“I will,” I promised.

“I’m glad to know you, Ellie,” Icarus said. “Good night.”

I smiled at him. “I’m glad to know you too. Thank you.”

He gave me a slow, shallow bow before he walked from the room. A few moments later, Will returned and tossed my duffle bag on the bed.

“Got your stuff,” he said.

“Thanks. I’m going to catch a shower. Are you crashing?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I have a feeling we won’t get a lot of rest after tonight so I’m going to get in as much as I can.”

“Good call,” I said with a tired smile. “I’ll be back in a few.”

I hoisted my bag over my shoulder and searched down the hall for the bathroom. I took a quick shower to get the dirt out of my hair and when I returned to the bedroom, the lights were off. I climbed into bed beside Will as quietly as I could so I wouldn’t wake him. I nestled against his body and rested my cheek on his chest, his heartbeat a metronome lullaby.

I drifted in and out of sleep for a little while, each spell so short that I wasn’t asleep long enough to dream. Something kept pulling me back out and awake, but I couldn’t quite tell what exactly. Before I realized what I was doing, I was sliding out of bed and into my shoes and tiptoeing out the door. I felt an energy pulling me out of the underground house and outside into the night. The doors all unlocked before me, swinging wide to let me through, and I climbed the winding staircase to the surface in a sort of trance. My shoes made soft footsteps on the creaky wood floor of the rickety trailer, and when I pulled open the front door and pushed the torn screen aside, I became too aware that I’d just let myself get lured out into the open.

And something else was out here, too.

18

I WAS NO STRANGER TO THE HEAT AND LIGHT OF an archangel’s glory. Michael stood before me in all his brightness, that cold, hard stare fixed on me. I felt so primitive and fragile in that moment when I looked at him and saw what I had once been. But in all his beauty, there was no life in him, no happiness. There was something different about him tonight, something flickering in his emotionless face that he was fighting with all his might to hide—something I could have sworn was anger.

Even though I was wary of his presence, I hoped he was here to deliver a message, something that might give us an edge against the Fallen. “Michael? Are you here to help us?”

“I’m here for the Guardian,” he answered in his icy, hollow voice.

In the next instant, Will was at my side. His power hummed around him and I knew he could sense through our bond that I felt threatened. Michael wasn’t here out of peace. Neither of us was fool enough to drop our guards.

“I know why you’ve come,” Will said, his voice dark and challenging.

Michael’s robes fluttered beneath his golden armor in an unseen breeze, his wings spread high and wide. His feet were firmly on the ground, but he towered over us. “I warned you, Guardian.”

I suddenly realized the exact reason for Michael’s arrival. “Are you serious?” I spit at him. “You turn your back on this war, refuse to step in while Sammael is running rampant, while demonic reapers massacre humans in public and threaten not only Earth, but Heaven as well, and now you show your face? Is my sex life really your priority? No wonder our side is in such deep shit.”

“Accepting the life of Guardianship is to accept the life of servitude,” Michael boomed, his voice ringing out above mine. “The Guardian is not to pursue his own longings and desires, and he is especially not permitted to pursue an archangel.”

“Is this about him breaking rules I’ve never heard of, or is it the fact that he’s a reaper?” I demanded. “Whatever rule you insist on enforcing has no grounds here. In Heaven, I’m an archangel, but this is Earth and down here, it doesn’t matter that I have an archangel’s power. on Earth, I’m human and I answer to no one.”

“The Guardian’s punishment doesn’t involve you, Gabriel,” Michael said.

“Like hell it doesn’t!”

“Ellie,” Will said in a careful, quiet tone, warning me. I understood his concern, but now wasn’t the time to be careful not to anger an archangel.

“You knew I would come if you disobeyed me,” Michael said to Will. “You have overstepped your limits. Have you no respect for your charge, reaper?”

“How dare you ask him that?” I shouted. “This reaper has shed more blood for me than you or any of our brothers and sisters have ever shed. None of you have any clue what it’s like down here. The angelic reapers are the only reason there’s any life left on Earth at all and you have no reverence for them because of what they are. They are losing their lives for your cause!”

“They are tools,” Michael said, his gaze piercing me. “As are we.”

I shook my head in disgust. “If that’s what you think, then you have nothing to fight for. And if you have nothing to fight for, then there’s no way you can win this war. That’s the difference between you and me. I do have something to fight for. The reapers and I aren’t mindless drones. We’re fighting for our lives, for everyone’s lives! No thanks to you, we will win this war.”

“The Guardian’s mission is to keep you alive until he is dead,” Michael said. “He accepted this duty when I offered it to him and he has disobeyed my orders.”