“I haven’t yet spoken to you of all I saw on my journey.” No tiredness in her voice, but he saw it in those wings and in the strain on her face. “Who should I consult regarding the settlements that desperately need assistance?”
“Tzadiq will take care of it,” Titus said, not happy to know so many people were suffering. “But right now, I wish to talk about your power.”
She waved it off, as if he wasn’t an archangel and she could defy him with impunity. “I have something far more interesting for you—I thought the reborn must’ve begun to mutate, but now I’ve seen the ones here, I begin to question my conclusion.”
While he was still agog at her complete disregard for his authority, she pulled out a phone device from her pocket and touched the screen. “Here, look at the moving pictures I took.”
Caught between the urge to snarl at her to respect his authority and a fascination that was rooted in befuddlement, Titus found his attention caught by the images on the screen. The recording showed the hand of what he thought must be a reborn. It was severely burned, but the hand was elongated in a way that turned the stomach, it was so alien . . . and there.
He grabbed her wrist without thought, faintly noting the unexpected tensile strength of her bones. “Can you show me again?”
“I believe so, but I need both hands.”
Heat burned his skin. “My apologies.” Titus wasn’t in the habit of grabbing women without permission.
“It is no matter,” she murmured, her focus on tapping at the device.
Once again treating him like an errant pup who’d made a misstep, rather than the archangel of an entire continent.
Chest rumbling, he went to point out that he was no pup and never would be, but she smiled without warning—and the searing beauty of the light in her expression knocked him flat.
“I have it,” she said with open pride, and held out the phone again.
Titus had to force himself to pay attention. “Watch with me, focus on the fingers.” He needed to know if she saw it, too.
A second in, she sucked in a hard breath. “It moved.” Horror in every syllable. “That should be impossible. The bodies were so badly burned that nothing could’ve survived it—and reborn are susceptible to fire.”
“It’s possible this reborn was a vampire before being turned, and managed to survive for a considerable period of time.” Those were always the nastiest ones to kill. “But it should still not be showing signs of life, given the intensity of the fire.” The rest of the recording offered evidence of a violent blaze. “How far is this settlement?” He couldn’t ignore the sign of an even more robust strain.
When she told him the location, he did rapid calculations in his head. He couldn’t send a proxy for this—he had to see her discovery himself, but he also couldn’t leave his people low on manpower. Still, if he flew at archangelic speed . . . “Can you give me exact coordinates to the village?”
Her face dropped, smile fading. “I don’t know how to give you such coordinates.”
“Your device may have noted it.” He reached out mentally to Obren, aware the youth was an aficionado of technology. “Obren joins us soon to check.”
But the boy shook his head after checking the device, his locs tied back at his nape with a thin piece of twine. “I’m sorry, sire, it appears that operation has been turned off.”
“I may have done it while I was working out how to use the device.” The Hummingbird’s tone was apologetic. “I’m sorry.”
Titus ordered Obren to return to his duties. “In that case,” he began.
But the Hummingbird was already speaking. “I can lead you directly to it.”
“You’ll slow me down,” Titus said bluntly, and braced himself for a fit of feminine anger. “I can’t lose time, not now.”
“Yes,” the Hummingbird agreed in a quiet tone. “But I think even an archangel shouldn’t go into such danger alone. And as I am not yet assigned to a specific task, taking me along will leave no hole in your defenses.”
Titus didn’t believe he was invincible because he was an archangel. Even archangels could be hurt. Right now, an enemy didn’t need to kill him to do catastrophic damage to his territory. If they shot a missile at him, blowing his body to pieces, they took out a massive part of his offensive forces for however long it took for his body to knit together.
He didn’t believe any of the Cadre currently had the time or energy to launch such an assault, but some of Charisemnon’s flunkies might yet act out of stupid loyalty. And, as she’d proved today, the Hummingbird had some power. Enough to scare off anyone who thought they were coming at a tired and worn Titus.
“A good strategic point,” he said. “Can you be ready to fly in four hours?” That would give him time to organize his forces—and for her to get a few hours’ rest. Her wings had dropped even further.
A nod from the Hummingbird. “I should tell you, my endurance is not yours.”
“I’ll carry you from the point you get tired, if you’ll permit it.” It came out stilted. “I mean no insult.”
“I take none.” Her eyes were intense, and yet somehow . . . lost. No, that wasn’t right. When he’d seen her in the distance through the years, he’d thought her a lovely ghost, a woman with so many fractures in her psyche that she only survived by disassociating from the world.
This was different; she hadn’t retreated from the world. Rather, it was as if she was looking inward, searching for something she’d forgotten. Such wasn’t the least bit unusual in older angels. Even Titus found himself doing it on occasion, and he was only three thousand five hundred years old in comparison to—
It was then that he realized he had no idea of the Hummingbird’s age. What knowledge he had said she was a contemporary of Caliane’s—and Raphael’s mother was an acknowledged Ancient. Yet when he looked at the Hummingbird, he felt no sense of age, no sense of history pressing down on his bones.
Her presence was radiant, full of an unexpected light.
“Is all well?” He tried to temper his voice out of its usual booming register.
Lines furrowing her forehead, she seemed to snap back to reality. “What’s wrong with your voice? Are you falling ill?”
Titus wanted to throw back his head and just roar at the sky. Why were women the bane of his existence? He loved them, that much was true. But they also drove him to distraction. “My voice is fine,” he grumbled. “I was attempting a tone that wouldn’t blow out your eardrums. According to all those borrowed warriors who quit my service, I yell too much.”
She tilted her head a fraction to the side. “I don’t recall making that complaint.” Arch words, no indication of anything but a woman confident and strong.
“My people seem to find my voice just fine, too, but others are weak and lily-livered.” It was a gauntlet he’d just thrown down, pushed to the edge by her . . . He didn’t know what it was about the Hummingbird that aggravated him, and that just turned the aggravation up another notch.
The edge of her mouth lifted slightly, her extraordinary eyes filling with an effervescence he could’ve sworn was laughter. “I agree with you,” she said in that mellifluous voice rich with tonal layers. “You’re an archangel fighting a deadly scourge. Those who expect you to waste time pandering to their needs should be ashamed to call themselves warriors.”
He glared at her, not sure if she was making fun of him or not. Regardless, there was nothing he could do about it. She was the Hummingbird. Angelkind would disown him should he lay a finger on her. Not that he would. But it was the principle of the thing. “I am an archangel,” he boomed. “I am the law in this territory.”