It was the girl she'd saved from the demons. She had survived. She was alive. As she hugged Issa around the legs, smiling, Issa hastily stowed the gun inside the angel dress.
"Maman, come meet my angel!" The tiny girl was a wriggly bundle of warmth and she jumped several times, trying to climb up Issa's legs.
Issa stared down at her awkwardly. She was about to reach for the girl when the blood-covered bunny flashed before her eyes. The real angel was half-dead and she imagined Lilith's voice returning with its full power. Leave no human alive. A hug would turn into a strangle and—
Issa kept her hands to herself.
"Alice?"
Issa turned her attention to the woman at the door, noting that she acted nothing like a typical human mother. She made no move to enter or call her daughter back. She simply stood at the doorway, watching Issa warily. They also looked nothing alike. While the little girl was dark-haired and dark-eyed with soft features, the woman was all angles with fair hair and light eyes.
Issa's instincts flashed. Was the woman keeping the child around as a future sacrifice? A decoy? As food when she died?
Without thinking, Issa put a protective arm around the girl. "Who are you?"
"She's my maman," Alice said imploringly. She caught sight of Edvardiel and blinked. "Is that another angel?"
Issa stiffened but the woman relaxed when she saw Edvardiel's sleeping form. She pushed her choppy, dishevelled hair behind her ear and stepped over the rotting corpses. "I apologise," she said. "I thought you might be one of the demons. My name is Rosalie."
A bow was strapped across her chest, arrows to her back, and Issa saw several long knives and guns glinting in her belt.
Rosalie was studying her too. "Where are your weapons?"
"Had to leave them behind when he fell ill," Issa lied smoothly.
Rosalie began to move towards Edvardiel but Issa blocked her way, her muscles tensing for a fight. Rosalie raised her hands.
"Relax, I just want to help," she said.
"Maman is very good at healing," Alice piped up. She let go of Issa's legs and peered curiously at Edvardiel.
Issa gave Rosalie a once-over and decided she could move fast enough to kill her if she tried to hurt the angel. With that, she moved out of the way, letting Rosalie kneel next to Edvardiel. The human woman pinched a fold of his skin near his neck and checked his eyes.
"Are you a doctor?" Issa asked.
Rosalie gave her a funny look. "You need schools for those to exist. They've died out. My grandmother Clémence was one of the last ones."
She glanced back at Edvardiel. "He's dehydrated."
Issa didn't think angels needed to drink. Then again, she hadn't thought they'd needed to sleep either. She nodded. "I'll find some water."
"I can give him some of mine." Rosalie unhooked a flask at her hip and, holding Issa's gaze, she took a very obvious swallow to show her it wasn't poisoned, before gently cradling Edvardiel's head and tipping some of it into his mouth.
He shifted restlessly, still delirious, but drank what she gave him.
"He has a fever too," Rosalie noted. "He needs more water but you'll have to take care of that. I need to keep the rest for myself and Alice."
Issa had no idea if the water would help Edvardiel, but she understood how precious the resource must be to Rosalie. "Thank you," she said. "If there's anything I can do in return—"
"There is." Rosalie looked pointedly at the pullovers.
Issa paused. Edvardiel needed them. She wondered if the woman would attack her if she said no. Then she looked at Alice, who was wearing nothing but her pink frock as she rolled herself into the dusty quilts on top of Edvardiel and touched his cheek. "He's so warm, maman!"
Something inside Issa revolted at the word as her eyes flickered from Alice's dress to Rosalie's thick jacket. The woman was not her mother. She would feed Alice to the demons to save her own skin. Issa stared at Rosalie. "You can take them. But they're still wet."
"Can you give us a dry one?" Rosalie pushed. "We need to get going."
She couldn't risk showing them Edvardiel's scars. "No," she said. "He's wearing it. But you can take anything else you want."
Rosalie didn't argue as she slipped one pullover onto herself and the other onto Alice.
"Maman," Alice tugged at Rosalie's jacket. "Can we please take the angel with us?"
Rosalie turned, her calculating eyes sizing Issa up. "Do you want to come with us? We have a car. You'll have to feed yourself of course."
Issa imagined herself and Edvardiel as humans, joining Rosalie in her car, before getting poisoned and eaten by her once the food supplies ran out.
"No," Issa said. "We have somewhere to go."
"Where?" Rosalie asked. "The nearest resistance I know is in Albania. That's where we're going."
Albania. Issa remembered its terrain being mountainous like Romania. It had been a nightmare to attack too. If there was human resistance nearby, it was likely to be in those two countries.
"Romania," she lied.
"I see. Are you sure you don't want a lift?"
"We're fine," Issa said.
Rosalie nodded once and took Alice's hand. She glanced at the fire. "You should probably put that out," she said softly. "Goodbye."
Alice tore away from Rosalie and hugged Issa's legs. "I don't want to go! I want to stay here with my angel." Her tattered pink dress peeked out from underneath the oversized pullover, her eyes filling with tears. "Please?"
This time, Issa couldn't help herself from picking her up. Her body was small and wonderfully warm. Something about her scent was oddly familiar. Something about her face was familiar too. Issa held the girl tightly, wanting, all of a sudden, to take her with them. But between Lilith's deadly orders and the demons, Alice would be much safer with another human, cannibal or not.
Issa tore off a small strip of angel robe and tied it into a ribbon at the front of her frock. Alice touched the shimmering cloth in wonder.
"I'll let you keep it if you don't cry," Issa said, putting her down. "Now go."
She stood at the door, watching long after the pink disappeared into the darkness.
Issa stayed up all night without putting out the fire, her gun on the ready, but the demons never came. It seemed Lilith was playing games this time. She boiled snow with both fire and glory and made Edvardiel drink it. To her surprise, the human woman had been right. The water helped immensely.
In the early hours of the morning, Edvardiel finally came to himself, his eyes bloodshot.
"Issa?" His voice was hoarse.
"Took you long enough," she said. "How do you feel?"
"Pretty bad," he admitted, and she felt his splitting headache through their bond. He looked up at her and his tired face broke into a smile. "Oh, congratulations. You didn't suffocate in space after all. You flew all the way to Koprivnica, didn't you?"
He remembered everything she said, even her stupid comment about suffocating in space. Issa stared and then flicked him on the forehead.
"Ouch! What was that for?"
Issa glared. "What if I had ended up in space? What if I couldn't find Koprivnica? Some Keeper you are, passing out on me."
"It's called faith," Edvardiel retorted, sitting up. "I had faith in you. I knew you could do it."
"Fuck faith," Issa muttered. She'd spent the entire night listening to his wild hallucinations and she'd come to the conclusion that Heaven was full of dicks. She shoved a bowl of water at him. "Drink."
Edvardiel sniffed the bowl. "What's this?"
"Water," Issa said. "A human healer passed by last night and said you were dehydrated. Drink it and then we'll go."
"A human healer?" Panic zinged through their bond.
"Don't worry," Issa said. "I made sure she didn't see anything."
Edvardiel looked uneasy. "Did anything else happen?"
"No." Issa crossed her arms. "Well, you might have spat water all over me." More like puked all over her. Several times.
He winced. "I spat on you?"
He opened his mouth and she held up a hand. "Don't. If I hear you say sorry one more time, I swear I'll shoot you."
"Here I thought your cold heart might be warming up to me." He smiled slightly and drained the bowl.
"And that's where you miscalculated," Issa said, cocking the gun as she walked towards the door. "I don't have a heart."
