Emeric did not look happy to hear that. “Is he adamant on the subject?”
“He only wants to help. I think that he is reluctant to miss the action, honestly,” Alex said with a small smile.
“Alright,” Emeric said, turning and offering Callie his hand. “We shall go over there at once.”
Callie didn’t know what was going on, but she took Emeric’s hand and stood up. Alex drew a breath when she touched Emeric’s hand, and Emeric looked at him in question.
“Yes, Alexander?” he asked.
He hesitated, and then said, “Is it wise to bring Callie, Emeric? You know how Serena can be, especially now that he is in town.”
“That is exactly the reason I want Callista to accompany us,” Emeric said, his authoritative voice having reappeared in full force. “I would like to remind Serena of her recent transgressions. Perhaps it will stop her from causing a riot.”
Alex winced, and Callie suspected he was not savoring the thought of using her as a weapon. But he did not protest further, not even when Emeric swept Callie into his arms and carried her right past him.
Callie looked over Emeric’s shoulder as they flew from the house, and saw that Alex stood in the doorway for a long moment, watching them. He looked stunned again, and a little sad. His eyes connected with hers momentarily, and she thought that she saw faint traces of accusation there. But that was all Callie saw before he was hidden behind the trees.
Chapter Seventeen
Trojan Horse
The shattering of plates, a familiar sound to these parts of the forest, preceded Serena’s cottage in breaking through the trees. Callie heard the commotion before she saw it. When she saw Serena’s house, she had barely laid eyes upon it for a second before Emeric jerked suddenly to the side, and Callie felt the sting of whistling air brush her arm as they narrowly avoided a piece of china.
“How does she have anything left to throw?” Callie asked.
Emeric chuckled, and they landed in Serena’s doorway. Serena was standing at the kitchen cabinets, glaring at a man who stood in her living room. The man was saying something, but before he was finished, Serena shrieked and reached for another plate. She was about to throw it at his head when Emeric’s voice boomed, “Enough!”
Serena froze, her arm stalling mid-pitch. Callie observed the man in the living room as Emeric set her on her feet. He had massive wings, tainted copper around the rims, the white coloring rubbed out into a shade of cream. He was definitely a Guardian, and Callie suspected that the staining on his feathers was a result of age.
He grinned at Emeric, seeming unaffected by the situation he was in. His cocky, sideways smile and deep, playful dimples were not those of a man who’d been the target of Serena’s attack moments ago. Callie took in his curly, ruddy brown hair, the exact color of red brick. That, coupled with the burnt orange freckles on his sun scorched skin, told Callie that he was Irish. He wasn’t very tall, only a few inches taller than Callie, but he was broadly built. His shoulders sat widely atop his muscular frame, reminding Callie of a football player.
Emeric strode into the room, his footprints making resounding smacks against the hardwood floor. “Serena, put your dishes away,” he said calmly. Serena looked at him in fury, but then her eyes flickered towards Callie, and she slowly lowered her arm. Emeric turned to the man in the living room. “I see that you remain as much a disaster as ever,” he said, though there was affection behind the words. “Feeling well, friend?”
“Ah, yeah,” he said, patting his stomach with a large hand. Callie looked at the shirtless chest, and saw a faint pink firework darting out below his rib cage. “The bomb went right through me. Guts everywhere. It must have been pretty awesome. I couldn’t stay awake to watch. But the doc did a good job—you can barely tell I was walking around like a hollowed out pumpkin a few days ago.”
The man walked up to Emeric and clapped him on the shoulder jovially, apparently numb to the thick tension in the room. Callie watched in fascination. True, if a bomb couldn’t kill him, a little china couldn’t. But still, it was odd to see someone so happy in the face of an attack.
“And if you’d known what was good for you, you would have stayed hollowed out in those Godforsaken valleys!” Serena spat. The man rolled his eyes, his grin turning indulgent.
“Serena,” Emeric warned, a cool caution against further bad behavior.
Callie felt a gust of wind at her back, followed by a wall of warmth. She turned and was surprised to find Alex, standing so close to her that she had to tip her chin up in order to see his face. Immediately, involuntarily, her pulse fluttered at his proximity.
She had to consciously keep herself upright, so that she didn’t lean back right then and nestle against him.
“Emeric, he shouldn’t even be back,” Serena complained. “He’s fine now. Shay cleared him. He can go.”
Emeric turned to the man. “She makes an excellent point, I must admit.”
“Aw, come on,” he said. “Lennie’s just mad because—“
“Do not call me that,” Serena hissed.
“—the last time I saw her, I teased her about that Trojan war thing. You know how touchy she is,” the man said.
“I’ll show you touchy,” Serena said, taking several violent steps towards him, wielding her plate like a sword. The man picked up the coffee table and held it before him as a shield. He didn’t strike Callie as afraid; more likely he was simply egging her on.
Emeric stopped her with an upraised hand. The man laughed at her threat; not cruelly, but as though she were a kitten clawing at a tiger.
“Trojan war?” Callie whispered to Alex.
“It’s a long story,” Alex whispered back.
Emeric said to the man, “You realize that you are not to stay here. It is your mission to return to Afghanistan. The American troops are quickly running out of manpower on the ground—“
“Tell me about it,” the man interrupted. He put down the coffee table and flopped onto the couch, crossing an ankle over the opposite knee. He folded his arms behind his head, and said, “I’m the one redirecting the routes of the bombs these copters are dropping. Hand to God, I don’t know how the humans think they make their marks without divine intervention. I just let go of one of ‘em a little too late, that’s all. But now that I’m here, I might as well stick around. From what I hear, you guys need me more than Uncle Sam does. When’s the good stuff start?”
Emeric sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. “Too soon, I fear. Even just today, they—“
“Wait, he gets to stay?” Serena cried. “I have been working my ass off for decades on this job. I’m the best shot you’ve got at winning this thing. And you’re inviting him to take part in it? No way, Emeric. I won’t do it.”
Emeric glared menacingly at Serena, holding her gaze for a second too long. Callie realized he was trying to remind her of the favor he was doing her by letting her stay in the forest. Undaunted, Serena stared evenly back at him, crossing her arms.
After a long moment, the man laughed and stood up, clapping his hands in applause. “Well done,” he said, his voice thick with amusement. “I haven’t seen a pissing match this intense since…well, about a week ago, actually. But at least they had heavy artillery. Lennie, you haven’t changed a bit.”
“Don’t call me that,” Serena replied, still staring at Emeric.
Emeric exhaled harshly, and turned to the man. “Zeke, given recent events, I would be glad to have you around. We’re going to need all the hands we can get.”
Serena gasped in outrage.
“As for you,” Emeric said to Serena. “You have a very precarious position in this canopy right now, and if you push me very hard I am sure you will lose your balance altogether. Do I make myself clear?”
She narrowed her eyes, but reluctantly, angrily, nodded.
“Good,” Emeric said, the matter decided. “Zeke, follow us. I will not have premature war in my village.”
The man, Zeke
, sighed dramatically. “But things were going so well,” he protested.
“Zeke,” Emeric drawled, and Zeke grinned again.
“Sure, boss, whatever you say,” he replied. Emeric nodded. Barely a moment after Emeric turned and glanced at Callie, Callie felt herself being lifted smoothly into the air. She gasped and grabbed his neck, unsure how the floor had suddenly disappeared from beneath her.
She felt a swiftly flowing breeze on her face; Emeric was flying much more quickly now. She was about to wonder if the others would be able to keep up, when suddenly Zeke darted out in front of them, twisting through the air in a horizontal circle before sinking into the trees. Callie looked to the right, and saw that Alex was keeping pace at Emeric’s side.
Minutes later, the trees gave way to the shoreline, the beach stretching out in a pale line along the horizon. Emeric slowly descended, and Callie saw that Zeke and Alex were already standing on a boulder below.
Emeric set Callie down, and she turned to him curiously. “What are we doing here?” she asked.
“Acquainting you,” he replied. “Zeke is the best war strategist I have met. He will know how to best use you to our advantage. Zeke, this is our newest weapon, Callista Ryan. Callista, this is Zeke.”
Zeke smiled at her and extended a hand. “Pleasure, lady,” he said in the olden way of a cowboy. Callie shook his hand hesitantly. She wasn’t sure yet if he was insane. He definitely acted as though he were; his response to Serena’s welcome had been unhealthy, to say the least.
“Zeke,” Emeric said, “Callista possesses the rare ability to Perceive upon not only Guardians, but upon Sirens as well.”
Zeke’s eyes widened as he swallowed that. He seemed impressed, like Emeric had just told him she were capable of doing a two-minute keg stand. “How’s that going for you?” he asked sarcastically.
Callie raised an eyebrow at the prodding. “How’s being back home going for you?” she returned.
Zeke seemed surprised for the barest fraction of a second, and then burst into huge, belly-deep laughs, and slapped Alex on the back. “I take it she’s yours?” he asked. “You have found yourself a tough one, buddy.”
“Hey,” Callie said defensively. “I’m not his. You lived through the feminist movement, didn’t you?”
Zeke smirked. “Are you boys sure she’s not a Guardian?” he asked. “She’s sure got the balls of one.”
Callie understood that the comment was supposed to shock her, and she crossed her arms. She got the feeling that they were testing each other out, seeing where the limits were. He was harmless, she realized. Despite his immortality, he seemed little more than a frat boy. “And from what I hear, all you ballsy Guardians are afraid of a bunch of women, right?”
There was a pause, and then Zeke’s smirk grew into a grin. “Cal,” he said, “I think you and I are going to get along just fine.”
Callie smiled in reply, and the tension was broken.
Zeke turned to Emeric. “Give me a few days, chief, and I’ll have her fitting into the line-up just perfectly.”
Emeric nodded. “Thank you. And now if you will all excuse me, there is a bit of a mess to clean up with our liaison to the Siren community.”
With a pointed look at Zeke, Emeric unfolded his wings, and stepped into the air. As he flew away, Alex and Zeke took a seat on the boulder. Callie joined them, sitting on the smooth stone surface of the grey rock.
They sat in silence for a moment, watching the evening sun slink below the clear sky. Callie traced a pattern of water stains onto the face of the rock, and was reminded of something that Zeke had said in Serena’s cottage.
“What did you mean when you said you’d teased Serena about the Trojan War?” Callie asked, turning to Zeke. She had to stop herself from looking across Zeke at Alex, who, she saw from the corner of her eye, was reclining back onto his elbows, the smooth contours of his chest reflecting the pink glimmer of the sun. He was Apollo, lounging with muscular ease without a care. For a moment, she was reminded of the Alex whom she had seen in the memory, before heartbreak had ever threatened him or fate had ever treated him unjustly.
Zeke chuckled. “It’s Lennie’s shining moment,” he said. “You’ve heard of the thing, right? I mean, not the horse, but how it all got started?”
“Yeah,” Callie said. “I thought it was just a myth.”
“You and every other human on the planet. Took us generations to convince your species it was just a story.”
“Oh,” Callie said, frowning at the news. “The prince of Troy stole that other king’s wife, didn’t he?”
“Something like that,” Zeke said. “But, really, it started way before that. Helen, Menelaus’ wife, was said to be Zeus’ daughter. The story of her birth is all about how Zeus was chasing Helen’s mother around while he was in the form of a goose, and when he eventually caught her, they had a little fun, Greek-god style. Helen’s mom laid an egg, and a little while later, a beautiful baby girl with the wings of a goose was hatched. That’s the reasoning the humans give for her having wings. Most translations miss that part, though; Helen is always painted as a normal person, wing-free despite her birth. What really happened, we know, is that she was born of two mortals, and began to grow her wings when she turned ten. Once that happened, suitors came from far and wide by the dozens, seeking to claim her as their own. She was the most beautiful person in the world, the rarest creature anyone had ever seen. A winged creature isn’t so easy to find, after all, especially one so gorgeous. And so Menelaus insisted on having her, and Menelaus was a man who got what he wanted. She married him when she was only twelve years old; I guess you can thank her spineless mortal father for that.”
Callie interrupted him. “But didn’t people usually marry young back then?”
Zeke’s jaw clenched, and a momentary flash of ancient bitterness stole the goodhearted grin from his face. “Still,” he argued, “she was practically a baby. She didn’t deserve that brute for a husband.”
Callie felt suspicion kick in full-force. He seemed almost…jealous.
“One day, when Paris was in Sparta for what was essentially a business trip, he saw her. He spotted her wings and, as often happens with men when they see valuable gems, decided he’d have to marry her no matter what. And so he kidnapped her.” Zeke rolled his eyes as he continued, “Some authors have romanticized the story, saying that he fell in love with her, that she was being abused by her husband, that they ran away together. But really, he just…took her. And that was how the war began. Menelaus sent his ships to Troy, insistent upon having his wife back; I don’t even think he missed her, he just didn’t like being robbed. He ravaged the city, destroyed many of its citizens, but never found her.”
“Why not?” Callie asked.
Zeke smirked. “Well, we’d picked her up by then,” he said.
Callie gasped. “A Guardian?” she whispered. But of course she’d been a Guardian. The wings ought to have been a give-away. Still, the new edition of the classic tale didn’t seem real. Winged creatures didn’t actually exist. Except here.
Zeke nodded. “I kind of fell off the map for a while there. I should have gotten her to the canopy at the first sign of feathers. But she was so protected back then, and so attached to her parents…. I couldn’t bear to do it. Sounds strange, I guess.”
“You were her protector?” Callie asked.
“Yeah,” he said. “Still am, though she hates it when I remind her. But once you’re someone’s protector, you never can quite shake the habit. That’s probably why Emeric only assigns a protector one charge; the rest of their missions are usually just war zones and nuclear labs and such. But Lennie…well, she’s enough of a headache for me, anyhow.”
Callie’s eyes widened. “Serena? She’s your charge? Wait…Serena was Helen of Troy?”
Zeke looked at her fondly, amused. “Yeah, kid, what’d you think?”
Callie swallowed. “Well, for one thing, that her name isn’t Helen.”
; Zeke brushed that aside with a hand. “Mistranslations. It was never Helen, it was Selena. Someone thought it was Helena, another got it down to Helen. Damn Greek letterings. At any rate, after I started calling her Lennie, she hated the nickname so much that she changed her name. Serena’s what she goes by now, apparently. But to me, she’ll always be Lennie, the bird who punched Paris in the socket just for trying to touch her feathers.” He grinned, and a sparkle was in his amber eyes. “She was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen when she did that.”
Callie tilted her head, touched by the strange story.
Zeke continued, “Glad to know she hasn’t lost that bite.” He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. “She almost took my head off back there. Pulled a butcher’s knife on me when I first showed up. Threatened to cut off my—“
“Zeke,” Alex warned.
Zeke paused, and then looked sheepishly at Callie in realization. “Oh, sorry, kid,” he said.
Callie smiled, unable to help herself. Even though he was a little rough around the edges, he had a certain charm about him. She couldn’t stifle the yawn, though, which stole over her then.
Alex frowned and leaned forwards as he heard her yawn, looking at her across Zeke. When he saw her press a hand to her mouth, he stood and brushed his hands together. “Alright,” he said. “That’s my cue.”
Callie looked up at him in confusion as he reached out a hand. “For what?”
He cocked a head towards the ocean. She looked across the water and saw that the sun had completely sunk behind the horizon. Stars were starting to pierce through the cobalt sky.
She groaned. “I can’t be tired already,” she said, accepting the hand. “I’m turning into my grandmother.”
Alex smiled at her tenderly, his eyes mocking as he pulled her into his arms. As his wings lifted, Callie looked down at the cock-eyed Guardian still lying on the rock.
“Good night, Zeke,” she said, hugging Alex’s warm neck as a chill ran down her spine.
Zeke saluted her with one hand, and Alex lifted off.
The Guardian (Callista Ryan Series) Page 21