Dark Intents
Chapter 1 – An
Introduction of Sorts
My life has changed. Such a simple statement, but nothing else can describe my life as well as that simple phrase. For as long as I can remember, my life has been constantly changing, to the point that change has become the norm. I turn thirteen tomorrow, and that too is a form of change. Theoretically, I leave behind my childhood and become a teenager. However, I don’t think I’ve ever really had a childhood. I never met my real parents, and my first memories are of a dirty, loud and run-down orphanage. Other memories after that are somewhat jumbled as I moved from one foster home to another. A couple of years ago, I was returned to another state run facility for children after I had run away from my last foster home. When asked why I had run away from what had appeared to be a stable home life, I had said that I preferred to live on the streets running free than be someone’s little pet. That comment had sparked a huge ruckus. Apparently, my last foster family had been a prominent one, and that comment had stirred up a literal hornet’s nest. I was quietly shuffled off to a remote facility before I could follow up on my comment. Too bad though. It could have been fun!
At the facility, I somehow acquired a nickname because of what had happened. Word gets around, and if you’re not able to tell your side of the story, you get labeled. Oh well, it didn’t really bother me. I was called the Ingrate because I had refused to live in a posh home. Heck, if anyone wants to live in a nice home for the price of having your body pawed by a dirty old man and his cronies, then they’re welcome to it. At least the whole affair gave me another name to attach after my first name. I lived in that facility for several months before I was officially adopted by Roy and Joanne Ellis.
The Ellises were very nice people. I kind of miss those early days. It almost felt like I was part of a family. They were a young couple and they tried very hard to earn my trust early on. The photos began innocently enough. Joanne had been a model in her younger years so she was always posing for Roy, who always seemed to have a digital camera handy. It wasn’t long before I was posing with Joanne, and then later on by myself. I didn’t really think anything of it until they started taking me to Victor’s basement. By then, I had started to suspect that something else was going on. What was I to do? I didn’t want to run away again. I’d just be found and returned. Also, it wasn’t as if I was being abused or anything. Either Roy or Joanne or both of them were always present at all the sessions. Victor never came close enough to touch me while he was taking the pictures, although some of the poses and some of the outfits he made me wear made me feel uncomfortable. Whenever I would hesitate at something though, it was Joanne who would coax me through it. I guess it was a trade off in a way. Having a grown woman around was nice, especially once I had started my periods, so I guess in a way, I was buying her affection and guidance by having my picture taken. I didn’t want to be known as the Ingrate for the rest of my life.
Having your period can be quite a traumatizing experience, especially since I was an early ‘bloomer’. Joanne was very understanding and nice to me throughout the whole ordeal. I never thought of her as a mother though…more like a big sister, even though she and her husband Roy basically exploited me and sold my pictures on the Internet. Now that she is gone, I sometimes find myself missing her and the ‘girly’ talks we used to have. I talked to her about almost everything. There was, however, one thing that I never dared to tell her.
Around the same time that my periods started, something else started to happen to me. My current guardian calls it manifesting. He says that the powers residing in my soul are manifesting in my body. Weird. But then, he says a lot of weird things that don’t make much sense. Unfortunately, I’ve seen enough of him to know that he knows what he’s talking about.
To put it in its simplest terms, I can do things. Things that no one else can do – or at least no one that I’ve met. I remember, one night, just after my first period, I woke up in the middle of the night to find that my room was as bright as day. It took me a while, but eventually I figured out that the source of the light was me. I was so freaked out that I screamed. Joanne came bursting into my room just as the magical light disappeared.
Soon after that, when I wasn’t so freaked out anymore, I began to experiment. One of the first things I found out was that I could somehow control light. Any kind of light was fine. For example, I could make a lamp turn on and off, without flicking the light switch. I simply think of it as on, and it turns on. That’s pretty minor compared to what I discovered next. I was staring at my desk lamp, when I found myself wondering what it would be like to hold the light within the bulb in my hand. The next thing I knew, the lamp went dark and there was a small ball of light in the palm of my right hand. I was so startled that I dropped the light. Wait, maybe that wasn’t entirely accurate. The ball of light fell through my hand and for split second, my hand disappeared.
That, of course, was like having the proverbial
light bulb
go off in my head. I began experimenting
with light more and more until I figured out that if I manipulated the
light
around me to go through me, I could turn invisible!
I’m somewhat ashamed to admit that my first
usage of my new skill was to spy on Roy and Joanne.
They were having a discussion in the living
room late into the night. I don’t
remember too much about what was said, but both of them were rather
upset. Apparently,
I crept back to my room feeling like my hands were dirty. I never knew of any of the kinds of problems Roy and Joanne faced. In my mind, I had categorized them with everyone else who had wanted to use me in the past. I had rationalized it by thinking that it was a trade off. That they provided me with shelter and I provided them with income from my pictures. But it wasn’t like that at all. They had only resorted to selling my pictures when they couldn’t help it anymore. I started to go more willingly to the photography sessions after that. I even began to save my allowance money, intending on giving it back to Roy and Joanne one day. Instead of buying the little things that I wanted, I fell upon using my new skill to simply take what I wanted. I would even steal little things that I knew Roy and Joanne would like, just to please them. I don’t know if they ever suspected anything. Maybe they just assumed I was using my allowance. They never did find out and I never got the chance to return my allowance money back to them.
I try not to think about what happened next very much. It still gives me nightmares. But sometimes, when I close my eyes, I can still remember every detail of that fateful day in Victor’s basement.
We were in the middle of a photo shoot when these men barged into the house. Somehow, instinctively, I knew they were evil. They ripped out Victor’s throat and left him to bleed his life away in his own basement. Then, one of them said something that I couldn’t understand and then Roy and Joanne were thrown up against the wall by some kind of invisible force. Some kind of green light flashed and then next thing I knew, their heads were lying on the floor just a few feet away from where their bodies were still plastered on the wall.
There was some kind of constriction in my throat and I found that I couldn’t even scream. My whole body seemed to be paralyzed. I probably would have fainted if my guardian angel hadn’t shown up just then. Enough of that for now though. The things that happened afterwards are still too fantastical for me to truly comprehend. Maybe a part of me just doesn’t want to accept it. Who knows?
These days, my guardian angel is just my guardian. I’ve asked him several times why he doesn’t adopt me. He would just give me a strange look and then evade the issue. I know he wants something from me though. I just wish I knew what it was.
Everyone wants something from everyone else. It’s just the nature of things. I get it. Most people look at me and they see a pretty girl. I don’t know why but they do. That pervert from my last foster home wanted my body. Roy and Joanne wanted the income that my pictures generated. I get it. In Roy and Joanne’s case, I was more than happy to give them what they wanted. They gave me something else in return. My new guardian though, has given me a new home, a new life in a new country, and has even enrolled me in a classy school where I’m making some new friends. But I don’t know what he wants from me! Sometimes, I think I see something. Sometimes I can see his frustration build up in his body and I think I know what he wants. But then, the moment usually passes and he becomes once more the stern and dark guardian angel that he is.
Once, he cryptically told me that he won’t adopt me because he doesn’t have a name that he can give me. But I don’t need him to give me a name. I already have one. In the orphanage, they gave me my first name. Joanne showed me that I could change Ingrate into something else. From both Joanne and Roy, I have kept their last name, in honor of who they were and what they had meant to me. I am, Rachel Ingrid Ellis.
Chapter 2 – The Nephilim
On the morning that I turned thirteen, I woke up screaming from a nightmare. It was one that I’ve had before. Several times actually. However, once I’m awake, I can only remember bits and pieces. Like, for instance, I’m underwater but I’m not drowning. There’s a man looking down at me, but he’s not helping me out of the water. He’s saying something, almost pleading with me, but I can’t remember what he’s saying. I can see that he’s got something bright in his arms but I can’t quite make out what it is. I feel drawn to this mysterious object though. I try reaching for the bright object but all of a sudden, it’s being pulled back. I keep reaching for it, but it remains beyond my reach. That’s when I woke up screaming in outrage.
My guardian, Az, came rushing into my room. “Rachel! Are you alright?”
I came to my senses and the first thing I realized is that I’m sitting up in my bed, but my nightgown has somehow pulled itself up to just under my armpits. The next thing I notice is that Az’s eyes are about to bug out of his head. I did what any normal teenage girl would do. I grabbed my pillow and threw it at him. “Get out!”
The pillow hit him in the face as he backpedaled out of my room. “Sorry!” he mumbled as he left.
I pulled my nightgown back down and was surprised that it seemed rather tight across my chest. I got up and slammed the door shut before removing the nightgown all the way off. That was another thing I missed about Joanne Ellis. Not only could something like this happen and neither of us would be terribly embarrassed by it, but also, she would have probably noticed that I was outgrowing my clothes again and would have taken me shopping a lot sooner.
It’s been almost a year now, since I started
living with
I jumped into my shower and hummed a tune while I went about my business. I would need to hit the malls today. I didn’t really need my overly tight nightgown to tell me that I’ve had another growth spurt, but at least it was physical proof that I could use to get Az to let me skip school today.
After my shower, I dressed in a baggy sweat shirt and a pair of jeans that would only fit if I sucked in my breath. I grabbed my nightgown and marched downstairs. Az was in the kitchen sipping his morning coffee while reading the newspaper. I knew it was all an act though. Az never had to read the newspaper to find out what was happening in the world. He always seemed to just know.
I tossed my nightgown down in front of him and said, “I need to go shopping.”
He looked calmly at me and casually said, “Oh?”
For some reason, I felt my embarrassment rising. He seemed to be ignoring the fact that he had just seen me half naked. I decided to try throwing that in his face. “Yeah, I need new clothes. You saw two rather prominent proofs of that this morning when you waltzed into my room!”
He raised an eyebrow and said, “I thought you were in trouble. Was it a bad dream again?”
Damn him! What does it take to faze this guy? “Forget my dreams. Among other things, I need some new bras.” There! Let’s see if talking about girls’ underwear will make him blush.
He stared at me and I could see his eyes moving up and down. I repressed a shudder because it felt as if he could see right through my clothes – which considering who and what he is, he probably could! “I see,” he said.
“That’s all you have to say?” I demanded. “I can’t go to school in clothes that are too small. My bra is going to pinch my skin all day.”
He looked back down at his newspaper and said, “You’re not going to school today. I’ve already made arrangements. We’ll go shopping once you’ve had breakfast.”
My jaw must have dropped because I could feel air blowing in. “Why didn’t you just say that?”
“It’s your birthday today. I’ve made some plans.” He said this without even looking up from his newspaper.
Arrgh! That man could be so infuriating. Why couldn’t he have just said that to begin with? He wasn’t even reading the newspaper. I could see that his eyes were staring at a single point, rather than moving back and forth, so I knew he was just pretending. I thought about setting the newspaper on fire but he had reprimanded me in the past about using my powers too openly. Instead, I directed my heated emotions at the kettle on the stove, which started to whistle as if boiling. When he raised his head to look at it, I focused some of my power at the stuff on the table in front of him. When he turned back, he took one look at the table in front of him and then turned back to look at me.
“Very funny Rach,” he said calmly. He was not smiling.
Damn it! I hated it when he called me Rach. For one thing, I happened to like my name Rachel, and for another whenever he called me Rach, he pronounced the ‘ch’ with a ‘sh’ sound, so the name ended sounding like Rash. I wouldn’t let him see how much his use of my name annoyed me though. I pretended not to notice anything different and went around the kitchen, gathering my breakfast together. I heard a rustling sound and turned to see Az patting the area in front of him to make sure that his newspaper was still there. Idiot! I can make his newspaper invisible, but I can’t really make it vanish altogether. After he had established where his newspaper was, he turned his attention to the three cups of coffee that had appeared in front of him. One of them was the real one, and he had a one in three chance of getting it right.
He got it wrong. He muttered a curse as his hand passed through one of the cups. I stifled a giggle but he glared at me anyway. I poured some milk into my bowl of cereal and prepared to sit down.
The chair suddenly vanished and I ended up falling backwards onto my butt with my bowl of cereal and milk falling all over my body and face.
If the bastard had laughed, or had even uttered a single sound, I think I probably would have killed him (or tried to at least) at that moment. Instead, he sipped his coffee as if nothing had happened.
I calmly picked myself up and went back upstairs. I would not give him the satisfaction of
hearing me curse. I jumped into the
shower again and rinsed myself off. When
I went back downstairs though, there was a plate of bacon, eggs, and
hash
browned potatoes in front of my chair.
There was a similar plate in front of
After we were done, I took the plates and cups and put them in the dishwasher. Still without a word to each other about the pranks, we got our things together and headed out the door.
When Az pulled the car out of the driveway, he finally spoke about the pranks. “Rachel, you have a sharp sense of humor. Just be careful of where you use your powers, ok?”
I tried not to sigh too loudly.
“I know,
“Yes we have, but I feel like I have to constantly remind you about using your powers before you learn how to control them properly.”
I arched an eyebrow at him and said, “I thought I had pretty good control this morning.”
He surprised me with a small smile. “You did. I was quite impressed. I didn’t even feel it when you cast your illusions.” His smile dropped as he continued, “Those are very minor spells though. I can, to a limit, mask the minor usage of your powers; however, as you grow in power, I may not be able to mask your powers completely.”
“Why? Why is it so important to mask my powers? As long as I only use my powers at home, no one will notice, right?”
He looked back at the road in front of us before turning back to me. “There are other ways of detecting celestial powers. Those who are watching for their usage can track you down to our home.”
I felt a shiver run down my spine at his words. Track me down? Is that how those men knew to find me when Roy and Joanne died? “You…” my voice cracked and I had to swallow a large lump before I could continue. “You’re talking about that time, aren’t you?”
He didn’t say anything but looked away. “Did…did me using my powers…It was my fault that Roy and Joanne died!” I felt tears run down my face and I looked out my window. I hated it when I cried! I stifled a sob but couldn’t stop the flow of tears. It was my fault!
A large strong hand grasped my left hand and held it securely. “It was not your fault!” said Az firmly. “You didn’t kill the Ellises. Lucifer and his Shadowmen did!”
I sniffled and said, “But you said that the using of my powers could be tracked! They must have tracked me down!”
He shook his head and turned to look at me again. “From what you’ve told me about how your powers started to manifest, I’d say that you pretty much stuck with low end spells. Someone would’ve had to been looking very closely to have spotted it. No, they found you through other means.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“But…why were they looking for me in the first place?”
“To get to me.” He looked at me with those dark sad eyes and said, “I wasn’t going to tell you today because today is your birthday. Would you like to know now, or would you like to talk about it tomorrow?”
I thought about it for a minute. I’m usually a very patient person. I know that in most cases, I only have to wait long enough before something I wanted came to me on its own. This time though, I could feel a sense of urgency so I said, “Tell me now. I can handle it.”
He gave me a quick smile and said, “Yes, I know you can. Where shall I start?”
I felt the car turning and I looked up to see that we had pulled into the mall’s parking lot. Az drove around until he found a satisfactory parking spot underground and parked the car. The mall wasn’t open yet, so I knew that now was as good as time as any for one of those ‘serious’ discussions. For once, Az didn’t disappoint me.
“You know who and what I am, right?”
I nodded and replied, “Yes, you are Az, my guardian angel.”
He shook his head and said, “No, I mean who I really am.”
I frowned. What was he getting at? “You are Azazel, formerly one of the Grigori - a fallen angel. I learned about you in my Mythology class.”
He grimaced but nodded his head. “Most of what you’ve learned is probably wrong, but it’s still based upon some shred of truth.”
“So it’s true you had sex with all those women?”
He threw his head back and laughed out loud. “Yes, that part is true, unfortunately. We, the Grigori that is, were assigned the mission of observing the early humans. They were little more than savages who lived in caves back then. Samyaza, our leader, learned of Lucifer’s defection from Heaven and realized that Lucifer was going to try to corrupt the humans and lead them towards Hell. Samyaza ordered us to take human form so that we could integrate with the humans and prepare them for the war that we knew was coming. For our crimes, we were cast out of Heaven.”
“Crimes? You were trying to help!”
Az shook his head sadly and said, “We were wrong. Lucifer tricked us. Or maybe, we tricked ourselves in our pride. We taught the early humans many things – most of which was forbidden knowledge. For example, I taught the humans how to make weapons. I’m not talking about the simple stone tools they already had. It took about three generations, but eventually, I managed to teach them how to make steel weapons. One of my brothers, Armaros, taught the humans magic. There were only a small number who had any kind of talent for magic, but a few of them actually became quite good.”
He paused then, as if lost in thought. “So then, what happened?” I asked.
“We got careless. At first, the humans were like children to us. However, with each new generation, they became fairer, almost as if they were trying to emulate us. I began to make little trinkets that some of the women would wear to attract the men. The problem was some of my brothers began to be attracted to the women too. By then, we’d been in human form for a long time. The urges that we felt and suppressed began to take their toll. In the end, it was too much for us to take. We argued about it. Long and hard. In the end, Samyaza convinced us that it would be fine to lie with the women. After all, we were angels and we had free will. We were on a holy mission and we deserved some form of reward. Looking back, I realize that it was a weak argument, but by then, none of us were really thinking straight.”
Az was looking very serious so I decided to try to lighten the mood a bit. “I bet you guys were just horny!”
It worked. Az laughed out loud again. “Maybe. Anyway, our real crime didn’t really become apparent until about 9 months later.”
“Let me guess. All those women started giving birth?”
“Multiple births,” said Az grimly. “None of the women ever survived the births, but each one gave birth to several babies at a time.”
I think my jawed dropped. “Several?”
“We stopped having sex with the women then. Well, most of us did. Some of us just couldn’t seem to stop. Sex became an obsession for some of the Grigori. We had been denied physical pleasure for so long, and to suddenly experience it so wantonly…well, it was more powerful than any drug.”
Az paused again, deep in his memories. I could tell that his memories were causing him a lot of pain though. However, he’d gone too far to stop now. “Then what happened?” I asked.
He shook himself as if shaking water off his body. “I’m not too sure of the details. God punished us for our sins and cast us into the Abyss. By then, of course, it was too late. There were thousands of Nephilim upon the earth.”
“Thousands? How many Grigori were there?”
“Only two hundred, but remember, each woman we impregnated had multiple babies. The Nephilim population grew exponentially. Michael told me much later that for several years after we were cast into the Abyss, it was actually quite peaceful. However, once the Nephilim children hit puberty, their powers started to manifest.”
I don’t know why, but I felt a sense of awe. Look, I know who Az is and what he is. I’ve know ever since I laid eyes on him. However, just to hear him casually toss around the name of the Archangel Michael really made me feel small and insignificant.
“What kind of powers?” I asked the question even though I think I already knew the answer.
Az gave me a strange piercing look and said, “They had powers similar to the angels. They had the powers of light. Maybe if we had been around, we may have been able to prevent what happened next. But then again, it was probably inevitable. As the Nephilim grew older, they became more powerful. They were so powerful in fact that they could challenge the angels. They caused massive destruction around the world because they had all this power, but no instruction or guidance in its use. Michael mobilized an army of angels, but there were limits to what he could do. If he brought his army into the mortal plane, then that would’ve allowed Satan to bring his legions of demons in as well. The celestial truce would have been broken. Instead, the war became a war of influence. Both sides would try to influence individual Nephilim to fight on their side. Whenever the angels and demons clashed, it was always on the immortal plane.
However, Michael really had his work cut out for him. How can you influence someone when you had nothing significant to offer in return? Unlike humans, Michael couldn’t dangle the carrot of Heaven in front of the Nephilim.”
“Why?”
“God and the angels of Heaven regarded them as abominations and barred them from Heaven. Satan, on the other hand, wanted to have those Nephilim under his control. He saw them as the perfect weapon to tip the balance of celestial power in his favor.
In the end, Michael managed to convince some of the Nephilim to side with Heaven. When I crawled out of the Abyss, he recruited me to assist the Nephilim that were fighting on the side of good.”
Az paused in his story again. I noticed that he did that a lot. This time though, there seemed to be an expression of pain on his face. I looked at him closely to make sure he was ok. He must have noticed because his expression went blank and he continued with his story. “In the end, all of our efforts were in vain. God had apparently decided that enough was enough. He sent the Great Flood which wiped out most of the Nephilim as well as a large chunk of the human population. What remained of the human population scattered across the world. Those few Nephilim that survived went into hiding. As for the Nephilim who perished, those who aligned themselves willingly with Hell had their souls end up there. Those who aligned themselves with Heaven, as well as those who remained undecided, had no where to go. Since their souls were immortal, they were forced to continually reincarnate over and over.”
There was an almost audible click in my mind. I’m not exactly dumb, but it sure took me a long time to figure out where Az was going with this. “I’m a Nephilim, aren’t I?”
“Yes, you are. Your original father was Samyaza, although parental responsibility was never one of his strong suits.”
“Samyaza?” I’m not entirely sure how I felt about that. It was like a splash of cold water in the face to find out that your father was a bad guy.
Az must have caught my concern. He reached over and tousled my hair. “Don’t let it concern you Rachel. He may have been the father of your first incarnation, but that’s it. There is nothing more to connect the two of you. These days, he’s Satan’s lapdog. He leads the remnants of the Grigori – those that Satan and Lucifer managed to pull from the Abyss. Other Grigori, who were rescued by Michael were placed under his command. Not too many of my former brothers survived the Abyss unfortunately. Armaros got out on his own, but then again, he always was very adept in magic. I only got out by changing my nature and making the Abyss a part of me.”
“What happens when angels die? I thought angels are supposed to be immortal.”
A look of sadness came over Az’s face. “Normally, angels are immortal. If they manifest on the mortal plane and are critically wounded, then they are immediately recalled back to Heaven where they can heal. They are similar to demons in that respect. However, the Grigori were cast out of Heaven, which means we have no place to go. In the Abyss, there were some predators who find the taste of angels to be particularly appealing.”
At first, I thought Az was kidding, but the look on his face told me otherwise. “Well, at least now I know why I have these powers. Was there anything else?”
Az shook his head and
suddenly, I
felt a sinking feeling in my stomach.
There was more, but Az wasn’t going
to tell
me. Why?
I forced a smile and said, “Thanks for telling me
He smiled and checked his watch. “You’re welcome Rachel. Now, let’s go shopping. We have a lot to do before your surprise tonight!”
That got me. I love surprises. It didn’t occur to me until much later that Az never really did answer my original question. Why was Lucifer after me? Maybe it was because I’m a Nephilim, but what did it have to do with Az? If Samyaza was my father in my previous incarnation, what was Az to me?
***
I love shopping! Az took me to all the trendy stores. Every time we made a purchase though, he would pull out a huge wad of cash out of his pocket. He never used a credit card. Oh well, to each his own I guess! We had a quick lunch in the food court and went right back to shopping.
We made several trips out to his car to drop off my purchases. I was feeling giddy! I was getting more than just a new wardrobe. There didn’t seem to be a limit to how much Az was willing to spend on me. If I showed even the smallest interest in something, he would buy it for me. He was spoiling me and I knew it – but I loved it too!
The last store we visited sold formal clothes. He had a smirky expression on his face as we went in. Instead of letting me shop though, a very pretty saleslady brought over a large garment box. “What is this?” I asked.
The lady – her name tag read Denise – gave me a broad smile and said, “Your guardian called us earlier this week with your measurements. We just need you to try it on for final fitting.”
I opened the box, and this time, I know for sure that my jaw dropped wide open. In a word, the dress inside was beautiful! It was black with glittering stones artistically placed around it. “Are…are those diamonds? I…I can’t accept this Az! It’s too much!”
Az responded by giving me a hug and a kiss on my forehead. “I did a little digging into your past. I know what you went through for most of it. Trust me, you can and will accept this gift. Besides, you’ll need it tonight.”
Before I could respond though, a salesman came up to Az with another large box. Az quickly followed him to the men’s side of the store.
Denise led me to the fitting room and opened the door for me. “Try on the dress. Once you have it on, give me a shout and I’ll come and help you with the final adjustments.”
She left me standing there looking at the beautiful dress. Suddenly, I couldn’t wait to try it on! I pulled off my clothes in record time. The dress slid over my body with a silky smoothness that gave me goose bumps. I checked my reflection in the mirror and couldn’t repress a grin. I looked beautiful! The dress was sleeveless and it had a daring (at least for me) V shaped neckline. There was just one little problem though. I slipped the dress off and removed my bra before pulling it back on. I checked myself again. Perfect! There was a discreet knock on the door and I opened it to allow Denise into the fitting room.
“Wow, you look gorgeous!” She busied herself around me for a few minutes. Then, she pulled my hair up into an impromptu bun. “I understand that you have an appointment with the hair stylist soon. This should give you an idea of what you’ll look like tonight.”
I don’t usually wear my hair up, but I had to admit, I looked several years older. The dress seemed to slump a little around my chest though. “I think my boobs need to be a little bit bigger.” My hands circled underneath to show what I meant.
Denise gave me a wink and handed me small box. “When you put on the dress tonight, put these under your breasts.
I looked at the box. It was one of those push up bra cups that woman taped to their breasts to make them seem bigger. I know many women usually wore them with dresses, but I’d never tried them on.
“You look wonderful,” said Denise. “I think you’re a very lucky girl. Your guardian must love you very much.”
I don’t know why, but suddenly I was crying. Denise pulled me into her shoulder and I cried there for several minutes. When I finally pulled myself together, she handed me several sheets of Kleenex. “I’m sorry; I don’t know what got into me.”
Denise hugged me again and said, “Shhh, it’s ok. I think I can guess. No one has ever shown you this much affection, right?”
I nodded and said, “No one’s ever said they loved me.”
“I think he loves you very much. He may not say it often, if at all, but actions speak louder than words.”
“But why? What does he want from me?”
Denise put her arm around my shoulder and said, “I think he just wants you to be happy. Now come on, I’m sure he’s done with his fitting. It’s time for you to hit the salon.”
I hugged Az as soon as I saw him. “Thank you,” I said quietly.
He leaned down and kissed my cheek and whispered, “Your welcome.”
We went next door to the salon and I went in as Az left to take our purchases to the car. The hair stylist spent about an hour on my hair. When she was done, I could see Az sitting patiently in the waiting area. He paid the cashier in cash and we left the salon hand in hand. I’m not sure what I felt at that moment. I felt warm and giddy inside and I held his hand tightly as if it were some sort of lifeline. Is this love?
Chapter 3 – Dark
Music
As perfect as the day was, the night was even more perfect. The first thing we did when we got home was to go to our separate rooms to shower and get changed. I used the push up pads that Denise had given me, and though the dress was classy, at least I now had a bit of a cleavage.
I could tell that Az approved. When he saw me, his eye traveled up and down my body several times. As for myself, it was almost as if I couldn’t pull my eyes from him. He was handsome! I mean, I guess I always knew that Az was good looking, but I guess I never really thought about it or acknowledged it. His skin color wasn’t exactly dark, but it was dusky…almost as if he had a perpetual tan. His body was lean with well defined muscles. And his face! I had lived with Az for about a year now. Why did I never notice how hunky he was? He had a rugged sort of face that looked as if were carved by a master xylographer. He had dark piercing eyes and thick deep brown hair that was cut short – almost in a military style. His tailored suit fit him like a body glove. My knees felt wobbly all of a sudden.
“You look beautiful Rachel.” Even his voice seemed to resonate.
“You too…I mean you look great Az!” I could feel my cheeks flush and I turned away. I felt his footsteps behind me and I felt his warm hands touch the back of my neck. Something cool and metallic touched my skin. I looked down and gasped. Az had clipped a pendant on a golden chain around my neck. “What? Az!”
I turned around but he put a finger to my lips. “Hush. Don’t say that you don’t deserve it. You do. Don’t ask how much this cost, because it didn’t cost anything beyond the raw materials.”
“You mean?”
“Yes, I made it. I still have some skill in making little trinkets.”
I looked at the pendant carefully and what I saw nearly took my breath away. It was definitely more than just a little trinket! It was beautiful! It was a small gold angel with its wings spread wide. The gold chain was attached to the tips of the wings. “It’s beautiful!”
“As are you, Rachel.”
His voice sounded a little hoarse, as if he were holding in emotions. I looked into to his face and I could tell that he was holding something back. He looked away for a second and when he turned back, he was once more in control of himself and the moment was lost.
“This pendant is rather special. I would ask that you not take it off unless you really need to.”
“I don’t know if I ever want to take it off!”
He smiled and said, “I’ve worked a couple of spells into it. For one thing, I’ll know where you are anywhere in the world. Secondly, if you ever need me, you can call me with it.”
“How?”
He smiled enigmatically and said, “You’ll figure it out when you need to. You can hide it with your illusion spell whenever you don’t want it shown. It’s small enough so that the spell won’t be detected.”
I nodded and tiptoed up so that I could kiss him. He turned his face so that I could kiss his
cheek, but I wouldn’t have any of it. I
cupped his chin with one hand and planted a solid kiss on his lips. “
I saw his expression flicker, as if he was about to say something momentous, but then, the moment passed again and he simply said, “Your welcome.”
What was wrong with him? Sometimes he could act to warm and tender towards me, but it’s like whenever he realizes that he’s being so nice, he backs off and grows cold. What’s up with that? I know he wants something from me. I just wish he would tell me what. Oh well. Whatever it is, I’m sure I’ll find out eventually. I am very patient when I want to be. But how do I tell him that? And how do I tell him that I love him?
***
My last surprise for the night was a Broadway show. Not just any show either! It was a musical that I had wanted to see for a long time. I may have mentioned it to Az at some point. Anyway, that doesn’t matter. The Phantom of the Opera was in town and we had a pair of the best seats available! We weren’t too close to the stage because that would have meant craning our necks to look at the show, but we weren’t very far back either. In fact, I think we were maybe in the fourth or fifth row, directly under the chandelier. I swear, when that thing came down, I thought I was going to pee my panties! I shouldn’t have worried though. I was with my guardian angel. What could go wrong?
The show was beyond amazing. The haunting melodies and enchanting lyrics will live with me forever. The first Act was much longer than the second and in my opinion, I liked it much better. The second Act was very sad and really ripped at my heartstrings. Az and I talked about the show in the car on the way home.
“That was incredible!
He smiled happily and said, “Your welcome. I’m very glad that you had a good time.”
“But today was must have been very expensive! How could you afford it all?”
“I’ve lived a very frugal life before I met you. Beyond the very basic necessities, there really wasn’t very much that I needed.”
“Az,” I said very seriously. “I saw the price tags of all the things you bought today. Today cost a small fortune!”
He just shrugged and said, “It’s just money Rachel. Besides, my job pays well, and my employer is quite generous.”
“Really? Az, just what do you do anyway?”
He looked at me as if he were gauging his answer. Then he surprised me by saying, “I’m an assassin.”
“What?!” That shocked me. Not only did I not expect an answer, I didn’t expect him to tell me truthfully. “An assassin?”
He looked somewhat sheepish and said, “Well, not all the time. Sometimes I do other odd jobs that normally wouldn’t involve killing.”
“Why are you telling me now? You never would tell me before.” Some pieces clicked in my mind. The birthday surprise, the shower of presents. I suddenly thought I knew what was going on. “You’re going away aren’t you? For good this time. You’re going away and you’re going to leave me alone!” The tears streaked down my face at the thought of never seeing Az again. Damn it! I really hated it when I cried!
“What?! No Rachel! I’m not going away! I promise!”
I sniffled and said, “Really? Truly?”
His voice softened as he said, “Really and truly. I’m here to stay Rachel. I’m telling you now because I believe you can now handle the truth. You would have found out eventually anyway, so at least you get to hear it from me. Besides, the time has come for you to start learning how to use your powers.”
I wiped away my tears and said, “Really? You’re going to teach me to use my powers?”
“I’m afraid I can’t teach you to use your powers.”
“Why not? You’re an angel aren’t you?”
“I’m a dark angel Rachel. The only one that I know of. My powers are steeped in darkness while your powers come from the light.”
“So who’s going to teach me?”
“I have a candidate in mind. I’ve sent out some messages a while ago but he hasn’t responded yet.”
“Oh, ok.” I tried not to show my disappointment, but I’m sure I didn’t succeed. “Say Az, who’s your employer anyway? Is that the one who keeps sending you those emails?”
Az let out a chuckle and said, “You’ve actually met him once, but I’m sure you don’t remember. He saved your life after Lucifer tried to kill you.”
“Your employer is the Archangel Michael?” I think I’ve lost count as to the number of times my mouth dropped open today.
Az laughed and said, “I didn’t know it until the day I met you actually. He had me fooled pretty good. Somehow, he identifies places and people where Satan is trying to get a foothold and then he sends me there to fix things up. That usually means disrupting whatever it was that Satan had planned and sending a lot of souls into Hell.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know how else to respond to that so I was thankful when Az changed the subject.
“So, how did you like Phantom of the Opera, now that you’ve finally seen it?”
“I loved it!” I think I must have gushed a bit. Hey, what can I say? I’m just a regular thirteen year old girl! Yeah right! “The ending was so sad. I felt so bad for the Phantom at the end there.”
“Really? So you think Christine should have chosen him over Raoul?”
“What? Of course not! Christine and Raoul belonged together.” I was looking at Az when I said this so I saw his face tighten up. “What? What’s wrong?”
He shook his head and said, “Nothing.”
“No, tell me! What’s wrong?” I wouldn’t let him go on this one. I had to find out what was bothering him. Maybe it would even give me a clue as to what he wanted out of me.
He let out a sigh and said, “You’re probably right. Christine and Raoul did belong together. I guess the story has changed so much from its original inspirations. I’ve watched this show many times and it never fails to bring back memories both fond and bitter.”
“Memories? What do you mean? It’s just a story, right?”
“It’s a story that’s over a hundred years old. The original author, Gaston Leroux was a journalist and theatre critic before he became a writer.”
I nodded, “I think I read that somewhere.”
“Mmhmm. What you probably wouldn’t have read anywhere is that Leroux was quite infatuated with a certain opera singer at the time. She was quite older than he was, but she still managed to inspire him. He even managed to interview her once.”
“Really?” I was genuinely interested now. “What was her name?”
“By the time she died, she was known as the Countess de
Casa Miranda. Leroux knew her as
Christina Nilsson. I, however, knew her
when she was just little Kristina Jonasdotter.
She became the basis of Christine Daaé.”
I suddenly sat straight
up in my seat.
“You knew the real life Christine Daaé?”
I couldn’t believe my ears! I
knew that as an angel, Az must have had a
long and
eventful life, but hearing something like this was simply incredible! “How did you know her? I
mean, what was your relationship…I mean…”
He laughed and said, “I
was her vocal trainer. Her
singing instructor.”
It took me a minute and
then I started laughing. “You’re the Angel
of Music!”
He looked startled for a
moment and then he laughed too. “You know,
I never thought of it that way. I was a
traveling musician in
I looked closely at him
and I somehow knew that there was more to this
story. “Was she beautiful?”
He looked at me closely
before answering, “Yes, but it was with her
voice that I fell in love with.”
“Were
you lovers?”
I was surprised by the shortness of my tone.
Az seemed somewhat startled too.
“She was fourteen years old at the time. I’m
not a pedophile!” He sighed deeply and
said, “She was my pupil
for three years before she started giving concerts and made a name for
herself. She moved to
“But for those three
years…I mean she was seventeen when she left,
right?”
“She fell in love with
and married a French banker after she moved to
I managed to sputter, “Me? Jealous? No way! You’re
the one who seemed to be so caught up
in memories!”
Az chuckled and said, “I guess some aspects of The
Phantom of the Opera hits a little close to home for me.
I’ve always related to the Phantom in a way,
I guess. It’s easy to become obsessed
with someone, especially if their singing reminds you of something
you’ve lost
forever and can never return to.”
“Well, take it from me,” I said tartly,
“you’re much better looking than the Phantom.
Heck, you could even give Raoul a run for his money!” We shared a laugh and then drove in silence
for
a while.
***
We reached our home shortly after midnight. We would have been home sooner but my teenaged stomach started to growl so Az took us to a late night dessert restaurant. We both got ready for bed in our own rooms and when I was done, I slipped on one of my new silk nightgowns, and slipped into his room.
He was sitting in front of his computer, probably checking his emails when I plopped down on his bed. “Az? How come you’ve never sang for me?”
He looked thoughtful for a moment and said, “I don’t know. I guess it never came up. I’m not even sure of what kind of music you like.”
“There’s a lot that you don’t know about me,” I said.
He nodded and smiled and said, “True. Would you like me to sing something for you now?”
I nodded my head and then he surprised me by singing a song from The Phantom of the Opera.
Nighttime
sharpens, heightens each sensation
Darkness stirs and wakes imagination
Silently the senses abandon their defenses
Slowly, gently, night unfurls its
splendor
Grasp it, sense it, tremulous and tender
Turn your face away from the garish light of day
Turn your face away from cold, unfeeling light
And listen to the music of the night
Close you eyes and surrender to
your darkest dreams
Leave all thoughts of the world you knew
before
Close your eyes, let your spirit start to soar
And you'll live as you've never lived before
Softly, deftly, music shall caress
you
Hear it, feel it, secretly possess you
Open up your mind, let your fantasies unwind
In this darkness which you know you cannot fight
The darkness of the music of the night
Let your mind start a journey
through a strange, new world
Leave all thoughts of the world you knew before
Let your soul take you where you long to go
Only then can you belong to me
Floating, falling, sweet
intoxication
Touch me, trust me, savor each sensation
Let the dream begin, let your darker side give in
To the power of the music that I write
The power of the music of the night
You alone can make my song take
flight
Help me make the music of the night
Oh my God! He sang it much better than the actor who played the Phantom tonight. Az was incredible. His voice…wow his voice…it was simply angelic.
I closed my eyes and just let my ears experience the song. It was beyond beautiful!
When he finished, I slowly opened my eyes and I could see him smiling down at me. There were tears flowing from my eyes and I absently brushed them away. “That was awesome,” I said quietly.
He gave me a little bow and said, “Thank you. I’m a little rusty since I haven’t sung in a while, but I’m glad you liked it.”
“Az, I loved it! That was probably the best present you gave me today. The memory of you singing that song will probably be in my mind forever.”
He gave me a shy tentative smile and said, “Would you like to hear that song the way it was meant to be heard?”
I cocked my head to the side and asked, “What do you mean?”
“The song is about the music of darkness. Just as the lyrics say, your ‘senses have to abandon their defenses’. You have to totally submerge yourself in darkness to truly understand the beauty that it has to offer.”
I felt a little uneasy at his words. Submerge myself in darkness? What did that mean? However, he was looking at me with such earnestness in his eyes that I couldn’t refuse. “Ok, I’d like that very much. What do I have to do?”
Az gave me a broad smile and then he make a circular motion with this hands. A circle of darkness emerged in front of him and I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up on end. He reached out his hand to me and I tentatively took it. “Stay close to me Rachel and don’t let go of my hand.”
He held my hand firmly and pulled me into the darkness. When I say darkness, I really mean DARKNESS! There was no light anywhere and I could feel the hairs on my forearms stand as straight as the hairs on the back of my neck. There was a deep sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach and I could feel my fear rising. The only thing that was keeping me from running insanely in every direction was Az’s firm grip on my hand. He slowly changed his grip until he was hugging me from behind. That helped to settle my nerves a little. I think this was the first time he’d ever held me this close. I leaned back into him and tried to relax.
Then he started to sing. The lyrics were the same, but this time I wasn’t just hearing them with my ears anymore. There seemed to be music in the darkness and I could feel the music with every pore on my skin. It made me want to rip off my clothes so that I could feel more of the music on my skin. It was like there was an orchestra playing somewhere and the notes they were playing were dancing all over my body. I was lost and I never wanted to be found.
Soon, I became aware of another sensation. It started like a pressure that gently pushed at me from all directions, but the gentle pressure grew quickly more insistent and persistent. The pressure filled me with longing and a deep yearning for…something…the pressure pushed and prodded me…it surrounded me and smothered me…it…wanted…me…
That was when I knew. I knew it in the core of my being. I knew what the pressure was. It was the pressure that Az kept bottled up every day and every day. I knew what he wanted now. He wanted me. All of me. He longed and yearned for me with an obsession that bordered upon the insane. I didn’t understand it. I wasn’t ready for it. Even before the song was finished, I began to struggle within Az’s embrace. I think I must have been screaming something too but I’m not sure.
The next thing I knew, I was back in Az’s room. He was looking at me with that deep sad obsessive look of yearning. I couldn’t take that. I just couldn’t! I covered my face and ran to my room. I slammed the door shut, turned on all the lights and curled up into a fetal position on my bed. I think I cried myself to sleep.
Chapter 4 – The
Magician
I avoided Az after that. I’m a bit ashamed of myself, but I just couldn’t bring myself to face him. Over the weekend, I spent a lot of my time working out in the basement where I practiced with the various training weapons that Az had taught me to use. I had all the lights turned on to max and I blanked out my mind as my body went through the motions. I think I was somewhat relieved when he left on one of his jobs soon afterwards. As usual, he had a babysitter come to stay with me. She was an older woman in her fifties named Miss Chin who drove me to school every morning and picked me up every afternoon. She even cooked me my meals and stayed in the guest bedroom at night. I’m not sure what Az paid her for her services, but it must have been substantial. Still, after my recent experience with true darkness, I was glad for the company. She didn’t even make any comment about my sudden need to sleep with the lights on.
On the Monday morning after Az left, Miss Chin dropped me off at my school and told me that she would pick me up after school at the usual place and time. I nodded at her and agreed to meet her. I looked at the imposing front entrance of Westmont Private School and felt a sudden strange urge to run away. What was wrong with me?
“Rachel!”
I turned my head in the direction of the shout and smiled despite myself. Faye Morgan was running towards me with her long red hair flying in all directions. Faye was my friend, possibly my best friend in school. Neither of us really fit in with any of the popular cliques in school, but we seemed to fit in with each other. She had started to bloom a little earlier than me and I thought I could detect a little bit more of a bounce in her chest and she stopped in front of me.
“Hi Faye!” I said and I gave her a hug.
She returned my hug and then pulled away with an impish grin. “Do I detect a bit of a growth spurt?”
I blushed in spite of myself. She was very perceptive and we seemed to think along the same lines. “No more than you, I suspect!”
The reddish hue on her fair skin as she blushed was very cute. We linked arms and walked into the school and into our homeroom class. Our teacher, Mrs. Bernstein was writing something on the chalkboard. When she finished, she said, “Ok, class. Settle down into your seats please. I hope everyone had a good weekend. Just a reminder, your book reports are due tomorrow.”
My back stiffened at those words. My book report! I had completely forgotten about it! I didn’t even have a book picked out yet.
Faye noticed my reaction and whispered to me. “What’s wrong Rachel?”
“I haven’t even picked out a book for my report yet! How am I going get it done by tomorrow?”
“Don’t worry about it Rachel. Here you can borrow this one.” Faye slipped a book onto my desk. It was titled Sword of the Rightful King by Jane Yolen.
“Thanks! But what about you?” I asked gratefully.
She gave me a quick grin and said, “I’ve already finished my report. I’ve also finished that book so I can help you out with your report if you want.”
“Faye, you’re the best!”
I must have forgotten to hush my voice in my excitement because Mrs. Bernstein cleared her throat and looked meaningfully at me. I slunk down in my chair and looked straight ahead. The rest of the class passed uneventfully.
Faye and I linked arms again as we walked to our next class. This, of course, drew several looks but we didn’t care.
At lunch, we headed outside to munch on our sandwiches. It was pretty warm outside and the sun was shining. Faye wolfed her sandwich down and then gave me a speculative look.
“There’s something different about you,” she said with her head tilted to the side.
I grinned tartly at her and put both my hands under my breasts. “What, beyond the obvious you mean?”
We shared a laugh and then she looked carefully at my neck. “Are you wearing a new pendant?”
My frowned slightly as my hand reached for my throat and touched the gold pendant that Az had given me on my birthday. I could have sworn that I had cast my spell of invisibility on it this morning. I pulled the pendant out and showed it to Faye. “My guardian gave it to me for my birthday.”
“It’s beautiful Rachel!” She cooed with delight as she reached up and held the pendant in her right hand. “You’re such a lucky girl. The detailing on this angel is amazing! That reminds me. I did a little shopping over the weekend and I got you something. Happy belated birthday!” She reached into her backpack and pulled out a small gift wrapped package.
“Aw, you shouldn’t have Faye! Thanks!” I loved surprises, and this one certainly was very surprising. I ripped open the wrapping and opened the box. Inside, was a letter opener shaped like a miniature sword. The holder for the sword was shaped like a marble stone and the sword fit inside it when it was not in use. “It’s really nice,” I said somewhat uncertainly.
Faye didn’t seem offended though. “I had a feeling that you would forget all about our homework assignment so I brought you that book. Then, I saw this in a store and knew that it would be perfect.”
“Um, what is it?”
She gave me a look of disbelief and said, “You don’t know? That’s Excalibur, the Sword in the Stone. The book I gave you is about King Arthur. Get it?”
“Uh, I think so. Excalibur was King Arthur’s sword, right?”
Faye gave a theatrical sigh and said, “Rachel, you can be pretty thick headed sometimes, you know?”
I grinned at her but didn’t disagree with her. When it came to reading, Faye loved to read the Fantasy genre whereas I simply didn’t read very much at all. I never really saw the point when I could get much more enjoyment out of watching TV.
Faye dug into her backpack once more and pulled out several sheets of paper. “Here, I doubt you’ll be able to read that book and write a report on it in one night. Just make sure to paraphrase this so that the writing is in your style, ok?”
I glanced at the sheets and whistled in amazement. “You actually wrote two reports? One for yourself and one for me?”
Faye rolled her eyes and said, “Well, I didn’t really write it for you. I just have a lot of time on my hands, you know? Especially when someone doesn’t call me all weekend!”
“I’m sorry Faye. I was really preoccupied this weekend.”
She gave me a lewd wink and said, “I’m sure! What with that hunky guardian of yours!”
I sputtered and said, “It’s not like that at all!”
She arched an eyebrow and asked, “It’s not?”
“Well, for one thing, he’s too old for me.”
“What do you mean? He looks like he’s thirty or something.”
I shook my head ruefully and said, “You have no idea Faye. You have no idea!” Faye didn’t know it but she was probably off the mark by like ten thousand years or something!
“Hey look girls! The geeks are doing their homework during lunch!”
Both Faye and I looked up to see Susan Thompson and her gang bearing down upon us. Susan Thompson is a big girl, and I don’t mean just her breasts either. She was a good half head taller than either Faye or me and she was stronger than most of the boys in our school. She usually traveled around the school with three or four other big and mean girls.
“Whatcha got there girlies? Let me see!” Before either of us could react, Susan snatched the sheets of paper out of my hands. “Oh look!” she crowed. “It’s a book report!”
I could feel my anger rising and I fought to keep it under control. “Give that back Susan. It’s not yours!”
Susan looked at me maliciously. “Hmm, I don’t think its yours either. You’re not thinking of cheating on your homework, are you? Nah, you wouldn’t have the guts. You’re such a prissy goody two shoes!”
My face flushed but I struggled to keep my temper in check. With my powers, it would be so easy to wipe that nasty grin off Susan’s face.
Before I could retort though, Faye suddenly spoke up. She was usually such a sweet girl that I was shocked at what she said. “What about your shoes bitch? Looks like you stepped in shit. Oh wait, those are you socks, right?”
Susan’s face turned red with fury. She dropped the book report and wound up her right arm. She gave Faye a look of venomous hatred as she swung her fist at my friend.
I had to do something! I couldn’t let my friend get hurt! I directed my gaze at Susan’s shoes and suddenly, they burst into flames.
Susan aborted her attack and screamed like a little girl. She stomped her feet on the ground in a vain effort to stomp out the flames. When that didn’t work, she ran away screaming in a mixture of fear and pain. Her gang quickly followed.
Faye turned to me with a look of awe on her face. “Did you see that? That was cool!”
I bent down to pick up the book report and by the time I stood back up, I had composed my face. “Come on Faye, I think we better get back into the school. Lunch is just about over.”
Faye made a show of looking at her watch and then said, “You’re right. Come on, let’s go!”
We linked arms again and walked into the school. Faye kept chatted gaily as if nothing had happened. I just listened with half an ear and nodded and made the appropriate noises at the appropriate places. I was too distracted by what had happened to really pay attention.
Az had warned me about my emotions. He said that if I used my powers when I was angry, I could unleash more than I had intended and cause unnecessary damage. I hadn’t meant to hurt Susan. I only wanted to distract her enough so that she wouldn’t hit Faye. That, however, was the problem. Everything had happened so fast, and already my mind was struggling with the chain of events. There was, however, one thing that I was absolutely certain of. I did not cast that fire spell.
***
Miss Chin picked me up after school and we drove home in silence. I was mulling over the events of the day, trying to get my head around it. I checked my pendant, making sure that my invisibility spell was back on. It was on during lunch as well, but somehow, Faye had seen it. Then, there was the whole affair of setting Susan’s shoes on fire.
Fire, is really simple to do – especially if you are emotionally agitated. The real tough part about playing with fire is controlling it. I was pretty angry at Susan during lunch. That was why I had been planning on simply distracting her by making her trip or something like that. I’m sure that if I had tried fire at that moment, in my then emotional state, I might have set Susan completely on fire. That spell had come from Faye. I was certain of it.
Miss Chin served dinner and we ate quietly. She was paid to look after me, not to entertain me. After the meal, I thanked her quietly and went straight to my room. I took a shower and then got into my bed. It was still much too early to sleep but I didn’t feel like doing anything else. I suddenly wished Az was here. He would know what to do. As I replayed the lunch time fiasco in my mind, I realized that it was entirely possible that one of Susan’s gang may have cast that fire spell. However, I discarded that thought almost instantly. I knew. Somehow, I just knew. Faye had cast the spell. But that would mean that she was a Nephilim, right? I nodded absently to myself. It was also entirely possible that she was something else entirely – like maybe a demon in disguise. I cringed at that thought. I couldn’t bear the thought that my friend could be a demon in disguise. No, she had to be a reincarnated Nephilim. That was the only explanation my mind would accept. That meant that she probably didn’t know of the dangers of using her powers openly. That meant that it was my duty as her friend to warn her and protect her.
I jumped out of bed and pulled out the report that Faye had written for me. I powered up my computer and started to read her report. It was very well written. I’d often envied Faye both her fair looks and her obvious brains. She far outstripped not only everyone in our class, but the school as well. That was probably why she didn’t fit in.
Her report on Sword of the Rightful King focused a lot on the sword Excalibur. I’d be the first one to admit that I never really cared for swords one way or another, but her report was very compelling. She talked a lot about the young King Arthur and of how he was the only one who could pull the sword from the stone. Then, she went into a lot of detail regarding Merlin and his apprentice Morgan le Fay. All in all, it was a rather interesting report and it almost made me want to read the book – almost. I paraphrased Faye’s report as best as I could and dumbed it down a bit – although I’m sure the dumbing down part wasn’t entirely intentional. I printed it out when I was done and left it on my printer.
As I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, I found myself thinking of shining swords and the strong handsome men who used them.
I slipped into my dream almost right away. Once more, I was underwater, looking up at a man who had something shiny in his arms. It was long and this time, even through the blurry water, I could see that it was a sword. It was a long sword, with a bright and shiny blade. The hilt was a simple cross piece and the handle looked as if a large man could tightly fit two hands upon it. The man holding the sword was saying something. I strained to hear it but could barely make out a single word: chalybs. As with before, I reached out for the sword, but suddenly it was being pulled back out of reach. I strained for the sword and could almost reach it when suddenly a dark form appeared behind the man. It was a woman with eyes and hair of fire. In her right hand, she gripped a flaming dagger which she pulled back and then plunged downward towards the man’s unprotected back. I screamed a warning to the man.
And woke up.
Az suddenly barged into my room again. I looked at him, surprised to see him there. He was staring at me and his eyes looked like they were about to bug out. I looked down and to my dismay found that somehow, in my sleep, my nightgown had pulled itself up again. My gold pendant was nicely framed between the results of my recent growth spurts and I was positive that it wasn’t the pendant that Az was staring at.
I grabbed my pillow, but this time, instead of throwing it at him, I hugged it to my chest and began to laugh. Az looked startled at first, as if he had expected another face full of pillow, but then he too started to laugh.
I beckoned him in and he entered and sat on the edge of my bed. We were both still laughing like crazy. Eventually, we managed to get control of ourselves and just looked at each other in the eyes. I could feel my heart start to pound in my chest as I looked into those hard dark eyes. I wanted to reach out and hug him, but instead, I leaned over and kissed him on his cheek. “I’m sorry,” I said softly.
He regarded me intently and then said, “You have nothing to be sorry for. I’m the one who was sorry. You are too young to have found out about it. I wasn’t going to tell you until you were a little older.”
I opened my mouth to say something else but he shushed me with a finger to my lips. “Shh, its ok little one. We can talk more about it later. Come on and get dressed. I have someone I want you to meet.”
He stood and looked away while I pulled my nightgown back down. “Who?” I asked.
He stepped out of my room and said, “Your new magic teacher.”
That perked me up almost right away. I was going to learn magic!
I dressed with record speed and hurried downstairs. In the kitchen, I found Az sitting across from a man. The man looked up as I approached and I felt a shiver run through my body as soon as I saw him. It was the man from my dreams!
“You!”
Both Az and the man looked surprised. The man recovered first. “You know me?”
Az was looking at me intently now and I was beginning to feel a little uncomfortable. “I…I’ve had dreams of you.”
Az and the man exchanged a look and then Az stood up and said, “Sit down Rachel and tell us of these dreams.
I sat down in the chair that Az vacated. I looked at the man across from me and repressed a shudder. The man was dressed like a street bum. There’s no other way to describe it. If it weren’t for his face, I wouldn’t have given him a second glance on the street. His face was every bit as handsome as Az’s, although his skin color was much lighter. Almost as light as Faye’s, actually. “You’re an angel, right?”
I was rewarded by a broad condescending smile from
the
man. He turned to Az
briefly and said, “You’re protégé is very perceptive
I peered at this face, trying to find more clues but I was at a loss as to who this was. I somehow knew that it wasn’t the Archangel Michael. I knew that Michael would have more of a presence. “Who are you?”
The man seemed to find this funny and he chuckled
softly. I was beginning to get a little
irritated. “Answer her question!” barked
The man suddenly straightened up and said to me, “I’m sorry. I haven’t had a normal conversation in a long time. My name, dear child, is Armaros.”
I gasped because I recognized the name. “You’re one of the Grigori!”
“Yes, child, I was one of the Watchers who were tasked with observing the early humans. Like Az, I was cast into the Abyss and managed to escape it.”
I hated when people treated me like a child, and having this dirty smelly miserable excuse of an angel continue to call me a child was annoying. “What do you want?” I demanded.
He turned to look at Az and said in a haughty tone, “She gets right to the point doesn’t she?”
Az came over and place a bowl of cereal in front of me. “Just talk to her as if you would talk to me Armaros.” Az said wearily.
Az seemed as if his patience was beginning to become frayed. I wonder what they were talking about before I woke up?
Armaros frowned at Az and said, “Don’t forget that it was you who called me here! I’m the one who’s doing you two the favor!”
“Oh really?” asked Az in a deceptively light tone. I knew that tone! He usually used it when he was about to drive home a point. “Don’t forget who interceded with Michael to get you a temporary pardon. If it weren’t for me, there would be a horde of righteous angels after you right now!”
Armaros’ face turned pale and he said, “Please accept my apologies.” He turned to me and said, “I’m here to teach you how to use your powers. Just like the way I taught you last time, Rachielle.”
Az, who had walked away to open the fridge door suddenly slammed the door shut. He turned upon Armaros and his face was a mask of fury. “I told you not to mention that name!” he exclaimed.
Armaros touched his lips with his hand and said, “Oops that slipped out. Sorry.”
He didn’t sound one bit sorry though. I shook my head because it was starting to feel foggy. “Wait. Wait. Who is Rachielle?”
“Never mind!” snapped
At the same time, Armaros said, “Why you are. In your first incarnation as a Nephilim, you were Rachielle. Azazel’s wife.”
My heart plummeted into my stomach and my head felt like it was going to explode. There was a roaring in my ears, and I belatedly realized that Az was shouting incoherently at Armaros. It made sense to me now. It all made sense. All the love and affection that Az was showering upon me; the deep sense of yearning I felt when we were in the dark. I suppose a part of me had already guessed something of this nature, but I did not expect the full truth. Wife? We were married? Is that what Az wanted of me? Is that why he won’t adopt me?
The shouting was getting worse and I raised my voice and yelled at the top of my lungs. “Shut up! Az, just shut up for a minute. I’m fine, really!” I looked at him and he was looking at me with complete vulnerability. “Is this true Az? Was I your wife?”
Az could only nod slowly to confirm my question. I took a deep breath before saying, “Az, I…I don’t know what to say. It all makes sense now. I…you have to understand. I’m Rachel now. I’m not Rachielle anymore.”
“I know Rachel. It is enough for me to be close to you after looking for you for over five thousand years.”
Five thousand years? “You…you looked for me for that long? Why? I mean why didn’t you ever find me?”
A look of deep sadness came to Az’s face. I wanted so much to hug him and wipe that sad look off! “You never reincarnated Rachel. This is your first incarnation since you died in the Great Flood.”
Died. Then it hit me. If I was a Nephilim, that means I must have died before. I subconsciously knew this, but had never quite acknowledged it. The sick sinking feeling grew in my stomach and suddenly, I threw up into my bowl of cereal.
“Well, that’s one way to eat your cereal!” quipped Armaros with a chuckle.
I wanted to smack him across the face. Az must have thought the same because he casually backhanded Armaros across the back of his head.
“Ouch!” exclaimed Armaros.
Az came to took my cereal away and dumped it in the garbage. He handed me a paper towel and I cleaned my face with it. I glared at Armaros and said, “You know why I never reincarnated before now, don’t you? Tell me!”
Armaros chuckled gleefully and then said, “I do, and I will. But not yet. Tell me about your dreams first. I’m quite interested.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but then I saw Az nodding his head. Oh well, I could exercise patience in this regard. Armaros was going tell me what he knew sooner or later. In quick short sentences, I told them about my dream. Through it all, Armaros was nodding his head as if I was just confirming what he already knew. I was really starting to dislike him! When I came to the part about the woman with the knife behind him, Armaros looked fearful and actually glanced behind him.
“You didn’t happen to see this woman’s face clearly did you?”
I shook my head and said, “No, all I remember is the eyes and hair of fire.”
“Pity,” mumbled Armaros to himself. “Now, this bright object, are you sure it’s a sword?”
I nodded and described the sword to him. When I described the length of the handle, he nodded his head and muttered, “A bastard sword for a bastard child.” He glanced at Az and said, “See, I told you. It’s calling to her. It will always call to her until she reclaims it once more. It’s too dangerous in other hands.”
“Wait, what’re you talking about?” I asked somewhat impatiently. None of this was making sense.
Before Armaros could answer though, Az spoke up and said in a firm voice, “Enough! Rachel, it’s time for you to get to school. We’ll talk more about this tonight, I promise.”
Suddenly Miss Chin stepped into the kitchen with my backpack in her hands. I hadn’t realized that she was still in the house. “I’ve packed your book report as well as a sandwich for lunch. Was there anything else you needed?”
I shook my head and followed her out of the house. After I got into her car, I looked up and
waved bye to
***
Faye, bless her soul, seemed to sense that I had a lot on my mind. She helped me to hand in my book report and then pretty much left me alone until lunch. We found a more isolated place to eat today because neither of us really wanted another run in with Susan and her cronies.
I ate my sandwich ravenously because I had missed breakfast. Faye, as usual, seemed to inhale hers. That girl was a walking stomach!
After we were finished, Faye touched my hand gently and said, “Rachel, I can tell that something is bothering you. Would you like to talk about it?”
I shook my head. How could I talk about what happened this morning? I still couldn’t even get it straight in my head! Instead, I decided to talk about what had happened yesterday. “Faye, can you tell me what happened yesterday?”
She looked at me thoughtfully for a minute before answering. “I stopped you from making a terrible mistake.”
That got me! “What do you mean?”
She held my hand tightly and said, “Rachel, if you had hit Susan with any kind of spell while being that emotionally charged, you could have killed her. So, I set Susan’s shoes on fire as a way to distract you.”
What?! “What?! What’re you talking about?” I think I must have sputtered a bit. This was definitely not going the way I had planned!
She continued on as calmly as I was agitated. “When you use magic in a fight, the number one key rule is to keep a level head. If you don’t, you can leave yourself wide open.”
She gave me a little smile and it eased my agitation a bit. “You were trying to look out for me. So in turn, I looked out for you. We Nephilim have to stick together, right?”
“You…you know that you’re a Nephilim?”
“Of course!” she said brightly. “I’ve known all my life!”
That really shocked me. I didn’t know that I was a Nephilim until Az told me. “All your life? Have you had your powers all your life too?”
She giggled and said, “Of course not silly. Our powers only manifest during puberty. That’s why I’m glad I was an early bloomer in this incarnation.”
I was stumped. Here I thought I was going to look out for my friend and she’d known about her origins a lot longer than me! I touched my pendant and said, “That’s how you saw this yesterday, right?”
She nodded and smiled happily. “I recognized the celestial imprint on it. Azazel is your guardian, right?”
I was speechless so I could only dip my head. She sighed dramatically and said, “He’s so dreamy! You are such a lucky girl!”
Suddenly, I had a bright idea. “Would you like to meet him?”
Her mouth dropped open. “Would I? I would love to!”
“You can come over after school today if you want. I’m sure Miss Chin wouldn’t mind driving the both of us.”
“That would be so cool! Thanks Rachel.” Her eyes were practically shining.
I felt glad that I was able to make my friend happy. I couldn’t resist teasing her a bit though. “You’re gonna have a blast. Tonight, you’re going to meet not one, but two angels!”
Faye suddenly frowned and said, “What do you mean?”
Suddenly feeling a little unsure of myself, I said, “We have an angel visiting us. Az asked him to teach me magic because that’s something that Az can’t do. What’s wrong Faye?”
“Angels don’t like Nephilim. I thought you knew that Rachel.”
“But this one seemed alright. He used to be one of the Grigori, so he’s not associated with Heaven.”
Faye’s expression turned dark and she asked in almost a whisper, “What’s his name?”
Faye was beginning to frighten me, but I forged ahead. “He said that his name is Armaros.”
“DAMN HIM! He’s found me already! I’m not ready for him!” Faye jumped up and grabbed her backpack. “You tell that monster. You tell him that he will never get the sword. NEVER!”
Faye suddenly ran off and I was still in so much shock that I didn’t even think to run after her. What the hell had just happened? What was Faye talking about? What sword? What kind of history did she have with Armaros?
***
By the time I got home, I had already decided that I wasn’t going to mention Faye to Armaros. Faye had not showed up to any of our afternoon classes. I knew that there must be something between Armaros and Faye, but until I could figure out what, I was keeping her existence to myself.
I found Az and Armaros in deep conversation in the living room. They were sitting on two of the three couches there. I felt a little uneasy about facing Az after this morning’s revelation, but looking at him now, I realized that it was something I could accept. After all, Az had lived with the knowledge ever since he met me. Yet, he had never once tried to press his attentions upon me. It was only when we were in the dark that his emotions had unwittingly surfaced.
I gave him a small smile and then plopped down on the third couch and looked directly at Armaros. He had cleaned up and was wearing some of Az’s clothes, but I still found that I didn’t like him very much. “Ok Armaros. Talk.”
He glanced sideways at Az, who simply shrugged his shoulders. Armaros cleared his throat and said, “Ok, where shall I begin?”
“How about at the beginning?”
“Well, in the beginning, God created –“
“Not that far back! Tell me about the war!”
Armaros smirked at me and started talking. “After I escaped from the Abyss, I made a deal with Michael. I would help in the war effort by instructing the Nephilim on how to use their powers. After Az came along, the plan changed somewhat. We decided that since our side was heavily outnumbered, we needed an edge. We decided to make weapons that had the ability to kill Nephilim. However, we didn’t want to become weapon smiths and spend all our time creating weapons. Instead our aim was to find those Nephilim with the right disposition and teach them to make the weapons. We decided to teach you, Rachielle.”
I raised a hand and interrupted him. “Don’t call me Rachielle and don’t talk to me as if I were there.”
“Fair enough. Where was I? Oh yes, the weapon. Az taught Rachielle to make a remarkable sword. It truly was a thing of beauty. The hilt was a simple crosspiece and the handle was a little longer than usual. This wasn’t because Rachielle wanted to use both hands though. Rachielle, you see, had very big hands, so even with the extended handle, it was made to fit in one of her hands.”
I made an impatient gesture and said, “Get on with it! I had big hands once. I get it!”
Armaros just smirked and said, “I taught Rachielle to imbue the sword with magical spells. Powerful spells that can break through the defenses of a Nephilim and kill it with a single blow. The Nephilim are creatures of great power. Only the most powerful spells could kill one. Unfortunately, Rachielle made a small mistake. She accidentally imbued part of her soul into the sword. In the end, no one could use the sword except for her. We tested the sword on a captive Nephilim. It worked beyond all expectations. The sword not only attacked the Nephilim’s physical body, it also attacked its soul. That was one Nephilim that never reincarnated again. The sword had killed its soul.”
I felt a chill run through my body at those words. Killed the soul? That seemed very permanent. What scared me even more was that I had apparently made this deadly weapon in my previous incarnation. Armaros was still talking so I forced myself to listen.
“Due to its unusual properties, Rachielle named
the sword Chalybs
Animus Talea – Steel Soul Cutter. The
sword was later known by its simplified name, Chalybian.
Unfortunately, Rachielle never used the sword in battle.”
“Why?”
I asked the question even
though I was starting to piece together the pieces.
Armaros looked a little
bit fearful as he said, “God sent the Great
Flood and ended the war. He was the
first one to realize something of grave importance about Chalybian. You see, Az,
Rachielle and I did our jobs too well.
Chalybian was created to kill Nephilim.
That meant that it could also theoretically be used to kill
angels and
demons. While infused with part of
Rachielle’s soul, it also had the ability to kill the soul of whoever
it
attacked. Chalybian became a threat to
every immortal being.”
The chill I had felt
before was nothing compared to what I was feeling
now. No wonder God had ended the
war! Something on Armaros’ face told me
that he wasn’t quite finished with his narration though.
I waited patiently, but he didn’t continue.
“Go ahead and tell her
the rest!” barked Az
angrily.
Armaros looked somewhat
sheepish but he continued. “Unlike other
Nephilim, Rachielle didn’t
reincarnate. You see, a part of her soul
was trapped within the sword. Until she
was reunited with the sword, her soul was not complete and therefore
could not
reincarnate.”
“But it must have
reunited eventually, right?” I asked. “Otherwise,
I wouldn’t be here now.”
Armaros smiled benignly
and said, “I had something to do with that.”
“You?”
He shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, not me directly, but I put the events in motion that
allowed it
to happen.”
I sighed and said, “Look
stop beating around the bush. What
happened next?” Getting a straight answer
from this guy was
harder than trying to faze Az!
“About two thousand years
ago, I found Chalybian deep in the
earth. Without Rachielle though, it was
just another sword except that it never dulled and it cut as if it had
a
diamond edge. Unfortunately, I suffered
a mishap and lost the sword. A few
hundred years later, I finally found it again.
By then, it had exchanged human hands a number of times and it
had
acquired a name for itself. Some people
called it Calabolg. Others called it
Caliburnus. Either way, the sword seemed
almost to have an appetite for battle.
It would always appear in moments in history where great battles
were
fought. Every time its duty was finished
though, it would find its way back into the earth.
Around the time when I
found Chalybian again, the Archangel Michael
came to me with a request. Since Azazel
was in a different part of the world at the moment, Michael had no one
else to
turn to.”
I looked over at Az who returned my look and
simply said, “I was in Hell.”
Armaros nodded. “Looking for Rachielle’s
soul in all the wrong places.
Anyway, the people of Britannia were being invaded - not only by
the
Saxons, but also by creatures from the Abyss.
Somehow, some of the smaller creatures had found a rift in the
Abyss and
were leaking out into the mortal plane.
Thankfully, it was only the small ones.”
Armaros shuddered and his eyes unfocused for a minute. Then, he shook himself and said, “Michael
wanted the people of Britannia to unite and fend off the invaders on
their
own. Of course, they would need some
special help. A boy was chosen to be the
new leader. Together, the boy and I
traveled to where I had located Chalybian.
This time though, it was almost completely encased in stone. I could not remove it without using a great
deal of my powers and revealing myself to unwanted attention. Instead, I used the sword as a compass
needle. I cast a spell of searching and
it led me to a small secluded lake.
There, I found the rest of Rachielle’s soul.
A part of her soul was partially aware and I
managed to convince her of the need.
With her approval, the boy bathed in the lake, thereby allowing
him the
ability to use Chalybian’s powers. The boy then retrieved Chalybian from where
it was trapped and used it to fight off not only the Saxon invaders,
but also
the creatures from the Abyss. The rest
of the story, I’m sure you know.”
I frowned. Some
of what Armaros
was saying was sounding a bit familiar.
Of course, I don’t remember anything of what he was talking
about with
regards to the lake. I don’t remember
giving my permission for anything. Or
did I? The details of my dream came back
to me. That was when it started to make
sense. Of course! Armaros
was the man in my dream, the one who
was pleading with me while holding the sword.
It appears that some of my dream was symbolic and some of it
actually
happened. What about the woman with the
eyes and hair of fire though? Suddenly,
like a brick hitting my head, Armaros’ story finally made complete and
utter
sense. I knew I was dense, but I
couldn’t believe how dense I was. Of
course I knew the rest of the story. I
had read about it the previous night!
“The boy gave the sword a
different name, didn’t he?” I asked with
trepidation.
Armaros gave me a
superior grin and said, “Figured it out already, did
you? The boy called it Ex Calce
Liberatus, or Liberated from the Stone.”
“Excalibur!” I couldn’t stop myself
from shouting.
“The boy’s name was
Artorius Aurelianus Pendragon. Otherwise known as King
Arthur.”
“Then…then that would
make you –“
Armaros nodded
benevolently, like a wise man giving his pupil his
approval. “Merlin. Merlin the Magician.
Chapter 5 –
The Second
Side
That was too much, even
for me.
I said good night to both Az and
Armaros and
went to my room. My mind was literally
spinning. Images of me together with Az were facing off with images of Armaros/Merlin
with a
young faceless boy. In another corner
was a shining sword that I now knew had to be Excalibur, and the other,
for
some strange reason, was Faye. She was
the last piece of this puzzle. Why had
she run off like that? What did she mean
when she said that ‘he will never get the sword?’ Before
I went to sleep, I powered up my
computer and did some quick Google searches.
What I found didn’t really tell me much, but at least it helped
me to
get a perspective on all the information I had just been given.
I hoped the morning would
shed some more light on this puzzle, but it
didn’t. I woke up as confused as I was
when I went to sleep.
In the kitchen, Az was talking with
Armaros. Didn’t those two ever
sleep? Without preamble, I asked,
“Where’s the sword now?”
Armaros looked as if he
were expecting that question. “After
Artorius died, one of his knights
threw Excalibur into the lake where Rachielle’s soul resided, as part
of the
bargain I had struck with her.”
“Then why didn’t I
reincarnate before now? How long does it
take before a soul
reincarnates?”
Armaros shook his head. “No one
really knows. There are still mysteries
left in this world after all.”
“Why didn’t you complete
the bargain?
Why did you leave it to some knight?” I demanded.
“If you had completed the bargain, then you
could have ensured that I reincarnated sooner!”
For once, I seemed to
have caught Armaros off guard. He cast his
eyes downward and actually looked
embarrassed. Az
looked amused as he said, “Go on Armaros,
or maybe I
should call you Merlin. Tell her how you
got trapped by your own disciple!”
Armaros mumbled a word. Az pretended not to
hear and said, “What’s that Merlin? I
can’t hear you!” Az
seemed to be
enjoying himself very much.
“Morganna. It was because of
Morganna,” mumbled
Armaros. “I fell in love with my pupil
at the time, never realizing that she was an agent of Hell. Just before Artorius’ last battle, she
tricked me and trapped me in crystal.
That was when I realized that her magical ability was far
greater than I
had realized.”
“Was that before or after
she seduced you?” asked
Armaros glared daggers at
“I think I would have
exercised more restraint,” said
“The way you’re excising
restraint now?” retorted Armaros.
Az’s face darkened but he
had no response.
I impatiently rapped my
knuckles on the table and said, “Enough with
the testosterone! What happened next?”
Armaros shrugged like it
was no big thing and said, “The spell that Morganna
used was quite ingenious. The crystal she
encased me in kept reflecting
my powers back on me. I had to resort to
assuming my angelic form to escape. No
matter how powerful a human sorceress is, she is no match for an angel. Of course, assuming my angelic form alerted
my presence to my enemies, so I hunted her down as fast as I could and
then I killed
her.”
The matter of fact way he
said the last sentence made me feel cold
inside. How could an angel talk about
murder so casually? I made up my mind
then. I couldn’t learn magic from
Armaros. I would have to talk to Az about it in secret later on.
I said my goodbyes to Az and Armaros and left
as quickly as courtesy allowed. I had to
get out of there! I don’t know how Az could stand that guy.
Armaros really gave me the creeps!
He seemed to have no morals and enjoyed hurting people out of
petty
spite. For instance, Az
must have asked Armaros not to mention the history that Az had with
Rachielle. I know Az
was just
trying to protect me. But the casual way
in which Armaros ignored Az made me angry. If for nothing else, I hated Armaros for the
look
of anguish on Az’s face when Armaros
revealed the
past.
Then, there was the
little niggling feeling in the back of my mind that
told me that there was more to Armaros’ story than he was letting on. I’m not dense – well not that
dense. Once my mind was traveling down a
certain route, it connected the dots fairly well. For
one thing, I knew that Armaros lied about
something. He said that Morganna was a
human sorceress. I spotted that lie
right away. Morganna was no more human
than I am. If it weren’t for the book
report I had read on Monday night, I probably would not have spotted
the lie
though. I couldn’t wait to get to school
to confirm my suspicions. I silently
urged Miss Chin to drive faster as I looked forward to my meeting.
***
I found Faye sitting on a
bench just outside the main doors to our
school. She looked up at me with real fear
in her eyes. She opened her mouth to
speak but I shushed her with a gesture.
As Miss Chin pulled away, I firmly took Faye’s hand and led her
away
from the school. We walked in silence
until we reached a Starbucks café. I
bought us a couple of mochas and sat down in a quiet corner on a couple
of
their big comfy chairs.
Faye was looking at me
with a resigned expression. I guess my
expression must have looked quite
resolute. She tried to speak again, but
I held up my hand. “Faye, before we
begin, I need to know one thing. Are you
my friend?”
That seemed to surprise
her. “Of
course I’m your friend Rachel. I was
your friend in your first incarnation too.”
“You knew me as
Rachielle?”
She nodded solemnly and
said, “I’ve been looking for you for almost as
long as Azazel. I didn’t go as far as to
invade Hell though. I always knew that
you were still on the mortal plane.”
“Why?”
She gave me a small smile
and then said, “Well, I could lie and tell
you that it was out of friendship, but I won’t.
It was out of self preservation.”
For some reason, that
relaxed me.
I leaned back in my chair and sipped my mocha.
“Before you go on, tell me one thing. Do
I keep calling you Faye, or should I be
calling you Morgan le Fay?”
Her eyes went wide and
she said, “So he told you about that?”
I gave her a small smile
and said, “Not all of it. I know what
little he told me was a lie. I also know
that you were trying to give me
little clues, but I just didn’t catch on until this morning. It all comes down to names.
Armaros told me that a human sorceress named
Morganna seduced and trapped him in crystal.
Jane Yolen in Sword of the Rightful King talks about
Merlinus and
his apprentice Morgause. However, in
your book report, you refer to her as Morgan le Fay.
I’ve never known you to make such mistakes
before. I’m dense, but I’m not that
dense!”
Faye and I shared a
chuckle. She
sipped her mocha before replying, “You can keep thinking of me as Faye. It’s the name I’ve used in this incarnation
and I’ve gotten used to it.”
“What’s your relationship
to Armaros?
I don’t think that it’s similar to mine and Az’s.”
She snorted and said, “I
should be so lucky! No, the only thing we
have in common is that
Armaros and I were lovers. There,
however, the similarity ends. You see,
Armaros is also my father.”
I was unfortunately
sipping my mocha when she made her
announcement. “What?!” The next few minutes were taken up by me
trying to clean the mess of mocha off my face and my clothes.
Faye had a twinkle in her
eyes and she helped me clean up. “Relax!
It’s kind of like you and Samyaza.
He’s the father of your first incarnation, but he’s also the
father of
your soul. When the Grigori fathered us
Nephilim, they unknowingly gave up a small piece of their soul and
imparted
that to us.”
“Did he…was he…”
“Was he my lover in my
first incarnation?” asked Faye with a tart
smile. “The answer is yes.
At least he was until he tried to kill me.”
My eyes widened and I
almost asked her what she meant. Instead,
I pushed my impatience to the side
and asked her, “Start at the beginning.”
Faye took a deep breath
and said, “Ok, I’ll try. You know about
the Nephilim and how they came
to be, right? Good. Well,
Armaros was a little different than his
brothers in that he only had one child.
Me. Not only that, he knowingly
fathered me. Normally, whenever he
impregnated a woman, he would sacrifice her in order to increase his
powers
when she was still in her first trimester.
Anyway, when all the other women starting giving birth, he began
to
wonder what it would be like to have an offspring - someone like
himself who
could devote his entire being for the sake of magic power.
So, he selected the mother carefully, and
then impregnated her, even though most of the other Grigori had stopped
having
intercourse with women. He didn’t want a
litter of children though. That would
just call undue attention upon him, so he killed off all the embryos in
the
poor woman until there was just one left.
Me. Throughout the pregnancy, he
worked his magic upon the woman. Thus,
when I was finally born nine months later, I was born aware - aware
that
Armaros was my father and that I had just killed my unknown mother by
entering
the world. He thought that he was so
clever. He thought that he had gotten
away with it. He was wrong.
He was cast into the Abyss along with the
rest of the Grigori soon after I was born.”
Faye paused to drink from
her mocha.
I took that as my cue to drink as well.
“I can’t describe what happened when I hit puberty.
I could see the destruction that the other
Nephilim caused, but they couldn’t really be blamed.
They didn’t know what they were doing. I
did.
I was intoxicated by the powers under my control.
I could do anything I wanted and no one could
stop me! That is true power, Rachel - to
be able to do whatever you want and have no one be able to tell you no. I carved out a nice little kingdom for myself
before the Archangel Michael and his army of angels showed up and
changed
everything. The angels tried to persuade
me that what I was doing was wrong. The
demons rationalized it by saying that if I sided with them, I could not
only
keep doing what I was doing, but I would be rewarded by it too. I chose neither side. Instead,
Armaros showed up again and promised
to teach me more magic if I aligned myself with him.
I agreed.
I infiltrated the Nephilim army led by Rachielle.
I got close to her and helped her in creating
Chalybian. By Armaros’ instruction, I
tricked Rachielle into imbuing her soul into the sword.”
Faye took another break
and drank from her mocha. I frowned to
myself. While I appreciated Faye’s candor,
I was
somewhat taken aback by her words.
Still, it was all ancient history, right?”
“It wasn’t until
Rachielle tested Chalybian that I knew that I had been
tricked. Armaros had intended on
creating a soul killing weapon all along.
However, it wasn’t to kill angels or demons.
He wanted to kill me. I didn’t know
it then, but Armaros was
obsessed with getting back into Heaven.
Somehow, he got it into his head that if he only reversed his
greatest
sin, God would allow him back. Since he
only had the one Nephilim child, he thought that by killing me
permanently, he
will have erased his sin.”
I thought about that. It kind of
made sense, but it also seemed too easy.
“Was he right?”
Faye shrugged her
shoulders and said, “Who knows? I didn’t
stick around to find out. I ran away as
fast as I could. When God sent the Great
Flood, I thought I
had gotten away. I was wrong.
Armaros found me and even though he didn’t
have Chalybian, he killed me anyway.”
She shuddered and I reached over and placed a hand on hers. She smiled at me and said, “It’s not a
pleasant experience. To
die. The worse part is, every
time I reincarnate, I have my full memories of what happened in the
last
life. I am born aware every time.” She shuddered again and I gave her hand a
squeeze. “I knew that no matter what, I
had to keep Chalybian away from Armaros.
With it, he can kill me permanently.
However, some times, when I grow tired of this endless cycle, I
wish
that he would kill me, just so that I can know the true gift of death
and
oblivion.”
Some other things clicked
in my head and I said, “So, every time you
reincarnated, your first impulse is to find the sword, right?”
She nodded and said, “I’m
not always successful though. Normally I
just follow the biggest battles
and hope that I find it there. Once I
find it though, I just sit back and wait.
I knew that sooner or later, Armaros will show up and claim it. Sometimes I’m successful at getting it away
from him. However, no matter how I try,
as soon as he becomes aware of me, he hunts me down and kills me, every
time.”
“So, where is the sword
now?”
She smiled enigmatically
and said, “I won’t tell you yet. There’s
still more to tell first. Last year, my
current body finally hit
puberty. My powers began to manifest. My adoptive parents are actually very nice
people so I kept my powers a secret from them.
One of the first spells I forced myself to re-master is the
scrying
spell. It’s a spell that detects
celestial powers in use. I wanted to
know where Armaros was. I found him much
sooner than I had anticipated. My spell
detected celestial power being used. I
could tell that someone was using a searching spell of some sort. Whoever was using it kept sending the search
spell
out, over and over as if he were looking for something in all
directions. It wasn’t easy, but I managed
to trick my
adoptive parents into thinking that I was going away on a school trip. Then, I followed my scrying spell until I
found him.” She took another drink of
her mocha and said, “You’ve discovered the invisibility spell, right?”
I nodded shamefully as I
remembered my first application of that
spell. “Well,” she said, “It’s very
useful for getting around. It’s also
great for sneaking up on people. Armaros
was underground, dressed like a homeless person, but he was talking to
a man
who seemed to blend in with the shadows.”
“A
Shadowman!” I exclaimed.
Faye nodded grimly and
said, “I missed most of the conversation but I
heard Armaros say, ‘The search is complete.
Tell your master that he can find her here.’
Then Armaros handed the Shadowman a piece of
paper and he said, ‘There, is that enough?
Will your master stop hounding me now?’
To which the Shadowman replied, ‘You promised my master the
weapon,
Trickster. You have not delivered yet. When the Light-bringer has the girl, you will
deliver Chalybian to him and he will make it complete once more.’”
Another click went off in
my head.
They were talking about me! That
was how they found me! Armaros led the
Shadowmen straight to Roy and Joanne Ellis!
A red haze seemed to drop
over my eyes.
I never realized how much I cared for the Ellises until now. A warm hand covered mine and I looked into
Faye’s clear green eyes. “Armaros has
Chalybian! He’s going to pay!”
“Not
yet Rachel!
You need to hear the rest. After
the Shadowman left, Armaros removed his
illusion spell and Chalybian was revealed.
I heard him say, ‘Why? Why does
it have to have her soul?’ And then, ‘Why
can I never kill her? Why can’t I return
to paradise?’ I snuck up on him while he
was indulging in his self pity and took Chalybian right from under his
nose. He was furious!
I knew that all I had to do was stay still
though. Without access to his higher
enchantments, there was very little chance of him finding me. He was still hiding from the angels for some
reason.”
“So you have Chalybian
now?” I asked.
She nodded her head
slowly.
“It’s in a safe place now.”
Suddenly, there was a
commotion at the front door of the café. An
Asian woman in her fifties stumbled into
the Starbucks. There was blood on her
clothes. I felt shock ripple through me
as I recognized Miss Chin.
“Miss Chin!” I exclaimed. I
rushed over and managed to reach her as she collapsed onto the floor. There was pandemonium all over the café
as
people reacted to Miss Chin’s presence.
She looked up at me and
her eyes were clouding over. There was a
large slash in her chest that
would have spurted her blood all over the place if her hand wasn’t
holding it
tightly in. I looked over at Faye, who
had followed me. “Can you heal her?” I
asked frantically.
Faye closed her eyes for
a second and then shook her head. “There
is a spell that is both keeping her
alive and preventing me from healing her.
I can break it eventually, but not before she dies.”
I looked back at Miss
Chin.
There were tears streaming down my face.
“Who did this?” Even before I
voiced the question though, I knew.
“Az…Az…needs…you…” Miss
Chin gasped the words and then released her
last breath. Her eyes glassed over in
death.
I felt numb inside. I hadn’t
known Miss Chin all that well, but I found that her death was affecting
me
inside. Something was pulling on my arm
and I glanced up. Faye was trying to
pull me to my feet.
“Come on!
We’ve gotta go!” she
said urgently.
I just stared dumbly at
her. I
couldn’t seem to think straight.
“Az is in trouble!”
That got me moving! I allowed
her to pull me to my feet and together, we threaded our way out of the
café. In the distance, I could hear
sirens.
Faye was saying something
in my ear.
I turned to her as she said, “You need to turn invisible Rachel! I can’t do us both. We
have to get back to your place!”
Turn invisible? How did I do
that? My mind seemed so foggy! Suddenly, Faye vanished from sight and
something urgent inside of me spurred me into action.
I concentrated on the light around me and
forced it through me. I couldn’t see
Faye, but suddenly, a warm strong hand grabbed my own.
I let Faye pull me along until I recognized
Miss Chin’s car.
“Here!” I said. “We can take
this!”
“Good thing I still
remember how to drive from my last life!” said
Faye.
I saw the driver door
open and I quickly opened the passenger
door. I thought I heard something go thump
but when I turned to look at the back seat, I saw nothing out of the
ordinary.
Faye dropped her
invisibility spell and I did the same. She
muttered some words that I couldn’t hear
and the car thrummed to life. She pulled
out of the parking space just as a police car and an ambulance pulled
onto the
street. I looked down at Faye’s feet and
could see that her feet couldn’t quite touch the gas pedal. Instead, the gas pedal seemed to be working
on its own.
“Good thing this is an
automatic!” said Faye. “I don’t think I
can work the gas, the clutch
and the stick all at once!”
I gave her directions to
my house and we drove in silence. There
didn’t seem to be much we could
say. I was still reeling from Miss
Chin’s death and from the possibility that Az
could be
in real trouble. He was an angel for
goodness sake. What on earth could
possibly harm him? I looked at Faye’s
face. She had a hard and resolute
expression. That was when I knew. Just like Rachielle’s soul was the one thing
that Az had searched for over the last
several
thousand years, Chalybian was the one thing that Armaros had searched
for. Somehow, he had known about Faye all
the
time. Only he could have ambushed
Chapter 6 –
Sins of the
Father
Faye and I rushed into my
house.
As soon as I entered it though, I knew that Az
was not there. I knew calling out to him
was useless so I led the way upstairs and into Az’s
bedroom.
It looked untouched. Az’s computer was
on and I walked over to look at the
screen. I typed in Az’s
password and the computer screen flashed to life. I
could feel Faye’s questioning look and I
shrugged and gave her an sheepish grin. “Hey, like you said, being invisible is great
for sneaking up on people!”
A beep drew my attention
back to the computer. An email message
popped up. I clicked on it and read the
message:
Please accept my
condolences on Miss Chin. I am sure that
you will miss her. Her soul is a welcome
addition to Heaven. Rest assured. I will take good care of her.
M.
There was nothing about
I typed in a short reply:
Thanks.
Can you help in finding Az? Armaros has taken him.
I waited for what seemed
like eternity.
I found myself tapping my finger impatiently.
Come on!
What was taking so long?
Suddenly, the computer
beeped and an email popped up.
I am sorry.
I cannot help. This is a private
matter. Besides, I would prefer if
Chalybian remained
hidden.
M.
I snorted in contempt. Private
matter eh? Looks like someone didn’t
want to get his hands dirty. I turned
away from the computer and noticed that Faye was looking at the screen
with
wide eyes. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Is that who I think it
is?” she asked in a hushed tone.
“Yeah, it’s the Archangel
Michael.
This is how he communicates with Az
and sends
him his jobs.”
“But there’s no return
email address or anything, and as far as I can
see, it’s just a typical computer setup!”
I just shrugged. “It must be a
pretty subtle form of magic.”
Faye’s voice was filled
with awe as she said, “The most complex forms
of magic are the subtle ones.”
I walked away from the
computer.
What did I care anyway? I just
wanted to get Az back! I
closed my eyes and concentrated on
“What are you doing?”
asked Faye.
I indicated the wall and
said, “It’s this wall. Look at the room. This wall should be a supporting wall. But this section here seems hollow.” I kept tapping the wall until I had roughly
mapped out a section that was about seven feet long.
“I’m sure there’s something behind here, if I
could only just figure out how to open it!”
I blew out my breath in frustration.
Faye narrowed her eyes
and said, “Move aside. Let me try
something.” She held up both hands and
twin beams of
light leapt from her hands and touched the borders that I had roughed
out. There was a sizzling sound not unlike
frying
bacon as Faye burned two lines on the wall, from floor to the ceiling. Faye stopped her burning as soon as she
finished
carving a rectangular shape in the wall.
There was a creaking sound and the section that Faye had burned
fell to
the ground with a loud thump.
I was amazed at Faye’s
little demonstration of power. However, I
was even more amazed at what had
been revealed. Inside the hidden
section, was an armory of weapons. And not just any weapons!
These were much different than the training
weapons that Az had in the basement and
used to train
me with. The various knives and swords
in the armory almost screamed their lethality.
I gingerly picked up a short sword.
It was about twenty inches long and it had a slightly curved
blade. I carefully pulled the blade out
from the
scabbard and was rewarded by a dark glint as the black blade was
revealed. Even I, with my slowly growing
awareness of
magic, could tell that there were dark spells woven into the weapon.
“He’s a genius!”
exclaimed Faye.
She was looking at the weapons with shining eyes.
“He’s worked dark magic into each and every
one of the weapons.” She came up to me
and lightly touched the blade of the sword in my hands.
“The spells are subtle and very complex, yet
very hard to detect unless you were specifically looking for them.”
I took the sword back
from her and sheathed it. I belted it
around my waist and looked for
anything else I could use. Faye picked
up a brace of black throwing knives and belted it around her waist. “I know enough about swords to be able to
tell which end is the sharp end. I’m
pretty handy with a knife though.”
I gave her a nod and then
something else caught my attention. At
first, I thought the black object was a
gun, but when I picked it up, I could see that it didn’t resemble any
gun I had
ever seen on TV. There was the typical
handle and barrel, but instead of a magazine, there was a bottle of
what looked
like dark fluid mounted on top. The
weapon was about a foot long in length.
Faye took one look at the
weapon and almost squealed with delight. “Bottled
mystic energy!” she exclaimed.
“Why would Az have
something like this?
Why does he need all these weapons?
I know that he’s an assassin, but he’s also pretty powerful in
his own
right.” I thought I knew the answer, but
I just couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
Faye looked at me as if I
were dense, which in her eyes, I probably
was. “He has them for the same reason
that Armaros doesn’t dare use his celestial powers too much. Az doesn’t want to
draw too much attention to himself when he goes out on his jobs. Hell’s demons would love to get their hands
on
I frowned.
That made sense in a
way. “Why would Armaros need to hide
himself?”
Faye smiled grimly and
said, “No matter how powerful Armaros is in
magic, he cannot fight both the angels and the demons.
Why do you think he’s so desperate to get
back into Heaven? Come on Rachel, put
the pieces together!”
I thought about it for a
minute.
I thought about the things that Faye told me.
I also thought about everything that Armaros
said to me and paid special attention to what he didn’t say. Behind the small
lies and half truths, Armaros had hidden his true intents.
“He didn’t really escape from the Abyss on
his own didn’t he?”
Faye smiled encouragingly
at me so I continued with my train of thought. “He
made a deal with Satan in exchange for
Satan’s and Lucifer’s help in getting out.
He promised them a weapon that could kill angels.
He helped Rachielle and Az
under the pretext of helping them create a weapon, but really he was
doing it
so he could appear as if he were fulfilling his end of the bargain with
Satan. However, his true intent was
always to kill you and hopefully redeem himself so that he can gain
entrance
back to Heaven and therefore be safe from Satan and Lucifer.”
“Not bad Rachel. Not bad at
all.”
“He’s crazy!” I exclaimed.
Faye shook her head
ruefully. “I
never said that he was entirely sane.
Who really knows the mind of God though?
Maybe it might even work. God was
really upset about the Nephilim
though. I think it had something to do
with His son.”
“Huh?
What does Jesus Christ
have to do with any of all of this? Did
he even really exist?”
Faye let out a small
chuckle.
“Oh, he existed all right. You
know, technically, Jesus Christ was a Nephilim, right?
It’s only my suspicion, but I think Jesus was
intended to be the only true Nephilim.
When the Grigori created us by accident, it must have totally
skewed
God’s plans. I bet He was royally
pissed!”
“But
why?”
“I don’t know for sure. I have
my theories, but that’s all they are - just theories.
And no, I’m not going to share them with you
yet. Let’s rescue Az first!”
I pushed the rest of my
questions out of my mind. Az came first! I
handed the strange gun to Faye and then
took another one for myself. “Can you
figure out how to use these?”
She turned the gun over
in her hands and then nodded. “Yup, it’s
fairly easy. I think there’s a voice
command to activate
them. Az
wouldn’t want these to fall into the wrong hands. Do
you have any idea what the password it?”
Great!
How the heck would I know
that? I thought about it for a minute
and tried to think of everything I knew about
“You did it Rachel!”
I nodded happily and then
said in a subdued tone. “Now all we have
to do is to find
“I think I can help with
that.” Said Faye with a sure
voice. “May I see your pendant?”
I took off my pendant and
handed it to Faye. She put down her gun
and held the pendant
cupped in both of her palms. She closed
her eyes and whispered a few words. A
ball of light enclosed the pendant.
After a few minutes, the ball of light vanished.
Faye opened her eyes and made a gesture in
the air in front of her. An image
appeared, like a hologram in midair. The
image showed a large building that looked as it were made out of
building
blocks. At the top of the building were
two tall vertical structures.
“Az is on top of the
“Ok, let’s go!” I said
impatiently.
She handed the pendant
back to me and I put it back around my
neck. “Wait Rachel. How do you want to do this?
We can’t just go barging in. We
should scout the area first and come up
with a plan.”
“What’s there to plan? We go in,
rescue Az and kick some angel butt!”
“Rachel, there may be two
of us, but Armaros is still an angel. You’ve
only just begun to learn your powers
and I’m not nearly as powerful as I would be when this body of mine is
fully
grown up.”
“Well, I can’t wait until
you and I grow up. All we have to do is
distract Armaros long
enough to free
Faye nodded reluctantly.
“Rachel, just make me a promise, ok?
If this doesn’t go well, kill me!”
“What?”
“I won’t be his little
pet ever again!” said Faye fiercely. “The
next time I reincarnate, I’ll just keep
killing myself over and over so that he’ll never get his hands on me!”
Faye was trembling with
fear and rage.
I can’t pretend to understand everything about Faye, but I knew
one
thing: she was my friend here and now and I would do what I could to
protect
her. “I’ll do it Faye!”
Faye gathered herself up
and said, “Ok, get ready for action the second
we get there, ok?”
I nodded grimly. Faye reached
out and hugged me tight and then we vanished into light.
***
It took me a second to
get my bearings.
Somehow, Faye had transformed us into light and we had
materialized on
top of what appeared to be the roof of a very tall building. In the center of the roof were the two tall
structures that I had noticed earlier. I
remember from reading somewhere that the two tall structures were
antennae and
they were well over two hundred and fifty feet tall.
Hanging between them, bound by chains of
light, was
“It took you long enough,
little Rachielle! And look, you brought my
errant daughter back
to me too!” Armaros’ tone was haughty
and triumphant.
I had expected Armaros. What I
hadn’t expected was the twenty or so Shadowmen.
I turned to Faye, whose face had turned paler.
I don’t think she had expected the Shadowmen
either. “Oops,” I said.
She gave me a brave smile
and then said two little words. “Full power.”
I gave her a firm nod and
said, “Full power.”
Our dark guns suddenly
whined as they obeyed our voice commands. As
one, Faye and I pointed our guns at the
group in front of us and pulled our triggers.
What can only be
described as dark lightening flared out from our guns. The two lines
of dark energy smashed into the closely huddled group.
It was awfully nice of the Shadowmen to clump
together like that!
There seemed to be an
explosion of red as many of the Shadowmen
disintegrated from our onslaught.
Armaros shielded himself under a globe of light though. Pity about that.
Under full power, our
guns ran out of energy after a few of
seconds. Armaros released his shield and
I could see that at least four of the Shadowmen had survived by being
lucky
enough to fit under his shield.
“Take the little blonde
Nephilim alive and leave the redhead to me!”
cried Armaros. The Shadowmen surged
forward under his command.
Faye slapped me on my
back and said, “Good luck! Remember your
promise!”
I charged towards the
Shadowmen as Faye turned to face Armaros. Bright
bolts of mystic energy flashed between the two of them as they dueled,
turning
the air between them into a crackling field of death.
I had no more time to
focus on them though, as my opponents drove at
me. I drew my sword and ducked under the
blade of the first Shadowman. Az had taught me that there was no such thing as
a fair
fight when you were fighting for your life.
It was all a matter of survival.
As the blade passed over my head, I lanced out with my sword and
drew
first blood across the calf of the Shadowman.
He fell to the ground screaming in pain.
He was writhing as if his soul was burning.
Clearly my sword had some rather powerful
properties!
Out of the corner of my
eye, I saw a bright flash and dove and rolled
to the side, barely avoiding the sword of the second Shadowman. The third one was circling around me, and the
fourth was mumbling and making gestures with his hands.
That was the dangerous one, I decided.
I backpedaled away as I
struggled to keep the two upright and advancing
Shadowmen in my front field of vision. I
didn’t like my odds, but I didn’t have much choice.
I needed some sort of distraction! I
glanced at their feet. Could I?
I stopped thinking about it and simply did it.
Both Shadowmen suddenly
cried out as their shoes burst into flames. I
ran towards them and just as they were
registering my presence, I ducked down and slashed at the leg of the
Shadowman
on my right. As he went down screaming
like the first one I’d wounded. I spun
to my left, and closed the distance to the Shadowman on my left. His sword came arching down, but I was
already inside the reach of his longer blade.
My short sword swiped upwards and cut off his sword arm just
below his
elbow.
Rather than moving away
though, I stayed in front of him. I
grabbed the front of his clothes and with
strength that I didn’t know I had, I swung him around until he was
between me
and the last Shadowman. Suddenly, my
captive Shadowman’s head disappeared into a red mist, and blood rained
all over
me.
I pushed the body away
and could see that the fourth Shadowman was
readying another spell. He was too far
away and I wasn’t sure I could dodge the second attack.
“Rachel duck!” Faye’s voice
sounded frantic from somewhere behind me.
I ducked and I barely saw
the dark object that flashed over my head and
bury itself into the forehead of the fourth Shadowman.
I heard Faye’s scream of pain and turned to
see that Armaros had used her distraction to overpower her defenses and
grab
her by her throat. She had saved my life
at the cost of her own!
NO! I
won’t allow it! Out of the corner of my
eye, I saw the two
Shadowmen that I had wounded disappear into portals of darkness. I
didn’t care
about them. I suddenly wanted one fallen
angel to be very dead.
Armaros lifted Faye
straight up in the air by her throat and snarled,
“Not a step closer Rachielle!”
Great!
Who do I save? I was aware that Az
was somewhere behind me, suspended between the two antennae. I glanced back at him and I could see his
expression of pain. The chains of light
kept him spread-eagled and I could see dark blood on the front of his
clothes. Armaros had hurt him badly!
“If you come with me, I
will let him go,” said Armaros. “I’ll
deliver you to Lucifer, and when he has
Chalybian, he’ll merge your soul back into the sword.
Then, I’ll use it to kill this worthless
child of mine once and for all and leave this wretched world for good!”
“It won’t work Armaros!”
I said grimly.
“I don’t even know where the sword is!”
Armaros chuckled evilly. “You
may not, but this little thief does!” He
looked at Faye, who was hanging helplessly off the ground.
“Where is it, you little slut! Where
is Chalybian?” He shook her like a rag
doll.
My heart thundered in my
chest.
My friend was going to be killed!
I had to do something! I
regretted my impulsive decision to use my gun at full power. I didn’t have any weapons now that could
reach him. I didn’t even know enough of
my powers to use them properly. Or did
I?
I concentrated hard on
how Faye had used her powers to cut through the
wall in Az’s room to reveal the hidden
armory. How had she done it?
I dropped my sword and it
clanged on the ground. Armaros saw this
and he must have taken it
for my submission because he smiled triumphantly. That
smile vanished as I lifted up my hands
and unleashed twin blasts of light at him.
One of the beams hit him on his chest, and the other one hit the
arm
that was holding Faye captive.
He dropped Faye and
snarled at me.
“You will pay for that! I think
I’ll just kill you now and then just wait for you to reincarnate. Once I have Chalybian, I can find you
whenever I want!”
He stood upright and
suddenly, giant wings of light flashed out from
behind his back. Uh
oh. Looks like Armaros is getting
serious! I ducked and dodged as he sent
bright lightening at me. The air around
me crackled from all the near misses. I
didn’t even have time to fire back at him.
I cursed my own stupidity at challenging an angel to a duel of
power
when I wasn’t even partially trained yet.
Bright lightening smashed
into Armaros’ side. He recoiled from the
attack. His surprise was evident on his
face. He was so intent on me that he
hadn’t even
noticed when Faye had gotten back onto her feet.
I joined the attack and
sent my own bright bolts of mystic energy at
Armaros. He was strong.
I had to give him credit. He threw
up a shield of light that held our
attacks at bay. We needed something to
tip the balance!
In between bursts, Faye
yelled over to me, “You need to free Az!”
“How?” I yelled back. The
fight was really taxing my strength, and
I could tell that my last few blasts were getting weaker.
I could see the strain on Faye’s face as
well. I realized that if Faye were in
her prime, she could probably give Armaros a run for his money. But in her current incarnation, she was still
just a thirteen year old girl.
“Take Chalybian and free
him!” cried Faye.
“I don’t even know where
it is!” I yelled back.
“It’s right behind you!”
shouted Faye.
She was visibly tiring. Armaros
was grinning in anticipation. “I gave it
to you as soon as we got here!”
What?
What was she talking
about? When did she give it to me? Then it hit me. Or
actually, it was Faye who had hit me. Just
before we started our attack, she had
slapped me on the back and said, ‘Good luck!’
Faye had told me that Chalybian was in a safe place. What safer place is there than to have it close at hand all the time?
Invisibility spells were great for sneaking up on people, but
they were
also great for hiding things. Just like
how I kept Az’s pendant hidden from sight,
Faye had
kept Chalybian hidden from the world with a simple invisibility spell.
I reached over my
shoulder with my right hand but encountered only
empty air.
“You have to call for it!”
Of course!
I thought about the
image of the sword in my dreams and willed it to come to my hand. An instant later, a cool metallic object
filled my hand. I pulled my hand to in
front of me and Chalybian was suddenly revealed.
The handle fit my hand
like it was an extension of my body. The
sword was huge. The blade was well over
three feet in length
and both my hands easily fit on the handle.
I must have had really big hands in my first incarnation! However, the sword had no apparent
weight. It was as light as air in my
hands. Somehow, I knew it was because
the sword was forever a part of me, and we were reunited once more.
Armaros saw the sword in
my hands and cried in desperation. “NO!
Not you!”
His shield exploded out
from him in a wave of mystic force. It
knocked Faye off her feet, but I simply
held Chalybian out in front of me and the energy wave parted around me.
“Let me give you a gift
Armaros!” I said in a taunting voice. “Let
me give you the gift of oblivion. Come
over here so that I can kill your
twisted soul!”
It was an empty threat
though. I
knew that Chalybian in its current state was not imbued with part of my
soul
the way it was in my first incarnation.
However, I was sure that Armaros
didn’t know
that though.
He blasted bright
lightening at me, but I simply deflected it with
Chalybian. He sidestepped in a circular
pattern and continued to lance mystic energy at me.
Every time he did though, I just held Chalybian
out in front of me and it deflected every
attack. Armaros’
face was filled with rage as he came to the realization that he could
not
attack me from a distance. He would have
to get in close if he were to overpower Chalybian’s defenses.
Suddenly, his face
brightened. Uh oh. I think he
must have realized that Chalybian could not possibly kill his soul just
yet. He ignited a sword of light in his
hands
and charged me.
I met his attack head on
but before I could counterattack, he was
swinging that burning sword at my face.
Damn it he was fast! And skilled
too!
I danced out of his range
and tried to get some breathing room. He
wouldn’t let me have it. It was all I
could do to block his
attacks. He suddenly feinted and I fell
for it. His blazing sword traced a line
of fire along my left thigh. I gritted
my teeth in pain and backpedaled away. A
small piece of my mind was thinking that it couldn’t have been a
burning sword
because my blood was dripping from my wound.
I sometimes get strange thoughts when under pressure!
Suddenly, Armaros
stiffened in pain.
He turned away from me and I could see three black knives
sticking out
of his back. As he bared his teeth at
Faye, who had recovered from his previous attack, I swung Chalybian at
his
unprotected back.
At least, I thought it
was unprotected!
One of Armaros’ huge wings swept backward and knocked me off my
feet. I skidded to a stop close to the
edge of the skyscraper. I picked myself
up and prepared to rejoin the battle.
“Free Az!” cried Faye. Armaros
used that tiny moment of distraction to blast through Faye’s defenses. A bright bolt of mystic energy stabbed into
her chest.
“NO!
FAYE!” For what seemed like an
eternity, I was
rooted to the ground. All I could see
was Faye slowly dropping to her knees.
Her blood spurted in slow motion out of her chest.
Her hands reached up to her chest as if they
could stop the flow from the ghastly wound there. It
reminded me of the way Miss Chin had died. With
what seemed like a note of finality, she
fell face first onto the ground.
Armaros laughed in glee. I
raised Chalybian again, but this time, I knew what I had to do. My vision disappeared into to haze of bright
white light. When the light cleared, I
was hovering in midair in front of
Together, we dropped to
the ground.
Armaros looked at us in fear. He
backed away slowly as Az and I advanced. Suddenly, Az
stopped
and said, “How would you like to visit the Abyss Armaros?
I know of some old friends who are dying to
sink their teeth into you!” Az’s body shimmered and shifted.
His arms and legs thickened with bulging
muscles. His fingers grew into talons
and he fell forward onto all fours. His
neck lengthened and his head reshaped itself until it was longer and
leaner.
Within seconds, Az was gone. In his
place, was a large black dragon with
blazing eyes.
The dragon roared at Armaros and stretched his mouth into a
large gaping
maw. From my vantage point, I couldn’t see
inside Az’s
mouth, but I
couldn’t suppress my shivers as I sensed the complete and utter
darkness
within. It reminded of my own aborted
sojourn into the dark. The very air in
front of the dragon seemed to shimmer and shift as Az inhaled deeply like a giant vacuum. Armaros leaned backwards, as if he were
resisting gale force winds. It was no
use. Armaros
was slowly being pulled towards Az’s
gaping mouth.
Armaros’
eyes widened in desperation and fear. His body shimmered and glowed
and his clothes
fell off his body. Where Armaros once
stood, there was now a man shaped winged figure of light.
Armaros had assumed his angelic form!
From somewhere up high, I
thought I heard a trumpet blowing. Dozens
of bright spheres of light dropped out
of the sky. From below, I heard the
sound of booming drums and dozens of dark purplish spheres of light
rose from
below. Armaros swung his head back and
forth between the two approaching forces and suddenly launched himself into the air.
His wings beat furiously as he strove to build some distance
between
himself and the forces of Heaven and Hell, both of whom he had betrayed
and
double crossed, multiple times.
I ran to Faye’s inert
form and carefully turned her body over. I
didn’t notice it before, but my face was
streaked with tears. From behind me, Az, in his human form, came up and placed a hand
on my
shoulder. I thought he was going to
offer me his condolences but instead he said, “She’s still alive, but
just
barely. I can’t heal her, but you can.”
“What do you mean?” I
asked.
“I have the powers of
darkness.
Only the powers of light can heal.
Just like when Michael healed you last year, you must heal Faye
now.”
“But
how?”
“The knowledge is in your
soul,” said
I thought hard about that. Az
was right, somehow I knew that!
When I saw Faye using her powers, a part
of me had responded. After watching
Faye, I too was able to bring forth energy blasts, and I was able to
travel by
using a beam of light. I had to know how
to heal. I just had to!
“Hurry
Rachel! She’s
slipping away!”
It was a memory…just a
dim memory, but I clutched it like a
lifeline. Magical light surrounded my
hands and I placed my hands on Faye’s bloody and ghastly wound and
willed the
light into her body. I imagined Faye’s
wound closing and I could feel the light respond to my mental commands. I used the light to encourage blood
production in Faye’s body to replace what she had lost.
Then, I commanded the light to massage Faye’s
heart and lungs and to repair the damage done to them.
I don’t know how long it
took, but eventually, I was rewarded with a
flickering of Faye’s eyelids. After a
couple of seconds, her eyes opened all the way and she looked at me
with
wonderment.
She touched her chest and
said to me, “You healed me!”
I gave her a tired nod
and then leaned down to kiss her forehead. It
was all I could do to prevent myself from
slumping forward.
“Where’s Armaros?” asked
Faye with some trepidation.
Az gave her an amused smile and said, “He’ll be
running for a very long time. There is
no safe haven for someone like him. He
could try making another deal with Lucifer, but I don’t think that will
happen
for a very long time.”
“Will…will he come after
me again?”
“I will not allow him to
ever touch you again,” I said firmly. I
felt a tingle of power and I saw Faye’s
eyes widen in surprise.
Az touched my shoulder and asked, “Rachel, do you
know what you just did?”
I turned to him and said
fiercely, “I’ve just used my power to make a
promise. It doesn’t matter.
I would have kept the promise no matter
what. I have Chalybian now.
Armaros will think twice before facing me
again.”
“But Chalybian is only a
threat to Armaros if you imbue it with your
soul,” said
“I can teach her,” said
Faye weakly.
We both looked at her and she said, “I tricked Rachielle to do
it the
first time. I hid in her lake to catch
the sword when King Arthur’s knight threw it in. I
used my magic to separate her soul from the
sword and rejoin the pieces together. I
think I can teach her how to use Chalybian as a soul killer on her own
terms,
and only when she wants to.”
I looked from Az, who quietly gave his
approval, to Faye who smiled weakly at me, and finally at Chalybian, my
sword. I knew I would have to learn
Faye’s trick of keeping it hidden and hovering behind me, but I knew
that it
wouldn’t be a problem. I had already
proven what a fast learner I am once I put my mind to it.
I am Rachel Ingrid Ellis. I have
a destiny that is only now starting to reveal itself to me. I still didn’t know what lay in store for me,
or how this would all turn out, but I knew that I would not face it
alone.