by Lola StVil
East sits next to her on the floor as she cries. He strokes her hair and tells her that everything will be okay. But it’s not. Melody will have a hole in her heart for years to come. I know that feeling all too well.
“Shit, the Omari are here. We gotta go!” Diana says as she hurriedly applies the necessary mixtures to Mel’s face. Once she’s done, we force Mel onto a Port and send her home.
We then take to the air to find the cave the New Order used to stash Bex. The location is hidden deep inside the mountains on the outskirts of Syria. We land on the makeshift ledge and see the cave opening a few yards ahead.
“The entrance isn’t guarded,” Swoop says, surprised.
“Don’t let that fool you. They would never leave Bex unguarded. Keep your eyes open,” I instruct.
“Pryor’s right, there should be something in the way of us getting to Bex. Just because we can’t see what that is doesn’t mean it’s not there. Be careful,” Aaden cautions as we get closer. We slowly inch towards the opening of the cave. The air reeks of dry blood and rust. The cave is so silent it’s eerie. It’s as if time itself has stopped.
“Did you see that?” East asks Swoop.
“See what?” she replies.
“I thought I saw…never mind,” East says as we continue straight ahead.
“Hey, did that thing…” Swoop lets the words die in her throat.
“What is it, Bird?” Aaden asks her.
“I think the slab of rock moved,” she says.
We follow her gaze and find the rock off to the side of the cave. It’s not moving. It’s still and looks like it has not moved in centuries.
“Sorry, guys. I really thought I saw—” Swoop is in midsentence when the rock formation to the right of us springs to life, leaps into the air, and comes straight for us.
The creature’s outer shell is the same color as the cave, allowing it to blend in and be virtually impossible to see. It’s the size of a Doberman pinscher and has wings that expand and contract rapidly. It has webbed feet that make it easy to latch on to the rocky surface of the cave. Its skin is scaly and shiny; its tail is made of dozens of sharp spikes. There is a gaping black void filled with jagged fangs where its face should have been.
“Swoop, look out!” I yell.
Swoop dives to the ground, but it’s too late. The creature latches on to her and sinks its teeth into her midsection. We run to her side to pull the animal off of her, but Diana stops us.
“That’s a Tytu. If you make contact with the spikes on its tail, death is instant,” she warns.
Aaden sends a fireball directly at the Tytu. Diana shouts at him not to do it, but it’s too late. The fireball Aaden launches comes back to him and nearly sets his head on fire.
“The shiny surface of a Tytu’s skin causes any attacks to rebound,” Diana says.
“Yeah, we got that,” East says.
“The only way to kill it is to beat it to death, but don’t let its skin touch you,” Diana reveals.
I grab hold of the nearest rock and bash the creature in the head; it does nothing to loosen its grip on Swoop, who is now starting to lose consciousness.
“Hurry!” I shout at the team as they join in and try to beat the animal into submission. Pissed off, the Tytu lets go of Swoop and comes straight for me. The second its fangs pierce my shoulder, I can feel the life draining from my body. The pain it sends shooting down my body is unreal. East and Diana tend to Swoop while the rest of the team combats the creature. It takes several minutes, but they are finally able to kill it.
“Is Swoop okay?” I ask as Aaden helps me off the ground and tends to my shoulder.
“Yeah, Pry. I’m good, but we should get going before—”
Suddenly the entire opening of the cave springs to life, and Tytu surround us. They worked together to make it appear as if we were headed for the cave when, in fact, we were headed for the Tytu’s nest. Hundreds of them converge down on us. We try to fight them off, but it’s hard to do so without touching them.
East, unable to resist, flings his lasso at them. It hits their skin and the lasso is sent flying back to its owner. East almost gets himself killed with his own weapon. Aaden goes to help him but is attacked by a smaller yet even more vicious Tytu. I manage to make it over to him and kick the beast so hard, it moans as it falls down the side of the ledge.
“I see a hole; it’s at the center of the Tytu nest. Bex must be down there,” Diana says.
“Wait, you can’t aim for the middle by yourself,” I call out.
“Bex has no more time left. We have to go. Now!” Diana says as she darts for the center of the nest, where most of the Tytu have gathered.
“Diana, wait!” Aaden yells.
It does no good; she’s off to save Bex even if it means her death. Damn that girl, she’s going to get her ass killed and take her baby with her.
“Diana, no!” I plead.
Again, she does not listen. She runs as fast as she can towards the death that awaits her. The Tytu swarm down on her, and death is a breath away. That’s when something unbelievable happens—something that has us all stunned. Every single Tytu around us has been stopped in midflight. Seriously, they all just stop where they are.
“What’s happening? Why aren’t they attacking you?” Swoop asks Diana.
“Nix must have stopped time,” she says, sounding shocked herself. She studies the markings on her arms as they glow.
I spot a worm a few feet away. There’s nothing special about it, it’s just a worm, but something about the damn invertebrate bothers me.
“Phoenix can pause time?” Swoop asks.
“I guess so. I never knew that. You saved Mommy, Nix! Good boy!” she raves. Her markings glow off and on.
“Okay, Nix, you are officially a show-off. I like you already,” East says to Diana’s markings.
“We need to go down there and get Bex before it’s too late,” Diana says.
Aaden summons a fireball so that we can use its light to see down the hole.
“It’s not that far down. I see Bex!” Swoop shouts excitedly.
“He’s surrounded by Sives,” East informs us as he pokes his head down the hole. A Sive is a chrome-colored spider that feeds on an angel’s soul and will eat through flesh and bone to do so. They are feasting on Bex’s soul through every one of his pores. Bex looks pale, sickly, and still. So still, in fact, we fear we are too late.
“Is he…gone?” Diana asks.
“I can feel his agony. Damn, it’s intense,” East says as he doubles over in pain.
“If he’s hurting, that means he’s still alive. Had he not been a Para, he would have died already,” Swoop says.
“Why are we waiting? Let’s go get him,” Diana says.
“If the Sives think their meal is about to be taken away, they will eat faster. By the time we make it down there, there will be nothing left of Bex to save,” I reply.
“Then what do we do?” Swoop asks.
“Did a Sive give him that scar?” Diana says.
“You mean the twelve-inch one on his right side? That’s not from a Sive, that happened when he was a kid, trying to get the demons off his father. It nearly killed him,” I remind her.
How the hell can Diana not remember a scar that big? When they slept together, he must have told her about it. How could that just slip her mind?
“Guys, his pain is growing. He’s about to die. We need to get him out.” East groans as he too is now in pain thanks to his powers of empathy.
“We can’t get him out without his help. We need to wake him up,” Aaden says.
“The pain made him lose consciousness. He won’t wake up on his own,” Diana replies.
“Then pain can bring him back,” I reply. I instruct East to reach down into the hole and hit Bex with the lasso. I’m hoping that it jolts him back to reality.
“It could work, but he’s so weak, the lasso could also kill him,” East reminds me.
“We have no othe
r option,” Aaden says.
“Here we go,” East says as he sends his lasso beaming down the hole.
It takes three tries, but eventually the tip of the lasso makes contact with Bex’s body. It zaps him back to us. He sits up and cries out in pain. We hold Swoop’s leg and dangle her upside down in the cave so that she can be a makeshift ladder for Bex. The team and I will then pull them both up. Bex understands the plan, but he’s so weak he can barely hold his head up, let alone climb.
When he finally reaches Swoop’s hand, the Sives are crawling all over him. He’s too weak to fend them off. They start penetrating Bex’s soul. I can tell because black veins are spreading across his chest.
“Hurry!” I shout to him.
Luckily Bex is able to make contact with Swoop’s hand. Together we pull the two of them up from the hole. We pull Bex out and use a Holder to contain the chrome spiders.
“Bex! Bex!” I shout desperately.
“It’s no use. He’s alive, but we need to get him to a clinic. The mixtures I have on me aren’t strong enough,” Diana says.
“Do you have anything that can revive him, at least long enough to fly out of here? What about the mixture you always make in case one of us is hit by a Powerball? The one you call a Cold Shower?” Aaden asks.
“I’m all out. I used the last of the fresh-squeezed grapefruit a few days ago. I can’t make it without that. I would have restocked, but Nix loves the sound of cars passing by. So every night he’s woken me up to hear it. I’ve gotten about ten minutes of sleep in the past few days,” Diana admits.
“Okay then, East and I will carry Bex out of here. Swoop and Pry will have our backs in case we’re attacked again,” Aaden says as he starts to take to the sky.
The worm. Why is the worm on my mind? It’s just a stupid worm.
“Pry, what is it?” Aaden asks from above.
“The worm,” I whisper to myself as it dawns on me.
“What?” Swoop says as she’s about to fly away.
“Let’s get out of here first; then we can talk,” East says.
I agree and help them get Bex out of the cave and hurry him to the clinic that handles the Kon. The Healers quickly throw us out while they work on Bex. We head out into the waiting room. But even now, as I pace up and down the halls, worrying about Bex, I can’t stop thinking I missed something. I find myself staring at Diana.
“We better pray that Bex wakes up in time to tell the Omari to back down, or we will have to fight them—okay, what’s up with you, Pry? Why are you looking at Diana like that?” Swoop says.
“How could you sleep with Bex and not notice his scar?” I ask her.
“We had other things on our minds,” she says defensively.
“Diana, you didn’t have many female friends when you were human. I think you wanted to change that. I think you really wanted us to be friends. I don’t think you would have jeopardized all the work you did to be part of this team and to have us as friends.”
“What are you saying?” she asks.
“Diana, you never slept with Bex,” I reply.
“I already told you I did,” she counters.
“No, actually, you said it was complicated. I thought that was just crap, but now…”
“Pry, where is this going?” East asks.
“Diana, please be honest with me. I’m your friend and I need to know the truth.”
“There’s nothing to know,” she insists.
“When you were pregnant with Sparks, she would light up when Aaden entered the room. Yet we couldn’t get Nix to light the hole back in the cave. Nix could have also stopped the Sives from crawling all over his father, but he didn’t. Why?” I ask.
“I don’t know. All babies are different,” she reasons.
Yet something in her voice tells me that I’m on the right track.
“Is Nix Bex’s son?” I ask.
She says nothing.
“Damn it, Diana, talk to me. Is Nix Bex’s son?” I ask again.
“No,” she says, lowering her head.
“You two never even slept together, did you?” I push.
“No. I said that because I hoped that would keep my son safe,” she says, finally making eye contact.
“Diana, who is Nix’s father?” Swoop asks.
“I’m sorry, I can’t,” she says as she starts to run off.
We all run after her, determined to get answers.
“You said Nix paused time back in the cave,” I remind Diana as I approach her.
“Yeah, so?” she says.
“But there was a worm a few feet from us. I couldn’t get what it was about it, but now I know. The worm was moving. It was slow, of course, but still moving.”
“What’s your point, Pry?” East asks.
“My point is Nix didn’t pause time. He simply told the creatures to stop moving. Nix can control animals,” I shout at the team. They look back at me blankly. I force myself to stay calm and explain it to them.
“After everything that’s happened with Aaden and Diana, I’m sure she uses birth control. Isn’t that right, Diana?” I ask.
“Yes, but it’s not always one hundred percent. And why are we even talking about this—”
“That mixture you make with the citrus fruit, have you had any?” I ask.
“A few weeks back after a battle,” Diana admits.
“That’s why the birth control didn’t work. Citrus neutralized it,” I reply.
“Is that true for everyone?” East asks.
“Not everyone. There’s a Quo who is affected by citrus. I’m guessing her son is the same way,” I reply.
“I’m not following you,” Swoop says.
“The being that is affected by citrus is also the same being that learned to control animals at a very young age.”
“Pryor…please,” Diana whispers.
“I need to hear you say it out loud,” I beg.
She’s silent; the words weigh too much for her. But we are way past the time for tiptoeing around and being gentle. In fact, the time for games is over.
“Diana, who does Nix belong to?” Aaden asks, looking into her eyes.
“Damn it, Diana, say it!” I order.
“Malakaro! Nix is Malakaro’s son.”
Chapter Eighteen:
That night,
On The Rooftop…
The words that come out of Diana’s mouth affect us all deeply. However, the angel who is by far the most pissed off is Swoop. She grabs Diana by her neck and hurls her down to the ground before we can stop her.
“You screwed the guy who killed my sister?” Swoop rages. We rush over to them and try to pull Swoop off of her, but her hold on Diana is absolute.
“It wasn’t planned. I wasn’t trying to make you angry,” Diana says, barely able to get the words out.
“Anger? You think that’s what this is? That’s not anger, this is,” Swoop says as she takes something out of her pocket: marble-sized black and white balls.
“Are those Toss balls?” East asks.
“Damn it, Swoop, don’t!” Aaden yells.
Swoop pays no attention to Aaden. Instead she shoves a handful of Toss balls down Diana’s throat. A Toss ball is something angels and demons take when they want to remove their wings for a few moments so they can do something adventurous and generally stupid (like jump off a mountain with nothing to save them). Your wings come back, but it takes time.
Judging by the number of Toss balls in her mouth, Diana will be without her wings for a few minutes. But Swoop is not done. As we help Diana up, she kicks her in the face, knocking her out; she then snatches the now wingless Diana into the air and flies out the window.
The team and I take flight, desperate to stop Swoop from doing something she will regret. Swoop flies at such a frenzied pace, she gets to her destination in record time. We are now standing above an active volcano somewhere in Italy.
“Swoop, honey, you have to put Diana down,” East says gently as he looks at D
iana’s unconscious body dangling from Swoop’s fingers. The lava springs up from the volcano in various shades of red. The eruption is so intense we can feel the heat from where we are.
“That’s exactly what I plan to do,” Swoop promises.
“Bird, let’s talk about this. You know this isn’t who you are. You can’t do this. You’re too good of an angel to hurt someone who’s pregnant,” I reason.
“Pregnant with Malakaro’s kid. Do you guys get that?” she demands.
“Yes, we do. And that was the biggest mistake anyone can possibly make. And maybe Diana will end up paying for it, but not like this. We can’t hurt our own team member, and we certainly can’t kill Phoenix,” I reason with her.
“Why not? You tried,” she reminds me.
“Yes, and I was wrong. I never should have gotten violent with her. Please don’t repeat my mistakes,” I plead.
“Bird, you can’t hurt Diana. She matters to me,” Aaden says with pain in his voice. Had it not been Swoop holding Diana, we would have already found ways to take her out. But there is no way we are going to hurt Swoop. Still, watching her drop Diana into a volcano spewing flesh-melting lava isn’t the way to go.
“Kiana, put her down,” I instruct in the firmest tone I’ve ever taken with her. She stares me down, but I do not blink.
“I don’t care how pissed you are nor how wrong Diana is. This is my team, not yours. And I will decide what happens to its members. Now put. Her. Down,” I order.
Swoop looks beyond annoyed. She shakes her head angrily and sighs, but she follows my orders. Unfortunately, Diana wakes up just then and starts to panic. She struggles with Swoop, who soon loses her grip. Now Diana is falling to her death.
“Shit!” Aaden shouts as he dives down to save Diana. We all dive after them, not wanting anything to happen to Nix.
“Her wings should have come back by now,” Swoop shouts as she tries to increase her speed and get ahead of Diana’s fall. But Swoop is wrong; Diana’s wings aren’t back. She is now falling faster than any of us can fly.
The closest one to reaching Diana is Aaden. And as hard as he’s trying, Diana is a fraction of a second faster in her descent. And while that normally doesn’t mean much, right now, that fraction of a second is the difference between life and death.
