chapter twenty-eight

Michael’s eyes, warm as an embrace, drew me to him. He twined his fingers around mine, and when our palms met, everything fell away—the room, the cathedral, St. Mary’s, the crypt. We stood in a place bathed in light, the colors of the rainbow filling my vision.

A bearded giant of a man, his hands resting on the hilt of a sword so broad it was as wide as me, stood in front of an octagonal building with a beam of light shooting from its center into the vastness of space. He nodded when our eyes met, but didn’t speak.

“Where are we?” I asked in a whisper. Michael dipped his head, resting his forehead on mine, our noses touching.

“We’re nowhere. Everywhere. We’re on the Bridge between worlds.”

“How did we get here? And why is there no Remembering?” I shivered as I realized I might Remember . . . things . . . with Michael right here beside me. I didn’t want him to know just what kind of monster I’d become since the time when he loved me.

“Heimdall,” Michael glanced at the giant god, who nodded once more and turned his back, giving us privacy, “is a friend. He extracted no price to bring us here.” Michael lifted my chin with his finger, so I couldn’t hide with my cheek against his shoulder.

“Besides, I am your memory too. And I wanted you to Remember me.” His eyes deepened as I stared into them. I felt like I was falling,

falling,

falling

into them and I never, ever wanted to stop.

He held my face in his hands. Kissed my forehead. Kissed the corners of my eyes, and oh, I’d never felt kisses so gentle. He kissed the corner of my lips, just the corner. I wished for him to really kiss me, but at the same time I didn’t wanted him to stop this soft shower of love.

I Remembered the first time I met him, standing in my favorite garden.

When I enter the clearing, he stands with his back to me, and I almost turn around. At first I don’t recognize him, and I think I know everyone in the Great City. So instead I hang back, one hand holding the branch of a birch tree so I can see him unobstructed.

He crouches and plucks a tender stem from the cluster of Lily of the Valley at his feet. The stem bows under the weight of its tiny, heady blossoms. The man puts a shining sword on the ground next to him, and I gasp.

I do know him—he is Michael, Odin’s general, a great warrior.

He turns then, one hand hovering in the air above the hilt of his sword. When our eyes meet, he pulls his hand back and rests it lightly on his knees. And then he smiles.

“Hello,” he says.

“Hello.” I step around the tree and smooth my dress. “I’m . . .”

He stands and crosses the short distance until he’s close to me. Very close. “I know.” And searching his eyes, I see he does know. And I do too.

He smiles, as glorious as the sun, his eyes a pool of love that I want to swim in forever. Michael, my love, tilts his head back to greet the sky with his laughter. And when he pulls me to him, I laugh too. Because this is how it sometimes is in Asgard. You can know, or not know, someone your whole life and then you See them. A gift from the gods—love.

Complete.

Perfect.

Forever.

At the Bridge, Michael moved his hands up my arms and smiled, a subdued reflection of the one he gave me that day in the garden. “Do you Remember?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

I Remembered everything.

I Remembered the day not long after meeting Michael, that Odin presented me with the staff. He told me I was his Spear of Destiny—that I would bring truth to all the worlds when it was most needed. He said the staff could be used to commit great evil or great good, and that I would determine its path. I didn’t understand what he meant but I glowed with happiness as I accepted the staff, a rare gift from the Tree of Knowledge itself.

I Remembered other things, too.

Akaros and his seething jealousy.

Loki and his endless debates over whose plan was best, his or Odin’s.

The dark and dreadful day when Michael raised his sword against him and all who sided with him. The day Odin cast them out.

And I realized then that Father did have reason to call the Apocalypse. Because he had always wanted to punish Odin, to punish all of us. He always believed he’d been wronged.

I straightened my back and looked Michael square in the eye. I nodded. “I Remember.”

Michael pulled me to him once again and wrapped his arms around me.

When he stepped back, I realized it hadn’t been his arms only, but his wings as well. Their golden Halo gently receded and I found we were back in the room. No one seemed to have noticed we were gone—it seemed only our spirits had made the journey. But Knowles had a small smirk on his lips and something like wariness in his eyes.

“So Father is calling for Hell on Earth.” My voice rang in the small room like a gong. “How do we stop him?”