Guardian Angel (Psionic Pentalogy Book 5)

by Adrian Howell

  “Why?”

  “I just can’t.”

  “Then you’re not going to stop?”

  “No, Alia, I’m not,” I said resolutely. But then my voice faltered as I added, “I just don’t know how I’m going to go on.”

  Gazing into my eyes, Alia suggested gently, “How about with the truth?”

  “Truth?” I asked, bewildered.

  Alia nodded solemnly. “You hate calling Cat your sister, Addy, but inside, you know that she is.”

  Of course I knew. That was the problem. “Please don’t call her that,” I said, shaking my head. “I can’t do this if I see her that way.”

  “It doesn’t matter how you see her,” argued Alia. “She’s still your sister. You can’t escape that.”

  “She’s Queen Divine, Alia!” I said forcefully. “She’s not my sister!”

  “Yes she is, Adrian!” Alia shot back furiously. “You know she is!”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  Alia took my hand as she said soothingly, “Just admit to yourself what you’re doing, Addy. She’s not Queen Divine to you. She’s not Catherine Divine. She’s not even Catherine Howell. She’s Cat. She’s your sister. You love her as much as I love you. You can try all you want, but you can’t escape the truth. Stop trying to fool yourself. It never works anyway.”

  “You really have grown, haven’t you?” I said in wonder as I once again saw Cindy Gifford standing before me.

  Alia smiled. “Just try it, Addy.”

  “I am trying to kill my sister,” I whispered, looking up at the last stars in the dawn sky. And then, more loudly, “I am trying to find and kill Cat.”

  “Say it again, Addy.”

  I did. “I am trying to kill Cat.”

  “Again.”

  I said it again and again, over and over, louder and louder. And as I did, I felt as if the poison I had been force-feeding myself ever since I left the Historian’s mountain was finally beginning to leave my blood. There was no release from the guilt of my vow. But Alia was right: I did breathe just a little easier. It was the most horrible truth that I could ever say. But at least it was the truth.

  I heard Terry ask from behind me, “Does that mean this mission isn’t over yet?”

  I turned around and saw her standing at the door with Ed Regis.

  “It’s not over,” I confirmed. “We’re still going after Div… I mean, we’re still going after Cat. I promised the Historian and I promised myself that I would never stop hunting my sister. And I won’t. As long as we’re both alive, this doesn’t end.”

  “And can you kill her?” asked Ed Regis. “Or at least stand by and let one of us do it?”

  I glanced at Alia. She gave me a little nod and whispered into my head, “Truth, Addy.”

  “No, Ed Regis,” I replied. “I can’t kill her. And I can’t let you or Terry or anyone else do it either.”

  Ed Regis frowned. “Then you’re hoping that our mission will fail.”

  “No,” I said again, “I am not. I will do anything and everything I can to find and kill Cat.”

  “That sounds very much like a paradox.”

  I gave him a wry smile. “Try living it.”

  If Ed Regis found my position paradoxical, I could only agree. But just because I didn’t have it in me to do something didn’t excuse me from doing it. My first sister still had to die, and I owed it to her to end her life myself. Cat was once my master, but she was always my family, and you never turn your back on family. Failure would be just as much a betrayal as success, and I couldn’t allow either.

  Terry gave me a grim look, asking, “Then what happens if, by some unhappy miracle, we actually do find her?”

  “How are we supposed to kill her, Adrian?” added Ed Regis. “Over your dead body?”

  “If it comes to that,” I said evenly. “But one thing at a time. We still have to find her.”

  Chapter 15: The Tipping Point

  Alia went upstairs to check on Marion. She wanted to be there when the poor kid woke.

  Back in the comparative warmth of the living room, I asked Terry and Ed Regis, “So, what do we do now?”

  “We might as well just leave Raider where he is,” said Terry. “Someone will find the body sooner or later anyway, and I’d rather get back on the road before the hiding bubble around the van fades completely. Who knows how many days we’ll get before Randal Divine discovers that we’re not being taken to the Royal Gate.”

  “But where are we going to go?” I asked.

  “We could try returning to Lumina,” said Terry.

  “That would be dangerous,” warned Ed Regis. “Even if we could somehow get to our assigned safe house, the Seraphim will double their patrols and S&Ds after yesterday’s attack. There’s also a good chance that the information from Raider’s mapping mission, however incomplete, will be used against the Resistance before long.”

  “That’s assuming Raider had been giving periodic updates to Randal Divine,” said Terry, “which, admittedly, is possible.”

  “We should consider the worst-case scenario and warn the Resistance quickly,” said Ed Regis, “but from outside of Lumina. We can’t risk capture ourselves.”

  “To the Council, then?” suggested Terry. “If we could get to the nearest Guardian settlement, we could probably contact the Council from there.”

  “That might be best,” agreed Ed Regis.

  Personally, I didn’t fancy the idea of taking Marion with us to a Guardian settlement. Her mother was still a converted Angel, and I couldn’t imagine the Guardians not using Marion against her if they found out. Still, I kept my opinion to myself. As always, the mission specifics were best left to the experts.

  “Adrian,” Terry said suddenly, “what do you think we should do?”

  I looked at her in surprise. “What are you asking me for? You’ve always steered this boat.”

  “True,” said Terry. “Just not in the right direction.”

  “Tiffy – I mean Terry,” I said uncomfortably, “you’re the leader.”

  “Then as the leader,” Terry said with a touch of exasperation in her voice, “I’m asking you for your opinion, Adrian.”

  “I don’t know,” I said stupidly. “Personally, I’d rather return to Wood-claw than go to some random Guardian settlement. At least at Wood-claw they’d trust us and we can trust them too.”

  “You may have a point,” said Ed Regis. “If we just show up unannounced at a Guardian settlement, it could take some time to earn their trust. Besides, Wood-claw isn’t that much farther than the nearest outpost that we know of.”

  “I suppose there’s some sense to that,” agreed Terry. “That way Harding could contact the Resistance directly. And she might even remember her promise to fund our mission.”

  Nobody would say it out loud, but I think we all just wanted a break, a chance to regain a little sanity.

  “Let’s get going,” said Ed Regis. “We need to warn the Resistance before Randal Divine realizes that Raider has been compromised.”

  As Terry and Ed Regis quickly searched the house for things we might be able to use on the road, I went upstairs to find Alia and have her wake Marion.

  When I entered the room, Alia was sitting on the edge of Marion’s bed, blankly staring off into space. I wasn’t sure if she was focused enough to hear my words, so I said nothing for a while. Eventually, Alia turned her head and looked at me. “Willow’s baby,” she said in a monotone. “Do you think it was a girl or a boy?”

  “I don’t know,” I whispered. “Willow thought it was a boy. She’s probably right.”

  Alia looked out the window. “All those people died so quickly.”

  “Don’t do this to yourself, Alia,” I said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “This is a war. It’s nobody’s fault.”

  Alia didn’t reply, her eyes fixed on the dawn sky.

  “Come on,” I said gently. “Give yourself a break. Just this once.”

  Alia took a minut
e more to breathe. Then she looked up at me again, saying quietly, “I just wish people would stop hurting each other.”

  “One way or another, it’ll be over soon,” I assured her. “Wake Marion up and put her in the van.”

  “What should I tell her happened to her father?”

  “What have you told her so far?”

  “Just that he was having an argument with you and Terry,” said Alia. “And that everything was going to be okay in the end.”

  “Good,” I said, nodding. “Then tell her that Raider returned to Lumina by himself.”

  “I don’t like lying.”

  I shrugged. “Tell her the truth if you want. Just wake her up and get her ready. We’ve got a long road ahead.”

  Ed Regis and Terry came up with next to nothing in their search: no money, no weapons and no spare gasoline.

  Not surprisingly, the refrigerator was empty, but there were some cans and pickle jars in the pantry, and we took those to the van. In the bedrooms, we found some spare clothes. It was mostly summer stuff, but at least it was clean. Terry didn’t want to show Marion the blood on her shirt.

  We filed quietly into Raider’s van. Ed Regis took the driver’s seat while the rest of us hid in the back behind the tinted windows. Marion, looking a bit dazed, remained silent, sticking close to Alia in the back seat as Ed Regis pulled the van back onto the empty country road.

  For most of that day, we rode in silence.

  Alia said nothing more about the fall of the command center, so no one else brought it up either. I was sure that she still felt responsible for the deaths of those Resistance Knights, including Willow’s unborn child, but there was nothing more I could say to comfort her. If we were still alive when the war ended, we would have plenty of time to mourn.

  Marion also talked very little. When she did, she spoke in whispers, and mostly to Alia. To keep his cover intact, Raider had lied as convincingly to Marion as he had to the Guardians. Marion never suspected that her father had been an Angel Seraph. Outwardly, she seemed to accept our claim that Raider had returned to the Resistance alone, leaving her in our care until things cooled down. Marion had heard her father screaming in the basement, so no doubt she suspected foul play, but either afraid or simply unwilling, she didn’t question our story.

  We had come from Wood-claw by air, but we were returning by road, which would take considerably longer. Once in Wood-claw’s city, we would have to wait for pickup by Scott and company. I wondered how long we really had before Randal Divine discovered that Raider had failed to deliver us. How much time did we have before the hunt for Adrian Howell resumed?

  Ed Regis figured that we had just enough cash, taken from Raider’s wallet, to get us back to Wood-claw. He kept Raider’s pistol, which had a full clip and was our only weapon aside from Terry’s and my psionics.

  But Raider’s van, with its cracked rear windshield, was a dead giveaway. At the first small town we came to, with Terry’s help, Ed Regis acquired something less conspicuous: a dusty four-door dark brown SUV that, though I won’t bother with the details, was guaranteed not to be reported stolen for at least a week.

  No longer concealed by Raider’s hiding bubble, Terry, Alia and I went back to using metal draining to hide our psionic presence as best we could.

  “This draining really is a pain in the neck,” admitted Terry when she realized that she had to stay in the car as Ed Regis did our food shopping for us.

  Terry and I took turns driving when we were in the countryside, and Ed Regis took the wheel whenever we passed through anywhere populated. But whether by luck or by the order of Randal Divine, we met no obstacles on the road.

  It was a race against the clock and we didn’t stop for the night. By midnight, we were already on the last, long stretch to Wood-claw’s city. Terry was at the wheel, and I was sitting next to her and keeping her company as Ed Regis, Alia and Marion slept in the back.

  “We’re making good time,” said Terry, using her hook to steer the SUV around a gentle curve in the road. “We might even be in Wood-claw for breakfast tomorrow.”

  Sitting beside her, I had been lost in my dismal thoughts as I watched the dark gray countryside drifting by. I turned to her and smiled. “It’d be nice to have a normal breakfast for a change.”

  “Agreed, but you know we can’t stay in Wood-claw for very long. We need to find that Royal Gate somehow.”

  Terry had said that more than once on the road so far. But “somehow” wasn’t a proven method for finding something.

  “I sure hope Mrs. Harding can help,” I said. It wasn’t the first time I had said this either, but it was the only response I could give.

  Terry wasn’t just making conversation, though.

  “If the Council really had heard of the Royal Gate,” she continued, “and if they knew where it was, then they would have hit it by now. They probably don’t even know of its existence. We can ask, but don’t expect a miracle.”

  “I never ask for miracles,” I informed her.

  “We may need one before long, Adrian,” said Terry. “Ever since the Meridian folded, our allies are disappearing fast and quiet. Even if the Resistance and the Council don’t surrender, it won’t matter soon.”

  I knew that. “What’s your point?”

  Terry kept her eyes on the road as she said quietly, “Maybe it’s time to try something crazy.”

  “Such as?”

  “Not everyone fighting the Angels is allied with the Guardians. If our friends can’t help, then maybe our enemies can.”

  I was usually the one to come up with the wild ideas, but it still took a moment before I fully understood what Terry was suggesting.

  “No,” I said flatly.

  “They may not be psionic, Adrian, but they’re the biggest faction left,” argued Terry. “They have a fairly extensive information network. Maybe not as complete as the Guardians’, but that’s precisely the point. They could have stumbled across something that they themselves don’t fully understand.”

  “You really want to ask the God-slayers for help?” I asked incredulously. “You’re insane.”

  Terry seemed to smile. “Then I’m in good company.”

  “I’m not going to beg the Slayers for anything, Terry. Not ever.”

  “Why not?” scoffed Terry. “You made nice with the Wolves, didn’t you?”

  “The Wolves are soldiers!” I countered vehemently. “The Slayers are just psychopaths.”

  “Well-funded and dedicated psychopaths,” said Terry. “And their cause is not that different from ours anymore. If we offered them the chance to kill the world’s last master controller, I’ll bet they’d help us.”

  “No.”

  “A master controller, Adrian! You think they wouldn’t side with us for that? Come on, it’s not like you have any real principles left to break anyway.”

  I glared at her. “Have you forgotten what they did to me?”

  “Have you forgotten what we did to them?” Terry replied evenly.

  I looked away. My slightly sunken, mismatching eyes reflected in the window stared back at me.

  “Let’s at least try our luck with the Council first,” I said wearily.

  “Of course,” Terry replied with an air of victory. “I was just considering options.”

  “You mean you were testing my resolve,” I said dryly, finally realizing that she had set me up. “You really think I want this mission to fail, don’t you?”

  “I didn’t say that,” said Terry. “I’m just worried about you.”

  “Well, don’t worry,” I said. “I still know how to kill people.”

  “I hope that’s true.”

  Ever since returning from the Historian’s mountain, my mission rules had been pretty straightforward: One, kill the Angel master. Two, don’t get converted. Three, save Cindy. Four, return Alia. And five, if at all possible, get through this alive. But my inability to kill Raider, the Historian’s dream and Alia’s insistence on truth had forc
ed me to acknowledge that I had one more rule: Don’t kill Cat. This one had also been there from the start.

  No, I didn’t want our mission to fail, but nor could I allow it to succeed. And I still had no idea what would really happen if I came face to face with my first sister like this. So, in short, yes, Terry was right to be concerned.

  Even so, I felt incredibly stupid for stepping into her little trap. But if Terry thought that it was okay to challenge my commitment by bringing up something as painful to me as the God-slayers, then I was going to have my say too.

  “Now you tell me something, Terry,” I breathed. “What really happened back in the command center?”

  “What do you mean?” asked Terry. She tried to make it sound innocent, but I could tell that she was bracing herself.

  “You’ve been itching for a battle all last year,” I said. “I know you wished you were on that Wolf plane with us. And I’ve never seen you miss an opportunity to kill some Angels.”

  “What happened in Nonus wasn’t an opportunity, Adrian,” Terry said stiffly. “It was a deathtrap. If we hadn’t retreated, we would have all died in there. Every last one of us.”

  “Still, that was a pretty quick retreat.”

  Terry shook her head. “When Mark led us to the trapdoor, I thought you were right behind us. I was so sure you had heard James and me calling. We were both yelling like crazy. But when we got down to the twentieth, you weren’t there.”

  “So why didn’t you come back? Why did you send James?”

  “Are you questioning my honor?!” snapped Terry.

  “I’m just curious, Terry,” I said in a monotone. “You gave your gun to James and sent him back in.”

  “Because he insisted! Because he wanted to prove something, and…”

  “Terry!”

  Suddenly Terry pulled the SUV to the side of the road. “You want to know what really happened?” she asked, her voice quivering. “The truth? The truth is that I froze up. I was scared, alright?! It was just a second, but James saw it. He told me to give him my gun, and I did.”

  I nodded silently.

  Terry looked away as she mumbled, “I tried to justify it by thinking it was a firefight, not a brawl, and since James had two hands to use two guns, he had a better chance. But that’s just stupid. You’re right, Adrian. I should have gone back in with him.”