25
“As I did in my time,” Caliane said at last, turning her attention back to the glossy green trees as they continued to walk. “Alexander was my compatriot, but we were never friends. He was a terror as a child, always breaking his bones and skinning his knee, while I was a girl who preferred to keep my dresses clean and to have civilized tea parties free of dirty boys.”
Andromeda felt wonder unfurl in her. Caliane’s memories came from a time so long ago that there was no one else awake in the world who knew them. “Is it lonely?” she asked impulsively. “To be the only Ancient in the world as Alexander once was? The only one with memories of times long gone?” Lijuan might believe herself an Ancient, but even if she was older than anyone knew, her age came nowhere close to Caliane’s.
Caliane didn’t strike her down for the impertinent question. Rather, the Ancient smiled. “I see why you are Naasir’s friend, scholar. You are as recklessly courageous as my son’s leashed tiger.”
Naasir isn’t leashed, Andromeda thought. He simply chose to give his loyalty to Raphael—and she had a feeling Raphael understood that. Their relationship wouldn’t otherwise be so strong.
“Yes,” Caliane said after a minute’s quiet. “It would be a pleasure to have a compatriot to speak with of times no one else remembers—perhaps I will invite Alexander to Amanat when he wakes. He grew up into a great general, and despite his foolishness in threatening my son, seems to have learned a modicum of civilized manners along the way.”
Andromeda realized Caliane was saying more than her words told. There was a hidden undertone to her statement. Caliane and Alexander hadn’t been friends, but instinct told Andromeda they’d been more than strangers. Not lovers; that wasn’t it. It could be as simple as the fact they’d sat on the same Cadre—perhaps they had exchanged dry insults across a negotiating table, all the while conscious that in the end, only an Ancient could understand another Ancient.
“Do you know of any secret places lost in time where he might Sleep?” she asked, hope burning inside her. “Could he have hidden himself under the earth as you did?” If so, the Sleeping archangel was safe.
But Caliane shook her head. “No, Alexander didn’t have an affinity for the earth.”
Andromeda’s brain clicked—despite having risen from the sea, the Legion, too, were rumored to be of the earth. Raphael must’ve inherited some of his mother’s gift, though his had manifested in a different form. “If not earth—”
“Hush, child.” A deep frown. “My memories are tangled skeins I must unravel.”
It was over a half hour later, the world gray, that Caliane said, “Metal. Alexander’s affinity was to metal. He could make iron flow like water and draw gold and silver out of the earth.”
Andromeda’s eyes widened. That fact was in none of the Histories.
“When he was a cocky youth, he pulled gold out of the earth in front of me and fashioned it into a bracelet.” Caliane shook her head. “He and Nadiel had such a rivalry . . . but Alexander grieved with me when my love’s heart no longer beat, and he remembered who Nadiel had once been.”
Andromeda heard the thickness of grief in Caliane’s voice even now. What must it have cost her to be forced to execute her insane mate? Andromeda couldn’t imagine the depth of her pain. About to gently excuse herself and leave Caliane to her private memories, she heard the Ancient draw in a breath.
“If I know Alexander, he will have built himself a vault of metal in a hidden place.” Caliane’s voice was so confident it confirmed Andromeda’s belief that the two Ancients had been closer than anyone realized. “It would’ve been impregnable to everything except angelfire when he went to Sleep, but Jelena has been teaching me about the new machines using hot light.”
“Lasers?” Andromeda guessed when Caliane paused.
“Yes. I think such a machine could cut through Alexander’s metal, even if Lijuan was not there to use the poisonous black rain she spews from her hands.”
It was news Andromeda didn’t want to hear. “Will he wake when disturbed?”
“To wake from Sleep is normally a long and slow process,” Caliane told her. “If Alexander’s subconscious terms you a threat when you first disturb him, you may end up dead before you can explain anything. I would recommend you waste no time once you have his attention.”
Andromeda swallowed, but felt no temptation to step back, attempt to hide. Far better that her last moments be spent with the most incredible man she had ever met, working to save the life of an Ancient, than to feel her soul shrivel away in her grandfather’s court.
Naasir was climbing through the treetops of Kagoshima under early evening starlight, the resident monkeys chattering at him for invading their territory, and Amanat almost within sight, when everything went quiet. The monkeys in the trees, the wild horses below, the birds in the sky. Naasir.
Holding himself in position, not even a breath stirring the air, he listened. The hairs rose on the back of his neck, the early warning system one civilized beings had learned to ignore. Naasir didn’t.
So he caught the unfamiliar scents on the breeze, heard the beat of wings snapping out to land. Turning very carefully, he made his way soundlessly through the trees. The monkeys didn’t give him away—they might scold him bad-temperedly, but when it came to animal against other, they saw him as one of them.
They also knew who belonged this close to Caliane’s territory and who didn’t.
The wings Naasir could see below definitely didn’t. It appeared he’d underestimated Lijuan’s generals—it was pure luck the light squadron had arrived too late to pluck Andromeda from the sky. Pressing himself down along the branch, Naasir strained his senses to hear what the four angels were saying.
“. . . go inside?”
“Negative.” The tallest male sliced out a hand at the sole female angel’s question. “We don’t want to start hostilities. Philomena was clear that Lady Lijuan has other priorities. Our task is only to retrieve the scholar.”
The angel on the left, the one who had skin as dark as Naasir’s, nodded. “She must be here—the last sighting from one of our people in the country puts her above the southern end of Kumamoto. There’s no other safe haven nearby, and she’s too young to have the endurance to have continued flying.”
“Agreed,” said the final man, and though his dialect differed from the others, it was familiar enough in the basics.
When Naasir was yet a child, Dmitri had told him he must learn as many languages as possible, so no one could keep secrets from him. This wasn’t the first time that advice had held Naasir in good stead.
“We watch and we wait,” said the angel who seemed to be the leader. “She can’t stay here indefinitely.”
The woman appeared dubious. “Amanat is a jewel for any historian.”
“But she has certain responsibilities in the Refuge. If she does decide to stay, we’ll reconsider our options.”
“Can we afford to wait?”
“Philomena wants her as soon as possible, but we can wait tonight. If she doesn’t leave with the dawn, I’ll contact the general.”
Naasir listened further, learned the squadron intended to spread out around Amanat, covering one quadrant each. He thought about taking them down one at a time, but if they were used to checking in with one another within short periods of time, he’d betray his hand. Deciding to leave them to their surveillance and wanting to ensure the four didn’t suspect he’d spotted them, he retraced his steps until he was about an hour out from Amanat, then ran toward the city openly.
Unlike Andromeda, he didn’t have to wait for an escort to enter Caliane’s territory. The city shield knew him, opened automatically in a welcome that was a ripple of archangelic power over his skin. The only person who could revoke his access was Caliane.