Guardian (22 page)

“Could he, could he be dead?” I heard myself ask, as though from a distance. Demons fought with Rafael. That meant danger. If Rafael was in danger, he could possibly die. The thought made my blood run cold. “I mean, you can’t just be killed, in a normal sense, can you? You were shot, but you healed in just a few minutes.”

Rafael gave that smile, the one he gave when, in his eyes, I asked something that was silly or something I ought to have already known. “I told you once that we couldn’t set foot in a church, or we would turn to dust. That’s true. What is life threatening to us isn’t the elements, isn’t weapons, nothing like that. We always will heal, our bodies will become whole again. But to us, holy water is like poison. Blessed objects are like a heated brand. Something very important to remember, Lyla, is that unless my body turns to dust, joining the earth once more, I am
not
dead, though I may look it.”

I filed that information away for later, because it seemed extremely important. “So, you don’t think Damian is dead,” I surmised.

“If he is dead, then we face a problem; who or what killed him? Most likely a demon, we can assume. A greater demon. But if he isn’t dead, we face a greater problem: who is keeping him captive, and how do they know about the Fallen and how to restrain them? Damian would have easily been able to break free from any normal means of captivity.”

I sat for a minute, thinking, my mind going over the events of the past two months, trying to piece together all the puzzles I’d always had about Rafael. “When you left, where were you? Where did you go?” I met his gaze, his powerful green-purple eyes meeting mine with a mixture of guilt and sorrow.

“Cleveland, and then Cincinnati. We were following some leads on Damian, which turned out to be dead ends. Matthias didn’t know then how… unique you are, and why I was spending so much time with you, instead of hunting for Damian every second of the day. He forced me to go with him and Daniel and Sara, leaving the rest of the flock here. He thought I was putting us in danger, letting you see so much. And putting you in danger, in case someone saw the connection. He was right, and I convinced myself of that. So I left. I’m so sorry, Lyla.”

“I wondered for a long time if you were really gone,” I said quietly, tracing a scratch in our table. “I felt like I was being watched, somehow, at weird times. I always wondered if you were there, just keeping your distance.”

“If I had been here, I don’t think I would have been able to keep my distance,” Rafael said, in just a whisper.

I took a deep breath and forced myself to meet Rafael’s eyes, to ask the question I had been wondering for the past week, maybe even longer. “When you’re going around, doing these good deeds, cleaning up cities and helping people, do you always find someone who needs your help? Someone who needs you, the way I do, and Colton and Grace? Are you always rescuing someone?”

A frown creased Rafael’s brow, and he drummed his fingers on the table uncomfortably. “Do you mean, wherever I stay for an extended period of time, am I revealing myself to someone and making a friend?”

I shifted in my chair.
I don’t want to be just your friend!
my mind shouted.
I love you!
But the words that came from my lips were, “Yes. I think that’s what I mean. Are you always working on some kind of hands-on project, I guess. The shopping, the cell phones, the fun things I would never have been able to take Colton and Grace to by myself or been able to pay for. It helps with your penance, doesn’t it?”

A look of understanding entered Rafael’s face. “I see,” he said slowly. “You think my reasons for helping you, for rescuing you and being here with you, are all part of my mission to re-enter heaven. That I go around doing it all the time? That’s what you’re asking?”

I nodded uncomfortably, keeping my gaze down at the table, not able to look at Rafael. I hadn’t wanted to ask, but I needed to know the answer.

“Lyla,” Rafael said, gently, a little exasperatedly. It was the self-righteous tone again, and he clearly thought I should know the answer to this. His hand entered my line of vision and calmed my nervously twitching fingers, pressing them to the table. He kept
touching
me, I realized. Ever since he had returned, Rafael had touched me more times than he ever had during the month before he had left. It was unnerving, and I always retained a weird tingling feeling, even when he let go, as though his touch were a live spark that shocked me every time we made contact.

“I have been on this earth for one thousand, eight hundred and eighty-four years,” he continued, and I choked at hearing his age. “And in all that time, my contact with humans has been limited, to say the least. I don’t get close to anyone, I don’t associate with them unless I have to, and I mean
absolutely
have to. In all that time, I have roamed around, seen and come into contact with countless people, but never, never
ever
have I stayed and talked to someone, gotten to know someone, become friends with anyone, the way I have with you. No one has ever known me the way you do. With your faith and just being yourself, you spoke to me and captured me in a way no one else has ever done, in almost two thousand years. Aside from the other Fallen, you are the only, and the best, friend I have ever had.”

I felt a warm, contented glow spread through me, from where our hands were touching all the way to the top of my head and the tips of all my toes. It wasn’t a declaration of love, by any means, but I felt better knowing I was the only one who had ever known Rafael’s secret, who was special enough to be trusted with it. For now, I was satisfied with that.

After I had finished my coffee and cupcake, Rafael asked if I wanted to officially meet the other Fallen, and I eagerly, though nervously, said yes. It took us only five minutes to cross town, and then Rafael was opening the Hummer door for me in the underground parking level of the factory he and the other angels called home. Pausing at the top floor, Rafael drew me out of the stairwell, into the large open room where I had slept only days ago.

“I don’t believe you have formally met all of the others,” Rafael said.

Five angels were in the room, coming cautiously closer as he spoke.

“This is Sara, Orpah, and Joseph. You already met Daniel and Rachel,” Rafael said. “This is Lyla, everyone.”

“Hello,” I said, trying to keep an easy, friendly smile on my face.

“Welcome to our flock,” Rachel said. She was tall and lithe, her skin deeply tan with soft brown eyes. Everything about her was graceful, from her long regal neck to the way her chocolate-colored wings rose and fell slightly with each breath.

I felt Rafael stiffen slightly beside me at her words. “Rachel is not part of our flock,” he muttered in a dark tone. Putting a hand to my back, he propelled me back to the stairwell, where, I idly noticed, the door had been ripped clean off. “Come, Lyla.”

“Do you really call yourselves a flock?” I asked, in the privacy of the stairs. I found it a little amusing.

Rafael looked back at me, bright eyes glinting. “Birds are what we most resemble. Why not call ourselves the same thing?”

“I suppose ‘coven’ wouldn’t really be right,” I mused as we stepped out onto the roof of the building.

“What
is
it with girls and vampires these days?” Rafael groaned.

I could only grin at him. “It’s
in
right now. Someday it will fade.”

“’Flock’ is a better term, since like birds, we are apt to be flying all over the place.”

“Why do you say Rachel isn’t actually one of your flock?” I asked, taking in the view from the top of the building. I could see the freeway, I-670, from here, and a good deal of the Columbus State Community College campus. I could even see the spires of one of the other Catholic churches, St. Patrick’s. I finally turned back to Rafael. “Rachel is a Fallen, isn’t she? But Naomi isn’t.” I frowned suddenly. “How is that possible?”

Rafael sighed. “Rachel was human as well, until about a year and a half ago.”

I could only blink at him. “But then how…”

“Matthias rescued her and Naomi from a car crash. Naomi’s father died three years ago, and Matthias encountered Rachel while we were in Tucson. She was a director at an abortion recovery clinic and therapy organization. We were passing through and happened to help them one week while they were remodeling their new headquarters and moving in. Matthias talked to Rachel twice, maybe three times, and said that was all it took. He fell in love with her. The next day, Rachel and Naomi were in a car crash and Matthias saw it happen. Naomi was all right, but Rachel was dying. She was… mangled. And so without telling her anything, Matthias gave her his light right then and there and changed her into a Fallen.”

My heart leapt in my chest so violently I thought I was having a mini heart attack. “It’s possible,” I said slowly, staring at him, “to be human and
become
an angel?”

“
No
,” Rafael said forcefully, then sighed and sat on the very edge of the building wall, dangerously close to the ten-story drop. “It is possible to be human and become a
Fallen
, Lyla. There’s a difference.”

“But you’re ang-” I began, and he cut me off.

“We are angels in the barest sense of the word,” Rafael said bitterly. “There’s no way of knowing for sure that the life we lead will take us to heaven. Matthias turned Rachel, and thus damned her to this life, taking away a safer and more guaranteed promise of heaven. He not only robbed her of being able to set foot on holy ground, of receiving communion and her old life, but he opened her up to the vices that we are prey to, the dangerous life of fighting demons. Not to mention putting Naomi in a very precarious state, as she is still human.”

“Why didn’t Matthias change her into a Fallen as well? At least to keep her safe, if nothing else?”

“We can’t go around changing people into Fallen willy-nilly, or we would become just as legendary and as badly a kept secret as vampires in those silly books everyone is obsessed with.” Rafael’s tone was condescending. “I told you once that God always forgives, no matter the sin. The other thing, perhaps the only other thing, you can count on with Him is that He understands loneliness. That’s why we have love in the world, why He created Adam, and why He created Eve for Adam. We Fallen roam the earth for millennia, and He knows that many of us fall in and out of flocks, and how short human life can be compared to how long we have been on this earth. So, God gave each of us one extra flame, a light inside our being, which can be shared, changing a human into a Fallen. Into one of us. Matthias used his only light on Rachel, and so Naomi is still human.”

“And none of the other Fallen want to… waste their light on her because then they won’t be able to change the human they may fall in love with.” I caught on instantly.

Rafael didn’t look at me as he replied. “Yes,” he whispered quietly.

His voice sounded ashamed, and I knew Rafael, who always strived to live the best life he could for God and protect everyone around him, was tortured by the fact that he was too selfish to make this sacrifice for Naomi. And I was ashamed because I didn’t want him to either.

“And yet,” I asked hesitantly, “you’ve been traveling the world for nearly two
thousand
years and haven’t found someone to, to share your light with?”

“No, and I never will!”

I stared at him in shock, unnerved by the flagrant show of emotion that simply wasn’t the normal Rafael I knew. He sighed deeply and jerkily ran his fingers through his dark hair, resting his elbows against the low wall surrounding the roof and keeping his face hidden from me.

“It’s so much more complicated than you understand, Lyla,” he said, yet again. “We Fallen wander this earth, with no real promise of salvation. We are tempted every day by Lucifer, have
thousands
of years to just try and be good, not one lifetime. We are starved for the Eucharist, for setting foot on holy ground, and the thing we want most, the presence of God, is the thing we are denied. How could I bear to take that away from someone? Take them from a life where getting into heaven is easier, and bring them into this life? Giving someone my light doesn’t just allow them to live forever and compel people. It opens them up to the choice of Lucifer, of going and serving Satan instead of fighting for a way to heaven. I could never do that, to anyone, especially not someone I claimed to love.”

I was too full of nervous energy to sit still, had to get up and move around because I couldn’t believe Rafael’s attitude toward the incredible life that he had. “How can you even say that?” I demanded. “Rafael, God
always
keeps his promises! You
will
go to heaven when He comes, I’ve seen how devoted you are to Him! And how can you be so, so
depressed
about what you are? You’ve been given the most incredible gift! You can help the world, help people in ways that no human could ever manage! No missionary or priest or anyone could possibly be better equipped than you are! And as for giving someone your light… well, isn’t it
their
choice? Don’t you believe enough in yourself and God to keep them from making the wrong choice?”

Rafael stood up and headed toward the stairs of the warehouse. “It’s time we were leaving,” he told me, a note of finality in his voice.

I sighed and wagged a finger at him. “This conversation isn’t over,” I said warningly.