Page 24 of When Monsters Fight
“Refuge?” Her lip curled in derision. “I’d hardly call it that. We found an uninhabited world and made it a home. We lived in harmony with nature for decades until your God arrived and claimed that our new world belonged to him. He demanded we leave to make way for his creations. Webegged to stay, asserted that we would live in harmony with his creations, but he would not be moved. There was conflict, but our god was gone, and we were no match for yours. We were forced into a hastily created world and trapped there.” Her mouth twisted bitterly. “And your god gifted the world we’d vacated to humans.”
What the… “You’re saying you used to live on earth?”
“It was our home, and then…then it wasn’t.” Her voice throbbed with sorrow.
The more I learned about God, the more I disliked him. He sounded like an egomaniac on a power trip. “I’m sorry, Jilyana. Sorry for all that you went through.”
She offered me a watery smile. “I appreciate that. But the world we were given is home now, and once we fix the Morningstar, I can return to it.”
The doorways into her world hadn’t been controlled by the Morningstar but by God. I’d have to ask Lucifer if she knew of a way to help Jilyana get home.
In fact, it was time I apologized to the djinn for lying to her. “I wanted to tell you about Lucifer, but I had to be cautious. I had to be sure you weren’t going to betray us, and you can’t now, so it doesn’t matter. And maybe I was a little annoyed with you trying to get Shem back, but that doesn’t matter now either. None of it does.” What the fuck? Why was I saying all this?
Jilyana stared at me with woe in her eyes, opened her mouth to speak, then pressed it shut again.
“What is happening here?” Kabiel asked.
“I think I know,” Kokabel said. “This valley makes you speak truth and tell your secrets. The hidden…it means secrets.”
Wait…did that mean the bones belonged to Gehennans that had killed each other?
Jilyana pressed her hand to her mouth and picked up her pace.
We all followed.
The end of the valley was close. We could make it without speaking, right?
But there was a pressure in my throat pushing on my tongue, and words, so many fucking words swirled inside my head.
Kabiel growled softly.
I wanted to ask him if he was okay, but that meant speaking, and I was afraid of what would come out of my mouth. My secrets might not provoke anyone to kill me, but I’d probably want to die of shame afterwards.
Best to keep my mouth shut and the words trapped.
“I wanted to take you the first time I had you pinned to my nest,” Kabiel blurted out. His silver eyes brightened with relief then closed on a groan. “Fuck. I still want to fuck you.” He slapped himself hard.
My cheeks heated, and Gabriel grabbed my hand, his lips bloodless from how hard he was pressing them together, and for some reason I wanted him to fail. To speak and tell me his deepest, darkest thoughts so that I could reciprocate and tell him how much I hurt. How much Shem’s loss had broken me. Broken what could have been, because if Shem had lived then maybe, somewhere down the road, Gabriel and I might have become more than friends. Because it was clear to me now that the attraction between us was more than physical. I found his mind fascinating, and in time, our bond might have flourished, but not now. Not without Shem. Because being with Gabriel would be like cheating on the memory of the watcher that had claimed my heart so wholly it was now a battered, bruised version of itself.
In this moment, I needed to tell Gabriel all of it. Every last word.
Dammit, I needed out of this valley.
I broke into a jog, and the others followed. The exit loomed, the world beyond a gray, dull landscape with the dark canopy of a tree line in the distance.
A ripple of energy passed over my skin. I was out, and the urge to purge my thoughts abated, but my relief was cut short by an icy slap of air that then proceeded to run its hands beneath my clothes.
My gasp of shock froze in my lungs.
“Rue!” Gabriel wrapped his arms around me, and I melted against him, desperate for his heat. “Get back into the valley!” Mist bloomed around my face—my breath and his mingling in the subzero temperatures.
He scooped me up and turned back to the mountain.
“It’s blocked off,” Kabiel said. “The wards won’t let us back in.”
“Fuck!” Gabriel hugged me tighter as if he could quell my body’s defiant shivering.
My eyeballs hurt from the cold, but I was afraid if I closed my eyes for too long, then they’d stay shut.
