Divinity (34 page)

“Yes, and it’s dangerous. I have missed things I should have seen. Disasters. Deaths.” Michael flexed his wings, then resettled them on his back, a motion that was rife with frustration. “We need an eighth. We have been watching the Twelve come and go much more carefully these last couple of centuries, hoping there would be one able to join us.”

“You think I am that one?” Julia’s voice rose as she spoke, until it was shrill, almost panicked. “How is this even possible? I am still half-human, Michael.”

“Please be calm, girl, and hear me out.”

“There’s more?” Julia sat back against the couch, took a deep breath, and closed her eyes for a moment. Michael’s words echoed in her head as the weight of them settled on her. She was to be an Archangel. All of the arguments against that bubbled to the surface.

She’d had impure thoughts. She’d been jealous. In fact, she figured she’d pretty much covered all of the so-called deadly sins at some point in her life. Wouldn’t these things disqualify her?

“You are not being sainted, girl, and you are not being judged by your human standards,” Michael said. He shook his head. “It isn’t as complicated as it’s made out to be.”

Julia thought about his words. She knew she had done some things in order to survive. While living on the streets in her youth, she had once stolen an orange from a local market. She’d lied. She’d…well, she’d done a lot of things she wasn’t proud of. But since she had opened the restaurant, she had tried to make up for those things. She shopped at that same market, even though it was a forty-five minute drive from her home. She donated groceries to the food bank every week. She tried to never hurt anyone.

“That’s the key right there,” Michael said. “Even in your destitution you have never made decisions that intentionally hurt others.”

Julia opened her mouth to argue, but he raised a hand to cut her off.

“Yes, you’ve hurt people, but it was never what you meant to do. Your heart is pure. You know it as well as I do.”

Julia felt a tear slide down her cheek. “Okay. Go on.”

“We don’t just need an eighth Archangel. I need a second in command. Basically, I need another me.” Michael folded his hands together and fixed his intent gaze upon her.

“Second in command.” Julia dropped her head into her hands, her voice a mere whisper. “To you.”

“It could be you.”

“Could be?” She looked up. “So it’s possible I won’t be?”

“You are capable. Your progress has exceeded all expectations. Right now, you are more capable than five of the seven of us. But we have a new threat.”

“The
A’nwel.”

“Yes.” Michael moved back over to the couch and sat beside Julia, taking her hand in his. “You are the only one who can fight it. We can’t call you home if it is part of your human make-up that gives you this power.”

“Call me home.” Julia’s voice cracked. She had ached for that all her life without knowing the reason. Now it was becoming painfully clear. And that was the pain that held her together and refocused her thoughts. “I would have to die to become the Eighth?”

Michael squeezed Julia’s hand lightly. “In order to function fully as one of us, yes, the human body should be discarded. But you wouldn’t be the Eighth, girl. You would be the Second.”

Discard her body. Leave behind food, sleep, coffee? Sex? Her restaurant, Sandra, Isabel? Everything she’d worked for. Julia wasn’t so sure she was ready to take Michael up on this…promotion.

“Wait. Second? All the others would be bumped down?” Julia was shocked. “That’s not a great way to make friends on your first day.”

“No, I suppose it isn’t. But that is how it is.”

“Perhaps that’s why there is a monster after me,” Julia mused.

“That was my thought exactly.” Michael released Julia’s hand and leaned back. “You absorb information incredibly well. We have caused a lot of mental breaks and physical damage in humans, trying to teach them things.”

“I’m not exactly your average human, Michael.”

“No, you most certainly are not. Now you need to answer some questions.”

“Fire away.”

“I have never understood that expression.” Michael grimaced and shook his head. “Tell me how you followed me.”

“Actually, you showed me how the day you brought me to that apartment.” Julia smiled. “I saw your energy trail. I quickly realized I could follow it, and see where you had been. It’s like you leave a thread behind. Not just you. Everyone—every
thing
—does.”

“How much of the world can you see?”

Julia raised her eyebrows. It hadn’t occurred to her to try. “I don’t really know.”

“How much can you hear?”

“Everything, I’m pretty sure. Inside conversations and outside ones, if that’s what you mean.”

“Can you move without motion?”

“Teleport, you mean? No. That is, I haven’t tried.” Julia looked inward, recalling when Michael had moved them from her living room to the field. She replayed the moment in her mind, watched everything he did from every angle, then realized she was looking at the wrong thing, just as Michael told her so.

“You are viewing the physical. Watch the metaphysical.”

Even as he spoke, she could see the memory of him projecting the two of them. In a millisecond, he felt with all his senses the place he wanted to go. He smelled the wood fire burning and the air exactly as it was in the room. He pictured the room’s furnishings, the walls, the ceiling. He felt for the moisture in the air and heard all the creaks and groans of the house as it shifted and settled. Then he simply envisioned them both there and then they were.

“I see now,” Julia said, almost giddy. She felt like a child holding her first snow globe in her hands. “But how would you go to a place you don’t know?”

“There is no place I don’t know.”

Julia laughed. “No, I suppose there isn’t.”

“You need to take some time, girl. Do some exploring. I think your friend, Cassielle, will be a great help. Speak with her tonight.” Michael stood again and began to fade. “But for now, you need to sleep. You must remember to take care of the vessel you use. You are able to forget the confines of your human body. You must remember the things that it needs in order to live.”

“I won’t forget, Michael,” Julia said, surprised to hear her stomach growling.

“Get some rest, girl. And find Cassielle.” Michael faded further, now nearly invisible.

Seeing Michael in his nearly transparent phase gave Julia a pang of guilt. Now that she knew what it meant, she wanted to fix it, especially knowing that she was the only one who could.

“Wait. If I have to remain human because of the
A’nwel
, who is going to help you?”

“Do you not think fighting the
A’nwel
is helping me?”

“That was unexpected,” Gabriel said.

“Yes, it was,” Michael replied. “She has learned so much so quickly, I kept waiting for her to break.”

“I wonder if it was the best plan to inform her, but I suppose we have no choice if she can hear us.”

“And follow us.”

“Yes,” Gabriel shook his head as his wings twitched. “Unsettling.”

“Indeed.” Michael turned to face Gabriel. “The beast has been silent for too long.”

“Perhaps she killed it,” Gabriel said. “It is possible, given the damage she did to the fabric of being.”

“No, it’s not dead. I still feel the threat of it.”

“I think it is healing itself, or being healed.” Raphael’s voice flowed softly into the conversation as she stepped up between the two of them. “In time, it will return.”

“Yes,” Michael agreed. “It will. The question is, will it return alone?”

“We need to find the source,” Gabriel said. “A puppet is no good without someone to pull the strings.”

Raphael nodded her agreement. “If we find the source before the beast is healed, we should be able to take care of the whole situation.”

“Raphael,” Michael said, turning to face her, “I need you to teach her healing.”

“I will if you ask me to, Michael.” Raphael’s face tightened, her lips thinned and her eyes narrowed. “But wouldn’t it be better if I am there when the battle takes place?”

“It would be best to be prepared for any outcome.” Michael turned away, lowering his eyes. “Tell me, Sister, how is Ariel?”

“He is difficult. Petulant. But he does as he is told. He calls himself a glorified babysitter to hundreds of new angels.”

“Does he behave suspiciously in any way?” Gabriel interjected.

“Not that I have noticed, and I have not seen nor heard of anyone approaching him.”

“We are in a sad state,” Michael said heavily, “when we have to watch our own.”

XXXV

E
XHAUSTION
pulled Julia quickly into a deep sleep. She found herself in the field of tall grass where she had met with Cassielle the week before. There were butterflies fluttering above the field in an endless game of tag, dancing circles around one another and then darting away, only to be caught again. Julia found herself full of delight as they put on their show, seemingly just for her.

“The Second Realm,” she said, “is a delightful place to be.”

“It is what you choose to see, my friend.” Cassielle walked up beside Julia, resting a hand on her shoulder. “It is this way for you because that is how you were introduced to it.”

“I like it this way for now,” Julia said, hugging her friend. “Where’s Ayasha?”

“It is nearing her time,” Cassielle said with half a smile.

“Time?”

“She will become human again. This time she will have many years. I went with her to help her pick a path.” Cassielle’s voice reminded Julia of a saxophone softly playing jazz in the dark. “She will have a much better life this time.”

Julia examined her friend’s eyes and saw the happiness behind them. “And you’re not sad to lose her?”

“I haven’t lost her, I will go with her. We will be twins.” Joy radiated from her. “Don’t worry; I have several months to spend with you here before I am needed full-time.”

“Thank goodness!” Julia said, and immediately felt selfish for having said it. “I’m sorry. It’s nice to have a friend, that’s all.”

“It is, isn’t it?”

The two friends walked quietly through the grass, arms looped together, enjoying the peace and comfort they brought to one another. Julia’s wings lay on her back, the breeze tousling the feathers lightly, the tips tickling the backs of her heels with each step. Cassielle’s were shorter, only reaching down to the backs of her knees.

“It’s funny, isn’t it, Cass? My father, I mean,” Julia said, stealing a look to the sky before meeting her friend’s eyes. “All that time I was desperate for a dad.”

“Funny?”

“Yes, because now,” Julia pointed straight above them, “my father seems to be stalking me.”

Cassielle glanced up, her jaw hanging open. She looked back at Julia and let out a giggle before slapping her hand to her mouth. “I don’t think you are supposed to know he’s there.”

“You know, I haven’t spoken to him since the first time—when he told me who he was. It has been Michael with me ever since.”

“Seems to me he has been there all along,” Cassielle gave Julia’s arm a squeeze, “and you are only now learning how to see him.”

“You may be right. It’s still hard for me to let go of the hurt, though.” Julia stopped and turned to face her friend. “I don’t know how I feel about this…appointment. Part of me—admittedly a shrinking part—is shaking my head, thinking they must be mistaken. This must be all one really long, crazy, elaborate dream. Maybe the mushrooms I put in my spaghetti sauce the other day weren’t really shiitake mushrooms. You know?”

“You are questioning something that has not yet come to pass, something that may never happen.” Cassielle gave Julia an encouraging smile. “You have been told that you are capable of being Michael’s equal. Think about that. You have been seeking the meaning of your life, the meaning of everything. Now you have it.”

“In the back of my mind is this fading voice. My human voice.” Julia looked up at Gabriel and waved. He did not appear amused. She looked back at Cassielle. “It wants a normal, human life. It keeps reminding me of all the beauty and joy there is in having a physical body in the physical realm of existence. What happens to me if I lose that voice, Cass?”

“You will not.”

“Who I am right now, this, all of it.” Julia pointed at herself, her wings, her entire body. “They think I can take on this creature. Not because I’m half-angel, but because I’m half-human.”

“My oldest and dearest friend,” Cassielle said as she flattened a spot in the grass and sat, motioning for Julia to join her. “What you are calling your humanity, I know as the essence of your being. It’s in your soul, not your body.”

Julia folded the ends of her wings under her and joined Cassielle on the ground. She hugged her knees to her chest and rested her chin on them.

“Trust me,” Cassielle said, extending one wing around Julia and pulling her close. “You have held up through more than any one spirit ever has, and you just keep getting stronger. Sister, when things start getting out of control, it’s you I want at my back. No one else.”

“Thank you, Cass. Okay, I’m finished feeling sorry for myself.” Julia hugged Cassielle tightly, then sat back. “Can you help me learn? There are a few things I am not very good at yet. But I’m a quick learner.”