~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Imorean couldn’t breathe. Someone was sitting on his chest. Nails like claws sunk into his skin. Blood, hot and sticky, ran from his arms. Against his will, he opened his eyes and looked up. A girl sat on his chest. His heart juddered against his ribcage, desperate to break free of its mortal confines. Panicked and fearful. Her dark hair was matted and hung low around her shoulders. It obscured her face. Somehow, though, Imorean knew her. How could he not?
“You left us,” the little girl whispered. Imorean knew her voice. His mind screamed otherwise, but his heart knew her. It was his half-sister. Rachel.
“You cared more about yourself than you did about us.”
“No, Rachel. Please. That’s not true.”
Rachel looked up. Imorean’s scream died in his throat. Her eyes were gray. Full of steel color. Blazing with it.
“You left us,” she said again. She sunk her long nails into his chest, into the skin just above his heart. Imorean cried out as claw-like talons drew blood.
“She’s right, you know,” said a new voice.
Imorean thrashed, desperate to get up. To be away from here! He knew that voice. He knew it too well. Somewhere in the darkness, Vortigern was lurking. Imorean could picture him now. The ever-present smile. The jet-black hair and wings. Those unfeeling, cold, gray eyes. Yes, he could picture him.
There was a flicker of movement in the corner of his vision and Imorean lurched to his feet, Rachel falling from where she sat on his chest. He spun. Standing between two shadow trees, Vortigern blinked at him.
“Your family haunts you,” said Vortigern with a grin. “And so will I. You can never escape this, Imorean. They will hunt you in your mind, just as I will hunt you in your waking hours. I will find you, but they will destroy you.”
This wasn’t real! This was just his subconscious! He had to wake up. Rachel dug her claws into his thigh. Vortigern raced forward, snatching one wrist in his hand. Imorean cried out and tried to pull away, but Vortigern’s other hand latched onto his wing. Flame burst from under his fingers, catching the feathers alight. Pain. Imorean looked at Vortigern in horror. Even in this dream world, he could feel pain.
Chapter 17
Overall, the week had been slow. A genuine joy at being home had been destroyed by an insidious, false happiness. Imorean had enjoyed showing Michael around Blowing Rock and Boone. Michael had taken his excitement with good grace, better grace than he had expected. Roxy’s luck had turned, too. Under Diniel’s good guidance and gentle nature, Roxy’s family had finally accepted her wings and the way she had changed. She hadn’t yet flown in front of her family with them, though. Roxy had asked Imorean to be there with her when she did and he’d jumped at the chance. At night, the terrors came. A plague. His false sense of happiness at being home was quelled the moment he closed his eyes. Michael spent nighttime on the astral plane. Imorean wished he was so lucky. Nightmares came without fail now. He supposed that the happiness he was faking, his true stress and his nearly sleepless nights had led to his current action.
Brown eyes lifted. This was where his heart had been pulling him. The one place he had tried to avoid during his stay here. Home. Nearly six months had passed since he had last been here. The single-story building looked sad, the darkened windows glaring at him like the hollow eyes of some long dead creature. Imorean blinked, his stomach turning. He wanted to tell the house that this wasn’t his fault. It wasn’t his fault that it now lay empty. But what would the house know? It was just a house.
The screen door hung off its hinges, swaying whenever any breeze batted it. The main door behind it, covered in deep grooves. Imorean held motionless, as though if he stayed still enough, some ghosts of his past may visit him. Michael’s rental car was parked in the gravel driveway, the keys settled in Imorean’s palm. He could have flown, but desperation had driven him to take the vehicle this morning. He had wanted to drive these familiar roads himself. He had wanted to drive home. He ran a finger along his lip. He would be in trouble for this, but he didn’t care. All that mattered was that he was here. The metal of his old pickup truck was cool beneath his legs. Imorean dropped his hand to rest on the hood. The windshield was long smashed. Rust spots showed through the paintwork now. Weeds had grown up around the wheels. Soon, it would be an abandoned rust bucket in the driveway of an abandoned house. He closed his eyes tight, then he looked back to the house. The house. Not his house. It wasn’t his house anymore.
Everything was eerily quiet. Not even birdsong broke the morning air. Imorean closed his eyes. He wasn’t relaxed. He wasn’t about to slip into sleep. He just needed to close his eyes. He felt sure that when he opened them, there would be no rental car keys in his hand, no empty windows staring at him, no white wings sprouting from his shoulders. He wanted his family back. Brown eyes opened. Nothing had changed. The keys from Michael’s rental were still heavy in his hand. Wings clung to his back, as much flesh and blood as an arm or a leg. The dark eyes of the house penetrated him to his core. His fault, they seemed to say. All his fault.
Imorean perked up. The soft rush of air behind him had stirred sound. It was the only thing to disturb this place. Green. He already knew who it was. He braced himself as he turned, expecting fury. Michael had arrived, landing on the roof of Imorean’s old pickup truck.
“I did wonder if I might find you here.”
Imorean shrugged, surprised at the lack of anger in Michael’s tone. “Here I am. Are you angry?”
“About?”
“Me taking the car.”
Michael made a soft noise in the back of his throat and stepped down from the roof of the car, onto the hood. “No. I would say that you are a better driver than I am. Much less chance of you wrecking it. I just wish you had told me you would be leaving. I thought you did not want to come back here.”
“I didn’t,” sighed Imorean. Emotion rose in his chest. Vortigern. Vortigern had caused this. Vortigern was the reason his house was empty. The reason that there was no life left in it. “Why does he hate me so much, Michael?”
Silence. Then Michael sighed and settled beside him. “He finds you dangerous. You are human and Archangel. You are unpredictable. You stand for everything he hates. And for everything he loved. Archangels and humans. Two things that he hates with passion. But, eyes aside, you are the very image of Inmerael, who Vortigern loved and later killed. He hates your existence because you led a happy life as a human and are leading a successful one as an angel. Because you have begun to fill Inmerael’s place, which, Vortigern seems to feel, can never be filled. It likely that he finds your existence unrighteous, and because of that, he wants you destroyed. His hate for you is as boundless as his love was for Inmerael.”
Imorean looked up at the sky. Love and hate held in equal measure. “If he loved him, why did Vortigern kill him?”
“You test my memory, Imorean. This was several thousand years ago, but … I do not believe he meant to. Vortigern and some of his own had just massacred Inmerael’s entire company. I brought my own as reinforcements, but by the time I got there, Inmerael was injured. My angels engaged Vortigern’s demons. I tried to reach Inmerael, but he was still fighting Vortigern. When he saw me, Vortigern changed tack, trying to get to me. Inmerael got between us.” Michael paused. “They both went down on the battlefield that day.”
Confused, Imorean turned to Michael. “Inmerael killed Vortigern?”
“They killed each other in a physical sense. Spiritually, that is murkier. Supernatural creatures are more than adept at evading true death. It is likely that Vortigern existed as an astral presence for several thousand years until he gathered enough strength to return to a physical body. We will probably never know how he did it, though Raphael and I suspect it had something to do with possession. A means angels would never use.”
A sigh rattled Imorean’s chest and he turned his eyes back on his house. His former home. “I don’t know why I’m here.”
“Perhaps just to think.”
“I don’t know. I’m so confused.” Imorean put his head in his hands. A green wing nudged him. “What?”
“You can go inside if you like. It is allowed.”
“Why would I?”
“Maybe there is something inside that will bring you some relief from your pain. A photograph, a memory, something of that nature. Maybe it will help you to come to terms with what has happened … or simply to grieve.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Perhaps you need to.”
“Come with me.” He hoped Michael could hear the desperation in his voice. Maybe it was a good idea. “Please.”
“Of course.”
With a deep breath, Imorean approached the empty house. His heart seemed to thud in his throat. This was the place he had failed his family. This was where Vortigern had taken them. Gingerly, he pushed the screen door out of the way and rested one hand on the doorknob. The door swung inward without any prompting. He froze. The living room was dark and destroyed. The overhead lightbulbs were blown out. Shards of glass still glittered on the carpet. The clock on the mantelpiece had stopped. The couches were torn, pieces of stuffing leaking out of the rips. The easy chair was turned over. The carpet was littered with dust and splats of something dark. Something Imorean didn’t want to consider. He shivered. This was just the living room. Surely, the rest of the house couldn’t be so bad. He walked onward. The kitchen drawers were open. Knives and forks were scattered on the floor in a cacophony of silver. The blender stood open and unplugged on the counter. Thick, blackening mold had grown on its glass walls. Wings pulled tight against Imorean’s body as he moved further into the kitchen. He didn’t like this. He didn’t like it at all. A rancid smell came from the fridge.
Turning, Imorean looked at the pictures on the walls. Him, his mother, Rachel, Isaac, his grandparents. They were all featured in the photos. He had been scratched out of them. Wide, deep grooves tore across his face, or thin, angry marks obliterated him completely. He finally caught sight of a trio of pictures next to the microwave. He was in the center of the pictures in his graduation cap. Individual pictures of Rachel and Isaac stood on either side of him. A butcher knife had been plunged through his picture. Grinning, newly graduated Imorean had no idea. He swallowed and left the kitchen. He felt sick, genuinely sick. This wasn’t cathartic, not in the least, this was that horrible burden of guilt returning to haunt him. He could feel its molten claws seize his stomach. He felt ready to vomit.
Chapter 18
Imorean made his way down the hallway to his mother’s room. The knob on her door was broken, clinging on by twisted screws. He could picture her in his mind’s eye. She would have brought Rachel and Isaac into her bedroom in a vain attempt to protect them. He turned, spotting a spatter of blood on the door jamb. Nausea swept him. Was it his mother’s blood? He couldn’t bear to look any longer. He tore his eyes away and went in further. A wave of comfort pushed at him. He blinked. He appreciated Michael’s attempt to console him, but this was beyond any relief comfort could bring. It felt as though his heart was being cut from his chest with surgical precision. Angry, Imorean shoved Michael’s sympathy away. There was nothing anyone could do to make this better. Floorboards creaked behind him.
Shaking his wings, Imorean pulled himself from his thoughts. His mother’s room was cold in spite of the summer heat. Her bedsheets were rumpled, as though they had been gotten out of in a hurry. Her curtains were still drawn, casting a brown light throughout the room.
On Amelia’s nightstand, a few small items remained. Imorean approached them slowly, reverently. It almost seemed like she had been here only moments before. A glass of water – dust settled on the surface. Her nametag for work at the veterinary clinic. It was pinned to a clip in the shape of a cat. He quirked a tiny smile. He had bought her that as part of a birthday present. He spotted something out of place. A small picture frame. It seemed like it was the only one to have escaped Vortigern’s destruction. Facedown. Imorean picked it up and found his own, much younger face, looking back at him. In this frozen image, Imorean knew he could have been no older than ten. Christian, his father, was crouched next to him. Imorean saw it now. He really did have his father’s features. Their cheekbones and smiles were carbon copies of each other. The major difference between them was the hair color. Christian’s was so dark it was almost black. His own was already pale brown, the first few white hairs sprouting by his temples. His eyes traced over the picture to Amelia. His mother. She was standing on his younger self’s other side, pulling him into a hug. A droplet of water landed on the glass front of the photo. Imorean wiped his burning eyes. His nose felt clogged. He was the only one in this photo who was still alive. Of all the photos in this house, he was the only one in them who was still alive. He drew a shuddering breath and tightened his grip around the picture frame. Try as he might, he couldn’t stop his lower lip trembling. He brought the metal frame to his chest and folded inward. One hand pulled the photo close, as tight as he could hold it without shattering the glass, the other kept a hold on his own hair. The burning ache in his heart was too much to ignore now. A silent scream left his mouth. Sobs racked him, threatening to steal the breath from his chest. If this was how catharsis was supposed to feel, he didn’t want it.
Eyes painful and blurred with tears, Imorean unfolded. He glanced at his watch. Michael had given him his space for the last twenty minutes. Imorean was glad of it. He wiped his eyes of tears, trying to shed the salt tracks from his cheeks. His skin stung when he touched it. An odd sense of tension in his stomach had eased, as though grief had begun to release her grip on him. He could feel his own heartbeat in his chest. He was alive. The last one alive. He had a duty to his family to stay that way. Imorean sniffed and wiped his nose. A strip of photo paper caught his attention again. It was half-visible, shoved nearly under the bed. Still clutching his family photo, he leaned down and picked up the photo strip. Photo booth pictures. He balked. His mother was in the pictures, her mouth open in laughter. Next to her was Gabriel, given away by his hazel eyes, leaning over and pressing a kiss against Amelia’s cheek. The photos had been taken so close together that it seemed Gabriel and Amelia were almost moving. Imorean’s eyes lingered on an image of them resting their foreheads against each other, their eyes closed. His mother couldn’t have known then that Gabriel would be one of the reasons she would be killed in just a few short weeks. There was such a sweet innocence to the pictures that Imorean couldn’t help but smile. Gabriel had made her happy.
Careful not to damage them, Imorean tucked the strip of pictures into his pocket. He was sure Gabriel would like to see them as well. Feeling slightly dizzy, Imorean looked around. He was alone. Michael was nowhere to be seen.
“Michael!” called Imorean. He felt strangely aware of himself. His body. His muscles. His heartbeat. His life.
“Here,” replied Michael.
Imorean walked to the opposite end of the house and found Michael in Rachel and Isaac’s bedroom. Their toys lay scattered on the floor, dressers torn open and clothes strewn everywhere. A rush of protectiveness surged through him.
“What are you doing in here?” he asked.
“I thought you would want this,” said Michael, picking up a torn photo. Imorean took it. His mother and grandparents were in the photograph, along with Rachael and Isaac. His fingers traced to the tear. He could see the remnant of his own hand in the corner. He had been torn out of the picture. He looked up as Michael passed the second half of the photo.
“I did not think you would want to keep this part.”
Imorean swallowed. The face that smiled from the picture had been blotted out by something that looked disturbingly like blood.
“No,” he said. “I don’t.”
He dropped the bloodied half of the photo onto the floor and turned away. He paused when he arrived at his bedroom door. Should he …? What damage had Vortigern wrought on this room? The room that had once been his. Heart beating just a little
too loudly, Imorean pushed open the door.
The bedroom was pristine. The polar opposite of the rest of the house. Imorean glared. His books were stacked on his desk with mathematical precision. Video games and DVDs were aligned perfectly on their shelves. It was as though someone had taken a ruler to the room. It was too neat. This was not his kind of organization.
“If only you were this tidy at our bases,” said Michael, looking inside.
“That’s the thing.” Imorean’s expression darkened. “I’m not this tidy. Someone came in here.”
Michael pointed. “Was that there when you left?”
Imorean followed Michael’s finger. On his pillow was an envelope. On the white front was his name, written in jerky, sharp script. “No, it wasn’t.”
“Open it. It is addressed to you.”
With trembling fingers, Imorean opened the envelope. There was only one item inside. A photograph. He heard Michael gasp. A Gothic castle? Why would a castle spark such a reaction from Michael?
“What is it?” asked Imorean, passing Michael the photo. He took it gingerly, as though he was afraid it might bite.
“It cannot be … This is Houska Castle. It was one of Vortigern’s greatest strongholds. I thought he abandoned this place long ago.”
“What’s Houska?” asked Imorean, looking again at the picture.
“A castle in the Czech Republic. A few decades ago, it was one of Vortigern’s chief sites of torture and a base for many of his officers.”
Angels Falling Page 11
