by A. J. Rand
He didn’t say anything. What could he say? He knew the odds as well as I did, and all the wishful thinking in the world wasn’t going to change that.
“So were you tempted?”
I knew what he meant. “Of course I was tempted. You know me, always wanting answers. I had the answer to questions I probably haven’t even asked yet in the palm of my hand––how could I not be tempted?”
Chaz nodded. “Did you ever wonder what it would be like to be normal, Yesh? You know––to not know the things we know, to not have experienced the darkness the way we have?”
I sighed. “All the time, kid. Neither of us had the luxury of choice. Both of us were born into this life in one form or another. Now we just have to figure out what to do with it all.”
A polite knock on the apartment door before Arianna came bursting through brought an end to our conversation. I got up to close the door behind her while she fluttered around Chaz, bugging him. Poor kid. I think Arianna felt as though she had found a new playmate. Looking at the little cherub, and her child-like exuberance, it was hard to remember she was actually thousands of years old. Heck, I didn’t get a couple of years to be a child, so I guess she made the time up for the both of us and then some.
The indigo light from outside made me squint a bit while closing the door. I couldn’t get used to the fact that it opened to the outside instead of my dark hallway. I wanted nothing more than to shed this realm of the angels and get back to my not so normal life. It wasn’t going to happen any time soon.
“What’s up, Arianna?” Chaz was pulling back away from her. Angels never seemed to get that whole personal space thing, either. It was a bit unnerving.
“Sariel said she was going to give Yeshua a break. She told me that I could take you to the observatory, if you wanted to go.”
Her eyes were lit with a pleading look. Hey, I knew the cherub was a little on the annoying side, but didn’t she have any other friends to bug? The observatory. It was the place where Arianna had wanted Ithane to go that fateful day––
“Okay, let’s do it. Show me this marvelous place you want to share so badly.”
Arianna did a mid-air somersault that made me smile. Her enthusiasm was certainly contagious. Chaz and I exchanged amused looks as we followed the cherub out the door.
It only took us a few minutes to get to the observatory, which was near the center of the city by the Hall of Thrones. Then again, I don’t know what it was, some sort of odd physics going on, or whatever, but it seemed to take nothing more than a few minutes to get to any part of the Crystal City, no matter where you started and where you were going.
We stepped inside a building that was completely black. You couldn’t see anything. While we stood there in the dark, wondering what to do next, a dim light flooded the floor around us. When it reached full brightness, I could see forms taking shape from out of the misty cloud that covered the floor.
As I watched in wonder, those shaped became planets. When the light show seemed finished, Chaz and I were standing on an indigo-colored disk, set amidst what appeared to be the galaxy where the planet Earth was located. At the peripheral edges, the entire universe stretched out into an infinity of stars, planets, and multiple other shapes and colors.
“Look!” Arianna smiled at our awe, pointing to the planet I recognized as Earth.
I peered closer, leaning over to get a better look. The indigo disk moved toward the planet, as though drawn to it by my desire to see. If I focused hard on any one particular place, it moved in closer and I could see the blue and green colors become waters and trees. As it came closer, the grey-white areas became cities, and then buildings. Eventually people became distinguishable, down to their facial expressions.
I stood up a little too fast, disoriented by what I was seeing. “What–?”
“It’s the eyes of the angels.” Arianna laughed. “Want to check out the rings of Saturn?”
Talk about overwhelming. Arianna moved the disk with expert control around the galaxy. So this was how the angels kept track of everything that was going on. I’d always wondered about the claims the church made. Now I knew. It wasn’t what I had expected.
Another disk came up next to ours and I saw Ke. The guy seemed to show up wherever I went. It was starting to get a little weird. I was frustrated by him, and angry with myself for being glad when he did show up. It always ended up with him walking away and leaving me alone with a lot of confusion. Yeah, I always managed to pick the real winners.
Arianna came up close to my ear and whispered, “Why not go with Ke? I will take Chaz on a cruise of the universe.”
I looked at the cherub with suspicion. She was trying to look innocent, but I could tell there was more to his showing up than she was letting on. The little snot was setting us up.
Ke held out a hand to offer assistance for me to step over to his disk. Arianna took off with Chaz before I had barely stepped off their disk. As they pulled away, I could hear Chaz asking questions of the cherub.
“Are there any planets out there that have alien life on them?”
“Of course.” I heard Arianna’s fading reply as they sped off. “You cannot possibly believe, with this whole playground, that Earth is the only populated planet in the whole universe––”
Then they were out of hearing range. The disk shifted and I fell against Ke. Embarrassed, I pushed away from him, but he didn’t let me get far. What, another round of sexual tension torture from this guy? It was getting old in my book.
He was staring down at me with those golden chocolate eyes, and I wanted to melt into him. Instead, I tried to gently push away. He still wasn’t letting go.
“The time is coming close.”
For what? For him to finally come to his senses?
“I can feel the events changing, the pattern drawing to the point.”
Oh. Duh. That time.
“So what does this mean?” I tried to focus on what he was talking about, even though that was not where my mind or my body wanted to take me.
“It means that you have to make your decision soon as to what you are going to do.”
That brought on a bit of a panic attack. No pressure there. My mind started working through everything all at once. It was overwhelming. How could I make this decision? Not only was I not ready, but I also didn’t want to do it. What if I made the wrong one?
“You will make the right decision.”
What, was this guy reading my mind now? “How can you be so certain? What if I choose not to do as the Grigori want?”
He shrugged. “Things will be as they will. Whatever decision you make will be the right one.”
“I wish I could be as sure of myself as you are.”
“I’m not sure of myself.” Ke shook his head. “I am more sure of you.”
“Why?”
He looked at me for a long time without saying anything. I was getting a little uneasy under the scrutiny. The look wasn’t so much longing this time, although I saw that there, too. It was something different––trust? Belief? It bordered on worship, which frightened me more than anything else. I was so not ready to deal with any of this.
“Because I know you. I know who you are, I know what you are capable of.”
“I don’t even know what I am capable of, how can you be so sure?”
“I haven’t waited for you, searched for you over all these years because I was unsure of you.”
“Why did you search for me? If you had just let me be, you would never had to deal with the possibility of my interfering with the plans of the Grigori. Now I am an unknown factor that could screw up everything you have worked toward all these years.”
The look of longing was back in his eyes, along with some else. But I didn’t have time to figure out what that something else was, or maybe he just decided to show me, rather than to waste time with words. He brought me in, holding me tight to his body while his lips claimed mine. My senses were reeling under the onslaught of the pass
ion he threw into that kiss.
All the time I had spent with Sariel, opening up my energy, tapping into it, didn’t prepare me for this. I hadn’t shut it down. Now it interwove with his energy, blending and meshing together in heightened awareness. And boy was I aware. I could feel every ounce of emotion, every inch of pleasure, not only of my own, but of his as well. Talk about playing with fire––my body was a raging inferno, hitting heights of heat I had never experienced before. Even power drunk around the immortals, I had never reached this feverish level of desire.
Then he stopped, pulling back. I could see the inner war being waged within him, the struggle between desire and morality. Why the heck did he have to find that spark of morality in him now?
“Please tell me you are not going to do this to me again.” I think it is the closest I have ever come to begging for something in my entire life. But I could see by the look in his eyes, the angst displayed so openly, that it would still not get me what my body was craving right now. I started shutting down before I did something completely stupid. I was tired of this teasing game.
“Yeshua––”
I pushed away from him and held up a hand. “Save it. I am done with the game you are playing, Ke. I can’t take it any more. I won’t take this from you.”
He was hurt. I could see it in his eyes. Right now, I was beyond caring.
“Get me out of here.” I looked around, searching for the exit.
Ke’s shoulders slumped in defeat. The disk started moving, but apparently it didn’t have far to go. I went to step off, to leave him behind for a change, but he grabbed my arm and held me back, forcing me to look at him. He had gone into guarded mode, but I could still feel the residual of heightened energy between us.
“Of all the Grigori, other than you, there were very few of us that abstained from taking pleasure with human women. I was one of those few, as were you.”
I looked away from him, not trusting myself to speak. What did this have to do with anything?
“I abstained because there was only one I would have shared anything with, and she wouldn’t even do that much.”
“Ithane.” I made it a statement, rather than a question. I was pissy enough at this point to let the thought cross my mind that if Ke had played these kind of games back when Ithane was around, no wonder she didn’t share that part of herself with him.
“I loved her, Yeshua, beyond anything else. I––”
“Save it angel boy. I am not Ithane.”
“No, you are not. You hold a part of her, but you are different on many levels. Not so different on others. But so help me, I find myself feeling the same way about you that I did about her.”
I turned to look him in the eye. “Really? Is it just because I share a part of her? Or is this something separate? I’m having a hard time buying all of this, Ke. Now you are claiming love.” I shrugged. “Okay. So what? I have offered myself over and over again to you only to be pushef away. What kind of sick, twisted idea of love is that?”
He closed his eyes, but not before I saw the pain there. I wanted to reach up and soothe it away. But I didn’t. I wasn’t dealing well with this at all.
“I cannot. You are human. Not only is it not right, but it is forbidden to the angelic host.”
“You are human now, too. Unless I can figure out a way to undo those weaves, which I am pretty well failing at, you will die as a human. What about this is forbidden? Or am I missing something here?”
“There is the possibility I will not live out my life as a human. I will not––cannot break that taboo.”
“Is it the free will thing?”
“Yes.”
“But you are feeling that free will now, aren’t you? That makes you human, and all your words are meaningless.”
He shook his head. “No. If we were both in angelic form right now, then I would never have turned you away from me. But we are not.”
“No.” I frowned. “We are both in human form. Which makes it no more taboo than the other.”
“But it does, can you not see that? My body may be human, and pushing me beyond the limitation of very human desire, but my mind is still that of the angel that I am. I am not truly human––I am only trapped in a human form. It does not make me any less an angel that I am.”
He had a point there. I felt some of my irritation slip away. This whole situation sucked rocks. I moved my hand up to touch his cheek. I thought he would flinch from my touch, but he didn’t.
“I understand, Ke. But you have to realize that this game of pushing me around like emotional play dough has to stop. I am human. You have me falling for you one minute and then pushing me away the next. I can’t take this any more.”
“You care for me?” There was a look of hope in his eyes that I tried to ignore.
“It doesn’t matter, does it? Whether it is some residual part of Ithane within me that holds onto feelings for you or something of my own––there is nothing to be done about it, is there? I choose not to dwell on it. But I won’t play this game. My very human emotions will not take it. We’ll just call it friends and move on. Deal?”
“I––”
My hand moved to cover his mouth. “No. I don’t want to hear any more. Can we just leave at this and move on?”
He hesitated, and then nodded. There was definite unhappiness in his eyes, but what else could he say? I really couldn’t take any more. I wasn’t kidding. Father David’s hidden stash of scotch was sounding pretty good to me right now.
“Fine.” I took my hand away from his mouth. “Then I’m going to count on you as the one friend out of this whole angelic host thing. I sure as heck don’t think I will ever consider any of the others in that way.”
Without saying anything further, I turned to leave. I figured it was the best move for both of us. He had opened up something inside of me I never thought I’d feel. And just as quickly, he slammed the door on the feeling. Or was I the one slamming the door? I didn’t know, and really didn’t care one way or another. I just wanted to get away.
Chapter 24
One of the benefits of having spent a lot of time in the dreamscape was that it became easy to discern when I was in the middle of a dream. I often felt sorry for those who couldn’t. Take this dream for instance.
I was in the middle of the angel observatory, the planets doing a fancy little dance reminiscent to one of those movies scenes taking place in a grand ballroom. There were angels standing on the planets and stars, whirling around me in some kind of bizarre, unaware dance. Now that I thought about it, maybe it was more like the Sufis, who worked into a trance-like state by twirling around in circles, confusing their senses until they reached a place of altered awareness. Either way, it was creepy.
Other people didn’t have the advantage of understanding they were caught in the middle of the dreamscape. They’d follow the bizarre path of the dream and wake up feeling disconcerted, wondering what it all meant. Dreams do mean a lot. They are the hidden keys to the psyche. I could usually figure it out easily. Since I knew and understood the dreamscape on an intimate level, my dreams tended to be straight forward, for the most part. As I looked around me at the angels twirling around in circles on planets suspended by whatever force was used to keep them in place, I had to seriously wonder about the state of my psyche.
Ten planets lined up before me in an odd configuration. I frowned. It seemed familiar, but I couldn’t put a finger on what it meant. Ke stood with challenging arrogance on the last planet, the one furthest away from where I was, his feet spread apart to shoulder width, his hands on his hips. What the heck was that supposed to mean?
While I turned my attention back to the configuration of the planets, Arianna flew in low, diving toward the place where I stood. She stopped at the last minute and with her hands on her hips, started hopping her way through the pattern of planets. I finally understood. It was set up as a hopscotch board. No wonder it looked familiar, but I couldn’t get a handle on it. Games were so
mething I never had the luxury of playing as a child. I had watched others from a distance, but never got to play. That definitely had to have had some whacked effect on how I had turned out.
So, for the first time in my life I started hopping the hopscotch board. It was fun in an absent-minded, weird way. It was also a bit more challenging than the chalk-squared child version. The planets gave a little under my weight as I jumped to each one. Two of them spread apart slightly, making my eyes grow big as I thought of myself doing planetary splits. Ke was now only a hop, skip and a jump away.
Pulling myself together, I made the final leap that would take me to him. Somewhere at the edges of my awareness, I noticed he was standing on top of the planet Earth. I didn’t get a whole lot of time to think that one through. As I hopped to the final spot on the game board, it moved away from me and I felt myself falling, dropping into the endless rift of space below.
It was ironic that I didn’t feel any fear. Maybe it was because I didn’t see any surface coming up fast to meet my body. Maybe it was because I knew I was in the dreamscape. Whatever the case, I let myself fall for what felt like forever.
As abruptly as my drop had begun, it ended. I was disoriented for a moment while I tried to get my bearings. I was caught in a pair of strong arms, cradled like a child. I turned, half expecting to find Ke. It wasn’t him that held me. I stared into the devilish, twinkling blue eyes of Phobetor.
“I always knew you would fall for me eventually.”
I laughed, indicating with my head that he should let me down. “So this is your dream work?”
He shook his head with a smile. “No, it was a team effort.” He turned me to face his team.
Morpheus was there, and Phantasos. What I had not expected to find were several others in various states of recline among the pillows of Morpheus’ antechamber. Erishkigal was one, Marduk, another. There were a few other immortals I recognized––Loki, who I had never gotten along with, Apollo, Osiris, and Kali––along with a few more that I didn’t. I was betting they were other rankers among the immortals.