Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 118699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 593(@200wpm)___ 475(@250wpm)___ 396(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118699 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 593(@200wpm)___ 475(@250wpm)___ 396(@300wpm)
“Come,” he said to his friend and acting second, “we need to finish our sweep of the eastern border. The fortifications there are crumbling.”
“Yes, it’s lucky that you have Sha-yi on that border,” Avelina said as she put space between them so they could take off without tangling wings. “She’s old and pondering Sleep and not in the mood to pick a fight with a young archangel.”
Alexander paused. “Do you think it’s odd? So many of the old ones starting to slip away?”
Avelina made a face. “These are not things I think about, sire. I’m a battle hand.”
On that blunt statement, they flew out to the border that had none of the forbidding and ice-laden mountains that could be found in other parts of his territory, but the question was yet on Alexander’s mind when he met up with Caliane the next winter. She’d flown to him for the visit, for her land was now far more stable—she’d had longer as an archangel, was already becoming known in the Cadre for her calm way and unyielding spine.
When he brought up the subject with her as they sat side by side on rocks perched on a snowy mountaintop that was part of a much bigger range, the two of them feasting on the dried meats, nuts, and plump dates they’d brought along for lunch, she said, “I’ve noticed it too. I even spoke to the Librarian, asked if we had records of past Cadres.”
“You mean he hasn’t keeled over dead yet?” The Librarian was so old that Alexander was certain he must have cobwebs growing in his full white beard.
Caliane blurted out a laugh. “Alex!” A punch to his shoulder.
Alexander grinned and tore off a piece of dried meat. “I mean he has to be old,” he said after he’d chewed and swallowed. “He actually looks old!” Immortals didn’t show age after they reached a certain point of adulthood, their physical progression from that time on so imperceptible as to be non-existent.
“He’s always had white hair, you idiot. All his family does. As you well know.” Lips still curved, she dug into the bag for her favorite dried berries. “But yes, he does look a touch older than is usual among our kind—which makes him a great Librarian and Historian. He knows so many pieces of our history that I sometimes wonder if he even knew the Ancestors.”
A cold wind swept through Alexander’s bones at the mention of the angels said to Sleep below the Refuge. Angels who were so old that they might well be another species altogether. “Have you ever asked him?”
“Once, when I was a child. He gave me an inscrutable smile and said I was too young for some knowledge. Perhaps in another few eons, he’d share all with me.” A shake of her head. “He has no fear of anyone, you know. Not even archangels.”
“That’s because he’s outlived all of them,” Alexander pointed out, throwing a tidbit to a curious bird of prey that had landed nearby. “What did he say about the Cadre?”
“That things appear to happen in cycles. Some long, some short. An entire group comes in or goes out—the transition might be scattered over a few decades or a century, but it’s a pattern that holds. He says the current cycle has been one of the longest—many of the present Cadre weren’t even close to being Ancients at the beginning of their reign.”
Alexander whistled. “A long time to rule.” Considering this new information, he said, “Makes sense, doesn’t it? The cycling. It means that each Cadre has enough time to become a battle unit in case it’s ever needed. You can’t do that as effectively with constant change.”
“Can you imagine a storm that unites us all?” Caliane murmured, the date she’d taken forgotten in her hand. “It’d have to be a terrible threat indeed.”
“Let’s hope it never comes to that.” It might well augur the end of the world. “How goes it in your lands?”
“Rumaia’s stirring on my border for no reason but that she’s bored. It’s like a game to the old ones, their loyal warriors just bodies to be fed into the fire to fuel a brief respite from ennui.”
Alexander’s muscles tensed, his skin frigid—and it had little to do with his hatred of Rumaia. “Is that our future, Callie? An aimless existence devoid of challenge or growth?”
“I hope not, Alex,” Caliane said, but he knew the fear would haunt her, as it did him.
“Let’s vow to stay young in our hearts. Always.” He held out a forearm as snow began to dust their shoulders. One of his ravens landed on his shoulder at the same instant, stark black against the falling white.
Though Caliane returned the hold in the way of warriors, her expression was solemn through the snow. “I’m not certain that’s a vow we’ll be able to keep. Immortality is a slow and relentless march that crushes everything in its path. We are but its foot soldiers.”