Page 12 of Seraph's Tears
“What is your name?”
I licked my lips, suddenly hating myself for trying to sneak out without even leaving a note. He deserved better. “Eve Lovejoy.”
He gave a short nod. “Eve.” He lifted his face to the manor behind me and flew away.
My heart throbbed in my chest and my toes scrunched inside my shoes as I watched the angel alight on a balcony on the side of the house. Oh, I was in trouble indeed.
The next morning I woke, lukewarm under my covers in my boxbed. I braced myself for the cold as I swung the door open and crawled out of bed.
Last evening, after the seraph delivered my trunk right into the kitchen, startling me with the informality, I made myself a hot vegetable stew. Gabriel had tarried at the door, watching me, arms crossed, then left. I hadn’t seen him the rest of the night.
Now I smiled at the memory of his kindness as I busied around the kitchen. I made fresh bread and organized the vegetables, jams, and other preserves he’d brought. I was pleasantly surprised at the variety. Based on how he’d spoken about human food yesterday, I didn’t expect him to be familiar with it. But I had a good store now of butter, eggs, flour, milk, sugar, and more.
Last night I lay in bed, thinking over and over about our interaction yesterday as I traced the grooves of the key’s teeth over and over. He lived in a crumbling manor on the moors without even his fellow seraphim for company. No one knew much about them. A few sightings had been made around the world over the years, and some had even claimed to see winged demons—no one knew what they were. Other types of seraphim? But for all I knew, his companions had died. He was alone in a world that wasn’t his own for fifty years.
He must be so lonely. Just like me.
He deserved a little kindness. When it was time to find my new home, I’d leave a letter.
I wore my best dress and brushed my hair until it shone, as pretty as dishwater hair could get. I found a tray tucked behind a cabinet and dusted it, then took a plate of eggs, toast, jam, and tea upstairs. I hadn’t explored this upstairs wing, where I assumed he lived. I followed a trail of footprints in the dust on the ground to a wide, carved wooden door.
Holding my breath, I knocked.
“What?” growled a male voice.
My heart skipped a beat. Maybe this is a bad idea. “Breakfast!” I called in a false, cheerful voice.
After a moment the door flew open, revealing a grouchy seraph. Black hair fell over those jade green eyes, and he was shirtless again. Damn it, he was beautiful even when sulky. This could prove distracting.
His eyes widened and his wings hitched higher behind his back. “Eve.”
Well, there was no way forward but through. If I acted like this was normal, maybe it would become normal. “Good morning.” I ducked under his arm, careful to keep the tray level. “Where do you want this?”
Gabriel turned and blinked at me.
I glanced around the room. It was a dark, dusty place. Candles that had never been lit tilted in candlesticks on a shelf, nightstand, and table on the other side of the room. Stone walls with faded, threadbare tapestries surrounded the sparse room. Cobwebs decorated the corners of the room. The largest, most prominent piece of furniture in the room was the bed—a giant wooden monstrosity that had once had curtains to trap the heat inside. With his wings he needs a large bed, I realized.
The exterior wall had a door leading to a balcony. A breeze trickled inside, and I shivered. A large fireplace with an exquisitely carved mantle made up one wall—full of ash so old it was white— and the final wall was free of tapestries, because a massive painting covered the stones instead.
My eyes widened. It was a map of the Anglian Isles and parts of Europa. The details faded away the farther from Anglia the map sprawled. Blue swirls denoted the ocean, and spotted green spread across what should be Rus and Slav countries. Further afield were the lands of the Great Zhou. “Oh my,” I breathed.
The door slammed shut behind me.
I jumped, and the cutlery rattled on the tray. “I’ll set this here, hmm?” I faked confidence and strode to the small table in one corner of the room. “I hope you like eggs!”
“What are you doing?” the seraph growled.
I would be frightened, but I remembered the way he treated me last night by bringing me goods and my trunk. “Doing my duties.” I blinked at him innocently. “I'm your housekeeper.”
“Eve,” he warned, stalking toward the table beside me.
I should be alarmed, but I wasn’t. Not when I could see the bafflement in his furrowed brow and the way he said my name.
“I don’t eat eggs.”
I began to wilt under his dismissive attitude. No. You’re stronger than this. You want to survive on your own, a single woman out in the wide world? Get used to pushing back. It was like using an atrophied muscle. I ignored the teaching of the church and rallied. “Have you ever tried them?”
His head swung toward me, nostrils flaring. Was he always like this, or just with humans?
