Phoenix Contract: Part Three (Fallen Angel Watchers)

by Melissa Thomas

  “In her immense grief, Channah chose her successor unwisely. The reign of the Third Phoenix was fraught with tragedy for our people, disastrous and short, a mere five hundred years before the reign of Cassio came to an abrupt and mysterious end.”

  Father Matthew paused.

  Aiden stirred, realizing that she’d been leaning forward in attentive fascination. “Cassio was the Phoenix who went missing?”

  The priest responded with a solemn nod.

  “Do you know what happened to him?”

  “No, sadly, I do not,” Matthew said. “The last reliable record of Cassio’s location came from Abbot Bere of Glastonbury Abbey in autumn of 1506. In a journal entry, he recounts that Cassio and his wife stayed for one night in Glastonbury and then continued northward. Officially, he was never seen or heard from again.”

  “What about unofficially?” Aiden asked, drawing a look from the priest. “You said officially.”

  “Oh, there were rumors and such of a man and a woman matching their description, but nothing could be confirmed,” Matthew explained. “Nothing solid. Nothing believable.”

  “What do you think happened to him?” Aiden asked, fascinated with the topic. The mystery intrigued her imagination, and the taboo nature titillated her.

  “I believe he was murdered,” Matthew replied flatly. The priest’s eyes narrowed, and he took in her surprise without comment.

  “I thought the Phoenix was immortal?” Aiden whispered. “Immune to all things that would kill a normal man.”

  “It is true,” Father Matthew agreed. “There is only one time when a Phoenix is vulnerable and can die—during the Ascension ceremony. It is my belief that Cassio intended to pass his power on to his wife, Mariah, but some disaster prevented him from doing so.”

  “What disaster?” she breathed. “Was it a person?”

  Bringing his finger to his lips in a hushing gesture, Matthew shook his head hard. “I will not say. I cannot speak his name.”

  “But—”

  “No! You endanger us both!” he exclaimed with such conviction that he frightened Aiden into acquiescence.

  She held up her hands to show that she’d let it drop.

  “The loss of our leader has been devastating to our people,” Matthew continued as if nothing had happened. “We have become fragmented and divided, and our elders have succumbed to fear and ignorance. Those who still believe that the Phoenix once lived have taken his disappearance as a harbinger of doom, a portent of the Apocalypse.”

  “Is that what you believe?” Aiden asked, a shiver of fear passing through her.

  “I believe…” Matthew’s rough, bass voice spoke the words with the distinctive tightness of a constricted throat. “That we live in a very dark time. However, I also believe that there are signs. Portents, if you will, which indicate that the Phoenix has not been permanently destroyed. The Phoenix is more than just a person. It possesses an essence independent of the person. I believe that the Phoenix will once again rise from the proverbial ashes to be reborn, and the new leader will emerge and save our people from certain ruin.”

  Expression intent and brow arched, Aiden looked up in avid curiosity. “Who?” Her lips formed the question in silent inquiry. The aura of mystery lingered in the study—paranoia and secrecy.

  “Every single Phoenix has been a member of House Shemyaza,” Father Matthew explained carefully. “However—”

  “House Shemyaza is gone,” Aiden stated bluntly. “Destroyed during the Inquisition—”

  “Or so we’ve been led to believe,” Matthew retorted. “The truth is that more agencies than just the Inquisition should be blamed for the destruction of House Shemyaza. And the most important thing for you to know is that it was not entirely annihilated.”

  “What do you mean?” Aiden asked, suddenly overcome with a feeling of suspicion. She drew in a slow, deep breath in anticipation of something big to come.

  “I mean that Shemyaza’s blood line is not gone. During the early 1500s, a young woman named Sarah was spirited out of Ireland. Her ship sunk in a storm, and her body was never found, because she’d been brought here to the New World.”

  “A direct descendant of pure blood?” Aiden asked, awed because the power the sorcerers of the House Shemyaza had possessed was the stuff of legends.

  “In secrecy, Sarah was brought to the New World and given a new name and a new identity. She was adopted into House Armaros.”

  Aiden grew intent and still, frozen in place with her fingers dug into the armrests of her chair. “You’re talking about me, aren’t you?” she demanded with a startling flash of insight. “This is about me.”

  Father Matthew nodded. “Sarah was your many times over great grandmother. We’ve tracked the lineage only through matrilineal lines to ensure the purity.”

  “I’m of House Shemyaza,” Aiden said, stunned. Saying it aloud did not make it feel any less unreal. She found the possibility absurd and mind-boggling. “The last living member of an extinct bloodline...”

  “Not the last,” Matthew corrected. “There is a handful of the Shemyaza bloodline left, hidden within the diverse population of House Armaros. But House Shemyaza lies in ruins. The purity of the bloodline has become diluted with the passage of time and marriages with the members of other Houses. We did our best to retain what we could of Shemyaza’s genes, but we had to be careful to manage things so that close inbreeding didn’t occur.”

  “We?” Aiden asked, shocked by what he was telling her. “You’re talking about breeding people as if they’re horses or dogs.” While she knew the practice was common in some other Houses, the idea still offended her modern sensibilities.

  “At the time of its downfall, Shemyaza was notorious for its inter-breeding,” Matthew continued as if unaware of her turmoil. “Cousins married all the time. Even siblings...”

  “My entire life is a lie.” Her stomach churned with anxiety and upset.

  “Yes, a lie, but a necessary one. We, my order, the Guardians of the Sacred Heart, have watched over the women of your bloodline for centuries. I have been personally charged with your guardianship, and have sworn an oath to protect your life with my own,” Matthew said, speaking rapidly and blithely as if unaware of her turmoil. Or perhaps he was all too aware and saw the need to pour the information forth as fast as possible.

  “You’re to be the next Phoenix, Aiden,” Matthew blurted out. His gaze had taken on the intensity of fanaticism: burning, scary, compelling, and zealous.

  “Me?” Her surprise turned to shock.

  “It’s you. You’re The One, Aiden. The One. The Phoenix to be reborn!”

  “No, that can’t possibly be right. That’s crazy talk!” Aiden exclaimed, staring at the priest in wide-eyed disbelief. “It can’t be true,” she repeated, striving for a tone of reasonableness. “For one thing, I’d know, wouldn’t I?”

  “Would you?” Matthew asked. “Or maybe you just haven’t realized your destiny yet. Signs have manifested since your birth, and the timing is right. It’s been almost precisely five hundred years since Cassio’s disappearance.”

  “Signs? What signs?” Aiden demanded. If there were signs, events Matthew assigned significance to, then it stood to reason that his irrational reasoning could be worked through.

  “Before you were born, I had a vision. One of the Grigori came to me in a dream and granted me a revelation. ‘FIRE IS BORN. THE PHOENIX RETURNS’ he said to me. At your birth—”

  Aiden opened her mouth to protest, but Father Matthew’s hand shot up to silence her.

  “Let me finish!”

  “Fine,” she bit out, folding her arms. But this is crazy.

  “At your birth, your hospital room was engulfed in flames, a heralding inferno.”

  “You told me the electrical fire was caused by faulty wiring,” Aiden said, struggling to reconcile the truth with the many fabrications.

  “And you alone were rescued from the flames. Taken unharmed from the heart of the infer
no without so much as a burn. The doctors called it a miracle,” Matthew continued, refusing to hear or acknowledge her objection.

  “That fire killed my mother,” Aiden whispered in a hollow voice. Her heart was bereft. She’d grown up motherless and never overcome her sense of loss. It empowered her with self-righteous anger to have anyone, even Matthew, use her mother’s death as evidence in an insane fantasy.

  “Yes, your mother—”

  “Stop! Stop right there.” Infuriated, Aiden shot to her feet. How dare he involve her mother in this madness?

  “And then there are your dreams,” Matthew continued, unhearing and heedless of her protest. He hadn’t heard her. “Your dreams alone are clear indicators of—”

  “STOP!”

  Aiden’s shout rocked Matthew backward and shocked him into silence. He stared at her blankly, leaning back hard in his chair so that the leather creaked.

  “I can’t, I won’t hear any more of this,” Aiden continued. She lowered her voice but remained adamant enough to make her point.

  “W-what’s wrong? I know that it’s shocking but—”

  “You’re saying that I killed my own mother,” Aiden said, choking the words out past her strangled throat. Her green eyes brimmed with tears, and when she blinked, they flowed freely down her cheeks.

  “Aiden, no, I—” Matthew extended his hand, fingers closing on empty air.

  “I’m not. I’m not. You have no proof,” Aiden insisted, shaking her head hard so that more tears flowed until she couldn’t see clearly.

  “I do. If you’ll just allow me to show you. You haven’t heard all of the evidence,” he said.

  “I don’t want to hear more. Enough of your lies! All you’ve done for years is lie to me. How can I believe anything you say now?”

  Matthew gasped and recoiled from her vehemence. He clutched his hands to his chest as if he’d been struck. “Aiden, no!”

  The priest stood, an action that propelled Aiden. With a sob, she ran from the study. Father Matthew, ridden with infirmities that left him physically disabled, had no hope of catching her.

  Phoenix Contract is available in all parts via Kindle Unlimited.

  Click here to read Part Four.

  Visit Amazon.com to read the complete story.

  About the Author

  Melissa Thomas breathes life into her dreams, bringing imaginary characters and fantasy worlds into our reality. She loves her characters so much they become her alter-egos, enacting the exciting adventures she envisions for them. She is a resident of San Francisco, California and adores the picturesque city by the bay. Her hobbies include surfing and scuba diving.

  Phoenix Contract is her debut novel.

  You can learn more about Melissa at http://thephoenixascending.blogspot.com/