Sentinel of Heaven (34 page)

“Want to watch
me put on the war-paint?” she asked archly.

Leo smiled,
his eyes curious, and sank to his knees on the carpet behind her bench.  He
gazed over her shoulder to meet her eyes in the mirror.

“You look like
a ghost,” he murmured after she’d spread the foundation over her skin.

“We remove
all
the color, so that we can add back only the colors we
want
.”

He made no
other comment but watched silently until she was finished.  The effect was not
far from her natural look; the differences were slight but favorable.

“It's not my
real face,” she admitted.  “It's an idealized version of my face, without
flaws.  I hide my face beneath a mask and recreate my features over it, the way
I want them to look.  Bigger and brighter eyes, fuller lips, perfect skin. 
Everything is heightened; dramatized, even.

“But it makes
people look, and look twice.  It brings forward all physical advantages.  It
makes me striking, and formidable.  It refuses to let me blend into the
background.  Useful, at times.”

“Your body
becomes your weapon,” he mused.

She tilted her
head.  The polished creature in the mirror smiled; her teeth were dazzling
white against the deep red of her lips.  “That may be true of any woman.”

Moira turned
around on the bench to look at him directly.  He studied her for a long moment.

“I respect it,
aesthetically; I respect the effort and care it takes,” Leo answered the
unspoken question, “and I see how it can be useful, in the human world.  But I
do not prefer it to your natural look.”

His lips
pursed sensually.  “That, and it seems like it would be troublesome during
love-making.”

She laughed. 

He wrapped his
arms around her and, in the absence of anywhere else available, kissed the top
of her head affectionately.  “More kisses tonight, when you are back to being
my own valkyrie and not this painted idol.”

“That's a
promise,” she agreed, then sighed.

“What ails my
mate?”

“There is one
thing I don’t have... I never could afford a set of matching jewelry.  Seems a
shame to have the outfit and the makeup but not the accessories.”

His huge white
wings fluttered up behind him, mindful of the ceiling.

“Ahhh,” he
chided her.  “Here it was I thought you sorrowed over something
difficult
.”

Leo released
her to reach into his feathered appendages like a magician performing an
age-old trick made rote by length of use – his hands came back out overflowing
with silver and moonstones.

He spread the
wealth on the carpet and helped her sort it joyfully – from the great pile she
picked three shining bracelets of faceted rainbow moonstones similar to the
pendant he’d made her, two sparkling rings, and a set of French-backed dangle
earrings with three stones each.  When she removed her the silver hoops she
usually wore and put them in, she saw with delight that they were the perfect
length; their motion drew the eye again to her face.

Moonstones
girding my wrists...

Leo gathered
up all the rest – more that she hadn’t seen, anklets and slender belly chains
and shining diadems – and returned them to the portals of his wings.

“Awwww... do
you have to put them all back?”

Leo chuckled
at her and embraced her briefly, body thrumming with desire restrained.  “When
my lady comes home to me tonight I shall decorate all of her naked form with
moonstones, if she wishes.  My queen of moonstones, from head to feet.”

He helped her
into her garments and her socks and boots as smoothly as any squire would arm
and armor his knight, her cane appearing in his hands silently for him to pass
to her.  But when she followed him into the kitchen and saw her bags in his
hands a spike of the morning's unreasoning terror returned.

“Wait,” Moira
said.  He stood silently and watched her face as she puzzled out the
instructions she could only barely discern at the edge of her conscious mind.

“The bags...
my lunch bag and my laptop bag.”

“Yes.  I carry
them to the car for you usually, and put them in the side where I would sit.”

The poignard
of fear again.

“Not today,”
she answered slowly.  “Once I leave I'm probably going to be nervy again... I
don't even know if I'll be able to eat.  If I need something at lunchtime I can
use some of the money you gave me.  And I should have my entire presentation on
my computer at work; I don't need any of the material in my laptop bag for now.”

“That is fine;
I can keep your bags with me here, if it will make you more comfortable.”

The immediate
ease she felt at his agreement confirmed that they were on the right track.  “Yeah,
baby – after the meeting today I'll probably relax.  Once the right people know
what I know, it won't be my problem anymore.  Thank you, angel.”

His eyes were
kind and affectionate; he set the little lunch bag in the fridge and her laptop
bag back in its usual place behind the bedroom door.  “I am glad to help calm
you so easily.  But you will have my feather with you?”

“Yes, of
course.”  The wallet even now was in her back pocket.

“Then there is
no other worry.  Should you require anything at all you can call on me and I
will be there, with arm or wing at your service.”

He shook out
two of her pills for her and handed her the water glass to take them, glancing
with amusement at the red mark her lips left on it.  “It will be well, my love,”
he said as he escorted her to the car, his hands empty.

“If you say it
to me, I believe it.”

Leo opened the
door for her and smiled.

“Then know
that you are still a warrior, no matter what mask you wear.”

The building
was deserted when she pulled into the parking garage.  Moira walked in with her
hands empty except for her cane, decked out from head to toe.

The security
guard was the same young man from Wednesday, who pursed his lips and raised his
eyebrows appreciatively as she badged in.  She sketched him an ironic salute
and sashayed down the hall to the elevator bays.

It was eight
o'clock.  The meeting was at ten AM.

Moira spent a
lot of time fiddling around on her computer and nudging the formatting of her
presentation, trying to make everything just so.  She put a dollar in the
vending machine and got a bottled water that she refilled on the way back each
time from her trips to the restroom.  She stopped at one of the windows on the
floor on the way back from such a trip and gazed out at the city for a long
moment, at the steel and glass that shone in the winter sunlight.

She didn't
have a company laptop so she emailed the presentation to Erica at 9:55 AM, then
picked up the team's projector from the secretary's desk and carried it to the conference
room to begin setting up.

Erica arrived
shortly after, not bothering to speak; she took the cable connector that Moira
offered her with ill grace and plugged it into her own laptop.

“Good morning,
ladies,” Gene said as he came in; giving a brief wave to Erica and a thoughtful
nod at Moira as he slipped his tall frame into one of the old conference room
chairs.  Daniel, the director over Gene's section, was only a minute or so
behind but obviously nursing a Thanksgiving Day hangover; he dimmed the room's
lights to his comfort level and sat down.

“Let's get
started,” Moira said, standing up to lean on her cane.  “Erica – next slide,
please?”

Moira talked
for twenty minutes, quiet and firm, detailing all her projects and cases for
the last half-year.  She took occasional sips of her water bottle, turning her
chair around backwards and leaning her bad leg on it when it wanted to give
out.  Erica looked nowhere but straight ahead at the screen, flipping slides
when told to do so.

She won't
even let me control my own goddamned presentation,
thought Moira. 
Well,
here goes nothing.

“But I'd like
to take a moment now,” she continued smoothly, “and discuss a recent discovery
I've made, regarding a group or entity called the 'Collectors'.”

Erica shifted
in her chair.  Gene met Daniel's puffy eyes; the long fingers of his slender
hand fidgeted with his wedding band.

“Next slide
please.”

And she talked
through it all, everything she had discovered and the lengths to which she had
gone to uncover their dealings.

Two minutes
left in the presentation, Moira got to the last slide.  “Most disturbing to me,
however, was the apparent connection between the Collectors and Molon Labe
Staffing –”

“Molon Labe?”
Daniel seized on the words, running the spade of his palm over his blond
crew-cut.  “I remember that; that was the big government contract four years
ago.  All material from that was ordered destroyed.  Are you telling me you
saved something?”

“Just one
page,” Moira said, writhing inwardly at the puncture of the director's gaze.  “Just
the one I couldn't figure out, until now.”

Daniel bounced
to his feet, his brow creased in anger – but something in his posture almost
seemed relieved. 
He has a reason now,
she realized. 
A real
reason to be upset.

“You've opened
us up, you know.  You've put us in an actionable position by this.  Moira, I
would have expected better from a long-time associate like yourself.”

She drew
herself up, gripping tight to the curve of her cane.  “It's important, sir, and
I'm glad I kept it, because it helps us to see–”

“We see
nothing
.” 
He came around the table towards her, trying to tower over her.  He was only
five foot ten, however; she gave no ground, did not even blink.  She'd been towered
over by far better men than he, in her life – and one quite recently.

“There is
nothing here
to
see,” Daniel fumed.  “I have no idea why you're
wasting our time with this.”

Gene reached
into his suit jacket and pulled out a pack of gum, unwrapping a piece and
putting it in his mouth.

“Don’t you
understand?” Moira pleaded, some small part of her still hoping to convince
them.  “This is the making of a huge criminal organization – possibly an
international crime syndicate.  What motivates the Collectors?  What are they
after?  Why the secrecy?  At best this borders on a RICO case; at worst they
could be plotting a coup or some other type of large-scale terrorist action. 
Someone has to be told – we have to take this to the authorities.”

“We’ll do no
such thing!  I'm done with this,” Daniel said to the room at large.  “I've got
to decide if this breach is a firing offense or if we can retain you after
appropriate disciplinary action has been taken.  I'll have to spend the rest of
my day talking with Legal – thanks a bunch, Moira.”

He yanked open
the conference room door and barreled through it, allowing it to slam behind
him.  Gene exhaled and stood slowly to his feet, slipping the gum wrapper into
his pants pocket.

“Well, this
has been... eye-opening, let me tell you,” he murmured in his deep cultured
voice, his tone sarcastic.  “He won't talk to Legal,” he said to Erica.  “I'll
manage him; we’ll keep it contained.  As for you:  you are going to handle
this.  No one needs to hear another word about it.”  Gene breezed out of the
conference room past Moira without another glance in her direction.

She stood
trembling in the shambles of her career, shocked at the abrupt turn of fortune,
of the rages both loud and quiet of the two men.  What the hell happened?  How
could they just shrug this off as if it were meaningless?

Erica shut her
laptop and looked at her with glittering eyes.

“You should
have come to me first about this, Moira – this unauthorized use of company
hours and resources,” she said sweetly.

“You hag,”
Moira answered.

“Because then
I could have told you it was a waste of your time,” Erica continued as if she
hadn't spoken.  “You're not going to go anywhere in this company but out,
without my say-so.  Today's your lucky day though, Moira.  You can save
yourself, your life, your job... with just a few sentences.”

“What on God's
green earth could you possibly want to hear out of me now?”

Erica stood up
to come around to her side of the table.  Moira shuddered with revulsion at
having her so near.

“I want to
know,” she purred, “everything you can tell me about the alien life-form at
your house.”

Moira gaped at
her blankly.

“You call it
'General',” she continued.  Her big fishy lips writhed in a snarl.  “You have
sex with it.”

Moira stepped
back, chin rising as understanding dawned.  Her grip tightened on her white ash
cane.  “How do you...” 

“Don't be that
way,” the other woman said, her expression snapping back to something almost
pleasant by comparison.  “You don't know – you don't realize what you've got. 
You never would have known by yourself.  You're not in a position to see.

“But they'd
told me to examine everyone.  Look for sudden changes in behavior, in
attitude.  New relationships.  New cash or jewelry they didn't have before. 
And then they sent a little watcher to your home. 

“They saw it,
Moira.  They saw you with it.

“And wisely
they brought me in yesterday, very interested to hear everything I could
remember about you.”  Her eyes went to Moira’s necklace again, to the feather
design.  “Very interested indeed.”

“Now's the
time for you to be sensible, Moira.  You can make the both of us a lot of money
here, enough that we can forget all the trouble you've been.

“Just give
them information about the creature... or even better, access to it.”

Millions of
pawns, Moira thought, terror and understanding blooming like black roses inside
her.

“No,” she
growled.  “Never.”

“Give it to
them,” Erica said, sidling closer, “or they'll take you and get it anyway.”

Moira lashed
out with her cane; the older woman moved surprisingly fast and dodged it – but
was unprepared for Moira's left cross follow-up, spreading her nose flat across
her cheeks in a satisfying crunch, knocking her unconscious.  She crumpled to
the floor.

Moira shook
out her knuckles, dizzy only for a second in shock and nausea. 
Got to get
out.  Get out now.

She took
nothing but her cane, going straight from the conference room to the elevator
bays, her blood hammering in her veins.  Twenty floors, even without
interruption, had never before taken such an eternity. 

She was
limping towards the parking garage as fast as she could; she glanced cautiously
around the last corner then flung herself back against the wall out of sight. 
Two men in all black uniforms with SECURITY written on them – and no other
identifying badges or patches – were talking quietly with the regular guard at
the desk.

You're about
to be CLASSIFIED, Moira.

“Shit,” she
breathed.  Caught like a rat in a trap; there was an external door to the
building's front lawn behind her but it had an alarm on it and was only used
during fire drills.  She didn't think she could get to the garage from there
anyway... and Molon Labe had her car already if they'd gotten this far.

Leo.  Leo! 
Call Leo!

Moira darted
into the nearby bathroom – it was one stall only, meant for visitors.  She
could lock the main door to the room for the extra time it'd give her.

She hung her
cane from her arm, digging out her wallet with trembling hands and reaching for
the feather.  “Leo, hear me, baby please – come here, come get me, we have to
get out, we have to go far away,” she was begging it, babbling; as the bond
connected with an almost audible snap she saw him raise his eyes in surprise
from the book in his hands, dropping it carelessly to the floor.

Then space
stretched... and suddenly he was before her, soundlessly here in the building,
filling the tiny bathroom from ceiling to floor.

He wrapped his
arms around her without a word of question and pulled her into the shadow world,
leaving the sonic boom of her body's departure from the office building and the
wreckage of her old life.

 “We can't go
home,” she was sobbing in terror.  “We can't go anywhere near it, you have to
take me far far away.”

Leo's huge
arms crushed her tightly to him in the place that was neither here nor there
and he nodded, changing course.  Other-worldly winds tugged at her hair and
face as new surroundings appeared – a beach at moonless midnight, full of
stars.  The glow of Leo's wings was the only light beside theirs.

He set her on
her feet, moving his hands to cradle her head between them and turn her face
skyward.  She had only a moment to think “Why is it so warm?” before something
that felt like a bolt of lightning shot through her skull between his palms.

Moira let out
one ragged cry and stood panting in the dark, her mind clear and empty like an
infant's.  Leo made soft soothing noises, stroking his thumbs under her eyes to
brush away her tears.  Eventually her tension faded, assisted by Leo's alchemy
in her veins, drawing out the adrenaline and replacing it with a thread of
endorphins.

“Moira,” he
breathed, the only other sound besides the crashing of the waves.

“Yes,” she
answered. 
That is my name.  Moira.

“You were in a
full panic a moment ago.  Something happened to scare you very badly.”

“Oh.”

He took the
wallet out of her limp hands before she dropped it, tapping the feather back
into its hiding spot and folding the black leather to slip it into its proper
place in her back pocket.

“I have locked
away the last few hours of your memory, until we have the space to explore them
together,” he explained, lifting her cane from where it lay on the wet sand.

“Okay.”

“What do you
remember of today?”

“Moonstones.”

He chuckled
and kissed her forehead, then bent to pick her up and carry her to a large flat
rock nearby, scoured clean by sun and wind.  He sat down with her in the
shelter of his arms, her head against his chest.

“This place is
like your vision, with the little boat.”  Her voice had a child-like quality
now, far different from her normal capable tone.

“Mmmhmm, very
like.”

“I remember I
wanted to go to the beach with you.  I wanted that today.  But I thought the
beach would be cold.  Why is it warm?”

“Because this
is not your beach,” he answered tenderly.  He raised his head to watch the wind
that stirred his long steel-colored hair.  “This is a beach half a world away,
in the other hemisphere of your planet.  On this part of the world it is
midsummer.”

“Oh...  Leo?”

“Yes, my love?”

“I don't feel
like I can think right.  Why?”

“What I did
has some temporary side-effects.  They will wear off in a few moments.”

“Why... did
you do what you did?  Take the memories?”

“I did not
take them, my love, only locked them away.  They will return in perhaps two
hours, more or less.  I did this so that you would have safety and room to
think on them logically, without the pressure of the fear that had your mind in
grip.”

She struggled
with the idea for a moment, feeling weak as a kitten.

“Don't you
think... that I could have been afraid... for a reason?”

The angel
smiled faintly.  “My canny queen still, even after such mistreatment.”  His
chest swelled around a huge sigh.  “I think you had reason to be afraid.  I
also think that there is very little on the planet that could effectively harm
you, if you are by my side.  I gain surety of that with every passing moment.”