Wreathed in Flame (Faith of the Fallen Book 3) Read online

  “Savanna.”

  “She saw you in a dream?”

  “That’s what she told me. How else would she know my name?”

  The two angels exchanged a long glance.

  “That has to be it, then,” Michael said, finally. Gabriel nodded.

  “What?” Alexi asked. “What aren’t you telling me?” She was so tired of being in the dark.

  Michael opened his mouth to speak, when Alexi suddenly doubled over. Pain lanced through her middle, spreading through her whole body.

  Her fingers tingled and burned from the sudden invasion.

  “Alexi?” Michael touched her shoulder.

  Gabriel lifted his hand, making a gesture in the air in front of her. Light flashed across her skin. Alexi groaned. The pain shifted into a sense of chaos. She wanted to throw up. Hand over her mouth, she desperately fought the nausea.

  “She can’t stay, Michael,” Gabriel said. “It’s killing her.”

  “She’s one of us. This is her home,” Michael insisted.

  Alexi shook her head. “My home is on Earth, not here,” she forced out through clenched teeth.

  “She’s not wrong, brother,” Gabriel said. “The Angel in her belongs here, and when she dies in the mortal plane, she will likely return here… but her physical body—”

  “It’s the vampire,” Michael finished with a nod.

  Another wave of pain and nausea crashed over Alexi. “Get… me… out of here!”

  Michael’s hand touched her shoulder, and the light of heaven began to fade. “We’ll find a way to bring you back, Alexi. We won’t stop trying. Thank you.”

  Alexi’s vision dimmed as heaven receded.

  The pain vanished.

  Alexi took a deep breath. She was home, in Tacoma, kneeling in the middle of the living room. Bright light streamed through the windows.

  She looked down at her penguin pajamas. There was a burn mark across the thigh.

  Alexi rose to her feet, her legs weak and shaky beneath her. One hand on the wall, she made her way back to her room. She was so tired. Her stomach ached with hunger. Halfway to her room, her knees buckled. She sunk to the ground, slumping against the wall.

  “Alexi?” A gust of air preceded Savanna as she burst out of her room, silky pajamas flapping about her knees. “You look awful. What happened?”

  “How long… how long was I gone?”

  Savanna’s black hair was combed neatly back, and she smelled of vanilla. “A week. Where did you go?”

  “Savanna, I’m so hungry. Please, I don’t want to ask but….” Her fangs sharped while she spoke. Savanna’s heart pounded in her ears, and she could almost taste the blood on her lips.

  “It’s okay.” Savanna knelt and held out an arm.

  A growl escaped Alexi’s throat as she lunged.

  “All of them?” Gabriel asked again.

  “Yes, sir,” replied his lieutenant. “Like some kind of chain reaction. Some closed with demons still climbing through.”

  The demon attack came as a complete surprise. Demons couldn’t exist in Heaven any more than Angels could be in Hell. It was lucky Alexi had been there—if Gabriel believed in luck.

  Gabriel dismissed his lieutenant. “I know what you’re going to say, Michael,” he said as the door swung softly closed. “Save us both the trouble.”

  Michael shook his head. “She saved us. Are you seriously considering leaving her there? Look what she did! We need her.”

  Gabriel closed his eyes with a sigh, kneading his brow. “I know she did. And you know I miss her as much as you do.”

  “When we took her memory from her, we thought it was a kindness, but—”

  “But what?” Gabriel gave his brother a hard glance. “What else were we to do? After we realized what those… abominations were going to do to her? How could we not spare her the memory of her life, when she had only a few brief moments yet to live?”

  “You were so sure she’d be back.” Michael shook his head. “Just a few moments more, you said. But she lived, and look what she is now. Brother, she would have been brighter than all the rest of us…”

  “I know.” Gabriel looked away, forcing down his regret. “There’s nothing we can do about that, now. All we can do is look at the problem in front of us. She killed their king. That must be the reason they attacked. She can cross the borders. A child of both Heaven and Hell.”

  “That’s the end of it, then?” Michael crossed his arms across his chest. “We just leave her to this wretched fate?”

  “We can’t affect her mortal body, Michael. You know it as well as I. We can’t interfere on Earth—we all agreed to the Accord. I made sure of that.” Gabriel sighed. It had been a gambit, all those millennia ago. The risk had proved worthy in the short term, but as the best of plans often did, it had unforeseen consequences.

  “You couldn’t have known, Gabe,” Michael said. “We all agreed to it, not just you. Give mankind a chance to determine their own destiny, free of fae. Free of angels and demons. You couldn’t have known about the witches.”

  Gabriel offered his brother a half smile. “That doesn’t change what has happened. We grow too few, brother. Darkness spreads over the earth, and we can’t do anything to stop it.” He paused. “What if…”

  Michael raised his eyebrows. “What are you thinking?”

  “They were here because of her,” Gabriel said. “What if we could go there? We could destroy the black gates, and leave them confined to their own Hell for eternity.”

  John?”

  Detective Yu glanced up at the broad-shouldered man in front of him. “What’s up, Pearson?”

  “Dispatch passed along a call from the Marysville PD.” The fellow seemed a little reluctant to speak the next words. “Someone broke into your sister’s house.”

  John’s blood went cold. His sister, her husband, and their six-year-old lived north of Everett. It was out of his jurisdiction as a police officer, but not as a brother.

  “Thanks for the heads up,” he said, pulling on his shoulder holster. Grabbing his leather jacket off the back of his chair, he jogged for the elevator. The doors couldn’t open fast enough.

  Fumbling to pull his phone from his jacket pocket, he swiped through it, searching for his sister’s number. He punched the call open, and put it to his ear.

  Ring.

  Ring.

  Ring.

  Voicemail. Damn it. He texted her instead.

  On my way. What happened?

  John waited all the way down to the main floor for an answer, but none came. He gave a growl of frustration as the elevator doors opened.

  It was almost four. With traffic, it could take him the better part of an hour to find out what happened. If anyone had been hurt, he was sure Pearson would have said something.

  He was sure of it.

  An hour of slightly aggressive driving later, John pulled his Challenger up to the curb outside his sister’s house. He barely had it in park before he jumped out.

  Three patrol cars were parked outside, along with the Ford Crown Victoria that practically every department used as an undercover car for detectives.

  The front door was shattered. Wooden splinters covered the entryway. No scorching or burn marks on the carpet, though. A parade of terrible images raced through his mind again, visions he had seen all the way from the precinct.

  He burst into the living room to see his sister on the couch with her husband. She stood as he came in, and he brushed past the uniformed officer there to take a statement.

  “Sara, what happened?” He pulled her into a fierce hug, and she cried into his shoulder. He couldn’t make out what she was saying through her sobs.

  He looked to her husband, Li. The older man’s eyes narrowed, and John forced down his annoyance. First generation Chinese-American, more than a decade older than Sara, and a perpetual thorn in John’s side. He didn’t have time for this jealous crap right now.

  John had sworn to protect Sara years ago
, when their parents died. He didn’t know what she saw in Li, but at least the man respected her. He hadn’t given John a reason to put the hurt on him. Not yet.

  “What happened, Li?” John asked.

  “Someone took Wei,” Li said, looking to the officer instead of John. “We woke up this morning, and she was gone.”

  John could hear the pain in Li’s voice. That’s something, at least.

  “Any leads?” John asked the officer.

  The officer raised his eyebrows. “Who are you?”

  “Detective Yu, SPD. Missing person’s division,” he added. “I’m just here as a brother, not to step on toes.”

  “Detective Summer is upstairs if you want to talk to her,” the officer said. “I’ll finish this in a minute, ma’am, sir.” He nodded to Sara and Li, and then stepped away to speak to the CSI.

  “Shh.” John stroked Sara’s hair. “It’s going to be okay.”

  She pulled away from him, still crying, with one hand over her mouth. It hurt John to see her this way.

  Sara sat on the couch again, but Li made no move to comfort his wife, or even sit closer to her.

  “We woke up this morning and found the door all—” Sara hiccupped. “How could we even sleep through that? I don’t—” She broke down again.

  John shot a look at Li, who only sat there, seeming faintly embarrassed by his wife’s hysterics. “Take care of your wife,” he growled at the man, only earning himself a resentful glare from Li as he jogged up the stairs.

  That was John’s least favorite part of his parents’ culture. Save face at all costs.

  Wei’s room was full of pink. Princesses everywhere—on the curtains and the bedspread. Even a princess rug next to the bed. He’d bought her half of it, unable to help spoiling her.

  In the far corner of the room stood a slender woman with black hair. She wore latex gloves and protective shoe-covers. He caught a glimpse of her pistol as she bent to examine the floor.

  “Stop,” she said as he approached the door. She didn’t even turn to look.

  “I’m not going to touch anything.” John wasn’t exactly an amateur. “Detective Summer?”

  “That’s what it says on my paycheck. How about yours?”

  “I’m Sara’s brother, Detective Yu. SPD.”

  She finally turned to face him. Brown eyes narrowed. “I’m not going to have to call your Captain am I, Detective?”

  John raised his hands. He knew the rules—he couldn’t investigate his own niece’s kidnapping, or be privy to any details his sister wasn’t also aware of. “I’m not here to interfere. I just want to know what happened so I can explain it to my sister. She’s pretty freaked out, and her husband is less than no help at all. Please?”

  Detective Summer paused, seeming to consider. Finally, she nodded and handed him a pair of gloves and some shoe covers.

  “To be honest, Detective,” she said, “I could use a second pair of eyes. Our department isn’t exactly huge. Is there anything you can tell me about the family that might shed some light on this?”

  John slipped on the shoe covers and struggled into a pair of gloves that were a size too small.

  “John,” he said.

  “Christa,” she replied with a smile.

  “I don’t know if any of this will be useful, but her husband works for Boeing, Sara’s a C.P.A and she home-schools Wei.”

  “There’s a few odd things here,” Christa said, pointing out a torn stuffed unicorn and a ripped poster. John had missed the unicorn, but he’d noticed the poster immediately, as well as the fact that the headboard was at an odd angle.

  “Headboard’s broken,” he said.

  “It’s like a wild animal tore around the place and then took the girl. Whoever it was left this behind.” Christa lifted the sheet on Wei’s bed.

  There, where Wei would have slept, was a pile of leaves and twigs. It almost seemed like it was in the shape of a baby bundle.

  John raised his eyebrows. “That’s…”

  “I know,” Christa said. “A little weird.”

  John looked around, trying to imagine himself as the perp. Christa stepped aside, seeming to understand what he was doing.

  Wei’s door was intact, unlike the front door, so the kidnapper had just opened it. And walked through. He retraced the steps.

  “I probably touch here coming through the door.” John gestured to a spot on the door frame. Some of the wood was chipped off. “Then, I step… here.” His foot hovered over the ripped unicorn.

  “That’s a hell of a stride,” Christa said. “A good four feet.”

  “Yeah… I—” John looked back to the door frame. The wood wasn’t chipped off. They were gouges, right where his fingers would have fallen. He held up his hand to the marks. Inches apart. Like… claws.

  Damn it.

  Christa saw his face. “You think of something?”

  “How would you feel about bringing in a consultant?” John stepped out of the room and pulled his gloves off.

  “Like a P.I?”

  “No, she’s someone I’ve… worked with before. She specializes in the weird.”

  “She’ll have to answer to me, and I don’t have any budget for her.”

  “I’m pretty sure she’ll do this one pro bono.”

  Christa’s lips tightened into a thin smile. “And her name in the paper. They always want their name in the paper.”

  John shook his head. “Not her. She’ll want a lid on it.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and scrolled through until he saw Alexi’s face. Not smiling, of course. Typical Lex.

  He hit the button and prayed she could help them. He didn’t know anyone else who could fight a werewolf.

  A bright, sunny Seattle shone through the windows of The Book Fairy. All the things Savanna wasn’t, this morning. Most mornings. Though, if she were honest with herself, she felt better than she had since… since it happened.

  It was a relief, having Alexi back, and Savanna was more than willing to feed her. The act calmed Savanna’s nerves and seemed to shore her up in that strange way it often did, as Alexi shared some of her own strength.

  Savanna wouldn’t have asked, if Alexi hadn’t first. In some strange way, Savanna wanted the pain and guilt. Like she needed to feel it in some sort of self-inflicted penance. How could she just continue on with her life, after everything that had happened? How could the sun shine like everything that had happened hadn’t happened?

  The city’s recovery over the last month amazed her. The people had dug in and worked tirelessly to return the Emerald City to its former self. Even with tens of thousands dead, the spirit of the city seemed undimmed, perhaps even brighter for all they had been through. The local companies were giving until it hurt. All the people were pitching in and repairing the damage, both physical and emotional.

  Except for the stadium.

  The once proud home to local football was a lost cause. Molten rock covered the field, thirty feet deep.

  Rabies. That was what the CDC said. An ancient strain, released into the air by a volcanic fissure they hadn’t known existed.

  Savanna was sure that no one had swallowed that one whole—but aside from a small group of people, no one knew the whole truth. She pushed the thought away. She didn’t want to think about it. Every time she did… it all led back to the same place.

  His smile. The way his brown eyes caught the light. The sound of his quiet chuckle, and the way he smelled…

  Connor’s memory was sweet at first, and then it turned bitter.

  One moment she was remembering the way she felt when his hand grazed hers… and the next, she could feel the final beat of his heart through the haft of her dagger.

  She couldn’t carry the blade any more. The sight of it made her sick.

  If not for Alexi’s sudden desire to shop, Savanna would still be in bed. Maybe it was a good thing. New clothes. Maybe a new apartment. She kind of liked the idea of moving. Their tiny house in Tacoma had too many memories i
n it, like so many shadows and cobwebs clinging to the corners.

  Savanna shook her head. New clothes. She liked new clothes—even though she couldn’t really afford much right now. But Warren had finally agreed to let her look at his private book collection—the one he kept under glass. She didn’t want to waste that.

  A shiny new volume at the end of the display case caught her attention. Warren liked to travel all over the Earth and bring back these tomes. She was one of the few people who could actually read them.

  She waved her hand in a vague circle, and the book lifted out of its case. A faint blue light clung to her fingers as the book came to her. She couldn’t remember everything about their time in the Fae, but she remembered the Well. Somehow, it had done more than just cure her.

  “Oh, my gosh! That is so cool!”

  Savanna’s shoulders slumped, and she silently berated herself. Magic was such a part of herself, she reached for it instinctively. If the wrong person were to see her use magic, or discover the link she now had to the Fae…

  “Are you a mage?”

  Savanna turned to greet the woman who spoke. The woman’s smoky voice somehow matcher her features. She was beautiful, not just in the way nature had made her, but in the well-kept way that spoke of money. Lots and lots of money. Brown hair just so. Skin that had seen a million facials, and just enough makeup. Enough jewelry to suggest wealth without being gaudy.

  “It’s kind of a secret,” Savanna said to the woman. “The owner lets me use his books like a library if I help him out once in a while. Sometimes I forget I’m not the only one here.” Warren had offered her a job, but Savanna hadn’t taken him up on it. She didn’t want to be any closer to the Fae than she had to. Instead, she’d strengthened his wards and placed some more specific protection spells of her own.

  The woman smiled. Her red lipstick was flawless. Savanna wondered how she could get the edges so smooth and clean.

  “I won’t say a word,” the woman said. “I’ve never actually seen anyone do magic. Plenty of people say they can, but you know how it is. Can you tell me more about it? How do you do it?”