The Sentinel (12 page)

But then Izri and Clementine were suddenly kneeling before me. I felt sick.

‘Don’t do this, please,’ I whispered. ‘Go and have a life, go enjoy yourselves.’

Go and have the life that I can’t. They ignored me, the words weren’t exactly the same as the ones that Persia used, but they meant the same. The tingling that settled over me after each of them had held my hand was the same. Persia grinned as each one made their pledge.

After it was over, there was silence in the church.

Seth was the first to break it. ‘Wow, I didn’t realise this was a pledge party.’

I went and sat on the window ledge, a million emotions tearing through me, anger, sadness, guilt, responsibility. The silence was deafening again. They all just looked at me expectantly. I looked away across the old graveyard. If I was with my other friends from school right now, some of my normal friends, if I was upset about something, then I would just listen to them chatter about mindless things, films, music, TV, to fill my head with inane stuff and it would help to block out what I was upset about. But, in reality, if I was with my normal friends, I wouldn’t have just heard how I was going to die to save the world, how the world was going to burn, how by rights Seth and I would have got married one day, when we were old enough to realise that the intense friendship we felt for each other was actually love and how that future was no longer possible. If I was with my normal friends, the most they would ever pledge is to lose a few pounds on a new fad diet or they might pledge to buy that new leather jacket in River Island. They certainly wouldn’t be pledging to spend the rest of their lives with me, to guide me, to protect me until one of us dies.

I started biting my nails, something I hadn’t done since I was six. The silence continued. Maybe, once I was strong in the power, maybe if I was a quick learner then that hut in the middle of the Amazonian rainforest wouldn’t be a bad idea. I could learn everything I needed to learn over the next few months and then live out the remainder of my days, surrounded for miles by trees. Persia, her sisters, Seth, Quinn, the Guardians, they could all carry on with their lives, go to university, get good jobs, get married, have children, live by the sea. I would live in a hut by myself, and when the time came, when the earth burned, I would just step out of my little hut and save the world and die and no one would be any the wiser. My friends would feel a rumble, might see the odd storm, but other than that they could carry on with their happy lives. I would die on the floor of the rainforest and a while later some creature would feast on my remains. Everybody’s happy, even the creature.

But I’d miss Seth though. God the thought of not seeing him again, of living the last three or five years of my life without him made me ache inside, not just ache, it was painful. Didn’t I deserve some happiness. If I was going to die to save the world, then couldn’t I have some happiness with Seth for a few years before I died. I could balance a marriage and training. It’d be like going to work, by day I would train and then at night I would come home to my husband. Husband, wow. I’m seventeen years old and I’m thinking of getting married already. Something that definitely wouldn’t have happened to the other me some weeks ago. The other me, the me that didn’t know anything about my destiny, had a whole life mapped out. I was going to go to university and train to be a doctor. The thought of helping people appealed. How ironic. I had thought about marriage, even thought about the dress and where I’d like the reception to take place. But that would come after I’d qualified. Then I was going to get a job in a hospital, maybe as a surgeon. But after a few years I would leave to have children and move to the beach. Maybe work part time in a tiny local hospital. Ok so I wasn’t going to have any of that now, and that was ok, because my friends could, but maybe I could still have the marriage thing, I could do both, get married and save the world.

But then I thought about Seth and how unfair that was to him. I couldn’t ask him to marry someone that was going to die. He loved me so much now, after three years of marriage he’d love me even more. And then he’d just have to stand back and watch me die. Really, I could never tell Seth about that possible future, I could never tell Seth that I loved him too. The best thing for Seth would be for him to fall out of love with me and in love with someone else, someone he could have a long and happy life with. How was it still silent in the church. Oh for goodness sake, somebody say something, please, I screamed to myself.

‘Erm…apparently it’s going to snow again tonight,’ mumbled Mason.

I looked at him in confusion and relief that the silence had finally been broken.

‘Er yes twenty centimetres apparently,’ joined in Caleb.

They knew, they knew I needed the attention diverted away from me for a moment whilst I wrestled with all my emotions, and they were attempting small talk. Guardians attempting small talk. If it had been any other day, I would have laughed. I nodded at Mason with gratitude and he gave me a small smile back.

‘Erm it will mean the roads will be icy tomorrow,’ Eli struggled on with the weather topic. It was almost painful to listen to.

‘I was raised in Australia, its winters like this that I wish I was back there,’ Caleb ventured.

This caught my interest. ‘You were raised in Australia? What on earth made you come to England?’

Caleb frowned slightly and I saw Seth shake his head a fraction but Caleb answered, the most obvious answer in the world. ‘You.’

I let my head fall into my hands. I wasn’t just ruining people’s lives now, I had been ruining people’s lives for the last seventeen years. Until I died, no one could have a normal life. Bring on the end of the world.

I looked back up at the Guardians, at Caleb. ‘Don’t you miss your family?’

He smiled with relief. ‘No Eve, the Deus is not a family orientated species. We’re solitary creatures. Once I was born, my Mum raised me for the first few years. But we grow up and become independent very quickly. I haven’t seen my Mum since I was six. I never knew my Dad.’

‘You’ve been on your own since you were six?’ I was aghast.

‘Many creatures in the animal kingdom live solitary lives. Once they are old enough to fend for themselves they go and live independently, they don’t live in packs, they don’t mate for life, they live on their own. The Deus are no different. Just because we look human, it doesn’t mean we are. I had made my own house in the Australian outback and was living off fish and small mammals by the time I was six. Some Deus prefer to try to blend in with the humans, have proper jobs. The Deus children go to school, but the family role doesn’t change. The Deus mothers just pretend to play the mother role, for appearance sake, there’s certainly no love involved, there’s just two or three Deus living independently in the same house.’

‘Do you have any brothers or sisters?’ I asked.

‘Probably,’ Caleb shrugged. ‘Deus mothers tend to concentrate on bringing up one offspring at a time. Generally brothers and sisters don’t stick together, we prefer to be on our own, there are exceptions,’ he nodded to Eli.

I looked at Eli in confusion.

Eli shrugged. ‘Lucas is my brother.’

I gasped. ‘I didn’t know that.’

‘It doesn’t make a difference,’ said Eli.

‘Isn’t it nice working with your brother?’ I thought about Persia and the close bond she shared with her sisters.

‘Over the years the Deus that are pledged to you and the Oraculum, the Guardians, have learnt to work together, it’s now become…pleasant…’ he clearly struggled with that word. ‘…to have…colleagues…to work with every day. The longer I work with these guys, the easier it is to communicate with them, to understand them. I er appreciate having them around. I see Lucas in the same way.’

‘Do you love them, or care about them at all?’ I asked quietly. I thought about my friendship with Persia and Quinn, I loved them, and then Seth, well that was something else altogether.

‘It’s not really something the Guardians have. Our relationships are not built on love, but of respect. The Guardians that make up your personal guard are great warriors. They are highly skilled and would all die to save you. This I respect. However, over the last few days, I’ve seen the emotional ties you have with Seth, Quinn and Persia and I can understand the importance of these ties. I don’t think the Guardians will ever have that, something that intense, but because we have been exposed to your emotions we have been starting to feel more … attached to each other. I think now, maybe I speak for myself here, but when our commitment to you is done, if it’s done, I imagine we would continue to live together, as a pack.’ Eli looked around at the other Guardians.

Caleb nodded. ‘It’s weird, the thought of living with and working with other Deus was not a pleasant one, but we all agreed to do it, for you. But now it’s hard for me to imagine going back to being solitary again. I think I would be lonely.’

‘Me too,’ said Mason.

I grinned. I couldn’t help myself. One good thing that would come out of all of this, because of me, the Guardians would find friendship. After all this was over, they would still have each other. I liked that. And it had worked; this conversation had put my other worries firmly to the back of my mind. I stood up. ‘Right, come on then Persia, let’s get started.’

She grinned and hugged me.

*

‘Sorry Quinn.’ I sighed as he got smacked in the face by yet another snowball.

I’d had sporadic luck with my training all morning. We had practised speaking telepathically, which I could do quite successfully with Seth, Quinn and Persia as I knew them so well. But I’d had no luck in finding the Guardians minds to communicate with them. I’d practised some more with the weather with varying degrees of success, this time using safe, harmless mist and fog as my weapon of choice and even managed to successfully pull Seth to me. Seeing him land next to me like the air had spat him out was an amazing thing.

But when we tried with the shield again we started to have problems. I could easily form the shield around me, but Persia wanted to challenge me to stretch it over others as well. My visualization didn’t help. As I pictured a bubble around me for my shield, when I imagined stretching the bubble out over my friends it just popped. Poor Quinn was soaked with snowballs as he stood next to me, whilst I was bone dry in my little cocoon of protection. He didn’t mind though. It reminded me again of when he was a dog; enduring patiently everything I threw at him as a child. It was ridiculous. I knew I had the power in me to do it. But my powers were just a mass of colour, light and heat at the moment and I couldn’t focus any of it to really do what I wanted.

Alexandria had come back but Seth had not long been despatched to go and find some soft beanbags for me to practise my skills of telekinesis with after yesterday’s mishap.

As my shield around Quinn popped for what seemed like the tenth time that morning, I let it wink out altogether.

My stomach gurgled hungrily.

‘Maybe you should take a break, get some food and then we can practise some more this afternoon,’ suggested Persia.

‘I’ll take her.’

I turned round to see Lucas walking into the church.

As I left with Lucas, I heard Quinn sigh with relief that his torture would be over. I grinned at him.

‘I’ve had a busy morning, I’ve got lots to tell you. Though I expect you know half of it.’

Lucas didn’t say a word as he got in the car, a dark grey Toyota RAV4. I hadn’t seen this car as part of the Guardian fleet before, but they had so many. He started the car, and it was soon tearing down the lane. I thought I would try my telepathy again. I felt closer to Lucas than I did the others, so maybe that would help. I closed my eyes and visualized Lucas in my head, then imagined a beam of light connecting us. I found him very easily. I was surprised by how sleepy his thoughts were, despite that he didn’t look tired. Maybe he had come to the church before he was fully rested.

‘
Hey Lucas
,’ I said in my head.

‘
Eve?’
said his thoughts.

I opened my eyes and looked at him, driving next to me. He looked as if we hadn’t spoken at all. He almost sounded surprised to hear from me.

I sighed, and then out loud. ‘I met a member of the Oraculum this morning. Well sort of.’

‘The Oraculum was here?’ He looked at me in shock. Eli hadn’t seemed that surprised to see Samuel, so why Lucas was looking so stunned was unclear.

‘Yes, he didn’t seem to think a lot of me.’

He stared at me, licking his lips greedily, then he turned back to face the road, his eyes still wide.

‘
Eve?’
came Lucas in my head again. ‘
You alright?’

This was so weird; it was like having two conversations with the same person. I closed my eyes again. ‘
Yeah I’m fine, are you ok, you seem a bit…weird.’

‘
Yeah just having a few hours rest. What do you mean I seem weird, where are you? Up at the church
?’

I opened my eyes and looked across at Lucas in confusion. He smiled back at me, warily I thought, and then continued focussing on his driving.

‘
Eve
?’ came Lucas in my head.

‘
What do you mean where am I? Is that some kind of joke? Where you taking me to eat anyway, I’m starving. Ooh there’s that new burger place just up here on the left, let’s go there
.’

In my head, I heard Lucas’s heartbeat quicken, could feel the panic surge through him. Something was wrong.

Suddenly Mason appeared in the car between me and Lucas, he elbowed Lucas hard in the face, causing his nose to erupt in a spray of blood and then grabbed the wheel.

‘Mason, what the hell are you doing?’

11. Deception

Lucas punched him back but Mason didn’t even seem to notice.

A deafening bang came from the front of the car and I thought for one sickening moment that we had crashed. But as I looked up I saw Eli on the front of the car, two craters at his feet, where the metal had moulded like clay around him as he landed. He looked livid. He took one step towards us and punched through the windscreen, grabbing Lucas by the throat and dragging him back out the hole he had just created with his fist. He pulled him with such speed and strength, that the seat belt Lucas was wearing tore apart easily.