“Ascend to your throne? Do you think you’re God? Jesus?”

He gave me a look of withering disdain. “You know nothing of these matters. I will join Uriel as the guardian of heaven and earth, and wickedness will be burned out. The Fallen will be entombed in the middle of the earth as Lucifer has been, there to suffer eternal torment—”

“I get the picture.” There was a messianic gleam to his eye now, and I’d learned at my mother’s knee that there was nothing worse than a zealot. “And what happens to me?”

“You are the whore of a fallen one. There is no mercy or forgiveness for you.” He took my wrist, his hand grinding my bones together, but I bit my lip and didn’t say anything. “He awaits you.”

He dragged me out onto the narrow terrace, and I gave up all dignity and shrieked for help, prepared to fight like hell before I let him throw me over.

Instead he put one beefy arm around my waist and soared upward, into the moonlit sky.

I stopped struggling. He could easily have dropped me, and I’d never liked heights. Yes, I know I was supposed to be over all my phobias, but there were a lot of things that were supposed to be true that so far had failed me.

I hadn’t been afraid when I flew with Raziel. But Raziel was my mate, my soul, everything to me. Since I was probably going to die, there was no need to try to talk myself out of it. It was completely unoriginal of me, but I was desperately in love with my beautiful fallen angel, and thank God I was going to die before I told him. At least I’d be saved that embarrassment.

Except that he knew. He had to have heard me, known me, during those endless, blissful hours of taking and giving. He knew I was in love with him, and had been since . . . I could no longer remember when I didn’t love him. It was so much a part of me that I couldn’t separate it into time or space. Loved him so much that I could die for him, leap into hell for him. Whatever I had to do.

I had a choice. I felt dangerously close to tears, but I wasn’t going to give in to weakness. If I was going to die, I was going down in flames, and I’d take Sammael with me if I could.

We landed hard on the side of the mountain, and he released me as if my touch were something unclean. I landed on my butt, and as I looked up into his face I managed to muster clear disdain. “So where’s Raziel? Did you kill him already? And what are you going to do about all the others?” It wasn’t over until it was over, and if I could get him to do the Evil Warlord shtick and reveal his wicked plans, I might just possibly have a chance to stop him.

Particularly if he turned into a snake, which, according to Number 666 of the Evil Overlord Rules, never helps.

No, he couldn’t do that. I was getting a little giddy—too many things had happened to me, and I was tired of being buffeted around.

“The others will be no problem. Their women are dead or dying. If there is no Source, they will weaken and die. The next time I let the Nephilim in, they will devour the rest, and I will ascend to heaven.”

“Unless they devour you too,” I pointed out, trying to be practical. “So I get to die because I’m the Source. Lucky me. Why kill Raziel? Why not let him weaken and die like the others?” It would take a hell of a long time for Raziel to weaken enough that Sammael or a whole host of Nephilim could take him, and before that happened he’d figure out who the traitor was. I had absolutely no doubt about that.

I’d be dead, though. And I didn’t want to die. I wanted to spend as long as I could with Raziel, no matter how bossy he was.

“I can’t kill you without killing Raziel. If he loses his mate too soon, he’ll be very dangerous.”

Yeah, right. For some reason I couldn’t picture Raziel losing it over my untimely demise. For him, I was simply a matter of destiny. It wasn’t as if he really wanted a mate. If I died, he’d have a get-out-of-jail-free pass.

I got to my feet slowly, feeling bruised and cold. He’d flown me up high, where the air was thin and icy, and I still felt chilled. “You know,” I said in a conversational tone, “I don’t want to die. Couldn’t we work something out?” If Raziel wasn’t dead yet, there was still hope. I couldn’t believe that Raziel could be bested by a little shit like Sammael.

“What you want means nothing to me,” he said.

I ignored him. “I spent the first part of my life with a religious crackpot. I’d rather not be killed by one.”

Sammael was unmoved. “He’s waiting for you. And I have things to do. Start walking.”

I looked at the great yawning maw of the cave, and a cold sweat broke over me. “Is he still alive?” Because if he wasn’t, I decided I’d just as soon die outside, beneath the clear night sky, as down in some dark hole.

“He lives,” Sammael said grudgingly. “He waits.”

“I go,” I said, matching his terse language. And I started up the pathway.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

HE WAS LYING ON HIS BACK AT the far side of the huge stone cavern, and for a moment I thought he was dead. Raziel’s color was always a pale golden, but right now he looked ashen, and he was absolutely still. He looked like he had that first night in the forest when he was dying from the poisoned burn.

“What have you done to him?” I whispered to the man whose hand was clamped onto my arm. I yanked at it, but I was no longer trying to escape. I was desperate to get to Raziel.

He released me, and I stumbled forward, almost falling to my knees. I ran across the hard rock floor, ignoring everything in my haste to reach my mate. I sank down on my knees, throwing my arms around him in a way I would never have dared to if he’d been conscious. I could hear his heart beating, more faintly than usual but still steady, and his skin was cool. I wanted to hide my face against his chest, but it would do no good. Sammael wasn’t going to change his mind, walk away. God save me from zealots.

I rose, looking down into Raziel’s still face. His tawny hair had fallen back, and he looked starkly beautiful, from his high cheekbones, his chiseled features, to his pale mouth that could do such lovely, wicked things. I let my hand brush his hair back from his high forehead, gently. “What did you do to him?” I whispered, unable to keep the anguish out of my voice.

“I thought you didn’t care for him,” Sammael said. “Why are you mourning him?”

I looked back at him. “You know perfectly well why,” I said, irritation breaking through my despair. “I’m in love with him. I’m his bonded mate, his soul, whether either of us likes it or not.”

“You both like it,” Sammael said with an ugly twist to his mouth. “I know these things. You rut like animals. You are what caused them to fall in the first place.”

“Hey, I wasn’t even there,” I protested, looking around me for any kind of weapon.