He dodged, the energy dissipating into mist at having missed its target.
“Leela,” he said, his tone lacking emotion. “Let’s—”
She threw another creation at him, this one sharper and shaped like a blade.
He ducked, his golden-brown irises flashing with something that looked a lot like emotion. She blinked, certain she’d made it up. But his lips were curled down.
Seraphim do not feel.
So why is he frowning at me?
He shot upward to become level with her, his hands out in front of him. “I just want to talk.”
“Is that why you threw a net at me?”
“Well, yes. I didn’t want to fight, just subdue you long enough to say what I need to say.” He spoke directly, just as all Seraphim did.
However, his voice held a note of exasperation to it.
One that was not very Seraphim-like at all.
“Vera sent me to talk to you,” he continued. “Both of you.”
Vera sent him? How? When? And what did he mean by…“Both of us?”
He nodded. “You and the abomination.”
“Balthazar,” she corrected him immediately. The termabominationhad never appealed to her.
“Yes. Balthazar. Your bonded half.”
“Bonded half?” she repeated, starting to feel like an echoing channel.
He blinked at her, the mannerism a bit more Seraphim-like in his obvious confusion. “Vera said you would want him involved in this conversation.”
Leela straightened, allowing the ethereal energy crawling over her arms to subside. Was this a trap of some kind?
She didn’t sense anyone else.
But that didn’t mean they wouldn’t appear in the next few seconds.
She narrowed her gaze. “Why should I believe you?”
“Because I’m the reason they haven’t found you yet,” he replied without missing a beat. “I recognized your blood on the cloth immediately, as I’ve been assigned to you since your first reformation. But Vera convinced me not to say anything. And now it’s time for me to tell you why I agreed.”
Chapter21
Leela
“Re-reformation?”Leela stuttered.First reformation? What… what does he mean… b-by “first”?Her wings faltered around her, sending her down a few feet in the air before Patreel caught her by the elbow.
She jerked out of his hold, his touch burning her senses with all sorts of wrongness.
“Part of your reformation requires mandatory memory cleansing,” he said, his voice featherlike soft. “You don’t remember the process as a result.”
She swallowed, her heart beating a mile a minute in her chest. “That’s… that’s impossible.” She would remember undergoing reformation.
More than once.
