“If I were to kill you, I’d die.”
“Ah, well, no, that’s a special case.”
Egan flopped his head to his left and opened his eyes again to look at Wasson. Wasson grimaced with pain. Egan felt blindly, wildly, with his right hand until he found what he was seeking. A heavy, fist-sized rock. He knew he didn’t have much time left.
He gripped the rock with his bloody hand and forced himself onto his left side. Saliva and blood drooled from his mouth. He was weakening and his hand was slick with blood. He adjusted his grip on the rock then swung his arm down hard, smashing Wasson with the rock. The little pixie squeaked in terror and pain. Egan brought the rock up and smashed it down again and again. He got to his knees and pulverized his pixie with the rock.
When he finally stopped slamming the rock into the bloody pulp that remained of the pixie, he realized that the sound of gunfire had ceased. He stared down at the smashed, broken, bloody corpse of his pixie and he was stricken with remorse.
“Wasson! What have I done? Oh, Christ! Oh, god!” He wailed.
A pistol shot sounded from behind him and he felt an impact in his right shoulder. He toppled forward, but the pain only lasted for a moment. He waited until the American got closer, then he sprang to his feet and unfurled his fearsome black leathery wings and whirled to face his attacker. His fangs grew long and razor-sharp and he leaped at the young revolutionary. He bit the kid in the neck and relished in the feeling of his pointed teeth piercing into flesh. He tore a chunk of the kid’s throat from his body. The rebel gurgled and blood shot from the jagged wound in his neck. He fell to the ground.
Two more rebels froze in place as they watched Egan attack their colleague. Egan swallowed the chunk of flesh and hunched over toward the other two Americans. He bared his fangs at them and hissed. A fine mist of fresh blood sprayed from his mouth. The rebels turned and ran.
Egan looked back at Wasson’s flattened body. Instantly, Egan shrank down to Wasson’s size. He looked up, confused, at the rocks and trees which towered over him now. He felt himself growing again and the world returned to normal. He understood.
He willed himself small again, took Wasson’s remains in his arms, and whispered, “I’m sorry, friend. I’m so sorry. Thank you for sacrificing yourself so that I could live.”
Egan unfurled his wings and flew into the forest.
Chapter 12
The angels David and Mark sat on a long stone bench, waiting for the Oracle to see them.
“See? And after it took us two hours to get here, now we have to wait for an hour!” Mark complained.
“It took us less than forty-five minutes to get here,” David said. “Now quit whining. We’ll wait however long we have to wait.”
Mark folded his arms across his chest and frowned.
David rolled his eyes and leaned back against the granite wall. He closed his eyes and meditated, tensing and subsequently relaxing each muscle in his body. Before he was halfway done, the door opened and the Oracle stepped into the hallway.
The Oracle looked at David and Mark and smiled warmly. “David,” he shook David’s hand, “Always nice to see you. It’s been too long. And Mark, thank you for coming on this cold winter night.”
“Thank you for seeing us, Oracle,” David said. “We’re here with some unnerving news. I’ve talked to a number of us at the Enclave and none of us knows what to make of it.”
The Oracle nodded. “Yes, yes, I’ve heard. Come in. Come in.” He escorted them into his office.
The Oracle’s office was paneled in a dark wood and its rich, warm color contrasted with the stark grayness of the cold, gray stonework that made up the rest of the block. The Oracle gestured at the two guest chairs before he walked around his desk and sat in his own seat.
“Tell me what you know,” the Oracle said.
David cleared his throat. “I checked in on David from below last night. There were pixies spying on the house. They seemed to take a greater interest in David’s wife, Tammy, than they did in him. The pixies discussed something and one of them flew away. I didn’t follow him.”
The Oracle rocked back in his chair and sighed deeply. He closed his eyes, then steepled his fingers in front of his chin then tapped his forefingers against his lips, lost in thought.
Mark glanced at David and made an exaggerated shrug. David turned back to the Oracle and waited patiently. After several minutes, the Oracle opened his eyes.
“You’re right,” the Oracle said. “They’re not after David from below. They’re after his wife. Who is her counterpart? Is she an angel?”
David shook his head. “No. Tammy’s a fairy.”
“Interesting,” The Oracle said. “I wonder what they’re up to. Why would they be so interested in a fairy’s human?”
David shrugged. “That’s why we’re here.”
“I don’t have many answers to give you,” the Oracle said. “I can tell you that she is in danger. They mean to kill her. But I can’t tell you why. The answer to your mystery lies in the past, not in the future.”
David stood up from his chair. “How can we stop them? We have to be able to save her!”
“We can try,” the Oracle said. “But I’m not sure we’ll be able to succeed. These pixies are trained for war. If we engage them, we’ll loose many angels.”
“But we need to save this human!”
“There is another who must be saved,” the Oracle answered calmly. “I hate having to put priorities on people’s lives, but I’m afraid she’s more important.”
“But David from below’s wife!”
Mark spoke up. “Who’s this other human who must be saved?”
The Oracle was quiet for a while. “A child by the name of Molly Ritchey.”
“Why is she more important?” David asked.
The Oracle looked David square in the eye and shook his head. “Sorry.”
David frowned. “You’re asking me to give up my human’s wife, the love of his life, for a girl who you think is more important?”
“That’s exactly what I’m asking you to do.”
“And you can’t tell me why.”
The Oracle shook his head. “I won’t tell you why.”
“That’s worse,” David said.
“I know, and I’m sorry.” The Oracle stood and sat on the edge of his desk. “Find a past-seer and see if you can find out what the pixies are actually after. It’s not clear to me. It’s fuzzy.”
David said, “I don’t like this one damn bit.”
“I know you don’t. But Molly is the key to stopping this before anyone else gets killed. It’s key that her fairy lives.”
“I’m having a really hard time with this, Oracle,” David said. “Please, tell me why I’m giving up Tammy for this Molly?”
The Oracle closed his eyes for a moment. When he reopened them, his face was lined with sadness. “Because,” he said, “Now it’s done. If I would’ve told you before, you would’ve left and you needed to hear what I had to tell you.”
David’s mouth dropped open. He shoved the door to the Oracle’s office open and ran down the hall. As soon as he felt the night air on his face, he spread his wings and flew to the world below.
He landed across the street on the same rooftop he stood on the day before. Bright red and blue flashing lights lit the street from the police cars lined up in front of the Liebowitz house.
-
Two days later, David flew through the Gate to the Rockford Enclave to see the past-seer. Rockford, like several other Enclaves but unlike his own, was climate-controlled so it was a very pleasant seventy-two degrees Fahrenheit with a light and comfortable breeze all year round.
A pair of sentries peered over the wall at the world below. They held their silver bows at the ready, prepared to loose their never-missing golden arrows on whatever might threaten the Earth or the Enclave. David greeted them with the traditional sentry hail. “Never miss, brothers.”
“Never miss,” each of them
echoed back to him.
David chuckled to himself when he realized that missing wasn’t actually an option for the sentries. Their golden arrows were enchanted to fly straight and true for whatever target the archer aimed at.
He flew over the streets of the Enclave until he reached a nice but rather ordinary-looking house. He landed on the porch and clunked the heavy, bronze knocker against the door. Nobody came. After a minute or so, David knocked on the door again. He heard movement inside the house.
The door opened a crack and an eye looked him up and down, then narrowed fiercely at him.
“Hi, I’m David. I have an appointment with Leonard this afternoon.”
The eye continued to stare blankly at David.
“The past-seer.”
It didn’t so much as blink.
“I’m from the Chicago Enclave. I asked about Tammy Liebowitz and the pixies.”
The door flung open. An angel with brindled gray wings, wearing a full plaid tartan kilt and a tailored white shirt frowned at him. “Do you… Oh, yes. You do have an appointment. You want to know about the rabbi’s wife.”
“That’s right.”
“Come on in, then. I’m Leonard.” The angel stepped back to invite David in. Leonard sat on a sofa and David sat on the love seat across from him. “What do you want to know about?”
“A human by the name of Tamsin Liebowitz was killed two days ago.”
Leonard’s eyes became slightly unfocused for a moment, then he focused on David again. “Yes. I’m so sorry.”
David nodded. “Thank you. Why was she killed?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
Leonard shook his head. “No. She was an unremarkable human. She fell down the stairs. Broke her neck. Poor thing.”
“Fell down the stairs? She was murdered.”
Leonard stared through David again. “I think you’re right. She didn’t fall. She was pushed.”
“Who pushed her?”
Leonard squinted as though he was trying to see something far away. “Not sure. The police thought her husband did, but she was already dead when he got home. She died alone. No.” He closed his eyes and furrowed his brow in concentration, then blinked them open in surprise. His face showed his shock quite clearly.
“What did you see?” David asked.
“Pixies. She was killed by pixies.”
David nodded. “I thought so. I saw pixies–”
Leonard interrupted him, “Spying on her from the window. Yes, I know. They most certainly targeted this woman. But I can’t tell why. Nothing this woman’s done in her life connects her to those pixies.”
“Nothing at all?”
Leonard shook her head. “She’s a–she was a veterinarian. She saved animals. She was a Jew who took her faith fairly seriously. After all, she married a rabbi. The glass didn’t break. Not at first. They had to stomp on it twice. They met in college. She never cheated on him. She never jilted a lover. She broke up with her earlier boyfriends in as pleasant a manner as possible. She never had a traffic ticket, ever. She was a genuinely decent woman.”
“Why would those pixies murder her, then?”
Leonard looked at him blankly. “I have no answer for you right now. It’s possible her fairy did something offensive. But not to the pixies who killed her.”
“Then to who?”
“To whom,” Leonard corrected.
“My apologies. To whom?”
“To whom what?”
“Who did she offend or threaten or upset enough to make them want to kill her?” David cried in frustration.
“Oh. I really have no idea.”
“Well, this was a giant waste of time!” David stood up and started for the door.
“When you come back, bring someone who can identify a human’s counterpart, will you?”
David whirled around and yelled at Leonard. “What?”
“Find someone who can tell me who her fairy was, then we can work together and figure out why they wanted to kill her.”
“And who do you suggest I bring?” David stopped trying to hide his snark and frustration.
“You’ll find someone.”
David shouted in wordless frustration, then he stormed out of the house and slammed the door behind him. He took off as soon as he was outside and flew to the Enclave wall. His eyes widened when he saw the sentries. He flew to one of them.
“Sentry, may I please make use of a golden arrow? It’s a matter of life and death!”
The sentry glanced at David, then at his partner, then back to David. He reached into his quiver and handed David a golden arrow.
“Thank you. I’ll do my best to return it when I can.” He held the golden arrow in his hand. “Find me a link-seer.” The arrow instantly flipped in his hand and pointed to the right and downward.
He turned to the sentry again and nodded his thanks. “Thank you, truly. You may have saved some lives.”
David leaped off the wall and followed the arrow down to the world below. It led him back toward Lake Michigan, north of Chicago. His stomach tightened when he realized where it was leading him. He settled down on a power line in Wilmette and looked up at the Bicentennial Ash – the oldest tree in the North Shore area. He was tempted to put the arrow away, confident that he knew where it would lead him, but he flew on after the arrow anyway.
It led him to a particular fork in the trunk, about two-thirds up to the top. There was a hole in the trunk there. David swallowed hard with apprehension went in. The arrow floated next to him and David watched its reflection in the mirror of the Bridge.
Chapter 13
“See?” Shae said. “I told you they wouldn’t notice us out here!” She stirred soup in a metal pot on a heatstone. She held up a large wooden spoon and said, “And this is great! Using actual cookware while we’re all together! It’s like we’re not living like refugees in a desolate, ravaged wasteland that used to be a lush and beautiful paradise.”
Hope lounged on Ivy’s long wicker sofa and read a book. She felt Gen’s eyes on her and looked up. She smiled warmly at Gen. Gen did her best to smile back but she knew it looked forced. Hope’s expression turned to one of concern and she started to get up. Gen put her hand up and shook her head. Hope nodded, smiled at her again, and went back to reading.
“When are Herron and Slynn due back?” Gen asked Shae.
“Um,” Shae thought for a moment. “Not until after I finish dinner. But before the moon comes up. Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be okay.” Shae blinked then immediately blinked again. “Oh. Um. I’ll leave you two alone for a bit, then.”
She flitted to the front door and opened it, then turned back over her shoulder. “One of you, remember to stir the soup. I’m not joking! Come on, Hawn!”
The tiny dragon that had been sitting coiled up near Hope’s feet darted in a quick circle and zipped off after Shae. Shae closed the door behind her.
“What was all that about?” Hope asked.
“What do we do now, Hope?” Gen asked.
“What do you mean?”
Gen sighed and paced around the living room. “We’re about to bring back The Meadows. We brought back all three of the stolen Realms. Something’s going on with the pixies. Maybe they’re getting ready to attack.”
“You sound almost hopeful.”
Gen stopped pacing and looked at Hope. Gen’s face wore a pained expression.
“Skies above,” Hope breathed. “You do want them to attack.”
“No! I don’t want that at all!”
“What, then?”
“When I came here, I was doing something important. Something special. Something worthwhile. Maybe something nobody else could do. What do we do now? What do I do now?”
“Oh,” Hope said. “I see.” She smirked and picked her book back up.
“You see? What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Gen shouted.
Hope snapped her book shut again and stood up. “I
t means that it’s not all about you! I came along to rescue these Realms because it needed to be done! Because these fairies needed our help! Not because it turned me into some kind of hero!”
“I’m not–”
“Oh, yes, you are!” Hope shouted back. “You told me before how much it meant to you to be important. That you were so ordinary back in your human world. You think the only thing that makes you special is that you brought back some Realms that another fairy sent away? I can’t imagine what you’d think of me, then! You think the only reason I’m with you is because you’re this big hero? Or maybe that you’re immortal now and I just have to be near you to bring meaning to my own life? How dare you? Do you know what this all means? You know what it means that you’re so fucking special? It means that I’m going to get old and wither away and you won’t. It means that sooner or later, I’ll have to stop traipsing around the world and you won’t! What happens to me then? What happens to me when you’re off being special and important and I’m old and sick and bedridden?”
Gen looked at the floor. “I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m sorry.”
“You don’t get to do that, either!” Hope’s voice was fiery, full of anger. “Don’t be sorry you said something. If you want to be sorry about something, be sorry you felt it to begin with! I do want to hear what’s on your mind. I do want to know about the things you worry about. But this is ridiculous. You’re worried that you won’t be special anymore because you aren’t off on some important adventure? Please.”
Gen didn’t say anything. She kept her eyes on her feet.
Hope made a frustrated sound, threw her book on the sofa, and stormed off to the bedroom. She shouted back at Gen, “And stir the fucking soup!” Then she slammed the door.
Gen flopped onto the sofa and cried. She picked up the book Hope was reading. Ivy had never gotten around to reading it. Gen placed the book carefully on the floor and curled up on the sofa, feeling miserable and very alone.
-
Shae gently shook Gen. Gen opened her eyes, then sat up and stretched. She yawned and rubbed her eyes.
“I guess I fell asleep,” Gen said. Then she looked at the heatstone. “Oh, no. I forgot the soup!”
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