Titus had no disagreement with her words. But he was an archangel. “I must inform the Cadre.” It wasn’t a matter of choice but of his duty to the office he held. “I’ll take full responsibility for stopping the scourge. No one will argue with all else that’s going on—they’re all too busy battling their own fires.” And when it came down to it, he was the final authority on this continent.

* * *

* * *

Titus contacted the Cadre as soon as he and Sharine returned to the citadel.

He could tell she was exhausted after the brutal speed of their return flight—even the fact he’d carried her couldn’t ameliorate the impact. She’d curled into as small a ball as possible to reduce drag and now slowly stretched out her limbs under a cloud-heavy and dull afternoon, shaking life back into her wings, arms, and legs. “I want a bath more than anything.”

So did Titus. But this had to be done first.

“Would you like to sit in on the meeting?” he found himself asking when he should’ve been ordering her to rest.

She stared at him for a moment. “Yes.” Her expression was inscrutable.

“I need only to make a stop to put on my breastplate.” Gold, it curved over his shoulders and bore the emblem of a sun in the center, lightning bolts of power arcing out from it.

But the breastplate wasn’t a thing of vanity. Neither was it a warrior’s armor in the strictest sense, for an archangel had no need for such—anything that took him down wouldn’t be halted by a shield of metal. No, this was a symbol of power, and today, he needed the symbolism.

Sharine waited silently while he put it on, then gave a crisp nod. “Your face bears streaks of dirt and sweat, as do your arms. You look exactly what you are—an archangel fighting a battle.”

Warmth spreading inside him, he led her first to his most senior technical specialist, and asked her to hand over her phone for a minute so the relevant photographs could be copied.

That done, they walked into a large room set up with screens that would connect him to the rest of the Cadre. “You’ll have to stay out of sight of the cameras.” He pointed out the devices that would broadcast his visage to the others. “You’re not a consort and thus automatically entitled to attend.”

“I understand,” she said, but there was a scowl on her face. “Which one will show Aegaeon’s face? I must prepare myself not to smash it to pieces.”

Startled, he threw back his head and laughed, his chest expanding and light flooding his veins to push out the heaviness and darkness. “Alas, there’s no specified order,” he told her. “It simply depends on who responds when.” He smiled at her. “You’ll just have to be strong, Shari of the Throwing Knife.”

* * *

* * *

Shari of the Throwing Knife.

His playful words, his smile, the tone of his voice, it all hit Sharine hard, it was so . . . real. With no hint that he was laying on his vaunted charm or chancing techniques of seduction. He was simply smiling at her, the two of them sharing a moment of humor. She hadn’t been joking about Aegaeon, but Titus’s smile had her lips tugging upward. “I’ll grit my teeth and clench my jaw.”

“Think only that he’d be most satisfied to see you lose control, and it’ll be enough. I gather he is that kind of angel, yes?”

“Yes,” she said and settled her yet-cramped wings. “I’ll keep it together.” Words she’d heard Tanicia use on one of her soldiers when that man was crying over a broken heart. Tanicia wasn’t the gentlest of generals, but Sharine had been in sympathy with her on that occasion—for the soldier in question fell in love every Saturday and cried over a broken heart every Thursday, or so it seemed.

“Now I must do this.” Smile fading, Titus turned to face the screens. He shifted his stance in the same movement. No longer was he the relaxed angel who’d hit her with that glorious smile; he stood with his feet apart, his arms loose and ready by his sides, and his wings held with precision control. His muscles carried a subtle tension.

A warrior angel at ease but ready to shift into an attack stance in seconds.

Exhaustion made it impossible for her to do anything similar. Saying to hell with pride, she slid down to sit on the floor.

Sharine?

I’m fine. I want to focus on the discussion, not my aching muscles.

Titus nodded. A moment later, the dark screens in front of him lit from within and began to show the image of a turning hourglass. He must’ve sent a mental command to the member of his staff in charge of this technology.

As she waited for the other archangels to respond, Sharine considered the fact that this was the first time she’d ever be in the presence of the entire ruling Cadre. She’d been a significant part of Aegaeon’s life, yet he’d never bothered to do her the respect of introducing her to the other archangels.

By contrast, Astaad had introduced his Mele to everyone, and she’d often accompanied him to formal events. Even Sharine had met her, though she’d gone to few large gatherings in the past several hundred years; she still remembered Mele’s stunning dark eyes, clear intelligence, and graceful way of speaking. But most of all, she remembered Astaad’s quiet pride in having her by his side.

How foolish Sharine had been not to see through Aegaeon’s motives. All she’d ever been to him was a shiny trophy. He’d never loved Sharine, had just wanted to own the Hummingbird. And she’d been so needy and wounded that she’d accepted the dregs of affection he threw her way.

That was on her.

You judge yourself harshly.

Even as the memory of Titus’s words reverberated through her, the screen on the top left cleared to reveal Neha’s face. From what Sharine could see of her torso, the Queen of India was dressed in warrior leathers of darkest green, and those leathers were dusty, as was her face. Her braided black hair bore the same patina of dust.

“My apologies for the slow response, Titus.” Tight words. “I was in the field, helping Suyin clear out the nests of child victims Lijuan left behind.”

A shudder rocked Sharine.

“I thought the children had already been given mercy,” Titus boomed, his expression taut with rage. “You’re saying there were more?”

Neha nodded, her brown eyes tired in a way Sharine had never seen in any archangel. “Either Lijuan was keeping them in reserve, or they didn’t respond to her order when she gave it during the war. They’ve turned on each other in the interim. It is . . . a difficult scene.”

Sharine couldn’t imagine the horror of what the archangel was describing, the utter nightmare of having to execute children who’d been made monstrous without their consent or desire. Used as tools for an insane archangel. There’s no hope of a cure for these children?

No. Titus’s responding tone was somber. There’s no cure for any of it.

“Suyin was dirty and bloody to the extent that she needs a moment to wash.” One of Neha’s beloved snakes twined its way up her arm, a living jewel of brilliant orange. “As she has no functioning communication center close to this border, she’ll be entering the discussion from another room in my border stronghold.”

Once more, the Archangel of India and the Archangel of China were working together, as they’d done often throughout history. But never in such a horrific circumstance.

Another screen cleared, this time to show Alexander’s face, lines pressed into his cheek and the golden strands of his hair appearing finger-combed. It was the most natural Sharine had seen Alexander since . . . a time long, long ago.

A flicker of memory that had her fingers itching for a pencil—of a young and shirtless Alexander laughing with an equally young Caliane as they contemplated jumping into a waterfall. His hair had been damp already from the spray of water, droplets rolling down his chest, his limbs more slender than they were now. And his eyes had been . . . bright, untouched by life.

Was she so very old that she’d known Alexander as a youth?

Sharine had no answer to that, time having become an endless slipstream in her mind. But she knew the memory was true; a true memory had a taste, a textured reality to it. She’d ask Caliane about it when her friend rose from anshara.

“Titus, you’ll have to excuse my appearance.” Alexander’s voice evidenced the grit of sleep. “I finally had to surrender and lay down.”

As archangels needed even less sleep than ordinary angels, he had to have been on the verge of collapse.

The other screens cleared one after the other before Titus could reply, and none of the Cadre looked any better than the rest. Suyin’s hair was sleekly wet, and damp spots marked the dust of her leathers—as if she’d dunked her head under a tap—while Raphael had streaks of what appeared to be grease on his face, and Qin just looked haggard.

Aegaeon was as bare-chested as Titus had been earlier, and on that chest was a silver swirl familiar to Sharine . . . below fresh claw marks. “One of the sick ones got me,” he muttered while using a cloth to wipe away blood crusted around the edges, the blue-green of his hair matted and as wet as Suyin’s. “Vicious animals.”

“Do you feel any effect?” Titus asked, a new stiffness to his body.

“An itch, but it’s already healing,” Aegaeon said without concern.

The most powerful among angelkind were used to being unkillable except in very specific circumstances. Those circumstances always involved another archangel.

As she looked at him, this archangel with wings of deep green streaked with wild blue, Sharine felt both a deep rumble of anger and a crashing sense of relief. She saw him now, would always see him. Aegaeon would never again fool her, and with that realization went a fear she hadn’t even realized she was carrying.

She was so glad he’d bequeathed nothing much more than a little of his coloring and a touch of his power to their son, so glad that he’d left the raising of Illium to her. Her boy would never be cruel, never purposefully cause others pain. Illium was more akin to Titus than he was to Aegaeon.