Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 121854 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121854 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
The black had faded under the sun, rain, and constant wear, and it bore more than one small tear, but it still fit Illium like a glove. The sword over his shoulder, however, was new. Thunder, to pair with the swords that made up his line of Lightnings. Aodhan had designed the hilt of Thunder—to Illium’s exact requirements. Including a grip that mirrored the precise shape of Illium’s fingers.
The woven metal of the design glinted in the rays of the sun that speared through the doorway just as Illium smiled…and burst into light golden and violent enough to shove Aodhan back with explosive power. Yet he hit the wall with far less force than he should have, and knew that Illium had managed to protect him even as he couldn’t protect himself.
Because the love of Aodhan’s life had blasted through the roof of the studio to become a blazing golden star in a sky gone the intense, unmistakable blue of his wings.
Debris cascaded around Aodhan, dust coating his tongue as he shoved away a fallen beam with a bleeding hand to run outside. “Illium!” He emerged into a world filled with a driving rain that was droplets of molten gold. It pooled in his palm like metal gone liquid in the forge, rippled off his wings in tiny balls.
The cut on his hand vanished under a line of gold that was a kiss.
Aodhan knew he should stay on the ground, that it was madness to get in the way of an ascension, but he tried to rise up anyway, tried to get to the man who was his heart, his chest painful with the pressure of not knowing if Illium was all right. The last time the power had tried to force itself into him…
Illium!
No reply to his panicked call.
Driven by fear for his lover, Aodhan managed to rise far enough up to see that the Hudson had turned liquid gold, a glittering beauty that wasn’t natural except for this single moment in time when the entire world became attuned to this one being. For the gold wasn’t shiny and new. It was aged with a haunting patina, the same dark shade as Illium’s eyes.
Then Illium’s power shoved Aodhan back to the earth.
And Illium, he was a supernova of gold against a sky suddenly devoid of clouds and turned the distinctive blue of his own wings riven with veins of glittering silver and gold. The shields around the floating habitats blazed a dazzling gold as they dropped to the lowest possible altitude in full emergency mode; their world was built for power that broke the skies…but still, no one had expected this, not after seven centuries.
This wasn’t like before, Aodhan told himself, when the golden light had poured out of Illium’s mouth and cracked his skin, bending his back almost in half.
This wasn’t death.
This was…ascension.
Wet on his cheeks, but it wasn’t from the startlingly beautiful rain. The wet was Aodhan’s tears. Because while many dreamed of ascension and of power limitless, Illium had dreamed of being by Raphael’s side through the eons, a first general loyal. Heart-friend to Elena, treasured member of the Seven, beloved by all in the Tower and adored by the citizens of the city, Illium had wanted nothing more. He’d been happy, had intended to stay true to his purpose through eternity.
But that could never again be his place.
As being one of Raphael’s Seven could never again be Aodhan’s.
Today, Aodhan became to Illium what Dmitri was to Raphael: second to…the Archangel Illium.
Yesterday
(Seven Hundred Years Ago)
3
Wet and bedraggled from the storm that raged around them, the sky roiling black and the ocean below full of turbulent white caps, but with joy and a nervous excitement emanating from his pores, Illium flew into New York side by side with Aodhan. And realized that they hadn’t discussed a critical question in their time alone—how they’d tell the people closest to them of the fundamental change in their relationship.
Now it was too late. Illium could see Raphael on the Tower roof, waiting for them to come in. The rain beat down on the midnight of Raphael’s hair, dripped off the white-gold of wings held with warrior perfection, and carved runnels of water down his well-worn and sleeveless black leathers, but he stood as if he noticed none of it, an archangel strong.
Illium landed in a wash of wind, his heart a huge ache as his feet hit home ground at last.
The sire embraced him with the arms of a warrior welcoming one of his own home…and the care of a man who had known Illium since he was a child. A man who had been more father to Illium than the waste of cells who was his biological male parent.
Theirs would never only be the relationship of warrior and liege, would never be the same as the relationship Raphael had with others of his Seven. Raphael was too young to hold the position of father…or he should’ve been. Inside Illium’s heart, however, that was where he stood—as the man who had taught the boy Illium had been how to be a good man, a trusted angel, a loyal battle mate.