal way of his that reminded me of lords and ladies and royalty. “Now, the angel is in there with Felix and she’s agreed to speak with you. She’s also given Hugo some pointers on how this should proceed from a legal standpoint. The king was correct. If this is to happen, it will happen on this plane, and it will be decided by combat.”

I’d known that all along. “Nemcox told me something about my sword. Can you look into it? Gray hasn’t been able to get in touch with Jacob, but I thought you might know some people. He said that originally the Council took the sword from the companions because they were afraid.”

“It was before my time, but there were rumors that the sword the Nex Apparatus uses was originally handed down to the queen of the companions. It had much power, and the original vampires were worried because of the way it seemed to hunger for blood.”

“Nemcox said there was a secret and that blood had something to do with it. Blood and the line. I assume he meant either bloodline or the lineage of Nex Apparatuses. I remember this part verbatim. ‘Blood will unlock blood and unleash the true strength of the sword, but only the strongest of the line will do.’ Any thoughts? I could use a stronger sword.”

“I don’t think he’s talking about a line of Death Machines. They aren’t connected by blood, merely by ability. I believe he is talking about the companion line. They are hereditary and Zoey is the strongest I’ve ever seen, though I believe her daughter will pass her in time. I will think on it and see if I can find out anything about the lore of the sword. I’ve always wondered what it did with all that blood. Perhaps we can find out.” He glanced at the door. “Please be careful with her. She’s the kindest of the three, but she’s still dangerous.”

I glanced in and saw her standing over Felix’s bed. She was dressed in a pretty sheath; her hair and makeup model perfect, but there was a sadness I couldn’t deny.

“I’ll handle her. And Marcus, did I ever thank you for everything?”

He stepped back. “Every time you save the plane, bella. Be safe.”

I walked into the hospital with a lighter heart. Marcus and I would be cool. Better than that. I strode up to Felicity Day and felt not a single effect from her legendary powers.

Except I did feel for her because she was crying. That wasn’t her power. It was all that stupid humanity I’d found. It made me weak and it made me so very strong.

“Ms. Day?”

She looked up and stared at me for a moment. “Kelsey, dear. I’m sorry to have to see you at a time like this.” She looked back down at Felix. “He looks like he’s sleeping.”

“In some ways he is.”

She took a deep breath and looked up at me. “But he’s not. He’s in between, and whether he lives or moves on depends on what you do next.”

“I get that a lot.” As long as I had a heavenly being here and she was talking, I might as well ask a few questions. “Does it ever get easier? The whole ‘fate of the world on my back’ thing.”

She smiled, a fraction of her usual, and reached out to put a hand on my shoulder. “I can feel that it already is because you’ve accepted your gifts.”

“My wolf?”

She shook her head. “No, your men, dear. Your wolf was a part of you the moment you were born. She was an act set in motion long ago, but those two men are the gifts of a loving deity who believes we must be allowed to choose. Even when we make the wrong choice.”

“Like Jude?” Jude, the betrayer. Jude, who embodied faith and had used it against us all.

Tears fell from her eyes like diamonds raining down. “Yes, like Jude. I’m surprised you figured that out. I assume he meant for the blame to fall on Oliver.”

But he’d made a mistake. He’d used a child, and her honesty had led me straight to him. “He went to Mia and convinced her to betray her father. She told me that when his light was close to her, she knew how smart she was, how worthy. It was what I felt when I was close to him.”

“He didn’t realize how clever you can be. He underestimates humans.” She sniffled and went back to Felix. “He’s my brother, you know.”

“Jude?”

She smoothed back Felix’s hair with her hand. “Felix. We were made of the same clay, split by our maker’s hand because he said he’d pinched off a bit too much. Oliver came before us and Jude after, but there wasn’t a moment of my life that I didn’t know and love Felix.”

“Can you save him?”

She shook her head. “Only you can do that, dear. When Felix fell he became human. He’s under angelic magic, and only by killing Jude can he be made free. That’s what I’m struggling to accept. He knew what it meant for Felix to make this decision.”

“The decision to fall? It must have been difficult.”

She turned to me. “Not at all. He knew from the moment Sarah’s soul came into being that she was half of him. This was not something Felix struggled with. He knew he would fall, and he welcomed it with joy in his heart because this is what we all wish for.”

Even with the ward protecting me, I couldn’t help but watch Felicity Day. She was beautiful without her angelic glow. “You want to fall?”

She turned bright eyes on me. “We want to feel. At least many of us do. To love is the highest purpose we have. It’s what we were built for. Our father made us out of love and he made us to love, to experience it in all of its forms, and Felix knew it was his time to be a husband and a parent. He helped me to understand what time I am going through.”

“What time is that?”

The saddest smile crossed her face. “Unrequited love is difficult, but once accepted, it makes us better beings. It brings us closer to understanding what love is and how it works. I’ve been the angelic manifestation of love for millennia and I’m still learning, still growing. Love is the destination and it is also the journey. Being loved in return is merely winning the lottery.”

I was quiet for a moment, letting it sink in and giving her a bit of space. “I’m truly sorry about your brother. I know him. He’s my therapist and he’s amazing. He helps people.”

“It was what he wanted to do,” she said. “He wanted to come here to the Earth plane and experience everything. We’re isolated in Heaven. Some say it’s because God favors us, but I worry it’s because we’re not ready. Being human is hard. I often wonder which of us God thinks of as the more advanced of his children. Would it surprise you to know the reason I want to fall? I hope to experience physical love and to have a child.”

My heart constricted because we had a few things in common. “That doesn’t surprise me at all. I want to have my own babies. That surprises me.”

“Stay on your path and those children will come to you. You are very brave, Kelsey Owens. You would risk everything to make things right for others. I’ve found that kind of bravery is often rewarded by my father, though he sometimes takes his time.” She turned again and seemed more resolute. “I can feel the ward you placed on your body.”

“I can’t allow him to influence me.”

She nodded. “I understand, though it makes me sad because our influence often has purpose. Our influence, when well placed, can allow our charges to move mountains.”

But I could now see that I’d been given other influences. “I think that’s what Marcus was for in the beginning. And now Gray and Trent will take that role. It’s like Dev said. I will be provided with the tools I need. I merely have to be smart enough to see them and have enough faith to use them.”

“Then you are ready,” Felicity said. “I’ll tell you how to call him. From there you are on your own, though know that I will pray for you.”

“Why did Jude do this? Do you know?”

She leaned over and kissed Felix’s forehead before stepping back and finding one of the chairs in the room. She sank into it before speaking. “We’ve been on our own for a while. It’s not like the creator keeps office hours. We can feel his love, but not all choose to live inside it. It’s much like all the planes, when you think about it. We’re given the tools we need, but we must both find them and accept them and be smart enough to use them properly. It doesn’t mean he loves us less. It merely means we should try again. I often think his highest principles are patience and fortitude.”

“I thought you said they were love.”

“Ah, but patience and fortitude are the foundations of love. All rests on those two virtues. Anyway, there is a faction in Heaven that has become restless again. It’s cyclical, from what I can tell. We’ve received several souls from the lower planes who worked to ascend, and that tends to make some ready to descend, in a perverse way.”

That was news to me. “You can move from Hell to Heaven?”

“Of course. What would be the point of Hell if there wasn’t a way to get to Heaven? Do you think my father loves less than yours? It’s why I want a child so badly. I want to know that love, the love that is purely selfless, the one that requires nothing from the receiver except existence. No, my father leaves no one truly behind, and Armageddon won’t go the way some believe. If you had a child, could that child do anything that would make you damn him or her for all eternity?”

I knew the answer. “No. I would still love my child.”

“And so it is in Heaven. What Hell doesn’t understand is that it is merely a way station, and one day…oh, one glorious day it will not be required and my father will open his arms and welcome them all home.”

“Even Lucifer?”

“Well, I didn’t say it would be tomorrow,” she admitted. “My father plans things out, and his version of a timeline is a bit on the endless scale. He’s a long-term planner. As for Jude, he has become ambitious. He believes we should rule the planes in our father’s stead, but he cannot simply lead an army. He doesn’t have enough who believe.”

“Hence he’s sowing dissent between the Earth and Hell planes,” I surmised. “A war between the planes would almost certainly disrupt the humans, and then it would be easy to convince the others that angelic intervention is required.”

She nodded approvingly. “See, a smart girl. Yes, Oliver and I believe this is what he has done and what he has planned. They already speak of it in Heaven. The talk will cease if you kill Jude. It will be seen as our father’s will. I am so sorry we can’t help you. We used up much of our power a few years ago. It’s not endless and it takes years for us to recharge when we do something big.”

I could guess. “Something like pulling a soul out of Hell?”

She smoothed her hair back. “Oh, yes. Years ago, when the queen was taken by the head of the corrupt Council, she was left alone when the king smuggled Devinshea out of the compound. I had a hand in that. He is my charge, you see. In exchange, I offered my power, my strength, and my influence to help Oliver’s charge.”

“The queen.” I’d heard that story. The gruff and grumpy angel watched over the queen.

“She needed someone with her, someone to lift her up, and it couldn’t be her husbands. So Oliver and I freed the little wolf. We wiped his memory clean and gave him the means to find his friend. We could not break the seal placed on his soul, but we could protect him from being dragged to Hell again.”

Whoa. That was definitely some news I wished I’d heard earlier in the game. “Seriously? Neil can’t go back to Hell?”

She smiled beatifically. “No. He is safe from the demon.”

“You might have mentioned that to him. I think he’s been worried about it for flipping years.”

She seemed to think about that for a second. “Huh. I suppose it slipped my mind. So many things to do, you know.”

I had some other questions. About a million actually, but I settled on the most immediate one. “If he can’t be influenced that way anymore, how is your brother doing it?”

“When we pulled him out of Hell, we did it through the dragon. Think of it as a portal to his soul. Now that portal is open to angelic influence, though most Earth plane beings are. Neither Oliver nor I would ever have used it in such a way.” She moved to me and put a hand on my shoulder. “You must be resolute and brave. You must set Jude free of this life.”

“You’re calm about me killing your brother.”

“Kill is a hard word, and not truly fitting. You are ending one life and allowing him the chance to choose again,” she explained. “Nothing is ever wasted. Certainly not a soul. Do what we cannot do, Hunter. Set Jude free and bring Felix back to us. Everything you need is here. The battle should take place somewhere you feel comfortable.”

“Can my sword kill him?” I knew she wasn’t fond of the word, but it was kind of the point of me.

“The Sword of Light can kill anything if it’s properly prepared. It’s angelic so its power isn’t endless, and it has been gone from the Heaven plane for a long time. But it also hasn’t been used in forever.”

That was where she was wrong. “I used it just the other day.”

She shook her head. “Not the way it was meant to be used. Not the way the original caretakers would have used it. What do you think it drinks?”

“Blood.” Which was fitting of the current caretakers.

“Oh, but there is strength in blood, and that is what it gathers. It gathers strength so the warrior can call on all of the tribe. When the strongest gives her blood, the chosen warrior is complete and the tribe empowers her to save them. It is how the companions survived in the beginning. They were not the strongest, but together they could move mountains. They could use the blood of their enemies against them.”

A chill went down my spine because I thought I’d figured out what she was saying. “And it hasn’t been used this way in millennia?”

“No, dear. All that power, waiting for you.” She leaned over again and kissed Felix’s forehead. “Like I said. My father always provides. Good luck, Kelsey, and I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“As I explained, I watch over Devinshea and Oliver protects Zoey. I apologize that the angel directed to watch you turned out to be so very incapable.”

So I got a guardian angel and he turned out to be a dud. Story of my life. “Well, he’s about to get his angelic ass fired.”

Felicity winked out of existence and almost immediately Sarah Day rushed into the room as though she’d been standing outside, waiting for the chance to come in again.

I nodded her way and wished her well.

I had work to do.