Fallen Academy: Year One

by Leia Stone

  “Oh, right. I’m sorry. Brielle, our blood will be mixed with tattoo ink, and that will be what’s used to help you harness your power,” Raphael explained cheerily.

  I’m getting angel blood tattoos? Umm, what the what?

  Lincoln finally released my arms, looking down at me with pity. “This is the weird part. Tomorrow you’ll start your studies, and get your ass kicked like every other student here. Trust me, it’s best to just get this part over with.”

  Four angel blood tattoos? Should I call my mom? I mean, I’m eighteen, but coming home with four tats is going to throw her into a frenzy. Should the blood be tested for diseases? That was probably a stupid question; they were angels, for crying out loud.

  I was still standing there in shock when Michael approached me. “It’s been an honor meeting you, Brielle. Now I must go and… tend to some things.”

  “Oh. Right. You too,” I answered nervously.

  “Peace be with you, child.” Uriel offered with prayer-clasped hands, then exited after Michael.

  “May we meet again.” Gabriel’s feathery voice came from behind me, and then he too was gone.

  I wasn’t sure what to say in return, so I just stood there covering my arms. My stomach was eating itself after giving Bernie my breakfast and chucking my coffee at Lincoln.

  “Is our escort assembled?” Raphael asked Lincoln.

  He nodded. “And Marleen is waiting.”

  “Brielle, dear, would you like something to eat for the road?” Raphael asked from behind me.

  I spun around, no longer able to hold it in. “You totally read minds, don’t you?”

  His cheeks reddened. “You’re a very loud thinker.”

  Lincoln was giving me a smug grin. Ugh.

  “I’d love some breakfast. Thank you,” I grumbled, because I wasn’t sure what to say about the ‘loud thinker’ thing.

  Raphael nodded and disappeared into a hallway at the back of the office. When he emerged, he was holding a muffin and coffee. “Cream with two sugars?” he asked.

  My eyes bugged out. “How did you? You know what, never mind.”

  I snatched the coffee and chugged it just as a loud knock came at the door. Lincoln stepped forward and opened it, letting three insanely hot Celestial guys in. My eyes immediately fell on the one to the left, his wings glowing a pearly white that gave his dark chocolate skin a luminescent glow. He seemed to notice my attention on him and gave me a wink.

  Oh. My. God.

  “Brielle, these four fine gentlemen will be your Celestial master guides during your studies at Fallen Academy,” Raphael instructed.

  My master what?

  “I’m Darren,” the one who’d caught me looking offered. “I’ll be your Uriel master guide.” He stuck out his hand.

  I shook it. “Brielle.”

  The next guy stepped forward, super tall with bright blond hair and blue eyes. He looked like a Norse god with tight muscles that wrapped around his arms as he extended his hand. “I’m Blake. I’m your Gabriel master guide.”

  I shook his soft hand and just nodded stupidly. Shea would shit herself if she saw this many hot guys in one room.

  The final guy stepped forward. He looked about twenty, with dark brown hair and arresting green eyes. “Hello, beautiful. I’m Noah, your Raphael master guide.” He winked.

  My eyes flicked to Lincoln and then back to Raphael. “Can’t Lincoln teach me to control my Michael and Raphael powers?” Not that I wanted him to, but….

  Noah burst out laughing. “Not if you want to actually learn anything. Trust me, darling, I’m better with the healing stuff. Lincoln doesn’t exactly have a tender heart.”

  Lincoln groaned, giving Noah a death glare.

  “Yeah, I noticed that,” I agreed, crossing my arms.

  There was a chuckle behind me as Raphael stepped forward with a tray full of the blood goblets. “Still working on that humility, are you, son?” he called out Noah.

  He shrugged. “Just educating her, sir.”

  “Yes, well she’s only allowed to be here until noon, so we must hurry. I’d hate to imagine what it would be like to send her back to Demon City with half-finished tattoos of light.”

  Noah shivered as if that would be an awful thing. At that point I had resigned myself to shock. I’d known being a black-winged Celestial wasn’t going to be an easy life, but I never imagined my first day at the academy would involve getting tatted up.

  Darren eyed the four goblets and then me. “Four. That’s so dope.”

  Raphael frowned. “And remind me again, dope isn’t about drugs?”

  Darren laughed, showcasing a handsome set of straight white teeth. “Not in this context, sir.”

  “Right. Let’s go.” Raphael flung his hand out, the set of double doors in front of us springing open. I stumbled backward and my wings slammed into Lincoln.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled.

  They started to walk outside when Lincoln reached out and tugged on my arm. “Let’s put these away for this little trip, shall we?” He said over my shoulder, right into my right ear, his warm breath cascaded down my neck, giving me chills. His fingers trailed the length of my left wing, stroking from the top to midway down. With a shiver they retracted, and then he walked in front of me.

  “Come on, keep up. This is a dangerous mission,” he snapped.

  Once I could gather my wits from that little wing massage episode, I ran after him.

  “Why is it dangerous?” I asked, stepping out into the open atrium to see no less than twenty armed Fallen Army guards taking orders from Raphael.

  Lincoln turned to face me. “One goblet of archangel blood will fetch a fortune on the black market. Four? It’s extremely valuable.”

  Oh. “Why?” I hated asking him questions, because each one gave him the opportunity to be a dick, but I was a curious soul, and I needed to know.

  He squinted as he glared at me. “Your demon friends buy them to sell to the Black Mages for dark magic. Don’t act like you didn’t know that.”

  Anger ripped through me, and my wings popped from my back as I stepped into his space. “I don’t have demon friends, you prick, and I didn’t know. You don’t know anything about me, so how about from now on, you don’t assume, and only speak to me when absolutely necessary.”

  I blasted past him, knocking into him with one of my wings, and went to stand next to Raphael. He seemed like the only sane one in the bunch.

  I suddenly regretted letting my wings out, because now the guards were staring at me like I was the angel of death, fascination mixed with fear in each and every one of their gazes. Considering one of the guards was a Centaur, half his body a white horse, I shouldn’t have been the freak in the group.

  Raphael smiled as I approached, seemingly oblivious to the effect my wings were having on everyone.

  “This is Brielle, your charge,” he told the guards. Each one nodded slightly when I made eye contact with them.

  Raphael then turned to Lincoln. “Protect her well and report back to me when it’s done.”

  My eyes widened. “You’re not coming?”

  He smiled softly. “If I went, it would be like painting a target on your back. It’s best if Lincoln and the others take care of you from now on.”

  I swallowed hard. I felt so safe around him—probably because he was a freaking archangel, but still. I didn’t want to go anywhere with Lincoln. He was an asshole, who hated me, and treated me like a demon-loving piece of shit.

  Raphael’s mouth turned into a frown. “Be patient with those who appear to be against you,” he whispered in my ear, patting my shoulder. “Not all is as it seems.” Pulling back, he gave me a fatherly look, and a feeling of warmth and peace trickled down my arm. My wings drew into my back again.

  I sighed. This is going to be a long day.

  “All right, let’s move out. This is a time-sensitive mission,” Lincoln barked.

  With a flurry of activity, I was hauled into a row of four blacke
d-out SUVs. Darren sat on my left, Noah on my right while Lincoln drove and Blake sat shotgun.

  “Dude, where is Marleen going to put four tats?” Darren asked Lincoln, leaning forward as he made a hard right turn onto 7th Avenue.

  Lincoln’s eyes flicked to the rearview mirror at me for a split second. “I dunno. She’ll figure it out.”

  Blake was balancing the tray of blood-filled goblets on his lap, each one having been fitted with a lid to keep the contents from spilling.

  “Is this a bad time to mention that I’m scared of needles?” I announced.

  Noah was the first to laugh, but soon everyone joined in, minus Lincoln. “Don’t worry, I’ll be there to take your pain, darlin.” Noah winked at me. Mr. Winky wink, was a wink-happy dude it seemed.

  Lincoln groaned from the front seat. “Noah, are you capable of not hitting on a female? I mean, is that within your realm of skillsets?”

  Darren and Blake snickered, but Noah just shrugged. “Sure. I don’t hit on Mrs. Topeka.”

  Lincoln took a hard right turn and then I was totally lost. I didn’t know the area, but it was looking seedier and seedier the more we drove.

  “She’s the seventy-year-old librarian!” Lincoln countered.

  That time I smiled. I was gathering from their banter that the boys were all close friends.

  “Besides, Brielle is too stubborn to accept your help,” Lincoln continued.

  I’d always wondered if I was capable of murder, one of those weird thoughts that sometimes cross your mind. Now I was quite sure I was capable of killing Lincoln. I had actually been starting to loosen up and not think about the impending angel blood tattoos when he went and ruined it.

  “Oh, Noah, I’d love a healing from you. It’s Lincoln who makes me shiver just to think of him touching me,” I snapped back.

  “Ohhhhh.” The car burst into frat boy noises of shame at my smug glare. When Lincoln’s murderous eyes flicked up to the rearview mirror, I kept mine forward.

  Take that, you venomous, judging bastard.

  He took another hard right, the SUVs behind us following, and then pulled up to a shoddy-looking tattoo shop with literally no one on the street. It looked like a vacated and half-condemned street block.

  “Where are we?” I asked, mystified.

  “This street is spelled to look like a shithole, so no one will come down it. We call it Angel Avenue. It’s where we do all of our magical shopping.” Noah winked.

  The boy was an expert winker. I was venturing to guess he did well with the ladies.

  Lincoln scanned the street. The other three SUVs had parked, Fallen Army officers spilling out of them. My eyes roamed over their weapons, guns, swords, bows and arrows. They were varied, and totally badass.

  “Blake, you get those goblets’ inside,” Lincoln ordered. “We’ll protect her.” His tone changed with the word “her,” like I was a venomous snake.

  “Let’s move out.” The doors popped open then and we rushed out of the vehicle. The second my boots landed on the curb, the tattoo shop door flew open to a woman in her mid-thirties, with tattooed sleeves, and long red hair.

  “Linc!” she shouted excitedly.

  Blake had just reached her with the goblets when a dark shadow passed overhead, momentarily blotting out the sun.

  “Incoming!” Lincoln shouted, wrapping his big arm around my waist and tucking me into his body as his huge white wings snapped out. He crouched, bringing me to the ground with him while his wings curled around us to shield me. Bullets and shouts rang out as I stayed pinned beneath his body, eyes wide as saucers.

  I grew up in the hood. Demon gangs were the vilest creatures on Earth, and Shea and I’d had our fair share of run-ins with them. I was robbed quarterly, so I knew we were totally getting jumped right now, and I wasn’t going to hide beneath this asshole and get killed. He smelled good, and his pecs against my back were making my stomach do somersaults, but he was still an asshole nonetheless.

  I must never forget that.

  Lincoln pulled his sword and popped up on his knees, keeping his wings curled forward to protect me. Or cage me in, depending on how you were looking at it.

  Reaching into my boot, I pulled out my switchblade and prepared myself to throw down. I wasn’t going to have any luck against the guns, but I could gut someone if they got within two feet of me. I was good with blades.

  “Lincoln, look out!” I recognized Noah’s smooth voice.

  Lincoln stood to his full height then, his wings snapping back to reveal me, and I came face-to-face with a Monkshood demon.

  Shit.

  The Monkshood demons were by far one of the creepiest kinds. They didn’t have tongues, so they couldn’t speak. They wore hooded cloaks to cover their misshapen bodies, but their red knobby horns stuck out through the top, and they were masters of mental compulsion. The demon’s eyes were glowing blue, which I knew meant he was using his gift of compulsion. Lincoln was staring at him dreamily and lowering his sword. They didn’t even need to speak to use their gift, that’s how powerful they were. They only needed eye contact to get the job done.

  I saw a glint of steel underneath the Monkshood’s cloak and acted quickly. As the demon pulled out his sword, I pushed the button on my switchblade, revealing the sharp knife. Reaching under his cloak, I slashed wildly, cutting into his thick ankles. A roar bellowed from under the demon’s cloak, and he broke eye contact with Lincoln to look down at me. The Celestial burst into action, his sword glowing a vibrant blue as he cut down the demon before us. I stayed crouched, assessing the situation, and wondering what the hell I should do.

  Turning my head, I took stock of the scene. Demons and Dark Mages had rappelled from the roof, the ropes still dangling. There were a dozen of them, at least, one a Beast Shifter in the shape of a cougar, curled brown horns coming off his head. We had them outnumbered, but the Dark Mages were going to town on the Fallen Army.

  A swarm of magical bees was spinning around a group of soldiers, while a demon-bound slave shot bullets, seemingly at random but in our direction. I sat there, crouched and in shock as the human with the red crescent tattoo on her forehead cut down the Fallen Army. It shook me to my core to know I had the same mark on my own head, as did my mother. For the first time, I was regretful about taking the mark. Maybe it would’ve been best to just let my father go…

  One of the Fallen Army soldiers was a Light Mage, her hands were glowing a golden yellow as she built up a powerful spell between them. With a battle cry, she thrust her palms outward and the light exploded. I flinched, unsure what it would do. The demons and Black Mages left standing all began to scream and hiss, their skin growing an angry red as it smoked.

  With one final attempt, a tiny twelve-inch-tall Snakeroot demon slammed against the door of the tattoo parlor. When it didn’t open, he leapt onto Noah’s shoulder and took a chunk out of it with his teeth.

  “Ahh!” Noah screamed, and threw the Snakeroot demon on the ground. All of the demons were looking pretty uncomfortable—close to being set on fire, more like it—and collectively must’ve decided to ditch the plan. It might’ve helped that Lincoln was holding the bloody head of the Monkshood demon and his sword was doing a crazy swirly thing of blue light.

  “Go!” Lincoln roared, then chucked the head onto the street as they scattered.

  The demons and their consort scrambled then, shielded from view by a puff of black mist, and then they were just… gone.

  Holy hell on wheels, what just happened?

  “Noah!” Lincoln leapt to his friend’s side.

  Noah was holding his bleeding shoulder with a glowing orange hand, and wincing. “I’m fine,” he stated in a gruff voice.

  Lincoln turned to me then. “Are you okay?” he asked, his eyes roaming over my body for injuries, before stopping on the switchblade in my hand.

  I just nodded, about all I could manage at the moment.

  Lincoln seemed to be gathering himself as well. “All right, take up the
perimeter and radio me if they come back. I’ll call the academy for backup. I want fifty more guards here within the hour!” he roared.

  The warriors spread out, pulling their weapons, and watching the end of the street where the demons had fled with eagle eyes.

  The door to the shop popped open again. “Hey, sweet thing. You okay?” the tattooed young woman asked me. I just nodded while her eyes fell to the shank in my hands.

  Oops. I retracted the blade and stuffed it back in my boot.

  “Dude, she sliced up that Monkshood demon’s ankles. That was hardcore!” Darren announced.

  Lincoln was looking down at me like he wanted to say something but thought better of it. “Inside,” he finally snarled, and then I was being pulled up, and into the building.

  If this was everyday events in Angel City, I was going to have to upgrade my switchblade, and work on my fighting skills.

  Chapter Five

  “Whoa.” The tattoo shop was not ghetto by any means. I’d been expecting crumbling plaster, maybe some mold, but the floors were a shiny travertine and the walls were smooth plaster with various angel-related artwork painted on them. There was a check-out counter, where a balding older man with Coke bottle glasses was reading through a magazine.

  “Hey, Mr. Hensley,” Noah called out, his glowing hand still on his injured and bleeding shoulder.

  Is he healing himself?

  The man looked up, squinted at Noah and frowned. “Hello, son. You okay?”

  Noah shrugged. “Snakeroot demon bite. I’ll be fine by tonight.”

  The tattooed woman led us back to her desk. A leather massage table lay next to it, and a tattoo gun was on the desk beside the four goblets of blood. My heart started to pound in my chest.

  “Four. So gnarly.” The woman grinned and looked me up and down.

  I rubbed my arms. “Yeah… about that. I’m a bit needle shy. Can I get like one today and the rest next week?” I laughed nervously.

  She looked at me with pity. “Hon, this blood won’t last a week, and neither will you without these tattoos. Once a Celestial goes through the Awakening, they need their tattoos of light within twenty-four hours or—”