Chapter 7

I marched away from him and back to the long tables, checking the shelf numbers to make sure I was going the right way. I could hear his footsteps behind me, but I was sure that if I turned to tell him to stop following him, I would punch him.

I knew where punching him had led before.

Abbie was hunched over several books and Lacey had come out of the shelves, carrying more books. Thankfully, Maggie, Gwen, and Britt were nowhere to be seen.

I stopped across the table from them, my head barely above the tall pile of books, crossed my arms, and asked, "Is there a bond connecting us? Levi and me, I mean?"

Lacey almost dropped the books and stared at Levi with huge eyes.

Abbie frowned. "Yes. Why?"

"But we broke it." I stared at Lacey. "You and I broke the bond three weeks ago."

"About that," she said sheepishly.

"What?" I almost barked.

"Remember when you fell into the circle during the ritual?" Lacey asked. If she could, she would hide under the table.

Of course, I remembered. "I asked you if that had messed up anything."

"I thought it didn't," she said. Her gaze shifted to Levi, who was standing a couple of feet behind me. "But it did."

I whirled to him. "You lied to me."

He shrugged. "I thought it was what you wanted to hear."

Once more, he had lied to me. Tricked me yet again. I shook my head, not knowing where to start. "So what now? Do you still feel pain when you are away from me? Do you feel my feelings?"

His brows slammed down. "I … it doesn't hurt as much anymore, but I do feel a deep tug that can get quite painful when you're away, and your feelings are muted. I have to pay attention to them to feel them."

"What else?" I asked, sure there was more.

"Don't you feel it too?" Abbie asked.

I glanced at her. "Feel what?"

"The bond," she said. "I can see the thread. It's both ways. Yours is a lot fainter, but it's definitely there."

Eyes round, I placed a hand on my chest and opened my mouth to deny it, but then closed it again. I had felt several tugs and pulls, sometimes even painful, when I thought about him or saw him.

"Oh, shit," I muttered. "This can't be happening."

"I'm sorry it didn't work," Lacey said. "We can try again and?—"

"We should," I snapped. "Or we can find a better ritual, one that we can't mess up." I looked up at the millions of books and countless pieces of knowledge this place held. "There has to be a spell that can do that."

"Well, we can pause looking for a way to give you back your magic so we can break the bond between the two of you," Abbie said, sounding a little annoyed. "What do you prefer?"

Ouch.

I felt like screaming, running, punching, crying. This wasn't how any of this was supposed to go, damn it.

"I … I need a break," I muttered, walking away from them.

"Don't get lost," Abbie called out. "It'll be dark again and we still have two ghouls loose."

"No, we don't," I said back, without turning.

I heard their voices as Levi told them what happened, and then I exited the library.

I kept walking, down the hallways and into places I had no idea were in here. A music room, a theater room, a small ballroom, a conference room, several small reading nooks, and dozens of galleries. I walked by another archway adorned by vines, and at first it looked like the other hundred I had seen, but the light coming from this one was brighter, yellower. I stopped before the archway and the vines moved, twisting until a white flower showed beside me.

With a small smile, I touched the flower and it fell in my hand. "Thank you." I took the flower to my nose and inhaled deeply. The sweet, earthy scent brought me a sense of calm.

I walked past the archway and found myself in a large courtyard. Stone paths were flanked by low bushes and white and yellow flowers. I took one of the stone paths toward the center, where a circle and wooden chairs were. In the middle was a round pit in the ground and some firewood. A fire pit? Now I wanted a s'more.

Holding the flower, I sat on one of the chairs and leaned back. I glanced up, toward the beautiful blue sky and tried opening my mind, clearing my thoughts and just being.

Easier said than done.

I was a freaking fallen angel without her magic and her Celestial Sword, who was still bonded to an evil higher demon who kept tricking me.

I couldn't even think of what else I was missing, what else I didn't know, what Rhodes was doing right now, and everything in between.

There was nothing I could do from here, and the more I thought about it, the more desperate I became.

I felt lost, useless.

Before, I had a purpose. I had gone to the academy and joined the ranks of guardians to protect humankind from evil.

That was my whole life.

But since that fateful day, that failed mission, what was my goal? My purpose?

To find my wings? Check. To get my magic back? Working on it. How about my sword? Not sure that one was recoverable.

And then what? What could I do? And what if I had it all wrong? What if I had misread Rhodes's intentions, his plans? What if he was trying to save Elysium from a terrible fate? What if he was as evil as the worst demon and had corrupted Adona?

What was I supposed to do about that? How could I save us all?

I groaned, frustrated with my active mind as it took off and ran from me again.

Why did I keep imagining crazy scenarios when I knew nothing of what was going on up there, other than me being accused of killing my friends?

Until I knew, I shouldn't assume.

I had to focus on one step at a time. And the next step was clearly recovering my magic, not breaking a forsaken bond.

From the way Levi acted when we were alone between the bookshelves, the bond was affecting him more than he let on, but he would survive. He was a grown demon and could endure a few more days tied to me, right?

Right.

My magic came first. Always.

I closed my eyes and tried to remember the feeling of magic in my veins, of holding a bolt of light in my hands, of feeling so pure and powerful, it was electric. I held on to that. I had to hold on to that. This feeling was what was going to get me through.

I let out a long breath, finally more centered than before.

I had a damn mission and nothing would stop me from finishing it.

"Ariella?" I opened my eyes and looked to the side. Maggie stood there, her green eyes full of light. "Are you okay?"

"Yes. I was focusing, remembering what's important." I inhaled in and out again, another cleansing breath. "Why? Anything wrong?"

"Abbie sent me to check on you," she said.

"Sorry."

She shrugged. "Don't be. I was about to play babysitter with Trent, but now Gwen has to go."

I smiled. "Is taking care of him so bad?"

"It's not bad, but it can be boring."

I nodded. "How old are you?"

"Nineteen."

Angels lived differently from humans, but at nineteen, I was at the academy and living my best life. Sneaking out at night to do things we shouldn't, making friends and enemies, falling in love and having my heart broken.

"Did you ever leave the Grand Eternity Hall?" I asked.

She nodded. "With my parents, before they died. Once every couple of months, they liked to take us out to see the world, to know what was happening out there, and how technology was advancing."

"Did you like those outings?"

"Oh, yeah. We've been to New York City, Los Angeles, Rome, London, Sydney, Hong Kong … but my favorite was Paris."

I felt a little jealous of her. I was almost four years her senior and I hadn't left North America.

"It sounds like they were great parents."

"The best," Maggie said, her voice soft. She smiled at me, a sad line on her pink lips. Then her eyes glossed over and she went rigid. "Ariella." Her voice turned eerie. "Your heart will be ripped from your chest, taken to the black abyss, the trip there might claim your life, but to survive what's coming, you'll need it."

She blinked and her eyes went back to normal.

I gawked at her. "What was that?"

"Oh no, what did I say?"

"Something about my heart being ripped from my chest and that I'll need it to survive." Who wouldn't?

"That was a vision-slash-prophecy. Sorry, I can't tell the difference between them yet."

"Do your visions-slash-prophecies always come true?" I asked, trying to decipher her ominous words.

She shook her head. "From what my mother told me, our visions are more like possibilities of the future, the most likely to happen if you don't change anything affecting it at this moment. But if you change something, then the vision is null."

So, when I figured out what she meant, if it was bad, all I had to do was change something affecting it? That sounded simple enough.

But how would I stop my heart from being ripped from me? That didn't make sense. If that happened, I would be dead!

"Sorry I'm not much help," she continued. "Abbie is a great teacher, but she was also learning when our parents died, and she doesn't know much about my gift." She let out a long breath. "I would probably know if it was a vision or a prophecy if my mother was still here."

I pushed that vision-slash-prophecy out of my head. I had enough on my plate as it was. I wouldn't add ominous and uncertain things to it.

Instead, I reached to the side and patted Maggie's hand. "I'm sorry you lost your parents so young." I knew the feeling. I had lost my father when I was at the academy, and in some way, I had lost my mother and my sister five years ago.

She offered me a small smile. "We should go back. We have many books to look through."

I nodded. "Right."

This time, following Maggie, it was a straight shot to the library and we were back there in less than five minutes. I swear, this hall either didn't like me much, or it liked me enough to feel comfortable playing with me.

In the library, the scene hadn't changed. Abbie was kneeling on a chair, looking over five open books over the table, with more piled high around her. Lacey was on the other side of the table, sorting books, and Gwen was helping for a change, checking the list each of us received.

I glanced around, expecting to see Levi helping.

Lacey looked at me. "He's not here."

I shrugged. "I didn't ask anything."

"But I can see it in your eyes," she said, sounding almost mad.

"All right, where did he go, then?" I should find him and tell him that unfortunately my magic was more important than this crazy bond, but we would break it soon.

I promised.

Again.

"He's not here," she repeated. "He got a call and had to leave."

Oh, he wasn't here, as not in this room, but not in the entire Grand Eternity Hall.

My heart sank at the thought, a little pain snaked through my chest, and I told myself that was this damned bond.

Nothing else.