Archangel's Sun (Guild Hunter #13) - Nalini Singh Page 0,105
begun to crawl over it, grasses growing in the nooks and crannies—he flew down to examine it with more care.
It wouldn’t work were Charisemnon unable to access the underground facility, and this pile of debris was just that. No way to get inside to whatever lay beyond. The two buildings on either side of it, however, stood whole but for some minor damage. Hmm . . .
Cobwebs kissed his face as he went to enter the building on the right; he heard wings come down behind him at the same time as he brushed the webs away. “Wait outside,” he ordered Sharine. “I’m not sure of the structural safety of this building.” What appeared minor damage from the outside could have a significant impact on the inside.
“Then why are you going in?” A sharp question. “It could as easily fall on top of your stubborn head.”
He turned to look over his shoulder, wondering if he should be insulted, but no, genuine concern marked her features, her lips flattened and her eyes dark. Deep inside him, an unknown thing twisted. No one had worried about him in such a way for an eternity. Not even his mother or sisters, all of whom often referred to him as the baby of the family.
“I’m one of the Cadre,” he reminded her with a gentleness that came from the same unknown thing inside him. “A building falling on me will do no damage that my body can’t repair in a matter of minutes.” It would take her far longer.
“Just be careful,” she said after a pause. “I don’t feel like spending hours digging you out of the rubble if you get stuck.” Though the words sounded harsh, she reached over to close her hand over his. “Don’t take any unnecessary risks.”
It felt natural to dip his head and kiss those worried lips. “I won’t.”
Releasing her hand with a squeeze, he walked into the dusty building, the floor of which was coated with flakes of debris from the ceiling, and made his way to the steps he could see on the left-hand side. Those steps led down into what appeared to be a large storage area, but he soon discovered another set of steps beyond that.
Heading down those after turning on lights that flickered but still worked, he found himself in a space filled with neat piles of boxes. A thick layer of dust coated the tops—far thicker than could be explained by the lack of movement here since the war.
He opened one, found weapons.
Titus’s cargo master would’ve long since shifted these unused boxes to open up space. Unless, of course, Titus told him that the weapons needed to be kept in place in preparation for a specific action of which his archangel would inform him when it was time. No one would then touch it.
A curious warrior who opened a box would find weapons—nothing unusual in a battlefield. What was unusual was the door concealed behind a set of boxes at the very back. He only spotted it because he’d cracked the earth under Charisemnon’s infantry. The land had shifted . . . and the wall had moved to reveal the lines of what would’ve otherwise been a hidden door.
Invisible. Unseen.
Something smashed above, the building shaking around him. He was considering his next step when he heard footsteps, light and swift, coming down the steps. “I told you to stay upstairs!”
He couldn’t bear it if those wings of indigo and gold were broken, that small body crushed. Not because she was the Hummingbird, a treasure of angelkind, but because she was Sharine, who worried about him and who had a quick wit and who he was finding he could talk to without ever getting bored.
“The building is falling down around you.” She walked over to him, unrepentant . . . as the translucent champagne of her eyes scanned him for injury. “And, as your lordship pointed out, you are part of the Cadre. I’m sure you can protect me should anything happen.” Then she reached out and took his hand, tugged. “Come.”
He realized she’d come to drag him to safety.
Astonishment turned him to stone.
Not simply because, physically, she couldn’t drag him anywhere, much less up two flights of stairs. No, because she’d been worried enough about his safety that she’d disregarded the danger to her own. It was foolishness, but it opened a vein inside him, one so profound that he wove his fingers through her own and said, “I’ve found a hidden door.”