Praefatio: A Novel (16 page)

I couldn’t read his thoughts. At the time I had no idea what he was talking about.

“Speak freely, Fallen, and get to the point. My daughter … Grace will receive you,” Dad ordered.

I held the flower in my palm, extending my arm as far out as possible. Its roots wrapped around my hand and wiggled like worms, giving me the creeps.

“Tonight you must write a letter announcing your intention to leave home and not return. It is the only way to save the lives of your human caregivers and friends. Accept refuge at Kheiron to insure your safekeeping, and the Fallen will accept you
as their own
.” He inhaled deeply and wrinkled his jagged eyebrows.

I looked at Dad, and he nodded as if the flower was right, that I should do as it instructed. I turned back to the talking weed.

“Seekers will come for you just before midnight, intent on your death. And they will not stop this time until they have achieved their goal. You would do best to heed my words. Until we meet again.” He bowed once more. It did little to soften his message of doom.

The flower fell instantly out of my hand and onto the ground. It rested near my foot and died. Its roots, however, clung to me; the wormy things tried to get under my skin. I shook my hand violently to get them off. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dad nod toward somewhere in the distance. Caius descended upon me, grabbed my wrist, and blew air into my hand, which caught on fire. The roots began to burn, screaming as they did. And then, so did my skin.

“Are you crazy?” I shouted to Dad and Caius.

“Numbskull! She’s human!” Dad proclaimed as if I had polio and Caius had asked me to run a 5K.

Arcturus approached with water from the stream; it both cooled and healed my hand instantly. “Sorry about that. You can’t trust the Fallen, Grace. That’s the bottom line,” Arcturus stated with full certainty and followed with a death stare to Caius and Dad.

“No matter how well intended they are,” Dad added, as if Arcturus hadn’t already made his point. I supposed they were talking about Gavin. I remembered Gavin’s comments regarding
Praefatio
and what he’d claimed it said about us.

“
Praefatio,
” Dad began, reading my mind, “is
our
book. Humans have the Bible and we have
Praefatio
. We have rules and commandments too, you know. It applies to all angels, something The Divine One gave to us after the Fall of some of our most cherished. Contrary to popular belief, it isn’t simply a book for the Fallen. How
Praefatio
develops on the page depends on its owner. Sure, it tells us about you and Gavin, but how it ultimately ends up isn’t up to
Praefatio
; it’s up to you.”

Silence settled in the air.

“Owner? How it develops? What the heck does that mean?”

“
Praefatio
is different for everyone. The core basics like the commandments, rules, and regulations remain the same. And then the history and prophecies are the same. But the future—your individual future—belongs to you and only you. Once you own your destiny, and your part in the future of the world, you are free to pass
Praefatio
along to someone else who may need it. I assume Remi has already made peace with his fate.”

“So Remi gave me his book?” I asked in a quiet voice.

Dad’s voice was nearly as quiet. I guess he didn’t want to upset me further. “Remi’s job was to be a brother to you as you grew up, to help make life as a human easier and to help keep you safe when the Seekers came for you that night. You had to make it until your next birthday.”

I felt immediately guilty. Remi’s life until then had been completely devoted to me. It must have been hard for him, living in my shadow all those years.

“Yes,” Dad interrupted my thoughts. “Remi struggles with his heritage, having been raised around humans his entire life. Fifteen years is a long time for a young angel to remain on earth. But he is strong, and when it is required of him, he will do what needs to be done.”

“Remi’s heritage.” Mom and Dad had spent so much time arguing about it, and I had always assumed they’d meant his ethnicity and the fact that he was adopted and biracial. Seems I wasn’t as smart as I’d thought.

Dad placed a finger to his lips, making a
shh
sound as he did. “Remi’s path is for Remi to worry about, not you,” he insisted.

“Hi, Grace, I’m Marcus,” a voice behind me chimed in during the lull in conversation. I turned sharply to face the speaker. I could have been looking at Remi’s twin, several years older, with slightly darker skin and hazel eyes. With wings outstretched and a broad smile on his face, the stranger added, “Thanks for looking after Remi all these years.” He extended his hand to shake mine, and when we touched, I knew exactly who he was.

Remi’s father
, I thought to myself, and couldn’t stop the smile that exploded across my face. I jumped up and rounded the bench so fast I would have been a blur to the human eye. As I grabbed Marcus into a bear hug, it was clear that he and Remi had the same pureness of heart.

I had so many questions. They invaded my mind so fast that my mouth had trouble keeping up. It was the one time I was thrilled angels could read minds.

“So,” I started slowly. “I don’t understand. Remi said his parents were punished, made human.” Dad smiled, then excused himself with a slight bow to me.

“Remi said you could be pretty human at times,” Marcus responded, but not to my question. I don’t think he intended to hurt my feelings. “We
were
punished. The order had been given. But when Remi’s mother died giving birth, The Divine One decided my eternally broken heart was punishment enough for us both. He decided to give me a kind of celestial ‘time-out’ by placing me here in the Garden forever. Don’t you see? I can never go home, or even to earth to see my son.
”

“Can Remi ever visit?”

“He used to visit. But he’s come a lot less lately, and I’m concerned in light of his latest stunts
.
”
Marcus’s thoughts turned to worry for his only son.

I figured the rest out on my own. Marcus was thrilled when Dad was chosen to raise Remi. Unlike humans, angels were capable of unimaginable levels of love. Even though Remi was not raised by Marcus, each of them loved the other as if he had been. Remi had the same love for Gabriel as he did his own father.

Arcturus was at my side without warning.

“Sorry, Marcus. I need Grace for a minute.” Agitation creased Arcturus’s brow.

“No worries, kid. Do what you gotta do,” Marcus said, then man-hugged Arcturus to himself quickly before releasing him in my direction. “Be well, Grace, and please tell Remi I said happy birthday.” It was the last thing he said before he walked briskly out of sight.

A pang of regret hit me as I remembered that I’d forgotten all about Remi’s fifteenth birthday! That I could ever forget was a testament to my mental state. It was the day after mine.

Arcturus took my hand and led me to the Garden’s east entrance, which was guarded by two cherubim with flaming swords that turned in each direction. At least that part was true. They seemed like harmless tweens, but I knew better. As I passed through and exited, the redheaded one with freckles shot me a look. They seemed serious, like the Queen’s Guard in England, though I had a feeling that trying to make them laugh was a horrible idea.

The land around the Garden was barren and the sky above gray in stark contrast to inside the gates. I waited for Arcturus to tell me why he had dragged me from my conversation with Marcus.

“Emeria, come forth!” Arcturus ordered in a voice that seemed deeper than it had before. He looked around suspiciously from left to right, then zeroed in on a translucent figure with a dim light glowing beneath its skin. It was my twin, the girl who’d tried to kill me.

I felt faint, but steadied myself by grabbing onto Arcturus’s arm. Emeria looked harder, more complex than me. She had way more drama, for sure. And she seemed to go out of her way to get people to think she was dangerous. Emeria stood before us, outfitted in swords and other weapons, eyes fixed on Arcturus. The two blocked me from hearing their silent conversation.

Angered by the disregard for my feelings, I imagined crushing water, like a dam breaking, and its water forcing itself through a town, smashing buildings and large structures. It worked. It broke their block on me. From the looks of it, they had no idea that I heard the rest of the conversation.

She has
, Arcturus replied with caution. His words were strained, his body taut.

Devious little one, aren’t you? Why’d you summon me here
?

Had she never met Arcturus before, I wondered? She would regret referring to him that way.

“Reveal yourself to Grace and do
not
leave anything out,” Arcturus ordered, placing a hand on the top of his sword.

“Is this really necessary?” Emeria shot back and used both hands to draw attention to her many weapons. She must have known Arcturus had no intention of letting her go until he’d gotten what he wanted.

I wasn’t prepared for what happened next. Emeria grabbed me into her arms as if doing so to a ragdoll, covering me completely with her dark wings. I couldn’t hear or see anything at first. Then the visions came.

They blew past me quickly. I saw myself, reading
Praefatio
, picturing Gavin in my mind as I read. I sat thinking of how much I loved him and wanted to be with him. After slamming the book shut, I began to dance and twirl around the room as intense feelings of love and affection overtook me. My closed eyes watered as I watched the vision unfold and listened to my racing heart. I hugged the book to myself while envisioning a life with him, marrying him and having a family. A knock at the door interrupted my rapture. I placed the book on my bed, then answered the knocking. My birth mom stood in the doorway, beautiful, and angry. A gasp forced itself out of my mouth when I laid eyes on her.

The vision and the feelings that accompanied it were so real, vivid, and painful. But the memory could not have belonged to me.

They’re
her
memories
, Arcturus suggested, and the thought floated around in my brain like a ball in a pinball machine: hitting, fast, slowing, swirling, hitting, score.

It felt like I’d gotten the wind kicked out of me. My heart sank into a deep and physical sadness when I realized what I had been witnessing. Emeria was in love with Gavin. The depths of her emotion were great enough that I could literally feel her pain. My breathing became labored.

I turned to face Emeria in my mind’s eye and saw the rest from her point of view.

The angels whose job it was to give other angels talents, posts, or purpose were focused squarely on me when we were created. Since my purpose (to be born on earth as a human and ascend to high Archangel), talent (had yet to figure that out), and post (earth) had already been determined, and Remi had been hand-picked to be my sibling, Emeria was all but forgotten about once my birth mother, Rosa, Fell to have me. Emeria had never been given a post or any particular talents. She had no real purpose. So she unwittingly created her own purpose: to win Gavin’s heart.

Her post? Wherever Gavin was.

The problem? Gavin had been promised to another. Me.

Jealous of my future with Gavin, Emeria was determined to have him, even after she realized the visions she had were of my future, not hers. It was too late by then. Emeria was deeply in love. When our mother pointed out the true nature of the situation, Emeria’s heart became filled with rage, envy, and a desire for vengeance. She aimed to rid the world of me, to clear the way for her and Gavin to be together.

Emeria set out to win Gavin’s love by appearing to him as me in an attempt to manipulate his affections. I was not ready for what happened next. Images of Gavin, with Emeria posing as me. There was something about it that seemed real, tangible, and full of raw emotion. I tried to turn away, but her hold on me was too strong. She forced me to watch the two of them together. I refused to cry in front of her.

What happened after that was more incredible than anything I could have dreamed up. Discovery, betrayal, humiliation, rage, denial, shame, and wreckage.

“See what you’ve done? It’s all your fault. All of it!” Emeria screamed into my ear and tightened her grip on me. My stomach lurched and rumbled in response. I tried to expand my wings, but it was too late. Emeria was like a chain around me.

I’d wanted so badly to feel connected to my sister, but it was hard to feel connected to someone who was intent on killing you. I considered the impact of having a real blood relative, what it could mean. I just loved the name Emeria, like Emerson, only for girls. Then again, it probably wasn’t even her real name.

She embraced me, and for a moment she softened, and I thought maybe she sensed it too: that we needed one another.
Maybe we could have a chance
. I embraced her in return and thought I felt her soften even more. But then she paused and tightened her grip around me.

“Don’t feel sorry for me. You have no idea what you’ve signed up for. You think you’re in control and you know how this is all gonna end? Oh, it
will
end. Believe me, Grace. It
will
end.”

The venom in her words was like fire in my ears.

I felt our bodies leave the ground. Upward, colder and darker. There was only blackness when I opened my eyes. No visions, no thoughts, as if our minds had been shut down. The void startled me. She squeezed me harder and closed her wings tighter around me. Her breathing was labored.

When her grasp upon me loosened, I tried to break free, but she held on. The sound of loud flapping wings belonged to Arcturus and a boy I’d never before seen.

Arcturus grabbed Emeria, and they fought, wings flapping so hard it sounded like continuous claps of thunder. As they moved, clouds gathered and stirred around them. The boy grabbed me and lifted me back and away from them. I watched as Arcturus and Emeria fought, hand to hand, eye to eye, and mind to mind. The boy sang to me, drowning out all other sounds. It looked as if a tornado was forming in the midst of the most melodic, soft, boy choirish chanting, serving only to heighten my fear. My chest heaved as I strained against the strength of the boy holding me back.