Noru 4: When Angels Break (The Noru Series, Book 4)

by Lola StVil

The fact is, East has gotten so much better at flying. He has been able to make it halfway around the world. I spoke to his instructor and was told he was a natural. In order to both reward and torment him, I put a gold-star sticker on his wing. It was just a joke, but by the end of the day, the team had placed stickers all over East’s body without him noticing. It drove him nuts. It was awesome.

  East is also learning to hone his empath skills. Although it drives us crazy knowing he can tell what we’re feeling, we all try to be supportive as he struggles to control it. Sometimes he’s great at it, and other times, we find our feelings on display for the whole house to see.

  Although East’s powers can be a pain, I’m glad to know what Randy was thinking that day in school. I thought he was okay with everything, but I was wrong. So now, as we play games, I take the chance to reassure him yet again that I will never hurt him. I think he gets it, yet I can’t be certain.

  “Pry, I know you will protect me. East was wrong about how I feel. I’m not scared,” he lies.

  I don’t argue, because I think Randy needs to keep saying that in order to try to believe it. Instead, I focus on our friendship. It’s been forever since we just hung out together. Maybe doing more human stuff will get him to forget all the other things we have to deal with.

  Like finding the vial before Malakaro does.

  We’ve had some leads as to where the vial might be, but none of them have panned out. So for now, we’re stuck trying to convince the Face to let us in on where the vial is located. She says she doesn’t know, but that she’ll ask the board to share what they know with us.

  However, she will only do that if we promise to go to school and not skip classes. In the end, I’m sure we will have to find a way around the board, but for now, we play along.

  “Okay, I’m going downstairs to get us some snacks, and when I come back, be prepared to get your ass handed to you!” I promise Randy as I run down the steps.

  In the middle of the living room, I find East and Aaden in the middle of a conversation. Judging by his stance, Easton is less than willing to participate.

  “Easton, c’mon, man, what is it?” Aaden pushes.

  “These new powers I have…I don’t know how to control them fully. Well, at least not yet. Sometimes I pick up things that I don’t mean to. Things I wish I didn’t.”

  “East, what are you picking up?” Aaden pushes.

  “Whenever Diana walks into the room and you and Pry are holding hands or showing any kind of affection towards each other, I pick up sadness and confusion. And I mean big time.”

  “Yeah, I can see that. Diana and I have a long history and she still feels—”

  “Diana isn’t the one whose feelings I’m picking up. It’s Sparks.”

  “What? Are you sure?” he asks.

  “Yeah. It’s been going on for a while now.”

  “How do you know for sure it’s my daughter’s feelings and not her mother’s?”

  “While two beings can feel the same way, each one has a different…signature.”

  “East, are you saying that Sparks doesn’t like Pryor?”

  “No, she loves her. When Pry enters the room alone, Sparks is happy. What I’m saying is she isn’t a big fan of you and Pry entering together. Or doing anything else together, for that matter.”

  “She’s just a kid. She doesn’t understand that Pry and I are together.”

  “The girl turned on all the lights in North America. I think she can put two and two together.”

  “No, she can’t feel that way. If she did, Diana would have told me.”

  “If you say so.”

  “East, do you really pick that up from Sparks?”

  “She sees you and Pry, and yeah, she’s sad and she’s mixed-up and very upset.”

  “Okay…I guess I have to try to explain it to her, then.”

  “I’m just gonna say this and hope you don’t set me on fire.”

  “Okay…”

  “Why aren’t you and Diana together?”

  “What? You know why. I’m with Pry.”

  “Hey, I love Pry, but you have Sparks to think about. I know what your daughter feels because I’ve been there before. Sparks wants a family, and she deserves that.”

  “We are a family. It’s just not…traditional, but that doesn’t mean it won’t work,” Aaden argues.

  “Whatever you say, but every time she sees you with someone who isn’t her mom, her heart breaks a little.”

  “Hey, are you guys ready to go?” Diana asks as she enters the room.

  “Yeah, I’m all set,” East replies.

  Aaden asks Diana to stay behind for a few moments so they can talk. East steps away and Aaden asks if Sparks is awake. When the light in the room doesn’t turn on, they know their daughter is fast asleep.

  “What’s wrong?” Diana asks.

  “East thinks Sparks is hurt and confused by me being with Pry. Is that true?” Aaden asks.

  “Argh! That boy really needs to gain control of his powers.”

  “Diana, is that true?”

  “Yes.”

  “What? Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Because I didn’t want it to seem like a ‘Ruin-plots-to-get-Silver’ scene. I know that’s what everyone will think.”

  “You should have told me that my child was hurting, Diana!”

  “Our child, and she is going to have to deal with you and Pryor being together. We all do.”

  “How upset is she?”

  “Silver, if she doesn’t get to stay up to see the sun rise, she gets upset. If I won’t drink the liquid ‘giggle’ flavor juice she likes, she gets upset. She’s a baby. They want everything their way. And sooner or later she will learn she can’t have everything she wants. When she’s born, which will be soon, we can sit her down and talk to her.”

  “No, I want to talk to her now.”

  “And what are you going to say?”

  “I don’t know. I just know that my child is in pain, and I need to make it stop.”

  “I get it; believe me. But you can’t take this hurt away.”

  “I can fix it. I can make it better.”

  “How?”

  “I’ll explain to her that we love her and that sometimes moms and dads aren’t together.”

  “One day, she’ll have more powers than most angels we know, but right now, she’s just a little girl. She won’t get it.”

  “How do you know?” Aaden demands.

  “Because sometimes, I don’t get it either.”

  Aaden, deflated and deep in thought, leans against the wall for support. Diana thinks to herself and takes Aaden’s hand.

  “You’re a good dad. You love her and you’re there for her. That already makes her the luckiest Noru in the world. But I’m learning we can’t give her everything. We can just give her what we have and hope it’s enough.”

  “Have you told him you overheard what East said about Sparks?” Randy asks.

  “Yeah, I offered to talk to her with him, but he said he wanted to do it alone,” I reply as I scour the party, looking for Aaden.

  It’s two weeks later, and Easton is done with flight school. We can now make it across the world and back in no time. So, in order to celebrate all his hard work, we have a small get-together at an angel bar in Chicago.

  Since the ball was such a disaster, we decided to keep things very small and very casual. There’s no more than two dozen angels and Quo at the bar. The music is good, the Coy is endless, and the spirits are generally high. I told Randy about what East felt when he tapped into Sparks, and now he thinks I better talk to Aaden about it.

  “You know as well as I do that you need to talk to Aaden. Find out where his head is,” Randy pushes.

  “You should talk. It’s been forever and you still have yet to tell Key how you feel,” I remind him.

  “And you haven’t pushed Swoop to tell you who her ex-boyfriend was.”

  “Okay, okay, you win.”

  �
��Ha!” Randy says.

  “Swoop and Key have talked, and while she didn’t reveal who her ex was, Key is trying to let go of her twin keeping a secret from her. They took East out on the weekend and filled him in on info about his dad…”

  “So…?” Randy asks.

  “So, I see them getting closer, the twins and East, and trying to be a family. Maybe I was wrong to push Swoop to tell us who her ex was. I mean, she says he’s out of the picture; maybe that’s enough. Maybe she’s right and she deserves privacy.”

  “Pry…” he warns.

  “I know, I know; secrets come back and bite us in the ass. But things are better now and not just for Swoop. East is talking to Winter. Granted, he won’t be putting her up for mother of the year, but at least he’s taking her calls. Key has stopped looking at Bex and me with murderous eyes; Diana will meet her daughter in a few weeks. Also, Aaden and I are doing great. Things are working out. Can’t we just leave it at that?” I plead.

  “Yeah, I see your point.”

  “You know, this is Key’s favorite song. Maybe you should ask her to dance?” I suggest.

  “Where would I be able to locate my older brother?” someone asks behind us.

  Randy and I turn and find a tall, gorgeous blonde girl with grey eyes looking back at us. Her designer outfit is conservative and exquisitely tailored. Her diction, like everything else about her, is impeccable.

  Crap.

  “Randy, this is Easton’s younger sister, Madeline,” I announce.

  “Oh, hey! Nice to meet you,” Randy replies.

  She looks down her nose at him and then completely dismisses him by turning her attention over to me.

  “Where is my brother?” she asks again.

  “I don’t know. I’m sure he’s around here somewhere,” I reply.

  Being around Madeline is like swallowing a fireball; it’s hard to stomach. Madeline is as irritating as she is beautiful.

  “So…what’s it like now that your brother is a Noru?” Randy asks, trying to be friendly.

  “You want to go away,” Madeline suggests to Randy.

  Randy isn’t sure why he’s doing what she asks, but there he is, walking away from us. Madeline has the power of suggestion. She can’t use it on powerful angels like the ones on my team or the Paras, but humans are at her mercy.

  “You didn’t have to do that,” I snap.

  “I don’t have time to play nice with humans. I’m here to speak to the Noru who tried to kill my father,” Madeline informs me.

  “Frank was awful to East. He put up with it for as long as he could. You should be helping him get past the sick things your father did to him,” I scold.

  “Easton was an entitled brat. My father put up with his ‘common’ behavior for far too long. Really it’s my mother’s fault. She betrayed my father, yet despite that, he took her bastard in. How does Easton repay him? By attacking him.”

  “Frank is alive; that’s more than he deserves,” I remind her.

  “He may be alive, but he’s in a lot of pain and has months of healing ahead of him.”

  “Yeah, I’m good with that,” I reply.

  She snarls at me, as if she’s about to attack.

  “Bring it on, princess,” I dare her.

  She regains control of herself and goes back to her poised demeanor. “I see my brother across the room.”

  “Fine, go over there. You won’t be missed,” I promise her.

  “Better yet, you can give East a message for me. Tell him that I have not forgotten what he did to my father. And that payback will be swift and brutal.”

  “Madeline, I love your dress. It would break my heart to ruin it. But if you threaten a member of my team again, you will spend all night trying to find a dry cleaner who knows how to remove spinal cord fragments from silk.”

  She glares at me and stomps away. Randy returns, and I fill him in on what he missed.

  “Wow, she’s something,” he replies.

  “Yeah, I’m glad she’s gone. East doesn’t need any drama tonight,” I reply.

  “I agree. Now dance with me so I’ll have a reason to get closer to Key on the dance floor,” Randy says.

  “That’s gonna have to wait. She’s mine tonight,” Aaden says as he pulls me close to him.

  Swoop “kidnaps” Randy and takes him onto the dance floor. Aaden and I join them.

  “You know, we keep meaning to get away, but we never do,” I remind him.

  “I’ll do my best to make that up to you,” he replies as he kisses me tenderly.

  While in his arms, Aaden spins me around so that I am now facing the entrance of the bar, and I look up just in time to see Bex enter. When he does, naturally the room stops to acknowledge him. Yet while the whole party is looking at him, his only focus is me.

  A few days later, Aaden is true to his word and we’re headed out of the country. He takes me to Blue Dove, the series of underground caves in the Ukraine. The one he spoke of the first night we made love. The blue archway does indeed look like a dove’s wings. The stars shining down into the stream at our feet make it look just as magical as he described it to me that night.

  “Aaden, I know you said this place is beautiful, but I never thought it would be this amazing.”

  “I thought you’d like it,” he says as he watches me closely.

  “I’m in love with this place. I know this is ‘your’ place, but can we share it?” I ask.

  “It’s all yours,” he says with a sad smile.

  “I’ve been thinking, with so much going on, if we don’t make time for each other, things could get bad between us. So you and I are going on a mission.”

  “Aren’t we already on one?” he reminds me.

  “Yes, but we’re going on a hidden mission within the mission.”

  “Okay, what’s this ‘hidden’ mission?”

  “It’s called the ‘Silver-Carrot’ mission,” I joke.

  “I see, and what’s the goal?”

  “We have to fight and gain back something that’s been stolen from us—our alone time.”

  “Pry—”

  “Wait, I know it seems like a lost cause since we’re always battling and putting out ‘demon’ fires, but I think we can actually find time to be together and not just once in a while. Ask me how.”

  “How?”

  “Well, since we’re going all over the world anyway, why not make the best of it? Let’s promise that no matter what country we’re in, we’ll sneak in ‘alone time.’ Now, if we’re somewhere awesome like Greece, Paris, or Tokyo, we should be fine.

  “But if we end up somewhere less glamorous, we can seek to find the charm of that place. For example, if we’re ever in Texas, we could swing by the Cadillac ranch. It’s a series of Cadillac cars growing out of the ground. Also, if we’re ever in Kansas, we could stop by a place called Ma Joe’s.”

  “And what’s there?” he asks.

  “The world’s largest ball of rubber bands.”

  “Sounds exciting,” he says, clearly mocking me.

  “Or we could visit a few bed and breakfast—”

  “We don’t eat,” he reminds me.

  “I guess that means we can just focus on the ‘bed’ part,” I tease as I pull him closer to me.

  He laughs at me, and I can’t help but join in. I place my arms around him and lean in to kiss him. When our lips touch, it releases butterflies in my stomach and makes blood rush to my face. The more I kiss him, the more of him I desire. But just as things start to heat up, he pulls away.

  “Can we sit for a second?” he asks.

  “Sure,” I reply as we sit on top of the large rock nearby.

  The light shining from above gives everything an awe-inspiring glow. The cave is filled with the soothing sounds of the gentle stream that runs gently beneath our feet. The surface of the water carries the reflection of a million stars like Aaden said it would. Here, we are closed in. Here, we are far from anything that would seek to destroy us. As of ri
ght now, Aaden and I are the only two beings in the world.

  “Aaden, I know those places sound silly, and we don’t have to go. I just want us to make time for each other. I know it sounds crazy—”

  “They don’t sound crazy, Pry. And I know it’s not about where we go but the fact that we are there together. That’s why I brought you here. I wanted to be with you in this place…”

  “Well, I love it.” I smile as I take his hand in mine.

  I look into his face and find that my angel is troubled.

  “Aaden, what is it?”

  “I talked to Sparks this morning.”

  “Really, how did it go?”

  “She cried.”

  “What? How do you know? I mean…”

  “I was talking to her and grey tears started running down Diana’s face.”

  For some reason, when we’re little, every time we cry, it comes out grey. It doesn’t happen to any other types of angels but us. It stops once we’re older, like ten or so, but until then, grey tears are the norm.

  “It must be hard for her. Do you want to go back? Maybe we can talk to Firebug together? Or maybe she just needs to spend more time with you?” I suggest.

  “Diana and I talked to her, and eventually, she calmed down.”

  “That’s good, right?”

  “Yeah, it is.”

  “Aaden, what’s going on?” I ask.

  “I never thought I would have to say this, and now that I do…I don’t know how,” he admits.

  “Say what?”

  “Pry, you know I love you, right? I mean, I have never loved anyone the way I do you.”

  OMO! He’s going to give me his Rah! That would make us official. That would mean that in the Angel world we are married! Am I ready for that? YES! YES! YES!

  I have dreamed about this day, and now we are here. I hope I don’t scream with glee. That would be so embarrassing. Screw it. I love him, he loves me, and we have gone through way too much for me to care about appearances. I am going to scream without shame.

  “Pryor, you are absolutely the love of my life, and I don’t know what I would do without you.”

  It’s happening! It’s happening! It’s happening!

  “Oh, Aaden…” I whisper as I blush and cover my mouth with the palm of my hand.

  “I have no idea how to do this, so I’m just gonna…say the words,” he replies nervously.