No Angel

by Helen Keeble

  A blaze of white fire reflected in the black glass. My halo was back, shining as brilliantly as the midday sun.

  And behind it, springing from my shoulders, were the wings.

  Chapter 8

  I am not an angel!” Krystal and Faith both ducked as my wings swept over their heads. We were hiding out in the old shrine Krystal had shown me yesterday—Faith had gabbled something about the “sanctified ground protecting us” before running to fetch Krystal. I didn’t know what she’d meant, but at least the half-ruined building was deep in the woods and still had most of its walls and roof. The last thing I needed was for anyone else to witness my psychotic breakdown. “There’s—there’s a perfectly rational explanation.”

  “For crying out loud, Raf, you have wings and a halo!” Krystal grabbed hold of my jacket, forcing me to stop my frantic pacing. “What more do you want, to be handed a harp by God Himself?”

  “I don’t believe in God! I’m an atheist!” I checked over my shoulder to see if my wings had disappeared in a puff of logic. They hadn’t. I groaned, clenching my fists in my radiant hair. “I can’t be an atheist angel!”

  Krystal shrugged. “And I’m agnostic. So? I still managed to get you here.”

  “I can’t believe he’s really an angel,” Faith said, sounding as shocked as I felt. “I wasn’t expecting one to be so . . . physical.”

  Krystal smirked, flashing her pentagram pendant. “Computer-guided laser-etching machine in the workshop. Accurate to a hundredth of a millimeter. I told you it was better than messing around with chalk on a freezing rooftop.”

  “Angel-summoning is supposed to be done with holy reverence,” Faith protested. From the way Krystal rolled her eyes, this was not the first time they’d had this argument. “Not in between cutting out gears for your mechanical engineering course work!”

  “Excuse me, could we get back to the topic of my giant, glowing wings?” I snapped, waving them for emphasis. “I don’t care how hard you wished. People make dumb wishes all the time. They don’t cause innocent bystanders to suddenly sprout extra limbs!”

  “I didn’t wish,” Krystal said, maddeningly calm. “I made a summoning charm.” She shrugged. “Even if you know the right symbols to call the angel you want, it’s not easy. As Faith found out, if you don’t get every line spot-on, nothing happens.”

  “I’m not good at geometry, okay?” Faith said defensively. She turned back to me, her voice softening again. “But the important thing is that you’re here. You’re my angel, and you’re finally here.” She smiled suddenly, as brilliant as the rising sun. “And now everything is going to be fine.”

  “Everything is not fine! Giant freaking wings!” I took a deep breath, forcing myself to stop hyperventilating. “Look, I don’t know what you’re playing at here, but I am not an angel. I’m a normal guy! I mean, I have parents and everything. What do you want me to do, show you baby photos? Call up my dad as a character reference? Trust me, I’m human!”

  “I’ve met your dad.” Faith chewed on her lip for a second, looking pensive. “Raffi, what’s your mother like?”

  “Dead, thanks so much for asking,” I snapped. Faith flinched, looking stricken, and I felt a stab of guilt. “Sorry,” I muttered. “It’s okay, it was ages ago. What do you mean, what was she like? She was my mum.”

  “Yes, but how would you describe her?”

  I hesitated for a second, trying out and discarding a dozen adjectives in my head. In the end, there was only one that did her justice. “Perfect,” I said, my voice going low. “She was perfect.” Then my head snapped up. “Wait, what are you suggesting?”

  “I think you’re right, you aren’t an angel . . . not entirely, at least.” Faith pointed up at the star-filled sky. “I’ve read about nephilim. The children of earthbound angels, half mortal and half divine. Maybe your mother didn’t die. Maybe she just went home.”

  “Now you think my mum was an angel? That’s the stupidest—” The words died, half formed in my mouth.

  My dad had always loved to tease my mum about their first meeting, at some bigwig general’s party. My mum had been a guest while my dad had been working security. “I fell in love with you at first sight,” he’d always said to her, “but with all the gold braid in the room, I thought I didn’t stand a chance. Then you saw my tag, and did that double take, and started laughing your head off.” My dad would poke her, grinning. “I think you fancied my name more than you did me!”

  My mum had always just shaken her head with a small, private smile. And she never would explain what had been so funny about my dad’s last name.

  Angelos.

  I sank down to the leaf-covered floor, my wings obligingly refolding themselves behind me, and put my head in my hands. “Okay,” I said after a moment. “So let’s say I’m, I’m what you say I am. Why?”

  “You mean, why did we want an angel?” Krystal asked. She jerked her thumb at Faith. “Your turn, Faith. This is your show, after all.”

  Faith knelt opposite me, her expression grave. “Raffi, how much school gossip have you heard about my father?”

  “Huh? What’s that got to do with anything?” I vaguely remembered Suzanne sneering something about Faith’s “crazy, dead dad.”

  “Everything. He was trying to summon an angel too, before he died. My father was a member of a secret organization sworn to protect the world against the forces of darkness.” She took a deep breath. “You see, Saint Mary’s is built on a Hellgate.”

  It took me two attempts to find words. “This school is built on a what?”

  “A Hellgate,” Faith repeated, apparently completely serious. “A place where demons can manifest in the mortal world.”

  “You have to admit, it explains a lot about this place,” Krystal interjected.

  She kind of had a point, considering the rampant bullying, but I shook my head. “There’s no such thing as demons.”

  Krystal snorted. “Says the guy with the wings and halo?”

  “Raffi, you saw that tentacle yourself,” Faith said earnestly. “That was a demon. It must have been trying to stop me from awakening your angelic powers.” She frowned, looking worried. “I’ve never seen one physically manifest like that before. It shows that the Hellgate is starting to open without my father here to hold it shut. Soon the demons will be able to break through fully. They’ll be free to roam the world, spreading evil through people’s hearts, unseen and unsuspected.”

  “Unseen? I should think people would notice giant, alien squid-monsters crawling around the place.” My wings shuddered as I thought of that icy-cold tentacle curling out of nowhere.

  “If only demons were that obvious,” Faith said, the corner of her mouth twisting. “Raffi, Hellgates let demons approach our world, but in order to be able to stay permanently they have to find a human host. A demon will seek out a weak, foolish person inside the Hellgate’s area, and infiltrate their dreams with visions of a pentagram containing the mystic symbols that spell out the demon’s true name. When the person draws the pentagram, the demon manifests inside it, taking on a seductive appearance to better tempt its target. It will promise power, money . . . whatever it takes to make its target agree to the binding.” She shook her head. “Demons don’t lie. The host will get the promised rewards . . . while the demon slowly corrupts them with its evil. In the end, the host becomes as cold and heartless as the demon itself. And that’s not the worst of it.”

  “It gets worse than demons turning people into monsters?” I said.

  “Yes.” Faith’s face was set and pale. “Because once the host dies, and the blackened soul finally leaves the body . . . the demon moves into the abandoned flesh. And then it can act in the world directly.”

  I thought of all the things an evil alien entity wearing a human skin could do, and shivered. “So close the Hellgate already! You said your father kept it shut, why can’t you?”

  “Because I don’t know how he did it! He only talked to me about all this once.”
Faith’s head drooped. “Just before he died, a year ago. He said that I finally had to learn the truth, because time was running out before my final year here, when I’d be able to attend the Masked Ball. He told me that there was something I had to do, and that he’d summoned help to make sure I’d be able to do it . . . but he didn’t get a chance to tell me more. My mother overheard and interrupted us. She thought he was delusional. They had the biggest fight. . . .” Faith trailed off for a moment. Her hair hid her face. “She made him leave. I never saw him again. My mother said his sickness drove him to suicide, but I know what really happened. Away from his home, without his holy sword, the forces of evil caught up with him.” She took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders. “But I rescued his notebooks before my mother could burn them, and I’ve been studying them ever since. I’ve sworn to finish his life’s work. My father kept the Hellgate from opening. I am going to destroy it for good.”

  “Great,” I said. “Super. How?”

  Faith drew herself up to her full height. She practically glowed with holy righteousness. “At midnight at the Masked Ball, I will kiss my one true soul mate, and the power of our love will banish the demons forever.”

  The wind rustled the leaves across the stone floor.

  At last, I spoke. “That is—and I am speaking here as the guy who just found out he’s a winged, glowing mutant, mind you—the most insane thing I have ever heard.”

  “I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks it’s unlikely,” Krystal muttered. She held up a hand to forestall Faith as the other girl opened her mouth. “Let me handle this one, okay? I at least get where Raf’s coming from.” She folded her arms across her chest, facing me square on. “Look, up until now, I wasn’t convinced myself that Faith could be telling the truth.” Krystal threw Faith an apologetic glance as she spoke. “I was just willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. After all, it wasn’t like I had any popularity to lose by hearing her out.” Krystal gestured at me. “And now here you are. Pretty conclusive evidence that the mystic stuff Faith’s learned from her dad’s notebooks does work, no matter how nuts it seems. Isn’t it at least worth testing her theory about closing the Hellgate? All you have to do is make sure she has a date for the Ball. What have you got to lose?”

  “Apparently, my mind,” I retorted. I buried my head in my hands again. “Demons and angels and now magic kisses . . . I didn’t ask for any of this.”

  “I know you didn’t.” I felt rather than saw Faith lean forward. Her fingers hovered hesitantly over my shoulder, as if she was afraid to actually touch me again. “I’m sorry, Raffi. But please. I really need your help. Please help me. Please be my guardian angel.”

  I looked into her face and knew that even if I had no idea what I was meant to do, I didn’t have a choice about doing it. “All right. I will.”

  Faith’s blue eyes met mine, shining with more than just the reflected light from my halo. She was so close. “Thank you,” she whispered, her breath soft on my lips.

  Krystal cleared her throat. “I hate to interrupt the moment, but Raf is setting the place on fire.”

  Wisps of smoke were rising from the dry leaves drifting around my shining feathers. I sprang to my feet, wings jerking straight upward. Faith scooted back out of my way as I stamped out the smoldering embers. “That’s strange,” she said, touching one of the scorched leaves. “You weren’t hot before.” She blushed. “I mean, your wings were touching things without them bursting into flame.”

  “Uh, yeah, well,” I said, surreptitiously tugging my jacket down. “Very weird. No idea what happened there.” I cleared my throat. “All right. So I’ll help you. What the hell am I supposed to do?”

  “Stop the sixth-year girls from being utter bitches,” Krystal said.

  I stared at her. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like me to fight some demons instead?”

  “You can’t fight demons,” Faith said, getting to her own feet. She was still faintly pink and avoided making eye contact. “In their natural state, they exist on a different plane than us. Even when they’re possessing a human body, they’re practically invulnerable to normal weapons. Anyway, I’m not trying to just drive them off temporarily, but to seal the Hellgate for all time. That can only be done with the power of true love. But I can’t get my true love here unless I have a date for the Ball. It’s the only time boys are allowed in the school. Were allowed,” she corrected herself. “Anyway, only girls with the highest Peer Assessment results are allowed to take a boy to the dance.” Her face was the very picture of woe. “And I’m the least popular girl in the year, thanks to the demons. They know full well what I’m trying to do. They’re influencing the girls here, making them hate me.”

  Krystal must have read the skepticism on my face, because she aimed a kick at me. “She’s actually got solid evidence on this one. Up until last year—before Faith’s dad died—Faith was the most popular girl. She always has been. It was freaky how fast it all went bad. One minute everyone was tiptoeing around, feeling sorry for her because of her dad, and the next there were all these rumors flying around about him actually having gone insane and that Faith was just as crazy. Then someone drew one of those pentagrams—maybe under demonic influence, maybe just as a joke—and Faith completely flipped in front of the whole year group. That confirmed the rumors. Fast train to outcast town.”

  “I couldn’t help it,” Faith said in a low voice. “Those things . . . they’re wrong and evil. I still can’t believe you don’t feel it yourself.”

  Krystal wrinkled her nose. “They’re just lines, Faith. No one else finds them upsetting.”

  “I do,” I said. “A few of them anyway.” I still hadn’t worked out why some of the pentagram graffiti I’d cleaned today had inexplicably made my stomach churn, when others didn’t affect me at all.

  Krystal’s eyebrows rose. “Really? Well, you’re the angel.” She shrugged. “Anyway, Faith’s spectacular fall from grace was another of the things that made me think she might be onto something with her Ball plan. Why else would demons want to destroy her popularity? That’s why we decided to try to summon an angel, using the instructions in Faith’s dad’s notebooks. If demons are influencing the girls subconsciously, it makes sense that it could be counteracted by angelic influence.”

  “You have to spread your holy love over everyone,” Faith said, nodding.

  I was pretty sure a real angel wouldn’t find that quite so dirty. “You want me to send soothing vibes at people? Looking like this?”

  We all paused for a moment, considering my wingspan and incandescent glow.

  “Good point,” Krystal conceded. “You’d better go back to normal, Raf.”

  “If I knew how, don’t you think I’d have done it already?” I waved my arms, sending up a draft as my wings echoed the movement. I still wasn’t used to the bizarre sensation of the air pushing against them. I groaned as a thought struck me. “Oh, man, and this suit was custom tailored. My dad is going to kill me.”

  Krystal circled me, ducking under my outstretched wings. “Actually, your jacket isn’t torn,” she said, startled. “They’re just hovering behind you. Not really attached.”

  “But I can feel them in my shoulders.” I squawked as she tugged experimentally on my feathers. “Believe me, they don’t come off! Quit it, Krystal!”

  “Sorry.” Krystal reappeared, frowning. “How small do they fold up? Maybe we can hide them.”

  “Under what, a tent?” Nevertheless, I tentatively flexed . . . something. The wings stirred. Trying to control them consciously was like wrestling with a couple of enormous and recalcitrant umbrellas. In a closet. In the dark. It was ridiculous, considering that I’d managed to fly with the things. I closed my eyes, letting instinct take over. My wings settled themselves on my back with a strange little twist.

  Faith’s gasp made me open my eyes again. “They vanished!” she exclaimed. “Into thin air!”

  “Huh?” I waved my arm behind myself, encountering nothing.
But I could still feel them, tucked up behind my shoulders, feathers ruffling in a warm wind. I opened them experimentally, and they popped into visibility again. “They’re still here. Just . . . somewhere else.”

  “Well, that’s one problem solved,” Krystal said as I folded them up again. “At least we won’t have to try to explain to the teachers why you’re wearing a cloak.”

  “Just a hat,” said Faith. “The halo’s still there.”

  I swore. “And the teachers won’t let me get away with that. I tried.”

  Krystal tapped her finger against her lips. “You started glowing last night, but you weren’t today. I saw you during your detention. How did you turn it off?”

  “I didn’t do it deliberately. It just went away on its own when I—uh.”

  “After you what?” Krystal demanded when I didn’t continue. “This is important, Raf!”

  “After I, uh . . .” I glanced at Faith. “After I kind of . . . looked up Michaela’s skirt.”

  There was a horrible silence.

  “That makes sense,” Faith said thoughtfully. “You can’t have a halo if you’re acting like a demon.”

  “Hey!” I protested. “I only looked!”

  “Yes, but you were still, um, filled with lust, right?” Faith was going pink again. She cleared her throat. “That’s one of the Seven Deadly Sins. It’s not very angelic.”

  “But just now I was—uh, that is, you were kind of close to me, and you’re very, um, pretty.” I was certain that my blush had to be as visible as my halo. Clearly, Embarrassment wasn’t a Deadly Sin. “And I’m still glowing.”

  Krystal frowned. “Lust is meant to be sinful. I don’t think simply being attracted to someone is necessarily, you know, a bad thing. Maybe you have to actively be trying to take advantage for it to count, as it were.”

  There was another, longer silence.

  Faith swallowed hard, the sound carrying clearly. “W-well, you’re doing a lot for me,” she said. Her hands went to the top button of her shirt. “S-so I suppose . . .” The shirt slipped, flashing a glimpse of bra strap. “I mean, I do owe you my life.”