Archangel's Resurrection (Guild Hunter #15)(12)

Zanaya ignored the feeling. She was used to ignoring it.

“Zanaya, right?”

Jerking at the soft voice at her shoulder, she spun on her heel to find herself facing the person she’d have judged the least likely to speak to her. Where Zanaya was dressed in a rough tunic with a rope around the middle, Aureline wore soft leathers of a pale brown that had clearly been made with intense care, then worn so often they molded to their wearer’s body.

Zanaya had one pair of leathers—she’d been gifted them by Mivoniel, and she treasured the set, would never wear it while just in the barracks. As for her tunic, it wasn’t as if she couldn’t afford better—her father had done his duty by her there—but that she had no idea what women her age wore or what was acceptable.

The hamlet in which she’d grown up was populated by retired warriors for the most part, not a girl or youth among them. Old leathers, simple pants, or rough tunics, that was the usual dress code. Zanaya had worked out for herself that her mother’s preferred gowns weren’t apt to be the right choice for her new life either. So she’d gone for the simplest item, the one least likely to subject her to ridicule.

As it was, one of the other young soldiers had snickered and called her a “feral” when she walked in. She’d wanted to kick him in the face, but Mivoniel had warned her that her temper was her greatest weakness. “Control it or you’ll be the one who comes out the worse off. No archangel wants a hothead in their ranks.”

So she’d stifled her rage and kept to herself.

Now Aureline, with her beautiful leathers, her skin like dark gold and her mane of hair of a thick and shiny sable, a shade that was echoed in her wings, was talking to her. Zanaya didn’t know what the other girl wanted, was ready for a knife to the ribs, but once again, she fell back on what her mentor had advised.

“Watch for betrayal, but don’t expect it of everyone. A fighter alone will always fall. And I’m not talking only of battle. Walking a solitary path through life . . . you’ve witnessed your mother do it. It’s a hard existence. I wouldn’t have this for you. And, for a warrior, battlemates can become kin over time.”

Zanaya couldn’t imagine Aureline being any kind of kin to her—she’d seen the other girl laughing with the others, could already tell she was one of the most popular people in the group. Far more likely, she’d come to spare a crumb to the outsider, feel good about herself. But Zanaya kept her tone civil as she said, “Yes, I’m Zanaya.”

Aureline’s smile deepened, revealing dents in her cheeks that made her even more lovely. “I’m Aureline, but all my friends call me Auri. Did you truly grow up in the outside world?”

When Zanaya nodded, Aureline’s eyes—a striking translucent brown—widened. “I’ve never met anyone who did that! You must have such amazing stories.” She rolled her eyes. “My parents barely let me go past the edge of the Refuge, even after I wasn’t a baby any longer.”

Zanaya didn’t know why she said it, but she did. “I’ve ridden a horse.” It was a strange thing to say, but Zanaya wasn’t going to pretend to be like the others. Because she wasn’t. Her whole life had been different.

Aureline all but jumped, her wings opening out a fraction to reveal hints of brighter autumnal hues among the sable. “No!” Her cry attracted the attention of the others, but she ignored them to say, “Was it terrifying?”

And that was the beginning of Zanaya learning that Aureline was nice. Just . . . nice. She discovered that the girl who was going to become her best friend in the entire world had been born to nice parents who’d raised her with love and affection, and that she’d grown surrounded by others who were also nice.

As a result, Aureline was that rare being who was plain good. She had no hidden agenda, no sly side, no awareness that people could be two-faced. It drove Zanaya to distraction at times, how Aureline just believed the best of others—but she also came to see that most people tried to be their best with her . . . because it was very hard to hurt a person who saw only the best in you.

“I was raised to see such openness as a weakness,” she said to her friend some ten years later, after they’d long settled into a friendship tight and true. “My mother taught me that to open yourself up to people is to invite them to cut out a piece of you, then discard you.”

Aureline passed over a wedge of the fruit she’d just sliced as they sat on the low wall of the training salle, watching older warriors do a bout. “She must’ve been awfully hurt by someone she trusted.”

“Yes.” The man who’d sired Zanaya had forever altered Rzia’s path. But—“I think at a certain point, a person must take responsibility for being their own person. To look forever backward . . .” She thought of the pile of returned letters her mother hoarded in a trunk, letters Camio hadn’t even bothered to open. “It’s stagnation and obsession.”

Because no matter how often Rzia cursed Camio for destroying her life, she also cried for him night after night. Zanaya was certain that should her father walk back into Rzia’s life, Rzia would accept him into her bed with open arms. Camio was the sun to her, and she’d shriveled and grown sour without the light of his attention.

“Aren’t you afraid?” she said to Aureline before her friend could ask what she knew of obsession. “Of trusting and having it end in betrayal?”