Chapter 9 Feather
Feather
“Shopping? Oh, how fun,” I moaned. I had always hated shopping.
In more than one recent lifetime, I’d been the designated “take it back” child, whose role was to return things my parents couldn’t afford.
Clothes shopping was done in the school lost and found bin, or garage sales, or didn’t happen at all.
I’d mostly worn hand-me-downs or clothing others had thrown out.
“What are you getting? Is this a store?”
“It’s a storage closet. You’re the one getting stuff.
” Sunny moved her hand in a semicircle over a spot that seemed a bit darker than the rest of the surface.
I didn’t see a door, but one opened in the middle of the wall.
“Come on, I’ll carry everything.” She waved her hand over another dark patch of wall and soft, diffuse light filled the space.
This “closet” was larger than any bedroom I’d ever had on Earth—larger even than some of the houses I’d lived in. Against all the walls were strangely shaped objects covered with sheets. Some were the size of cars, but flat. I lifted an eyebrow, and Sunny smiled.
“Beds, mostly. Some interesting chairs in the back. But we’re here for sheets and extra togas for you. We can get furniture once you’re… a little further along.”
She was right. Putting nice things in my room when I’d just get them covered with muck was silly.
She walked back to some silver and white metal shelving and began pulling folded sheets down. “Are those the same kind as on my bed now?” I asked. I really hoped I hadn’t ruined the good sheets, and was now only getting the crappy ones.
“Yeah,” she said. Her nose crinkled. “Want to feel the sheets the High Angeli used?”
Used? I nodded, popping a cheese cube in my mouth as she tiptoed a few rows back.
“Here, come feel.” I set the plates down and followed her. The shelving was tall, and I had the sudden thought that this would make a great hiding place if Gavriel ever decided it was unmaking time. Sunny held a folded sheet out to me, and I took it, gasping at the soft, almost liquid feel.
“On Earth, people would kill to have sheets like this,” I murmured, rubbing my hand over the top. It was softer than a baby bird, softer than chocolate mousse, softer than… I snatched my hand back when I saw my smut was coming off on it. “Crapola, I’m ruining it!”
Sunny laughed as I grabbed it and ran a few rows away, glancing around for a place to hide it. If I left it with the other sheets, someone would figure out what I’d done. Maybe they’d think it was a drop cloth over here…
I’d just shoved it under what looked like a miniature harp when Sunny grabbed my arm. “Don’t freak out, Feather. Those sheets aren’t being used. Nothing in here is.”
“Why not?” I stared around me, realizing I was standing in a section reserved for musical instruments.
There were trumpets, horns, harps of every size and shape, and one solitary instrument that seemed to be calling me.
“A kazoo?” I had almost grabbed the small, solid gold thing when I remembered, and tucked my hands behind my back.
“This place is amazing,” I murmured. “But why isn’t this stuff being used?
” A thought popped into my head. “I haven’t heard any music since I got here.
It seems odd not to have music in a place filled with angels. ”
“Again, we don’t call ourselves that.” Sunny’s voice was filled with sadness as she peered around.
“I’m not old enough to have played these, but some of my Protector friends say everyone used to have musical instruments.
There was singing all the time. But then the imbalance got worse, and most of the High Angeli walked into the gate.
” She lifted the stack of sheets in her arms. “Go ahead and touch them. No one will care about you messing those up. They don’t use them anymore. ”
“But… the harps.” I plucked one string with a finger, shivering at the pure tone that emerged. “Why would they stop making music?”
“The Guides decided we needed to focus on more important things. Useful lessons, on how to keep the balance and fight the evil threats.” She sighed, staring at the harp. “I wish I knew how to play one of these, though.”
I couldn’t help her with that, but I pointed to the kazoo. “I will one hundred percent teach you how to play that one,” I promised, “if you tell me more about the gate and the High Angeli.”
“Really? You can play one of these?” When I nodded, she plucked it off the shelf and stuck it into a pocket. “I’ll just borrow it for a day or so.”
“Good plan. Think they’d notice if I stuck a baby-sized harp down my toga?”
She had just opened her mouth to answer when a new voice interrupted.
“What are you doing in here? This area is off limits!” I ducked down and peeked through a break in the row of harps to see Righteous at the door, wings extended slightly and knees bent as if he’d just landed.
His toga gleamed pure white, and he had on the most outrageous shoes: gladiator sandals that laced all the way up his lickable calves. Had he changed after dinner?
“Protector Righteous?” Sunny jumped like she’d been caught shoplifting. Which, in a way, she had. “What a surprise! A pleasant one, I’m sure. Totally fine for you to be here.”
I wanted to tell her to calm down or she was going to get searched for contraband, and who knew what happened to kazoo thieves here? I followed her out of the narrow aisle, wishing I had on less smut, and more lipstick. Slightly breathless Righteous was even hotter than usual.
“Feather needed sheets.” Sunny zipped her lips as Righteous joined us in the storage room, which suddenly felt much smaller.
He prowled toward us, assessing. “And you had permission to enter here?”
“Master Mikhail said—”
He cut her off with a sharp motion. “The sheets are right inside the door. What were you doing back here?” He scanned the shelves, his gaze falling on the harps. Had I left a fingerprint?
A movement distracted me from his stupidly perfect face. Sunny was fiddling with the kazoo in her pocket. Crapola.
I stepped toward him, flinging greasy hair away from my face.
“I was asking what happened to stop the music in Sanctuary.” His eyes cut to me, and I shrugged.
“I love music. Any kind at all.” His eyebrows lowered, like he was confused.
I kept going, distracting him from Sunny’s obvious guilt. “Did you play one of these harps?”
Righteous stopped and lifted a harp from the shelf, holding it across his chest. When his fingers touched the instrument, his expression changed. I watched as longing and regret flickered there… and then he played a few notes.
My heart squeezed. It was glorious, everything I had always dreamed an angel’s harp would sound like. He played a glissando, notes spiraling upward that turned into a sweet melody, wrapping us in a cocoon of silvery sound, until Sunny sniffled.
Then he cleared his throat and tied the harp back in its bag. “I loved playing more than anything,” he said softly.
I swallowed, wondering which one was the real Righteous: the condescending jerk or the sensitive musician. “Sunny said the music stopped after Arabella was… made?”
He nodded, his dark hair gleaming in the soft light.
“It was only a few years afterward when the Guides locked up the harps, and all the rest.” His features were bleak.
“We needed to focus on more important things.” His finger twitched at his side as he darted a glance at the harp again, like he wanted to steal it. Or free it.
“Were you there?” I asked. “When Arabella got hurt? Did the Apprentice Sunny told me about kill her?”
He crossed his arms over his chest, folding his wings tightly behind him and scanning the shelves as he answered.
“I saw it all, but no one knows exactly what happened. Gavriel ignited their bond and brought her out of the Maker Hall to introduce her to Sanctuary. From the very beginning, I could tell something was wrong. She couldn’t speak almost at all; she was distant.
While we were trying to communicate, introduce ourselves, the Apprentice…
” He clenched his teeth. “He threw himself into the Well of Souls, where the material for new Constructs came from. It killed him almost instantly, but not before he had sealed up the Well.”
“Sealed it up? Why?”
“No one knows. But now, since the only entrance to the Well was blocked off, no new Angeli can be constructed.” Behind me, Sunny gasped. I wasn’t sure why, but Righteous’s features had gone stone cold.
I didn’t understand. “How did the Apprentice block it off?” I had a feeling it wasn’t superglue.
“He was pure, not a hint of stain on him,” Righteous replied, spitting out the words. “He had to be, to work in the Maker Hall. When the Maker left, he melted himself down and forced his own soul into the seal.”
“He unmade himself?” Sunny squeaked.
As if her question had shocked him back to his previous ashhole self, Righteous’s lip curled.
“Storytime’s over, and I have someplace to be.
Get out. Both of you.” He did an amazing impression of a hot mall security officer as we grabbed our plates and scurried out.
Then he snarled, “Return the Novice to her room now, Sunny. And report to me tomorrow to discuss this.” He followed us out of the storage room, muttering a word as he closed the door that made a patch of it glow, as if locking.
Sunny hustled me back to my room so fast, I almost dropped all the food off our plates. Once the door was safely closed behind us, she shoved the new sheets under the bed and then climbed up next to me. She flung herself on top of the mattress, making a small whimpering sound. “I’m so screwed.”
“Why?” I asked, eating as fast as I could while still talking. I was starving. “What can he do?”
Sunny moaned. “He knows I’m guilty of something, I can tell. And if he asks me if I stole anything—”
“He won’t,” I said soothingly. “You didn’t steal it. You borrowed it. Hide it under my bed if you like.”
She got up and did just that, muttering something about losing it all for a kazoo. She started pacing around my bed as I ate, until I finally ordered her back on the bed.
“No one’s going to find out, or even care, Sunny. Now focus. You promised you’d tell me about the gate.” Ugh, it was so weird; I felt like I was asking about my crush.
She groaned and held up a hand, ticking off numbers on her fingers. “Okay, so there are three ways out of Sanctuary: the small Earth Gate that baby Novices go through for their first earthly missions—it’s accessed through the Maker Hall—the Flight Hall, and the Great Gate.”
I didn’t care about the others right now. “The Great Gate. What’s so great about it? Is it better than the others?” It probably was; how could any other gate be that sexy? And so strong, and tall, reaching all the way up to the—
“No.” Sunny interrupted my inappropriate thoughts, although it sounded like she wasn’t certain. “Maybe more important. It’s the gate that separates this realm from both the Abyss and the Celestial Realm.”
“Wait.” I swallowed a mouthful of cheese cube. “On the other side of that gate is Hell? It’s a darned Hell Gate?” Shizz, I was crushing on a Hell Gate.
Sunny rolled her eyes. “No, on the other side are two pathways, and one leads to the Abyss. According to Gavriel, that path grows wider and shorter every year, and the one to the Celestial Realm longer, as the balance shifts.”
“So that’s a yes, Hell is on the other side of that gate, and getting effing closer?
” I screeched. “Why would they even make it a gate? Why not make it… I don’t know, a wall?
The Great Wall, with absolutely no way of opening up and letting Hell take over.
Or like The Hell No Not A Gate, This is An Impermeable Barricade?
Oh, crap, I heard it screaming. Were those tortured souls in Hell?
I wanted to touch it, like it drew me in.
Was that Hell reaching out for me? Why did I find Hell attractive? Is Hell even single?”
She tossed a pillow at my head. “Calm down, Feather! It’s not a Hell Gate. It’s the Great Gate, and the Abyss is safely on the other side. The Angeli and Protectors who sacrificed themselves made certain of that.”
“Wait, sacrificed?” She had mentioned the High Angeli walking into the gate, though I hadn’t known what she meant. Had they died?
“That’s the way the gates were all formed. Pure souls sacrificed their own lives to create gates of power to protect the realms—or in the Apprentice’s case, to seal off one.”
What the actual fudge. “They all sacrificed their lives. They’re all dead?”
Sunny bobbled her head, then shook it. “It’s not clear. No one knows if a soul dies when they transform, or when they’re unmade. So we always greet the gate, and bow to honor their sacrifice. They might still be…”
“Alive? Sentient?” I blinked. “Trapped in the gate to Hell for eternity?”
The corners of Sunny’s mouth dipped. “No one knows. And if they are, well, that’s the nature of a Great Sacrifice.”
“I’ll say.” I shivered. The level of weird was getting too high even for me. And my plate was empty. “You know, I’m still hungry.” And sort of creeped out by this gate made of possibly dead angels, that I still sort of wanted to explore. In a totally non-sexual manner. Just naked.
“Want me to bring golden donuts here for breakfast?” Sunny asked, licking her lips. “The chefs make this vanilla cloud frosting that will blow your mind.”
“Get two dozen,” I suggested, making puppy eyes. “Being this smutty is hard work.”
Sunny saluted as she hopped off the bed. “Yes, ma’am. Get some sleep.” She waved a hand over a panel shaped like a feather at the door, and the lighting in the room faded to a perfect, sleepy dusk.
I waited until she left to remake my bed and rub myself thoroughly on my new, super soft sheets, only murmuring a few obscene suggestions as to what I’d do to them when I had more energy, and then crashed.