Shadowhunter (Nephilim Quest Book 1)
Page 39
"That bird-wing thinking is the human way of seeing how anyone could fly in the first place: flying means wings, and everyone knows how wings should work, don't they? I would think we'd look just plain funny if we went flapping about. If we needed to move our wings in that way, our chests would have to be huge just to accommodate all the necessary muscles. We would stand out in crowds like a sore thumb."
Nevertheless, we did need the wings to move for the flying part, to overcome the gravity of the earth. First Daniel and Elijah taught me to fly with wings open, even though it could be learned to do so without showing the wings. With wings open moving about was more accurate, faster and safer, they explained.
"When we fly with wings open," explained Daniel, "it's the connection between our minds and the tips of the wings that holds the key."
So we opened our wings to their full extent. First up and then out to the sides, so they formed a semi-circle behind us and cocooned our legs. And then we used our minds to connect to the upper tips of the wings. This wasn't as difficult as it might sound - it was as though the tips drew our attention to them automatically once the wings were open. Like a tiny tug inside the mind. You know when you feel itchy – your mind goes to the location immediately.
With our attention concentrated on that point, the pulsing of our veins intensified towards the tips. It felt like a slight tremor in the wings. Then the rest of the wings turned around us from back to front like a transparent cocoon, and gravity no longer existed.
The sensation was the same I remembered from my dreams - I had simply willed my energies upwards, and flew. In the air the breathing of the wings was so strong it made me elated, light, and dizzy.
The first time I managed to rise above the sands of the desert I got so excited I forgot to keep my attention focussed in my wings, and started to tumble back towards the earth like a stone. Elijah, who had been flying under me, caught me mid-air and laughed. He laughed a lot these days, I had noticed.
"Keep your focus on flying, young lady!" He shook his forefinger at me after putting me safely down on the sand. "Knights in shining wings aren't always near to catch you when you fall."
Then he gave a smacking kiss on my cheek, which made me giggle and Daniel look at him under his eyebrows sternly.
"Oh come on, Daniel!" Elijah smiled. "She's so cute you can't blame a guy for stealing a kiss from her!"
Daniel muttered something and rose higher, followed by Elijah's laughter. He also winked at me.
I learned to like Elijah a lot during those days. With his wings extended he was just as fierce-looking as his brother, but Daniel was much more serious. When they stood side by side, blonde and dark, with their wings extended, they looked like true angel warriors – tall, muscular, handsome, and... lethal. That really was the only word I could think of. The power in their wings was pulsing like distant thunder – you could almost hear it, and you certainly felt the rumble and electricity around them much as you feel an approaching thunderstorm.
After a few scary moments of plunging down through the air, I finally learned to keep a small part of my mind in my wings all the time, while I flew. The rest of my mind was free for everything else.
I loved looking at the desert. The golden dunes, slowly making their way across the desert plain with the deep blue sky beyond them took my breath away. There were strange rock formations. There were oases.
Once Elijah and Daniel took me on a flight to the southern end of the Great Sand Sea near Gilf el-Kebir. There, they showed me some strange stones lying in the sand. They were light yellowish green, and the light shone right through them.
"They look like glass." I raised one in my hand against the sun.
"That's because they are," Daniel said, "silica glass, formed by the impact of a meteorite some 29 million years ago, or so it has been estimated."
"Did you know that one of Tutankhamon's pectorals has this same glass in it?" Elijah asked, "a light green scarab."
I nodded. Now I remembered the pectoral.
"How on earth did they get the glass? We are in the middle of nowhere! Surely no one can survive in this environment for the time it takes to get back to the Nile valley on foot!"
Indeed we were in the middle of nowhere. Huge sand dunes were all around us like solid waves of a golden ocean. Wind constantly blew sand into the air. You could see the green pieces of desert glass in the dunes, being polished by the power of these elements.
"They had their sand-dwellers in ancient times, people who lived in the desert," Daniel said, "and anything this beautiful would have been valuable in trading. Silica glass is rarer than diamonds."
I noticed the little jewel – or piece of glass – on my necklace was the same color as this meteorite glass. Of course! Grandma had told me my necklace was made of this very same glass in the distant past. For the Shadow of Isis... Shuet...
One day Daniel disappeared for a few hours without telling us where he was going. Elijah and I spent the hottest hours sitting in the shade of a mushroom-like rock formation in the Egyptian White Desert. The blinding whiteness meant it was like sitting in a snowy landscape – only this was rocks and hot sand. We did not talk much and didn't find the silence uncomfortable. Instead we watched the day turning into night. After sundown, it looked as though the sky was on fire; it was of such an intense golden color. Then it changed into deep blue, and slowly softened into black. The moon rose, and the glow of the white rock formations looked unearthly. A little desert fox appeared out of nowhere and observed us for a while, alert. The next time I blinked my eyes it had vanished, like a small ghost from another dimension.
I looked at this unbelievable beauty with my new sense of sight, my heart feeling like bursting. I could clearly see myriad stars despite the strong moonlight. I sighed, content.
"Do you love him?" Elijah broke the silence.
I looked at him in surprise. I was even more surprised when I saw the look in his eyes. They were calm, but the depth of sadness in them made tears well up in my own eyes.
I glimpsed a vision from the time I had healed him - a tall, blonde woman was looking at me with serene eyes. While I was still trapped in the vision, Elijah suddenly bent and kissed me. Tenderly, for a long time.
I was so surprised I did not even fight it. He felt so comfortable, so trustworthy. I felt myself answering his kiss, tentatively, listening to the emotions the kiss caused in me. A surge of sadness hit me and I withdrew.
"Elijah..." I did not know what to say, "I... Why....?"
He did not say anything, just questioned me with his eyes, and clearly got his answer, because he got to his feet and walked away. I turned my gaze to the desert, wiping tears, breathing in with a ragged breath. When I could see clearly again, I saw Daniel standing nearby in the white moonlight.
He must have seen it all. He might have been chiseled out of stone, standing on the white sand, with the moonlight pouring over his tall figure. He did not move any closer. His blue eyes glowed eerily in the darkness as if they were lit from within. I looked at him, and began to cry for real, burying my face to my hands.
He vanished in an instant, withdrawing into the buffer zone.
Only he did not stay there. Suddenly I heard the brothers on the other side of the rock formation, arguing. They kept their voices down, but with my enhanced hearing I could still hear them.
"If you ever touch her again..." Daniel's voice was icy.
"Then what?" Elijah sounded tired. "You will attack your own brother? You two are not married; no one has given any promises to anyone. She is free to choose. It is only fair to show her she has options. Young Nephilim have a tendency to fall in love with the first Nephilim they meet after their transformation. Her own mother did so, when Cain's son approached her."
"Which is exactly why you should have left her in peace!" Daniel snapped. "She is not yet of age to make such decisions. She transformed too soon and her mind is not ready! And what of Merit?"
A long silence followed.
"I know." Daniel's voice was icy. "And I will not. And I expect you to do the same. No one is to try to claim her, until she is old enough to make such decisions for herself."
Silence. Then Elijah spoke in so low a voice that I almost missed his words in the soft whisper of the desert wind.
"Daniel – do you love her?"
He never answered out loud.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
65. Killing Swans
Hades tied the metal against Ambrogio's neck. The silvery piece rested tightly against the skin of his lower throat, the straps tied to the nape. Then he tightened a bracer to Amrogio's left arm, and gave him a finger tab to protect his drawing fingers.
"I leave. They do not come anywhere near when I am around," Hades said. "All you need to do is to sing, and keep your bow at the ready."
"What shall I sing, oh Hades?" Ambrogio asked.
"It doesn't matter. It's the voice itself that will bring them to you. Cease singing as soon as one is near enough. You don't want more than one at a time, because they move too fast for you to kill both of them. When there is only one, others of their kind won't be warned. They usually fly alone, so only one should come at a time. Do not try to attack, if there is more than one. The other one will kill you."
At that, Hades disappeared and Ambrogio was left standing in the dark. Nervously, he pointed the arrow with its strange transparent tip towards the ground, and placed its shaft on the arrow rest, so he would be ready.
It was a peaceful night. He was standing up on the mountain, above Delphi. Not a soul was in sight. Only the stars like droplets of milk thrown across the sky.
He drew in a breath and began to sing a lullaby his mother had sung to him when he was a small child. And that is when the miracle started. His voice suddenly had many layers - as if he was singing with many voices. It had a lingering echo that was caused by the device against his throat, not by his voice bouncing back to him from a distance.
And it was beautiful. So beautiful... His voice had never reached these depths, these heights. Tears welled into his eyes at the beauty of it.
Then he saw the silvery one. It was human in shape, just as Hades had said. A man. His wings were green, and the light pulsing in them was pure silver. There was no mistaking that this was one of those he was hunting for.
He was beautiful, and obviously very curious about the singing voice. He came through the air and landed near Ambrogio.
He almost could not do it. But then his stinging skin and his love for Selene won. He stopped singing, and quickly pointed his left shoulder towards the silver-winged one, and raised his bow to aim. He was right-eyed, and the bow was right-handed. He held the bow with his left hand so he could aim with his right eye. Somewhere from the back of his mind he heard his father explaining how eye-dominance was everything in archery.
His hand rose to his anchor point, the corner of his mouth. The movement was automatic, from years of practice. Just as automatically he relaxed the fingers of his bow hand, before his movement alerted the winged creature.
The arrow flew straight and hit the silver winged man in the middle of the chest. His mouth opened in surprise and a strange voice rose towards the stars. For a short while Ambrogio wondered if he himself had continued singing, but no. The same strange echoing song that had come from Ambrogio's throat, came now from the winged creature.
He fell to his knees, and something very strange happened to his chest. Cautiously, ready for any sudden movement, Ambrogio stepped closer to see.
There was a hole in his chest. Not just a small hole created by the arrow, but a really big hole, as if someone had slashed the man with a huge knife and carved him open. The edges of the wound had an eerie bluish glow. Ambrogio could actually see through the hole. Silver blood gushed from the wound onto the ground.
The man's blue eyes stared into his, in a silent question. And then he slumped forward, and swayed for a while. In the end he did not fall onto his face, but on his back. Something white, like mist, rose from the wound and when it was gone, the winged one was dead.
Ambrogio's knees gave way and he fell to his knees and vomited until only bile came out. With shaking hands he placed his bow on the ground, and leaned over the dead body.
The wings were darkening fast. The silver blood wasn't. It pooled on the ground, which began to absorb it.
With great haste Ambrogio fumbled through his clothing, in search of the parchment and the quill. He found them, and trying to stop his hands from shaking so the quill would not break, he dipped it into the silver pool on the ground. With care he wrote a note.
"I have killed the first swan."
He could not think of anything else to write, and put the note on the ground. Then he took another note, and wrote on it.
"My beloved Selene. I cannot meet you as promised, because Apollo does not wish you to leave his temple. I am afraid he wants you to himself. Try to stay away from him; you will recognize him as the very tall man with yellow eyes. He has cursed me so I cannot walk under the sun, but I have found a way for us to be together. It only takes some time. If you are willing to wait for me, make a spiral of stones on the roadside where we were supposed to meet this morning. I will write to you every day so you will know I am here. Ambrogio."
He stood up, watching the dead creature with wonder. His wings were almost gone now, melted into the ground, and he looked like an ordinary, tall man, if not for the strange glowing silver blood running in tiny rivers from under him. Ambrogio hesitantly reached for the arrow and pulled it away. Its transparent tip had partly melted. He dropped it, and it seemed to draw a bluish line into the air, which glowed faintly for a while, and then vanished.
Then Ambrogio turned and made haste towards the Delphi temple. He would have to place his letter on the spot where they were supposed to meet with Selene, before the sun rose. The eastern horizon was no longer totally black, you could sense dark blue color there. He would have to hurry.
He ran when he could, and he did make it in time. He placed the letter on a stone, and put another stone on top of it. His shadow appeared next to him.
"You will guard this so no one else takes it but Selene. She is a beautiful maiden who comes here searching for me. You will not show yourself to her, but you will scare off anyone trying to get this letter. Do you understand?"
"Yes, master," the shadow bowed.
And then Hades stepped out of the darkness.
"Well done," he said. "Next time you can simply ask your shadow to leave your note for your girl. And your shadow will also take you back to my realm before sunrise. Now you need to go back and call for the goddess so you can give the body of the silver one to her."
Hades touched his hand, and quickly they travelled through the grey mist to the body of the dead man.
"How do I call for her, oh mighty Hades?"
"By name. Sing."
"Her name...? I am sorry, I do not know her name."
"Artemis. Do not let her see the singing device." Hades said and disappeared.
Ambrogio closed his eyes for a while, feeling nauseous. He had never killed anyone before. But he was also proud - he had served a real god, and served him well.
He opened his mouth, and began to sing Artemis's name.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
66. The Pyramids
I had fallen asleep at some point, because the next thing I was looking at was t
he sunrise. I could not see Daniel or Elijah anywhere.
Still half asleep I jumped to my feet. In dreams emotions are strong, and raw, and for a while I was certain the brothers had fought one another, and were lying wounded somewhere. The nightmarish sight of Elijah's torn wings flashed in my mind.
"Good morning!" A cheerful and familar voice greeted me. "Perfect timing – coffee will be ready in a moment. Just enough time to clean your teeth!"
"Diana! What are you doing here?"
Because it was Diana. And behind her, Grandma was sitting by a small fire, boiling water in a kettle, measuring the horizon with a content look on her face. At her feet was a tin of coffee. And to top the scene off, Jason appeared somewhere from behind the rock.
"Top of the mornin', as they say," he grinned, "slept well?"
"No, not very..." I yawned and stretched myself. "Where did you all come from?"
"Daniel picked us up during the night, while you slept. Your father has been calling, and wants to speak to you on the phone. We better get ourselves to some touristy places and take some photos, and call your parents," Grandma commented.
I took the bottle of water Diana handed to me, and my toothbrush. Cleaning my teeth made me feel better, even though I could not use much water here. There's nothing more valuable in the desert than water, that I had learned very quickly. It seemed that even the Nephilim could not go on without water.
I sat down for breakfast, looking around. I had to ask, or else they would have begun to wonder.
"Where are Daniel and Elijah?" I tried to sound as casual as possible.
"They have gone ahead to meet the Council of the Nephilim. You're about to be introduced to your own kind, after we have taken some appropriately touristy snaps," Grandma said matter-of-factly. "We also need to vanish from here, after we send photos of you in Egypt to your parents' email. We are certain the dark Nephilim are spying on it, and will appear here as soon as they see where the photos are taken."