Before These Wings (Wings Book 1)

by Wendy Knight

  Good night, Cole.

  Chapter Two

  “I DON’T THINK IT’S A GOOD idea to go back to our house, Enika.” Cole followed his half-insane sister up the street of their old neighborhood, not daring to blink as his eyes frantically scanned the shadows for Garce.

  “Why not?” Enika had an ax that she was dragging behind her like the world’s most dangerous teddy bear. “I want the pictures, Cole. I don’t want to forget.”

  “What if there are bodies? Or—” RayAnna’s hand tightened nervously around Cole’s, her footsteps dragging.

  “There’s not.” Enika snarled, which Cole was positive she hadn’t even known how to do until a year ago.

  After Phoenyx had been taken.

  Phoenyx had been Enika’s best friend, her soul sister. And Enika refused to admit she was dead. Nothing anyone said or did could change her mind. Which meant, of course, that she was not a fan of Cole’s new… friend.

  Cole glanced over at RayAnna, giving her his most encouraging smile. She wasn’t fast, like Phoenyx. She didn’t throw herself in front of danger to save those around her. She was small and helpless. Maybe it was the fact that she was so different from Phoenyx that made Cole fall in love with her. Because anything that reminded Cole of Phoenyx was a burning knife to the heart. It was bad enough that he relived the day she was taken every night in his dreams. But his dreams took him beyond the moment when Enika was on her knees, screaming for Phoenyx. It took him to the alien’s space ship, where he got to watch them dissect her like he’d had to do to frogs in biology.

  He relived it. Every. Single. Night.

  No one really knew what happened on their ship. It seemed more than surreal to even think about alien space ships, like it was a blockbuster movie that would eventually have a happy ending. But it didn’t. He’d lost everyone he loved but his sister. Everyone he’d ever known. His parents, his best friend.

  And Phoenyx.

  The Garce had invaded first. Scientists thought it was a meteor coming. They’d fired a nuclear warhead at it to try and alter its course with Earth. Instead, the warhead was shoved back toward the planet, causing the first wave of total destruction. The second wave came shortly after — when the Garce landed. It took them less than a month to devour forty percent of the world’s population. His parents had been among them. That memory was a blur of running, screaming, desperately trying to keep his sister alive. And then the second invasion, from the beautiful blue, winged aliens — the Empyrean — that the humans thought had come to save them. They killed the Garce, whose blood gave them their immortality, and promised the humans the same immortality and beauty and safety. The chance to be like them. In reality, they’d brought the third wave of destruction, and wiped out almost all of what was left of the human population.

  When the first wave of Empyreans showed up, they seemed to be the answer to an entire world’s worth of prayers. The Garce, which had arrived months before the Empyreans, were the stuff of nightmares. Dark as night, red glowing eyes, the ability to melt into shadows and, of course, the gaping jaws. The Empyreans, in contrast, were beautiful. Long, slender. Light blue with twisting, sparkling tattoos around their eyes and up their arms and legs. Glowing dark blue hair. And wings that put the Morpho butterfly’s to shame. Dark, dark blue with silver veins running through them and black splotches barely visible until they caught the light.

  They were immortal. And they said they were willing to share that gift with the humans — if the humans would help them fight the war against the Garce. What person didn’t jump at the chance for eternal life and beauty beyond compare? Phoenyx’s mom had. Her sister too. But when the Empyreans announced that only women and girls were eligible, Enika, and Phoenyx had backed out.

  It wasn’t until it was too late that the rest of the world realized the Empyreans weren’t sending any of their wives, mothers, sisters, daughters back. They weren’t heard from again, and when the remaining females refused to willingly give themselves up, the Empyreans started taking them.

  That was how he’d lost the love of his life.

  Yes, he believed that Phoenyx was his soul mate. He was only a few months shy of twenty years old, but he had known she was the one the second he’d swung the door open to see her standing on his porch. The day she was taken, his heart shattered, and there was no fixing it. Ever. But RayAnna needed him, and she soothed the jagged edges of pain. He couldn’t love her like he had Phoenyx. But he could love her enough.

  “Hey.” Enika nudged him with the blunt edge of her ax, which wasn’t the safest way ever to get his attention. “You fall asleep standing in the middle of the road and you’ll get eaten alive. Wake up, slacker brother.” Her eyes, big and brown, shared the pain his did. Her heart couldn’t heal, either, but she didn’t have RayAnna to comfort her. His little sister barely tolerated his girlfriend. It made for some awkward months trying to survive.

  He shook his head. “Yeah. Okay. Sorry. We need to get in here and get out before dark. We need to find somewhere safe for the night.”

  RayAnna whimpered. “I’m so tired of running every night. We haven’t seen any other people for weeks.”

  Enika snorted, which she never would have done before. Rolling her eyes, she turned around and stalked off, dragging her ax behind her. Cole had no choice to follow her, but every step felt like ice gripping his very soul. He’d grown up here. His house was in that cul-de-sac right around the corner. He’d crashed his bike right there. He’d climbed that tree to save Mrs. Wright’s cat. He’d kissed Phoenyx for the first time, right there. He’d taught Enika to drive on this street and played basketball at that neighborhood park.

  Now it was a silent city, overtaken by weeds and grass and dandelions. Enika hesitated, then bent over swiftly and picked one, clutching it in her hand.

  Cole thought his heart was pretty much broken, but she’d found a piece to shatter completely. Enika had always believed dandelions were flowers, not weeds. She’d had such a meltdown the first time their dad sprayed weed killer on the lawn, he’d never done it again. And their house had always been full of dandelion bouquets. Even when she was a big, tough teenager, she still brought home fistfulls of dandelions every chance she could.

  “I can’t, Enika.” His feet felt rooted to the overgrown road. “I can’t do this—” His voice broke, and he gritted his teeth.

  RayAnna watched him helplessly, but Enika dropped her ax and threw her arms around him. He sobbed, and she sobbed, and then she complained about him getting her hair all wet. Finally, she pulled back, her hands still gripping his upper arms. “It’s okay. I can go. I’ll be right back.”

  “Haven’t you ever watched a horror movie? You never split up. Ever.” RayAnna whispered harshly. She reached out and took Cole’s hand with her smaller, shaking one.

  Enika didn’t take her eyes off Cole. “You don’t have to do this.”

  It wasn’t about the fear. He knew it wasn’t. Was Enika scared to go off by herself? Yes. She wasn’t stupid, not by a long shot. But she wouldn’t ask him to do something that hurt so much. Somehow, in the year since they’d lost everything, his little sister had become so much stronger than he was.

  Not waiting for his response, she whirled around, ax flying dangerously, and up the driveway. Her footsteps clattered up the wooden stairs to the front porch — and then nothing.

  “Enika?” he called, afraid to raise his voice. He’d become pretty good at smelling the Garce when they were coming after him, but it wasn’t fool proof. When she didn’t respond, he took off running.

  “Cole!” RayAnna squealed, struggling to keep up with him.

  “Enika!” he yelled as loudly as he dared. He rounded the corner, coming face to face with his childhood home… and his sister, frozen on the porch, a hand over her mouth. Slowly, she backed down the stairs and stumbled over to him.

  “Cole, someone’s been here! Someone’s left us a message!”

  He frowned, dragging his worried glare from her face to t
heir house. It was true. There, in black spray paint, was a message. “Twenty-Fifth tunnels. They’re not a myth.” The message had been sprayed several times, he could tell, because of the many layers of faded paint beneath the freshest coat.

  His heart tried to climb out of his chest and into his throat.

  “It’s Phoenyx! She’s alive, Cole!” Enika squealed, all the color rushing to her face as she bounced up and down and clapped her hands.

  “What does that mean?” RayAnna asked, frowning. “Phoenyx isn’t alive. You saw her taken.”

  Enika looked like she’d been punched. Cole closed his eyes for several long seconds before he could face his sister. “Enika, I know what it looks like, but—”

  “No.” There was that uncharacteristic snarl again. “No, Cole.” Enika rubbed her fist angrily across her cheeks, obliterating tears. “You know Phoenyx was obsessed with those tunnels. You know! All our plans to find them? Who else would — it’s her, Cole! It has to be!”

  It took a year from the time Cole first met Phoenyx until he was finally brave enough to ask her out. And then they were together for a year before the invasion. In that time, he and Enika and Phoenyx spent hours pestering the Ogden Historical Society, asking local business owners, and pouring over old blueprints trying to find the entrance to the mysterious tunnels that supposedly ran beneath Ogden City. It was rumored that the tunnels had been built during Prohibition in the 1920s, when Ogden was a city so dangerous, Al Capone himself said it was too wild for him. Phoenyx had an obsession for the mysterious, for the abandoned, for the off-limits. She wanted to be an urban explorer, and her wall had been plastered with pictures of buildings given up for dead.

  They’d never found the tunnels.

  But it appeared that someone had.

  Even though he knew it couldn’t be possible — that no one had escaped the Empyreans — a small glimmer of hope shone through the cracks in his heart.

  Please.

  “What are we doing?” RayAnna moaned, running a hand through her spiky brown hair. “We can’t stay here in the road. It’s getting dark.”

  Dark. Yes. That’s when the Empyreans came out to play. That’s when the Garce could appear without warning.

  Enika’s eyes wavered with unshed tears, her hands clasped in front of her mouth like she was praying. His own soul was screaming at him to go, to see, because if there was any chance at all—

  He nodded. “Okay. We’ll go to 25th street. Get your photo albums, Enika. It’s several miles. We’ll have to run.”

  Enika squealed and whirled around, sprinting to the house. Cole felt more hopeful than he had in a year, even though he knew that hope would hurt when it was crushed. Phoenyx couldn’t be alive. It was impossible.

  But what if she was?

  #

  “BACK THE HECK UP unless you want me to blow your head off.”

  Maybe it was because he was exhausted, after running almost five miles to beat the dark, or the fact that he hadn’t eaten yet that day, but his crazy mind told him he knew that voice. Cole froze, slowly raising his hands. “Keven?”

  For three whole seconds, the gun didn’t move. It wasn’t until Cole was sure he’d lost his mind and was hearing the voices of the dead that the gun jerked back through the slit in the door and the gate swung open. Keven appeared out of the inner shadows like a wraith — tall, grizzled, and holding a very large gun. “Cole? You’re still alive? We thought you were dead.”

  “Keven!” Cole dropped RayAnna’s hand and threw his arms around his best friend. “You’re alive!”

  Keven rolled his eyes. “Of course I’m alive. Did you really think I wouldn’t be?”

  “I just—I haven’t—I didn’t know—”

  RayAnna reached over to tug at his hand. “It’s getting dark. We have to find somewhere to stay.”

  Enika rushed forward, shoving Keven backward. “Have you seen Phoenyx? Have you heard from her? She was taken but she left us a note and I think—”

  Keven winced. “Phoenyx isn’t…” He ran a hand over his scalp, shaking his head. “I don’t know how to tell you this—”

  Enika collapsed, all the hope that had been carrying her this far suddenly crushing her to the ground. And she sobbed, burying her face in her hands, curling in on herself. Cole shook RayAnna’s hand off and scooped Enika up, although what he really wanted to do was fall to the floor with her and give up on everything.

  And then the smell hit him. The Garce were close.

  Keven must have smelled them too because he tensed, his grip tightening as he raised his gun.

  “We’ve got a compound. It’s safe here.” Keven nodded with his head toward the door he’d come through, into Brewskies, one of Cole’s parents favorite place to eat. Cole nodded, unable to talk around the lump in his throat.

  RayAnna scurried in ahead of him, turning in circles. “This isn’t safe! They’ll tear right through these walls!”

  Enika slid out of Cole’s arms and, by sheer force of will, stood on her own two feet. “It’s safer than it is out there,” she said, but the fight was gone out of her. She didn’t snarl at all this time.

  “The compound is down below. They know we’re there but they can’t figure out how to get in.” Keven started pushing them toward the back of the abandoned restaurant. Cole backed off so Keven could take the lead. He pulled open a door in the floor and motioned them inside, leading the way down an ancient flight of stairs. “When we first moved in, the tunnels were pretty small and narrow, but Ny—”

  Whatever he was going to say was cut off as the building above them shook and shattered.

  The Garce had found their way in.

  RayAnna screamed. Enika whirled toward the trap door, ax ready. “You can’t hurt them with that,” Keven said, almost conversationally.

  Enika didn’t bother to look back at him. “You can’t hurt them with that, either, but you still carry it.”

  “Yeah…” Keven said slowly, cocking the gun. “But it will slow them down.”

  “Exactly,” Enika snapped.

  Cole pulled his gun out of its holster and aimed it at the trap door. Keven didn’t look worried at all, but he did keep checking over his shoulder. When the trap door shattered above their heads, Keven yelled, “Get down!”

  Cole dove for the floor at the bottom of the stairs, waiting for the aliens to rise up from the shadows around them and devour him alive. Please don’t take Enika. Please don’t take Enika.

  A frigid breeze blew past, so cold and so fast the hair on his head swept back. RayAnna screamed, burrowing herself against him. It wasn’t just Garce attacking them. The Empyreans had found them too. Maybe they had followed his small group. Maybe he’d led them right to Keven’s compound. Now they would all die, and it was his fault. He felt the sting of the blood balls — they sucked all the warmth out of the air when they were thrown, devouring the heat for their own flames. He heard them blow up. He knew the Empyreans would kill him — they had no use for men, but they would take his sister. They would take RayAnna.

  But death didn’t come. There was the screaming of the Garce, which wasn’t unusual, they didn’t like to be drained of blood while still mostly alive. But then there was nothing, only the sound of heavy breathing — his, Enika’s, RayAnna, and Keven’s. When he heard Keven climb to his feet, Cole hesitantly raised his head. Through the dust and the dirt, he saw Keven brushing off his jeans, gun still in his hand.

  “Come on. Let’s get out of here,” Keven said, heading into the tunnel without looking back to see if they were following.

  RayAnna started to babble. “The Empyreans are here! They’re going to take me, Cole! You promised you wouldn’t let them take me!”

  Enika had somehow gotten down the tunnel ahead of them, but she paused, her face ashen, tears staining her cheeks through the grime. Her light brown curls were dark now because of the dirt. She was almost unrecognizable.

  Keven stopped too, half-shrouded in darkness. “The Empyreans aren’t
here.”

  “Yes they are! I felt one fly by us, and now it’s dark, there will be hundreds. I felt it!”

  Sighing, Keven turned. Cole shook his head, tugging RayAnna forward. “It’s fine. Let’s just get away from the mouth of the tunnel. We’ll be fine. We’ve slept in some dangerous places, right?” He tried to give RayAnna an encouraging smile, but it was hard to find. Something was off. Keven wasn’t telling them something, and secrets could very well get them killed. He’d learned that in the last group they’d tried to survive with. “So… are you the only one living here in the tunnels?”

  Keven shook his head. “There’s about three-hundred of us.”

  For the first time since the attack, Enika spoke, her voice exhausted and dead. “Where is everyone else?”

  Again, Keven winced, running his hand over his face. “They don’t come into the tunnels after dark. They stay in the main chambers until the sun comes up.”

  RayAnna burrowed tighter against Cole’s side. “Why?” she whimpered. He kissed her temple.

  Keven’s eyes moved past them, into the darkness of the tunnel they’d come from. “Because of Nyx.”

  Cole felt the cold first, and spun, but he didn’t have time to pull his gun. The huge black and blue wings shimmered in the darkness, brushing against the ceiling of the tunnel. He scrambled backward, pulling RayAnna with him, pushing Keven and Enika blindly.