However, I have gotten a little distracted from the story of my own fall.

  Before I knew all this and more, I had to make an incredibly painful and shocking journey. A journey that all of the Fallen had made.... A one-way ride.

  Everything that followed our fourth date (if I may call it so) had happened so fast. And the faster it seemed to be coming, the more I wanted to put it off.

  I really wanted the time stop.

  I was angry. I was shaking with hatred and fear. I do not remember who poisoned my soul with these feelings. They were tearing me apart without mercy, making my awakened love bleed. If not the love which was burning me down, I would never have come out on this road again.

  But I couldn't, I couldn't just disappear. I wanted to feel Alistair's eyes on me just once more, just once more to see the bckness of his hair. If not touch than at least shamelessly watch it for once more… Let it be in the flood of harsh unmasking words I wanted to throw in his face. To throw my pain at his feet and leave.

  Leave forever. To stay in the cold and clear vastness of the heaven. That's what I decided. A naive, cruel creature of the emptiness…

  Stirring the rage fming in my soul, filled with almost sincere remorse, I flew out on the bck indifferent ribbon of this road. I did not wait. Pulling off the jacket he had given me, unable to see or hear anything through my own fury and the wind, I headed for Alistair. Toward where he usually came from.

  I felt strong, powerful, and scary. I felt like my eyes were radiating fire. Sparks were flying from me, thousands of fiery trails were scattering off my feet. I was almost flying and the wind tangled subtly in my dishevelled hair.

  Finally, I saw his car. And him. Alistair was standing on the road, leaning against the car's hood as he had the st time, watching me closely. He moved toward me, and our gazes cshed. Not touched, like palms caressing each other, but cshed as two bdes might csh in the heat of battle. The roiling darkness in his eyes and the twinkling sparks of the heaven in mine. And I held his gaze. But he did not avert his. We froze against each other in a ringing tension-filled pause.

  He wasn't smiling, and I couldn't read anything on his face. Except that he was devilishly beautiful. As beautiful as I myself must have been at that moment. He was still wearing the same bck shirt, its light fabric torn loosely by the wind of the heavens, and tight bck pants with defiantly bare cing.

  I threw the jacket at his feet. Then, I don't know how, my hand rose up and I spped him on the face. He watched mesmerized for a second as my palm made a smooth, quick sweep, escaping… Then he sharply grabbed my wrist. He wrenched it, and I felt the pain. He shook his head.

  ‘I hate you, Alistair,’ I hissed. ‘Now you're going to get the hell out of here and I won't follow you. I'm leaving you, Alistair! Because you’re evil and you lie to me, lie about everything! And there is no such wind in your city!’ I spit in his face.

  He slowly let go of my hand and wiped himself with the sleeve of his shirt. Then he raised his head and I saw that he was smiling.

  ‘You're a brave boy, Vic,’ he said in a low voice, so that I could hardly catch the meaning of his words over the howl of the wind. ‘But how do you know the difference between good and evil?’

  He looked at me, and I could feel how vicious and greedy his thoughts were at that moment. He was probing my body with his eyes, making me tremble with rage and helplessness. But at the same time, I was aware of how much power I had over him. He wasn't about to hide it, though. He was frantic to get me. To get me now, when I was so desperate.

  I scked off returning the stare with defiance. I know I was beautiful then. Refined and stubborn, cheeks fming and lips open, ready to spit out another angry word. The half-naked embodiment of heaven's wrath. Almost an icon...

  ‘I'm leaving you, Alistair,’ I repeated. ‘Though we never belonged together. Someday I'll be rid of the venom you poisoned me with. Someday I will know peace again. I will walk against the wind for centuries! Once it will clean me entirely! It's better to suffer than to be cursed! I will not hesitate to kill myself to banish your foul image. To wipe it off as one wipes off a grease stain! Even if it's a stain from the sweetest of pies! That’s what you are, Alistair, the stain!’

  Alistair stood straight as I spoke, or rather threw those words in his face.

  ‘I hear you, Vic,’ he said, at st, ‘and I'm embarrassed. But you're wrong about one thing - you will never forget me. Never. Not even if your praised wind blows all the young and tempting flesh off your bones. And death will not save you, if only because you are immortal. It is fear that speaks in you, another one's fear. He's your most passionate lover yet. I'm jealous, Vic. I'm very jealous.’

  In one elusive movement, he drew me to him. Weaving my hands behind my back, he kissed me deeply and roughly. I growled and fought him. I was kicking him, but he pressed me against the car with his whole body and didn't let go until I was finally exhausted and quiet.

  ‘I'd do anything to get in the way of your pathetic lover,’ he whispered into my face. ‘He's not worthy of owning you. You are too young for his aged arms. He smells of the smoke of burnt victims. His hands are as dry as the branches of an old tree, and they have long forgotten how to give pleasure. His lips are wrinkled with countless words of admonishment. But guess what - that's all he knows. He is a master at making them up, but he himself has not walked a single road yet. The one he's found, by sheer luck, has led him here. And he fears anything that might disturb his eternal aging. You, on the other hand, smell of wind. Greedy blood. Oh, you won't forget me, Vic! Only I can make you moan. Moan so sweet, the heaven will shudder to hear how much pleasure there is in those moans....’

  He squeezed my trembling back and kissed me again. Demanding and tender. I moaned. And screamed in anger, knowing that he had me under his power again, again, if only for a moment. Breaking free, I threw myself away like a lunatic. I turned around only for a moment to shout at him:

  ‘I don't need you!’

  and also to capture his image in my mind. Glowing with the dark light of hell, the image of a demon calling me…

  That was the fifth time we met. And I did not yet know how fast time could pass, driven by the wrathful shepherds of virtue.