Archangel’s Legion (Guild Hunter #6)(98)
Author: Nalini Singh

Raphael spoke through a haze of red. “Numbers.”

Walking over so their words wouldn’t be overheard, his second said, “More than half our forces are dead or too severely injured to recover anytime soon. The others are exhausted, even our strongest. I predict Lijuan’s forces will launch an all-out offensive with the dawn—we have no other surprises to throw in their path and they know it.”

“Authorize the use of the rocket launchers come dawn,” Raphael said, but they both knew it wouldn’t be enough. “The cargo planes with the reborn?”

“Lifted off two hours ago,” Dmitri said, then lowered his voice. “Go. Heal. We’ll finish this discussion later.”

“Watch over my city, Dmitri.” He left the war room with agony searing up his spine, making it to his and Elena’s private Tower suite with teeth gritted. Collapsing on the living room floor on his front, he clenched his jaw to stifle the violent scream that wanted to erupt from his throat. A single sound and his entire fleet would realize how close they were to losing the city.

43

“Elena,” came Dmitri’s voice in her ear, “the fighting has lessened in intensity. You can stand down for now.”

Frowning, she tapped the reply button. “I’m fine, Dmitri. Pull some of the others.” Her mortal friends were showing worse signs of exhaustion—while she might be a baby immortal, she was still an immortal and it had an impact.

“You need to get back to the Tower.”

Ice trickled down her spine. “Understood.”

Flying directly to her and Raphael’s Tower suite after timing her flight to avoid the sporadic bursts of continued fighting, she entered through the locked balcony doors by using her palm print. “Raphael!”

She shoved the door closed because she knew he wouldn’t want anyone to see him like this and ran to go down on her knees by his side. For a second, she was afraid he was dead, but then she saw the rigid muscles of his arms, his hands fisted tight and his spine locked, and knew he fought a battle against Lijuan’s poison.

Not knowing what to do, she just stroked her hand through his hair over and over. “I’m here, my love. If you can hear me, reach for what you need inside me.”

She felt nothing, Raphael’s body locked in combat against a vicious enemy. The feeling of helplessness was terrifying, but she refused to surrender. Instead, she kept stroking his hair, her other hand closing over one of his fists, and swallowed the tears of rage at the pain of her mate.

Time passed at the pace of a snail’s crawl. Elena was barely aware of what was happening outside, but she felt the shudder as either Lijuan or one of her generals managed to hit the Tower. When it wasn’t repeated, she guessed it had been a general and that either Jason or Illium had managed to head him off. A while later, who knew how long, she heard Dmitri’s voice in her ear.

“If you can speak to the Sire, tell him Naasir and his team just successfully decapitated one of Lijuan’s strongest generals by stringing a wire across two buildings on their side of the line. He might not die, given his strength, but he’s out of the fight.”

Elena shared the news with Raphael, not knowing if he could hear her. “Those three lunatics are in the heart of enemy territory and they’re doing damage,” she said. “God, I bet Ash will have some stories to tell after this is over.” Leaning down, she pressed a kiss to his sweat-soaked temple, the dragon mark pulsing with a glow.

As if, she thought, it, too, fought the poison.

Another blow made the Tower shudder some time later. “Dmitri?” she asked, touching the communications device.

“A general we took down yesterday appears to have recovered. Aodhan has managed to shove him back and is keeping him busy for the time being.”

Elena frowned, thinking of the casualty lists she’d seen. “The general with the white wings, yellow primaries?”

“Yes. He shouldn’t have recovered after Illium’s blade cut him almost in half, but he is whole.”

Skin chilling at what that might mean, Elena decided to keep her silence on that piece of news until Raphael had fought this battle. “Come on, Archangel. The bitch can’t beat you—you’ve sent her scuttling off to lick her wounds time and time again.”

His body shuddered under her touch, his muscles going lax.

“Raphael?” she said, scared by the sudden change. “Archangel?”

Fists opening, he pressed his palms down on the carpet and turned over onto his back. His face was sharper, the bones of his face more prominent. His body, she thought, had burned itself up in an effort to fight the poison. “I’m here,” he said, chest rising and falling in harsh breaths, one of his hands reaching to intertwine with hers.

Bringing their clasped hands to her mouth, she pressed a kiss to the hot burn of his skin. “It’s gone?” she asked, seeing no obvious signs of the poison.

“Yes, but the wildfire is almost completely depleted.” He squeezed her hand. “In you, too, Elena. There are mere flickers in both of us now.”

“What about your capacity to create angelfire?”

“The sources from which I can draw are now farther and farther away—I could take it from the generators but it would mean the Tower going dead for a relatively small boost. My ability to generate power within myself is being hobbled by the fact my energy is constantly being redirected to heal.” His eyes held her own. “Lijuan retreats because she doesn’t like to be hurt, but there’s a good chance I won’t be able to cause her any real harm in our next engagement if I fight as I have been doing.”

A strange calm descended over Elena. They hadn’t spoken about this, but she’d always known it was on the table. “You have to get closer,” she said, even as, below the calm, horror clawed its way across her soul.

A nod. “If I can get close enough to grip any part of her, I can release every last flicker of angelfire and wildfire inside me. If a single fragment reaches her heart, I don’t think even Lijuan could survive it.”

All those words, but he was talking about blowing himself up. “I’m coming with you.” She pressed her fingers to his lips. “I have some wildfire left inside me, you said—we have to give it our best shot.”

His expression was gentle, the arms he held out to her strong. Going into them, her head on his shoulder, and his wing below her body, she lay in quiet with her archangel and she wasn’t afraid of the darkness that awaited. Whatever death held for her, she’d go into it with Raphael by her side.