Archangel's War (Guild Hunter #12) - Nalini Singh Page 0,115

Cadre without a trace.”

“Wait. Wait.” Elena rubbed her forehead. “What happens to all the Cascade ‘gifts’ afterward? Your wildfire, Titus’s earthquakes, everything else. Your mother lived through a Cascade and she’s not mega-powerful.” She paused, squeezed her eyes shut for a second as she fought to get her thoughts in order. “Well, she is because she took an entire city with her into Sleep and now protects Amanat with a shield, but she doesn’t have a crazy-violent offensive power. Same with Alexander.”

“Hers was a ‘normal’ Cascade.” He cupped the side of her neck, stroking his thumb over the delicate skin there. “Yet the question remains. Perhaps the Legion know.”

But the Legion had no more answers for them. We Slept after the Cascade of Terror. Such a deep Sleep that when we woke, none of the old archangels walked the world.

Elena ran her hands over his chest. “Guess we’ll find the answer after we kick Lijuan’s butt.” But in her eyes was the same dark knowledge that haunted him—that the wildfire hadn’t been enough to save Antonicus.

Their only weapon against Lijuan’s poison had failed.

47

Raphael was called into a Cadre meeting only three hours later.

Elena woke when he stirred, accompanied him down to the meeting space after pulling on some sweats. Raphael, in contrast, wore his warrior leathers—conversations with the Cadre were never simple things, especially now. The man who’d held her tucked against his bare chest, his wing her blanket, had to give way to an archangel ready for war.

Neha was streaming live from the border with China. Bright sunlight glimmered off the roofs closest to the border . . . on Lijuan’s side.

The fog was retreating.

“It’s happening all around the territory,” Neha said, her voice clipped and precise. “Lady Caliane, Michaela, Alexander, and I have had our squadrons running patrols near the border regions and they all report the same thing. The fog has begun to withdraw toward the center.”

The image on the screen changed as the feed switched to a drone flying directly over a section now clear of fog. It showed the edges of a small village.

“A typical border village,” Neha told them. “Mostly the homes of off-duty soldiers. Lijuan and I never displayed enmity toward one another, but it’d be foolish of us not to have soldiers positioned along our borders.”

Raphael, do you have soldiers along the border with Elijah?

Yes. As he has his on the other side.

Sometimes, she forgot how many layers there were to the relationships between archangels. Friendship, when it came, was a long and complicated process.

“The homes are empty,” Neha continued as the drone scanned the eerily motionless area; not even a tumbleweed blew in the wind. “She must’ve recalled her soldiers to a central location. Unexpected since she knows I have a strong force of my own, but as I said, Lijuan and I have never gone to war.”

Michaela broke in, her voice sharp. “Where are the wives, husbands, lovers, children, servants, pets? This was not a garrison. It was home.”

Elena’s skin chilled. She stared again at the scene unfolding in front of them. Absolute and utter stillness. A village utterly abandoned. No sense of life at all.

“It’s possible she called entire families back to a base command,” Titus said, his voice far more somber and quiet than was Titus’s normal.

“Possible, but unlikely.” Charisemnon curled his lip. “She was my ally, but I do not wear rose-colored glasses when it comes to her. Lijuan wouldn’t care about pets and mortal servants. They should be present.”

“We need more information.” Elijah sounded like the general he’d once been. “An abandoned border village can be explained as a strategic retreat. The animals could’ve run away disoriented during the fog.”

“Eli is right.” Raphael’s tone was calm, measured . . . but wildfire arced across his fingers out of sight of the screen. “Is it possible to switch views?”

“Yes,” Neha confirmed. “However, the border views all show the same thing. We will have to wait until the fog retreats farther inland.”

No one spoke in the interim.

The first person to appear in the footage did so on a square rooftop like the ones Elena had seen in India while on a hunt. She’d slept on a roof like that herself during the heat of summer and for a second, she thought they’d intruded on a poor schmuck who was trying to get some shut-eye under the weird fog night. Though it had to be freezing up there—roof sleeping wasn’t a winter activity and the fog must’ve caused