Page 63 of Wings of Lies (Daughter of the Seven Circles #1)

Chapter

Thirty-Seven

A pulse resonated as Michael flung up a flaming white arm, blocking his face.

He roared in agony as the fireball struck, engulfing and blistering his skin.

Astonished, he fixated on his arm, seething gasps escaping him as he processed the unexpected burn.

Michael jerked his attention toward the figure covered in a dark cloak, staring down my fake father with murder in their glowing gaze.

But why didn’t Michael attack back?

“A Seraphim shouldn’t be in Elora. Why are you here? Who are you?” Michael asked with a shaky voice—a sound I enjoyed.

The figure bounced two fireballs in his hands. “Who I am is irrelevant, but I’d very much like to know who you are so I can send you a card when you arrive in Hell for your sins.”

I let out a pitiful whimper at his voice.

Aspen found me .

My father’s words made a lot of sense, matching my memories of the texts I read, and Miriam and my mom’s words. The cobalt rings . They signified Seraphim.

Michael sputtered, clearly confused by Aspen’s flames and proclamation. “I’m doing my duty. I’m eradicating impurity and sin as you all tell us to!” He slammed the ebony knife into my other hand to emphasize his words.

The pain of the slice hardly penetrated the pain of the rune, but it was yet another cut for my broken body to attempt to heal as my internal organs fought against the deadly temperatures of my power.

“That was the wrong choice, Michael.” The deadly calm overtaking Aspen’s voice spread goosebumps down my spine. He stepped forward until he stood a few feet from my bloody table. The heat of his fireballs brushed my skin.

“You can’t kill me. It’s against our laws. You need two more to cast judgment.”

Aspen hid underneath the hood of his cloak. “And what of the female, Archangel Michael? Did she receive all three votes from the council before you cast judgment?”

“She—” He swallowed. “She’s a Dream-Walker! I figured you would be pleased by my actions. She’s born of pure sin! Her maker is?—”

Aspen cut off his eager stuttering, holding a ball of flaming blue fire inches from Michael’s face.

“I do not care who or what she is. You speak of our laws and then go against them like you’re above them.

Now, she is mine to deal with. Take your wings and leave before I raze them from your back, Archangel Michael. ”

“But— but—” Michael looked between me and my mom. “You can’t do this! We made a deal. They’re mine!” he finally spat out .

Aspen pressed his hand into the white metal of Michael’s chest. The surface heated to a fiery red and yielded to his touch, melting away. “You have seconds before I obliterate you from existence.”

Michael stumbled back. “Which Seraphim are you? Who sent you?”

“Leave us!” Aspen bellowed. His entire body erupted in blue flame.

Michael luscelered out, and any relief I would’ve felt evaded me. Aspen was too late.

I was dying.

“Lucille?” Aspen flung back the hood of his cloak and let go of his power, the rune under his chin a flickering light red. I’d take that. Warm hands pressed into my face. I gasped, and he snapped his hands back.

“You found me,” I said with rolling tears.

“Always.”

“How’d you escape? Why did he listen to you?” Each word I forced out was like dragging heated, barbed wire up my raw throat. Why didn’t he just kill him?

Lines pinched his face. His gaze raked up and down my body. His blue irises glinted with an inner light before becoming consumed by fire.

“Hold still,” he demanded.

“What happened?”

“Don’t speak, Lucille.” He gripped his sword in a shaking, cuffless hand. I glanced at his ankles, finding them free as well.

“What happened?” I rasped out again.

“You did. ”

My brows pulled together as he raised his sword, hands still shaking.

They never shook. Aspen’s sword worked like an additional limb.

Anyone with a brain could tell Aspen had unparalleled skill with a sword.

Yet, as it hovered behind his shoulder, ready to cleave through the air and into my chains, and I felt his overwhelming fear, it wobbled.

“You’re scared,” I whispered.

“Our tether is weakening. I sensed it through the Nephilim’s fear visions—it jolted me awake. I found the Nephilim locked in a struggle with the witch, and you were gone. I snapped. Somehow, I burned through the cuffs, and once I did, it was game over for the fucking witch.”

He swung down. The sword did nothing to the thick links.

“She’d never witnessed my power before. When she did, she begged for mercy. She spilled everything about that bastard, Michael—where he took you and his fear of Seraphim. They outrank him; their word is law, and I wield the flames of one.”

His flames sprung to his sword, licking up the edges.

This close, the raging fire curled the hairs on my arms. He brought the sword over his shoulder and swung it into the largest chain across my chest. The clanking noise I expected didn’t sound a second time—instead, tangy metallic infused the air, and liquid steel oozed off the edge.

The heat blistered my skin, and as my body temperature plummeted, the liquid metal steamed.

“No, you are one. Your mom was one.” I whispered. He was at least half of one. The other half must’ve been another angel paired with demon blood.

He was the first-born angel .

Aspen gave a sharp nod, but the rune under his chin didn’t like the reminder of his mom. It flared, and he cursed.

Unimaginable pain wrecked my body. My flesh remained exposed to the air, bleeding freely, stinging, throbbing, and jiggling when I squirmed.

My insides boiled, then froze. I didn’t need any more agony, and yet…

I would endure the searing heat of his rune if it could only free him from its influence.

I glared at Aspen’s chin. “I’m sorry I can’t touch you,” I said.

“Don’t apologize,” he forced out on an air of breath. “I’ve known agony for a long time, sweetheart.” Ever so gently, he smoothed away my trailing tears, the rune losing its battle and fading back into his skin. “But it’s nothing compared to feeling our tether shrink.”

I swallowed. “You should go.” He shouldn’t be here. I didn’t want him to watch me die. “Go and take my mom somewhere safe.”

The heaviness of my eyes eased as my Glory built.

Aspen ignored me and swung quicker.

Comfortable warmth turned hot, then hot turned to blistering heat.

Toward its peak, needles shoved against my skin, begging to pop out.

But release wasn’t an option, so my insides battled against the searing pressure.

Whimpers tore from my clenched lips as my thoughts prayed for the end.

Then piles of snow dumped on the heat, shocking my system, and bringing me down to frigid temperatures.

The cycle repeated again and again. I could almost handle the cold, the slowing of my thoughts, and the numbing of my pain.

But it lasted for seconds before climbing back to a raging inferno.

I didn’t even feel Aspen’s pain anymore.

There would be a point when my body would give up .

“Leave me and take her!” I sobbed, slamming against the rest of my chains. Blood oozed out of my gashes, sliding down my limbs to collect in the growing puddle. “Please.”

He increased the force of his slamming sword.

“Aspen,” I begged.

“No!” he snapped. His jaw throbbed as he attacked my ankle restraints with a force that sliced through the table.

Only one chain left, and it came. Billions of molten needles shoved their way into every cell of my body. An agonized scream spilled from my bloody lips. My Glory hit its first significant peak.

“Lucille!”

My hoarse cries died as the cold hit the warmth. A moment of reprieve before I descended into the beginnings of hypothermia.

“Leave.”

He met my gaze. Unwavering determination seeped through our bond and flickered in his miserable eyes.

“I can’t. I won’t.”

I nodded at his lightless rune. “It looks like you can.”

He swung, melting my last chain, and released me.

“What happens when it lights back up, Aspen? Will you take me to your queen like this?” I rasped, struggling to string together sentences. “Will I die in your arms, or will I die in hers?”

He brushed my sweat-soaked hair back from my face, shaking his head vehemently. “You’re not going to die. Do you hear me? I won’t let you.”

I wanted to laugh since I was all cried out, but I didn’t want to move.

“You’re not a good liar. I can feel your emotions.

Remember?” My finger twitched, yearning to trace his tense jaw and smooth away the worry etched between his brows, though I knew it wouldn’t alleviate his inner turmoil.

“Get my mom out.” If he did this one thing for me, I’d be okay with my outcome. “For me,” I begged.

He didn’t respond, staring at me like I tore out his heart.

I could feel the fissure cracking inside his soul.

But there was nothing I could do about it.

Elora stole all my reassuring words, and kind smiles the moment I stepped through the Earth portal.

He didn’t have a way to remove my Reversal Rune, even if he was a Seraphim. Michael took the feather with him.

“Aspen?”

“Only if you fight it. You have to survive.”

“I am fighting it.”

He shook his head, eyes glassy. “It doesn’t fucking feel like it. You do not get to give up.”

“I’m not.” But I was. “Take her someplace safe, and I’ll fight.”

Lips pressed in a thin line, he nodded, but I felt his fear. He didn’t believe me. It made sense. My words probably didn’t match the tether he could feel between us. I wouldn’t believe me either.

The sweat on my skin crystallized, a layer of frost coating my body.

My eyelashes blanketed in my tears, froze together in the corner of my eyes.

The beads of ice made it difficult to blink.

Each drastic change in my power neared a new extreme.

I didn’t have much time left. The frost was a new development, but I knew it wouldn’t be the power to take me out.

One, maybe two hits of my Glory at peak, and it’d be enough to eradicate me like Michael wanted.

Aspen scanned my body with lowered brows, taking in the frost. When he lingered on my torn flesh, the muscle in his jaw throbbed, and fire leaped in his eyes.

“I’m going to take out the knife and pick you up. Ready? ”

Sleep weighed on my lids, and my limbs became numb. Unable to feel Michael’s presents, I almost sighed.

“No.”

I couldn’t let him touch me anymore. Not that I’d have much say in the matter if my eyes closed.

Wouldn’t that be wonderful? I would much rather die that way.

But in my core, I knew how I’d die, which was why Aspen couldn’t pick me up.

Michael said he’d seen demons explode with the Reversal Rune.

If my skin frosted over when the cold took hold, I didn’t want to know what would happen when I transitioned to my Glory. It wasn’t safe. For him or me.

My eyes fluttered.

“Sweetheart? Stay here. Stay with me. Please, just hang on a little longer. I’ll take you to a healer first. I promise.

” I wished I could give him a smile for his sweet admission.

But I didn’t have the hours it would require for him to find a healer.

Nor did I have the energy to dissect the word first as his rune flickered .

I wished I could’ve saved him like his mother wanted. That was my one regret. That and… I glanced over at my mom, noticing her hand was healed. She’d be okay. I made sure of it. But I wish I could’ve said goodbye.

“Stay with me, sweetheart.” He grabbed the knife in my hand. I cringed. Carefully, he slid it from my cut.

“Put it in my waistband,” I whispered on a whim. I’d die today, but at least I could say I tried for him.

He removed a dagger and sheath from his belt, exchanged it with my knife, and carefully tucked the humming, protected blade into my waistband.

The heaviness subsided, and I gave a weak smile—a lie of my own. I focused on the handsome male gazing down at me with that damned broken expression and something tender and raw. My eyes lifted to his deep brown locks, unable to hold his gaze, and I noticed a flickering shadow behind his ear.

The ache in my shattered heart paused. A figure cloaked in shadows spun a sphere of darkness and hurled it toward Aspen’s back.

“Aspen! Behind you!”

It didn’t matter I was seconds away from an agony that would kill me. It didn’t matter only part of him was here for me. I knew one thing. Aspen would live.

I reacted when I saw the ball, anticipating his turn but knowing he’d keep himself between me and the threat. I rolled and pushed myself off the table, throwing myself in front of his body and screaming as the gashes in my thighs split further.

“No!” a voice yelled from the shadows as the ball hit me in the chest—a deep tenor filled with angry desperation.

I jolted, and Aspen caught me around the waist.

It was him. The one that woke me from my shadow prison.

I stared into horror-stricken golden eyes, and my pain ceased. A familiar, tantalizing blackness enveloped me and whisked me away.