“It is our laws,” Raphael replied. “For better or worse, they are to be obeyed until we are told differently.”
“Didn’t you break the laws by throwing the angels out of Heaven?” Shax asked.
“Yes, we did,” Raphael said. “Angels were never supposed to walk Earth again. However, the war in Heaven was spiraling out of control. Something had to be done before we were all destroyed, and though most of you probably wouldn’t have a problem with that”—a lot of nods followed this statement—“Earth and Hell would have been destroyed too without Heaven functioning as it should.
“We had no choice but to remove the problem before it ended existence as we knew it. With only Michael being able to open a gateway while on Earth, we never expected Lucifer to find a way to open a gateway too. However, we couldn’t have done things differently. I also wouldn’t change what I did today even though it broke our laws. I may have saved you for you to die tomorrow,” he said to me, “or you could live for thousands more years. Even if you are our greatest weapon against Lucifer, I will not intervene again. I cannot continue to rewrite your life in such a way. Fate will designate the rest of your course, not angels.”
I snorted. “I like your optimism, but I doubt I have thousands of years left in me.”
Raphael shrugged. “Perhaps not, but there is no way to know how long an immortal could live.”
“I’m not immortal. In case you forgot, Ijustdied.” I couldn’t stop the shudder running through me at the reminder of Caim’s sword plunging into my heart. My hand went to the hole in my shirt again. The pain, the coldness, theemptinessof dying flooded me once more. Yet there had still been a sense of peace and a knowing that everyone I loved would be okay.
“You entered Hell. We felt the outburst of your power all the way in Heaven when you toppled the seals—”
Raphael stopped speaking when Erin, Vargas, and Shax inhaled sharply and their eyes swung toward me.
“I didn’t do it on purpose,” I said defensively. “Lucifer didn’t exactly give me a choice on the matter.”
“I will fill you in later,” Kobal said to them, but their eyes still bored into me.
“You are the Chosen of the varcolac,” Raphael continued. “You wield fire and life, have premonitions and are capable of entering other’s dreams. You are more angel than demon, but more than that, you are more immortal than you are mortal.”
I glanced questioningly at Kobal who stared at Raphael like he was trying to figure out if the angel was screwing with him. When his claws lengthened, I knew he would kill Raphael if he was.
“I don’t understand,” Erin said. “Weallsaw her plunge a sword through her heart, close the gateway, anddie. I’ve seen demons regenerate ears and hands, watched more than a few of them get stabbed, burnt, bleed out to the point where nothing could survive it. Yet somehow, they did survive. River was dead.Youwouldn’t be here if she hadn’t died.”
“She was dead,” Raphael confirmed, “but she is and will be an immortal.”
He made my head hurt more than Magnus ever had. Releasing Caim’s arm, which I hadn’t realized I’d still been clutching, I lifted my fingers to rub my temples. “I don’t understand,” I muttered.
“I do,” Caim said. “You haven’t frozen into your immortality, yet. You are too young to have stopped aging. Youaremortal now, but you won’t be once you come into everything you are.”
I opened my mouth to reply before closing it. I couldn’t form words in my head to get them out.
“We would have sensed that,” Corson said. “Demons know when another is still a youth.”
“Would you have?” Raphael replied. “She is not a demon such as you know them to be.”
My gaze shot to Caim. “Didyousense this?”
“I haven’t spent much time with you, but no I didn’t, and I probably wouldn’t. I am more demon than angel now, or at the very least I am something different than all of you.”
“Ishould have sensed this,” Kobal grated.
“You are too close to her and all of this, and you are also extremely different than her,” Raphael replied. “She is far more angel than demon.”
“I realized in Hell I felt more angel than anything else,” I murmured as I tried to process everything he’d revealed and what it all meant. After everything that happened today, my brain seemed completely incapable of absorbing this knowledge.
“I can sense her youth in her, but I can also sense she is nearing the end and will freeze soon,” Raphael said. “Keep in mind, soon for an immortal may still be years.”
“So I will stop aging and become an immortal?” I inquired, too afraid to believe what Raphael said.
“If you live to freeze into your immortality, then yes, you will become immortal.”
Unexpected tears burned my eyes as I grabbed Kobal’s arm. My fingers dug into his flesh, but I couldn’t get myself to ease my grip on him. I couldn’t look at him; I was petrified I’d see denial in his eyes if I did.
Eternity withhim, if I survived to make it to immortality.
