Table of Contents
PRAISE FOR
Nalini Singh
Breathtaking blend of passion, adventure, and the paranormal.
Gena Showalter, New York Times bestselling author
A must read for all of my fans. Nalini Singh is a major new talent.
Christine Feehan, #1 New York Times bestselling author
Ilona Andrews
Splendid... Edgy dark fantasy touched with just the right amount of humor.
Patricia Briggs, #1 New York Times bestselling author
Recommend[ed]... to fans of Charlaine Harris and Patricia Briggs, and to anyone who enjoys a romantic fairy tale.
Dear Author
Sharon Shinn
Provocative.
Anne McCaffrey
The most promising and original writer of fantasy to come along since Robin McKinley.
Peter Beagle
Meljean Brook
I cant resist a book by Meljean Brook!
Gena Showalter, New York Times bestselling author
Brilliant, heartbreaking, genre-bendingeven, I dare say, epic.
Marjorie M. Liu, New York Times bestselling author
Angels Wolf
Nalini Singh
CHAPTER 1
Noel had been given a promotion in being assigned to the lush green state of Louisiana, but the position was a double-edged sword. Though the area was part of Raphaels territory, the archangel had assigned the day-to-day ruling of it to Nimra, an angel who had lived six hundred years. Nowhere close to Raphael in age, but old enougheven if age alone was not the arbiter of power when it came to the immortal race.
Nimra had more strength in her fine bones than angels twice her age and had ruled this region for eighty years; shed been considered a power when most of her peers were still working in the courts of their seniors. Hardly surprising when it was said that she had a will of iron and a capacity for cruelty untempered by mercy.
He was no fool. He knew this promotion was in truth a silent, cutting statement that he was no longer the man hed once beenand no longer of use. His hand fisted. The torn and bloodied flesh, the broken bones, the glass that had been driven into his wounds by the servants of a crazed angel, it was all gone courtesy of his vampirism. The only things that remained were the nightmares... and the damage within.
Noel didnt see the same man he always had when he looked in the mirror. He saw a victim, someone who had been beaten to a pulp and left to die. Theyd taken his eyes, shattered his legs, crushed his fingers until the pieces were pebbles in a sack of flesh. The recovery process had been brutal, had taken every ounce of his will. But if this insulting position was to be his fate, it wouldve been better not to survive. Before the attack, hed been on the short list for a senior position in the Tower from which Raphael ruled North America. Now he was a second-tier guard in one of the darkest of courts.
At its center stood Nimra.
Only five feet tall, she had the most delicate of builds. But the angel was no girlish-appearing waif. No, Nimra had curves that had probably led more than one man to his ruin. She also had skin the shade of melted toffee, a glowing complement to the luxuriant warmth of this region she called her own, and tumbling curls that gleamed blue-black against the dark jade of her gown. Those heavy curls cascaded down her back with a playfulness that suited neither her reputation nor the cold heart that had to beat beneath a chest that spoke of sin and seduction, her breasts ripe and almost too full for her frame.
Her eyes slammed into his at that moment, as if shed sensed his scrutiny. Those eyes, a deep topaz painted with shimmering streaks of amber, were sharp and incisive. And right now, they were focused on him as she walked across the large room she used as her audience chamber, the only sounds the rustle of her wings, the soft caress of her gown against her skin.
She dressed like an angel of old, the quiet elegance of her clothing reminiscent of ancient Greece. He hadnt been born then, but hed seen the paintings kept in the angelic stronghold that was the Refuge, seen, too, other angels who continued to dress in a way they considered far more regal than the clothing of modern times. None had looked like thiswith her gown held up by simple clasps of gold at the shoulders and a thin braided rope of the same color around her waist, Nimra couldve been some ancient goddess.
Beautiful.
Powerful.
Lethal.
Noel, she said and the sound of his name was touched with the whisper of an accent that was of this region, and yet held echoes of other places, other times. You will attend me. With that, she swept out of the room, her wings a rich, deep brown shot with glittering streaks that echoed the color of her eyes. Arching over her shoulders and stroking down to caress the gleaming wood of the floor, those wings were the only things in his vision as he turned to follow.
The exquisite shade of her wings spoke not of the cold viciousness of a dark court, but of the solid calm of the earth and the trees. That much, at least, wasnt false advertising. Nimras home was not what hed been expecting. A sprawling and graceful old lady with soaring ceilings situated on an extensive estate about an hour out of New Orleans, it had a multitude of windows as well as balconies ringing every level. Most had no railingas befitted the home of a being with wings. The roof, too, had been built with an angel in mind. It sloped, but not at an acute angle, not enough to make it dangerous for landings.
However, notwithstanding the beauty of the house, it was the gardens that made the place. Cascading with blooms both exotic and ordinary, and full of trees gnarled with age alongside newly budding plants, those gardens whispered of peace... the kind of place where a broken man might sit, try to find himself again. Except, Noel thought as he followed Nimra up a flight of stairs, he was fairly certain that what hed lost when hed been ambushed and then debased until his face was unrecognizable, his body so much meat, was gone forever.
Nimra halted in front of a pair of large wooden doors carved with a filigree of jasmine in bloom, shooting him an expectant look over her shoulder when he stopped behind her. The doors, she said with what he was certain was a thread of amusement in that voice kissed by the music of the bayou.
Taking care not to brush her wings, he walked around to pull one open. I apologize. The words came out harsh, his throat unaccustomed to speech these days. Im not used to being a He cut himself off in midsentence, having no idea what to call himself.
Come. Nimra continued to walk down the corridor lined with windows that bathed the varnished floors in the molten, languid sunlight of this place that held both the bold, brazen beauty of New Orleans as well as an older, quieter elegance. Each windowsill was set with earth-toned pots that overflowed with the most cheerful, unexpected bursts of colorpansies and wildflowers, daisies and chrysanthemums.
Noel found himself fighting the desire to stroke their petals, feel the velvet softness against his skin. It was an unexpected urge, and it made him pull back, tug his shields even tighter around himself. He couldnt afford to be vulnerable here, in this court where hed been sent to rotit wasnt a stretch to believe that everyone was waiting for him to give up on life and complete what his attackers had begun.
