49

The road is empty of life. As we drive, I see nothing more than a deserted world of abandoned cars, earthquake-damaged landscape, and fire-gutted buildings.

The similarities between our landscape and the Pit are becoming disturbing.

We’re halfway to the Resistance camp when I see a growing speck in the sky behind us. It’s a single angel.

I debate whether to speed up or stop. I pull over and hide among the dead cars on the road. My mom and I slide down in our seats. Paige has already moved ahead of us.

I watch through the rearview mirror as the angel nears. He has bright white wings with a torso to match. It’s Josiah.

I make sure he’s alone before I get out and wave him down.

‘Raphael sent me to tell you not to go to the Resistance camp,’ says Josiah as he lands. He sounds out of breath.

‘Why? What’s going on?’

‘You need to stay away from any concentration of people. The trial by contest is going to be a blood hunt.’

‘What’s a blood hunt?’ Just saying those words makes me want to run and hide.

‘Two teams hunt as much game as possible,’ says Josiah. ‘It starts at dusk and ends at dawn. At the end, whoever has the most kills wins.’

‘What kind of game?’ My lips are numb, and I’m vaguely surprised the words come out.

He has the decency to look uncomfortable. ‘Uriel insists there’s only one prey worth hunting. The only one that’s attacked back.’

‘No.’ I shake my head. ‘Raffe wouldn’t do that.’

‘He has no choice. No one backs out of a blood hunt.’

I have to lean against the truck.

‘So Raffe is going to slaughter as many humans as he can? You too?’

‘Whoever wins the contest wins the trial. If Raphael wins, he’ll be in charge, and everyone who survives the blood hunt will be better off.’

My stomach feels like an acid volcano, and I swallow hard to keep it down.

‘But it’s a long flight to victory,’ he says. ‘A blood hunt includes everyone who wants to join. All of Uriel’s angels will join him. A Watcher can kill three times the game that a regular soldier can, but we’ll still need to go to the most populated area if we have any shot at beating Uriel’s team.’

‘You do know that you’re talking about killing my kind, right? We’re not prey, and we’re not game.’ I can’t get away from the thought that I helped Raffe get his team together.

Josiah’s look softens. ‘Your orders are to survive. Run as far away from populated areas as possible. Then hide in the most buried, most secure place you can find. You’ll have until sunset.’

There’s only one place that’s densely populated now. The Resistance camp.

And Raffe knows where it is.

Because I showed it to him.

It feels like the acid in my stomach is boiling and bubbling up to my throat. I can’t seem to get enough air into my lungs.

‘He wouldn’t do that.’ My voice comes out choked and wobbly. ‘He’s not like that.’

Josiah just gives me a look filled with pity. ‘Raphael wants you to run as far away as you can. You and your family. Go. Survive.’

Then he leaps into the air and flies back toward the aerie.

I take a deep breath to try to calm myself.

Raffe wouldn’t do it.

He won’t hunt people. Slaughter them like they’re wild pigs. He wouldn’t do it.

But no matter what I tell myself, I can’t blot out the image of him watching angels fly in formation without him. All I hear in my head is someone saying that angels weren’t meant to be alone. The main reason he so desperately needed his wings back was so he could return to the angels, right? Be one of them? Take his rightful place in their ranks as an archangel?

He wants to be accepted back into the angel world as much as I want to keep my family safe. If I had to kill a few angels to keep my family safe, wouldn’t I do that?

Absolutely. No-brainer.

Then I remember the look of distaste on his face as he talked about the dissection tables at the Resistance camp. He wouldn’t want to wipe out the camp or kill anyone. I’m sure of that. But if he had to? If it was the only way to take his rightful place as an archangel and save his angels from falling?

I slide down the side of the truck and hug my knees.

I took Raffe to the Resistance camp. Knowing he was an angel, I showed him where the largest surviving group of humans was hiding.

A memory of the ruins of the Pit runs through my mind. Did the original hellions have some lovesick teenager who betrayed them too? The thought of a perfectly chiseled ex-angel falling in love with a hellion is laughable. But I’ll bet the teenage hellion didn’t think so.

I shut my eyes.

I feel sick.

Beliel’s words after he showed me what happened to his wife echo in my head. ‘I once thought of him as my friend too . . . Now you know what becomes of people who trust him.’

I climb back into the truck and sit there with my hands gripping the steering wheel. I take a deep breath and try to think things through.

My mother watches me with trusting eyes. I don’t know how much she heard, but she wouldn’t believe anything he said anyway. Even if she worked with him to rescue me, she would never trust him. Maybe I should be more like her.

Ahead of us, down the road, my sister perches on a tree branch, ready to follow my lead.

My family is here with me, and all we have to do is drive away. North or south – either way, we could be far away from the fight if we drive all day. We are about as safe in this moment as can be expected during the End of Days.