Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 118699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 593(@200wpm)___ 475(@250wpm)___ 396(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 593(@200wpm)___ 475(@250wpm)___ 396(@300wpm)
Meher continued to saw, flecks of wood falling onto Aureline’s face and chest.
It took a long time. Zanaya knew there was no way to rush it without killing Aureline, but every one of the muscles in her body was bunched up with the urge to yell at Meher to go faster. And in the end, Aureline couldn’t stay conscious anymore. It wasn’t a matter of will; her body no longer had the strength.
“She’s still alive,” Zanaya told Meher when he began to breathe in short hard puffs, his hands shaking. “Complete the cut.”
He did so with gritted teeth.
In the interim, one of the other members of their squadron had flown down and ripped off her tunic of a fine handwoven fabric—to reveal a skirted loincloth and breasts strapped in place by the wide bandages used by most fighters whose breasts weren’t small enough to not become painful from the intense motion of combat. Since their wings didn’t permit a simple around-the-body strapping, their squadron mate’s bared body was a complex matrix of lines in cloth.
Right now, her focus was on the tunic she was tearing into long panels.
As Meher completed his task and threw aside the piece of the spear he’d cut, Zanaya slid her hand under Aureline’s neck with extreme care and placed her fingers around the other end of the spear. Perspiration chilled her skin. “Tip’s buried too deep in the ground. We can’t pull it out without hurting her.” She thought fast. “We extricate Auri by sliding her neck up over the top end of the spear.” It was short now, the exercise doable.
Meher helped her stabilize Aureline’s head as they gently, gently, gently got her free. Then they worked at rapid speed to wrap her wound with the bandages formed of their squadron mate’s tunic. It didn’t matter if they made it tight; angels could survive without air for long periods. It wouldn’t be comfortable, but it was better than Aureline’s head detaching from her body.
Because there was no coming back from that for anyone but an archangel.
“Is she still alive?” Meher asked as they finished wrapping the final bandage.
“Yes,” Zanaya said, though she wasn’t sure. “Hold the line.” With that, she gathered Aureline up in her arms. Her friend was taller than her, but Zanaya had built up considerable strength over the years—in all honesty, she was far stronger than she should be, given her size and outward appearance. A little gift from her father no doubt, because it certainly hadn’t come from Rzia’s willowy and ethereal line.
Just grateful for the strength that meant she had no trouble doing a vertical takeoff with Auri’s body cradled in her arms, she tucked her friend close and, hoping against hope that Aureline could fight just a little longer, she flew her friend home.
12
Alexander saw Zanaya again a bare season after his ascension, while he was in the process of trying to put together his court. She came into his world as a squadron leader in charge of escorting a renowned scholar whom Archangel Inj’ra had kindly permitted to guest in Alexander’s court for a period, the scholar’s task to assist Alexander in certain matters.
If Zanaya had been a punch to the solar plexus before, she was now a grip around his throat. But if she’d been forbidden then, she was now verboten.
An archangel and such a young angel?
It would be an abomination.
Yet she stood under the banner that bore his sigil—a raven in flight—and held his eyes with impudent arrogance, challenging him to see her, know her, have her. But there was something different about her this time, a tension that hinted at pain. And that Alexander couldn’t stand, so he closed the distance between them.
“What’s happened?” he asked, as if they’d been having this conversation throughout the years between their first meeting and this. “Why do you hurt?”
She would’ve been well within her rights to tell him it was none of his business, but he’d startled her out of her martial calm by striding over to stand so close to her. So she told him the truth. “My best friend is gravely injured. She might die.”
Alexander wanted to hold her. To face the specter of death so young . . . “She isn’t dead yet,” he said. “And Inj’ra has a corps of healers that outshine any other.”
“Yes.” Hope in her tone now, her face younger and more innocent than it had been a bare moment ago. “Thank you, Alexander.” She should’ve called him Archangel Alexander but of course she wouldn’t, not this warrior woman who refused to treat him with diffidence. “Will you walk with me today?”
Gut clenched against the desire to hold her, comfort her further, he said, “I do not consort with babes.” It was a cruel thing to say, but he had to be cruel. Or he’d doom them both.