Bladed Wings (6 page)

“If you say so.”

Cordinox hopped onto a counter, perched at the edge when he said, “Can you see them?”

“What?”

“My scales. Unfortunately I’m something of a cliché, a demon with scales and talons. Thankfully I was lucky enough not to be born with a tail or horns. Those would have been very irritating.”

“I see you, a guy in a suit.”

“But there’s so much more,” Cordinox smirked. “For example, right now I can see the shadows that surround you, especially around your hands. I’m guessing that’s how your new soul filters through your body. See, Cipher was a fire demon, but that power manifests differently now it’s inside you. Even if you killed another demon somehow, your tendrils would just get faster and stronger. So concentrate. Look at me. Look at me like you’re searching for something, because  you know that there’s something wrong. See the truth of who and what I am. Use more than your human eyes.”

Timothy inhaled, not sure if he had any idea what the demon meant. But if this was real, then he knew he had to learn more about how he’d changed. So he stared, searching through Cordinox’s face, looking for something different. His cheeks and chin were normal. So was his dark hair, short and combed. As he looked at the guy’s neck, maybe for a vampire’s bite marks, there was a glimmer at the eyes. When Timothy spotted that, he saw the red, the shine of crimson light.

“What’d you see?”

“Your eyes.”

“Red, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Easier to see in the dark with. Now try to see the rest.” Timothy concentrated again, but it didn’t work. Instead he had to relax a little. It was like trying to spot a bug from far off. He had to wait for it to fly, to make some motion before he could see it. Cordinox turned, a glance at someone passing the shop, and that’s when Timothy saw him, when he knew a demon sat there, swinging his legs back and forth. Dressed in the same black silk shirt, his hands ended in talons. His skin was dark green and covered in thousands of interlocked scales. Timothy saw that, his eyes a little wide, and Cordinox nodded like he knew the first lesson was complete.

“Now the harder part.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pen, “Stay where you are and grab this.”

“With what?”

“Use the shadow stuff you have wrapped around your soul. Reach very, very hard and your soul should know what to do.”

“Reach? That’s what you’re telling me to do?”

“Must you question every one of my instructions?”

“Sorry,” Timothy said, fingertips to the air. With a puffed sigh, he started. He pointed his eyes and concentrated. Then he tried something else, reaching out with a hand. Motionless, he tried to imagine an invisible set of fingers stretching across the empty store, through the dust-clogged air to wrap around the little pen.

Nothing came out.

“Try again.”

With a tight nod, Timothy raised his other hand. He didn’t know if it would help. Still, he kept his fingers still and tried to imagine one of his hands there, one of his hands just flying for the pen. Fingers of shadow would grab the pen. He imagined it, one step at a time, exactly how it should happen.

“What are you doing?” Cordinox asked. “How are you approaching this problem?”

“I’m trying to reach it, to make the shadow stuff take your pen.”

“Let your soul do the work.” The demon made it sound easy.

“My soul?”

“A human learns to fight by training the body, by learning conscious strategies. They learn to duck, riposte, slash, aim. We’re different. We fight by instinct, because our souls know what to do without training or education. For you it’s just a matter of learning to listen to that part of yourself.”

“Great.”

“Now try again. And don’t think about it too much. If your brain’s too loud, your muscles won’t hear your instincts.”

Timothy tried it again. He tried not to think. For a moment he had his hands at his sides; then he swung out with one hand, his palm aimed at Cordinox. He didn’t think about it, yet he didn’t need to. A rope of shadow erupted from the base of his palm and soared for the pen. Already across the room, Timothy’s spike jabbed down through Cordinox’s hand, and the pen jerked back to Timothy’s chest, a little sting before it fell to the floor. Timothy threw out his other hand, trying not to think, just to act. His demon soul knew what to do, translated the unspoken desires, and a tendril snatched up the pen before Cordinox could reach down for it.

“That’s the joy of instinct. You already know how to do it.”

“Now what?”

“Nothing,” Cordinox said. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re ready to work with us.”

“That’s it?” Timothy had expected a lot more than a fifteen-minute lesson.

“That’s it. Give it some time and you’ll learn how to use your abilities more effectively, but for the moment we have someone we need to find, so now you know how to defend yourself. Everyone tends to work pretty independently. Stay out of the way and you should be okay. Just remember, Morgon probably wouldn’t stop if you got in the way of his fist.”

“Thanks.”

“C’mon,” Cordinox said with half a wave back to the door. Timothy followed him again and back into the public parts of the mall. Moments later they were surrounded by teenagers shopping, guys and girls bored because they lived in Sacramento.

“See Isis?”

“No,” Timothy said. “Where?”

“At the other end of the promenade.” Cordinox pointed past hundreds of people. Squinting, Timothy couldn’t even see the department store marquis so far away. Everything blurred and disappeared together, stores and people and lights and sound mixed together in the chaos of Arden Fair Mall.

“See her the same way you saw me.”

Timothy tried to let go to just stare into nothing, the same way he first saw the red spark of Cordinox’s eyes. Everything melted together, so he didn’t see anything in particular. His vision focused on a cone where motion danced and spiraled at the edges. Then he saw light, a spark that grew until he saw a feminine silhouette, a young woman made of light.

“I see someone, someone made of light.”

“Isis,” Cordinox said. “That’s why she can shape shift so easily. She’s just light.”

Isis leaned against the railing of the second level, something far away he could barely see. “She’s got the angel,” Cordinox said. “I don’t wish to walk, do you?” But before Timothy could answer, Cordinox reached out, grabbed Timothy’s shoulder, and a wave of nausea punched his stomach.

Groaning, his eyes locked shut to block out the feeling of empty swish beneath his ribs. Then he forced his eyes open and saw they weren’t in the same spot, “What did you do?”

“Translation,” he said. “Instant movement from one spot to another. I jumped us here.” That came out like bragging.

Timothy let go of his stomach, trying to stand straight as Isis spun around and skipped over to them. “Hi boss!”

“Isis, you found her?”

“Yup,” Isis said, pointing to the first floor with a manicured finger. “Right down there.”

“What’s she doing?”

“Waiting. A couple of her friends went into one of the stores.”

“She didn’t go inside?”

“I guess she’s tired of shopping.”

“Way to break a stereotype,” Cordinox grinned. Timothy stayed against the wall, the weight of his back pressed into the sheetrock as Cordinox looked down. “Definitely our angel.”

“Why do you want her?” Timothy tried to find his stomach.

“She’s an angel,” Isis said. “That makes her valuable.”

“Very,” Cordinox said, though half-distracted.

“How come no one noticed?” Timothy asked. “We just appeared, right? Shouldn’t  someone have noticed?” He glanced around, waiting to see someone point or shout.

“No one was paying attention.” Cordinox sounded distracted, a guy tracking something important as he answered unimportant questions. “Same reason they don’t see my scales or Isis’s light.”

“I’m very bright,” Isis said with a bright laugh. She chortled with a voice that was a little too high for her twenty-something body. Touching a hand to Timothy’s shoulder, she asked, “Are you okay?”

“Fine.” To distract himself, he asked, “The light. Why? Shouldn’t you be darkness or something? Something bleak?”

“As as you? Nah, I prefer something brighter and happier, more cheerful! You know?”

“I guess,” he said, though he really didn’t.

“Timothy, come over here,” Cordinox instructed, breaking his line of sight on their target. “Time to learn to track an angel. Now it’s just like searching out a demon.”

“Okay,” Timothy took careful steps to the railing. He looked down and didn’t bother asking which would she would be. Instead he let his sight slip into the distance, unfocused on anything in particular.

Tracking Isis took a few seconds, yet it took half that to track this angel. This girl was bright too, but her light seemed different. Isis was white, pure, but devoid of texture and detail. Looking at Isis was like looking at a light bulb. The angel’s light felt different. Distinct—but familiar. Timothy couldn’t understand it, not at first. All he saw was the rainbow light, different hues sliding into one another. The light seemed to stream through a quartz crystal and come out blue, yellow, and white. There were swirls of luminescence, beads and beams of color around this corona of a figure. Everything else disappeared as he watched her sitting on a bench. But looking at her soul was like staring into a night sky. It didn’t need to move to be infinite.

“You got her?” Cordinox asked.

“Yeah,” Timothy blinked and squinted to focus his vision. He needed to see the rest of the world, the different people around her. Even looking away, he had to concentrate and try to pick out the other little things. Words and t-shirts, people moving and talking to reshape his sight so he just saw people. Even then, he didn’t see the angel’s face.

“Good. Morgon’s going to follow her, get some background information. But congratulations, you’ve completed your first mission with our merry little band of demons.” Timothy inhaled to say something, but words didn’t come out. She turned around in time, an instant before they disappeared.

He felt Cordinox’s hand on his shoulder, felt himself pulled through space as the demon translated them away. But in that second of sight, Timothy recognized her. Timothy could see everyone, but everything was about her. Everything was about Jenny because she was the girl, the angel, the girl he loved.

Three

They jumped, and the same nausea kicked into Timothy’s stomach. They reappeared, surrounded by boxes. Back at the warehouse, he tried to stand straight, but his legs wavered like springs. Everything shifted and shook, not quite spinning, but not quite still either.

“No, no. No way.” The sickness felt like someone punched him in the stomach right after eating a really big steak. Timothy ignored it. He shoved his body’s complaints aside, because this was too important. Jenny was too important. Thinking about nothing but breathing and protecting Jenny, Timothy didn’t care what happened in the next few minutes as long as he kept her safe.

“What?” Cordinox asked. A few feet from one wall sat a desk and leather office chair waited behind the mahogany. An unfolded laptop sat on the desk’s corner. The demon sounded curious even as fury rumbled through his chest.

“You can’t hurt her,” he said. He kept his voice down, eyes on Isis and Cordinox. He imagined his tendrils of shadow. He imagined them sharp, hoping instinct would protect him. It didn’t take much to kill Cipher. Timothy could only pray he would be able to take out these two demons. Itching doubts still lingered behind the promise to protect her.

“Of course not,” Cordinox said as he sat in his chair’s shining leather. The demon’s fingertips rested against one another. After another moment, he smiled with the confidence of a man who knew all of the variables and all of the answers.

“You’re not going to hurt her?” Timothy should have sounded confused, but his question came out skeptical.

“No.”

“You can trust him,” Isis promised.

“She’s an angel. You were at war with them. You’re supposed to be opposites.” Timothy didn’t know if he could believe them. More than that, he didn’t know if he could beat them. “She’s an angel. You’re supposed to fight.”

“What would you say if my goal is to protect her?” Cordinox asked.

“Why?”

“Angels are made of love, pure love for others, the kind of love that burns a demon. Now a sufficiently strong demon, someone such as Maria Despada—my principle competitor—is strong enough to eat this child’s soul, but I’m not. She knows how to protect herself from the angel fire, something neither I, nor any other demon in this valley, can do. She’d eat an angel’s soul and double in power. I can’t let that happen. Therefore it’s in my best interest to protect the angel and keep her out of my enemy’s hands.” Timothy still stared at the demon, one other question on his mind. But he didn’t need to ask because Cordinox gave the answer first, “And you’re wondering why we don’t just kill her. Open an angel’s soul, either because she figured out her abilities or if you cut her open, and there’d be a spiritual explosion. Call it the equivalent of a nuclear blast for demons. I’m not really looking to die in such a humiliating manner.”

“She can do that, and you won the war?”

Cordinox smiled like he knew something special. “Of course we won. Demons can do anything. We can eat babies or raise money for orphans. That gives us options. Angels won’t hurt others to win. We will. That’s the thing about an evil person. He can do both good and evil because he doesn’t care. A good person is confined to morality. And morality means limitations. Given that, we won. Flexibility is the key to any victory. That’s why they’re an endangered species.”

“So why’d you want to know where she lived? Why do you need more information on her?” he asked, hesitant he might still have to fight, that they wanted to imprison her.

“I want to make sure Despada’s forces don’t get to her. Now that leads us to the better question. Why are you so worried about her? Why would you care about some random girl?”

“I know her,” Timothy confessed.

“Really?”

“I do.” Timothy exhaled at the ceiling, “She goes to my school. We live in the same apartment complex.” Timothy tried to sound definitive, like that’s all there was too it. They were neighbors, nothing more.

And the demon heard right through it, “But there is more.”

“No.”

“Yes,” Cordinox said. “There’s a lot more. Even if I couldn’t read that flush to your cheeks or the breaks in your voice, why would you defend someone you barely know? I mean, c’mon. We both know you’re not that good a person.”

“There’s nothing else.”

“You want her,” Cordinox said.

“He loves her?” Isis asked, her hands balled together. “That’s really sweet. Have you asked her out yet?” She sounded like a girl from middle school.

“He’s certainly infatuated with her.”

“Well I’m sure he’ll win her. It always has to go like that, right?” Isis asked of no one in particular.

“So Timothy, I have your first real assignment. I’ll recall Morgon, but keep an eye on your angel. And make sure she doesn’t burn you. Angel fire can be exceptionally toxic, especially now that you’ve become one of us.”

Timothy got back to The Verge. He turned off the engine to his compact car, a gift from his parents when he left for college. He stared out the window, waiting for some idea of what he should do. When nothing popped into his brain, he banged his head against the steering wheel. It wouldn’t bruise, but it hurt enough to be satisfying. A week ago he was just a guy trying to get a girl. Now he was a demon following a girl who was really an angel but somehow didn’t know it. He felt like he’d be sick, a twisted stomach that didn’t have anything to do with Cordinox’s translation across distance.

“Okay,” he said. He got out and trudged out toward the tower of steps which would take him to his apartment.

He got half way up the stairs before he noticed someone leaning against the banister on the floor beneath his. Jenny looked sad as she stared out at nothing. Even now, without concentrating, Timothy could see some of the glow, the angel’s energy that would make her a target for Cordinox’s enemy. Someone cynical would say that’s what attracted him. That glow, the shape of her soul, made him wake up thinking about her. But Timothy wouldn’t have cared either way. He cared about her. He’d protect her.

Timothy took the steps, two at a time, before he walked down the hall. He was one landing too early. Twenty feet ahead he saw her. Jenny’s shoulders were scrunched around her neck, her wavy brown hair ending at her collar, her powder blue shirt tight around her waist.
Be a man,
he told himself.
You can do this.

He swallowed. He did something that took a lot of courage. “Hi,” he said, proud of how he didn’t stutter and that his voice didn’t crack.

“Oh, hi,” Jenny turned and stood straight. She forced a smile, but it glowed small and fragile. He’d never seen her smile that way. Warm adrenaline flowed in his veins and prickled up through his skin.

Thinking hard, he wanted to find the best words for this. He pressed forward with one question and hoped he wouldn’t hurt her. “Are you okay?” Being this close made his chest feel lighter. He felt the urge to slide closer.

“Thinking.”

“About what?” Timothy rested his forearms against the railing. It might be easier for her to talk to him if she didn’t have to look at him. That’s something Jeremiah would have come up with. And Timothy could barely believe he had the brain cells to come up with it himself. “Anything you want to talk about?”

“Just boyfriend stuff.” Jenny’s eyes shined as Timothy tried not to flinch, “Nothing you want to hear about.”

“Try me,” Timothy said. “Sometimes I can come up with good advice.”

“You’re sure?”

“I am. And I promise I’ll just jump off if you say something really bad. Deal?” He smiled at her, thinking he would do whatever he could to help her. It didn’t even matter that he’d be helping her with her boyfriend.

“Deal,” she laughed. There was an incredible high of knowing he could get her to laugh. “I’m kind of thinking about Terrance, my boyfriend.” Lips tight, she breathed out, “I’m wondering if we’re really compatible.”

“Isn’t that supposed to be kind of obvious?” Timothy asked.

“I guess not. I’m not sure.”

“What do you like?” Timothy said finding a strategy. It was a great strategy too because it led to a bunch of information he didn’t have.

“Stuff?” she said with a shrug and laughed since she knew it was a terrible answer.

“Seriously, what do you like? You can use that to start to figure out if he likes the same things. Right?” Before she answered, Timothy heard himself pray she would ask his advice.

“Friends,” she started. “Uh, chick flicks, jogging, strawberry ice cream,
Harry Potter
, horses, reading, and playing with my sister’s kids. Yeah, I know, I’m kind of girly like that.” A glance in her direction and he saw she was wearing her favorite sweatshirt again. He tried not to smile when he spotted the insignia.

“Nothing wrong with your answer,” Timothy said. He dropped his voice, a dramatic whisper that wasn’t that much lower when he said, “I’ll let you in on a little secret. Sometimes I watch chick flicks too.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Don’t tell anyone. I’m pretty sure I’d have to say we never met and that I have no idea who you are. Or I’d have to say you’re some kind of addict trying to get money.” She smiled, but then she got quiet and sad again, probably flying back to thoughts about her boyfriend. Timothy tried to hide his disgust at the world’s luckiest and dumbest bastard in the universe all because he got to be with her and somehow managed to mess it up. Hoping to make her feel safe, Timothy asked, “So I’ve got to wonder, why your sister’s kids?”

“They’re fun and I love how they see the world,” Jenny said.

“How?”

“They see it with fresh eyes. Like adults go around and we think we know all of the answers when we really don’t. But they don’t have that baggage. They see it without assuming they know everything. That’s fun.”

“Makes sense.”

“That’s why I love my job so much,” she said, then answered Timothy’s glance of an unspoken question, “I’m a nanny.”

“A nanny, really?”

“Yup.”

“And do you fly with an umbrella?”

“I wish,” Jenny giggled again, a sound perfectly designed to addict Timothy. “Wouldn’t that be cool? Then I could just break out into song whenever I wanted and there’d be the background music to back me up.” She had her eyes on him when she asked, “Do you like kids?”

“I don’t know.”

“How can you not know?”

“They probably scare me a little,” he said, honest. He didn’t know how much she’d appreciate that. “I don’t have any younger siblings, so yeah, I don’t see or talk to little kids, so I don’t know how to act around them.”

“You’re the first guy to say something like that to me.”

“Well, I’m sure a lot of us feel this way.”

“Terrance was cute the first time I saw him with a kid,” Jenny said. “He told me he loved children, talked about his little brothers and how much he loved teaching them and everything. Then he meets Jaime and Dougie—the kids I take care of—and he totally didn’t know what he was doing. He lied to me. He totally lied to me, but I’m not sure if it really bothers me. Is that insane? Can a guy lie to your face and be sweet at the same time?”

“I don’t know,” Timothy said. Now it stung to talk about her great boyfriend.

“But that was good. It’s nice you were honest.”

“One of my many superpowers,” Timothy said with a little bow.

“You go to Sac State, right? Any idea what you’re going to do when you graduate?”

“Yeah, I’m a hornet,” he said. Compared to other schools’ mascots, the hornet actually sounded scary. “And no, I have no idea what’s going to happen after graduation.” Cordinox and his merry band made things a lot more complicated. “You?”

“English major,” she said.

“And what do they do after college?”

“I have no idea,” Jenny shrugged and made the little roll of her shoulders look sexy and sweet. “Maybe I’ll go to Hollywood and strike it big as a screenwriter.”

“Good luck.”

“I think I’ll need it.”

They leaned there, and it was comfortable, and then Timothy felt stupid because he wanted to keep talking. He wanted to hear her voice so he went back to that first question, “What’s he like? What’s Terrance into?” Timothy decided that Terrance was a name for bad people—all of them.

She inhaled for the answer, but paused, “I, uh, I’m not really sure.” She said it like a revelation, turning to Timothy. “You know, I really don’t know.”

“How long have you been together?”

“A couple months. I mean, we met and it was pretty incredible. Like instant chemistry.”

“Really?” All of his effort aimed at keeping the jealousy out of his voice. “How?” Timothy asked because masochism is easy in college. Jeremiah would have asked so he could better simulate the experiences, thus making it easier to supplant this Terrance when the time was right.

“I don’t know,” Jenny said, her eyes directed out at the sky. It was barely past four thirty, but the sun was still half way down. The sunlight looked pale, everything cast in gray. “It was like he was really strong, but really sensitive too. Like I could look at him, and we felt right together. Chemistry. Not much more. Do you know what I mean?”