Fallen Angels

by Warren DeBary

  They would make a fierce army, and the mysterious Council would not be able to take a side because there were no sides to take. It was just humans killing humans. After everything I’d learned so far, that was exactly what Pazuzu wanted.

  “We have to get out of here,” George said as he held Maya upright. The two girls were whimpering and Maya looked to be in shock, but George held her tightly to his side, whispering softly.

  Finally, after what seemed like forever, we found the main tunnel and the service door we’d come in through.

  “When we hit the door, we have to wait until it’s clear,” George said. I cracked the door to find the sky just beginning to lighten. Dawn would be here soon. We’d been down in that wine cellar for a long time.

  “Shit! Sun’s coming up, better hurry or we’ll be easy pickings for that thing up there,” I said.

  “The sun is our friend, buddy. Most of those things don’t like the sun, so it’s probably already took off to wherever it’s using as an aerie,” George said, but he didn’t look all that sure.

  “But that’ll also mean any other guards will be able to see us that much better,” Kayla responded. We moved as quickly as possible, helping the girls, but it was rough going because they were in bare feet. I remembered that Maya had five-inch stilettoes at the party, but those were gone now.

  We ducked behind the hedge, making our way to the low rock wall. One of the girls ran out ahead of us toward the wall.

  “No!” I yelled, but it was too late. She touched the wall and red lines of power stretched, and then broke with a golden flash, sending streaks of power directly up to Pazuzu’s house.

  “Aw, man. We better get a move on. I think we’re about to have company.”

  Kayla had that distant look on her face again, and she looked back toward the house. “There are about six guards heading this way right now. I don’t feel Pazuzu or Ricco, but the guards are armed,” she said.

  “That’s just great.”

  “Well, as any good wascally wabbit would say ‘Let’s get the hell out of here!’” George quipped. He grinned and his eyes lit up, the bastard was actually enjoying this.

  Kayla grabbed the first girl we rescued, helped her over the wall, and disappeared into the semi-darkness. The sky was lightening quickly, and the shadows would not give cover for very long.

  George helped Maya over the wall, and I assisted the last girl. The rocky ditch was very difficult for the barefooted girls, so half-carrying them, we made our way down the hillside until we reached the service road.

  Suddenly, I heard an ear splitting shriek overhead; so much for George’s idea that the flying lizard went beddy-by.

  “Run!” George yelled, and we dashed down the road with Kayla leading the way. It was more than a quarter of a mile to the car, and we saw the dark shape above the house closing the distance quickly.

  “They’re not going to make it!” I yelled as we ran.

  “Well then, let’s have a little fun with gruesome up there!” George answered and took out his Kindjals. They were already humming with blue light. He grinned and looked back at me. “Hey, make yourself useful. When it comes, do that shield thing.”

  “I don’t really know how to control it,” I said.

  “It’s reactionary, kinda like putting your arm up when something falls on you. Just do it, right?”

  “Right,” I muttered, hoping I sounded more confident than I felt.

  The sky lightened even more and I could see the flying creature’s huge claws at the end of its short legs. Its wings were membranous and black like the rest of its body. It saw us and shrieked again, a dark tongue protruding from its open maw. Up at the house, there was a commotion that sounded like the guards working their way down the steep hillside. We had a few minutes before they would see us.

  There was a whoosh of sound and the black creature swooped down, its claws extended to rake at us. Just as George had told me to, I ducked and my pendant flared, forming a red shield over our heads. The creature screamed as sparks flew from the red dome.

  “Drop the shield!” George said. I tried to think about the shield disappearing, and it did. George jumped after the monster and swung one of his Kindjals, cutting deeply into its lashing tail. It shrieked but flew out of George’s reach before he could do any more damage. It banked high in the air and began to circle back. George landed lightly beside me.

  “That should keep its attention away from the girls! Let’s get going; those guards are gonna be here soon. Just keep that thing off our back when it comes around.” We took off like a bat out of hell.

  Overhead, the creature screeched, alerting the guards that something was going on down here. I heard sharp shouts from the house. We were too far down the road for the guards to see us, but if we didn’t hurry, they would realize where we were and bring a car around. We didn’t have much time.

  A squawk from the winged thing overhead warned us as it dove yet again, this time with its jaws wide open, showing razor-sharp teeth. My pendant blazed and the shield formed again. This time, my pendant showed me how to control it. I pushed the shield toward the creature, actually deflecting its black body.

  “Drop it!” George screamed, and I dropped the shield. George leapt, his Kindjals a fiery blue in the brightening sky. He reached out. The glowing blade sliced through the creature’s left wing. It shrieked in pain and lashed out with its black talons at George’s airborne body.

  I saw the talons drag across George’s back as he cried out just before the creature spun out and swirled down, screeching over the ridge and out of view. George thudded against the dirt road, a deep slash bleeding down his back, soaking his white shirt a dark red.

  I grabbed his arm and helped him up. He jerked away.

  “Just a cut. Don’t worry about it,” he grimaced.

  “Let’s get to the car!” I heard more noises from the road above us. We ran down the hill as fast as possible, George’s head lolling down onto his chest. We made it to the roadway to see Kayla’s black BMW waiting for us, the girls already inside.

  “Need a lift?” Kayla called out but her smirk turned to worry as she saw the condition George was in. I opened the back door as Maya reached for George. One of the other girls was forced to sit on the lap of the other.

  “Go! Go! Go!” I yelled and Kayla hit the accelerator, sending the car screeching down the road.

  “What happened?” Maya asked, smoothing George’s sweat-soaked hair.

  “He fought off that flying thing, forcing it down, but it caught him in the back before it crashed.”

  “The Drake did this?” Maya asked, peeling George’s tattered shirt out of the bloody slashes on his back.

  “The what?”

  “Was it black, like all black?” she asked.

  “Yeah!”

  Kayla swerved around a turn, tires sliding across gravel.

  “That’s not good,” Maya said. “The Drake’s claws are poisonous.”

  I was pushed back in my seat as Kayla accelerated the BMW forward even faster. George was now dripping with sweat, although the air coming through the window was chilly. Maya wiped his forehead with the edge of her top, and when George didn’t notice, I really got worried.

  We drove up to the gateway of Ravenstone. Kayla pulled out one of those clicker controls and the gate opened. She beeped the horn as we made our way down the driveway and swung around to the front door.

  I jumped out of the car and was busy helping George out when Ms. Maggie opened the front door.

  “Where were you kids? I was worried sick.” She was about to lecture us but stopped when she saw George’s face. She glanced down the driveway and I could tell this wasn’t the first time she had seen someone coming home wounded from battle. “Get him inside and to Emily’s office,” she ordered.

  I was about to put George’s arm around my shoulder and help him through the entryway when Maya grabbed his other arm, supporting him. She gave me a look that told me she would take care
of him now. I dropped his arm, watching as she helped George through the door, disappearing with Ms. Maggie down the hallway toward Aunt Emily’s rooms.

  The sun was about to peek over the eastern horizon. Birds chirped, ready for the dawn.

  “I’ll take these two home,” Kayla said, motioning toward the two girls in the back seat.

  “Tell them, watch out for gingerbread houses. They might not be rescued from the oven next time.”

  “I think they know that. The burnt hand teaches best,” Kayla responded.

  I watched Kayla’s BMW vanish in the distance.

  Maybe if I was lucky, I could get a little sleep before Rene’s training. And just maybe, I’d be lucky enough to not get myself killed in the process.

  Chapter 24 - Kayla

  The Pendrakes want Pazuzu’s head.

  Should we give it to them?

  No, of course not. I’m simply stating the obvious, those incorrigible twins. We never should have allowed them here.

  Could you stop them?

  No.

  They why are you complaining? Let the rain fall; we simply need an umbrella to keep from getting wet.

  And maybe a barrel to catch what is left?

  There will not be much left.

  Do the Timelines say that?

  No, I do. We have seen this many times before. The humans are so predictable, are they not?

  

  Rene didn’t show up that day. That was a good thing because I spent half the day sleeping, trying to recuperate from the night before. After waking, I went to go find George.

  When I found him, he was in Aunt Emily’s office, unconscious on a strange-looking bed. The rails of the bed glowed amber. His skin was clammy, his forehead beaded with perspiration. Maya slept on a chair next to him.

  “George,” I whispered.

  “He’ll be okay,” a voice said behind me. I spun to find Aunt Emily standing there.

  Ms. Maggie was behind her, carrying a bag filled with a clear liquid. “Excuse me.” She hooked the bag up to an IV feeding into George’s arm. “We have to get this solution into him. He lost a lot of blood last night.”

  “How is he?”

  “We’re trying to fight off the poison in his system. A lot of that foulness was absorbed directly into his cells. We’re trying to sift it out. If we go too fast, we’ll cause permanent damage. But this kid, he’s a tough one,” Ms. Maggie said.

  “Matthew, about last night,” Aunt Emily said.

  “I know I shouldn’t have,” I was starting to say but Aunt Emily shushed me before I could continue.

  “No, you did the right thing. We’re not sure what Pazuzu was planning, but you don’t know how important the twins are. Maya told us what Pazuzu’s building. That’s why Rene is away, trying to gather support. But it will be difficult. We are at our end game. If we had lost Maya, we may have been pushed over the edge.”

  “More games, Aunt Emily?” I looked up at the portrait of Robert Claire, my grandfather, and all the lies still stung. Now, for the second time, my best friend was at the edge of death and I was helpless to do anything to help him. I was angry, angrier because I was impotent, incapable of doing anything to help.

  “If saving our world is a game, then I will play it with everything I have. I’ve spent my entire life playing what you call a game.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

  “I know. This has been very hard on all of us.” She looked tired. The smiling face in the framed picture on the desk had been replaced with the one in front of me, burdened with scars no one could see. I wondered at what my aunt had been forced to endure. But there was no way I could know. She was so quiet, so closed off.

  “We got a boy that needs attention here. Why don’t you go get one of those sandwiches I made for you out of the fridge?” Ms. Maggie said.

  “Isn’t there anything I can do to help?” I asked.

  “It’s okay. George is through the worst of it so, I suggest you go get some rest.”

  I was about to protest, but a stern glare from Ms. Maggie silenced me. Like my father always said, you don’t mess with a battlefield nurse, not if you want to survive the experience. I glanced at George’s pallid face, wishing him the best, then walked out of the office, closing the door behind me.

  I made my way out to the practice circle outside of the garden gate, only to find the dried grass of the field. Cows wandered in the distance, black dots on the hills surrounding Aunt Emily’s vineyard.

  Stretching tired muscles, I tried my best to calm my mind, but it was so difficult with everything that had been going on. For the second time in as many weeks, George was unconscious. I had made more enemies than I ever had in my life. But this time, my enemies weren’t neighborhood bullies. They were thousands of years-old former gods and I was in the crosshairs of one of their most wicked. I had no idea where my father was and I was training with an archangel who made my father’s sadistic workout regimen seem like a summer vacation on the ocean.

  My Loci warmed on my chest and images of surfing at the beach ran through my mind.

  “Yeah, wouldn’t that be nice?” I asked and my loci sent a warm pulse through me, a mental nod of agreement. I smiled. “Well, let’s get going with this.”

  I pulled energy from the earth below me, feeling my reserves fill. My aching muscles loosened and my mind cleared. Even my bruised ribs started to feel better. I stretched slowly, working through a couple of exercises Dad had taught me.

  Then I bowed and whispered quietly, “Keep your head down and your eyes open and you might get through this.” I wondered where my father was. He was always gone, but it didn’t mean I didn’t miss him every time he was sent away.

  But I would have to push those thoughts away. He would tell me doubts like these were the mind-killer, and I didn’t have enough mind to kill off.

  I leapt into a forward dive, pulling my shoulder under me so I would roll upon impact just like Dad had shown me when I was seven. “How do you like that, Dad?” I asked. Then I used the power Rene had shown me, manipulating the air to assist me in my jumps. I leapt ten feet, then thirty feet, then fifty feet in the air, soaring above the trees of the garden. I gathered the power of the Earth and pushed skyward as hard as I could, soaring high above the field of grass and dirt. I tumbled and dove, spun and twisted as I shot up into the sky. There was no feeling quite like this, the utter power I now commanded.

  I kept going until I was absolutely exhausted from the effort. My body was still being fed by the Earth, but my mind was spent; too tired to think anymore and that was exactly what I needed. I left the open field just as the sun was setting above the peaks of the Twin Sister’s in the Western sky.

  

  The kitchen smelled absolutely incredible after my workout. The smell of a roast in the oven made my stomach rumble with hunger. I realized I had not eaten at all today and I was starving.

  Game Two of the World Series was on but I just couldn’t get myself to watch it, not while George was still recuperating.

  “’Bout time you got done,” Ms. Maggie said.

  “How’s George?”

  “He’s through the worst of it and he’ll be fine. But we’ve got to fatten you back up,” she said and piled a plate full of potatoes and thick slabs of bread with butter slathered all over it. The plate was so overstuffed that food dripped off the side.

  “Ms. Maggie, that is way too much,” I told her.

  “Young Malakhim, let me explain something to you,” she said, waving the wooden spoon in my direction. “I’ve been feeding Malakhim in training for more years than you could imagine. You eat every single thing I put on your plate. I won’t have you collapsing out there because you’re worried about keeping your boyish figure or something,” Ms. Maggie cackled.

  Her mirth was reassuring and I laughed despite myself.

  I finished my second plate, filled with thick slices of roast covered with gravy. I threw Bailey a few bits of the roast. He gav
e me that look that said don’t scrimp, buddy.

  “Don’t give him any,” Ms. Maggie said. “Bailey, you know you’re on a diet.”

  “Don’t listen to her, kid.” Bailey sniffed and continued his vigilance, staring at me through the nook table’s glass top. I was never going to get used to the dog talking.

  I heard girl’s shoes walking this way from the front foyer.

  “Kayla,” Ms. Maggie said. “You hungry?”

  “No thank you. I just came to check on George and Maya.”

  “How about some tea?”

  “That would be great,” she answered with a smile.

  Kayla was radiant, her skin aglow. Her black tresses shone in the kitchen lights.

  “Get a hold of the hormones, kid,” I heard Bailey whisper from under the table. “I can smell them from here.” Damn, I was not going to get used to that. Embarrassed, I threw two whole slices of roast into the corner for the dog.

  “Matthew,” Kayla sat at the table.

  “Here you go, dear.” Ms. Maggie placed a steaming cup of tea in front of her. Kayla stirred it absently.

  “How’s Maya?” I asked.

  “I sent her home to get some rest; she has a bit of a crush on George since he saved her and everything.”

  “George’s going to be impossible after this, saving the damsel in distress and all,” I said sarcastically.

  “As I saw it, he wasn’t the only one doing the saving,” Kayla mentioned.

  “Yeah, I seem to remember you being there, too.”

  Kayla smiled.

  “Are those girls okay?” I asked.

  “They were a bit shaken up, but they should be fine. I took them home. They both live in the city.”

  She continued to stir the tea with the small spoon. “Matthew, the girls told me what Devon planned. Their genetic material was to be harvested. Then they were to be disposed of. Killed.”

  “Genetic material?” I asked.