Archangel's Heart
Page 91

“His quarters are through here,” Donael began, but Elena shook her head, her crossbow in hand so she could watch Raphael’s back as he carried Ibrahim.
“We’re taking him to our suite,” she said, having no need to check with Raphael on that—she knew her archangel, had heard the fury in his tone.
Donael didn’t argue. “Of course, of course.” His breathing was ragged, white lines bracketing his mouth. “I don’t understand. We do not have violence at Lumia.”
The repetition of the patently untrue words had Elena snapping. “Yeah?” she said, her tone harsh. “What about the violence visited on the townspeople? That’s apparently okay?”
Donael looked at her with a complete lack of comprehension as he tried to keep up with her and Raphael’s long strides. “I have no reason to go to the town. There is no peace there, as is oft the case with mortal places. Always moving this way and that, always living their lives in fast-forward.”
The sea rolled into her mind, touched with floes of ice. He is old, Elena. Truly old. He may not ever go into the town.
Maybe. And maybe he’s just a really good actor.
“Why would anyone harm Ibrahim?” Donael’s voice had settled, but his expression remained shaken. “He is a child, one with a calling, but a child nonetheless.” A careful look at Raphael. “We have many non-Luminata here.”
“And I’ve seen Gian and others practicing martial arts,” Raphael’s consort bit out. “Violence isn’t off-limits in Lumia.”
“Controlled violence,” Donael protested. “A form of movement to aid meditation. It’s different from this atrocity.”
“True,” Raphael responded. “But we can debate who it was that hurt Ibrahim later. For now, do you have a healer in Lumia?”
“There is only the one called Stillness.” An angling of his head, a pause that said he was riffling through his memories to find the correct one. “The boy had another name once, and under that name, he was a student of healing.”
Aodhan, Raphael said, reaching out with his mind. We need a healer. Can you find Laric?
I’m with him at this moment, sire. Where shall I bring him?
To our suite.
When they reached their rooms, Raphael laid Ibrahim down on the bed he and Elena had moved to the living area, and as he did so, Ibrahim’s right arm slid down the injured male’s side. The movement was so strangely fluid that Raphael gently pushed up the sleeve of the man’s robe.
“His arm is in pieces,” Elena gritted out, her free hand fisted, the one holding her crossbow pointing it safely down and away from anyone in the vicinity. “Like it’s been deliberately smashed.”
Elena was right. It was as if whoever had harmed Ibrahim had focused his rage on this one arm after taking the angel down. But the rest of Ibrahim’s body hadn’t escaped insult by any measure. When Raphael opened Ibrahim’s robe and tore open the fine tunic he wore beneath, he saw the man’s ribs had been crushed inward, likely perforating his organs and causing bleeding on the inside if the swelling in his abdomen was anything to go by.
His face, too, was battered and fractured.
Bruises bloomed on every part of him that Raphael could see.
Though Donael called Ibrahim young, he had to be over a thousand years old to have been permitted to become a Luminata initiate. “He’ll survive,” Raphael told Elena, because his hunter knew very well that immortals could be killed. “He may, however, go into anshara.” The healing sleep might be the best thing for him.
Aodhan entered the room without knocking, the hooded Luminata by his side short of stature and small of form with shoulders that were hunched in and a gait that was hesitant. Laric came to Ibrahim’s side at once, the hands he placed on Ibrahim’s broken body an icy white marked with ridged scars of dark pink.
Stepping back to give the healer room to work, Raphael and his hunter both turned to Donael. It was Elena who spoke first. “Did you see or hear anything before you found him?”
A deep frown before Donael nodded slowly. “Yes. I heard muted thumps.” Dark gray eyes lingering on Ibrahim. “Such as could be made by punches being thrown into flesh. I did not like the sound, knew it was wrong in this place, so I called out.” His hands trembled as he tucked them into the sleeves of his robe. “I soon heard footsteps moving quickly away and there was no one but poor young Ibrahim in the hallway when I arrived.”
If Donael was telling the truth, he’d surprised Ibrahim’s attacker. That, however, brought up another question. “How long would that hallway usually be empty at this time of night?” Raphael asked.
“Close as it is to the dinner bell, it is not a time for contemplation for most of us,” Donael said slowly. “And the hallway is a crossroads for many. A ‘shortcut,’ the young ones call it.” The angel released a quiet breath. “I wouldn’t expect it to be empty for more than five minutes at most.”
“I don’t think this was a five-minute beating.” Elena’s voice was gritty. “An angel as old as Ibrahim couldn’t be so badly hurt so quickly . . . unless it was more than one person.”
“No,” Aodhan interrupted. “Laric says it was only one.”
Raphael turned to the angel, not asking how he was in communication with the silent healer. “Why?”
“He’s no expert, but there doesn’t seem to be enough variation in the blows.”