Chapter Twenty-Five

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

PITCH STEPPED into the room before Silas could touch him. The pained look on Silas's face, a whirl of anguish and sympathy, and unexpected hurt, had given Pitch the impetus to move, when just moments before he'd thought another step, another breath, impossible.

He stepped to one side, pressed his back against the wall.

He could not look yet at the bed, at the figure lying there. No matter how the simurgh battered his innards. Pitch felt himself at the edge of an abyss. And he was not yet ready to fall.

Fuck Seraphiel, and this game he played. If all that Pitch had left in his arsenal was avoidance, then so be it.

The room held a medieval sensibility to it. Jacquetta's clothing was not so jarring now in this space. But the lack of windows certainly was.

Their absence hadn't bothered him in the past. He remembered.

He'd been too preoccupied…or too manipulated…to wonder why the only light he ever saw was that from the candles that circled the huge lighting fixture hanging at the very centre of the room, a piece of metal large and round as a wagon wheel, and held by five link chains. It held twenty candles at its periphery; each as thick as his arm.

Twenty candles, exactly.

He knew. He'd counted them many times: in what he'd always remembered as a drunken stupor, or strong haze of enchantment, or post-coital bliss.

Pitch remembered this room: the fawn tiles on the floor that were always warm, the wallpaper with its busy yellow and blue design that reminded him of fleur-de-lys but with sharper tips upon the plumes, the rosewood beams with their thin trims of gold, and the coarse stone mantle with its hearth deep enough for a dozen logs. So dull compared to the florid, Baroque fashioning of the rest of the palace.

No part of which he recalled.

Had he ever been allowed from this room?

Whilst the others bustled around him, Pitch's memories fell over themselves, tangled up their pieces and pushed at him like a frightened herd of cattle. He could not make out their shape and substance.

He could not tell if a single one of them was real.

Pitch sought to keep his breath even, his mind from fraying at the edges. He dug his fingertips into his stomach, pressed down till he felt the warmth of blood. The simurgh quietened, sank deeper, gave him the space he craved.

Only then did he let his gaze settle on the bed: a rosewood four-poster, with black velvet canopy and hangings, perched upon a platform of red-painted wood.

A man lay upon a royal blue quilt, his head against black satin pillows which accentuated the spun-gold of his long, straight hair. Pale skin, a Roman nose and square jaw, with a jutting chin that held a deep cleft. Handsome, defined features; the sort of face that would have caught Pitch's eye, back when he was hungry for senseless desire.

But he had never seen this man before.

He swallowed against the immovable lump in his throat. Pitch had barely made it into the room, whilst everyone else, including Silas, moved deeper.

Pitch and the golden-haired stranger were the only points of stillness in the room. They, and the simurgh; the wildness had moved so far into its cage it could barely be felt.

The ankou approached, having settled Lucifer in an armchair he'd dragged closer to the bed. The king leaned out of the chair, his arse at the very edge. If he moved an inch more, he was likely to fall off. Scarlet took it upon themselves to grab at his shirt collar, hauling back, like the King of Daemonkind was a belligerent, bruised and battered, dog on a leash. Lucifer did not swipe at the wisp. He barely seemed to notice them at all. He gripped the ends of the armrests, eyes locked upon the man. His expression was not one Pitch recognised as common to the king. Fear lay there, bold and unapologetic, with barely a hint of royal daemonflame to see. He was dull, Pitch thought. Too dull. But he spent little time observing his sire. Edward, wretched with unnatural twists and jerks of his body, was negotiating the platform, Charlie and Jacquetta helping him ever closer to the prone man.

To whatever play this was, in Seraphiel's end game.

Pitch watched it all, the world around him moving in a languid way, his ears stuffed with cotton, voices muffled and distant.

Silas reached him. And did not seek to drag Pitch from his place, but joined him there. Stood beside him, his back to the wall, his hand just touching Pitch's own. Not a word said, nor question asked, only offering the comfort of silence and presence. And Pitch wondered, as he did so often, if love was what he felt for this man. Because these odd feelings were intangible and indescribable, and made him troubled and euphoric at once.

Silas ran his smallest finger over the back of Pitch's hand, and together they watched as Edward sat himself beside the sleeping beauty. The lieutenant laid a hand upon the other man's chest. One that did not rise nor fall, so far as Pitch could tell.

The moment that contact was made, Pitch could see the tension drain from Edward's beleaguered body, his muscles relaxing, his head settling straight upon his shoulders. Edward was free now, to look over, and find Pitch.

Something passed between them, in that pause between now and what was to come. And Pitch feared it was regret, there upon his friend's face. Edward Charters understood it was he who must strike the flint to start this fire, that it was he who would bring a daemon prince to the altar of his fate. And it pained him.

Pitch smiled, and poured all his regard for the man into the gesture. ‘It's all right,' he mouthed.

Perhaps he spoke the words aloud, he could hear nothing to tell him it was so. His blood ran too fast, made too much noise beneath his skull.

Silas's hand engulfed his, and their fingers found place among one another, as readily as petals closing over at night. The scythe was a resolute firmness in the tangle, and Pitch swore a tiny pulse came from the ring where it rested against his skin.

Edward drew back his shoulders, and nodded. He said something to Charlie, who shook his head, ever the resistant spirit. Jacquetta took hold of the lad and pulled him back, down off the platform, whispering in his ear.

Taking him out of harm's way.

Out of Seraphiel's way.

As Jacquetta continued to whisper, Charlie's fight left him. He was grim faced but compliant. He stood by. Waiting, as all the rest.

Edward leaned down, and opened his mouth. Light spilled from him. A haze as yellow as the down on a newborn chick.

Silas held on tighter, but asked nothing of Pitch. Simply reminded him it was as Silas had always promised. He was not alone.

Edward drew closer, the light spilling over the slumbering stranger's face. Another inch closer.

He brought their lips together.

The powder keg was lit.

The explosion was brilliance; sheer and blinding brilliance.

Silas's cry tore through Pitch's muffled existence, ripping away the shroud that had kept him strangely distant from the world in this room. The simurgh fluttered deeper, seeking refuge.

Silas shielded Pitch with his body, as though fearing the light had arrow tips.

As well it might. But none had a hope of seeing them coming. The glow was cataclysmic, sweeping like a wave to fill the room entirely, utterly blinding. Pitch cowered, eyes stinging, and pressed his cheek against Silas's chest, desperate for somewhere darkness could thrive.

The ankou roared, his ribs humming against Pitch's skin. Beneath the bone and flesh, his heart thundered, pounding against Pitch's ear.

He clutched at Silas's coat, terrified suddenly that the light had nasty tips after all. ‘Are you hurt?' he cried. ‘What is it?'

The ankou bowed his head, spreading himself over Pitch like a dark swan over its cygnet.

‘Life…' he gasped. ‘It is life.'

He roared again, and the light roared back, like the torrent of a mountainside waterfall. Cascading, pummelling, seeking to fill every crack and gap. Pitch clung to Silas, held on as though the torrent might sweep them both away. Because it was doing its level best to do so. The luminance brought static with it, lifting the strands on Pitch's head, prickling every fine hair on his body. Fuck. If this was life, it was unstoppable.

Pitch listened to the momentum of Silas's heart, each beat a thunderous boom. And feared what it meant for a messenger of death to bow to life.

The radiance extinguished. No warning. No waning.

Just there one moment, and vanished the next.

Thrusting them back into a world scorched with white shadows, the burning at the back of the eyes that brought tears forth.

Silas and Pitch had been floored, and neither seemed to have realised it. Pitch gazed up at Silas who braced his hands to the wall either side of Pitch's head. He was on his knees, and Pitch flat on his arse. Both blinked at one another, cheeks wet.

Pitch touched a hand to Silas's cheek. ‘Are you all right?'

He was gasping, but nodded. ‘You?'

‘Shaken but mostly in one piece.'

That brought a welcome, tremulous smile.

‘Bring him to me.'

The smile vanished. Silas's eyes narrowed. He moved to turn and follow the voice, but Pitch grabbed at his shirt. ‘One more moment. Just give me one more moment.'

He didn't need to look.

The simurgh scratched at Pitch's insides. But he could not say if it was to run to or from its maker.

Silas cupped his face. ‘Breathe, my darling.' He did so, gently, shifting the hairs that had fallen into Pitch's eyes. ‘Breathe.'

Not so easy, not here, in this old cell, with an old master. But Pitch indulged his lover, and played at an inhale and exhale. Drinking in the heart-aching smile it drew.

‘I said, bring him to me.' The angel was demanding. He'd never been anything less. Death, or whatever had befallen him, had not changed that.

Pitch abandoned his breathing lesson. ‘I'm ready.'

Silas nodded grimly. ‘And I'm here.'

He lifted Pitch to his feet, and stepped back, just enough to allow Pitch view of the room, but not so far that they did not still touch.

Edward was slumped by the side of the bed, groaning. Charlie crouched with him, sobbing, and indifferent to the enormity of all else. Jacquetta was on her knees at the foot of the bed, in a deep bow, one shift of the knees from prostrating herself.

That angel was now seated bolt upright. His linen nightshirt had slipped from one shoulder; his hair, ridiculously long, splayed like a golden web around him. Pitch noticed at once that this creature held no aura. No magnificence of design that screamed, Seraphim .

What aura should encompass the body–hugged it like a second skin–existed entirely in the angel's eyes. They glowed with an intensity that had, a short time ago, nearly sent everyone in the room blind. And those eyes were fixed upon one person.

Silas glanced at Pitch, his puzzlement obvious.

Neither of them attracted the angel's gaze.

Lucifer rose to his feet, shaking where he stood. His bruising and battery never more obvious; and barely a hint of flame survived in his gaze.

He had but one word to say. But one word was enough.

‘Seraphiel.'