by C. L. Coffey
“Well why aren’t you two wearing a uniform?” I asked him, nodding back at Veronica whose creation was beginning to smell delicious.
“The Cherubim were issued with a uniform, but the white made them look too cheerful,” Cupid explained, quickly winking at me.
“Bite me,” Veronica called. She appeared at my side, handing me the most delicious looking po’boy I had seen for a long time. “Cupid, on the other hand, decided that archangels didn’t need to wear a uniform.”
I nearly choked on the sandwich. “You’re an archangel?”
Cupid clutched at his heart. “It wounds me right here, that you are so surprised at that fact. Yes, I’m an archangel. Were you sleeping when I showed you my archery skills? There is no way a lowly angel would be that good.”
“I’m sorry,” I quickly apologized, hoping I hadn’t offended him. “You just don’t seem…” I trailed off, trying to work out what to say that wouldn’t offend him further.
“As grumpy and uptight an ass as my brother?” he offered with a grin.
This time, I did choke on the sandwich. Veronica kindly thumped me on my back, and when I could finally breathe, I looked up at him through my watering eyes. “Michael is your brother?”
Cupid patted me on the head. “Never mind introducing us to The Vampire Diaries, I think we need to fill you in on Angelology 101 first. Yes, Michael is my brother. All the archangels are my brothers.”
“Or sisters,” Veronica added. “Or they would be if there were some still.”
“Think of it this way,” Cupid began. He leaned over and stole a bite of my sandwich, chewing it slowly to prolong the agony, before he finally finished. “If Michael is the number one, I’m the number two.”
I was completely speechless. “But you thought he was yummy!”
Cupid mimicked sticking his finger down his throat. “I was trying to see what you thought of him. As if I’d think that – that would be wrong.”
That made me feel a little better, but the thought of them being brothers, and Cupid an archangel, was still mind boggling.
“I know,” Veronica said, excitedly. “Tonight, after dinner, we’ll go out – a little bit of dancing, maybe some virgin hurricanes – and then you can ask us any questions you want.”
“I think that would be a good idea,” I agreed, snatching my sandwich back off Cupid who was trying to eat it before I could. “And this is the best shrimp po’boy I have ever had.”
* * *
After taking a mere couple of minutes to inhale the sandwich, I left Cupid and Veronica, who had gone back to bickering over who was the ‘hottest guy’, and headed down to the gym. I quickly changed with the intention of warming up before Michael appeared. I was thwarted in the plan before I had taken a step into the room. He was already waiting for me, next to the treadmill, busy reading Paradise Lost.
“It’s already programmed. You just need to press start,” he informed me without looking up.
“Of course it is,” I muttered, stepping on the machine. I prepared myself for a roadrunner’s speed, but it was a nice manageable pace.
“It wouldn’t be unusual for you to run at yesterday’s speed for several hours. At this pace, you should be able to last a day.”
“Are you expecting me to run all day?” I asked in alarm.
He looked up from the book and frowned. “With that attitude, I would be surprised if you lasted longer than an hour.”
“I’d like to see you do better,” I grumbled.
Michael’s eyes clouded over, and for a moment I thought he was going to speed my machine up. Instead, he got on to the one next to me and hit the start button, quickly speeding it up to its fastest setting – making my steady jog look like a walk. Wordlessly, he set the book in front of the control and continued reading.
I stared. I couldn’t help it. He was breathing normally, there wasn’t a trace of sweat on him, and he was casually turning the pages.
I made myself run at that pace for two hours, and it was only because Michael was next to me, looking like he had just stepped on the machine that I managed that. I was determined to beat him.
In the end, I had to hit stop. The machine slowed me to a walking pace, and finally ground to a halt. I stumbled backwards off it, but managed to keep my balance. I did end up keeled over, trying to catch my breath.
Beside me, the machine stopped and Michael hopped off, book still in hand. “This isn’t good enough, Angel,” he told me.
Still doubled over, I glanced up at him and brushed the sweaty hair out of my eyes. “Does it look like I’m not trying?” I gasped.
“It doesn’t look like you’re trying hard enough. There are going to be people who depend on you – not just your charge. How would you feel if something were to happen to them and you were not able to protect them effectively?”
I made myself stand upright, one hand on my hip attempting to seem defensive, but really there to clutch at the cramp. “I don’t see how running is going to protect them. I thought you were supposed to be teaching me to use a sword?”
Michael’s eyes clouded over, a hint of red marking his cheeks. “The ones coming at you will be able to move at a supernatural speed,” he told me, managing to keep his voice level. “They are older than you. They will have more experience than you, and they will not fight fair. If you want to stand a glimmer of a chance against them, you need to be able to match their speed. There is no point in teaching you the basics if you will be disarmed before you can blink.”
He left, leaving me staring after him, trying to catch my breath. There had been anger there and I wasn’t entirely sure where it had come from. I was trying, damn it. Who the hell was I going to be up against, because this was striking me as the small print I should have read before I agreed to anything.
I headed back to the changing room and scooped some of the workout clothing into my arms. It made sense to me to keep a set or two in my bedroom, rather than use the locker room.
The angels were back in their rooms when I hit my floor. Maybe the trick was to do this the other way around and take a towel downstairs, rather than experience the stares of the model angels as I walked past still red faced and sweaty. Or maybe this was Michael’s punishment for not being as fast as he wanted me to be. I shook the idea from my head. He was an angel – he wasn’t capable of being that mean.
I had another cool shower, spending the extra time in there to allow the water to massage my muscles. I got out when I heard a muffled bang come from my bedroom. I quickly wrapped a towel around my body, leaving my wet hair dripping everywhere, and searched for a weapon. My hands grabbed the only thing available – the hairdryer – and I leapt into my room, brandishing it in front of me.
I was greeted by the stunned looks of Cupid and Veronica. Their surprise quickly melted into fits of giggles, collapsing against each other to keep themselves upright.
“Why don’t any of the rooms have locks?” I huffed as I marched back into the bathroom to turn the shower off. I took another towel and wrapped my hair up in a turban before I re-entered the bedroom.
“We come bearing gifts,” Cupid offered, indicating to a pile of clothing on the bed.
“There are no locks because angels are supposed to be trustworthy,” Veronica said, doing her best to look innocent.
“Whoever decided that never met you,” I informed her as I investigated the clothing.
“It’s Veronica’s,” Cupid explained apologetically. “There wasn’t a vast amount that I figured you would wear, without you looking like you wanted to slit your wrists-”
“Note the fashion advice is coming from the guy,” Veronica interrupted him.
“However,” Cupid continued loudly, ignoring her. “Any girl looks good in a little black dress.” He looked me up and down and then plucked one of the dresses out of the collection. “Try this one.”
I grabbed some underwear and disappeared back into the bathroom to pull the item on. It was a satin bandeau style dress
which fell to my knees. It had a strap over my right shoulder, which looked like it was supposed to be a trail of ivy – the ivy covering half the skirt. The dress was really pretty, and if I’m honest, not something I expected Veronica to own.
It didn’t take long for me to dry my hair, it automatically flicking out for me, and I put my make up on in record time. That being said, when I emerged from the bathroom, Cupid and Veronica were lying on the bed, pretending to be asleep.
“Fine, you sleep,” I told them while I pulled a pair of shoes out of the wardrobe. “But I look fabulous and I’m going out without you.”
That got their attention and they jumped off the bed. “You scrub up alright,” Veronica told me, giving me the seal of approval. She too was wearing a little black dress, although hers was more Holly Go-lightly. She looked fabulous. Cupid had opted for blue jeans and a casual white shirt.
“We are allowed to do this, aren’t we?” I asked dubiously as we made our way down the hallway. We were earning a few strange looks through the open doors.
“Of course we are,” Veronica tried to assure me. “Do we strike you as rule breakers?”
I gave her a pointed look.
Cupid wrapped an arm around my shoulder. “Second in command, remember?”
Strangely, it didn’t fill me with as much reassurance as it should have. Regardless, I followed the pair to one of the cars and slipped in the backseat. As soon as we pulled out of the gates Cupid turned up the radio.
We didn’t go to Bourbon Street as I expected. We ended up in a sleek little place in the Business District which allowed under twenty-one’s in. It was still quite early so it wasn’t too busy and we found a table easily. We grabbed some Cokes and sat down. Veronica and Cupid stared expectantly at me. “Well?” she asked.
“Well, what?”
“Well, the whole point of this evening was so you could ask us the questions to fill in the missing blanks, that our careless leader neglected to tell you,” Cupid said, pulling a face.
I thought about it. There were a dozen different things to know. I decided to start with the basics. “How many angels live in the convent?”
“You bring it up to a round fifty,” said Cupid. “Thirty angels, seventeen cherubim, two archangels, and an angel in training.”
“Well how is it I never see them, unless I’m a delightful sweaty mess?” I groaned.
“You shouldn’t really see the cherubim,” Veronica told me. “We’re supposed to be inconspicuous. We get the chores done without you noticing.”
I thought about it. With the exception of the servers in the canteen, I didn’t see them. “Is that who stocks my wardrobe and cleans my room?” I asked, thinking about how I had a habit of leaving my dirty clothes in a pile on the floor, and how they wouldn’t be there the next time I walked in the room.
“That’s us,” Veronica nodded.
“I think I said before, the regular angels are messengers. Whilst in theory they could be called upon at any time of day, we tend to stick to business hours,” Cupid added. “Unless it’s really important, there’s no sense waking people up.”
“That and the fact they’re all really shallow and insist on their beauty sleep,” Veronica muttered.
I really didn’t think angels were all that superficial, but Cupid quickly agreed. “Oh, it’s true. They’re not like icebergs with hidden depths – what you see is what you get with most messengers – it’s why they’re only trusted to be errand boys.”
Or maybe they were. I did my best not to compare them to model stereotypes and paid more attention.
“Angels with a bit more depth to them are the guardian angels,” Cupid continued. “I don’t know why New Orleans doesn’t have any though.”
“They did have,” Veronica pointed out. She stopped, quickly sharing a look with Cupid which I didn’t miss.
“What?” I asked, carefully, not sure that I wanted to know the answer.
“She moved on,” Cupid shrugged. Maybe I could move eventually? There was so much of America I wanted to see which I had never had, never mind a trip back to England, or the rest of the world.
“The good news is that guardian angels are a higher pay grade to the messengers, although I’m not sure how much a trainee will get,” Veronica said with a frown. “I never really asked.”
“Either way, it will be enough for you to personalize your room or buy some clothes,” Cupid beamed, before clapping happily. “Yay, shopping trip.”
“So why the fleet of SUVs?” I asked, mentally ticking off a list of questions. “I thought angels could teleport.” I frowned thoughtfully. “Can you two teleport?”
“Of course we can!” Veronica exclaimed, looking slightly offended.
“I can’t,” I hurriedly told her. “And I really don’t like the experience that I had. Is that why there are cars?”
“Archangels and cherubim can teleport,” Cupid disagreed. “Regular angels can’t. It’s more of a case of sometimes an angel can’t just go popping up in the middle of a room or street. It would create questions we wouldn’t want to answer.”
“I guess that makes sense,” I muttered. I probably could have worked it out by myself if I thought about it. On the plus side, it did give me some form of transportation if I needed it, and I was not in a hurry to learn teleporting. Ugh! “But SUVs?”
Cupid rolled his eyes. “Oh please, they’re hybrids. Humans might not be the most environmentally conscious things but we’re not supposed to do anything that harms them.”
“Surely riding a bike would be the most environmentally effective, or even walking?” I pointed out. That had Veronica chortling into her drink.
“Yes, because an angel running down the side of the interstate at the same speed as a car isn’t going to draw too much attention?” Cupid responded, dryly.
He had a point. “Okay then, the most important questions,” I announced, leaning forwards to take a very long drink of the Coke. “Why no drinking, drugs or sex?”
Cupid rolled his eyes. “The boring rules. No drugs is obvious. There’s only so much your vessel can heal from and drugs are tricky. Plus they affect you differently.”
“The same goes for alcohol,” Veronica added. “It affects us differently than humans. We can drink and drink and all of a sudden, just like that,” she snapped her fingers. “We’re drunk. And not that happy drunk which humans like. It’s like a sedative and completely slows our reflexes down.” She looked me up and down, before shrugging. “Besides, look at the ages of our vessels. We’re older than a millennia but there’s no way I would ever get served at a bar. The last thing we need is trouble with underage drinking. It attracts unwanted attention.”
“As for the sex,” Cupid shuddered. “That’s a little icky. There are nine different types of angels. Three of those are on earth – the Angels, the Cherubim and Archangels. If you think of all the Angels as brothers, all the Cherubim as brothers-”
“And sisters,” Veronica interrupted him, punching his arm.
“Okay, ow!” Cupid exclaimed, rubbing his arm. “And sisters,” he repeated, glaring at Veronica who grinned at him. “And so forth. Angels are all in the same family.”
“Which makes us cousins,” Veronica declared, wrapping her arm around Cupid.
I grimaced. “Yeah, that is icky. I get that. What about the human element.”
Cupid shrugged. “We just don’t.”
Veronica nodded, pulling a face. “There are also the consequences of that. The Nephilim.”
The word sent a shiver down my spine, and for the first time, I felt cold. “What?”
“The consequence of a human and an angel getting caught together is that angels are cast out. That’s bad enough by itself,” Cupid explained, looking uncomfortable. “Nephilim are the offspring. They’re the reason the Fallen are increasing in numbers. They’re mortal but they have the same strength and speed.”
I slumped back into my chair. I didn’t realize how hopeful I had been at the prosp
ect of there being a way around that. Now it was evident that I was going to spend eternity alone. “How do you two cope with it?”
“Cope with what?” Cupid asked. “The Nephilim?”
Veronica shuddered. “If needed, the Principalities step in.”
“What the hell is a Principality?” I asked, wearily.
“Seriously?” Veronica asked, sharing a look with Cupid.
“She’s apparently not read the Bible,” Cupid informed her as he chose to pat my arm in a somewhat patronizing manner.
“Laugh it up and get it out of your system, then carry on with this Angelology 101,” I muttered, shooting them both a glare.
“Okay,” Cupid agreed although he wasn’t going to too much trouble to hide his amusement. “You know there’s a hierarchy, right?”
I nodded. This I did remember. “Angels are the last rung on the ladder.”
“Well,” Veronica grinned coyly, biting on her straw. “I think angels in training are lower.”
“Lower than the help?” I shot back at her with my own grin.
She cocked her head, eyes wide, before she joined in with Cupid’s loud, bellowing laugh. “Touché,” she nodded, raising her glass. “But for the record, the girls are supposed to stick together.”
“I thought I had,” I responded, batting my eyelashes.
“Creep!” Veronica exclaimed loudly with mock disgust as Cupid high-fived me.
“Joking aside,” Cupid quickly cut in. “There are three tiers in the hierarchy. They’re called Choirs, and no, before you ask, there’s no singing involved. Only the Third Choir, the lowest tier, are allowed to walk the earth.”
Veronica coughed loudly and pointed at herself.
Cupid rolled his eyes. “The exception is the Cherubim, but I will get to them in a bit,” he informed me, giving Veronica a pointed look.
“Thank you,” she mouthed at him.
“The Angels, as you rightly pointed out, are the lowest ranking. Angels are the messengers and to be honest, they can’t be trusted to do anything else, but at least they do that well.”
