Quatrain Read Online Free PDF Page A

head back and laughed. The sound was so loud that I expected half the household to wake and come running to the kitchen. Little though I wanted to be caught having a private meeting with the Archangel, I thought I would relish the interruption. I wanted out of this conversation now .
    “Oh, but that’s rich,” the Archangel exclaimed. “Your sister stole Stephen right from under your nose! And bore his daughter! If Sheba had been an angel child, your humiliation must surely have been complete.”
    “Trust me, Raphael,” I said grimly, “it was complete nonetheless.”
    “We miss Stephen, at Windy Point,” Raphael said.
    I tried not to let my sudden sharp interest show on my face. I had had no news of Stephen for eighteen years. It had not occurred to me he might have relocated to some other hold. But I knew Raphael would withhold details if he thought I wanted them, so I pretended that I was not eager for every scrap of information he might let fall.
    Raphael continued, “He left for Monteverde—oh, twelve or fifteen years ago. Practically an insult, Saul says. I can understand wanting to join Gabriel at the Eyrie, for there is some honor in being in the Archangel’s entourage. But what is there to draw anyone to Monteverde?”
    “It is pretty enough,” I said, my voice indifferent. I had spent less time at Monteverde than at the other two angel holds, because I agreed with Raphael on this point. It was a much less exciting place, far from the exhilaration and commotion that swirled around any venue that the Archangel called home.
    But I rather thought Stephen had had his fill of excitement and commotion. I sometimes thought he would have been glad to leave Samaria altogether, if such an option existed.
    “It is pretty and dull and overrun with petitioners who find Monteverde entirely too easy to access,” Raphael replied. “Any petty Manadavvi landowner with some imaginary grudge can stride up to the hold and demand Ariel’s attention, and she has no choice but to listen politely. At least at Windy Point, we are safe from the intrusions of mortals. No one steps inside the hold without an angel’s invitation.”
    Very true—Windy Point was one of the most inaccessible settlements in all of Samaria. The hold was nestled inside an inhospitable mountain peak; if anyone had ever climbed it on his own two feet, I had never heard the story. An angel must fly you up there if you wanted to get in—and an angel must fly you down if you wanted to get out. When I was younger, it had never occurred to me that the second situation might someday be more urgent than the first.
    “You might have been a different kind of Archangel altogether if you had ruled from Monteverde instead of Windy Point,” I said. “I don’t think it would have harmed you any if you’d been forced to develop a common touch.”
    He seemed genuinely amused. “My dearest Salome, no accident of geography could ever have rendered me common,” he replied. “And I always had as much touch as I needed.”
    Suddenly I was so weary I didn’t think I could continue this edged conversation for another minute. If he was not going to talk about Stephen, and he was not going to promise to keep his distance from Sheba, there was nothing else Raphael could say that held any interest for me whatsoever. Stepping carefully, so I did not brush against those silky golden wings, I pushed farther into the kitchen and grabbed the food items that were closest to hand. A half loaf of bread and a handful of dried fruit. You would have thought the conversation had turned my stomach, but I was still hungry. I had long ago been forced to give up the luxury of squeamishness.
    “I’m sure Thaddeus would tell you to make free of anything in the kitchen,” I told him. “Breakfast is always served very early in the morning, so you won’t have to linger long before setting off for Windy Point.”
    He was still smiling. “I hope we see you in the morning before we go.