by Jerel Law
The uncomfortable feeling he had seemed to grow over the course of the afternoon. If anything, the time passing only made him feel more confused, and more urgent, about the voice. If someone really was in trouble, shouldn’t he try to do something about it? What if he was the only one who could hear it? Was he going to be too late? Was the clock running down, just like his vision?
The only time he was able to get his mind off the voice was during Angelic Combat class that evening. Marcus and Taryn spent their usual time on shooting arrows. They also had begun to work with Jonah’s group on the sandals of speed, since they all shared that gift too. They ran around a makeshift track set up along the walls of the large room. To even the angels’ surprise, Hai Ling was the fastest of the bunch.
“It’s all right, Jonah,” said Taryn, noticing Jonah’s discouragement. “No one can be the best at everything. Every quarterling has a unique set of gifts. Kind of like a fingerprint.”
“I don’t seem to be gifted at anything,” Jonah replied. He held his hands up in frustration. “Hai Ling is faster. And I thought I was a pretty good archer, but I can’t hit anything I aim at, especially compared to Frederick.”
“Jonah,” said Taryn in a soft voice. She moved closer to him so that only he could hear her. “You have special qualities that are different from anyone else here. You may not know this, but you were the first among the quarterlings whom Elohim allowed to discover your powers. Think about that for a minute.”
Jonah just stared at his feet, but he did allow himself to think about what she was saying. Marcus walked past him, focused in his conversation with Lania, and bumped Jonah on the shoulder.
“Watch where you’re going!” Jonah lashed out angrily, pushing the big angel right back.
Marcus glared at Jonah and suddenly pulled his sword from the side of his hip—a blazing, golden sword that appeared longer than Jonah was tall. Jonah was still in shock when Marcus charged at him. At the same time, the angel yelled what Jonah could only imagine was a warrior’s battle cry. It caused all of the students, now gathered on the edges of the space, to shudder and step back.
Instinct took over. Jonah grabbed at his side like Marcus had, making a pulling motion as if he were drawing a sword. Some of the students gasped as a real, gleaming sword appeared in his right hand.
Jonah’s angelblade.
The sword Marcus wielded was golden, with flames licking across its surface, but Jonah’s was more silver in color. Shorter, it was light and sleek in his hands, and instead of flames, it emitted a silvery glow. It was the perfect size and weight for its owner.
Marcus, with the help of a flap of his majestic wings, was right in front of Jonah now. With a wild look in his eyes, he brought his blade crashing down. Jonah fell back onto the stone floor, and just in time, he raised his blade, blocking the angel’s blow.
A brilliant white flash filled up the room as the swords met. Sparks exploded all around Marcus and Jonah. He anticipated a burning sensation as they fell onto his arms, but instead, they were cool when they touched his skin and melted away immediately.
Quickly, from his position on the ground, Jonah raised his foot and shoved it into the big angel’s stomach. Summoning all the angel strength he could muster, he pushed. He caught Marcus off balance, flinging him over his head so that he stumbled for a few feet and fell to one knee.
Jonah sprang up off the ground and turned toward Marcus. Crouching with the sword in front of him, everyone in the room but the massive angel vanished from his view. There was a gleam in Jonah’s eye now.
Marcus charged Jonah again, but Jonah was ready this time. Marcus swung his blade again and again, but the quarterling met each blow with one of his own. They moved around the room in a circle, trading blows, back and forth, faster and faster. The look of determination grew on Marcus’s face as he continued on. But Jonah was focused now as well and ferocious in his attempts to block the attacks.
Incredibly, Jonah began to actually push Marcus back with sword blows of his own, accompanied by an eruption of cheers. The swords crashing together created an indoor electrical storm, with almost blinding light. Jonah continued to advance, raining down blows one after the next. He sensed the retreat of the warrior angel.
Now was his chance.
He willed his feet to move. Instantly, his basketball shoes disappeared, replaced by ancient-looking sandals. Speeding around the large, but slower, angel, he was behind Marcus in a blur. Jonah swung his leg out, meeting the angel’s calf and sweeping it underneath him. Marcus crashed to the ground, thudding into the marble floor with the weight of a bulldozer.
He turned over as quickly as he could, but Jonah was faster. He was on top of the angel’s chest, his sword pointed at his neck.
“I guess all of the practice has been paying off,” Jonah said with a triumphant grin. He hopped off the angel and extended his hand.
A combination of surprise, anger, and embarrassment moved quickly across Marcus’s face. He glanced around at the students, though, and reluctantly accepted Jonah’s hand up.
“A bit of beginner’s luck,” said Marcus gruffly. But he held Jonah’s hand for an extra few seconds, shaking it. “But nice job, Stone.”
Taryn beamed as she moved beside Marcus. “Thank you, Marcus.”
Jonah looked confused. “You’re thanking him? For attacking me?”
But she only winked at him and walked away.
The students cheered again and then crowded around Jonah, all except Frederick, who stood off to the side, unable to hide his jealousy. Jonah smiled for the first time that day, overwhelmed by his friends offering their congratulations. They peppered him with a thousand questions—“How did you learn how to fight like that?” “How does a quarterling beat an angel in battle?” And most of all, “Where did you get that angelblade?”
It was impossible for Jonah to answer all of the questions, although he tried. When Andre asked how he might earn his own angelblade, it was Taryn who answered.
“Angelblades were simply not given to those who are not fully angel,” she said. “Until Jonah Stone came along, of course.”
“This is a key principle for all who follow Elohim,” Camilla chimed in. “He can do whatever He wants to do, whenever He wants to do it.”
She had effectively turned the conversation back to Elohim, and Jonah was grateful. As much as he enjoyed redeeming himself in front of his classmates, he remembered how uncomfortable he felt during his first day at the convent, when he had had the spotlight all to himself. The others backed off him but continued to talk about what they had just witnessed.
“Okay, students,” Samuel said, stepping in and looking more than a little perturbed that class time had been taken away. “Time to get back to our studies. Hurry along now.”
The students in Kareem’s class reappeared in front of him.
He ushered them back in. “I guess I missed something. Where have all of you been?”
EIGHTEEN
VANISHING ANGELS
Jonah knew he should get some sleep after his long day of classes, but he couldn’t calm down enough. Even with his success in the duel against Marcus, he could only think about his vision. How was he supposed to know if it was real? If he needed to do something? When he prayed, it just made him feel restless, like he needed to get up and move. He felt lost.
Not wanting to keep David awake with his tossing and turning, Jonah crept out of their room and over to the window at the end of the hallway. From four stories up, he had a pretty good view of the darkened street below. There were two streetlights visible, but they were barely emanating a glow at all. His eyes grew accustomed to the light, and he began to make out shapes and forms.
His eyes wandered upward, to the tops of the dark buildings. The sky behind them was covered in clouds, blue and gray, reflecting the light from the city. It created its own mysterious, dim glow. Jonah prayed and slipped into the hidden realm so he could make out the angels, like marble statues, standing guard over
the convent below. He wondered if they ever moved or changed shifts. He knew angels didn’t need sleep like humans did. They must get so bored, though, he thought.
He was about to turn away when something caught his eye on the building above. Movement. He blinked, squinting to try to see what was happening. The angel who had been on the end of the building just a few seconds ago was gone.
He stared hard at the empty space. Maybe he had been mistaken. Or perhaps the warrior angel had decided to take a break or check something out that he had seen on the street.
Jonah was still trying to figure out what had happened when he saw a faint, fiery glow on top of the building. The next angel in line suddenly disappeared. It wasn’t just that he fell down or was even dragged down. He simply disintegrated.
Before he had time to react, ten more angels along the rooftop met the same fate. Each time there was a flash of red, and then they were gone. He thought he saw white dust blowing off the building and down toward the street.
Behind the angels, other figures emerged. They did not strike the imposing silhouette the angels had. Instead, they were shadows with hunched backs, barely visible against the dark sky. The only light came from the gleam in their yellow eyes.
Jonah felt something inside him grow cold. His throat dried up, and he tried to swallow. He wanted to move, but his legs felt heavy. He continued to watch.
The creatures jumped off the roof, spreading their crumpled, black wings wide, soaring down to the street. They came into view under the street lamp on the ground. Their skin looked charred and blackened, as if they’d been dipped in boiling lava and then yanked out.
Jonah looked frantically up into the sky. Where were the other angels? He knew that there was a whole host of them posted along the top of the convent building too. Where were they? Had they also been attacked?
A wisp of white dust falling right in front of the window answered that question.
Turning down the hallway, he prayed himself back into the physical realm and began to run, banging on every door he came to.
“Get up!” he yelled as loudly as he could. “Everybody, get up! We’re under attack!”
Jonah continued banging on the doors, up and down the hallway. They began to open, sleepy boys in their pajamas sticking their heads out.
“Jonah Stone’s gone mad,” a groggy Rupert Clamwater said. “And there I was, having the nicest dream about tea and Turkish delight . . .”
Another door opened and Frederick stood, arms folded and grumpy. “What are you doing, Stone? We’re trying to get some sleep here!”
But Jonah would have none of it. “Get your clothes on and get dressed, all of you, as fast as you can!” he called out to the boys, who were all standing in the hallway now. “We’re surrounded by fallen angels, and they’re closing in.” They still stood, staring, unsure of whether they should believe him. Exasperated, Jonah yelled at them again. “If you don’t believe me, go to the window and look for yourselves!”
They tripped over each other to get to the windowsill. Frederick was the first one there, and the first to turn around. No more disdain on his face. It was replaced with both determination and fear.
“You heard what he said, guys!” he commanded the others. “Get dressed and get downstairs!”
They rushed back to their rooms as one. Jeremiah was among them, dressed in his light-blue pajamas with his hair sticking up in every direction. Jonah read the worry in his eyes. He tried to manage a smile for his younger brother.
“It’s going to be okay, Jeremiah,” he said, knowing how halfhearted he sounded. “Just . . . go ahead and get dressed. We have to go downstairs, okay?”
Jeremiah bit his lip and nodded.
When Jeremiah was ready, Jonah slammed the door of the stairwell open and bounded down the steps three at a time, grateful for the longer legs he’d grown over the last year, thanks to his angelic heritage. After bursting into the third-floor hall, he began banging on the girls’ doors too.
Girls started coming out of their rooms, confusion on their faces. Eliza emerged from her room quickly, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.
“You’re up fast,” Jonah said, beating on the door across the hall. “Good. Get dressed.”
She stared at him as he moved past her, and suddenly she knew. “Fallen angels. They’re here.”
“You guessed it,” he said, banging on another door. “They are everywhere outside. Do me a favor—wake up everybody and get them downstairs!”
“But how did they get past the angels?” she asked, putting her glasses on. “How do they know where we are?”
Jonah had already moved down the hallway. “No time to talk about that now, E. Just get these girls up!”
Jonah heard her switch into command mode and begin barking orders to the other girls. He knew she would have them downstairs soon. He had no idea what they would do when they got there, but they would be together.
When they reached the first floor, Jonah hurried past the dining hall and toward the meeting room. Four nuns rushed in, entering the prayer room just as he passed it. He glanced over and saw them kneel on the floor together, join hands, and begin to pray.
As he turned the corner, Camilla Aldridge strode down the hallway toward him, followed by Samuel, Marcus, and Taryn. Just behind them was Reverend Kareem, in gym shorts and a T-shirt, shaking the grogginess out of his head.
Camilla saw Jonah and paused. “Did you summon the others?”
“Yes,” Jonah said. “They’re coming. Camilla, I saw the Fallen overtake the angels on the building. They’re all over the pl—”
“Yes, dear, we know,” she said bluntly. She turned to Marcus and Taryn. “Guard the entrances, both of you. We will get the students organized and send them to reinforce you.”
The two warrior angels nodded, rushing by Jonah. Taryn stood at the door that opened up into the street. She had pulled an arrow from her quiver, bracing herself for whatever was about to come through the door. Marcus hurried down the hallway, half running and half flying to secure the back entrance.
The students were filtering down, rushing into the hallway. They began to move even faster when they saw Marcus flying by them and Taryn positioned at the front door. They glanced at each other as they ran, and the look on their faces was clear.
We really are in danger.
Camilla ushered all of the students into the meeting room, along with Samuel and Kareem.
“There has been a breach in our security,” she said, not trying to hide the gravity in her tone. “Our angelic forces have somehow been defeated. It is unclear at this point how, and it is not important at the moment. What is important is that we, together, are prepared to do battle.”
Jonah studied the faces of the students, many of whom had become his friends over the past couple of days. None of them had faced even one fallen angel before, let alone a whole company of them. No one could hide that they were scared.
“It will do you no good to worry,” said Camilla. “It is times like this when it will do you well to remember that Elohim is always with you. We will trust His strength to carry us through.”
Samuel and Kareem murmured together, nodding in agreement. Camilla extended her hand toward the young pastor.
“We angels have agreed to become visible to Kareem, as well as to the nuns in the convent. They will be critical in defending this place.” Kareem nodded, stepping forward as Camilla turned toward him and spoke. “Will you select four of your best students to join you and the others in the prayer room?”
“The prayer room?” Frederick blurted out. “Seriously? We have fallen angels all over the place outside, breaking right through the angelic barrier that you all said was so safe, and you are worried about us getting our prayer time in?”
“That is quite enough, Frederick!” she said, speaking so fiercely that her face almost began to emit a white-hot glow. He shut his mouth, taken aback by her forcefulness. She caught her breath and took a second to gather her emoti
ons, now speaking in a more measured tone. “You would do well not to speak ill of what you do not fully understand. There is a reason we teach the spiritual arts. You will find that out tonight.”
Kareem searched the faces of the students in front of him. “David. Bridget. Carlo. Julia. Come with me.”
The four students followed Kareem out of the room.
“We will divide the rest of you up. Some we will send with Marcus, others with Taryn. Others will patrol the hallways with me.”
Rupert slowly raised his hand. Everyone in the room could see it shaking as he held it in the air.
“Yes, Rupert?” said Camilla, glancing back toward the doorway. “Make it quick, please.”
He looked around at the others, then back at the angel. “Are they really after us? And if they can get through the whole Second Battalion of the Angelic Forces of the West, what makes you think that we can fare any better?”
Camilla looked on him with as much compassion as she could muster in the moment.
“Yes, they are after you, all of you,” she said. “And they won’t rest until each of you is dead. We have given you all of the protection we possibly can, but we always knew there would be a day when the fight would come directly to you. What we did not expect is that this day would come so soon.”
Jonah and the rest of the students already knew this, but hearing her say it carried a new weight.
“Trust, my friends,” she said. “Have faith. This is what you were made for, after all.”
With that, she began to assign the students to different groups.
She looked at Jonah, Eliza, Jeremiah, and Rupert. “You four are with me. We will patrol the halls. Just because the doorways are secure doesn’t mean that we won’t find them trying to enter through a window or an air duct. They are wily, desperate creatures.”
Camilla whipped around, her blue robe sweeping across the floor, and they followed, trying to keep up with her. Which was hard, considering that she was almost airborne as she strode down the hall.
“Eliza, Rupert—I want you two to patrol the first floor. Check rooms and windows. Locate all of the air vents and monitor them carefully. Do your best.” She turned to Jonah and Jeremiah. “You two, on the second floor. Same orders. I will cover the third and fourth floors, and rooftop, if necessary.”
