Angel Fire (6 page)

Alex shook his head, making a
tsk-
ing noise. “What, so you wouldn’t carry a fridge on your lap if we got one? That’s a serious lack of dedication.”

“Yeah, I know. Sorry.”

Crawling inside, we got the sleeping bags zipped together. The ground felt freezing through the nylon floor of the tent. “I don’t need a fridge, but a
heater
would be nice,” I said. My teeth were practically chattering.

Alex grabbed our things from the bike and brought them inside; then he fastened the tent closed, securing us in. “Come here, babe, I’ll keep you warm.”

I smiled; whenever he called me that, I wanted to melt. He drew me to him, and we snuggled together in the softness of the sleeping bags. We were both fully dressed, apart from having kicked our shoes off – it was way too cold to contemplate taking anything else off.

“Promise me it’s warmer in Mexico,” I said, nestling against him. Slowly, I was starting to feel less like an ice cube – and even better, safe, at least for the moment.

“I promise,” murmured Alex. He was lying on his back with his arms around me; one hand had slipped under my T-shirt and was lazily stroking my spine. I could sense how tired he was, now that we’d finally stopped moving. So was I. It felt like a million years had passed since I’d crouched in the Church of Angels cathedral in Denver, trying to stop the Second Wave from arriving. And it hadn’t even been two days.

“Alex?” I whispered.

“Hmm?”

“What are we going to do when we get to Mexico? Do you have any idea where we’re going?” I knew he’d been to Mexico dozens of times; from the sounds of it, he and the other AKs had crossed the border often.

His hand stopped trailing up and down my spine. For a minute I thought he’d fallen asleep; then his voice spoke in the darkness. “I thought we’d go to the Sierra Madre,” he said. “There should be someplace safe there where we can hole up and start trying to recruit other AKs.”

As he said the words, I got a flash of his thoughts: a dense, wild mountain range, full of plummeting canyons and almost unpassable roads. You could hide up there for years and never be found. It was the best possible place to do what we needed to do and still keep me safe; he was sure of it. Even so, I caught a sense of cold dread running beneath the images.

“Alex? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said.

I hesitated, wondering whether to push it. “No, there is. I mean, if you don’t want to tell me, it’s all right, but I can feel it.”

There was a long pause; outside the tent, the wind stirred through the bare bones of the trees. Finally Alex gave a soft laugh. “Okay, I’m still getting used to this psychic girlfriend thing,” he said. “I’m fine, I just...” He sighed. And suddenly I knew, the thought dropping into my head as if it were my own.

“You’re worried about being in charge,” I said in surprise. I rose up, trying to see his face in the darkness. “That’s it, isn’t it?”

The dread flickered again like the tongue of a snake, then faded as if he were making a conscious effort to control it. “It’s nothing,” he said gruffly. “I just saw enough about what it’s like to be a leader when my dad was in charge. I’d rather work on my own, or as part of a team under someone I trust. But, you know...” His chest shifted under me as he shrugged. “That’s not the way it is; we’ve got to train new AKs and I’m the only one who knows how. So I’ll deal with it.”

It didn’t really feel like he was telling me everything, but I let it go – he obviously didn’t want to talk about it. And even though I was psychic, I’d never thought it was okay to go probing around if someone didn’t want me to. I closed Alex’s thoughts away from mine, so that I wouldn’t pick up anything by mistake. We were so close that this happened more and more now when I wasn’t even thinking about it.

“You’ll be great,” I murmured. I kissed his smooth neck. “And I’ll help all I can. Psychic consultant, remember?”

I could almost hear his smile. “Don’t forget mechanic, too. If the Shadow’s anything like the Mustang...”

The Honda Shadow parked outside our tent was over twenty years old; I knew Alex was suspicious of it. “Hey, you leave the Mustang alone,” I said. “It was a complete classic. And Shadows aren’t bad either, you know – for a cheap bike, they’re pretty classic themselves.”

“Why did I know you were going to say that?” The sleeping bags gave a soft rustle as he rolled towards me. It felt much warmer in the tent now; almost cosy.

“I don’t know, maybe because...” My voice trailed off. Alex had taken my hand and was kissing my fingers, one by one. His lips seemed electric, zinging at my nerve endings as if I were an exposed wire. I felt myself go weak as he bit gently at my little finger; then his warm mouth slid down to my palm, pressing against it, and I shivered.

“Let’s stop talking for a while, okay?” he whispered.

That night I had a dream.

I was standing at the top of a high tower, gazing out at what had to be the largest city in the world. It was endless, like something from a science-fiction film. Low mountains crouched on the horizon in every direction; the city crept over them and kept right on going, fading into hazy infinity. Somehow I knew this was in Mexico – and that it was where Alex and I were meant to be. My heart tightened with urgency as I stared at the sea of buildings. We had to come here. We
had
to.

In the middle of the city lay a broad stone space: an immense square, with a cathedral at one end and a long, official-looking building stretching down the side. There was a stage set up near the cathedral, and rock music playing – it thumped through me as thousands danced. Dozens of angels glided over the square, too, like hawks hunting over a field. I took a panicked step backwards. They’d see my aura; they’d know what I was—

The world whirled and shifted; the crowd scene disappeared. Now twelve angels hovered over the city, brighter than any I’d ever seen – like twelve blazing suns that poured light over the concrete buildings below. An ancient, ruthless power connected the twelve; I shuddered as I felt it. The angels started to glow even brighter still, burning my eyes until I had to duck my head away. As I did, they vanished in an explosion that was sensation rather than sound – a shock wave that howled past, knocking me off my feet.

Seamlessly, I was in my angel form, flying from the tower as the screams of a million angels tore through me. But my wings were too heavy. I couldn’t stay aloft; I was falling – I had to hold on tighter, fly harder—

I landed with a bump. Silence, so still and perfect, like cut glass. I was in a park, in my human form again. Soft green grass; palm trees mixed with poplars and cypresses. The twelve angels were gone...but I wasn’t alone.

A boy stood watching me. He was a little older than me, about the same height as Alex, with brown hair that fell in loose curls. A glint of stubble; high cheekbones and strong features – a beautiful face that I knew had been through great pain, yet it held such humour and tenderness that it twisted my heart.

We stared at each other. I had no idea who the boy was, but the thought of ever being without him filled me with despair. The unexpected feeling robbed the breath from my throat, so that at first I couldn’t speak.

“Who are you?” I whispered at last.

In answer, the boy stretched out his hand. “Come,
querida
,” he said softly.

His eyes were urging me to say yes, and part of me wanted to link my fingers through his so badly that it hurt.
No, I’m in love with Alex,
I thought. And then:
But, oh my god, to not be with you – how could I possibly bear it?
I woke up with a start. It was still night-time; I was in the tent, safe in the sleeping bag with Alex asleep beside me. What had all
that
been about? Heart thudding, I pressed against Alex’s bare chest. He shifted in his sleep and pulled me closer; I hugged him hard, feeling almost guilty. Even in a dream, how could I have ever felt that way about someone else?

Especially now. My cheeks heated slightly; I smiled to myself as Alex’s breath stirred my hair. We’d been taking things slowly since we first got together, and then earlier tonight...well, basically we’d both been kicking ourselves that Alex hadn’t made another purchase along with the hair dye and scissors at the drugstore. We’d managed to hold back, though, and meanwhile it had still been just –incredible, and wonderful. I kissed his shoulder, feeling the warm weight of his bare leg looped over mine.

Okay, forget the part about the boy,
I told myself.
That was just the dream disintegrating into weirdness.
But the rest of it...I frowned as I went over the images: the endless city; its huge square pulsing with music and people. Then the twelve fiery angels exploding – the heaviness of my wings, the millions of angels screaming. Remembering it all, urgency tugged at me even stronger than before – along with a cold dread that coiled in my stomach.

The dream was a premonition, I was sure of it. Wherever this city was, Alex and I had to go there.

T
HE ANGEL DRIFTED IN AND
out of consciousness, memory mixing with the now.

He was lying in bed in his chambers; the covers were soft. Sometimes there was the hum of the central heating as it came on, then the faint click as it went off again. Over and over Raziel saw the assassin: the dark-haired youth who stood pointing a gun at him, his arm around the half-angel abomination. The girl’s face was pale, her green eyes wide.

The knowledge that he was the thing’s father had rocked him. But there was no doubt; he’d felt the unmistakable echo of his own energy as their angel selves had fought. Plus she looked almost exactly like Miranda, the young music student he’d once enjoyed – though nothing like him, thankfully. Raziel groaned aloud, seeing the assassin again. Next time he would move faster. Next time he would tear the energy forces from them both and watch them crumple into lifeless heaps on the ground...

“Hush, hush,” whispered a voice. A young human woman was there. She stroked his arm, and even in his current state, Raziel found this irritating and wished she would stop. More voices:

“Is he coming out of it yet?”

“No, I don’t think so. I don’t know what to do for him; they’re so different from us...”

The assassin’s finger, pulling the trigger. The searing wrench as the bullet hit his halo. His wings going into flapping, helpless spasm; his body shuddering, closing down in protest – and the
anger
that had seethed through him as he collapsed to the floor and the world turned black. The Second Wave was arriving, and instead of being there to greet them and show off his status in this world, he’d been brought down by the very assassin whose life he’d so stupidly spared for his own purposes. He’d thought he’d been so clever, using Kylar to kill the angelic traitors, letting him think he was following standard orders from the CIA. Who’d have guessed that the young assassin would have such a mind of his own?

It was a mistake Raziel would soon rectify. Oh, yes; he’d relish every second of it. But it was the girl who incensed him the most – the girl who caused his fists to clench beneath the covers. He’d been told she was dead, and instead she’d had the gall to actually try and stop the Second Wave from arriving.

“Shh,” soothed the woman’s voice. A cool, damp cloth brushed across his forehead. If the girl had succeeded it would have meant death for them all: Paschar’s vision fulfilled. And even though she’d failed, Raziel still burned with humiliation – the entire angel community knew that Willow Fields was the half-angel he’d been trying to find for weeks. They’d know exactly what she’d been trying to do in the cathedral; would know he’d been deceived and nearly bested. It was this that made him long to kill his daughter slowly, listening to her screams. And she felt so
close
now – so infuriatingly close. Raziel’s head turned restlessly on the pillow. He could sense her energy, even though she was hundreds of miles away, in a sleeping bag with the assassin. The knowledge felt fuzzy; he wasn’t sure how he knew it. Why,
why
, hadn’t he managed to kill them both when he had the chance?

“Can’t we at least make him more comfortable?” pleaded the woman. “He seems so distressed.”

“Let’s try this – it’s very mild, but it might help.”

A pinprick of pain in his arm. It did nothing, of course; angels were unaffected by either stimulants or relaxants. Raziel found himself drifting deeper anyway, exhausted by his own thoughts. As he did, other knowledge came to him...the most unwelcome knowledge he could have imagined.

Though individuals, angels were also all linked as if by an invisible web; when one died, they each felt it. Now, with the arrival of the Second Wave, the angelic energy in this world had more than doubled, humming with new life. And at its heart there pulsed a purposeful presence that Raziel recognized all too well.

In his long life he’d only rarely felt fear, but he felt something akin to it now – a jolt of shock and wariness so great that for a moment he almost surfaced back into full consciousness. No one had told him this. It was inconceivable that none of the other angels in this world had known, but the information had not been shared with him. The fact held ominous implications. He hadn’t expected this to happen for several more years at least; he’d thought the Council would wait until the last Wave to make their move, holding reign in the angels’ old world for as long as possible.