Days of New: The Complete Collection (Serials 1-5) (51 page)

They would only have the good.

But Clark couldn’t sift through it all, and his magic couldn’t rewind time. He only had now, even if it was slightly suspended in slow motion. And now was a gun in his hand. A killer in front of him. A lover behind him. A best friend dying beside him.

This was his moment.

Except it wasn’t the right one. Because Clark hadn’t caught the moment that mattered: the one before Zarachiel was shot again. He hadn’t caught the one before they’d decided to trust Grace. The one before Camille left the meeting room. The one before that demon had killed Liam. The one before Jenna was set on fire. The one before Lucifer had undied. Or the one before Sophia took her last breath.

And he certainly hadn’t caught the one before a war in Heaven was started.

So what did this one moment matter? He raised the gun. Pointed it straight into Grace’s silently screaming mouth. And pulled the trigger.

When time crashed back together and Zarachiel hit the ground and Grace’s scream was cut off by the gunshot and the back of her skull exploded and Camille dropped back to the earth and Clark lowered his arm…

…He waited for the reaction, the consequence. He waited to feel something after shooting Grace point blank.

But it never came. He didn’t feel anything.

Chapter Eight

C
amille landed beside Clark before Grace’s knees even hit the ground. With a brutally powerful kick, she sent Grace’s body catapulting across the clearing and slamming against the broad trunk of a tree. Grace hit the bark with enough force to dent the wood, the cracking impact like thunder. Something broke, possibly her spine from the look of her rag doll-limp body folding against the ground in jutting, impossible angles, tree limbs rattling above her like a witch’s cackle. Grace didn’t move. Part of her head was missing.

Camille collapsed beside Zarachiel with a sob. Her hands fluttered like shattered wings above his face. She was crying.

Z smiled up at her. “I’m okay, Camille. Don’t cry.”

“Shut up,” she growled. “Just shut up.” She swiped at her face with the back of her hand, scrubbing away the tears that betrayed her.

“Sure,” Zarachiel said, still smiling, but his voice was weak and too soft, like he was already drifting away. “Clark?”

Clark looked up at the sound of his name on his best friend’s lips. He shook his head, but he knew what Z wanted. Beside Camille, Clark crouched. Where she couldn’t touch the Archangel, Clark did. He eased Zarachiel into a cradle against his chest so Z wouldn’t have to lie on the cold ground. Gathering her courage, Camille picked up Zarachiel’s hands. She raised them to her lips and blew on them before rubbing them in her own hands to warm up his fingers. Zarachiel relaxed against Clark’s chest, his head resting on Clark’s shoulder.

Clark faded inside to the bottomless part of himself. It was easy now to find the magic and see it. He understood it better, though some parts were still foreign. He felt Zarachiel’s life; he tasted it. If he closed his eyes, he could see it in the air, a warm white glow hovering around their huddled group. Opening his eyes, he slid his hand over Zarachiel’s heart: it beat, but erratically, like it sometimes forgot its purpose.

“I know what you’re thinking, Clark,” Zarachiel said quietly.

“I know you know.”

Camille’s eyes met his over Zarachiel’s body. She shook her head, telling him no. But he pretended not to see.

“Even the Watchers didn’t have power over death.” Talking made Zarachiel’s breathing as uneven as his heartbeat. But he didn’t look like he was in as much pain as before. Clark didn’t take that as a good sign.

“You should have let me fix your wings,” Clark hissed, feeling suddenly, blindingly angry.

“There was nothing to fix.”

Before Clark could argue, the air popped with electricity. From the corner of his eye, he saw the light start to glimmer and shift. There was a noise, a heartbreaking mixture between a stifled sob and the last breath of air leaving someone’s body. Michaela dropped to her knees beside Zarachiel, across from Camille and next to Clark. She didn’t look at anyone but Zarachiel.

“Z,” she whispered. “
No
.”

“How did you know?” Zarachiel laughed weakly.

Michaela looked up at Clark, her face stricken, before finding Grace’s body against the base of the tree. “Her soul. It was bad, Z. As soon as it was free from her body, I could taste it completely.”

“I think,” Zarachiel said. He had to pause to take a shaky breath. “I think I knew too. But I wanted to save her. I thought I could.”

“I’m sorry,” Michaela said and didn’t stop. She repeated it over and over, bending over his body so that her forehead brushed against his slowly rising and falling chest. It was her prayer, her endless atonement. She would always, forever be sorry. Zarachiel didn’t waste time telling her not to be, which Clark was thankful for. It would have been a waste of breath, like telling a mountain not to be so tall. Instead, Zarachiel pulled a hand away from Camille and put it on Michaela’s head.

“Can you do me a favor?” he breathed.

Michaela didn’t need to even hear the words. She kissed Z’s cheek and nodded before she disappeared. Zarachiel’s hand hovered in the air, as if he still felt her form. When she left, she stirred a breeze like a warm sigh against their skin. For one moment, it almost felt like a summer sun was beaming down on them. Then Michaela was back, filling the space exactly where she’d been. Zarachiel’s hand hadn’t moved. He resumed his stroking of her hair, trailing his finger down her cheek as she looked at him.

“They’re coming,” she whispered and then started crying, but her tears were different. They were gold. Almost like an angel’s blood, but less grim and more brilliant. They were transparent against her skin, like tiny pieces of ice tumbling down her cheeks. They landed on Zarachiel’s chest, soaking through his blood-drenched jacket, and eased his breathing, like they’d poured right into his lungs and absolved them of their ache. He let out of breath of relief.

“Thank you,” he said.

Michaela bowed, her long black hair slipping off her shoulder and against his neck. Where it touched, the silken black strands slowed the thickening pulse of his blood. Beneath his hand, Clark felt Zarachiel’s heart slow into an easier rhythm. When Michaela looked back up, she met Clark’s eyes. Her navy blue irises were pricked through with gold. From those little specks came the golden icy tears. She was bleeding parts of her life onto Zarachiel to ease his pain. It was all she had to offer, and she was asking Clark what he had to give. He saw the question in the arch of her brows, the parting of her lips. The little breath of air that escaped from her mouth held the silent question.

Clark shook his head. There was nothing he could do. He felt it. Even if it wasn’t too late to save Z, the magic wouldn’t come to him—his heart was in the way. The marks on his arms were as distant as they’d ever been, cold and foreign on his skin.

Michaela understood and cried harder. It was too much for Clark to watch, like two friends were dying. He glanced away, and unfortunately looked right at the spot where Uriel fell.

He hadn’t known the holy Archangel long. He knew she’d been Zarachiel’s partner, the one he’d been created with. She made him whole. Together they were one being. When Clark had known her, she’d been angry and vengeful. She’d hated Michaela once, but she fought hard in the war. Possibly harder than all the other angels combined. But in the end, when Zarachiel hadn’t wanted his wings restored, she’d left. And Zarachiel had lost two things that were supposed to make him whole.

Clark had thought the next time he saw Uriel, he would hate her for leaving Z. But he couldn’t find the hate inside him, because she hit the ground without even slowing her fall. She was a blur of white feathers and short black hair, her olive skin flashing through the air and then crumpling into the earth. The ground rumbled from her impact, like a heavy sigh of acceptance. It gave around her, folding into her form and then lifting her back up.

Clark had seen angels hit the ground hard. They cratered the earth, made great scars in its skin. But not then. With Uriel, it cushioned around her, like she landed in soft foam. Clark glanced back at Michaela. She was quick about it, but he knew. She’d done that too. Her attention quickly turned back to Zarachiel, like she’d never been focusing on the ground beneath Uriel.

Even if Uriel had landed with more grace, Clark might have found the anger to hate her after a moment. Maybe if she’d walked over to Zarachiel and held him like she’d never left, like she had some right to comfort him. Maybe if she’d whispered into his ear that she loved him and always had. Clark probably could have mustered the rage. He’d just shot a person point blank and felt nothing. His heart was cold enough to kill and hate in the same moment. He could’ve hated Uriel easily.

But she did none of those things. She stayed where she fell, hunched into herself with her back turned to Zarachiel. Clark sensed when Z felt her presence; his eyelids closed for a brief moment, as if her pain had washed over him and nearly drowned him. Deep lines formed between his brows, and his heart thumped hard beneath Clark’s hand. Z withdrew inside himself for a moment, and Clark knew he was focusing very hard on something.

Clark couldn’t help it; he glanced back over at Uriel. She wore only a thin tank top that allowed for her wings, which hung limp and wasted on the ground around her. Her shoulders were hunched, revealing every bone in her back. She was emaciated, hollowed out in all the places that should have been full. She was bones and feathers and from the way her body wracked and trembled, full of tears. Clark knew Zarachiel was with her in that moment, like she’d been with him when she’d first landed, sending waves of despair to him. Clark knew Z well enough to know what the angel was sending her back in that moment.

Love
. Only love and good memories and the brightest light possible that he could summon.

Zarachiel saved people. Helped them and healed them. Held them and comforted them. He did it all in that moment for Uriel. Clark watched as her trembling stopped and she bowed against the ground, her body laid out in the most prone and unguarded position Clark had ever seen. She was nothing but loss right then. Would have been nothing but empty if Zarachiel hadn’t filled her with all the love in the world.

The other Archangels came next. They landed softer than Uriel had, but with as much pain radiating from their forms. Raphael came first, his dark skin flashing against the gray world. He went straight to his knees, closely shaved head and massive shoulders bowing in Z’s direction.

Simiel came next, landing a short distance from Raphael. He too was on his knees. Red hair fanned out on the ground in front of him, his forehead braced against the bitter earth. Clark heard his sobs, saw the ground darken from his tears.

Ophaniel came then. She didn’t fall to the ground, and she didn’t kneel. She stood and lifted her head to the sky, her tremendously long blond hair kissing the back of her thighs. With her position, Clark realized the Archangels were forming a semi-circle around Zarachiel.

Another angel landed. It was Gabriel. He smelled of fire so strongly that Clark almost looked away until he realized that Gabriel was carrying someone. But not just anyone: Clark’s mom.

Iris took her position in the circle, filling the last gap directly across from Clark. She offered him a small smile, then lifted her head as Ophaniel did. Clark shifted his attention to Gabriel, to see what the General of Hell would do in this instant. He neither knelt nor bowed nor lifted his head. He stared straight at Zarachiel and watched, offering Z his strength while the others had to look away and only pray as their brother died.

Briefly, Clark’s gaze met Gabriel’s. In it, Clark saw plenty. And he had to hold back a shudder. There was no doubt that Gabriel’s time in Hell had changed him. He showed Clark the quickest of glimpses into the future. And Clark had to look away.

There were other holy angels that Clark didn’t recognize, though he knew they weren’t Archangels. Each of them soothed Zarachiel with his presence. His eyes fluttered open, but he was so weak that they only opened halfway. His lips formed a soft smile, the ridges on his brow smoothing. His fingers kept up their rhythm in Michaela’s hair. His other hand squeezed Camille’s as she alternated between warming his fingers and kissing them in adoration. It took a good bit of strength, but Z focused his eyes on Clark.

Clark wasn’t partnered to him. Wasn’t connected by some great divine creation. But he knew. He felt it. Zarachiel was sending him waves of love. Waves of light and good and holiness and all the best things in the world.

And then Z spoke to him, just him.

Clark couldn’t hear him because Zarachiel was silent and never opened his mouth, but his words rang clear in Clark’s ears.

Fight for those who can’t. They are the hardest battles
, he said in Clark’s mind,
but they are the most precious ones
.
They are the ones the angels might not fight themselves because the battles aren’t the bloodiest or the most dire, so you will have to shoulder them yourself. Because to save the helpless is truly holy, truly good, truly right. You will see the line when the time comes. You will know what battles to fight.