Page 24 of Wings of Valor (Silver City University #4)

I come to in a rush of pain.

The ground beneath me shifts, and I almost crumble to the hard floor, but something catches me. Not something. Demons. It’s the same two assholes who watched as Auriel pulled feather after feather from my wings. The ones who smiled through my pain.

If I were stronger, I’d kick their asses. But right now, all I am is a bundle of agony. My wings are raw from endless torture, and my muscles feel like I’ve just fought a thousand demons and lost.

I did, though. Lose.

My only solace is knowing that Hayliel is safe. Her parents aren’t so lucky, but while a psychotic piece of shit may have them held hostage and confined, at least they aren’t getting tortured and beaten for information.

Only me. And I accept that. Prefer it, even.

I do my best to stay conscious as the two demons drag my limp form somewhere. They’re talking to one another, joking about how they can’t wait for the next phase of the plan. Fuck, but what is it? I need to know.

We round a corner, and my wings catch on the wall, scraping over the oozing, featherless patches. Pain explodes in my back, and as I’m falling into darkness once more, I hear the demon chuckle and say, “Whoops. Didn’t see the wall there.”

I don’t know how long I stay out for, but it can’t have been for long because those fuckers are still holding me up when I wake. My strength is gone, so all I do is breathe. Through the pain. Through my fears and worried thoughts.

How much longer will this go on?

“I can’t wait to see that thing go off! Shards of those angel blades will do most of the work for us. All we’ll need to do is take care of the Fallen it missed,” the demon on my right says with excitement.

The one on my left chuckles but says nothing.

Shards of angel blades? What does that even mean?

Blinding pain spears through me again as the demons shift their hold on me, and I swear I feel a pointed claw purposefully scratch against a tender spot on my wings.

I groan, and all they do is laugh. Squeezing my eyes shut, I try to breathe through the pain, but with each passing second I become more and more sure that I’m going to be sick.

“Not so tough now, are you?” the demon on my right says with venom lacing his tone.

“That’s enough,” the other one says. Just as I’m about to mentally thank him for the backup, he adds, “At least let him gain back his strength. I like it when they have some fight left.”

So much for backup.

I’m abruptly dumped on the floor, and as the demons retreat and a metal door clangs, I realize I’m back in my cell. With no strength left, all I do is lie on the dirty floor, breathing hard.

“Oh, Zeke,” I hear Maribella say. “They’re still asking about Hayliel?”

A grunt is all I can offer in reply. Auriel has been trying to get me to break for days now. At least I think it’s been days. It feels more like years. But it doesn’t matter how long he tries or how hard he pushes. I won’t break. Not on this.

She’s all that matters.

Knowing I need to be strong, I force myself into a sitting position.

There’s a shuffling sound that I immediately recognize as the pair moving closer to where our cages share a cell wall.

“Why are they doing all of this? And what does our little girl have to do with it?” Camael asks.

When I first arrived in this cell, I had a feeling Hayliel’s parents didn’t know their daughter was a Seraphim. I’m not sure why she didn’t tell them, but so far I’ve respected her wishes and kept quiet on the subject.

“It must be about her wings, don’t you think, Mari?” Cam continues. “Zeke, is that why they’re after her?”

Shit. I don’t have enough energy to handle this conversation.

“Yeah, I think so.” There. That’s not lying while also not giving away her secret.

Just like the last few times they’ve brought me back to my cell—bloodied and broken—Hayliel’s parents tear off strips of their thin blanket and help wrap my wounds.

I don’t know if the potion they’re giving me delays my healing, or if feathers are something that don’t grow back once plucked, but the mending process is painfully long.

Too long for me to ever fully heal by the time they collect me again.

It doesn’t help that we’re underfed and barely hydrated.

“You’ll run out of sheet if you keep using it on me,” I tell them, not wanting to accept their care but too damn tired to fight them.

“Oh, hush,” Maribella says, her hands shoved between the bars so she can tie a knot in the sheet. “You’re much more important to us than the sheet.”

Her words cause my eyes to burn, but I force the tears aside. Now isn’t the time to break down and become a blubbering mess. I need to be strong. “You’re important, too. Hayliel needs you both to get out of this.”

“We will,” Camael says, his tone allowing little argument. “Do you think she’s safe?”

Do I? I fucking have to—I’ll go mad otherwise. “I do. She’s got her friends to lean on, and I know Raphael and Theo won’t let anything happen to her.”

“Who are they?” Mari’s voice fades, as if she’s underwater.

But she isn’t, because I’m nowhere near water. I’m here, in pain, sitting on a grimy floor in a dungeon somewhere.

She ties another knot in the sheet over a tender section of skin, and I suck in a breath. Goddamn that hurts. “They’re her boyfriends.”

“What do you mean?” Camael asks, growing still. “Aren’t you her boyfriend?”

Ah, shit. Note to self: don’t fucking talk while in pain. Ever.

“Yes, yes. Boys who are friends. Sorry, I’m in a lot of pain,” I say, hoping they’ll buy the excuse.

I guess that’s one more thing to add to the box of secrets I have to keep on Hayliel’s behalf.

No way in hell am I telling Cam and Mari their daughter isn’t just a Seraphim but also dating three angels.

She can do that herself when we get out of here.

They seem to buy my story, and things grow silent as they continue checking over my wounds. While they work, I rack my brain for the details of what I overheard earlier. What was it the demon said? Shards of something, I think.

Fuck. Angel blades. What the hell does that even mean?

Not wanting to forget again, I tell Cam and Mari what I overheard, hoping they’ll have some clue about what it means.

“No. They wouldn’t,” Cam says, his face paler than before.

“What? They wouldn’t what?” Mari asks, studying her husband.

“I think they made a bomb filled with broken angel blades.”

His words hit me like a sucker punch, knocking all the oxygen from my lungs as the rest of what I overheard clicks into place. “They intend to use it on the Fallen.”

Shit! Now more than ever, I need access to my mental connections. I try to reach Hayliel, Raphael, Theo—anyone—but it doesn’t work. It hasn’t worked since I fucking got here.

Fucking fuck!

My gaze travels to the hole in the ceiling where light shines in, wishing yet again that I could figure out where the hell we are.

“Have either of you ever gotten a good look out there?” I ask, pointing to the window.

Pain barrels through me as I move, but I push through. I have to.

“Once when we first arrived,” Mari answers. “There was nothing to see but a tower of rock and a sky full of stars.”

Her wording makes me pause. “What do you mean by a tower of rock? Like a pole?”

Cam shakes his head. “No, not a pole. It’s the strangest thing. Like the land that once grew around it had been chipped away.”

Through my pain-addled mind, pieces slowly click together until I almost can’t believe it. They’ve figured it out! “Is there anything else you remember about when you first arrived? Anything strange or different?” Excitement bubbles up my throat, nearly choking me.

They both reply in unison, sounding sad. “No.”

“Well, nothing except the sand. I told Cam it’s going to kill my desire to ever go to the beach again,” Mari says, staring at her husband like she hates that she’s lost that joy—but maybe, just maybe, she won’t always hate it.

I don’t bother trying to stop the victorious grin that spreads across my face. “I know where we are.”

Silence greets me at my admission for only a moment before Cam and Mari press forward.

“How?”

“Where?”

Watching them clamber toward me only makes me smile harder. “The rock tower you saw is what’s left of the Godless Mountain. And because of the sand, we have to be somewhere between the desert and that mountain. I bet we’re in some old underground system from before God was overthrown.”

“That makes sense,” Cam says. “I don’t think it took long to get here when they first grabbed us, but I honestly just assumed I passed out.”

“How do we get this information to Hayliel?” Mari asks, effectively wiping the smile from my face.

“I’ve been trying to reach her and the others every day, but my connections don’t work.”

“We’ve been trying too. Sometimes it feels like we’ve connected to her, but we never get a reply.”

I look between them, stunned. Holy shit. I completely forgot that Hayliel had been working with them on developing telepathy. “They haven’t given you anything to block your mental paths?”

“No,” Cam huffs a derisive laugh. “We’re just lowly Fallen, remember? We wouldn’t know anything about our abilities.”

Mari squeezes his hand affectionately. “I, for one, don’t mind that they’re underestimating us.”

I nod. “Me neither. Let’s try before—” The sound of approaching footsteps has me cutting off my words. Fuck! They can’t be coming to drag me back already, can they?

A demon—different from the two who brought me in earlier—enters, carrying two trays of food.

He goes to Cam and Mari’s cell first, pushing the tray through the slot at the bottom of the cell.

When he comes to mine, he’s more forceful with his shove, causing the cup of water to spill on the stone floor, with the stale hunk of bread following it.

“Oops,” the demon says with zero fucking remorse.

It should piss me off, but I’m too tired to care. I’m just glad he didn’t give the same treatment to Hayliel’s parents.

The fucker gets angry when I don’t give him any sort of reaction. He slams his fist against the bars of my cell and then exits the room. Asshole.

After the demon leaves, Cam grabs their tray and offers me some of their food.

“No, no. I’ll go get mine in a moment. Thank you, though.”

Cam rolls his eyes. “It wasn’t a question, Ezekiel. Eat it.”

“He’s right,” Mari adds. “You need your strength.”

I smile and take it, thinking of how they sound so much like Hayliel.

Gods, I miss her.

“I’ll eat while you try reaching her again.” I pick at the bread, doing my best to eat despite how tired I feel. The effort of simply chewing the stale bread is almost too much for me, but I do it anyway because Cam and Mari are right. I need to keep my strength up.

Disappointment fills their eyes when they finally meet my gaze.

Mari runs a hand through her disheveled hair. “I don’t understand why we can’t reach her. We were doing so well before.”

“Distance,” I croak, my mouth too dry from the stale bread.

“Well, there’s nothing to be done about that,” Cam says, and for the first time since I’ve known him, he sounds pessimistic. Not at all like the glass-half-full type of guy I’ve grown to know.

Something nags at the back of my mind—a memory of a time when distance was my downfall, too. What did Dad have me do back then?

“There’s something we can try,” I tell them, my voice garbled. I clear my throat, but it’s only when Mari offers me a drink from her cup that I’m able to speak again. “Thank you.”

She nods. “What can we try?”

“Boosting. Whoever’s strongest with telepathy will try to reach Hayliel, and the rest of us will focus on boosting their ability.”

Cam’s brows crease together when he asks, “That’s a thing?”

“It is, but it’s not without risks. The schools don’t teach it because it’s easy to siphon power by accident. I’ve only boosted once before, so take a minute to think it over. There’s zero pressure from me.”

They say nothing for a moment, and I like that. I like that despite the shitty situation we’re in, they’re still looking at all sides of the issue and considering the risks. It says a lot about them that they can stay calm in such a terrible time and not just rush into something.

When Mari finally speaks, I trust her answer.

“We’re willing to try.”

“Then let’s get started before anyone comes to check on us.” For the first time since being taken, I feel hope.

“Mari’s had the most success communicating in the past, so she’ll try to reach Hayliel. How do we boost her, exactly?” Cam leans in, eager to learn. I wonder if he’s this excited to try telepathy in general, or if this is a special case.

“Mari has the easy part. She’ll find her connection with Hayliel and grab onto it in her mind. Cam, you and I need to find the well of power inside of us. What it looks like is different for everyone. For some it glows, for others it’s just a sensation of raw energy.”

Our cells grow quiet while we let Cam search for his power. I remember the first time I had to find mine. Mom taught me early, wanting to give me an edge in a world where Fallen weren’t treated equally. It took me forever to locate it, so I’m a little surprised when Cam finds his within minutes.

“It was kind of like following the trail of breadcrumbs,” Cam says with a shrug and a satisfied smile.

“Hey, whatever works! Alright, so once Mari is ready, we’ll each grab her hand and try to slowly—and very gently —press our power through her. It’ll feel a little weird on both sides, but weird is okay. If it starts to hurt, we need to stop. Is everyone ready?”

I locate my own source of energy, finding it far emptier than I hoped. Shit. I don’t let the worry show on my face, not wanting to put undue pressure on anyone. Hopefully whatever Cam can offer will be enough.

“We’re ready,” they say together as a unit.

It takes a few tries, but eventually, Cam and I manage to successfully funnel our power through Mari. Her hair damn near stands on end from the force of it.

“Mari, you need to use the power now. Don’t let it sit there too long, or our powers might get the wrong idea and attack one another,” I tell her, watching as her face lights up with bliss.

She doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even react. Fuck. If we lose her to the power, we’re screwed.

“Mari, honey,” Cam says. “Even more than saving Zeke and ourselves, we need to warn Hayliel about the bomb. Only you can do that, my love. It’s up to you to save our girl.”

His words bring her back to herself and away from the power hungry core at the center of her being. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.

“It’s alright,” I reassure her, not wanting her to feel bad for even a second. Power is addicting, especially when you’re not used to it. “You’re doing great. Now use all that power to reach out to Hayliel.”

With her brow furrowed, she concentrates until excitement flashes over her features, but it’s gone as quickly as it came. “I feel her, but it’s like I’m still blocked. I don’t think it’s enough.”