Chapter 17

-Martin-

I don’t normally make it a habit of attacking random people on the road, but Kossiq’s life is on the line. “I’m really sorry, I just need your horse,” I say quietly as I unload the man’s belongings from the animal, before climbing atop the beast.

The man just stares at me, mouth agape. “You- you’re not- you’re not going to rob me? Or kill me? You just want my- my horse?” I nod, smiling awkwardly before digging my heels into the animal abruptly and taking off along the paved way.

Trees zip past me, the wind ruffling my hair, adamantly trying to tug it free from its string, trying to get it in my way, slow me down.

But I won’t slow down for anything, definitely won’t stop. Because I have something to do.

I have an angel to free.

—————

-Kossiq-

This isn’t like what happened to Yvo before at all. He no longer has shimmering, transparent things which resemble rippling water and glass shards. No. He has wings. Real wings. Pale blue wings, which jut from his back to show a massive wingspan.

Archangels have larger wings than we regular angels do.

Yvo doesn’t look like he’s being possessed, he doesn’t look like himself. He looks like an Archangel, with long billowing sandy-blonde hair, his wings and these clear eyes. It’s like…he’s become something new entirely.

More disturbing than any of that, however, if the fact that he’s also crumbling. Small cracks in his face, across his hands and arms. And slowly, dust shards are splintering off him, swirling away on the non-existent winds within the cell.

“Yvo? What have you done?” I ask quietly, my voice coming out both urgent and concerned. This doesn’t look healthy. Not for me (who knows if Yvo is still in there; would he just attack me out of the blue?) and certainly not for Yvo.

“Kossiq. Yvo does not have control over his body anymore. It’s me, Arche. Or sort of, both of us. Our minds are fused together, it’s a little confusing,” the Archangel says apologetically, scrunching Yvo’s eyebrows together.

“We need to go now, we have to act quickly before Yvo’s time runs out,” Arche continues, pressing a hand to the cell bars and just…ripping them apart. Holy- I didn’t know the Arche-Yvo combo would be a literal tank, but ok.

Arche slips gracefully through the bars, pulling their wings after them and huffing when the appendages get a little stuck. I manage to squeeze through a little more easily, thank fuck. If I got trapped in a cell because of my damn wings, I would actually hack them off myself.

Now comes the real obstacle. The many people out to stop me from leaving. And now stop the weird angel-Yvo thing walking around. Arche barely even registers the Duchess’s guards as they try to attack the Archangel; they wrap their wings around me protectively, and keep walking forwards.

As knives and daggers hit Arche’s wings, a sound like metal clinking together chimes, and I smile wryly. Of course Arche has indestructible wings or something; why hadn’t I realised that sooner?!

We need to hurry up. The wings around us are starting to crumble, the cracks exacerbated by the attack on them- how come the guards still haven’t given up?

We suddenly stop moving as Arche- Yvo, bends over and abruptly spews blood onto the ground. “Stop, you’re going to die! Just give up, this is all so fucking hopeless anyway,” I exclaim, taking Yvo by the shoulders and shaking him.

He doesn’t even see me, and just continues frog-marching us to the stables.

“Arche, please. I know you care about nothing and no one, but Yvo will die. He fucked up big time, but he doesn’t deserve to die- he’s only 18 for fuck’s sake!” Arche stops again, grabbing my arm and staring into my eyes.

“I do care. I care about you, and I care about Yvo. But this is what he wanted; he wanted more power, so I’m giving it to him. But don’t ever think that it isn’t killing me too to make him go through this.”

I stare at the Archangel for a moment, before I’m pulled along again by Arche’s strong grip. “What do you mean? You’re an Archangel, you can’t die,” I reason, trying to catch my step as Arche increases their pace.

“That’s not what I mean.” They suddenly sigh, shaking their head. “I love Yvo. And I hate that I’m the one to end his life. That’s what I mean,” Arche says, sounding the most human I’ve ever heard an Archangel speak.

I didn’t realise. All this time, Yvo had already figured out what was happening between Martin and me, but I had no clue he and Arche had something going on. Him spending half the time in a vision makes more sense now; it was the only way to spend time with Arche.

Rounding the corner into the stables, Arche curses. “No fucking horses.” I glance around, my heart sinking further than I thought it could. There are guards pouring from the mansion; we’ll never make it out in time.

Arche lets go of me, raising their hands and bringing up shard-like feathers with the gesture. “Things are going to get dusty,” they say calmly before flicking their wrist with practiced grace, sending the feather into the nearest guard, and instantly turning him to dust.

People always think angels are good. Not really, we’re merely living organisms, the same as everyone else. We can neither be inherently good, nor bad. We are only the watchers of the heavens, the guardians of the gate to the demon realm. We only look down upon the humans when we have nothing better to do.

We aren’t good, and we aren’t bad. We’re only alive.