The Fallen Queen
House of Arkhangel’sk
Book One
Jane Kindred
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2011 by Jane Kindred. All rights reserved, including
the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any
means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
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Edited by Catherine Kean and Liz Pelletier
Cover design by Liz Pelletier
Print ISBN
978-1-937044-53-4
eBook ISBN
978-1-937044-52-7
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition
December 2011
For OTMA…
Hierarchy of the Spheres
The First Sphere
The Heavens (“Heaven”)
First Heaven: The Empyrean
Capital: Gehenna
once populated by the the Host of the First Choir, now abandoned
Second Heaven: Aravoth
Capital: Aravoth City
populated by the Order of Virtues
Third Heaven: Shehaqim (“The Firmament”)
Capital: Elysium
populated by the Host of the Fourth Choir
Fourth Heaven: Ma’on
Capital: Asphodel
populated by the Order of Powers and Fourth Choir military recruits Fifth Heaven: Zevul
Capital: Araphel
populated by the Order of Dominions and Fourth Choir scholars
Raqia
(formerly the Sixth Heaven, now annexed as a district of Elysium)
Capital: None (formerly Arcadia)
currently populated by the Fallen
Seventh Heaven: Vilon
Capital: Arcadia (formerly Aden)
populated by the Host of the Fourth Choir
The Host (angels)
First Choir: Spirits of Air
Orders: Tafsarim (“the Aeons”), Elim (“the Ardors”),
Erelim (“the Splendors”)
mysterious beings none living have seen
Second Choir: Spirits of Fire
Orders: Seraphim, Cherubim, Ophanim
elemental beings of fire who are able to manifest wings in
Heaven—bodyguards, brute squads, and palace guards of the
reigning principalities
Third Choir: Spirits of Earth
Orders: Dominions, Virtues, Powers
philosophers and administrators; scientists & investigators;
military officers
Fourth Choir: Spirits of Water
Orders: Principalities, Archangels, Angels
nobility, merchants, and commoners
Supernal House of Arkhangel’sk: Heaven’s imperial family, it takes its name from an earthly city named for the monastery of the Archangel Mikhail, founding principality of the House
Malakim: Messengers to the world of Man from the
Order of Archangels
Elohim: An elite sect and ruling body of princes (sars) of the Order of Virtues (Aravoth is the only princedom ruled by a governing body rather than a principality)
Hashmallim: Elite warriors of the Supernal Army from
the Order of Powers
The Fallen (demons)
Common demons: angels of mixed blood—
the serfs, demimondes, and outlaws of Heaven
The Second Sphere
The World of Man
Terrestrial Fallen: demons who permanently reside
in the world of Man
Grigori: Watchers from the Order of Powers sent to
observe the world of Man; the first Fallen
Nephilim: hybrid offspring of Grigori and Man
The race of Man: humans
Night Travelers: a secret society of gypsies who act as liaisons between the world of Man, the celestial militsiya ,
and terrestrial Fallen
The Third Sphere
Nezrimyi Mir (The Unseen World)
the realm of the Unseen, located in the Russian
forest in the world of Man
The Unseen
Syla: bereginyi: spring syla; mavki: summer syla;
samodivi: autumn syla; snegurochki: winter syla
female nature spirits
Leshi: male nature spirits
Rusalki: female water spirits
The Fourth Sphere
Irkalla and the Realm of the Dead (“Hell”)
Nehemoth: servants and gatekeepers of Irkalla
The dead: formerly living souls of the First and Second Spheres, now permanent residents of the Realm of the Dead
Pervoe: A Discordant Note in the Music of the Spheres
from the memoirs of the Grand Duchess Anazakia
Helisonovna of the House of Arkhangel’sk
As any demon will tell you over a bottle of vodka or a game of
preferans, Heaven is not the paradise you have been told. Depending upon the demon who holds your ear, he may also tell you Heaven’s
last ruler was a tyrant who cared nothing for the lives of the common
angel. Never believe it. He was the kindest soul ever born to the
supernal House of Arkhangel’sk; Heaven would be blessed to have
him now. But put no faith in me, for I am his daughter. I was born
within Elysium’s pearly gates and have been cast out.
I do not like to think my impetuosity brought down the throne of
Heaven, but on the darkest days, it is what I believe. When Elysium
fell to a quiet coup, I was at a wingcasting table in Raqia instead of by my family’s side.
It is a favorite game in Raqia’s dens of iniquity. A fast-moving
combination of cards and dice, wingcasting requires single-minded
concentration and a certain narcissistic audacity. Challengers who
hope to unseat the reigning prince of the game progress from one
table to the next until they are opposite the champion.
I only reached this coveted spot on one occasion.
Raqia’s reigning prince that night was a dark-haired demon with
eyes as sharp as the waxed points of his hair. He played his hand as
cool as you please and barely seemed to notice me, but he put nearly
every card I discarded into play with his own and soon had me
2 JANE KINDRED
hemorrhaging both cards and crystal.
Smoke burned my eyes while the demon nursed his cigar in a
deliberate distraction. When he took it between his fingers, I could
not help following with my eyes. Beneath the tattered lace of his
cuffs, black crosses and diamonds, interlaced with characters of an
unfamiliar alphabet, braced his fingers between the knuckles like rings made of ink.
He followed my gaze. “Prison,” he said around his cigar, the first
word he’d spoken not directly related to the game.
He was trying to unnerve me; there were no prisons in Heaven.
There was no need for any among the Host.
Raqia, for the most part policed itself, preferring to game the
crystal from wayward angelic youth rather than take it by force and
risk the flaming hand of
seraphic justice. If he had really been in
prison, he was one of the true Fallen who had spent time in the world
of Man—though all demons were Fallen, by the Host’s reckoning.
Their indiscriminate breeding muddied the cardinal elements by
mixing the pure water dominant in the blood of the Fourth Choir with
the earth of the Third, the fire of the Second, and the air of the First.
Such blending resulted in their sullied complexions and varied hue of
hair and eye.
A glance around the poorly lit den revealed half a dozen natural
shades of brown and a dozen more who colored their hair and eyes
with deliberately wild hues in defiance of celestial purity.
Most who fell to the world of Man bore signs of aging not present
in the Host; something in the air of the terrestrial plane made Men’s
lives short. A fine layer of stubble that could only have been carefully cultivated and trimmed hid any weathering of my opponent’s skin, but
studying his face, I saw the telltale signs: little lines around his deep-set ebony eyes that said he’d fallen more than once.
I tightened the drawstring on the purse of crystal at my wrist,
careful to keep the luminous celestine of my supernal ring turned
toward my palm and cupped between my fingers while I played my
hand.
The demon raised a dark eyebrow, pierced with a thin bar of
metal that accentuated his coarse nature. I had put down a card in
THE FALLEN QUEEN 3
my distraction without waiting for him to call the die. I blushed and
snatched it up again, furious with myself for making such a stupid
blunder. His immodest grin said he thought his ploy had worked, but
it took more than a small-time terrestrial thief to unnerve me. No
novice to the dens or to demon magic, I never came to Raqia without
a protective charm tucked into my bodice.
In truth, I had been distracted since climbing down the trellis to
sneak out in the middle of a tedious banquet. My younger brother
Azel was sick in bed, and my cousin Kae was acting strangely toward
his wife, my sister Omeliea—and both circumstances were in some
measure my fault.
§
Though I did not know it yet, the die had been cast against the
House of Arkhangel’sk by my unbridled impulse on the day I turned
seventeen. On a hunting holiday in the mountains of Aravoth, my
father had presented me with a blue roan mare. I was eager to take
her out, but the first snowfall had ushered in the season and my sisters were keen to head inside the lodge and curl up by the fire.
I sulked while the groom took my horse to the stable. Not even a
gift of a gorgeous red velvet riding cap lined with silver fox could coax me out of my bad humor.
When my sister Omeliea admonished me for being moody, I
tossed the cap back at her and announced I was taking my horse out
by myself. Mama would never have tolerated such willful behavior,
but she had stayed behind with Azel, and Papa was so softhearted, it
pained him to discipline his daughters.
When I led the mare out of the stable, Cousin Kae was waiting
for me.
“Tell her to stop being such a child!” my sister called, wrapped in
a fleece on the steps of the lodge. “It’s freezing out here!”
Kae caught the reins and drew the mare to him. “Stop being such
a child.” He winked, stroking the horse’s muzzle. “You can’t go alone.”
I pulled the tether from his hands and swung into the saddle.
“Then I suppose someone will have to mount up.”
I trotted the blue roan out to the road and into the wooded
heights, on a path muted with preternatural quiet. It seemed nothing
4 JANE KINDRED
but my horse and I existed. Here in the North, we were without the
oppressive, constant presence of the Seraphim Guard, which Papa
could not abide outside the city. In Heaven’s hinterlands, he said, there was no need for their protection.
After a minute or two, I heard the light clip of Kae’s horse behind
me.
“Is Ola angry with me?”
Kae drew up beside me. “Not as angry as she is with me for letting
you go.” He shrugged beneath his cloak. “It will pass. Sometimes I
think it’s her job as a wife to be angry. She’s very efficient at it.”
I laughed at his feigned look of persecution. “Such trials you must
endure for the crown.”
“Yes,” said Kae with a mock sigh. “I shall endure anything to
attain the crown. Even bed that shrew of a grand duchess of mine.”
I nearly slipped from my saddle for laughing. Kae adored Omeliea
and she, him. They were newly wed, and though betrothed at the cradle, he had courted her since childhood as though it were not prearranged.
I could not imagine two people more perfectly matched.
Kae stopped his mount in its tracks. “Did you see that?” His grey
eyes fixed on a distant point where the trees met over the road. A
peculiar fragrance hung on the air, like the freshly peeled bark of an Aravothan cedar, but I saw nothing. I shook my head, and Kae started
forward once more.
The bright snow began to dull, shadowed beneath the silver canopy
of gathering clouds. Perhaps my sisters had been right. The cold was
already making my hands ache within my gloves. I considered turning
back, but the thought of Ola’s smugness made me stay my course. I
knew my way blindfolded along the snow-covered path; I’d ridden it a
hundred times. Of course, my horse had not.
As a dusting of new snow began to fall, Kae leaned over his
mount and pointed. “There! Do you not see it?” He spurred his horse
forward without waiting for an answer.
I followed, urging my mare to keep pace with him, but we were
falling behind on the softening road. Heavy flakes melted in my hair,
and my cheeks burned with cold. I began to regret throwing the cap
at Ola.
THE FALLEN QUEEN 5
The road went higher here, and the clouds were lowering, and
soon I had to slow my horse to a walk, surrounded on all sides by grey, hanging damp. I called out for Kae, but I might have been shouting
into a wet blanket for all my voice seemed to carry.
After a few more yards, the trees grew close, and I was no longer
certain we were on the path. Everything looked different coated in
new snow, like some fairy world I’d stumbled into. Maybe I’d veered
off in the mist? I bit my lip and glanced over my shoulder, but the fog was so thick I couldn’t be sure of the distance.
I opened my mouth to call again, when the sound of approaching
hooves broke through the veil of clouds. A moment later, Kae’s
horse appeared without its rider. I leapt from my mare and ran in the
direction the horse had come, heedless of the precipices that might be hidden from view.
“Cousin!” I stumbled over a protruding root and fell headlong in
the snow. For a moment, the world was silent except for the dripping
branches over my head. Then the clouds thinned and Kae stood
before me in an open glade, stiller than the mountain around us. His
eyes were unfocused.
“The most beautiful steed,” he whispered. “I nearly caught her.”
“A runaway?” I got to m
y feet with no help from him, brushing
snow and pine needles from my riding skirt. “All the way up here?”
His eyes cleared. “Not a runaway. She’s wild.” He seemed angry
with me, as though I’d intruded. Brushing past me to rein in his
mount, he swung himself up into the saddle with a swift and brutal
motion. The horse, too, was intruding it seemed, unworthy next to the
imaginary steed.
Kae rode off toward our hunting house without another word.
§
I sighed and tossed the die against the wingcasting table. It
seemed a trivial thing, that moment in the heights, that trick of the
light that must have made my cousin imagine the wild steed, but his
temperament began to change when we returned from the north.
My distracted state cost me another round, and the demon
grinned and scooped up his winnings. “Had enough?” He knocked
the smoldering ash from his cigar against the side of the table and
6 JANE KINDRED
pocketed my crystal.
“Not by half.”
At the table beside us, the violet glow of eyes dyed with amethyst
oil glinted through the smoke from the player next in line to play the winner. I glared back through the ruby red with which I’d dyed my
own. I had a right to play so long as I had crystal to bet, and if I had to play all night to beat this demon at a single round, I would.
If only I had known what it would cost me.
When I think back to that night and the single-mindedness with
which I persisted at a game I could not possibly win, I want to shout at my former self, Forget this foolishness! Go home! Go home before it is too late! The irony is that it was guilt that kept me there, while I have been burdened with so much more by staying.
§
Ola suspected Kae of unfaithfulness. Upon our return to the
city of Elysium, they moved into the Camaeline Palace, built for her
wedding present, and we did not see Ola again until she came to us a
few weeks later with her suspicions.
“He is not himself.” She stood staring at the fire in the drawing
room. “I have hardly seen him since the holiday.” Ola gave me a
strange look. “He hasn’t been himself since the two of you came back
from that ride.” She seemed ashamed of what she was thinking and
burst into tears.
“Ola, dearest.” I went to her where she sank onto the divan before
the fire. Tatia came to her side while Maia hurried to the other, and