Chapter 19

My head poundedand I hadn't even opened my eyes.

By the light, what had happened?—

Before the sentence finished forming in my mind, I remembered. The diner, the price on my head, the supernaturals, the fight.

Levi running with me in his arms.

I sat up and groaned as the pain intensified. I inhaled a handful of times, until the pain lessened. Then I opened my eyes and found myself lying on a bedsheet on a torn couch in a dark, strange room. There were a couple of windows to my right, but they had been covered with plywood, and two metal doors ahead.

Beside the couch was a cardboard box with my phone, a water bottle, and one vial of my potion. Right, I didn't even remember when the last time was I had taken it. I tipped it and drank a good dose. Then I grabbed my phone.

This couldn't be right. It was almost eleven in the morning, which meant … I had passed out for almost a full day.

My phone also had dozens of messages—mostly from Hazel, one of the only numbers I had saved, and another unknown number, but when I clicked on the messages, I saw it was from Khalisa.

I had been right. They had heard the angels had put a price on my head and they were worried. Hazel also told me all of my friends were desperate after me. They wanted to know what was going on and what they could do to help me.

My heart squeezed.

If I told them the truth, would they believe in me, or would they side with Elysium?

I sighed and tried forgetting about it. I wouldn't contact them; I wouldn't even answer Hazel's and Khalisa's messages. Thankfully, I hadn't given Erin my number when we met a couple of days ago, or I'm sure she would be calling me too.

The less they knew, the better.

Where was Levi?

I walked to the doors. I opened one. It squeaked loudly and I found a smaller room with one thin window near the ceiling, and several empty and broken shelves along the walls. A storage room?

I opened the other one and found a dark and wide corridor with a handful of doors. I searched for a switch on the wall, since this corridor had no windows and the doors were all closed, but when I found it, it didn't work.

"Levi?" I called.

Nothing.

Using the flashlight from my phone, I started down the corridor and tried every single door. Four of them were locked, and only the last one wasn't.

I pushed the door open, this time silent, and stepped into a wide room with a vaulted ceiling. It looked like an abandoned plant equipped with broken assembly lines and empty crates.

In the center of the room a figure was tied to a metal column, much like the first demon I had seen in Houston.

But this time it wasn't a demon.

It was an angel.

My blood went cold, and Levi, who had been looming over the beaten angel, turned to me.

He straightened and put his game face on. "Awake, sweetheart?"

I snapped out of my stupor and marched to him, anger boiling in my veins. "What the hell are you doing?"

"I snatched one of the angels who were after you, sweetheart." He dared to sound proud! "You're a Cherubin, right? I think he's a Cherubin."

I glanced at the angel, and a quick wave of relief coursed through me when I didn't recognize him. Not that it made this better, but at least I wouldn't be facing a former friend.

The angel groaned, his eyes half closed and unseeing. He had silver-blond hair cut short, fair skin, but that was all I could make out of his features underneath the bruises on his face. His body was slumped forward, and if it weren't for the magical ropes, he would be passed out on the floor.

If I had to guess, I would say he had probably graduated from Guardian Academy not long ago, and the pitiful thing had already been captured by an evil demon and beaten to a pulp.

"You shouldn't have done that," I snarled.

"Why not? They are hunting you, sweetheart. I need to know all of the details so I can protect you, and the only way to do that was to get one of them."

While I was passed out on that filthy couch, Levi had hunted the angels.

It was sickening.

"If he's a Cherubin," and he looked like one, "he probably doesn't know anything! He's a grunt the higher levels order around. You got an innocent angel, my kind, and you're just letting your anger out!"

Levi scoffed. "There are no innocent angels, sweetheart."

"What the hell are you implying? That I'm as bad as they are saying?"

"Maybe you are."

"Do you even hear yourself?"

"I didn't change, sweetheart. You're the one who pretended not to hear me, not to see me, for the past few days."

I flinched.

That was it. Maybe I had seen only what I wanted to see and ignored the rest. Because a person, or a demon, with a sliver of good in his heart, wouldn't be doing this to another being, no matter how evil they were.

"Let him go," I said, my tone definite. "Untie him and let him go."

"So he can bring his friends back here? I don't think so."

"Then blindfold him, take him somewhere out of the way, and then run." I paused, the words all rushing to my tongue. I needed to choose them right. "But then, please, let him go."

"Can't do that, sweetheart. You see, this angel isn't innocent and?—"

I groaned. "Holy shit, stop!"

Levi's eyes hardened. "If you don't want to see me work, sweetheart, you're welcome to go."

"I might just?—"

"Ariella," the angel croaked.

I stilled for three seconds, shocked, and then turned to him. "Yes. I'm here." I wanted to reach for him, to help him stand straighter, but I was afraid that wherever I touched him, it would hurt. "Are you okay? Can I get you anything?"

Stupid questions, but they blurted out of my mouth.

The angel lifted his head and fixed his eyes on mine. His mouth quivered, his shoulder shook, and I thought he was crying. Until his mouth contorted in a big smile and he laughed.

I took a step back.

"We've been searching everywhere for you, angel-killer," the angel said, his voice raspy. "The guardians will find you, they will capture you, and they will ki?—"

Levi punched the angel's face, the sound of a crack echoing through the place. I gasped and startled back.

But the angel laughed and faced us again, his cheekbone clearly broken. "And you, Leviathan, are going down with her." He smiled at me, blood in his teeth. "We were told you had sided with demons. Now I have proof."

Levi grabbed his hair and pulled his head up. "Answer me, you motherfucker. Who sent you? Who is spreading lies about Ariella?"

Lies? Levi believed me.

"No one is lying," the angel said. "She betrayed her kind and killed a dozen angels. The entirety of Elysium knows about it."

My stomach twisted in knots. I knew every angel in Elysium must have heard about it, must have believed it, because why wouldn't they when the famous, powerful Archangel Rhodes told them so?

But to think my mother and my sister believed them too … that made me sick.

I frowned. "It's not true."

"If it's not true, then why don't you face us? Why don't you bring the dagger and turn yourself in?" the angel asked. I froze at the mention of the dagger and Levi glanced at me, eyes narrowed. "We are good, righteous beings. We would give you a fair trial and?—"

Levi closed his hand around the angel's throat, squeezing it. "You just said you'll capture her and kill her. That she's done for. I don't hear anything about a fair trial in that statement."

The angel smiled, even though it had to be hurting. "You're smart for a demon."

I pressed a hand to my stomach.

This angel … he wasn't behaving like an angel. He wasn't good and righteous. He was calculating and almost as evil as a demon.

"Who sent you? What do you know about me?" The words blurted out from my lips before I could stop them. I pressed a hand to my mouth in horror. "No, no, no." I took two steps back. "I'm not doing this."

I glanced at Levi. He didn't seem one bit worried about this, about my feelings. It looked like a fun game for him.

And it made me sick.

I turned and ran.

"Ariella!" Levi called after me.

"There's nowhere to run, traitor!" the angel shouted. "We'll find you and—" He groaned as Levi landed a hit on him.

I didn't stop to look; I didn't want to be a witness to this anymore.

Before I left the room, a hand closed around my arm and pulled me back. "Ariella, you have to understand?—"

I faced him. "There's nothing to understand. You're a demon. This is what you do. But …" I sucked in a sharp breath. I didn't want to be a part of this, I couldn't. "Let me go."

"You shouldn't be out there by yourself." He sounded mad and that didn't help his cause. "It's dangerous."

I jerked my arm free. "What do you care? Are you afraid of getting hurt if I do?"

"Sweetheart—"

I screamed. "Let me go!" I pulled on my arm again, and this time I got free. "And don't come after me!"