The whooshing sound of flapping wings interrupts the silence.
It’s been a long time since I flew, but the sound is more familiar to me than breathing. Unmistakably celestial. I stiffen, looking up, then around for something to defend myself with. “Get out of here,” I bark at Ciprian, giving up on finding a good weapon. My bare hands are more than enough.
“Not a chance,” he whispers. “Don’t move or speak.”
“Don’t tell me what to?—”
Ciprian claps his hand over my mouth and pushes me into the nearby retaining wall.Fuck.I need to prepare to fight, and I can’t see anything but his shoulder. His stupidity is going to get us killed.
The flapping wings get louder until they’re right on top of us.Enough of this.I brace to shove Ciprian out of my way, but... no one lands. The sound gets fainter, then disappears completely. It doesn’t make sense. We’re standing against a concrete wall in broad daylight. How could they have missed us?
Forcefully, I move Ciprian, but I’m too late. The sky is clear. Our winged visitor is gone.
I spin to face Ciprian, my mouth dropping open to yell. Then I close it. Open but unfocused, his eyes are bottomless, swirling pools of inky, roiling obsidian. Magic skitters along my skin, only obvious now that my battle adrenaline is fading.
“What did you do?” I ask, frustrated beyond belief. This was my chance to figure out who Dad sent to kill me. This was my chance to get answers.
“I saved your life,” Ciprian says, blinking until his eyes clear. “Did you forget someone is trying to kill you?”
My wings droop. Suddenly, I don’t have the energy to yell anymore. “This was my best shot to figure out what’s going on, and I didn’t even get a good look,” I whisper. “You hid us somehow. How did you do it?”
Ciprian’s onyx eyes turn hard. There’s no hint of our earlier camaraderie, only impenetrable, flat darkness. “I showed him what would be true nine times out of ten: a blank, boring street. I’m sorry that messed up your plans.”
“Don’t do it again,” I say, but my words lack their usual bite.
The Ciprian staring back at me is an enigma. I don’t recognize him at all, and it makes me wonder: if there are multiple versions of him, how will I ever know which one is real?
I need to get home.
This time, when I tell my wings to retract, they obey, and I’m able to drive us back to my apartment. I don’t take the long way.
By the time I unlock the stack of deadbolts on my front door, my stress is hovering at a manageable level. Ciprian trails along behind me, silently scrolling on his phone. His face is pinched.
I don’t ask him what’s wrong. It’s not my business, and it’s not how we do things out here on the Fringes. Information is currency. It wouldn’t be right to demand credit on a personal account I never intend to settle.
This afternoon was an exception. A mistake. I told him too much. Learning about his magic will be my payment for those ill-thought-out moments of transparency. I don’t plan to share the knowledge with anyone else unless I have to.
Ciprian has some sort of illusion power; there’s no other way he could have hidden us from the angel. It’s not a common skill, at least not around here, so it didn’t occur to me before.
I know a couple of witches who can manage simple visual warps, but it’s incredibly taxing and they have to prepare ahead of time. Brandy is one of them, but she would be laid up in bed ifshe tried something on the fly, and Ciprian is fine. Besides the tightness around his eyes, he couldn’t look healthier.
“Do you need to take a nap?” I ask.
I promised myself I wouldn’t prod, but now I’m curious about how he regenerates his energy. It’s the one thing all supernatural species share. Alistair feeds on blood, and Imani soaks in water. I have no idea how demons recover their magic.
“I’m fine,” Ciprian says. His tone is polite and detached. I don’t like it. Somehow, it’s less honest that his snark.
“Suit yourself.” I lock the door behind us, my shoulders climbing to my ears. It’s ridiculous. I’m more stressed walking into my own home than I was while being actively hunted by a winged assassin.
“Remember, you’re everything in between,” Ciprian says.
Sighing, I face him, feeling like there’s an impossibly large boulder coated with itching powder strapped to my back. “What do you even mean by that?” I ask.
“If you don’t forget that you’re everything in between, it’s easier to remember that they are too.”
I frown. “You think I should ignore what happened?”
Ciprian shakes his head. “You’re doing it again. You try to distill everything, to separate the salt from the water—like saltwater’s too messy for you. But it’s real. Just more complicated. I know you want things neat and orderly, but life doesn’t work that way. You’ve got to embrace the mess.”
