“Is that your version of a beam of light? Like the one in the Seven-Eleven? Only you send an image of yourself as light to warn us of what is coming?” Reed asks in a serious tone.
I grow still in his arms. Is that what I just did? Did I send them out of me? I wonder, feeling overwhelmed by all that is happening to me. “I don’t know, Reed. I wish I came with an owner’s manual or something.”
Stroking my hair, Reed says, “That is a book I would enjoy reading, Evie. Our timeline just moved up. We have been planning for the Gancanagh since we arrived here. We will have the superior position. Every angle has been analyzed. They will come and they will die.” I close my eyes because fear makes it hard for me to hear what he is telling me. “This changes things, though, I need to call Zephyr—ask him to return here. We have to bring in our reinforcements now. We will tell Dominion where we are, they have been demanding to send a team to protect you—”
“What?” I ask as my eyes widen in surprise.
Reed’s expression darkens. “Bodyguards. Dominion has been demanding that you have them to protect you,” he says and he sounds a little sour, like the thought of someone else defending me is making him ill.
“Do you trust them?” I ask as Brennus’ words echo in my mind.
“No,” he replies. “There will be some who will give their lives to protect you, but there will be others who will have another purpose.”
“What other purpose?” I ask.
He avoids looking at me when he replies, “I can think of several. They think of you as a weapon. You are the perfect lure to draw out evil. They would like to use you whenever and wherever they see fit to entrap the Fallen. I’m in the way of that because I will not allow Dominion access to you. I believe that some will want you to return to Dominion, with or without your consent.”
“Oh,” I say. Dominion wants me back and there will be a few of them with orders to seize the moment and make that happen. “So, my bodyguards could turn into my jailers, if given the right set of circumstances?”
“Yes,” Reed replies as if he is proud of me for understanding what he is telling me. “We have not allowed them close to you for that reason, but we may need them now that our timeline has been bumped up.”
I nod, “What about Brownie and Russell?” I ask, pulling away from Reed. Pacing the floor in front of him, I say, “They shouldn’t come back here, not with Brennus coming. He’ll kill Russell, after what Russell did to Ultan and Driscoll.” Brennus will torture Russell if he finds him because Russell killed several Gancanagh when he rescued me. Well that, and the fact that Russell is my soul mate, which seems to really bother Brennus.
“We can protect them when they arrive here,” Reed replies confidently, but paranoia is setting in now. I feel weak and vulnerable.
“Let’s go now, Reed. Let’s leave here, just you and me. We can lead Brennus away from here,” I reason. “That way, he will be forced to follow us and we can lose him—I know we can.” Then, at least Zephyr, Buns, Brownie, and Russell will be safe, I tell myself.
“No,” Reed replies. “This is the best position for us. We will fight here, and you will be safe, and so will Russell. We will protect him,” he says, reading my mind.
“I want to believe that, Reed, you have no idea how much I want to believe that, but I’ve seen what they can do. They walked right into my room at Dominion’s chateau, without any of the Powers knowing that they were there. Brennus is obsessed. He is like a spoiled child who has never been denied a toy before and he can’t stand it,” I explain, wringing my hands.
“You are not a toy,” he barks and I flinch.
“No, I’m not a toy,” I agree, as I stop pacing to look at him.
A small sound from the wooden gate that connects our pagoda to the others registers in my mind right before Zephyr’s tall frame materializes just inches in front of me. He reaches out to me, grasping my upper arms and pulling me off of my feet to dangle before him. His brown wings are stretching out, blotting out everything behind him but the menacing looking hilt to a broad sword that is strapped to his back.
“You are alive,” he states between panting breaths as his eyes rove over every inch of me, assessing me and looking for anything out of place.
“Yeah,” I nod in a soft tone, smiling sheepishly while gazing into Zee’s ice-blue eyes. “You get my message?” I add, and then I bite my lower lip as his eyes narrow.
“Explain,” he barks, but Reed steps between us, pulling me gently from Zephyr’s grasp.
“Evie has a new ability that we didn’t expect. She can send out clones of herself,” Reed says, standing between Zephyr and me. “If your message was anything like mine, then…”
“Is that what you are calling it? A message? It felt more like emotional terrorism to me,” Zephyr replies, piercing me with his stare.
“Sorry, that’s what I was feeling when it happened,” I reply, feeling ill remembering Molly’s face. I brief Zephyr on what just happened. Zephyr grills me about every detail of the email exchange between Brennus and me. I watch the corners of his mouth lift a little when he asks me to tell him again about addressing Brennus as a “walking corpse.”
Zephyr grunts when I finish. Looking at Reed, he says, “Buns should be here any minute. I didn’t wait for her after Evie’s clone ran into me. Buns tried to tell me that it was definitely not Evie’s soul, but you felt it too, didn’t you?” Zephyr asks Reed and he nods. “I have never felt that way. I did not enjoy it.”
“Sorry, Zee, I was freaked,” I say, looking down at my feet.
Using his finger, Zephyr lifts my chin up so he can see my eyes. “Yes, and now I finally know what ‘freaked’ means,” Zephyr replies. “You have more courage than I thought.”
“Sweetie!” Buns calls out right before she lands outside the doorway of our room. Her golden butterfly wings float behind her with effortless grace as she strides into the room. Coming to me, she embraces me, squeezing me briefly. “That’s a killa new trick you came up with,” she says.
“Thanks, Buns,” I reply, seeing that she is trying to make me feel like less of a freak than I feel right now. “It just happened, I wasn’t even trying.”
“Well, it’s a very stellar party trick. You can clone yourself and then we can make everyone guess which one is the real Evie,” Buns says, smiling into my eyes with her cornflower-blue ones as she brushes a stray hair back from my face. “Can you do it again now? Can you send one to me?”
“I don’t know,” I waver, biting my lower lip and looking uncertainly at Reed who is watching me. He nods to me in encouragement.
“Try,” Reed says.
Nodding slowly, I close my eyes, breathing in deeply. Now that Brennus is coming, this may be my last chance to tell each of them what they mean to me. My heart speeds up as I allow thoughts of Brennus to create in me a sense of urgency, like I had felt when this first happened. Thinking of Buns, of the love I have for her, I begin to feel like I’m spinning, caught in a centrifuge. Opening my eyes, I sway again. Trying to keep my balance, I find it’s impossible and I have to go down on one knee again so I won’t fall down. A tremor jolts through me, causing a sense of lightness to expand within my body. Light is pushing its way out of me as my form is separating from itself. Seeing my likeness in front of me, it turns and rockets towards Buns, running right into her and disappearing in an instant.
I have no time to gauge her reaction to it because another shockwave hits me, causing another image of me to spill out. This one runs towards Zee, disappearing into him. Concentrating now on all the love and desire that I have for Reed, a pulsing heat, like fire, erupts within me as the light from me grows more intense. A brightly lit image of me bursts forth from my body and it turns immediately towards Reed. Losing the dizziness that drove me to my knee, I watch as my clone bolts to Reed, enveloping him in its fiery light before it vanishes within him. He closes his eyes as his perfect face transforms from a concerned expression to one of bliss. Slowly, he opens his
eyes again and the deepest desire smolders within their dark green depths.
“Sweetie, I was wrong…that’s not a party trick,” Buns says as she staggers to the bed to sit on it. “That’s—I can smell you!” she remarks as her eyes widen and she pulls her honey-color hair to her nose, breathing in. She speaks to me in her musical language before she smiles and says, “That was like seeing love through another’s eyes. I will not forget it.”
“Dominion,” Zephyr says, not taking his eyes off of me. He has an awed expression on his face that I have seen only one other time and that was right before I managed to cut his arm with my dagger while sparring with him.
“We need to get them here now,” Reed finishes for him, but he’s not looking at Zee, he’s looking at me with that same expression of bliss still plastered to his face. “I will make the arrangements while you make the arrangements to get Brownie and Russell here sooner.”
“I cannot leave here now. They will have to make their way alone. I have not explained Russell to Dominion as yet. We can protect him once he is here, but I do not trust them to deliver him here if I were to tell them about him. It is too great a risk that they will keep him if I ask them to protect him,” Zephyr finishes.
Fear causes my palms to sweat as I see what I have done. I have ruined all of their carefully made plans. The plans to bring Brennus to them according to their own timeline and the plans to secure the safety of Russell and Brownie are now being scrapped because I messed up again. “No, Zee, you have to get them!” I say adamantly.
“They’ll be fine. Brownie is a Reaper and she kicks ass. She’ll be able to handle it,” Buns says with assurance, but I see the look she gives Zephyr over my shoulder. She is looking for him to reassure her.
As I observe Zephyr, something in his demeanor makes me feel cold. He is uncertain about them, that’s why he was going to get them. “Please, go get them, Zee,” I whisper in a hollow tone.
“He can’t, Evie. He has to stay with us now,” Reed says firmly. “We will have to rely on Brownie and Russell to make it here without help.” I want to argue with him, but I can see by the set of his jaw that he is not going to change his mind. He is firmly entrenched in the “protect Evie” mode and he will not deviate from that mission, no matter what I say.
Clenching my hands into fists, I want to break something. I keep thinking that this is all my fault. Grasping my phone, I walk from the room to out beneath the endless expanse of darkened sky in the courtyard. I dial Russell’s number, but it goes straight to voicemail. When his brief message prompts me to leave a message, I say, “It’s me. Call me when you get this.” Hanging up, I start to wonder if I affect Russell just as Brennus affects me. I wonder if the sound of my voice rips open all of the scars I have left behind in him.
CHAPTER 3
The Army
Trying to sit quietly and clear my mind as Phaedrus is instructing me to do, it is proving to be nearly impossible. I have thousands of thoughts going on in my mind and there are new layers of thought expanding almost daily. How am I supposed to channel that into one stream of consciousness? I wonder. Several “what if” scenarios are currently at work, viciously torturing me. Most of those scenarios have something to do with either Russell or Brennus, and in the worst scenarios, they involve both of them.
“This is not working,” Phaedrus sighs next to me. Opening my eyes I turn my head, looking at him sitting next to me. His legs are crossed, like mine, and his back is ramrod straight, exhibiting a perfect meditative pose. He is staring at me with his pitch black eyes. If I didn’t know that he is a Virtue angel, I would be creeped out by his eyes because there is no color differential between his pupils, irises and sclera—they are all black—making him look wicked. But I do know him, and I know that he is the farthest thing from evil. He is sent on missions of mercy to perform miracles, and at this moment, I’m very grateful that he is choosing to spend his time with me. We have been at this for hours now and I want to tell him it’s time to take a break, but I don’t want to let him down.
“Sorry,” I say, exhaling a breath that I have been holding.
“You are not letting go,” Phaedrus points out. “You are also not breathing.”
“Breathe more,” I remind myself, closing my eyes again.
“Yes, focus on what you want to accomplish–peace, serenity– if you can maintain those things and transcend rational thought for a moment–you can explore your newest ability,” he says in a coaxing voice.
“Everyone is always telling me I have to be more rational, Phaedrus. Now you’re saying I have to transcend rational thought. You guys are proving to be consistently inconsistent,” I sigh.
“You are doing fine, Evie. Relax…think of a favorite poem… or music…do you know any songs that are rhythmic?” he asks.
“Let me think…” I trail off, trying to think of any appropriate songs, one that I can focus on. The only one that’s coming to mind at the moment is Ninety-nine Bottles of Beer On The Wall.
“I don’t believe I know that one,” Phaedrus says, reading my mind in his uncanny way.
Annoyed that he can read my mind so easily, I begin singing it loudly in my head. Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of beer, take one down, pass it around, ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall…
“Urr, delightful…” Phaedrus mutters, “I was hoping you knew some Bach, maybe Handel or Wagner—my eyes will never get heavy with this lullaby.”
Smiling at his sarcasm, I continue to sing the rousing lyrics in my head as I hum the music aloud. On the 12th or 13th cycle through the song, I begin to feel calmer. A few more times through and a feeling of detachment filters through me and I lose the need to sing.
Slowly, I control the spinning that I feel, not allowing the sensation to overcome me, but channeling it. The energy is building within me, ramping up to the shockwave that I know is about to tear through me. Focusing as the tremor of light erupts from me, I keep my eyes closed while my clone juts out. Instead of being an empty shape full of emotion, I’m trying to control the image of me, maintain a consciousness within her, a connection to her. Murky images of our surroundings are flittering in my mind. It’s like having my eyes open under water; I can see shapes and contours, but they are not crisp or very clear.
“Can you direct her?” Phaedrus asks.
I don’t reply, but concentrate on the desire that I have to get up right now and look for Reed. Immediately, my clone moves towards the doorway that leads to the courtyard. The sunlight is bright outside, causing the shapes that I can see through her eyes to become clearer. Groups of angels are standing at intervals around the perimeter of the courtyard. The angels began arriving last night. Most of them are Powers that aren’t part of Dominion’s division of rank. They are the elite assassins that Reed and Zephyr know personally.
Moving across the garden, I have trouble discerning which of the angels is my angel. I can’t see facial features too clearly and colors are bleeding together. As my clone passes several figures, I move her closer to them and peer into their faces, searching for the one that is perfection. Needless to say, the ghostly image of me is not going unnoticed. In fact, all movement around her has ceased as well as all of the conversation, not that I would understand them anyway because they aren’t speaking English. Inhaling deeply, I smell Reed’s familiar scent dimly through the muted senses of my counterpart.
Following the meager scent of Reed, I direct my image forward over the carefully raked stone paths to the center of the garden where a small stream winds effortlessly around an ancient tree. Leaning against the tree, a hazy figure of an angel regards my clone silently. Sniffing the air around him, I push nearer, listening for any sound he might make. Drawing close, I bring my ghostly lips inches from his ear. Concentrating very hard, I move those lips and manage to just whisper, “Boo.”
Reed’s arms try to wrap around me, but as he does so, my clone dissipates into him like fog, and my consciousness immediately
shifts back to my body still sitting dormant next to Phaedrus. Inhaling a sharp breath, I open my eyes and look at Phaedrus who grins back at me with his black, shiny eyes.
“Well done!” he says, extending a hand as he rises to his feet. I take his hand and let him help me up off the floor.
Blushing a little at his praise and enthusiasm, I reply, “Thank you for your help, Phaedrus.”
“Not at all. Do you want to try again?” he asks.
“Not right now, maybe later,” I reply, feeling exhausted from the effort to control my new ability. But, as I say this, something in Phaedrus’ look makes me ask, “Is something wrong?”
“No, it’s just that I’m not sure how much longer I will be here to help you,” Phaedrus replies with a puzzled expression on his face.
My eyebrows pull together. “You’re leaving?” I ask in a sad tone, squeezing his hand tighter. I had hoped that Phaedrus would want to stay with us. He has become part of our circle quite quickly, more quickly than anyone else could, since we are all so tight now.
“I don’t know,” Phaedrus says in a frustrated tone. “I am getting really strange signals. I am not sure what I am supposed to be doing and it is very irritating because that has never happened to me before.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, letting go of his hand and seeing his brow knit.
“You know how I told you that I see images in my head, pictures of a target that I’m to help?” When I nod, he continues. “Well, I get these pictures and then I set out to find my target. The closer I get to the target, the warmer it gets. Conversely, the farther away the colder I feel.”
“Right, like you said before, it’s like a game of ‘hot and cold’ for you,” I reply.
“That is correct. I am getting images of a new target that needs my help,” he says.
“Oh,” I say with disappointment. I was hoping that I would remain his target to aid. Since he is an angel of mercy, a Virtue angel, who is sent to execute miracles for his targets, I like having him around.
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