The photo’s appearance now of all times was unnerving. It forcibly brought back his dreams of Miranda – her face, gazing up at him. You know, I’m often confused now…

Raziel’s teeth gritted. The dreams mean nothing, he reminded himself. Miranda was dead; before that she’d been catatonic. She could not be haunting him.

Their child was a different matter.

“You were wise to run, my daughter,” Raziel murmured to the blonde, smiling girl. He stroked a finger over the frame. “But you can’t run fast enough. I’ll find you very soon – you, and whatever powers you’re hiding.”

30

ALEX AND I WENT TO an empty room on the town hall’s chilly second floor. As soon as he shut the door behind us, I let out a shaky breath and wrapped my arms around him.

“Whatever this is, can it wait just a few minutes?” I said hoarsely against his leather jacket.

His voice was rough too. “Yeah – that’s an excellent idea.” His arms enfolded me; he dropped his head down to my shoulder. I pressed close, listening to his steady heartbeat under my cheek.

“I still can’t believe this,” I said finally. I drew back and wiped my eyes. “Oh god, Alex, to actually have you back again…” I couldn’t finish; I’d start crying for real.

“I know. It must have been—” Alex broke off as he studied me. “You look different,” he said softly. He stroked his knuckle across my cheekbone. “Your face and your eyes.”

I thought of the grief that had lodged in my throat these past twelve months, making it hard to eat, giving me hollowed-out cheekbones. My reflection in the truck’s rear-view mirror on the way here: my eyes showing a year’s worth of pain.

And Alex’s voice when he’d left: Trust me.

An emotion stirred that I didn’t want to analyze. I pushed it away and tried to smile. “Just another year older, that’s all.”

He nodded slowly. “Yeah…I guess that’s it.” He kissed me; I shut my eyes as his warm lips touched mine. Then he sighed and rubbed my arms. “You know, all I want to do is hold you for about the next week, but…”

“I know.” I could sense his apprehension over whatever he had to tell me – and suddenly recalled my premonition that whatever happened in Pawntucket would be especially awful for me. I could have done without remembering that, right then.

There was a metal table with folding chairs; we sat down. Alex took my hand. “See, my dad’s idea was that the energy field in the angels’ world could be used to destroy them,” he said. “Cully thought it was possible, so I had to try it – even though getting there seemed suicidal. That’s why I didn’t tell you. Just imagining the look on your face…”

The look on my face. I thought of this last year again and couldn’t respond.

Alex sat gazing down, playing with my fingers. “Anyway, the blast destroyed the gate, and then I wasn’t able to connect with the energy field anyway – I was just stuck. So I went to Denver to try and find another way back home, and…that’s when it happened.”

“When what happened?”

He took a breath. “Willow, I met your mother in the angels’ world.”

The words slammed into me. My spine jerked away from the seat. “You what?”

“Yeah,” he said softly. “Humans who have severe angel burn are like ghosts there. Their physical bodies still exist here in our world, but their minds just…go wandering with the angels.” He gave a sad smile, his thumb rubbing my palm. “She’s beautiful. She looks just like you. She’s been, like – frozen in time at twenty-one.”

Alex described his encounter with my mother as I sat stunned, drinking in every word. “She asked about you,” he said. “She wanted to know everything. And…she wished she’d been a better mother.”

“She did the best she could,” I said fiercely, swiping at sudden tears. “I always knew that – even as a little girl.”

Alex squeezed my hand hard. “She helped me escape,” he said quietly after a pause. “And, Willow…” He hesitated. “She said you could be the one to link to the energy field in the angels’ world.”

I straightened, staring. “Me?”

“You’re half angel, half human. You can straddle the two worlds and use their energy field to destroy them. I’m pretty sure that’s what Paschar’s vision meant.”

Was Paschar’s vision really true, then? I shook my head in a daze. “But, Alex, the immunity to the angels that’s happening here…Jonah thinks that has something to do with me too.” Quickly, I told him what Jonah had said. “None of this makes any sense!”

“Maybe it does.”

My hand in his went cold. “How?”

Alex shrugged. “The quakes were the most catastrophic event our world’s ever known – on the ethereal level too. What if, afterwards, humanity started trying to heal itself? Maybe people are unconsciously reaching out to the one thing that could save them from the angels.”

“Me, in other words,” I said in disbelief.

“Yeah, maybe. Except the only ones who can manage it are those who’ve been around you and know what your energy feels like.”

I remembered standing above Pawntucket with Seb – that strange sensation of the whole world straining towards me. “Fine, but that doesn’t explain what it is about me that lets them all marshal themselves! Why not Seb?”

Alex’s gaze was level. “Because he’s not the one who could save them. To be able to connect with the angel world’s energy field, you’ll need a link there to ground you, and you’ve got your mother. A piece of her energy is there – you connect to it every time you reach out to her.”

I opened my mouth; at first nothing came out. “So you’re saying that Paschar was right,” I said finally. “I really am the one who can destroy them.”

I could sense Alex’s fears for me. “Yeah, I guess that’s what I’m saying,” he said shortly. “And that means we’ve got to hold the angels back, no matter what. Miranda said that you need to try from Pawntucket – there must be a gate here you can still get through. If the angels destroy it, that’s our last chance gone for ever.”

My brain felt numb. We’d hoped to defeat them so many times. But oh, god, if this was true… I pressed my fingers against my temples. “Did Mom say where the gate was?”

“No, she didn’t get a chance.”

“Well, she didn’t get out much, so…maybe it’s somewhere in Aunt Jo’s house?” The idea was bizarre, but no more so than anything else today.

Alex got up. “Okay, let’s check it out. If we’re lucky, we can find it fast and do this before the angels even get here.” Then he stopped. “Wait, I haven’t had a chance to ask – how are things back at the base?”

My chest went tight. I saw Sam fall again – heard the screams of almost two hundred AKs. The news would devastate Alex. And what good would telling him now do, with thousands of angels about to attack?

I rose too, and ducked my head as I zipped my parka. “They’re all fine.” I glanced up and managed a smile. “We’ve been recruiting new people, training them… Everyone’s fine.”

Alex looked relieved. He touched my hair. “Good. When we have time, I want to hear everything that’s been going on, okay?”

That strange emotion flickered again like a dull flame. Remembering how I’d cried myself to sleep at night in the bed we’d shared, I almost said, I don’t think you really want to know, Alex.

I swallowed – and instead of speaking, just hugged him hard.

He was alive. That was all that mattered.

At my Aunt Jo’s old house, I was bracing myself for a black, burned-out shell – instead there was only a vacant lot and a driveway that led to nothing. I couldn’t stop staring. It was like no one had ever lived there at all.

We searched the ethereal plane for hours. Nothing – and when I reached out to ask Mom where she’d meant, her energy was as warm and unresponsive as ever. I tried reading Alex too…and though the image of my mother that was in his mind brought tears to my eyes, I didn’t get anything new.