VI. Snow
Issa shivered violently when she woke. She opened her eyes to see snow. Snow had blanketed the entirety of the fallen city, covering most of the devastation underneath a beautiful white blanket.
White as an angel's wings.
Dizzy and disoriented as she was, the icy flakes seemed to her like fallen feathers. A vision came to her: Two angels fighting as the world burned. They were silhouettes in the sky, one with a flaming sword and another wielding glory in his palms. Angelfire flared back and forth, illuminating their ash-smeared faces amidst the pure white of their wings. The angel with the sword turned as the other hurled fire at him—
Edvardiel?
She sat up with a start.
Edvardiel. Demons. The raid, the little girl—
God, her head hurt. Issa clutched it, feeling as though her skull were about to split open, and forced herself to look around. They were lying a few feet away from the subway entrance, dangerously exposed. No way this was on purpose.
The seraph's body was wrapped over hers, as though he'd been trying to keep her warm even as he'd collapsed. She looked down at herself. There was no more pain. His soft, moonlight robes were wrapped all over her body, torn in neat strips, and stiff with dried blood. She blinked. He didn't have much fabric left in his robes, as far as she remembered, and when she looked at him, she realised how right she was—what little remained of it was wrapped around his hips.
He'd literally given her the clothes off his back.
"Edvardiel," she said, teeth chattering as she dusted the fallen snow off his flesh.
He didn't move.
"Edvardiel," she said with more panic as her mind grew sharper. What were they doing here? How long had he been out? Had they been attacked?
She searched him for wounds but save for some minor cuts and bruises and the horrible scarring where his wings used to be, there was nothing. He was breathing but his lips and the tips of his fingers were turning blue, and the fiery heat of his body had dimmed to something lukewarm. Her heart clenched.
"Seraph, you better not die on me."
With some difficulty, she lifted him off the ground, bearing the full brunt of his weight on trembling legs. She only had a fraction of her strength left, but even that was a miracle. She had no Keeper. She'd been gravely injured. She was supposed to have died thrice—once at the antique shop, once at the subway, once in the cold. Instead, she was still alive and kicking, and the only angel left on earth was…
She looked at his limp form and didn't let herself think it.
He'd had so many chances.
He could've saved himself. He could've left her to die. He should've left her to die.
"Why did you have to go and save me?" she fumed, as she dragged him across the snow and towards the nearest building. "Why me?" Her vision blurred with tears even as she fought them back. This brought back everything—everything she'd been trying not to think about to survive.
She had no memories of her human life, but she remembered struggling against the impossibly heavy concrete, fighting to breathe, fighting to live, clawing her way out of the rubble inch by agonising inch only to step out into nothingness. It had been so, so silent. The air smelled like ash. Tasted like it. Her city had been completely flattened and, in the savage wave of death and destruction, she alone had crawled out like a cockroach.
Then there was stupid Yassper and his stupid smile. His stupid daggers that she'd dug out from underneath the collapsed cathedral. She'd crept out in the middle of the day to try and save him, endured a vicious whipping upon her return. Her fingers had been a bloody, pulpy mess—sliced open by the glass shards of painted saints as she'd delved through them to get to Yassper only to be greeted by the sight of his mangled, lifeless body. Now she had to watch this stupid angel die too. Fuck them all.
"You are not dying on me," she said to the angel. "You hear me? You're not fucking dying on me. I'll fucking break into heaven and drag you back myself."
She was shivering so badly that it was hard to walk. Even harder with the angel. She paused, panting, cold air stabbing her lungs. She couldn't bring him to the nearest abandoned building. He needed clothes. He needed warmth. He needed… he needed… what did angels need?
She looked down helplessly at her flimsy, torn dress—nothing she could give him. She looked around at the empty, ruined buildings. She'd find resources faster without him weighing her down but she didn't dare leave him alone—not when he was unconscious like this.
As she trudged through the snow, shaking with cold and exhaustion, she told herself that she wasn't abandoning him because she needed his glory. Because she needed the last angel to kill Lilith.
With every step, she cursed herself. She'd been made to kill, not to heal. The dirt and dried blood that caked her fingers were a sign of that—the same fingers had clawed through flesh and gouged out eyes. But now, in the faint winter sun, clutched around the angel, they glowed golden as though she were ablaze with glory.
Angel, the little girl had said to her. You're an angel, aren't you?
The world was mocking her. She was nothing but a tool—a merciless killing machine. She glared at the sun as it peeked behind the clouds.
Then she caught sight of turrets gleaming at her in the distance, its twin peaks towering higher than all the buildings around it. The city's cathedral was still standing. She looked back at the angel. Places of worship didn't keep demons or Acolytes out. Lilith herself had strolled into one. Issa doubted it would help an angel. But she was desperate.
Feeling foolish, she slung him over her back and half-carried, half-dragged him towards the cathedral. His breathing was so feeble, she knew she had to move faster. Faster, faster.
Broken street signs greeted her as she walked and shivered and panted. She recognised the language as Croatian, and as she saw more of the faded street signs… Zagreb. She'd studied the maps—it used to be the capital. Well, none of that mattered now. Everything was ash and rubble, and Lilith had destroyed the barriers between languages when she'd struck down the Tower of Babel. Now, someone could be speaking Uzbek or Swahili and anyone else would understand them.
After what felt like forever, they finally reached the cathedral. She stumbled through the double doors, shoving it open with her shoulder, and carried the angel through the nave. With her last bit of energy, she laid him on the stone altar and then collapsed below it, gasping for breath, her muscles screaming.
No time to rest.
She forced herself up and looked around for something to cover him. A shattered glass case caught her attention. Someone had smashed it open and pilfered everything shiny… but the sarcophagus on display still had his clothes. Issa had seen too much to be squeamish. Without hesitating, she pulled off the red and gold ceremonial garb from the corpse and carried it to the angel.
His colour had returned but he was still too pale, his lips too blue for her liking.
Was it warm enough? Should she start a fire?
She covered him with the cloak and the shirt, rubbing his arms to try to warm him. Light filtered through the colourful glass, lighting up his ethereal features.
"Come on, seraph," she said. "Wake up."
As she stood there, looking at his unconscious form, she felt more and more foolish. What had she been hoping for, dragging him to a church? She should've dragged him to a clothing store. Or a hospital. Maybe then she'd find something to help him. Here, all she could do was…
Pray? Did she have to pray?
She couldn't remember ever praying in her life. She had no human memories and now, heaven had literally forsaken them. Well, technically, Lilith had locked their gates. Still, that meant the chances of anyone coming to the rescue were slim to none. The guardian angel himself was dying. Who guarded the guardian angels anyway?
But Issa was ready to try anything at this point. She bowed her head, putting her hands on his chest.
If someone can hear me, please save this stupid angel. Um, sorry, didn't mean to curse.
Nothing. She felt silly for even trying.
If someone can hear me, please save this angel, she tried once more—minus the swearing.
She squeezed her eyes shut, trying and trying to find any sort of inner strength when she felt a hand wrap around her wrist.
"What are you doing?" His voice was at her ear.
It was so unexpected that she shot back, stumbling down the stone steps and knocking down the candles as she banged into the long table.
"Where—" Edvardiel looked around at the cathedral and then frowned at the ceremonial garb over his body. He blinked at her. "Were you praying?"
"No," she said automatically.
"You were." He was grinning now, blue lips and all, and she repressed the urge to stab him.
"I was not."
His grin turned into a grimace as he slowly sat up.
"Are you sure you should be sitting up?" she asked, approaching him cautiously.
He looked at her again, the sly amusement intensifying in his eyes. "Are you fussing over me? The cold-blooded Acolyte without feelings?"
Everything inside her shrivelled up.
"I'm only helping you because it's going to help me," she declared haughtily. Still, she came closer to inspect him. "Do you eat?"
"I can," he said. "But I don't have to."
"Where do you get your energy from?"
His gaze was faraway. "Heaven."
She frowned. "But the gates are locked. Do you have a connection? How do—"
"I have a question too." He reached out and took her hand. She was wearing very little, and her skin was still icy. His warm skin felt like fire against hers. "Why are you so close to death?"
She stared.
How did he know?
"I'm an angel," he said. "You're toeing the line between life and death. I can feel it. I thought it was because you were injured, but I feel it even now. Why?"
There was no point keeping things from him. "I need a Keeper to live. A hell-dweller to whom I'm connected, from whom I get my life energy."
"And whose orders you must obey," he said, connecting the dots surprisingly fast.
She nodded. "I thought you were going to be my next, at first. Then I figured out you were an angel."
"Does it have to be a hell-dweller?" he asked, wincing as struggled to sit up fully. In a movement that felt too natural for her liking, she took his arm and wrapped it around her shoulders, helping him up. His eyes followed her touch with more than a cursory glance—even half-frozen, the lure of her Acolyte body was too much to ignore. She smirked, the knowledge pleasing her.
"I'm hell-bound. Of course."
"No one is hell-bound," Edvardiel said.
His words made her doubt herself. It wasn't like she knew many angels—let alone anyone who tried binding themselves to an angel.
"You want to be my Keeper?" she asked uncertainly.
"If it'll help you." Of course. Idiot empath. She should've expected his answer.
He turned the question back to her. "Do you want to be my Acolyte?"
Did she?
The question made her head spin as it forced her to think. She was starting to realise that she hated it. Hated thinking. Hated choices. Hated that everything she did now would mean something, because she did them.
"It's not about what I want," she bit out irritably. "It's the only sensible way if we want to stop the Apocalypse. I need your power to stay alive. And you need… someone to stop you from getting yourself killed."
His lips curved with delight, and his skin seemed to blaze a faint gold, as though his glory burned higher with his emotions. "So you want to work together with me?"
"I need to," she corrected. For some reason, the distinction was important to her.
"No you don't," he said. He was teasing her, and she bristled.
"Don't push it, seraph, or I'll toss you out the window."
"You won't." He grinned at her and gingerly laid himself back down on the altar. "You even prayed for me."
"Shut up." God, he was insufferable. She glared. "For the last time, I did not pray for you." She didn't care, she'd deny it till her dying breath. "Do you want to be my Keeper or not?"
"You know I do," he said, his expression turning serious. "Let's do it."