The Kiss of Angels (Divine Vampires Book 2) (10 page)

“I’m afraid.” That confession was anathema.  There was nothing angels needed to be afraid of.  Nothing could harm them.  But she’d never had anything to lose before.  Not like this.  “Jari’s already asking where I disappear to every day.  And the more time I spend with you…”

She had found she couldn’t finish the sentence, the thought, not out loud. 

“What?” Char had asked.  “Tell me.”

“The more time I want to spend with you,” she’d managed to finish, a bare whisper.  “I don’t ever want to leave.”

“I know.”

“I don’t understand it,” she’d admitted.  “I don’t understand what’s happening to me.”

“You, of all angels?”

“What do you mean?”

“You don’t recognize love?”

“Did someone shoot me with an arrow when I wasn’t looking?” She’d laughed, in spite of herself. 

“Arrows don’t work on angels,” he had reminded her.  “Besides, cherubim don’t make humans fall in love.  You simply twine the fate of two souls.  Love… love is what they already are.  Love is the source.  They just don’t know it.  Look.”

He’d pointed to the expanse of liquid gold to prove his point. 

“Love is what they rediscover in themselves and in each other.”

“But…” Muriel had continued to protest.  “Angels can’t fall in love.”

“Because we already are love?” He’d sounded like he was agreeing with her.  “We don’t have to find that in another, we have nothing to rediscover.  We’re like fish living in water.  It’s all around us.  It
is
us.”

“I know.” Muriel had puzzled over it then just like she was now.  “So why do I feel this way?”

It wasn’t possible, was it? Two angels falling in love.  Did she love Char? Did she even know what love was? Part of her thought she did, in spite of everything she knew to be true.  Not just true, but The Truth.  If she loved Char, then everything
The Maker
had told them, everything she’d ever believed, was suspect, wasn’t it? It tilted her world upside down. 

No wonder she felt so dizzy. 

Muriel hurried down the hallway, already smiling, thinking of spending an hour with Char in Henry’s room, watching his family celebrate his fifth birthday.  She couldn’t stay long—she’d promised Jari, and she wasn’t going to let her down, not today—but she didn’t want to miss the boy’s birthday either.  Or Char. 

It was Valentine’s Day, after all. 

Humans seemed to think Valentine’s Day was about love—she remembered the aisles full of red paper hearts and candy with disdain—but the cherubim knew better.  Since the ancient days of human history, the day had never been about romance.  In its most raw, basic form, it was about hunting.  The hunter and its prey.  Cherubim were hunters, humans their prey.  And what was lust, culminating in the act of human procreation, if not a sort of hunt?

It was no wonder the cherubim held their annual archery contest on Valentine’s Day.  They wouldn’t work today.  Ironic, that the humans thought the day was all about love, but it was the one day of the year that no cherub would join two souls.  They were too busy competing, showing off their own hunting abilities, vying for the top spot, to be the alphas of their individual pack. 

It was the first year Muriel could remember not wanting to be first, not caring if her arrow ever hit its target again.  Something that had once seemed all-important had been relegated to an annoyance, a duty she had to take care of, an obligation to fulfill.  She had promised Jari, so she would go to the tournament, she would hit the bullseye again and again, and they would win the brand new bows and arrows. 

Then, maybe, she could go see Char afterward. 

She slowed as she neared Henry’s room, trying to calm herself.  Who would have thought anyone would feel so giddy at the thought of seeing the angel of death? But that’s just how she felt.  She’d wondered for ages what love felt like, and she found herself wondering, even now.  Was this really it? This all-over sensation like she was flying, even when her feet were firmly on the earth? Just contemplating it brought up so many questions. 

She’d asked him yesterday, just outside the diner—the one she’d been almost late to, joining Jari at the last minute—“Do you think angels have a fate, like humans do?”

“Maybe.”

“You don’t know?” She’d been hoping for more of an answer. 

“Seraphim don’t know everything.” Char had laughed. 

She’d considered making an appointment with the Fey Advisory Board.  It was the first step toward a direct consult with
The Maker
.  If anyone could provide an explanation…

But did she want one?

She’d had the most exciting, exhilarating, joyful week of her entire existence.  Part of her wanted to know, wanted to understand what was happening, but another part of her was afraid to rock the boat.  What if, just by asking the questions, the F.A.B.  decided, in their infinite wisdom, that any sort of connection between a cherubim and seraphim was a bad idea? Maybe there weren’t rules against it now, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t make any in the future. 

She didn’t want to take that chance. 

Henry’s door was closed—probably to keep the noise of the party from spilling into the hallway, she thought—so she just went through it. 

Instead of finding herself in the midst of balloons and cake and streamers, she found herself in darkness. 

“Muriel?” It was Char, behind her.  He’d followed her in. 

“Is he gone?” she whispered, somehow already knowing the answer. 

“How did it happen so fast?” Muriel stared at the little boy who had been happily digging into his green Jell-O the day before now lying so still, looking impossibly small in that big hospital bed.  They’d moved him to intensive care the night before, Char told Muriel as they rushed to his room.  He’d come down with a very high fever. 

It was the first sign that his remission was over. 

And, Muriel knew, because Char had just told her, it would be his last. 

“I’m sorry.” Char’s arms tightened around her.  They’d been sitting by his side for what felt like an eternity, along with his parents, waiting for the doctor to come and tell them something, anything.  He’d finally arrived, along with a nurse and a glass bottle of blood for a transfusion.

“But Dr.  Lazarus, the treatments were working.” Jack’s voice shook.  He stood in the hallway with the doctor, just outside the door.  It was open and Muriel could hear them, even though they spoke in hushed tones.  “I don’t understand.”

“Its effects were… short-term, I’m afraid,” Dr.  Lazarus explained.  He didn’t sound unsympathetic, but he was very doctor-like.  He delivered news like this all the time, Muriel thought, glancing at Char, realizing the similarities.  They gave people bad news more often than not.  They were a reminder that death was inevitable, mortality a reality no one could escape.  Even five-year-old little boys. 

“The way it performed, we thought folic acid would be a miracle drug for this type of leukemia, and for a while, it was.” The doctor spoke while Jack continued to shake his head in disbelief.  Muriel could see Jack’s face, the way he glanced into the room where his son was fighting for his life.  There was despair there, but also a strange sort of hope.  People clung to the idea that maybe, this time, they would escape the inevitable.  “But now… we’ve had three patients slip out of remission in as many days.  And Henry—I’m afraid he’s the worst.”

“But the transfusion?” Jack still had a bandage on his arm from donating blood for his son.  Muriel knew he would have cut out his own heart if it would save Henry’s life.  But it wouldn’t.  “It’s helping?”

“I don’t know yet.” Dr.  Lazarus shook his head, pushing his dark, square-framed glasses up his nose.  “The next few hours will be critical.  If he makes it through this infection, maybe…”

Hope hanging by a thread.  The doctor left it there, dangling, like a carrot on a stick that they would follow as long as they were able.  Until they had to face the fact that their son was gone, and they were once again all alone in the world. 

Muriel looked at the dark bag of blood hanging from the metal hook above the boy’s head.  It was only halfway through.  Maybe it really would help?

Muriel knew better, and still she clung to hope, just like they did. 

The look on Lucy’s face as her husband came back into the room after talking to the doctor made Muriel turn hers away from the sight.  She felt Char’s arms encircle her and she pressed her cheek to his torso. 

“What did he say?” Lucy asked.  She had refused to leave her son’s side, had told Jack to go into the hallway to talk to the doctor, because she didn’t want any negativity surrounding her little boy.  She didn’t want him to hear the words “out of remission,” or “infection,” and especially not the word “death.”

“They don’t know yet.” Jack sat on the other side of the bed, taking his wife’s hand across his son’s chest.  It was still rising and falling with every breath. 

“Jack, I can’t.” Lucy took a shuddering breath.  Her usually made-up face was streaked with mascara, her eyes red-rimmed from crying.  “I can’t do it.  If he… if… if…”

“Shhh.” He stroked her hand.  “He’s not going anywhere.”

But he was. 

Little Henry wasn’t going to open his eyes again.  He wasn’t going to play “parachute” or get help from his friend, Bonnie, onto the swing so his guardian angel, Zeph, could push him, higher, higher! Muriel looked over at the guardian, standing in the corner, holding vigil.  He couldn’t see them, Char and Muriel, where they stood clinging to each other, but she could see by the look on his face, he knew the end was near. 

They couldn’t interfere. 
The Maker
had a plan.  That’s what she’d always been told, what she believed.  But how could that plan include the death of a five-year-old boy? But how could she stand by and let it happen? Was she supposed to have the strength for that? The seraphim holding her in his arms had taken thousands of souls, hundreds of thousands, returning them to their source.  He was far stronger than she was. 

“He can’t die.” Muriel’s voice shook, looking at the bent heads of two souls whose lives had been entwined by one of her own kind.  The bond between them was a thick, golden braid.  “Please don’t let him die.”

“I’m sorry,” Char apologized, arms tightening around her.  “I’m so sorry.”

“Please.” Lucy whispered the word, head bowed, praying.  “Please, God, please…”

Muriel couldn’t stand it.  She knew there were thousands of souls dying this very moment.  She knew
The Maker
had some sort of plan that even angels couldn’t see or understand.  She knew that it wasn’t just Henry—there were souls leaving and entering this existence every moment.  Babies were dying.  Babies were being born.  Right down the hall.  The soul was ageless, timeless.  The human lifespan was nothing, the blink of an angel’s eye. 

Henry would go on forever, even when his body was dust.  He was just one tiny light, one speck of gold in a sea of eternal luminescence, a part of the whole.  He would be reunited with that source, and would experience a peaceful sort of bliss humans spent their entire existence trying to recapture. 

She knew all of that, and still, she was filled with despair, looking at the two souls who would miss his presence the most.  It was as if she could feel their pain as her own.  It stabbed her in the middle, making her double over with it.  He lifted her into his arms, nuzzling her as he held her in his lap, whispering how sorry he was, so sorry.  But sorry didn’t fix anything, even if it wasn’t his fault. 

“Muriel.” Char whispered her name, his arms strong, solid, his wings enveloping them both, a cocoon.  “Oh my sweet Muriel.”

He cupped her face in his hands, searching her eyes.  Wetness leaked from them, rolling down her cheeks like water. 

“What is this?” She touched her own cheek in wonder and alarm. 

“Tears.” He touched them too, wiping them away, but they didn’t stop coming. 

“I don’t understand.” She shook her head.  “Why? Why, Char, why?”

“I don’t know.” He rocked her, like a child, in his arms. 

“Why death? Why pain? Why?” Muriel wept.  There was no explanation.  How could there be?

“I don’t know, I don’t know.” He sounded as pained and confused as she did and she put her arms around his neck, rested her wet cheek against his shoulder. 

“You have to stop this.” Muriel turned her tear-stained face up to Char, pleading with him.  “He can’t die.”

“I can’t.” Char looked pained, shaking his head.  “I wish I could.”

“Can’t… or won’t?” She searched his face, looking for the truth.  It impaled her like a spike through her middle.  He really couldn’t stop it.  He didn’t have the power to keep Henry here.  He didn’t take life, he just collected it, gathering it and returning it to its source. 

Henry was going to die, no matter how much she begged and cried, no matter how much it hurt.  She couldn’t save him, Char couldn’t save him.  She didn’t even know if
The Maker
could save him.  There was nothing to be done.  She was utterly helpless in the face of death and she knew it. 

But there was one thing she could do.  A small gift, perhaps, but it was something. 

“You have to tell them.” She pulled back to meet Char’s eyes.

“Tell them?” he repeated, incredulous, staring at her with those dark, gold-rimmed eyes. 

“Tell them he’s going to be okay,” she insisted, the idea growing, gaining momentum, a snowball of hope rolling downhill.  “Tell them that death isn’t the end.”

“Muriel…” He shook his head and she knew he was going to deny her, deny them.  But why? He could offer them this one small consolation, couldn’t he? Give them hope, prove to them that their son’s light wasn’t really extinguished. 

“You can appear to them if you want to,” she went on, trying to at least delay his refusal.  “Henry could see you.”

“You don’t understand…”

“He’s all they have!” she cried, feeling those strange tears falling again.  They left her weak and trembling, as if her very essence was leaking slowly from her eyes.  It overwhelmed her.  “Char, please.  Give them that little bit of comfort.  Isn’t it the least we can do?”

He cupped her face again, wiping thoughtfully at her tears, and she waited, quivering in his arms, for his answer.  If she could have done it herself, she would have, but she couldn’t make herself visible, not the way he could.  He was the only one she knew who could give them what they so clearly needed. 

Hope. 

“Is this really what you want?”

“More than anything.” She nodded, feeling that flutter of hope in her chest, like a caged bird.  “Please.”

“For you.” He pressed his lips to her forehead and Muriel gasped, her limbs turning to liquid, like warm honey seeping through her.  “I’ll do it for you.”

“Thank you.” She hugged him, arms tight around his neck.  “Oh thank you so much.”

Char approached the bed, standing silently for a long moment.  Muriel watched, hands clasped against her chest, her own silent prayer.  She knew that Lucy and Jack needed this—almost as much as she did. 

Lucy startled when Char put his hand on her shoulder, gasping out loud. 

“Don’t be alarmed.” His tone was soft, soothing.

“Who are you?” Jack half-stood, protecting his son with his own body, as if he knew, as if he could keep Char from taking him. 

“My name is Chariel.” There was something in his tone that soothed.  Jack slowly sank back down into his seat, reaching over to clasp his wife’s hand.  “I want to tell you something.”

“Chariel,” Lucy murmured, a flash of recognition crossing her face.  “Char? Henry talked about you...”

“Yes.” Char nodded, glancing at the little boy, so still.  Muriel was afraid he was lost to them already. 

“He said you were coming to take him…” Lucy whispered.  A low, guttural moan escaped her throat.  “Oh, please, no… please don’t take him.”

“I’m sorry.” Char looked over, meeting Muriel’s eyes, and she knew then that he really was doing this for her.  “I wish I could do more for you.”

“I can’t live without him!” Lucy cried, her eyes roaming over her son’s face, as if she could memorize it, as if doing so might keep him safe, keep him there with her, forever. 

“Henry knew he was going to have to go,” Char said softly.  “He loves you both very much.”