Adrian: Bonus Material for a Touch of Crimson Page 2
The girl on the angel’s lap shoved her would-be lover back into the waiting arms of her laughing friends. Adrian engaged, darting forward, going for the victim. Catching him up in the center of the pack, Adrian snapped his wings free, spinning fluidly. The razor-sharp tips of his feathers sliced like a circular saw, halving the vampires at the waist in less than a second. As the pieces fell to the ground with sickening thuds, he delved into the young man’s mind and removed all memory of the night, resetting his recollections back to the point when he’d met the vampress at a frat party.
Then he faced her, the ringleader. She cowered into the arms of the angel, caged by Elijah and Trent in their lupine forms. But when her gaze met Adrian’s it was hot with defiance and swirling with madness.
Plucking her off the statue, Adrian rifled through her memories, confirming her guilt in the previous attack and discovering the tragedy of her Change. She’d been caught just this way by a young rogue and his friends. The attack had stolen her sanity; the Change had taken her soul, as it did all minions. What was left behind was one of the monsters he hunted.
Nevertheless, pity stirred in his chest.
“I’ll find the ones who did this to you,” he promised softly. Then he ended her.
In the morning, several dozen white lilies were found in the lap of the mourning angel statue. And in the years that followed, it became known as an unusually peaceful spot, one where visitors felt a joyous equanimity and departed with a renewed sense of hope in the days to come.
The following interview appeared on UnderTheCoversBookBlog.blogspot.com, Oct 2011.
AUTHOR OVERRIDE
Interview with Adrian Mitchell
I’m not overly surprised to find Adrian in a pensive mood when I visit him for this interview. I know he’s under a great deal of pressure now, although he hides it beautifully, as always.
I find him in his office, looking out the window at the native Southern California landscape. His hands are clasped beneath his wings and his inky black hair touches the collar of his dress shirt, having grown longer over the last few weeks as his world has steadily unraveled. Those beautiful wings of his, so pristinely and blindingly white except for the crimson tips, reveal so much about him. I wonder if he realizes that. He can hide them at will and the fact that he’s chosen not to do so today tells me how agitated he is. They stretch and flex when he’s of a mood, the only visible sign he gives of how he’s feeling.
I know it’s those feelings that are exacerbating his problems now. He’s a Sentinel, after all. An angel created to hunt and punish other angels. He was designed and built to feel no emotion, to function almost like a machine. A Terminator, perhaps. One mission, one purpose, no deviations. But he’s deviated a lot over the years. Now more so than ever before. And he’s paid the price. He’s paying it even now.
“Hi, Adrian,” I say in greeting, although he knows I’ve been standing here watching him.
He faces me and I’m struck, as I always am, by the brilliance of his cerulean eyes. All of the Sentinels have blue eyes and he explained why when I asked him previously. The Sentinels are seraphim angels—the “burning ones.” The blue of their irises is literally the flame inside them. Pure and hot. Beautiful in an eerie, preternatural way.
“Ms. Day,” he returns, in his smooth deep voice with its unique resonance. He can compel with that voice, but so far he’s resisted compelling me to do anything. At least I think he’s resisted... “Ah, you’re dressed today. I’d almost forgotten how you look when you’re not wearing your pajamas.”
I grin. “Hey, it’s one of the perks of being a writer. How are you today?”
“As well as can be expected.”
“Where’s Lindsay?”
“Training.”
I nod, understanding. The woman he loves can kick some serious ass, but she’s still fragile compared to the vampires she hunts and the Sentinels who are training her. “Are you ready for the interview?”
“No.” But he moves to his desk, gesturing for me to take a seat.
His wings dissipate like mist just before he sits, which always fascinates me. They’re so much a part of him and yet he can tuck them away where mortals like me can’t see them.
I eye him as he gets comfortable, admiring the savage beauty of his face. He’s stunning, with a dark and edgy sensuality that makes him seem more fallen angel than not.
“What do you like most about yourself?” I ask.
His brows rise. He leans back in his chair and studies me in return. “Is this part of the interview?”
“It can be.”
“Hmm... That I can still learn, I suppose. That I can change my mind, be surprised, discover something new.”
“You’re evolving.”
“Yes, perhaps that’s the way to say it. After all these years... after all I’ve seen, I’m not done formulating new opinions of things that should be old hat to me.”
“What do you like least about yourself?”
His lips curved wryly. “How much time do you have?”
Now it’s my brows that rise. “Really?”
“Part of evolution is trial and error, and I’ve made more than my share of mistakes. Unfortunately, I also keep making new ones.”
“That’s part of being human,” I point out.
“But I’m not human.”
Right. I consider him further. “What haven’t you done that you would like to do?”
“Take Lindsay away,” he says without hesitation. “For a week at least, longer if we could manage it.”
“Where would you go?”
“She likes the water. I like the mountains.”
“So you can fly.”
“Yes.” He smiles, which is a sign of how Lindsay is changing him. “So I suppose it would be somewhere with mountains overlooking the ocean.”
“Something to look forward to.”
“Yes.”
“What are you most afraid of?”
“Failure,” he responds, with the same alacrity as the previous question. “Too much is riding on me... too many people are dependent on my getting the job done. There’s too much at stake. And I have Lindsay now.”
“You won’t fail.” I have no doubt about that.
“No,” he agrees with conviction. “I won’t.”
And really, that’s the number one thing there is to know about Adrian right there.
The following interview appeared on DarhkPortal.com, Oct 2011.
Monday MANdy
Interview with Adrian Mitchell
Have you ever melted a trackball on your Blackberry?
No, but I’ve crushed a few in my fist when I’ve been aggravated enough.
What is the one thing you find most interesting about mortals?
Decisions are so mutable to mortals. Sayings such as, “Rules are made to be broken.” Even when the lines are clear and it’s apparent they’ve been crossed, emotions guide the response to those transgressions as much as the law does. That fascinates me. There are so few hard and fast rules in mortal lives and so many reasons you come up with for why a particular rule applies in one instance and not another.
Looking back, now that you have Lindsay in your life, is there anything you wish you had done differently regarding Helena?
I’m torn by this question. Helena came to me for two things: permission to break a law and help in doing so. It was rather like one police officer approaching another to ask for permission to rob a bank, assistance with disabling the alarm systems, and then a promise that she’d face no consequences for the theft. Can you see how impossible it was for me to give her what she wanted?
There’s precedence for what could happen if I’d made a different decision. Syre was faced with the same situation when he fell in love with his mortal mate and he responded differently. He gave the Watchers permission to do as he did and the result was that they all fell, even those who hadn’t taken mates. He damned them all for his mistake. In his situation, most of the Watcher
s had fallen in one way or another—certainly his permission was encouragement for some—but my Sentinels have stayed true to their mission. Aside from Helena and me, the rest have been inviolate. How could I risk all of them for the transgressions of just two of us?
That said, I could have been a better friend.
I had two roles with her—leader and friend—and I focused on the first to the detriment of the latter. I should’ve asked for more time to think. I should never have proceeded so quickly, when I was still reeling from the knowledge of her fall. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Then Lindsay left and I was barely thinking at all. It’s possible Helena didn’t realize that I haven’t escaped retribution for my sins. Lindsay, too, believed I’d face the same punishment as the Watchers, but that’s not my fate and I’ve always known that. Losing Shadoe over and over again, losing Phineas, knowing I’m no better than those I’ve punished, the sacrifice Lindsay ended up making for me... Even Elijah’s very existence. It’s no coincidence that he entered my life at the same time as Lindsay, wielding the power he does over the other lycans.
My punishment is insidious, like a spreading stain, eating through everything that has meaning to me. Everything I’ve worked for and believed in is crumbling around me. That is my punishment, and I should’ve shared it with Helena, armed her with the knowledge she needed to make her own decision without asking me for permission.
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Don’t miss Adrian’s story,
A TOUCH OF CRIMSON
Available now from Signet Eclipse!
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Can a love that transcends death survive a war between angels, vampires, and lycans?
An angel with immense power and insatiable desire, Adrian Mitchell leads an elite Special Ops unit of the seraphim. His task is to punish the Fallen—angels who have become vampires—and command a restless pack of indentured lycans.
But Adrian has suffered his own punishment for becoming involved with mortals—losing the woman he loves again and again. Now, after nearly two hundred years, he has found her: Shadoe, her soul once more inhabiting a new body that doesn't remember him. This time he won't let her go.
With no memory of her past as Shadoe, Lindsay Gibson knows only that she can't help being fiercely attracted to the smoldering, seductive male who crosses her path. Swept into a dangerous world of tumultuous passion and preternatural conflict, Lindsay is soon caught between her angel lover, her vampire father, and a full-blown lycan revolt. There's more at stake than her love and her life—she could lose her very soul...
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Signet (October 4, 2011)
ISBN-13: 978-0451234995
THE AUTHOR
Sylvia Day is the national bestselling, award-winning author of over a dozen novels written across multiple sub-genres. A wife and mother of two, she is a former Russian linguist for the U.S. Army Military Intelligence. Sylvia’s work has been called an “exhilarating adventure” by Publishers Weekly and “wickedly entertaining” by Booklist. Her stories have been translated into Russian, Japanese, Portuguese, German, Czech, Italian, and Thai. She’s been honored with the Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award, the EPPIE award, the National Readers’ Choice Award, the Readers’ Crown, and multiple finalist nominations for Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA Award of Excellence.
Sylvia also writes under the pseudonyms S. J. Day and Livia Dare.
Connect with Sylvia Day online:
http://www.sylviaday.com
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/SylDay
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/AuthorSylviaDay
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