"You should not have done that", the Nymph tells him.
"I should have let him slay you instead?" the Angel says in return, and to that the Nymph has no answer.
"I could not let him", the Angel speaks again, slowly and quietly. "I…I had to".
What he has done, he cannot repeat, and though the Nymph is grateful for his actions she finds that she can say nothing. How can she thank him for fighting - perhaps killing his own brother on her account?
"Let me see to your wounds", she says instead. He complies without another word.
The peace of the forest to which she led them embraces them as she kneels at his side. He winces softly as she tends to him, his head hung low as she repairs the torn flesh of his arm. She sees the crystal drop of tear fall from his eye and knows his pain; her heart grows heavy, but she knows not how to comfort him.
She had expected only death of his hand, certainly not mercy, and because of his actions he doomed himself to the existence she has known since the ruthless murder of her kin. The Angel is more than certain that his brother's mistress will continue pursuing them, if only to find him rather than her.
As the night falls around them, she bids him first to rest. He does not do so easily, but eventually his eyes give in to the lure of sleep. She watches him breathe gently, the rise and fall of his chest small and rhythmic. It seems that the nightmares do not plague him yet, and she is for a moment jealous. Her eyes linger upon his wings, tall and wide though they are tucked against his back, and white as the clouds. Shadows flicker across his soft features as the moonlight reaches through the crown of the trees above.
The Angel wakes sometime later to sounds both strange and familiar; he hears the voice of the Nymph vehemently speaking a tongue he does not know. He rouses himself and goes to investigate, startling the Nymph as he finds her grinding flowers beneath her heel. Her actions surprise him until she explains herself.
"The poison that spreads across the land, it comes from these flowers. They are not the product of my kin, of that I can assure you".
He believes her, though as he wordlessly kneels to look upon the crushed and twisted flowers something sparks in his remembrance. The petals of the flower are bright blue, a colour more vivid than the sky itself, and sitting within their ring are its organs, amethyst like the eyes of the woman who had visited his realm.
"What is it?" the Nymph asks him, noting his surprise.
Though he cannot determine why he knows it, the Angel reveals to the Nymph the identity of the flower's maker, but there is little time for either of them to ponder it. They both turn as they hear the forest whisper surreptitiously.
"We are pursued", the Nymph says, "Mother Nature will not rest until she finds me". She takes hold of his arm and pulls him in her wake, but the Angel offers resistance.
"We cannot hide long upon the earth", he answers her questioning gaze.
The Nymph disagrees; she knows the earth far better than he, and is convinced of the opposite. After all, that is the only hope she has. She knows nowhere else she can run to. The Angel does, however; he and his brother had often travelled there at the behest of their mistresses. And so he takes the hand of the Nymph and leads her down to the realm beneath the earth, the domain of the Keeper of Souls.