“You can’t take her!” Halle’s voice, yelling, so close now.
I want to tell her to run, to get out of here. But I don’t have the air. I’m barely holding on to consciousness. The pressure of the Archangel’s grip wraps around me, buries deep. Black spots dot my vision, and it takes everything I have to keep my head up. I see Halle fly at the Archangel, her dark hair streaming behind her. She throws herself against it, kicking, screaming.
With its other hand, it plucks Halle off the alloy and flings her dismissively aside. It doesn’t even bother to look where she lands.
But I look. I see.
Halle lands hard, the momentum from the throw causing her to skid, roll, and then—
Fall.
Right over the edge. Into the Elysian Depths.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“AS FOR THE ARCHANGELS, THEY ARE SACRED AND SHOULD BE TREATED WITH REVERENCE. DO NOT LET THEIR SHADOWS PASS OVER YOU WITHOUT GIVING THEM HONOR, FOR IN HONORING THEM, YOU HONOR THE HERALDS.”
—THE SACRED LAW OF THE HERALDS
Everything goes quiet. Around me. Inside me.
There is nothing but a heavy blanket of silence and a splintering pain inside my heart that cannot get out. The whole world has disappeared save for the yawning emptiness of the Depths and the sickly glow of the Archangel holding me.
The Archangel.
TheArchangel.
Hate and rage and grief boil up inside my chest, and Trinity’s song blasts loud and hot in my ears, the tempo pounding and fierce. It feels like a flare is coming, but it’s not coming from below this time. It’s coming from inside me, blazing out of my eyes, filling my vision with blue-white light. All my life, the melody has pulled at me, but this time—this time—I pull atit, wrapping itclose around me like a second skin. Feeling it tingle through my body, loosen my muscles, deepen my breath, make memore.
And suddenly I’m free. Phasing out of the Archangel’s grip and dropping into a crouch on the alloy in front of it.
“Val!” Dani’s voice. Calling my name.
But I’m gone already. Phasing for the edge of the Depths, to the spot where Halle fell, pushing against the expanding limits of my abilities because if I can just get there, maybe she’s not gone, maybe—
The Archangel slams down in front of me, a wall of metal, cutting me off mid-phase so that I bounce off its vicious edges and tumble to the ground.
I’m up in the next instant, launching myself at it, a flicker, moving so fast I’m barely there, even when I pause. No need to worry about timing or breath; it’s seamless, fluid, as natural as the melody vibrating under my skin. I flow with the chorus, one with it.
The Archangel tries to track me, swiping at me with its massive hand, but it doesn’t hit me this time. It can’t even touch me. I’m light and sound and air. I’m a shadow, quick-shifting up its body, jamming my gloved hands into its joints, tearing out its naphtha veins, causing a thousand little injuries that spray bluish oil all over me and onto the ground.
It snatches at me, but I’m above it now, hovering in the air over its head before dropping like a weight onto its shoulders, Wrath in one hand, Toothpick in the other, stabbing and hacking at the mask, at the plates around its neck, at the glowing mechanical heart in the middle of its chest cavity. My gloves and sleeves are shredded, the skin underneath sliced and bleeding, but theArchangel is bleeding, too. It’s bleeding and it can’t catch me because I’m riding Trinity’s song and the scream buried in my chest is ripping its way out.
There’s a muffled bang and a shout from somewhere below me. Flashes of pulse pistol fire. A blast wave ripples hot across my skin. Part of the Archangel’s mask tumbles past me to the ground.
I don’t look. I don’t stop.
I scream until my throat is raw, stabbing and tearing and kicking until finally the Archangel stumbles. Slick oily naphtha pours off its body, the golden light inside it flickering dangerously.
“Val!” Dani yells. “I’ve got it! Get clear!”
I don’t listen. I’m on its back, digging Toothpick deep into the depths of its construct when a glass bottle slams into its knee joints, the liquid inside bursting into flames so hot they’re almost blue. The Archangel shudders and keels forward, slamming down onto the alloy in a geyser of naphtha and loose screws, and I’m thrown to the ground by the impact, landing with a thud, pain shivering through my body. There’s a burning sensation up and down my arms and my muscles are so weak they’re practically liquid, but the pain inside me is so much worse. It’s an inferno driving me back onto my feet, sprinting for the edge of the Depths.
I slide to a stop on my knees, staring down into the chasm, at its bottomless, hungry darkness, at the smooth alloy sides that offer no ledges, no handholds, no purchase.
Nothing.
There’s nothing.
