Page 30 of Wolf of Ashes
Instead of heading toward the arched passageway that I’m sure is the quickest exit, he pulls me back toward the doorway we first came through.
His arms become painfully tight across my chest and stomach, but the pain is weirdly reassuring. It reminds me that I’m still breathing, that I survived Zadkiel, and I’ll survive this Cathedral too.
The panthers stay close to the keeper’s sides, their footfalls silent.
In the distance, I can now sense a flurry of movement and I inhale the sickly scent of flowers, which is growing stronger with every breath I take.
No wonder the keeper is in a hurry.
Some, if not all, of the other angels must be coming back into the building.
As much as I’m enjoying my body’s press against his hard chest and thighs, I whisper, “We’ll go faster if you put me back on my feet.”
He places me back on the ground, but he doesn’t let go of my hand. His grip is so tight that there’s no hope of escaping it—not that I want to right now. The aftereffects of the fight are starting to hit me, a combination of elation at beating the Commander with emptiness that I had to leave her alive. The keeper’s grip is keeping me balanced between the two emotions.
His face is filled with concentration as he leads me, not back toward the underground cage, but in the opposite direction. The farther we get from the atrium with the broken roof, the less damage appears on the walls and ceiling.
“I need space,” he mumbles. “To try what I’m going to try.”
My eyes widen. I don’t like the sound of that. Before I can ask him what he plans, he speaks.
“You made a good choice.”
The corners of my mouth turn down. “Leaving her alive?”
“No.” He casts a shadowed glance my way. “Refusing to fall for her trap.”
The anger I’ve been suppressing surfaces in a rush. “Don’t praise me for that!” I snap. “Leaving her alive was hard, but walking away without knowing if Zadkiel is really alive or dead? That was nearly fucking impossible. Even now, I want to turn back and make sure of it.”
As I speak, my heels are digging in, my hand is tugging in his, my body defying my logic. I allow a groan to expel from my chest. “I need to see his dead face.”
More than anything, I need a release from the decades-old fury within me.
The keeper’s hold on me doesn’t loosen and it’s suddenly clear to me why he’s gripping me so tightly. He knew I’d change my mind. And he’s smart enough to bring it up now so that it won’t come up tomorrow, or the day after, or in a month’s time, only to have my anger derail me then.
“Who was he?” the keeper asks, a question that must have been burning at him.
“He was my mother’s jailer. The one who lured her into a cage. He tormented me for twenty-three years.” My voice is tight with wrath. “I need to spit on his grave. I need to scream at it. I need to stomp on his dead body and break his brittle bones. I need to carve my mother’s name into his decaying flesh and curse his soul. I need to drag him to the gates of hell and watch him burn.”
Tears are gathering on my cheeks and I let them fall. “Ineedto know that he’s dead.”
“No,” the keeper says, more softly now. “You don’t.”
I drag at the air, swiping angrily at my wet cheeks. “You’re fucking heartless.”
“I’m only reinforcing the decision you already made,” he says. “As for being heartless, I wish I were. Unfortunately, I now have a heart.Yourheart. And through it, I can feel your pain. It’s bloody and raw and screams for justice.”
“Then you must understand that I need closure.”
He shakes his head. “What youneedis to not to risk your life further in this place and to conserve your anger for the man who was responsible for imprisoning your mother in the first place.”
It’s exactly the decision I made when the Serene Commander tempted me to go outside. The keeper’s speech simply echoes back to me the choice I know to be right. The choice that will keep me alive.
I grit my teeth and squeeze my eyes closed beneath the blindfold.
“I know it,” I say, my agitated breaths rattling from my chest. “That’s why I’m going to deny what I want and choose to leave instead.”
When I open my eyes, I find the keeper smiling at me. Well, not so much a smile as a dark glimmer in his eyes and a curve to his lips that has the power to make my heart cease beating.
