Genre: YA Fantasy – A Celestial Downfall Trilogy Debut
Azrael’s a wingless angel, and if that wasn’t bad enough, she’s the only one with a functioning conscience. Her bi-color eyes mark her as a moral hybrid, and when she breaks her enslavement to Manor Saffron by making a deal with a demon, she doesn’t expect to become Queen. She’ll have to survive her new royal magic, convince a legion of angels she’s worth fighting for, and find the breach in her Faustian deal, or risk a new master with horns.
Out of a cloud of mist a crouched silhouette formed. Still gasping for air, Azrael stood alert and watched the unmoving shadow. Oily feathers reflected the moonlight, revealing wide, dark arches. Talons pierced the sky on the wing’s arches. Even at the wingtips, the feathers grew together and formed talons of their own. Azrael shivered.
Underneath those wings, a looming shadow squirmed and drew cold breaths, sucking life out of the very air. Faint laughter gurgled in the creature’s throat.
A demon? Azrael’s heart lurched in the realization. She had fallen for the trap like a mouse would follow cheese. Her stomach felt as if hell itself jerked it to the depths. The force brought Azrael’s knees crashing to the ground.
Azrael shrunk her wings close to her body in horror as the stench of sulfur reached her nostrils. The creature moved closer. Blackness oozed down its white legs, leaving steaming footprints in its path. Its face was hidden, but Azrael could feel it watching her with a crooked smile in the darkness. Slowly, it unfurled its wings; Azrael trembled as two red eyes appeared in the blackness. A strange and disturbing contrast of death and life swirled underneath that gaze. Her skin was pale, as if she had been dead for far too long. Underneath the black unruly hair Azrael saw a creature of nightmares. A she-demon, with facial features of a goddess, and eyes filled with insanity. Surrounding her eyes in gleaming Light was Divine Material, tattooed in swirling Windborn characters. The demon wheezed in a giddy laugh at Azrael’s fear, revealing sharp fanged teeth and a slithering tongue. The demon crouched, naked, and without shame. Though sanity seemed to have been lost from her long ago, her head tilted in eerie recognition.
A.J. Flowers 