I thought about Tristan. And then I thought about Asher. Different kinds of monsters but both monstrous. And then, as per usual, my wings got gypped of a feather. “Yes.”
She blinked her wide eyes at me. “Are they really scary-looking?”
“No. Most look like you and me.”
“You don’t look like a monster.”
“I’m sure the ophanim would disagree.”
“Why would they disagree?”
“Because . . .” Where to start? “Because, for one, I’ve decided to make my life among humans.”
She slid her bottom lip into her mouth, as though contemplating why that would make me a fiend. “My favorite color is my apa’s wings.” Or not. “What’s your favorite color?”
I settled back into my chair. Children were inquisitive and created links between disjointed topics at the speed of light. I’d apparently driven Leigh nuts with my non-linear way of thinking. “Black. Black’s my favorite color.”
“Black isn’t a color.”
I gestured to my leather leggings and black T-shirt that read 5’4 but my attitude is 6’2 in bold white—a gift from Jase for my twentieth birthday last month. “I beg to differ. Black is a color.”
“Black is the absence of light.”
I frowned, not because of what she’d said . . . technically I knew black wasn’t a color, but because I was surprised someone so young was aware of this.
“I also like purple.” She looked up at the deepening sky. “Violet. Not lavender.”
“You’d like my wings, then.”
“Can I see them?”
I kept my sparse plumage magicked away, despising what it looked like and what it represented. Only once a year, on December 19th—the anniversary of my wing bone ceremony—did I allow my electric purple feathers to spill out of my back.
“No.” At my clipped answer, the child pursed her lips but didn’t hop off her chair. “How old are you, Naya?”
“Four and a half. And you?”
“Twenty.”
“My apa is one hundred and forty-three.”
Naya was a serious daddy’s girl . . . I almost inquired about her mommy but decided it wasn’t my place to pry. Nor did I care. It wasn’t like I would ever see the child again.
“Why are you sad?”
I blinked. Here I thought I looked angry. I twirled my phone a few times before answering. “Because someone I love is dying.”
Her brow puckered. “Death isn’t the end.”
I’d forgotten how early the brainwashing started. “For some people it is.”
“This person you love, they’re bad?”
“No. They’re extraordinary.” The lump, which had sat in my throat like a phantom limb, began to expand again.
“Then why are you sad?”
“Because I don’t want her to die.”
“But you’ll see her again.” She pointed a stubby finger toward the sky. “In Elysium.”
“I won’t.”
Her frown became so pronounced that she looked like she’d stolen a few wrinkles off Ophan Mira’s forehead. “But you have wings.”
“I do, but I won’t complete them in time. Do you know what happens when you don’t complete them?”
Without hesitation, she said, “You become nephilim.”
“Bingo. The worst sort of monster.”
“Nephilim aren’t monsters.”
My head jerked back in surprise. “I . . . agree.” I leaned forward. “But don’t voice that too loudly around here. I think we’re the only two people who share this belief.”
“I like sharing something with you, Celeste.”
My heart gave a slow, painful squeeze, but then the squeezing was replaced by total stillness. “I didn’t tell you my name. How do you know my name?”
She bit the inside of her cheek as though in deep concentration before a huge grin split her face. “My head told it to me.”
Her head? I stared at her until it hit me what she meant. She must’ve heard it screeched by Ophan Mira earlier. Stone carried sound like a tunnel carried wind.
Speak of the angel . . . Ophan Mira circled the fig tree. “Fletching, the sera—” Her lips stilled at the sight of my table companion. “Fletching Naya, what do you think you’re doing here?”
“I was spending time with my friend.” Her hands were linked together on the quartz tabletop as though she was in the middle of a business negotiation.
I found myself smiling at how she didn’t quiver or balk.
“Your . . . friend?”
Rude much, Ophan? Was I not worthy of friends?
Naya shifted on her seat. “Celeste and I are friends.”
“How . . . wonderful.” Since Mira’s feathers were now soldered to her wing bones, none fell. Had she been a fletching that lie would’ve cost her. “However, it’s bedtime. Please proceed to the dormitories. Ophan Pippa is awaiting you.”
A great sigh escaped Naya’s small chest. “Fine.” She lurched off her chair and then, completely unexpectedly, wrapped me in a hug, crushing the teal silk of my bomber. “Bye, Celeste.”
“Bye, Naya.” I was so stunned by her show of affection that I didn’t embrace her.
As she rounded the table toward Ophan Mira, she asked, “Will you come back and play with me?”
No. I needed to say no. “I . . . I . . .” One glance at Mira’s tight face had my good sense flooding back. “Probably not.”
I’d come for one reason and one alone: to help Mimi. If the angels proved incapable or unwilling to aid me, I’d have no purpose to visit guilds, much less form relationships with younger fletchings who I wouldn’t see for years to come since, pre-wing bones, children of Elysium weren’t allowed out of guilds, their bodies as brittle and mortal as humans.
Her bottom lip quivered. “But we’re friends.”
“Fletching Naya,” Mira pinched out the little girl’s name, “off you go now.”
She blinked up at the ophanim before returning her stricken gaze to me. Tears dribbled down her cheeks, glistening like crushed diamonds. She wiped them away and then she whirled and ran, making my heart feel as brittle as a dried petal.
Mira tracked Naya’s swinging golden hair until she vanished into the hallway that led to the children’s dormitories. “She’s an exceedingly . . . emotive little girl.”
Yet another thing wrong with our world: angels extolled empathy and yet advocated emotional detachment. Leigh had been too compassionate with her sinners. “Being emotive isn’t a flaw, Ophan.”
“Did I say it was?” If my feathers had been on display, her frosty tone would’ve iced them over.
“So, can the seraphim help me, Ophan?”
“No. But they did urge me to have you visit the Ranking Room to check on her score and to remind you to aid her in not compromising her natural death.”
I snorted. “I’m not going to help her commit suicide.”
“I never said you would.” But she was thinking it. I could see it in the myriad of shallow grooves crosshatching her centuries-old skin. “Perhaps you should check your score, too.”