The Pull of Destiny (Undying Love, Book 2) Read online

  “We’re not here to bring misery, Rynne. If it’s meant to be, and Tasia truly does love you, she will have the option to become a made angel—just like you. As things are now, she must remain completely human for the world’s sake, to get the other humans on her side, our side. For many of the reasons you just pointed out, Tasia must remain human because she needs to be a leader for humans until the world is fixed.”

  “That could take years,” I say.

  “Are you so shallow that you would not want her in a few years from now?”

  “No, I didn’t mean it like that,” I say quickly. Then I hang my head in shame. “It’s a lot of things. I should have considered everything before I went ahead with my feelings for Tasia. It’s not as simple as that. The oracle told me my feelings are valid, but angels conduct themselves so differently from humans. Tasia doesn’t know anything about how angels live. Unless she accepted angel rule, I doubt she’d want to become one.”

  “You talk of intimacy perhaps,” the confidant deduces.

  “Yes,” I say. “With Tasia, if we ever got that serious, I’m not sure how good of an angel I would be either.” I feel embarrassed admitting it, but it’s true. “Is that just the human side of me, too? Now that I am an angel, I’m not allowed to live like other humans do.”

  The confidant is silent for a moment. “Indeed. You are an angel, and therefore you must live by angel rule.”

  I say, “I’m not going to force Tasia into this life. It’s good she found out about me when she did, before things went too far. She has to make an important decision now, and she’ll be able to do it more objectively without me trying to sway her one way or the other. I only wish I had waited. I wish I hadn’t given in to my feelings at all. Then I wouldn’t be hurting like this.”

  “Everything happens for a reason.” The confidant puts her hand on my shoulder.

  “Am I always going to feel this inadequate?” I whisper.

  “In what way do you feel inadequate, Rynne? Do you feel inadequate as an angel? Or do you feel inadequate in your own standards? You are a good soldier. But soldiers have lives too. Take care of yourself.” She takes her hand off my shoulder and says, “Follow me. I’ll find some work for you.”

  And just like that, I’m one of the few angels stationed with the confidant. I’m honored, but I also wish it weren’t the case. It’s easier to run away. It would be easier to leave and to make Tasia’s decision for her. Angels are good, kind, true. I know all of that, and I believe all of that, but they are far from human, and this is not the life I want for her. I don’t think it’s the kind of life that would make her happy—or maybe I’m wrong. I can’t help feeling selfish for wanting her to choose me.

  VALOR FOUND ME at sundown and told me to go to the lobby after finishing my task with setting up the last of our replacement computers. I figured I’d meet her there, but I’m here, and I don’t see her anywhere. I hope she comes soon. I feel bad just sitting here and waiting while the others are still working. I wonder if the angels are going to instruct the hunters to do things differently now that the database and communications are back up and running. Hunters and the EEA have been making a difference I’m sure, but Valor and Cassius both talked about settling things once and for all and my role in this. I can’t help but feel nervous about what it all means.

  I can’t stop fidgeting.

  What if Valor called me to the lobby because Cassius is here or on his way to get me already? I should have asked if Fiona or Divya could come with me. I think I’d feel better if one of them could. Maybe even if Rynne could. He is my guardian angel after all. He’s been watching over me all this time, and I didn’t even know it.

  I cover my eyes with my right hand, trying to stop the feelings inside of me from coming out. I’m glad Rynne is okay. I really am, but I’m also so angry about everything. I don’t know what to think about him and me together anymore. It’s too weird.

  I take a deep, cleansing breath and continue watching for any sign of Valor. I see hunters pass through and an angel who isn’t Valor. I’m starting to wonder if she forgot about me, and then I see Rynne. He sees me too. He nods his head in a discreet hello, and I offer the same in return. I wonder if he’ll come over and talk to me, keep me company, but he doesn’t. He looks away from me right after I nod and disappears down a hall. I don’t know whether to feel hurt or relieved.

  I right myself and look ahead of me to see an angel in white robes, the only angel I’ve ever seen in white robes: Cassius.

  “H-hi,” I greet him.

  He nods. “Tasia.”

  He reaches out his hand for me, and I’m not sure what to do. Does he want to shake my hand? Help me off my seat? Hesitantly, I hold my hand out to his. As soon as my fingers brush his palm, he clasps my hand and pulls me off my seat and to my feet in a single fluid motion. It feels like I’m gliding through water instead of air because he does it so easily. Touching his hand is a weird sensation, like what I imagine floating in the clouds would feel like.

  Bending slightly, he places his mouth near my ear. He whispers, “I need you to stay calm. Do you have your diamonds?”

  Saying the words “I need you to stay calm” is probably the best way to make me anything but calm. I dry swallow and nod my head in a jerking motion.

  “I never go anywhere without my diamonds,” I remind him in a shaking voice.

  “May I see them?”

  He releases me and takes a step back while I pull my diamonds out from under my sweater. He places his hand on top of mine like he did before, hiding the crystals and flooding my body with peace. The shaking stops and the incessant vibrating caused by my anxiety stills.

  “What’s going on?” I whisper.

  Cassius tightens his grasp on my hand, pressing the crystals into both of our palms as he says, “Arsen has come to see you, but you aren’t ready for that yet.”

  I should be breaking out into a cold sweat right now, but I’m holding it together somehow. “What are we going to do then?” I ask.

  “Nothing hard. Just do exactly as I say.”

  MARCHING UP TO A hunter base without even trying to conceal my presence is something I’d usually consider foolhardy—especially when those hunters now have angel roommates. Their perimeter fence has been rebuilt and reinforced with silver. Large silver and ash wood crosses adorn the surrounding warehouses, and I swear I can smell a ridiculous concentration of garlic in the air. If this place wasn’t putrid before, it certainly is now. It may be night, but that’s the only thing I have on my side. The moon is only about half visible tonight.

  If this situation was anything other than what it is, I would think I’ve gone insane. Maybe I have. I could have waited longer to do this, but what would be the point? I don’t even have Yuki anymore. I have literally nothing, and when you have nothing, there’s nothing you can fear to lose. This is the first time in months my beast and logician haven’t been trying to tear each other apart. Both of them agree we’re out of options. Facing Tasia is all that’s left.

  I hop over the uninviting fence and land in the snow and ice on the other side. I shudder as the light surrounding me attempts to penetrate my dark aura. It’s even worse because of the angels. Their presence is making all of these evil repelling objects feel much stronger than they would on their own. It’s ironic. There was a time I walked through Zenith and the Citadel itself for my servant missions. The energy there was pure righteousness, pure angel. All of my time in the mortal world must have lowered my resistance to it. I haven’t had to face any light this powerful in years. In the mortal world, I’ve hardly ever fought and killed more than one angel at a time. I’d say there are at last ten, give or take a couple, of them at this base.

  Bypassing all of the uninhabited warehouses, I press forward into a denser field of light until I’m standing in front of a midget of an angel. She has her arms folded as she stares me down rather courageously with yellow-green eyes as fierce and sharp as she is small. My eyes flicker to a
nother angel standing behind her. With the way his orange eyes avert my gaze, he seems far less intent on facing me. Though he’s much taller than the female, his lack of presence renders him almost invisible.

  “Report this,” the small one says with clear superiority.

  The other angel speeds away, vanishing into the largest warehouse, and actual hunter base, now within my sight.

  “You must have lost your mind,” the short angel says, “coming here like this.” She hasn’t budged an inch. I can’t smell the slightest hint of fear on her either.

  “Truce,” I say. “I haven’t come here for a fight.” It takes everything my logician has to stop my beast from letting out a snarl.

  “I never thought I’d hear those words from the son of Maelstrom. Too bad they’re a lie,” she comments.

  I take a steps forward and stop just shy of touching the silver clad angel in front of me. My beast wants to squash her. She’s so short and so small it would be easy to do if I completely shifted over to my beast. My logician reminds us that she isn’t that short, nor would she be easily squashed. She’s an angel. I shake my head in an attempt to get rid of the discordance.

  “Look, short stack, I only want to see the girl. Tasia. I want to see Tasia. It’s a fucking simple request,” I say, showing my teeth.

  “Excuse me for not believing you then—not to mention your attitude.”

  “I was being honest when I said I didn’t come here to fight, but if you want to go a round, I won’t say no, doll.”

  She bristles.

  “I only want to talk. Let me pass or don’t. I’m going to see her,” I state.

  “You’ll have to get through me first,” she replies, revealing a row of teeth like razors. They look much sharper than mine. Seems she’s not all bark after all.

  I grin. “I was hoping you’d say that. I haven’t tasted angel in far too long.” I lick my lips in anticipation.

  The angel leaps back before I can slice through her armor with my claws. I let my beast consume my hands as I lurch forward to catch the angel before she can get away again, but she’s prepared for me. She catches my left arm as she leaps behind me, wrenching my arm in the process. I expect to tear right through her grasp, but glittering scales are coating her skin and she tears my arm into ribbons before I’m clear of her.

  I leap onto one of the warehouses to get some distance between us. My arm is throbbing and bleeding all over the white snow. The healing process is slowed because the wound was inflicted by the angel’s beast. Angel inflicted wounds are probably the worst kind.

  “Running away, Arsen? I thought you were determined to see Tasia,” she taunts, shaking the blood from her arm and wiping off the access in new snow.

  “You got lucky, angel, but it isn’t going to happen again,” I reply.

  I let my scales cover my body. I know they aren’t as dense as hers. My beast isn’t even entirely covered in scales, but I’m willing to bet hers is with how dense they are. I jump down from the warehouse, a few feet away from her, and I wait. She starts circling me in a predatory manner, but I stay still and watch her move like a shark.

  I discern when she’s about to strike. I leap into action a second before her, jumping and catching her from behind before she can strike me. Her scales chaff mine as her beast quickly manifests its scales on every inch of her skin as I use every bit of strength in my body to snap her neck—almost. Those scales, her beast, she’s much stronger than her logician’s small stature led me to believe. Even with all my strength I can’t snap her neck straight on like this, not with those damn scales of hers. I need to find a way around her defense.

  I release her and dash away. I never minded the wolfy part of my beast before, but I’ve faced few angels with a defense like this one’s, a defense stronger than mine; if I were all dragon, this would be much easier. I can hear and feel her running behind me, but it seems I have greater speed than she does. I smash into the asphalt and concrete surrounding me and launch the pieces like hulking bullets at the angel in pursuit. She smashes through them easily. Damn her.

  A storm, particularly lightning, is the element I’d like to call on right now, but It’d take too long. Plus, I’m sure backup will come for her at any time. That means I’ll have to try something else. I may not be expecting to live much longer, but I’m not going to make it easy for them to kill me.

  After taking note of all the snow and ice surrounding me, I make my decision. I hold out my arms as I rush past a particularly large bank of snow, linking the element to my open palms. My arm is still bleeding and I’m glad. It’s time to reuse a trick I haven’t had the opportunity to use in a while. I will my blood to combine with the frozen element I’m using. It works because my blood is close enough to the water element that it becomes an extension, as if I were simply picking up more snow or water to combine with what I’ve already grabbed; it’s a trick I learned over my years of hunting angels.

  The angel stops pursuing me when she sees what I’m doing. She tries to backtrack, but it’s too late. I leap into the air, the snow and my blood following me as they combine into an icy liquid. I hold out both of my hands to her and the liquid shoots past me and sprays her. Once I’ve landed on the ground I tighten my hands into fists and the liquid freezes around her, trapping her as I will it to hold her in place. I slowly allow my blood to seep out from the ice, using advanced magic control as I let my blood coat her body as I continue holding her still in ice encasing everything but her head.

  She screams as steam starts spilling up from her neck. It seems her flesh isn’t taking the contact with my blood very well, just as I hoped. While blood is a delicious treat for us demons, angels only willingly come into contact with the stuff when they have to. There’s a reason they typically choose to fight with silver armor and weapons rather than using their beasts as their weapon. All these little details you pick up when you’ve committed your life to killing angels. To their credit, or something like that, they usually hide their discomfort with demon blood very well. They can withstand it, depending on their strength and discipline, but the cracks in this angel’s armor must be more sensitive than the skin of her logician. Just as I suspected. Every armor that seems impenetrable always has a grave weakness.

  “How does that feel, sweetheart?” I ask.

  I growl as I walk up to her with one hand held out in a fist to keep the water encasing her frozen. She’s fighting against me, but I claimed the use of this element and there’s nothing she can do about it now. She screams again, baring her teeth as the sensitive flesh underneath her scales burns.

  “Do you think I can burn all the way through to your organs before I have to let this element go?” I mock.

  A flash of silver blurs in my peripheral.

  Shit.

  My hands shake and I let go of the element before another angel can smash into me and I jump back to safety onto a warehouse roof.

  “Imae, are you okay?” the angel asks, worried and jittery.

  He’s the same male she sent away earlier. I suspect he won’t be much of a problem. I can smell the fear on him.

  “I’m fine,” she announces as steam rises from her body and she frees herself from the ice encasing her. Then she shakes off the remainder of the liquid on her as well as she can manage.

  “I’ll kill him first,” I point at the orange eyed angel.

  His eyes grow wide and I give him a toothy grin before dashing off the building and smashing into him. The female is still trying to recover from what I did to her. It makes it easy for me to hold the male hostage. He’s wearing silver, but I don’t fucking care right now—even though it’s buzzing against my skin. I have one set of claws at his neck and the other holding his hands behind is back. I can break through his armor and remove his heart in an instant before the female can try anything.

  “You move, he dies,” I state.

  She glares at me. “Let him go, Arsen.”

  “Why the fuck would I do that? You haven’t ev
en offered me anything for his life.” I rake my nails across his neck, drawing blood. He whimpers in response, not even trying to struggle against me.

  “Arsen!”

  A shock runs down my neck at the sound of my name. No, not the sound of my name, because of the one who’s saying it.

  “Tasia,” I mutter.

  I turn with the angel still in my grasp to see her and Cassius at her side. They’re several feet away from me, standing their ground. It doesn’t look like they plan on coming any closer. They must have come out of the base. I was too preoccupied to notice their presence before, a ridiculous oversight on my part—at least when it comes to Cassius. That angel radiates light like no other angel I’ve ever seen. So even the oracle is here. Now that is an interesting development. This is so important that he would leave his station in Ilenima?

  Cassius is dangerous, but Tasia is probably more of a danger to me after everything that’s been happening—after making this reckless decision to see her.

  My eyes rest on her. She has a few cuts and bruises, but her arm isn’t in a sling. Apparently it wasn’t as bad off as it looked. For some reason, that brings me relief.

  Her brown hair is cascading over her shoulders, and some of it is even obscuring her eyes, but I can see them well enough. Her gaze is wavering and her earthy eyes are full of fear. I wish she wouldn’t look at me like that.

  I realize my grasp on the quivering angel isn’t as tight as it should be. I correct myself, but he really is stupid or simply scared out of his mind. He could have taken that opportunity to get away from me.

  “Let him go,” Tasia commands. I try to ignore the fact she’s practically clinging onto Cassius’s robes. She’s terrified of me too, and yet here she is, telling me what to do?

  “I think not, Tasia,” I reply, dredging up the strength I need to survive this as I dig my nails deeper into the angel’s neck. “Hell, but I’m feeling generous. If you’ll talk to me—alone—I’ll let the angel live.”