Broken Wings (An Angel Eyes Novel)(17)

       
           



       15



Brielle





Helene meets us in the skies, the lake a golden mirror below us. Her auburn hair flies about, red leaves blown on a warm celestial breeze.

"You saw them, then?" Canaan's mind asks.

"I did," she answers. "Did you know they were here?"

"No, I've heard nothing from the Throne Room. You?"

"Nothing. I'd very much like to see Virtue. Is he among them?"

"He is."

Her white gaze travels beyond Canaan's wings. I've never seen her so eager. "Will you join me?"

"I shouldn't. It isn't safe for Jake and Brielle."

"Yes, and they're needed back at the picnic area. I should have told you. The others are ready to go."

"It's not far, Canaan," I say. I can tell they'd like to see their brothers.

"Yeah, we can see the campground now," Jake says. "Drop us here. We'll walk."

"Well, don't actually drop us," I say.

Canaan laughs. "Never."



Jake's right. The walk is short, and we've very little time to discuss the Sabres or their song. But it consumes me. Their precisely crafted wings, violent in their beauty. Their worship-their stunning, sweet-smelling, harmonious worship-fills my mind. The air around me feels generic without it. Manufactured, unrefined. I'm struggling to explain my impressions to Jake when we emerge from the trees and the Terrestrial becomes far more real than I'm ready to deal with.

Olivia's guiding Dad to his truck. The food's been packed away; Delia and Kaylee are nowhere in sight. Our festive picnic area looks forlorn, and my face falls. Seeing the Sabres was an experience I'd never trade, but I suddenly feel bad for abandoning the party.

There's not much time to dwell on that, though.

Dad's further gone than I realized. He stumbles, nearly taking Olivia down with him. Marco catches her and they laugh, but there's nothing funny about it. Marco grabs Dad's other arm, and together they coax his foot up and onto the running board. The sight of their two slight figures hefting my father into his pickup drains the life and light that had blossomed in my chest. My feet are heavy, frozen to the dirt.

But Jake jumps in, taking Olivia's spot and hoisting Dad up and in. With a hand to his chest, Jake holds Dad against the seat while Marco stretches the seat belt across Dad's lap.

Olivia stands with her hands on her hips, her long, dark hair hanging loose.

I hate her.

She did this. Dad was fine until he met her.

I step to her side. "You should have cut him off."

"Me?" She doesn't look nearly as offended as she should. "I hardly know him. But you-where were you?"

I want to slap her. I'd like to say I'm above that, but I'm not. She broke my dad.

I hold out my hand. "Keys."

"I can take him."

"No. You can't." I feel her gaze on me, sharp, like a knife. But I've been stabbed before, and I can handle the threat in her eyes.

"And just how am I getting home?"

"Jake," I ask, walking toward the truck, "will you drive my car, take Marco and Olivia?"

He looks over his shoulder, his expression tender. "Whatever you need."

And he means it. He'll do anything to make this easier for me. There was a time, not long ago, when Dad was that person-the one who made it all better.

Olivia isn't done talking. "What if I don't want to ride with-"

"Then walk." There's a shrill edge to my words, and Dad rouses. His eyes swim in his head, but he's aware enough to notice Jake's hand on his chest. He swats at it.

"Dad!"

He leans past Marco and throws up. Jake sees it coming and tugs me out of the way, his arms the only thing tethering me to sanity.

"I'm so sorry," I tell him.

"Hey," Jake whispers, holding me tight. "It's not a problem."

Tears roll down my face as I look at the wreck Dad has become. When he's done emptying his stomach, I dig a beach towel out of my bag and mop his face, the others looking silently on. I'm ashamed. Of my dad. Of the little amber bottles that have turned him into an idiot. Of the fact that he's turned me-his nineteen-year-old daughter-into his babysitter.

Jake walks me to the driver's side and opens the door for me. "I'll call you tomorrow," he says, lifting me into the cab and closing me in. Dad's snoring surrounds me, loud and obnoxious. My hands shake, but I turn the key in the ignition and leave the lake behind. Dad wakes only once on the drive home. His head rolls toward me; his face is impossible to discern in the darkness, but his hand finds my knee.

"You missed the fireworks," he says.

I rest my hand on top of his, forcing the anger from my voice. "Sorry about that."

But he's snoring again.

It's better that way, actually. I've nothing to say. Nothing kind, anyway. And we did miss the fireworks, Jake and I. A stitch of sadness pierces my heart. It's been two years since I've seen fireworks with Dad. Two years since I've seen fireworks, period.

Then I think of the Sabres and their wings of blade. I think of their song, twisting bright and fragrant, surrounding me. I think of the mountain shining in the darkness, and the Terrestrial veil hanging like a ravaged curtain, the Celestial bleeding into the night.

I didn't miss the fireworks after all.                       
       
           



       16



Jake





Jake's window is open. The scent of sweltering evergreens invades his room, clings to the bedsheets. He's cleared his bed of the books and clothes and sits cross-legged facing the window. The Scriptures lie open on the sill next to a sweating glass of ice water. A secondhand lamp casts an amber glow over the book of Daniel, and Jake's calloused hand thumbs the thick corner of the leather tome as he reads.

Parts of this great book feel intensely personal. A boy separated from his home, from his family. A boy with gifts and integrity. A boy who has something the powers that ruled wanted. A boy thrown to the lions.

But above all, a boy who is a dreamer. Something he has in common with Brielle, which is why Jake is searching the pages tonight.

He's started marking things down so he won't forget, so he can piece this thing together. It's been six days since the first nightmare, three since Independence Day when the Sabres tore through the veil, and Brielle's nightmares have done nothing but grow in intensity. It doesn't matter if she has the halo with her or not, the dream visits every night. The girl in the hallway. Javan and Henry. Three scars marking the girl's arm.

The more Jake thinks about it, the less probable it seems that the Sabres and Brielle's dreams are disconnected. The timing is just too close.

He plays July Fourth over and over again in his mind. The Sabres-the gigantic Sabres-and their killer wings. And then the veil. Torn. It's a thing Jake never thought he'd see, and it was over before he'd had time to really consider the significance.

After the Sabres had broken through, Canaan set him and Brielle down on Bachelor's summit, and they saw with their very human, very Terrestrial eyes just what anyone else would see if they were watching.

The sky was torn. Like a tattered curtain, the veil did very little to hide the Celestial behind it. They saw jagged patches of orange sky where it should have been night. Wings of sharpened daggers flashed through the tear, widening the gap, as the Sabres' worship rose to the Throne Room.

"It's their presence that thins the veil," Canaan said.

But it was their worship that tore it.

Canaan used to tell him stories about the Sabres. Jake's favorite was the one about the great rebellion.

When the Prince of Darkness attempted to overthrow the Creator, it was the Sabres who stood staunchest against him. Canaan said it was the first time their instrumental wings were used as weapons. He'd love to have been there-to have seen the twelve of them unfurling their dagger-like feathers, locking blade into blade, keeping the Prince from the throne he so desired. While most of the ranks lost a third of their own that day, of the twelve, not a single Sabre fell.

But the Prince's rebellion changed their role. Before, their worship of the Creator was a thing never contested, never questioned; now, with thousands and thousands of angels standing in opposition to the light, the Sabres' song became a weapon against the Fallen, their adoration a swift blade that kept the celestial skies free of the rebels. Free of demonic attack against the angels of light.

Their song tore at anything that stood between the Creator and His creation.

They were the sword of God Himself.

But then mankind rebelled too. Darkness blossomed in the one place the Sabres could not fight-in the hearts of the woman and her husband. And the pure light of the Creator's glory became a danger to Adam and Eve. Without the Terrestrial veil, without something to dim the light of the Creator, God's holiness would eventually destroy them.

And God wept at the tragedy of it.

The Sabres were pulled from the surrounding skies. If left to worship freely, their song could tear through the veil, leaving humanity vulnerable to the unfiltered light of the Creator.

This part of the story always saddened Jake. That the veil separated humankind from their heavenly Father. When he was young, it made him cry. But Canaan would take him on his knee and tell him the end-the part of the story that hasn't happened yet.