sex. My sojourn in the world of Man was opening my eyes to ways of
being I had never imagined.
We became a strange kind of family, sharing meals and company,
and once even bundling up to watch the returning aurora while
huddled together in the garden. Knud took care of us, a role that had
THE FALLEN QUEEN 183
been Belphagor’s, and one we’d been sorely missing. When Knud told
us of the Seraphim’s reluctance to winter in this cold country, I told myself we were safe for now and set my plans aside. If I was going to
do what I intended, I needed to recover from this lingering malady. As long as I left before spring, I reasoned, Vasily wouldn’t be in danger.
If the syla’s words were true and Azel lived, he was hidden and safe.
But before spring came, the decision was taken out of my hands.
I came down one morning to find Knud making breakfast.
Though I thought I’d finally shaken whatever ailed me, the smell of
sausages frying made me suddenly ill. The nausea caught me off guard,
and I dashed to the sink and retched a clear yellow bile on an empty
stomach. Knud paused at the stove while I splashed water on my face
and caught my breath.
“Nastya,” he said, still unaware Vasily had lied about my name.
“I’m sorry,” I gasped. “It came on me suddenly.” Knud put his
hand on my shoulder and I turned, ready to apologize again, but the
look on his face gave me pause. “What? What’s wrong?”
“Nastya.” He looked at me earnestly. “How long have you been
pregnant?”
I gaped at him and shook my head, ready to deny it. But when
Knud put his arm around me and led me to the table, my defenses
crumbled. I’d lied to myself long enough. I knew little enough about
how such things worked that I’d been able to ignore the signs for a time.
Pregnancy was one of the impolite, unpleasant realities my mother felt only peasants were base enough to allow into their discourse. When a
cat I’d owned as a child gave birth to a litter of kittens, my mother had gathered us swiftly away to avoid exposure to the disagreeableness of
it.
“Didn’t you and Vasily take precautions?”
I shook my head, uncertain what precautions he meant.
“You were pregnant when I arrived. I assumed you’d discuss it in
your own time. But you hadn’t realized, had you?”
I gripped the edge of my chair, feeling pale. “I think I must have. I
just didn’t want to believe it.”
The pan started to smoke, and Knud resumed his cooking.
“What do I do?” I asked.
184 JANE KINDRED
“You have a baby.” The gypsy shrugged. “Or you don’t.”
“What do you mean? How could I not?”
Knud turned off the stove and faced me again. “You don’t know
anything about this sort of thing.”
“How do you know about it?” I asked, annoyed. “You don’t even
have sex.”
“I have three brothers and eight sisters. Six of my sisters have their own broods.” His mouth curved in a wry grin. “That may be why I
don’t have sex.”
I’d thought my family a large one with just three sisters and a
brother. Like the Fallen, the gypsies seemed to be people who indulged their appetites.
Knud pulled up a chair next to me. “There are ways to terminate
your pregnancy. We can take you to a doctor and have it taken care of.
Or there are gypsy ways.”
I put my hand on my stomach out of reflex. I couldn’t imagine
getting rid of the baby. Nor could I imagine giving birth. Ola was the one meant to have babies. Tears sprang to my eyes and Knud took
them for distress at his talk of termination.
“I’m sorry, Nastya, never mind. Don’t fret.” He pressed my hand.
“Vasily and I are here to help you through this.”
Help me through what? I wondered. The rest of my life? He’d
helped so much already, and with little reason. I couldn’t see him
staying with us forever. If there were a forever. I could see nothing at all beyond spring.
“You have to tell Vasily,” Knud added gently. “He deserves to
know.”
I nodded. “Can you take him out today? So I can think of how to
tell him?”
trick.” With a mischievous smile, he went back to preparing breakfast.
“Don’t worry. I’ve wanted to go to the baths. I’m sure I can convince
him to come along.”
While they were out later, I bundled up and went out to the ice-
locked garden, hoping to see the syla again. The low-lying sun cast
a dismal pall on the snow through a shroud of grey sky. No softly
THE FALLEN QUEEN 185
moving branches, no light and shadow, no whispering forms danced
at the periphery of my vision. The syla had come at midsummer and
midwinter. Perhaps those were the only times they could be seen. I
longed for their sisterly counsel, but there was none to be had.
I returned inside and sat by the fire, not bothering to take off my
coat, and drifted off to sleep. When I woke, the fire had burned down
to embers.
Vasily sat across from me. “I wanted to let you sleep. You’ve
looked so tired lately.”
“How were the baths?”
“Very relaxing. I’d never been to a banya before. Not the sort of thing you find in Raqia.”
I hadn’t come up with a good way to tell him my news while they
were out, so I blurted what Knud had jokingly suggested. “Vasily…
I’m pregnant.”
Emotion glowed deep in his pupils. It didn’t turn out to be the
emotion I’d hoped for.
He stood and stared at me as if I’d told him I had murdered Knud.
“You what?”
“I’m pregnant.”
“I bloody well heard you, Nazkia!” He kicked at the embers on
the grate, making them flare. “How could you do this?”
“How could I?”
“You had no control over it?” He stepped toward me in a way that
made me shrink back in my chair. “It just happened?”
“Of course it just happened!”
He yanked me from the chair and shook me, and I yelped in
surprise. “You’re as devious as any demon whore in Raqia! Was this
your plan from the start, to entrap one of us? Bel was gone so you
settled for me?”
The heat in his hands burned even through my coat.
“You’re hurting me.” I twisted away, but he grasped my collar.
Planting my feet, I shoved my hands in my coat pockets and stared in
defiance into his smoldering eyes. My fingers closed around a smooth,
cool object inside the right pocket. Belphagor’s callstone. I’d forgotten it. All this time I’d possessed the means to return to Heaven.
186 JANE KINDRED
Vasily jerked me toward him, but before I could take my hand
from my pocket, a swift tug pulled at me from the opposite direction.
The ground lurched. Reeling against the spinning room, I grasped in
vain for purchase, but everything solid eluded me. The compelling
force flung me forward into a blaze of whiteness, expelling the breath from me, and I stumbled to my knees in a bank of snow. Air rushed
back into my lungs; crisp and s
weet, it was the blessed air of Heaven.
Where Vasily had stood a moment ago in the sitting room of a
Russian dacha, a figure now stared down at me, wrapped in a hooded
cloak. The bright winter sun of Heaven left the face in shadow.
“Nenny?” It was a voice I’d not heard since the night I left Heaven.
The hood slipped back. I looked up into the astounded eyes of my
childhood nurse and burst into tears.
THE FALLEN QUEEN 187
Vosemnadtsatoe: Wingcasting
Aeval watched the demon sleep in her bed of down and silk, his
dark hair a pleasing contrast against her customary shades of ice and
diamond. His naked body bore a slate of tattoos that spoke of his
Fallen existence, and the small, dark tips of his breast were pierced
with rings of steel. It was a custom among the demons of Raqia to
pierce their flesh, as with the straight rod capped by spikes decorating his left eyebrow, but this was a place she’d never seen it before.
Her demon was proving a most excellent toy. He was recovered
now, his body firm and hale, though he walked with a hint of a limp,
and the pain he suffered in his joints was sometimes visible on his face.
To his credit, he suffered in silence, which tempted her to push him
beyond his limits. But when he dared even consider stepping out of
line, she reminded him of his beloved Vasily and he became instantly
compliant.
Her consort was less gracious. The principality was by turns furious
and fretful at her attentions to her plaything. Kae knew better than
to challenge her on it, but he sulked and brooded until she charmed
him with a smile or a kiss he couldn’t resist. On occasion she left
Belphagor in Kae’s company to punish his petulance, giving orders to
the Ophanim that Kae was not to abuse the demon, though she might
turn a blind eye to a slap or a cuffing.
She took perverse pleasure in seeing them together, the
principality dressed in his usual black against his fair hair and features, and the demon, with his darker coloring, dressed by her in white silks
188 JANE KINDRED
and ivory linens. It pleased her that the demon obeyed her without
enchantment while the angel remained oblivious to what she’d done
to him. Though she might tire of Belphagor eventually, Kae remained
necessary to her aims. She couldn’t afford to give him his free will for the pleasure of breaking it.
She woke her demon to partake of him, her mastery of the elements
giving his body the vigor his appetite did not. The sorrow in his eyes as he serviced her told her he’d been dreaming of his demon lover. She
indulged in a brief moment of compassion before his pain aroused her
to more ecstatic heights. It was, after all, a compassion tempered by
the knowledge that like all men, he was a liar. He’d brought the ring
not to do her any favors, but to keep her Seraphim from tracking the
troublesome grand duchess. Discreet inquiries among the Malakim
had turned up no sign of her in any earthly sanctuary.
Aeval did not take kindly to being thwarted.
§
Vasily stared in bewilderment at his empty hands.
“Vasily, what have you done?” The gypsy stood poised with one
foot on the bottom step of the staircase and the other not quite on the floor.
“I haven’t done anything!” He responded defensively, afraid that
he somehow had done something, though he couldn’t imagine what.
“She was just—we were talking, and then she just wasn’t here.”
Knud stepped down and approached him with caution. “Can you
manipulate air?”
Vasily shook his head. “That’s Belphagor’s element. But not even
Bel could do that.” He looked helplessly at Knud. “She must have done
it. I’ve seen her vanquish Seraphim.” He swallowed uncomfortably
and dropped back into his chair. She’d saved his life afterward. And
now he’d—what had he done?
Knud sat across from him, still looking suspicious. “‘Talking’ isn’t
exactly how I’d describe what I heard. You were rather unreasonable.”
Vasily’s eyes sparked with fire. “Do you know what she’s done?”
“As near as I can tell, she’s given up her virginity to a demon twice
her age who’s shown no restraint or common sense. Or even gratitude
for the gift.”
THE FALLEN QUEEN 189
Vasily flinched. “I wouldn’t say twice her age,” he muttered, and then thought for a moment; one tended to lose count without the
worry of physical aging. By the standards of the world of Man, he was
frozen at the age of twenty-two—give or take or year of terrestrial
living. He did the math anyway, using his piercings like an abacus.
Damn it.
Knud considered him with a frown. “You keep yourselves very
close here, and Belphagor told me little, but I gather she’s some kind of celestial nobility who’s lived a very sheltered life. She doesn’t seem the least bit aware of her own physical nature. But you’re well acquainted with the facts of life. Well enough to have known you ought to have
used protection. Well enough to know a woman can’t just will herself
pregnant.”
“You knew.” The tips of Vasily’s ears burned with anger and
embarrassment.
“Yes, I knew. I’m not daft. She seemed to be a bit, though. What’s
your excuse?”
Vasily opened his mouth, then thought better of answering and
shut it.
“She didn’t realize until this morning. She seemed mortified. I told
her to talk to you. I didn’t expect you to lose your mind.”
Vasily took off his glasses and scrubbed his face with his hands.
“I did lose my mind, didn’t I? Bozhe moi.” He groaned. “I just—for a moment, it was as if my own mother were standing before me.”
“That’s more perverse than I’d imagined.”
Vasily slipped the glasses back on and glared over the top of them,
and Knud looked sufficiently abashed. “There are a lot of street kids
in Raqia, from a lot of stupid demon whores. My mother was one of
them.” He tried to ignore the surge of hatred that always accompanied
the thought of her. “Those women have no regard for the consequences
of their actions or for their offspring. They’re worse than alley cats, breeding indiscriminately and dropping their spawn like garbage.”
“Perhaps they have no education and don’t know the first thing
about protecting themselves. Or maybe they can’t afford contraception.
Or they’re afraid they’ll lose business if they ask their clients to use condoms and get labeled as diseased.”
190 JANE KINDRED
“There are no condoms in Heaven,” Vasily scoffed. “It’s a different
age.”
Knud gave him a pointed look. “Or perhaps there are no condoms
in Heaven.”
Vasily grimaced. “How is it you’ve given so much thought to the
subject, anyway?”
Knud exhaled an exaggerated sigh. “Eight sisters. Fifteen nieces
and nephews. And one grandnephew.”
“Bozhe moi.”
“Exactly.” Knud got up and went to the kitchen to make tea, the
universal tonic. “I don’t envy women their choices. Or their lack of
them. But regardless of how you feel about your mother, Nas
tya is
hardly a world-hardened working girl. You took her to your bed and
enjoyed her comforts. She trusted you. I hope a child is the only thing you’ve given her.”
Vasily stood and spat on the fire, making it blaze once more with
the advantage of his element and anger. “Bel and I are clean. We’ve
been tested every time we’ve fallen and exposed ourselves to… ”
“Humans,” Knud finished. “You don’t have to spare my feelings. I
know we’re a dirty lot. I also know Belphagor has done time in Russian prisons more than once.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Knud took the pot from the samovar and poured the zavarka into the cups. “Have you ever asked Belphagor about his tattoos?”
“He won’t tell me.”
“Not all of them were put there by his choice. I can guarantee you
that.” The gypsy filled a cup at the samovar and held it out to Vasily.
“I’ve seen the red crown—not in the way you think,” he added when
Vasily’s volatile emotions boiled to the surface again. “The crown was placed there by force, to let the other prisoners know Belphagor was
fair game.”
Ignoring the cup Knud was still holding out, Vasily took a menacing
step toward the gypsy. “That’s bullshit. He’d never have allowed it.
And how the hell would you know?”
Knud took a sip of tea. “I have a tattoo or two of my own. Allowing
had exactly nothing to do with it.”
THE FALLEN QUEEN 191
Vasily folded his arms over his chest. “What are you trying to tell
me?”
“I am trying to tell you”—Knud set down the cup—“that your
boyfriend has made a far greater sacrifice for you than you realize,
and that your girlfriend, wherever she’s gone, is pregnant, frightened, and in need of understanding. In short, I’m trying to tell you to wake the fuck up.”
§
Early spring storms had come to the Firmament of Shehaqim,
sending flash floods from the northern mountain ranges of Aravoth
hurtling through the glassy thoroughfares of the Third Heaven. As
luck would have it, the flooding also gave Belphagor a welcome respite from the queen’s attentions. Concerned for her projects of renewal,
she rode out in the midst of it to survey the damage. Unfortunately,
she left Kae behind. His constitution was too fragile for such a journey, she said, leaving Belphagor with orders to keep him company. More
likely, she’d left the principality to make certain her “pet” didn’t escape in her absence.