Rhianon-4. Secrets of the Celestials. Natalie Yacobson

said innocently. Is he a devil? His surroundings may have made him doubt otherwise, but Rhianon remembered the other things: the tent, the bed, lily petals.

      “I know you as a man,” she reminded him, “others remember you as a warrior, and no one knows the truth.”

      “Not even myself. Sometimes you can get tangled up in all the things you’ve created yourself. It’s like a golden web, you’ve woven it and now you’re surrounded by it. But I’m looking for ways out.”

      “I really can help. You don’t believe I’m capable of anything?”

      “I don’t want to risk you,” he looked at her seriously. “This is not a child’s game, Rhianon. This is combat. Not the tiny battle you fought on earth. It can take forever, and it can become more and more complicated. It is difficult to fight forever, even with my powers. And you have such a frail body.”

      He put his hands on her shoulders, so thin and delicate. With a press of his fingers he could crush every bone in them. His acquisition, made in a mortal world, was so vulnerable, it would take only a push to wipe it away, and yet he looked at his new toy with unspeakable tenderness. There in heaven he had a bracelet, here on earth a girl appeared. During the battle in heaven, the bracelet twisted from the sun’s rays in the shape of a golden crowned snake came to life and stung him with such fury that he was no longer able to clutch his sword in his hand. Maybe that’s why he lost. Maybe…” Madael lowered his head, unable to finish the thought. What would the girl bring him? His favorite with golden curls and eyes as clear as the sky, would she one day be able to strike out at the one who embraced her? Is she capable of betrayal?

      “It is always the most beloved who betray,” his former assistant’s voice whispered to him from the darkness.

      He did not want to think about that now. Rhianon may be a copy of him in appearance, but only in appearance. He would not give her cause to rebel against himself. He would be very gentle with her. Though it is amazing how a hand capable of clutching a sword and slashing without mercy can be gentle at all. Perhaps there is a romance. Strength resigned to beauty. Gently he lifted her face by the chin with his fingertips and touched her seductive lips with a light kiss.

      “I’ll give you anything you want, just don’t put yourself in danger for anything. Don’t risk, just wait until I bring you what you want. Believe me, in time I can give you everything.”

      He tried to put all his feelings into those words. Did Rhianon understand him?

      She looked anxiously at the spot where the harp had recently been lying. The musical instrument had disappeared somewhere. The drapery no longer fluttered either. Then Arnaud was no longer there. Perhaps he really is capable of leaking into any crevices. Rhianon breathed a sigh of relief. Of course, Madael could have found out about everything. He would have been able to read it in her eyes, but now he was busy with his own complicated business and the intricacies of the world’s laws. So her lie passed easily. She didn’t want to explain to him about the harp or Arnaud. What if he got angry? Would his anger cost poor Arnaud his life? She didn’t want to let the minstrel down at all. Whatever he was, he deserved the right to live. Unlike the rest of her acquaintances, he had never once plotted against her or uttered hurtful words, so she could repay him in kind.

      “You said we wouldn’t spend the night here,” she reminded him.

      “Are you sleepy yet?”

      “No,” she looked at him questioningly, as if he were planning something, or thinking of making some sort of suggestion.

      “Then let’s go. If you want a new experience, I have something to show you,” he took her hand and forced her up. “You know, I’ve always wished to wander my kingdom with someone, not alone.”

      Rhianon felt someone place the cloak of purple damask with silver edging on her shoulders and quickly unfold it. She did not even have time to look back. The shadowy servant had already vanished into the darkness.

      “It’s cold out there,” Madael explained.

      “Is it outside?”

      “It is outside the walls of that tower.”

      He said it casually, as if he were used to being or keeping prisoners. Rhianon shuddered. The walls of this place truly seemed to her to be living creatures, capable of emitting moans and evil energy. She looked around, but she saw nothing strange this time. Everything around her was silent. But she already knew how deceptive that calm could be.

      Night was already falling over the land when Madael took her outside. In the tower it was impossible to tell exactly what time of day it was, for there was always darkness, just as in their celestial castle it was always dawn. Rhianon had already realized that in some of the enchanted places chosen for the unearthly to dwell, time could simply stand still. It did not apply to the mortal world. She sensed a sudden change. It was indeed much colder than the last time she had been on earth. A frosty wind blew in her face as they flew into the darkness of night. Above the black valley that surrounded the tower, Madael suddenly descended. Poisonous fumes whiffed in her face.

      “What was out there?”

      She spotted some creatures wriggling on the ground. The writhing bodies were naked despite the cold, and the pathetic, muddy rags that covered the sores were scarcely what they looked like. From below, cries and moans could be heard.

      “They burn like you from within, though there is no fire inside them, only infection.”

      “I want to take a closer look,” she saw, even from her height, that some small creatures were climbing up to the sores and gnawing into them. It was hard to tell who was squirming in the potholes on the ground: humans and nonhumans. If human, they had lost their human appearance as quickly as Madael’s angelic servants.

      “It’s dangerous,” he warned. “Even immortals get infected from them sometimes.”

      “So why don’t you burn them. Leave only ashes of them.”

      “It is poison ashes,” he corrected. “It will scatter across the world and poison others, your beautiful fairies, for example. Besides, who told you that when we are dismembered, shattered, or even burned to ashes, we cease to feel pain?”

      “But…” She thought it was too monstrous.

      “Chop me up into thousands and thousands of tiny pieces, and each of them will retain all my feelings, including my feelings for you. The latter is fine. But they don’t have that feeling. They have only anguish.”

      “I pity them.”

      “Don’t feel sorry for them. They’ve earned theirs.”

      His indifference echoed over the valley of sores like a bell. Even she was hurt by it.

      “But they are your army. They went after you.”

      “So what is it?”

      “Should you feel anything for them?”

      “They chose their fate.”

      “Stop!” She felt something attached to her belt snap off and fly down to the contaminated ground. It was the mirror she’d been carrying, and it must have shattered, falling from such a height, but she still wanted the golden frame back, even if it had no glass.

      “Come down, please.”

      He complied with her request and let her pick up the shiny object. Rhianon brushed dirt and lumps of earth from the mirror. To her joy it didn’t break or even crack. The glass must have been enchanted. She twirled it around, catching reflections of the squalid wasteland in the distance and the writhing bodies nearby. She held the mirror up to the moaning creature beneath her feet and almost dropped it in surprise. It reflected not a black, hunched-over creature, but a beautiful creature, wounded, moaning, but beautiful. Blood streaks ran down its white face and the same white wings behind its shoulders, but they did nothing to spoil it. The same two deep streaks also dissected