will use this device again to speak with me?”
“I’ll call.” He grinned, a glint in his eye. “I wonder how Titus will deal with you.”
“He is an archangel and I am an old and experienced angel who can assist him. We’ll work well together.”
Her son’s laugh held a glee that had her narrowing her eyes, but she allowed him his mischief, deeply content to see joy fill him to the brim once more.
* * *
* * *
Sharine saw nothing much of note in the first hour that she flew beyond Lumia. That wasn’t surprising—though Lumia’s lands stopped well before the hour mark, her troops flew that far regularly to stay in fighting shape and maintain their endurance.
In the ordinary scheme of things, they knew never to interfere with Charisemnon’s people, but Sharine had made the decision to breach that rule when the reborn began to spread across Africa—she’d ordered her warriors to quietly eliminate any reborn threats they saw. The shambling creatures who’d reached this far north had been small in number and soon dispatched.
Charisemnon had been too focused on his battle with Titus to pay attention.
The true scars appeared a half hour or so beyond that perimeter. A small village lay half in ruins, a large central area burned to blackened beams and collapsed roofs. Wanting to understand what had taken place there, she did a careful circle above the dead silence to ensure she wasn’t dropping down into danger.
Only when she was certain she saw no movement, no indication of anything living below, did she come down in the center of the long, wide road that seemed to be the heart of the village. Her position gave her an excellent view in all directions; she’d rapidly spot any reborn who might be scuttling toward her.
However, the only things moving in the charred landscape were pieces of fabric that might’ve once been curtains, tiny flags in the light wind. Perhaps this village had fallen prey to the battle between the two archangels. But no, that could not be. The fighting had taken place far from here, near what had been the north/south border.
Then she saw the red can tumbled on the ground, recognized it as the same type of can she’d seen the people of her town use to carry fuel. Once she began to search, she saw the other cans. Many had rolled away from whatever had been their original position, likely pushed or blown out by the storm of fire, but there was no hiding their widespread nature.
The fuel had been carefully dispersed to burn this place down.
A chill in her blood, she headed toward a large, blackened building that might’ve once functioned as a school or community hall. She took extreme care; she had no wish to make herself a victim of the reborn. She might be old and thus difficult to kill, but she wouldn’t survive decapitation—and, according to Tanicia, recent updates from the border had the creatures hunting in packs.
Again, however, she heard only a silence piercing in its intensity.
She didn’t know what she’d expected when she looked through the narrow gap created by the shattered and half-fallen wall of the large building . . . but it wasn’t bones. So many bones. Horror struck her at the thought of all who had died within; wondering if she should attempt to find a way to get deeper inside, unearth more answers, she looked down.
Just inside, shadowed by the way the wall had fallen, lay a hand that had somehow become mummified by the inferno, the skin a shiny and unnatural hue and the flesh long melted away. Like a piece of meat smoked too long. Its fingers bore sharp clawlike nails blackened from the smoke. She frowned. Perhaps it was simply her perspective, but the claws appeared oddly elongated.
But no, it wasn’t perspective because even when she twisted into the gap to look as closely as possible from her awkward position, the sense of odd dimensions remained. This individual’s finger and hand bones were . . . stretched. Spidery.
This wasn’t a vampire’s hand. As far as she was aware, the reborn, too, didn’t look like this. They had the correct proportions of the mortals from whom they were created. Thankfully, Africa hadn’t had to deal with the black-eyed dead Lijuan had made of her people. Those black-eyed ones had died with their liege in any case. However, it was possible the reborn had begun to mutate. If all within the hall were like this