Grace and Glory (The Harbinger #3) - Jennifer L. Armentrout Page 0,4
ran and ran, blindly cutting through traffic and nearly mowing down countless people as my sneakers pounded off pavement. How I didn’t get flattened by a car was beyond me. Every part of my body hurt, but I didn’t slow down. I didn’t even know where I was going—
Follow me.
My feet stumbled as the voice that was so not mine echoed around me. Breathing heavy, I slowed. Harsh yellow streetlights cast ominous shadows along the sidewalks. Faces and bodies were nothing more than shapeless blurs as horns honked from the street and people shouted.
Follow me, Trueborn.
Either I was losing my mind, which in my humble, nonbiased opinion would be completely understandable at this point, or I was actually hearing a voice in my head.
But didn’t hearing voices in your head also mean you were losing your mind?
Follow me, child of Michael. It is your only hope to restore the one who Fell for you.
A sudden image of what had looked like a star plummeting to Earth formed. Zayne. That had been Zayne.
Fallen.
He said he was Fallen.
I knew what that meant, but it couldn’t be.
Follow me.
The voice...it sounded like it bled power. It was no voice I could imagine. I swallowed dryly, my gaze darting around erratically and seeing nothing. Zayne had come back from the dead—he’d come back different in a very Pet Sematary way, and with wings, but he’d come back. That was him, and he was alive, so I could very well be hearing a real voice in my head.
Anything was possible at this point.
But if the voice was real, how in the world was I supposed to follow something I couldn’t see?
No sooner had that thought finished, I heard, Trust your grace. It knows where to go. You’re already halfway to where you need to be.
Trust my grace? I almost laughed, but I was too winded to do so. I was already halfway to where I needed to be? All I had been doing was running...
I’d been running blindly.
I’d run with no real conscious thought. Just like when I touched Zayne. Instinct had taken over both times, and instinct and grace were one and the same.
I was willing to try anything that would help me figure out what had happened to Zayne.
Picking up my pace, I started running and went straight until I took a left. There was no reason. I just cut down a street and then kept going. Then I took a right. It started raining, coming down steadily. I had no idea where I was going. Heart thumping against my ribs, I crossed a congested corner. I hadn’t heard the voice again, and just when I was beginning to fear I had imagined it, I saw the...the church across the street, slowly becoming more clear. Constructed of stone and with many steeples and turrets, it looked like something straight out of medieval times. Every part of me knew that was where I’d been led to. How or why, I had no idea.
I thought I recognized the church as I climbed the wide steps, passing between two lit lampposts. Saint Patrick’s or something? Moonlight glinted off the cross above the doorway, and for a moment, it looked like it glowed with heavenly light.
Stepping under the alcove, I drew in a shallow breath. Rain coursed down the side of my face and off my clothing. Blood caked under my mouth. Was it mine? Zayne’s? I wasn’t sure. I had a sinking suspicion that I might’ve cracked a rib that probably had just healed, but I felt no pain. Maybe because I was feeling so much it didn’t leave room for my body to beg for a time-out.
“Here goes nothing,” I muttered, approaching the door, and halted.
Every hair on my body stood and the sense of unease grew until I found it difficult to swallow. Having no idea what to expect, I opened the heavy doors and stepped inside the building built over two centuries ago. An immediate fissure of electricity danced over my skin, like a warning that I was...that I was somewhere I didn’t belong.
A child of any angel, let alone an archangel, was a big no-no even though I was basically created to fight for all the holy rollers. I shouldn’t be all that surprised by how every instinct in me demanded that I turn and leave.
But I didn’t.
My muscles locked as a small door to my right creaked open. A young priest swathed in white robes with red trim stepped out.