Both bowed their heads, but it was Jason who spoke. “The honor is, and will always be, ours,” he said, as Aodhan deflected another fury of blows aimed at the Tower. One got through, the balcony shuddering.
All four of them instinctively adjusted their stance to keep their feet.
“Did you manage to see Mahiya?” Elena asked his spymaster, and it was the question of a consort.
Jason’s face betrayed none of his emotions as he inclined his head, whatever had been shared between him and his princess, who’d worked in the infirmary throughout the fighting, a private matter. Raphael hoped it wouldn’t be the final conversation the two would ever have, for Jason had earned his happiness. To have it stolen from him, a bare heartbeat after he’d found it, would be a great unfairness—but as they had all learned in the preceding days, sometimes good did not prevail, evil triumphant.
Today, they’d do one final thing to change that, turn the tide. The ordinary fighters were ready to start the attack the instant they took off, forcing Lijuan’s forces to move before they were ready. Rocket launchers would be used to take out groups of enemy angels, his remaining winged fighters instructed to do everything in their power to create those groups by pushing the enemy together.
Those fighters understood that it was likely they, too, would die in the blasts. “If I take five of them with me,” one of his commanders had said, “it will be a sacrifice well made.”
Turning to Elena, his pride in his people absolute and the mark on his temple pulsing so hard that it seemed impossible no one else could see the movement, he said, “Ready, hbeebti?”
Elena notched a bolt into her crossbow. “Let’s go kill that murderous bitch.”
Snapping out their wings on her vow, Raphael, Elena, and his men were about to fly out through the bombardment that continued to shake the Tower when a bloodied angel came to a crash landing in front of Raphael, his blood splattering on the thin layer of snow. A crossbow bolt was embedded in his stomach.
“Azar.” Raphael knelt beside the advance scout, Jason beside him, while Illium took off to assist Aodhan in deflecting the blows now aimed at the balcony on which they stood.
“What are you doing here?” Jason asked the fallen angel. “You were stationed on the edge of the city.”
Gripping Jason’s hand as Elena called for the medics, Azar’s mouth bubbled with blood, the fluid crimson against his gleaming black skin in the dull light of the time before dawn. “I couldn’t get through on the communication lines, Sire. And you had to know.”
Raphael connected with the scout’s mind to make communication easier. While Raphael was always open to his Seven, Azar wouldn’t have been able to initiate such contact, especially from a distance. What do you have to report?
Another assault force, the slim angel said, green eyes dark with pain, for while angels could heal many wounds, those wounds did not hurt any less. On the horizon, perhaps five minutes behind me. I left as soon as I spotted them, but they are so fast—a dangerous assessment from a scout known for his extraordinary speed—they gained on me with every wingbeat.
Raphael looked at the devastated city around them, the Tower’s smashed walls and splintered windows, considered the number of fighters injured or dead, and knew his people simply could not survive against another fresh force, no matter how huge their hearts. Estimated numbers?
Hundreds, Sire. They flew in the most perfect fighting formation I’ve ever seen.
44
Handing Azar over to the healers, Raphael shared the information the scout had flown through enemy fire to deliver. “We go now and we do as much damage as possible to give our people a chance,” he said, as realization formed a layer of grim ice in Dmitri’s expression, his second having stepped out onto the balcony.
Illium, back with them, swore under his breath, next to a quietly stoic Jason.
Elena’s expression was a study in fury, and it made him want to smile even in this moment, for she was a woman any man would be proud to have by his side on the eve of the greatest battle of his life. “Warn our people,” he said to Dmitri, “and tell them that if there comes a time when there is no hope of victory, they do not dishonor me by choosing to retreat or surrender. With Lijuan gone from the world, they will not have to serve under evil.”
Dmitri’s eyes held his. I’ll make it known, but I’ll never serve anyone except you.
I know, old friend. Were it my choice, I would leave my city and my territory to no other angel, but to my second.
Fly strong, Raphael.
Fight well, Dmitri.
Wings snapping out, he swept off the Tower with Elena, Illium, and Jason, the four of them winging their way directly to the heart of Lijuan’s operation, hoping to take her unawares. Crossbow bolts filled the air as soon as they came within range. Jason and Illium were fast enough to avoid them; Elena wasn’t, but she was very good at shooting her own bolts in flight, slamming two home between the eyes. The shooters quickly grew wary of giving her a target.
They’d just crossed the border that divided their perimeter line from the enemy’s attacking front, the mark pulsing hot and urgent under his skin, when Raphael saw the wave of dark gray on the lightening horizon, the line shifting to encircle the entire stage of battle.
Watch out!
Twisting sideways at Illium’s warning, he barely avoided the hail of blades that was Lijuan’s power, as Elena, Illium, and Jason engaged the enemy fighters that sought to disable Raphael’s wings. Having materialized above him, the Archangel of China was attempting to shred him with her poisonous fire.
Coaxing the last of the wildfire inside him to the surface and drawing on the fire that lived in Elena, too, he blocked Lijuan’s next barrage with ordinary angelfire and, ignoring the crossbow bolt that thudded into his shoulder, flew up, his aim to make physical contact.
Except she dematerialized without warning, her strength renewed. And when she rematerialized to the left, she managed to score him with a whip of black poison. Vicious pain stabbed through his flesh as the wildfire inside him sought to cauterize the wound and he blocked the healing—he couldn’t afford to lose the last of it, of the only thing that could hurt Lijuan.
Dropping down beside him with a gloating smile, eyes virulent red, Lijuan said, “I give you one final chance to surrender, Raphael,” her face a skeletal mask. “I do not intend to kill you, not any longer.” She made certain not to come within touching distance. “You will be much, much more useful to me in other ways.”