“You forget who I am, Margaret.” He’s completely unruffled by her sass, charmed by it even. He’s being so patient. He prides himself on his patience. He knows she’s afraid. He’s waiting to see the cracks appear in her calm.
“No,” answers my mother softly. “You forget who I am, Watcher.”
I feel the fear stab through him, immediate and sharp. He’s not frightened of my mom, exactly, but someone else. Two people. I can see them vaguely in his mind, standing in the distance. Two men with snowy white wings. One with bright red hair and blazing blue eyes. The other, blond and golden-skinned and fierce, even though I can’t make out the particulars of his face.
But he’s holding a flaming sword.
“Who are they?” I whisper before I can stop myself.
Sam glances down at me, frowning.
“What did you say?”
He probes my mind again, a momentary pressure, and suddenly it’s as if a door slams between my thoughts and his. His hand drops away from me like I’ve burned him. The second he’s not touching me anymore his thoughts disappear. The anger and sadness are cut in half. I feel like I can move again. I can breathe. I can run.
I don’t think about it. I mash my foot down on his instep—not that that does any damage at all—and then dart forward, straight at my mother. She holds out her hand to me and I grab it. She tugs me behind her but doesn’t let go of my hand.
The Black Wing makes a sound like a growl that has the hairs on the back of my arm standing on end. There’s no mistaking the look on his face. He will destroy us.
He extends his wings. The clouds over us crackle with energy. Mom squeezes my hand.
Close your eyes, she orders without speaking. I don’t know what shocks me more, that she can talk in my head or that she expects me to close my eyes at a moment like this. She doesn’t wait for me to obey. A bright light explodes around us. Wherever its rays touch there’s a hint of color and warmth.
Glory.
The Black Wing instantly retreats, shielding his eyes. His face contorts in pain. For once his expression reflects the way he truly feels, like he’s being eaten up from the inside out.
Don’t look at him. Close your eyes, Mom orders again.
I shut my eyes.
Good girl, comes Mom’s voice in my head again. Now get out your wings.
I can’t. One of them’s broken.
It won’t matter.
I summon my wings. There’s a flash of pain so intense that I gasp and almost open my eyes, but it only lasts a second. Heat sears along my wings, burning through muscle and sinew and bone, and then, like with the cut on my palm, the pain is gone. Not just my wings. The scratches on my arms and face, the bruises, the soreness in my shoulder. It’s all gone. I’m completely healed. Still terrified, but healed. And warm again.
Are we still in hell? I ask Mom.
Yes. I can’t get us back to earth by myself. I’m not that powerful. I need your help.
What do I do?
Think of earth. Think of green and growing things. Flowers, trees. Grass under your feet. Think of the parts you love.
I picture the aspen outside our front window at home, rustling in the breeze, quivering, a thousand little waves of green, translucent leaves moving together like a dance. I remember Dad. Cutting out old credit cards in the shape of razors for me and the two of us shaving on Sunday mornings, dragging the plastic across my face, mimicking him. Meeting his warm gray eyes in the steamy mirror. I think of our house now and the smell of cedar and pine that instantly hits you when you walk in the door. Mom’s infamous coffeecake. Brown sugar melting on my tongue. And Tucker. Standing so close to him that we’re breathing the same air. Tucker.
The ground beneath us trembles but Mom holds me fast.
Perfect. Now open your eyes, she says. But do not let go of my hand.
I blink in the bright light. We’re on earth again, standing almost exactly where we were before, the glory enclosing us like a heavenly force field. I smile. It feels like we’ve been gone for hours, even though I know it’s only been a few minutes. It’s so good to see color. Like I just woke up from a nightmare and everything is back to the way it should be.
“You haven’t won, you know,” says that cold, familiar voice.
My smile fades. Sam is still there, standing back, out of range of the glory, but looking at us cool and composed.
“You can’t hold that forever,” he says.
“We can hold it long enough,” Mom says.
That answer makes him nervous. His eyes scan the sky quickly.
“I don’t have to touch you.” He holds out his hand to us, palm facing up.
Get ready to fly, says Mom in my head.
Smoke drifts up from the Black Wing’s hand. Then a small flame. He stares at Mom. Her grip on me tightens as he turns his hand over and fire drips off of his fingers and onto the forest floor. It catches quickly in the dry brush, moving from the bushes up the trunk of the nearest tree. Sam stands in the middle of the fire completely untouched as great plumes of smoke billow up around him. I know we won’t be so lucky. Then he steps forward out of the sudden wall of smoke and looks at my mother.
“I always thought you were the most beautiful of all the Nephilim,” he says.
“That’s ironic, because I always thought you were the ugliest of all the angels.”
It’s a good line. That I’ll give her.
Black Wings don’t have the best sense of humor, I guess.
Neither of us expect the stream of flame shooting from his hand. The fire strikes Mom in the chest and instantly catches her hair. The glory radiating off us blinks out. The second the glory’s gone, the angel is on us, his hand wrapped around Mom’s throat. He lifts her into the air. Her legs kick helplessly. Her wings flail. I try to pull my hand away from hers so I can fight him but she holds on to me tight. I shriek and beat at him with my free hand, yanking at his arm, but it’s no use.
“No more happy thoughts,” he says. He stares into her eyes sadly. Again I’m filled with his sorrow. He’s sorry to kill her. I see her through his eyes, a memory of her with cropped brown hair, smoking a cigarette, smirking up at him. He has held that image of her in his mind for almost a hundred years. He genuinely believes that he loves her. He loves her but he’s going to strangle her.
Her lips are turning blue. I scream and scream.
Be quiet, comes her voice in my head again, sternly, surprisingly strong for someone who looks like she’s dying right in front of me. The scream fades in my throat. My ears ring with the echoes of it. I swallow painfully.