Broken Wings (9 page)

Elis shaded his eyes and turned. Not
far away, a car door thunked closed.

"Josh?"

"Elis!" Josh crossed into the
headlights, a shadow against the brightness. His steps crunched
over the yellowed grass, until he stopped. "Whoa! Dude, you never
said…What happened?"

"Help me with Nare?" The explanation
could wait.

Elis lifted her into a sitting
position, her white-blue wings limp behind her.

Josh froze in place, staring wide-eyed
at Nare.

"Help, please?"

"Oh. Yeah. Right." Josh blinked and
helped Elis carry her to the car, one of them on each side. Getting
her into the car was another matter, especially with the wings
dragging. Elis folded them close to her. A few feathers had bent or
broken. She'd be upset with him for that, but she was
alive.

In the car, Elis laid her across the
back seat.

"What happened?" Josh closed the back
door and opened the driver door. "Where's Raea? You said she was in
trouble?"

Elis slammed the rear door on his side
and sat in the front passenger seat. He didn't want to talk about
what happened, but Josh probably had hundreds of
questions.

Josh sat down and shut the door.
"Where is she?"

"Gone." Elis swallowed the lump in his
throat. "I wasn't there. I should've been there."

"Where? What's going on?" Josh started
the car, but didn't drive. His eyes by the glow of the dashboard
demanded an explanation. He worried, with good reason.

How could Elis explain it to a human?
He'd explained it to Evelyn, or, rather, Debbie had, but Debbie had
already known about their kind from Padina.

Elis pulled off his gloves.

"No way. That's…just like Raea." Josh
sat back, his eyes staring into the distance.

"She's Inari, not human."

Josh blinked. "Inari? That's what you
call yourselves?"

"We're not from this world. Ours is in
a galaxy far from this."

"Whoa. I mean, WOW! I never thought…"
Josh let the words trail off.

"How about driving?"

"Yeah. I guess that'd be a good
thing." Josh twisted back and glanced at Nare. "What happened to
her?" He backed the car off the approach and onto a gravel road
before turning forward.

"Neutralizer, I'd guess. The Shirukan
didn't want Raea dead…" In a quiet voice, Elis added, "Not
yet."

The sudden stop threw Elis against the
seatbelt. Nare slid on the backseat.

"Wait. Shirukan? Raea dead? What's
going on?" Josh's voice hardened. He cared about Raea. Elis had
seen it many times in Josh's behavior. "You told me once that you
called the fallen angels Shirukan…Oh, God. You were talking about
bad guys from your world. Weren't you?"

"Yes. They're after the crystal shard
she wears. It's called the Starfire, a collective of powerful
entities, but it's only through Keepers that it has any
power."

"Keepers? You lost me at
crystal."

He should have expected this. Josh
deserved an explanation, though. "The Starfire created Keepers five
thousand years ago, because the machine made to use their power was
used as a weapon. It shattered and linked itself to the DNA of
those within the machine known as Heffin's Gate."

Elis took a deep breath
before continuing, because—knowing Josh—he was going to have to
explain anyway. "Twenty-five or six years ago, Shirat Marin was
elected governor of Naviketan. She gained a following among
the
meistal
, the
descendants of Keepers without the Starburst marks—the marks Raea
and I, and Nare, bear. Marin gave them special privileges in return
for their fealty to her. They became known as the Shirukan, the
honored of Shirat. With them, she went after Keepers, and swore to
gather every shard of the Starfire to gain full power over Heffin's
Gate, which would give her complete power over our world, and
others. With it, she could even destroy Earth, our sanctuary." The
speech repeated almost exactly what he'd told Raea in Inari six
weeks ago.

Josh focused on the road ahead.
Sometime during Elis's explanation, he'd made it to the paved road.
"So, like, Raea is Inari and a Crystal Keeper, and now the Shirukan
have her?"

"Yes. I have no way to reach her.
She'll be dead soon, if she…" He blinked back the tears threatening
again. "If she isn't already."

"Don't say that! She'll be back. She
has to." Josh fell silent, his eyes on the road and the town a few
miles away.

Elis wiped his eyes, but the faint
rasping of "Far Away" choked him. The worst song at a time like
that would play. He switched off the radio and pulled his glove on.
Josh said nothing.

They rode to the house in silence.
Elis stared at the quiet sky. No portal formed for him; not a sign
that Raea returned. But why would she? They'd neutralized her. She
wouldn't wake up for hours. Then they'd force her to give up the
shard. He had no way of rescuing her. She was as good as
dead.

Josh parked in the driveway next to
the yellow house. Together, he and Elis carried Nare inside and up
the stairs to the extra bedroom where Evelyn let her
stay.

She would wake up in the
morning.

"Now," Josh said in a quiet
voice after Elis closed the door of the bedroom. "Tell me again.
Raea has wings? What happened to yours? Why are you here? I
mean,
really
here,
on this world. That was you helping people?"

So many questions he didn't want to
answer. Not this. Not now. Elis walked down the stairs to hang up
his coat. Josh followed.

"I appreciate your help tonight." Elis
opened the closet door. Hopefully Josh would take the hint and
leave now.

"Sure. No problem. So, is this what
Raea meant by you teaching her about her homeland?"

"Yes."

Josh stood at the bottom of the
stairs, clearly not intending to leave. "Didn't she
know?"

"No. Padina asked that she grow up
human, and Debbie obeyed that."

"Debbie knows? I mean, she knew all
along?"

Elis grimaced and hung up his coat.
Debbie. He still had to tell her what happened, that he'd failed to
protect Raea.

"And she didn't tell Raea. This is all
just so…like…bizarre. You know? I never thought— I mean, my best
friend is an angel."

"No." Elis closed the door
and turned to face Josh. "We're not
angels
as you think."

"Sure. You said you were from a
different world. So you're, like, aliens. But you look
so…"

"Human?"

"Yeah." Josh studied him.

Elis expected the renewed scrutiny,
and walked into the sitting room, where Evelyn snoozed in her
recliner. Josh followed.

"So, like, how do you do the wing
tricks? I mean hiding them and stuff?"

The interrogation wasn't going to
quit. Elis sat down on the sofa with a sigh. Might as well get it
over with. The sooner he satisfied Josh, the sooner he would
leave.

The interrogation went on most of the
night, until the cell rang in Josh's pocket.

Saved by the phone.
Elis breathed a sigh of relief when Josh excused
himself to return home.

Seeing him leave opened the door for
regrets to reenter. For a while, the mundane questions had
distracted Elis. Now, the weight of losing Raea
returned.

The excitement and tears left him
drained. He wandered up to his bedroom and laid down. He could do
nothing now but hope someone rescued Raea.

It was a slim chance.

__________

No
Place Like Home

A faint light in the dark
highlighted a familiar face. Padina brushed strands of brown hair
behind her ear, but her hair betrayed her and fell towards the
view.

["Raea."] She spoke in a
soft voice. ["How sweetly you sleep. I can't believe how you've
grown. Soon you'll be in school on this world. If we were home,
we'd be at Starfire Tower for your preliminary
lessons."]

She sighed and looked away
a moment. "I'll be out soon."

"All right," a deep voice
replied.

After a couple seconds,
Padina licked her lips and reached around the view. ["I know the
Starfire sees me, but I hope it doesn't reveal this until you're
ready to understand. There's so much I wish I could tell you now.
With luck, they'll never find us and I'll watch you grow into a
beautiful woman.]

["But I feel that
the
meistal
serving
Shirat Marin know I'm here. I'm afraid they're coming. I won't run,
but I'll do all I can to protect you. My lovely little angel."] Her
lips quivered and she wiped her eyes. ["If they never find you,
that's all I could hope. If you have questions, Scott or Debbie
will be here for you."] She sniffed and wiped her eyes again. ["I
will always love you."]

A moment later, Padina
disappeared from the room.

["How's she doing?"] a deep voice
asked.

["Still resting off the neutralizer."]
A woman replied.

["Let me know—"]

["As soon as she's awake. Yes, I
know."] The woman sounded exasperated. ["It's no use checking every
five minutes. It won't hurry her recovery."]

Was she still dreaming? Who were they?
Raea didn't recognize either voice.

But they spoke Inari. Or was it
another dream?

Raea opened her eyes to a dimly lit
nook of thick metal pipes and walls. The foul aroma of waste mixed
with the dankness of stale water. She wasn't home on the plains
with the fresh, clean air.

Her last memories flashed back—the
Shirukan attacked her and Nare. Panic swept through her.

Raea jerked to sit up.
Stupid move; pain wracked her skull. She fell back to whatever hard
surface she laid on, her hands on her head.
Ow-ow-ow-ow-ow-ow.

["Easy. Take it slowly."] The faint
overhead light touched a head of yellow-brown hair on a woman
sitting next to her in a dark coverall. The shadowed visage touched
no familiarity in Raea. Where was Nare? Where was Elis?

Damn headache. It pounded a drum solo
in her head. ["What did you do to me? Who are you?"]

Footsteps padded closer, matching the
steady strides of a looming figure. Dark wings shifted slightly
behind him and settled out of sight again. The man carried an aura
of authority and a reservation of emotion, a cold stare in his dark
eyes. She didn't recognize him, but he was Inari, like the woman.
She definitely was not home.

["We rescued you from the Shirukan.
They neutralized you."] He spoke with a tone of authority that cut
off any argument.

["Neutralized?"] As if being attacked
by the Shirukan wasn't bad enough. ["Where am I?"]

["In the bowels of
Naviketan."]

Naviketan? Raea knew that name.
Through the subdued pounding in her head, it came back. Elis had
mentioned it. Her heart sank in dismay.

Naviketan, the capital of
the Shirat Empire, the home of Heffin's Gate. Now she knew this
wasn't real. She couldn't be on Inar'Ahben.
I'm dreaming…Wake up…There's no place like home. There's no
place like home…

Not working. Probably needed magic
ruby slippers, something in short supply.

["I'm Leksel, leader of
the
vaiyosh
."] He
spoke as if she should be impressed. Far from it.

["What?"] She'd never heard that word
before.

["We're one small group
of
vaiyosh
."] The
woman spoke in a firm but soft voice. Raea liked her.

["We're growing,"] the man said.
["There are five other groups in Naviketan, all of them dedicated
to stopping Shirat Marin."]

Now she got it. They were rebels. A
small gap in her Inari vocabulary. Only one question nipped at her
caution. ["What about Keepers?"] In other words, what about her?
Why was she still alive?

["Shirat Marin seeks to exterminate
all Keepers, but we won't allow that."] The woman smiled and
grabbed a metal cup next to her.

["Shartrael Raea—"]

She blinked and focused on the man's
face—he knew her name, not her actual name but her mother's maiden
name. How? The cold tone of command matched the stern lines carved
in shadow. His crossed arms were thick, his dark hair short, almost
military short, and stared through her with those dark eyes as if
into her soul where she couldn't escape.

In a startling show of respect, he
bowed his head as Nare had when she arrived. ["I pledge my service
to you."]

What? He pledged to serve her? Too
weird, especially coming from someone so cold. If he had ordered
her to do something, she would have believed that, but not the
opposite.

["But you can't stay
here."]