He picked up Andromeda’s scent the instant he hit the temperate air of Amanat; it was a shiny, delicious thread in the active mix of a thriving city.
“Naasir!”
He waved at the friend who’d called out to him from the second story of a nearby building, but didn’t stop. Isabel’s cool, clean scent crossed with Andromeda’s at one point, then both scents ran parallel toward the walled courtyard Isabel used as a sparring ground.
He grinned when he heard the clash of swords.
Loping up a wall on one side of the sparring ground, he crouched on top and watched Isabel and Andromeda dance with blades. His former partner in Amanat was good . . . but Andromeda was better. He hadn’t expected that. Neither, he saw, had Isabel. Naasir knew her, could read her expressions, tell when Andromeda’s moves surprised her.
Because, Naasir realized, Andromeda fought instinctively.
Dahariel had given her an excellent grounding, but she adapted her moves to the flow of combat, causing Isabel to have to rethink her more classical style. His eyes narrowed. That wasn’t just skill, not given Andromeda’s age—the instinct came from within.
She was an archangel’s granddaughter.
But where her mother wasted the strength that ran in her veins, Andromeda had honed it, made it her own. When she put her blade to Isabel’s throat in a move that signaled a win, her chest heaving but her hand steady, he wanted to growl in pride. Instead, he waited until the women drew apart and raised their swords in front of their faces in the respectful bow of two warriors.
Jumping down to the ground, he saw Andromeda’s head whip around. “Naasir!” She ran straight into his arms, sword thrust into a scabbard that hung alongside one of her thighs. He recognized it as one of Isabel’s.
And then she was cupping his face in her hands and all he could see was the clear brown of her irises, the golden starburst around her pupils bright. “You’re safe!”
Sliding his arms around her under her wings, he picked her up and spun her around. “You were worried about me.” He could look after himself, but it seemed right that a mate should worry.
“Of course I was worried.” Andromeda pretended to hit his shoulders as he held her up off the ground, but it was more a caress than censure. “You took your time getting here.”
Really wanting to kiss her—stupid Grimoire—he put her on the ground and sneakily petted her wings.
She shot him a minatory look but her lips were tugging up at the corners, her eyes sparkling. Playing with him again. Their own secret game. When her fingers brushed his, he closed his hand over hers. “I had to avoid Lijuan’s squadron,” he told her and Isabel. “They’re waiting for Andi to emerge from Amanat.”
Hands on her hips, Isabel asked for further information. “Hmm,” she said afterward. “Let them skulk about for now. We’ll eliminate the four from the equation when you and Andi are ready to leave—we don’t want to give Philomena a chance to send reinforcements or replacements.”
“We can do it,” he said, including both women in his statement.
Isabel shook her head. “Caliane’s squadrons need the experience and the confidence that comes from defeating the enemy.”
Naasir decided he could allow the squadron that; this prey wasn’t very interesting. “I need to speak to Caliane.” The Ancient would expect him. He wasn’t hers, but she thought of him as hers while he was here, and regardless, she had his respect.
Caliane might be an archangel known for her grace and the haunting beauty of her voice, but she had the same killer instinct as Naasir—and the same devotion to family.
Andromeda was still giddy with relief an hour later when Naasir climbed up to her balcony and walked into her room through the open doors. He’d bathed somewhere, was dressed in clean jeans and a white collarless shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Made of either a fine cotton or linen, it was washed soft and fit him so well that she knew it was his. He must’ve left clothes in Amanat.
Walking over to where she was sitting on the edge of her bed making notes on a small pad, he sat down beside her and nuzzled at her. She should’ve stopped him but she didn’t. His warm breath, his warmer skin, his quintessentially masculine scent, the dampness of his freshly washed hair, it all felt too good, felt like the best thing she would ever feel.
“Did you feed?” she asked in a husky tone, having noticed the fine lines of strain on his face when he first arrived.
“Yes.” He sprawled on the bed behind her—as if he had every right to just take over her space. “Have you seen the angel we rescued?”
Andromeda turned to sit with one leg bent and on the bed, curling her fingers into her palm to keep from reaching out and stroking the hard muscle of his thigh. “No, she’s in anshara.”
“She was brave,” Naasir said, his tone matter-of-fact. “She’ll survive.”
“The body, yes, but I worry about her mind and her heart.”
“When she wakes, she’ll make a choice to live or to die while living.” Starkly solemn words. “No one can make it for her.”
That metal hand, it was back, crushing her chest. “Did you ever have to do that?” she whispered.
“Yes, when I was created. I decided to live and to be me.”
It should’ve been a nonsensical statement, for what child remembered its birth? Yet she knew it for pure truth—Naasir didn’t lie. “I’m glad,” she said. “I like you.”
A glint of silver under the curl of his lashes. “Lie down beside me.”
Heart aching, she didn’t fight her need or his. Going down on her side beside him, she propped her head on one hand . . . and spread a wing over his chest.
His smile held her captive, the hands with which he petted her feathers unexpectedly gentle. Though he stayed away from the highly sensitive areas, the caresses made her toes curl.
“Pretty feathers,” he murmured, lashes lowered as he indulged himself. “Do you know you have bronze filaments that catch the sunlight?”
“No, I don’t.” Andromeda knew her wings weren’t striking, but they were strong and they took her to the freedom of the sky. It was more than enough.
Naasir smoothed out a feather. “Look.”
When she did, she caught the faint glimmer of a bronze filament hidden among all the others on a middle primary covert. Wonder unfurled in her. “How did you notice that?”
“Because I notice you.” With that comment that stole her breath, he began to stroke her wing again. “Alexander—tell me your thoughts.”
Andromeda looked at the notepad she’d dropped on the bed by her breasts. She’d been using it to organize her thoughts. “I think there’s a high chance he’s in his former territory, but not beneath what was his palace.”
She blew out a breath. “I tried to direct Lijuan’s people away from the entire region, but I don’t think Xi was convinced.” The tightrope she’d walked in Lijuan’s throne room made her breath turn shallow even now. “If he does go there, I’m certain he’ll focus on the palace.”
“Rohan is very strong—he’ll delay them.” Naasir bent his forearm behind his head. “Had you asked him, he’d have volunteered to be the first line of defense for his father.”
“Should we warn him?”
Naasir took out a sleek black phone in answer. “Jelena had a spare,” he told her before making a call to Raphael. “The sire will speak one-to-one with Rohan, tell him Lijuan’s plans,” he shared with her after a short conversation. “Rohan’s loyalty to his father is an indelible part of him.”
Trusting his judgment, she nodded. “What about Favashi?”
“She hasn’t chosen a side—and if Alexander rises, it’s near certain Favashi will no longer be the Archangel of Persia. Rohan won’t risk telling her.” With that frank summary, Naasir placed his hand flat on her wing, the touch possessive. “If not below the palace, then where?”
Wanting desperately to erase the distance between them, she picked up her notepad and showed him the crude map she’d drawn. “There’s a highly complex cave system about a five-hour flight from the palace.” More than distant and remote enough to offer total privacy.