Chapter 32.2

Vee didn’t necessarily wake up that morning; it felt more like admitting defeat. She’d spent a good portion of the night trying and failing to get comfortable, tossing and turning while trying to warm herself up. Despite the many blankets she’d piled on herself, despite the powerful Enochian wards, the cold had still found her.

She pushed her blankets to the side, swinging her legs gently to the floor. As she prepared to start her morning stretches, hoping some activity might warm her up, she flinched. Her feet bumped against something on the floor, something noticeably warm compared to its surroundings. Vee looked down quickly and saw that she’d barely avoided stepping on Amara’s tail. Her foot was resting less than an inch away from it, and the heat it gave off felt incredible.

Memories from yesterday returned, accompanied by a wave of emotions. She hadn’t intended to start a shouting match; she had just been fed up with Amara’s bad attitude. Apparently her frustration had just been a spark, and it ignited everything that had gone unsaid between the two of them.

She already knew quite a bit about Amara’s transformation from her conversation with Nick, but he hadn’t been able to capture the most important part: the fear. Even though Amara never admitted it, Vee could tell how afraid the transformation had made her, and it was easy to see why. Amara didn’t have a worldwide institution dedicated to helping her adjust to her supernatural lineage, nor did she have a supportive family to help break the news to her. She’d simply grown a tail out of the blue, with no idea that magic and monsters even existed.

Amara’s story had been incredibly insightful, and Vee had regretted that the conversation hadn’t continued longer, but there was so much to process. While the cold of Purgatory was certainly a big issue, she also knew that her tumultuous thoughts had contributed to her lack of sleep.

One thought, more than anything else, had become a point of fixation for her. Amara’s transformation had terrified her, upended her entire view of the world. In the face of all that uncertainty, however, she had tried to give herself one night of happiness. A chance to embrace her new identity, even if she didn’t fully understand what exactly she was.

And Vee had tried to murder her.

It was, perhaps, the one thought that Vee had been trying to avoid for weeks. Sure, everything she’d told Amara was true; she was scared of disobeying the Church, of discovering that their teachings were wrong. She was scared of learning that her own existence was built on a lie, but that fear didn’t seem as important right now. Above all else, hiding underneath every other fear, was one simple truth; accepting that Amara was different meant accepting that she’d tried to murder her best friend in cold blood without reason.

Of the two of them, who was really the monster?

Amara seemed convinced it was her, but hadn’t the entire world been telling her that for months? Hadn’t Vee basically told her that by driving a sword through her chest?

It was one thing to see hints, clues that Amara had felt bad. Yes, she’d cleaned up the palace, raised money for charity with her pictures, but there had always been distance between them. In person, faced with the entirety of Amara’s experience, Vee had felt just visceral Amara’s guilt was. It was tearing her apart, it was driving her to lash out, and it was even robbing her of her flight.

Vee didn’t need any more proof. There would be no more second guessing, no more hesitation. Amara was a demon, yes, but she was so much more than that. She was a friend, and most surprisingly, a kindred spirit.

She didn’t feel alone anymore.

Wiping a tear from her eye, Vee carefully stepped over Amara’s various limbs and headed for the door. She opened it carefully, not sure if the rest of her apartment was safe, but thankfully the outer wards still seemed partially intact. Her kitchen and living room still had some color to them, but the difference in temperature was incredibly obvious.

Deciding it was pointless to guess about how extraplanar forces might interact with demonic physiology, she instead got herself some breakfast. She salvaged the last of the food that seemed good from the fridge, made two small meals, and walked back to her bedroom.

She wrapped herself in blankets, sat on the bed, and slowly ate as she waited for Amara to wake up. Thankfully, she wasn’t waiting too long. She’d only just gotten comfortable when the blankets on the floor began to stir.

Amara groaned, her various limbs twitching and stretching as she woke up. When she finally sat up, the covers tumbling off her, she looked at Vee. “Oh, uh, morning,” she said, her voice thick with sleep.

“Morning, Amara. How’d you sleep?” Vee asked.

“Um, fine, I guess. Nothing against your floor, I think it’s just the stress of being here.” After a quick pause, Amara quickly clarified. “I mean Purgatory! Not your room.”

Vee laughed quietly. “You’re fine, I get it. I made you breakfast, by the way.” She pointed at the second meal she’d thrown together, hoping it would be up to Amara’s standards. From what she could gather, Amara’s ability to summon fire had inspired her to take up cooking.

Amara quickly crawled over the Vee’s nightstand, then grabbed her breakfast and started eating. As she crawled back to her spot, Vee’s gaze accidentally lingered on Amara’s pajama shorts; they were sitting higher than usual, perhaps because of how she’d been sleeping, and even more of her body was visible. Specifically, Vee noticed how pronounced the curves on Amara’s hips were, and how much the shorts struggled to contain her—

Vee shook her head, quickly staring back down at her breakfast. She let Amara settle in, not entirely sure what to say. She wanted to say something, to break the tension after everything they’d talked about yesterday, but she also didn’t want to push Amara too hard. Did Amara want time to think as well? The more Vee thought about it, the more she realized that Amara had shared more about herself than Vee had; maybe that was a good place to start.

“Y’know, I’m not a very good angel,” Vee said quietly.

Amara was in the middle of a bite, and Vee’s comment clearly caught her off guard. She quickly swallowed, then spoke up. “Hey, I know I said some pretty rude things when we were sparring with each other, but you know I didn’t mean them, right?”

Vee shook her head. “That’s not what I mean. I’m being quite literal; compared to other angels, I’m objectively much weaker than most of them.”

“Oh, um… do you guys, like, hang out and practice with each other or something?” Amara asked. She seemed nervous, like she was unsure what to say.

“Nothing like that, mostly because there aren’t many of us. I mean, there’s a fair amount, but the world is a big place, and we’re stationed all over. No, when I was training, they would tell me about all the other angels, about what they were capable of, and I never measured up.”

“That sounds pretty rude, to compare you to everyone else like that,” Amara said quietly.

“It’s not about being nice or rude, the Church looks at the Earth like it’s a warzone. They tell us that demons are constantly trying to invade, and it’s up to us to keep humanity safe from them.”

Amara paused briefly, then replied with a smirk. “I keep getting emails about our master plan to steal all the gold from Fort Knox, but I keep ignoring them.” Vee looked up, meeting Amara’s gaze, and she saw hesitation. It seemed like Amara wasn’t entirely sure if the joke was appropriate, but Vee broke out laughing almost immediately.

“Oh shoot, I should let them know. They think you’re trying to invent a new type of rap music.” Both girls were laughing now, and it took a minute before they settled down enough for Vee to continue talking. “No, but seriously, I’m not trying to rattle off about Church politics. I just wanted to let you know that, well, there’s a lot of things I’m supposed to be able to do that I simply can’t. The biggest one, the one I cared the most about, was manifesting my wings.”

A look of surprise crossed Amara’s face. “Oh, I didn’t know that. I’ve wondered, once or twice, but it never felt right to ask.”

“We’re supposed to have big, beautiful, feathered wings. Probably as big as yours, honestly, but I just can’t do it. One reason I rely so much on my book is because my magic is weaker. That’s also why I used lots of holy water and similar things when I… well, during our fight.”

“You can talk about it, you know. It’s not like I’m constantly on the verge of breaking down from the memories.”

“It’s not that, I just… I wanted to let you know that I can’t fly either. I don’t even know what my wings look like. I hope it’s okay to say this, but I understand how badly you want to fly. I know what it’s like to feel like you should be able to, but there’s something holding you back.”

Amara didn’t say anything, instead pulling her wings close and looking at them.

When Amara finally spoke up, her voice took on a melancholic tone. “It’s funny how much we have in common, isn’t it?”

“It really is. But, if I’m being honest, it’s nice to finally have someone I can talk to about everything.”

After briefly looking at each other again, the conversation paused. Vee finished her breakfast quickly, but when she put her bowl down, she noticed that Amara still had most of her food left. Vee thought about apologizing, her gut reaction that she’d given Amara something she didn’t like, when she remembered something Amara had said earlier.

If Vee’s memory was correct, today was their fourth day trapped in Purgatory. Earlier in the week, Amara had said the longest she’d ever gone without sex was a week, but that she’d also been somewhat sedentary that week. Here in Purgatory, they’d already fought two reapers, or maybe the same reaper twice. Plus, even if she couldn’t feel the cold, Vee was scared that being here might be draining Amara in ways she wasn’t aware of.

“Hey, we got pretty distracted yesterday. How about today we take another look around campus, see if we can learn more about the reapers or find any other clues about how to get home?”

Amara quickly put her food down and jumped to her feet. “Sounds good to me. Make sure you bundle up.”