“Okay, that’s nice and simple actually, for a starting point. No fiddly bits. Okay, now, this is where it gets tricky. You need to…split your focus. I don’t know how to explain it…your body should know what to do - you were born to this life, you just didn’t know it. Your body has forgotten, but soon it’ll remember. In the meantime, we have to help it along. So, keep the majority of your focus on your heart, keep that light in sight.
Now, you need to form a thread between your heart and your head. Wherever is hurting in your head.”
“A thread? A thread of what? Of the light?” Mia asked, her face screwed up in confusion, but her eyes still closed.
“NO!” cried Leonara, making Mia jump “Don’t touch that light, not yet! I…I don’t know how to explain it Mia, I’m not doing it right - maybe we shouldn’t do this” she sounded flustered for the first time since Mia had met her.
“It will be okay, Leonara. Just explain to me how it feels when you heal yourself. How does it feel before you use the light?”
“It feels…” Leonara closed her eyes and replayed the memory of healing her hand “it feels as though a channel opens up. Between the area you want to heal, and the area you are drawing power from. Just like a tube, empty, and waiting for something to pass through it.
“Okay, a tube. I can do that” replied Mia calmly.
In her mind, she pictured the mouth of a pipe near to her heart, and carefully built it from there, all the way up to the top of her head, where the power would flow out and cover her head like water from a hosepipe. She made the pipe a flexible one, more like an artery or a vein than an actual pipe. This seemed to make more sense, to fit better. It felt…right. Mia thought that perhaps Leonara was right. Her body knew how to do these things, it just needed reminding.
“What next?” she asked, her voice sounded surprisingly loud to her, as it rang through the otherwise silent room.
Leonara, who had watched carefully as the girl had built her ‘pipe’, her brow furrowed in concentration, started when the girl spoke.
“Oh…next. Okay, you need to maintain that pipe, keep it open. Make sure it is clear, that the power will be able to flow freely through it.”
Mia quickly did an inspection, and found it to be intact, strong, leak proof and with no blockages. She nodded. “Its fine. Its ready.”
“Right. Maintain that open channel. Now, you need to take a tiny bit of that power from your heart, just the tiniest amount. A thread, no thicker than you would thread through the eye of a needle. Tease it out, away from the heart, like you were unwinding a piece of thread from the spool. Do it slowly Mia, very slowly and gently” she urged, leaning forwards and holding her breath as she watched the girl’s facial expressions as she followed the instructions.
In her mind, Mia did as she was commanded, teasing out a tiny bit of the power. It took a few attempts - she kept pulling as the power swirled around her heart, like flames, almost afraid it would burn her if she touched it. Finally, she grasped a tiny thread, and began to gently stretch it away from the swirling mass of white hot power.
“Okay, I have it.” The strain in her voice surprised her. It took a lot of concentration, and effort, even though this was all only happening in her mind.
“Good. Now, gently, you need to thread that through the pipe, or the channel, or whatever you want to call it. Gently, slowly, thread it through until you reach the other end.”
Mia nodded, and did so. At one point, she cried out as she thought the channel was about to collapse. Leonara lurched forward to grab her, even as she did so not sure how it would help or what she planned to do, but was stopped by Mia’s raised hand. Both were shocked to find Mia had raised her hand at all, since her consciousness and senses were so focused on the task at hand. As Leonara sat down, a small satisfied smile crossed her lips. Mia’s senses were truly waking now. It was happening much more quickly than Leonara had anticipated - but that was a good thing, indeed.
Finally, the end of the power thread peeped out from the other end of the vein, and Mia asked “what now?”
“Now, you let it spread, seep into the areas it is needed. Think of it more as a liquid flow now, than a thread. Let it find it’s own course, and get to where it feels like it should go. It will know what to do. All you need to do now is turn on the tap, then return your attentions to your heart. You will notice the light dim, and that is okay, of course it must dim slightly, for some of the power is leaving it to go to heal you. But you must make sure it does not get too dim. It should always burn very brightly. You heal yourself until either you are healed, or until the power dims to a dangerous level.”
“And what do I do then? How do I stop?”
“As quickly as you can, without it being too jerky, pull the thread back through, as though you’re winding the spool back up again, and let that power in the channel return to your heart. Then simply close the channel, until it is needed again- which hopefully won’t be too soon.”
Again, Mia nodded, and followed the instructions.
She felt and saw the white power seeping from the “hosepipe” that her ‘vein’ had become, and once she was satisfied that all was well, she turned her attentions back to her heart. Leonara was right, it had dimmed - considerably, actually, Mia noted with concern. Still, it burned fiercely. She watched the dancing flames around her heart, until she realized her heart was becoming more visible through them, and was now appearing pinkish in colour, whereas before all she had seen was the whiteness of the bright light. Quickly squashing the wave of panic that reared up, she remembered the instructions, and carefully stopped the flow of power, before retracting the thread. Much more simply than she had constructed it, she simply allowed the vein to melt away, although she could still feel it there, ready to be popped up should she need it.
A little of the brightness had returned to her heart, and her head had a pleasant warmth and buzzing, the healing was working, she knew. As she opened her eyes to meet Leonara’s, there was a smile on her lips. The Angel was beaming back at her, and as Mia stood up and stretched her limbs, as if to prove she was still intact, Leonara clapped her hands with delight, her eyes shining.
“It’s quite easy, once you know how” winked Mia playfully.
She rested for a while, enjoying the pleasantly foggy feeling of her head being healed, and giddy that she herself had managed to do it. After a while, the pleasant feeling wore off, and although her head no longer hurt at all, she somehow became more aware of the other aches throughout her body.
“How soon before I can heal again?” she asked Leonara sullenly, when she was offered the paracetamol bottle in response to her complaints about the aches.
Leonara laughed. “Already forsaking your human remedies? These were good enough for you this morning” she winked, shaking the bottle at Mia playfully.
“Yes, well I know better now, don’t I?” replied Mia, who then stuck her tongue out at Leonara cheekily.
“No more healing, not yet. It is too draining, and you only have your head or your heart to choose between. Your head is freshly healed, and would be better off allowed to stay healed for a while, without any extra burdens being placed on it. And your heart has had enough for one day too. I told you, your heart is not really suitable for healing. It’s far too dangerous. You get too complacent, draw a tiny bit too much power, and its all over. No. Healing.” She tossed the bottle to Mia, who grumpily and grudgingly swallowed two tablets. “Now sleep” said Leonara.
As though it was a command she could not disobey, Mia was asleep within an instant.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
When she awoke, the room was again in darkness. She lay there, trying to figure out how long had passed since she had left her old life behind. She had no idea how long she had been in this room, or even where this room was. Was it early morning? Evening? Late night? She had no idea, and no way to tell. The clock was unplugged again, for some reason, and so the room was in complete blackness.
She knew, somehow, that Leonara
was still there, or at least close by. She turned her thoughts swiftly away from the Angel. For some reason that even she did not know, she didn’t want Leonara to know she was awake. Her bones still ached, and out of curiosity, she did a quick sweep of her body, to see how well she was healing. It was surprising that now she knew what she was looking for, she found that Leonara had been right. There was power throughout her body. She saw it and felt it returning, a dull glow throughout the parts of her that still ached, a more intense glare in the parts that didn’t. Her heart and her head burned fiercely and proudly, and so did her lungs which no longer hurt when she breathed in. She took a deep breath, savouring the feeling of being able to breathe freely. Temptation got the better of her, and she decided to take a little of the power from her lungs to soothe her aching stomach. Leonara need never know. And anyway, it was Mia’s own power that she was using. Surely she should be the one to determine when and how she should use it?
Carefully, she repeated the process she had followed earlier, to heal her head. She constructed a new vein, and gently teased a little power from her lungs and sent it to her stomach. It was more uncomfortable this time, as the power began to seep back into her stomach, and the warming turned to a fiercer blaze. It felt as though she had a bout of food poisoning, and the sensation was making her feel quite sick. She focused on remaining calm, and decided to stop the healing, even though her stomach was not fully healed. It had a better glow now than it had before, and that would help it on it’s way to healing properly. She could not stand focusing on it any longer, the white hot power caused great discomfort there, and the less she focused on it, the less uncomfortable she felt.
She lay in the darkness once the channels were closed and the thread of power had been returned to her lungs, where it belonged. The tingling she felt all over her body, more intense in the areas where the power was almost fully restored, roaring heat in her heart, head and lungs, faded gently away as she turned her mind away from matters of healing and back to the room around her. She listened silently, for any sign that Leonara had stirred, or noticed what she had done. She was sure Leonara was there, but why didn't she speak?
Perhaps she was asleep, Mia mused. She had not thought to ask if Angels sleep and eat, or whether she only did herself so because she was, somehow, part-human. After a few minutes, she was satisfied that Leonara had not seen or known of what she had just done, and she sat up to fluff the pillows on the bed. She turned over, and lay on the cool side of the freshly fluffed pillow, and drifted off to sleep. For the first time since she had left her home, she began to dream almost immediately.
In the chair at the foot of the bed, Leonara sat watching the sleeping girl. She had watched in silence as the girl had healed herself, seen the familiar glow through the sheets, and could not really pinpoint why she hadn’t stopped her. Curiosity, fascination - fear? She did not know. But for some reason, something in her gut told her that she may end up regretting her decision to sit idly by, whilst the child used powers she had been specifically told not to, theoretically unsupervised. Satisfied that the girl was asleep again, she left the room, to report this latest development.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The boy watched the pretty woman leave from his position by the window, where he stood invisible and undetectable to the others in the room. Well, not so much watched her leave as saw her vanish into thin air. It didn’t surprise him at all - he had been Shifting for years now himself. How strange it must look though, to someone who was not used to seeing such things - a person there one moment and gone the next. He turned his attention away from the empty chair, and to the figure of the sleeping girl in the bed. Softly and silently, he crossed the room and stood beside the bed to look down on her sleeping face.
She was just as pretty as he had remembered. Of course he had seen her since the night of the ‘dream’, but not this close. He hadn't dared to get this close, especially since she knew how to access her power now. He reached out to stroke her hair, but pulled his hand back. He didn't want to risk waking her, but something in him had made him want to touch her.. She looked so vulnerable there, so child-like. That the other one would simply leave her here alone, sleeping and defenceless, was unfathomable. Especially since they both knew that others were searching for this girl. That he was searching for this girl. And now he had found her, he didn't really know what to do about it.
He had his orders, they were clear enough. But whether or not he chose to obey them was another matter entirely. It had been simple: recruit her, or neutralize her. And since, as far as they knew, there was no way to take away her powers, the only way to remove her as a threat would be to kill her. As a general rule, Evan had no problem with banishing them - the closest they could come to killing their enemies was to banish their souls. To where, Evan didn't know - or care. And if humans got into the fray, and stood in his way, then yes, they were expendable too.
But something about knowing this girl was like him, made her a special case for him. Although if she insisted upon siding with them, he would, he supposed, have to kill her, as she would be a bigger threat to him than their whole army put together. But knowing all these years that she was out there, trying to find her, finally succeeding and seeing that yes, she was like him, he was not the only one…he wasn't sure if he could kill her. He cursed his own weakness. Emotions. Useless things, a part of humanity that he loathed. His life and his purpose would be so much easier without them. He would be so much better without them. Stronger.
Perhaps it would have been easier if he had not met her. If she was just a name. A face. A target. But he had met her. He had looked into her eyes, and he had tried to help her. To help her. When the whole purpose of breaking through that other one’s pitiful attempt at Truth merging was to get to her while she was weak. He felt angry. Angry at himself. And angry at her, the girl lying in front of him. She was making a fool of him, without even trying. There he went again. His emotions running away with him.
His head snapped up, and he listened in silence. He felt a shiver in the air, heard the faintest, barely audible (even to him) ringing, which meant there was a Truth Shift in progress. He had learned this trick fairly recently, how to pick up on Shifts. It was a great advantage to him. He knew when people were coming or going, and could quickly Shift before they arrived, if he wanted. He hadn't yet figured out how to determine who was coming, but knew that there must be a way.
For now, he could be fairly certain that it was that other one, the one called Leonara. She was, in theory, the only one who could access this room. He snorted softly at the notion of her, a supposedly powerful and wise Angel, had thought that a few parlour tricks he had learned when he was barely out of the cradle would stop him. He quickly swept around to make sure he hadn't left any trace of himself. He must not get complacent. True that the other one would not be able to follow him, or find him, but he would rather she didn't know he had been at all. He did not want her getting her guard up - her lax approach to ‘security’ suited him very well.
He had been foolish to stay last time, after Mia had woken up. He had wanted to see her awake, alive. He had broken the other one’s Influence, and allowed the girl to wake up. He still didn’t know why he had done it. He must make sure that he took no more chances like that one. Now that the girl was accessing her power, even without her mentor's permission - indeed, against her express instructions - he did not want to risk her getting her guard up and taking extra precautions herself. He wasn't sure he would be able to find her again, if she did not want to be found. Another thing he hated about her - she made him doubt himself. In his world, there was no need to doubt himself, he had no equal and he knew it. But here lay another like him, and he had no way of knowing if she was equal to him, or worse - stronger.
As it was, it had been a stroke of pure luck that he had found her so easily this time. She had basically summoned him there, calling to him the way his peers did when they needed him. Of course, she did not know that she had done it a
t the time. And he could not rely on being so lucky again, not now that the one called Leonara was teaching her shielding and control.
The shivering in the air grew more intense, and the ringing grew louder.
“Goodbye Mia. I’ll see you soon” he bent to kiss her on the head, and then stopped, unsure of why he had wanted to do it in the first place. He had never kissed anyone - on the head or anywhere else. What purpose would it have served? He frowned, looking down at her.
He shook his head as if to clear his thoughts, and managed to Shift at almost the exact same moment as Leonara arrived back in the room. She cast a glance around in confusion, sure that she had felt a disturbance as she had arrived.
There was no trace of any power other than that coming from the sleeping girl. After standing perfectly still, listening carefully and using her power to seek out any minute traces that anyone else had been here, she tested the ‘shields’ that she had placed over the room, and found them unbroken. It did not look like anyone, human or otherwise, had even attempted to access the room. That was good - they were still safe. Satisfied, she sat down again in the chair, and waited for the sleeping girl to awaken. She wondered what it was like to sleep, as she sat there in the darkness and silence broken only by the slow, rhythmic breathing of the child. She thought it must be nice, to be able to relax like that. She waited for morning.
Awakening (Children of Angels) Page 11