Total pages in book: 148
Estimated words: 139178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 139178 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 696(@200wpm)___ 557(@250wpm)___ 464(@300wpm)
“Here,” Raphael said when he reached them, “I’ll put him up on my shoulders.”
Hands in his father’s hair only moments later, Nix watched with shining eyes as energy filled the massive area in front of them, arcing bolts that went in every direction…but never touched them. Because Caliane knew her child, and she knew the woman her son loved.
A spark arced toward Phoenix, only to stop, hesitate, then twine around him.
“Guess we won’t get to surprise her,” Elena said, one hand tangled with her archangel’s.
“I don’t think this is conscious. She won’t ‘know’ anything until she wakes—this power acts in a way akin to Cassandra’s owls. The owls are part of her, but she’s only truly aware of what they see when she’s at a certain level of consciousness.”
As always, Elena looked around at this mention of the Seer of Seers. But there were no owls today, the only visible energy that of a huge dome of sheer power that covered a vast area…as the ground opened to reveal the peaks and curves of the tallest roofs in the ancient city that rose up out of the earth.
Amanat.
Caliane’s home and forever her favorite city, even when she lived in other regions as part of her duties as an archangel.
It was as lovely as always, the buildings only two stories at the highest and built of natural materials, flowers pouring out of window boxes and lining the cobblestoned pathways. And the people all asleep where they’d chosen to be when Caliane took them into her self-imposed exile.
“I thought they’d choose beds,” Elena said, glimpsing a man in a simple brown tunic and pants seated on the ground, his head pillowed on his hand—which he’d placed on a small stone bench.
Under his other hand curled a plush black-and-white cat.
“They don’t sense the hours and days between leaving this world and appearing again.” Raphael squeezed her hand. “To them, it is but a moment.”
If she’s waking, Cassandra must consider her sane again. Elena ran her free hand over his forearm. And Caliane made you a promise—to rise only when she was sane.
This time, the owls did appear, a whole bevy of them flying around inside the energy dome of Amanat.
Child of mortals. Such an old, old voice in her head, so heavy with time and a Sleep that might be endless.
Cassandra?
But the Ancient was gone again, and so were her avatars, her momentary wakefulness buried under the weight of her rest.
Elena would tell Raphael of the small contact, but not now…because Amanat was waking beyond the energy barrier. The man who’d been lying with his head on the stone bench opened sleepy eyes, yawned, then began to stretch.
His cat did the same, displaying sharp little teeth.
A maiden seated on another bench, her back to a wall and a basket of flowers in her lap, smiled before opening her eyes. More people stirred out of doors or poked their heads out windows. They were sluggish, their bodies yet catching up to this time, which, Elena thought, was why the energy barrier remained impermeable.
Caliane, protecting her people.
Raphael went motionless beside her. “She’s awake.” A rough whisper, his hand tight on hers. “She reached out to me. A fleeting contact—her mind hasn’t yet caught up with this world. I think”—he frowned—“it must take her longer to fully wake when she brings Amanat with her.”
“Should we wait, come back tomorrow?”
“No.” Plucking Nix from his shoulders, he shifted the boy to one arm. “Let’s go get him fed, see to Bengal and Tigress, then return to check on the situation.”
I would not have her wake to absence, he said privately into her mind.
Me either. Caliane deserved the respect of their presence.
Even as she replied, Elena took in Nix’s excited face, his eyes locked on Amanat, the arcs of energy yet circulating in the dome reflected in the vivid mountain blue. “I don’t think we’ll have any trouble keeping him up long enough to meet her.” Love filled her veins, such a piercing and all-consuming thing that, at times, she wondered how she could even breathe.
Then she met another set of eyes of intense mountain blue, the eyes of her archangel, and her love spilled over into an ocean that swept her away while keeping her buoyant.
Two pieces of her heart.
Integral and forever.
60
My Cali, our son…I love in a way I did not know before I held him in my arms.
—Nadiel to his Caliane (On the Birth of a boy named Rafi)
Though Caliane knew that going into Sleep wasn’t an action that added dirt or sweat to the body, she nonetheless made sure to have a quick but thorough bath, then dressed in new white leathers prior to meeting Elena and Raphael.
A few of her people had a vague recollection of seeing them outside the barrier when Amanat first rose, but with their minds groggy at the time, no one was quite certain.