Azrael Morningfall's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

The library still smelled of spilled ink and torn pages. Azrael knelt by the reading stand and pressed his ash to the book again. Golden letters rose, then stopped halfway. The rest of the page stayed blank. He needed those pages. Without them, he could not learn to steady his new form. Najera, the keeper who had taught him to hold both his halves, watched from the shadows. Her mousy brown hair fell loose. Her dark red dress was torn from the fight. "The book won't open for me anymore," Azrael said. "I'm stuck." Najera touched the cold page. "The book has given you what it can here. The rest waits somewhere else. Come. My home is safer than this pit." She led him up the stairs and out into the open air. Her home stood tall and warm, with painted shutters and a wide door. Inside, lamps glowed. For once, no blade waited for him. Azrael felt his shoulders drop. He opened his white wing without thinking. Najera did not leave. She stayed, and poured him tea, and listened. Something softened between them, quiet and real. She set a small box on the table. Inside lay a ring, two halves woven into one band, sun and moon locked together. "I found this years ago," she said. "I did not know who it was for. Now I do." Azrael slid the ring onto his finger. Warmth spread through his chest. The ache that had pulled at his seam for hours went still. His form settled, solid and sure. "It holds me together," he breathed. "Even when I'm tired." "There is more," Najera said. She drew back a cloth near the hearth. A sword lay there, its blade dark as night sky, stars and twin wings etched down the steel. Azrael lifted it. Power surged up his arm, tenfold what he had known. The blade matched him, light and dark in one edge. "Then I'm ready to stop hiding," he said. Najera's face turned grim. "The ring steadies you. But both Heaven and Hell still feel your shape. Walking out means walking into their sight." Azrael chose anyway. He traveled to a town built like a sleeping dragon, its roofs curved into wings and ridges. He stepped through the gate with the ring on his hand and the blade on his back. People stared at his two wings but did not flee. A tall figure blocked his path. Red scales, green belly, horns swept back, a tail dragging the stone. The dragonborn studied him with slit eyes. "You carry that blade," the dragonborn said, voice low as a grinding mill. "And you wear the ring. I have waited for the one who holds both." He bared his teeth. "You should not have brought them here. They mark you. And something already hunts you through this town." Azrael's hand found the hilt. The ring held him steady. But he was no longer hidden, and the hunt had already begun.