Something Deadly This Way Comes

Chapter Twelve

My feet slipped off Barnabas’s, and I gasped, clutching at his arm wrapped around me as my toes dangled in the wind. The world shifted beneath us, wheeling as an updraft buoyed us higher. I was safer in Barnabas’s grip than I would be at home in my own room. More so, probably.

“I’ve got you,” he murmured in my ear, a mix of annoyance and reassurance that only Barnabas could manage. Flying was a lot scarier now that hitting the ground held real consequence. I still had the bruises from hitting the seat belt. I didn’t need to add to them.

“I trust you,” I said, squinting down at the desert below. “It’s me I’m worried about.”

He said nothing, but his flight smoothed into a slow spiral down. It looked like he was headed for the modest home below us. Ron’s, presumably. It was the same color as the tan, almost pink sand. There was nearly no vegetation, either next to the house or in the surrounding area. I didn’t see any roads at all leading up to it, and no sign of people anywhere. Just a low single-story adobe home amid the desert dirt and water-cut gullies.

It was quiet and dim; the sun wasn’t up yet, but it was close. The wind was a steady, dry force, blowing my hair first one way, then another as Barnabas circled to a pink-tiled patio that opened seamlessly to the desert. My nerves were ragged. I didn’t know what was going to happen in the next five minutes, but it was tearing me up that I might not have a chance to even say good-bye. They’d let me say good-bye, wouldn’t they?

I was pretty sure I was meeting with the seraphs for one of three reasons: one, I stole some of Tammy’s soul; two, because I convinced the rising light timekeeper to help me circumvent a guardian angel; or three, to give them my amulet back and renounce my timekeeper status because I got my body back. But the seraph had said I could do that if I chose to. What if I chose to do something different now?

Maybe we hadn’t succeeded with Tammy. Maybe we had. Wasn’t it worth spending a little time to find out? And if it became certain that she would never change, then I would scythe her down myself.

Oh, God. Could I do that?

Barnabas set us down with a gentle step-hop, and I let out my held breath. His grip on me loosened, and I turned. I knew I had a scared look on my face, but he managed to muster up a weak smile for me. “I’ll see you later,” Barnabas said, and I reached for his sleeve, keeping him from going more than a step.

“You’re not staying?” My voice quavered, and I hated it.

Sighing, he dropped his head, then looked back up at me. “I can’t. I have to leave. I hope . . . I hope I see you later.”

They were going to take my amulet from me. I knew it. And my hand grabbed it, useless as it was at this point. “Remember me,” I breathed.

Barnabas cupped my chin, his thumb wiping away a tear that had somehow leaked out. “If they let me,” he said. “You were a very good timekeeper, Madison.”

Barnabas’s hand dropped. Eyes fixed to mine, he backed up. His wings made one fast downward push, and he was airborne. I felt alone and miserable.

He’d been told to leave, and he left. Angels were made to serve, Barnabas had said. But if one served unwillingly, wasn’t it slavery?

A bitter resolve pushed out my fear as I watched his silhouette spin, turn, and vanish. Sure, I had made the deal to give the amulet back once I had my body, but things had changed. I—no, we—had proved that a soul’s fate was not fixed, but that it could be turned back to a better path. I wanted my body, my amulet, and a chance to really see if this could work, and as I turned to look at Ron’s house, I promised myself that I wasn’t going to let anything go without a fight.

Arms wrapped around myself, I looked in the wide patio doors at a huge, tiled living room done in tasteful browns, taupes, and pale pinks and oranges. It looked very desert-ish, so unlike my green suburbia. No wonder Ron wore desert robes; the sand must get into everything.

Going up and knocking didn’t seem right—after all, the sun wasn’t up yet—and it wasn’t like I wanted to talk to Ron. “Where are you?” I whispered, looking up into the pale blue sky that almost looked white. No seraphs.

I went to sit on the waist-high wall surrounding most of the patio, angling so that I could see the house and the rising sun both. I’d never been to the desert, and it was breathtaking in its open beauty. The horizon was so far away, the colors melting into themselves like watercolors. The wind blew into me as if it had never brushed against anything ever before. I could feel a hum in my veins, and I wondered if it was because the ground was holy. It would have to be for a seraph to set foot on it. My island, too, was holy.

A thump on the glass door shattered my introspective mood, and I spun, chest clenching when I saw Ron, furious as he struggled to get the door to slide open. “You!” he shouted, his bony, bare, ugly feet slapping as he came out. “Paul is gone. You’re here. What have you done with him?” His pace slowed as he noticed my new, reaper-black clothes.

I slid from the wall and tugged my oversize tunic straight. “Hi, Ron. Nice place you have. Must be a bitch getting out here with no roads. Or is that to keep people from leaving once they get here?”

I gasped, backpedaling as he reached for me, giving me a shake with his small hands on my shoulders. I was too taken aback to try to stop him, and besides, I thought I deserved it.

“The seraphs told me to come here,” I said, teeth rattling. “Not my idea. I’m waiting for them! Get your . . . hands off!”

Ron let go, backing up as he tried to guess if I was telling the truth. His eyes narrowed in the rising sun, he looked at me. “You’re alive,” he said suddenly, and his gaze dropped to my amulet.

“Yeah,” I said in a huff. “I found my body. Thanks for adding to the misery.”

“I’m not going to adjust your amulet if that’s why you’re here,” Ron said haughtily, backing up even more and slowly making a 360 with his gaze on the skies. “Where is Paul?”

Sniffing, I refused to let him know how miserable I was. Adjust my amulet? Adjust it right out of my hands, maybe. “Careful,” I mocked, turning to look at the rising sun. “Someone might think you care about him.”

“You little . . . girl,” Ron spat, and I turned back around, hearing the hatred in his voice. “Where is Paul?! He’s changed his amulet’s signature. I don’t know how, but he did. I can’t find him.”

My eyebrows rose. I hadn’t told him how to change resonances, so his amulet must have changed on its own—because he helped me, the dark, save someone from the light. I didn’t even try to hide my smug look, and Ron’s look became choleric.

“You didn’t!” Ron exclaimed. “How dare you interfere with my own student!”

“Why not? You interfered with me, and I was Kairos’s student,” I said, arms over my chest. “Well, I would have been his student if he hadn’t been trying to kill me! Paul is helping me. We’re saving souls.”

“You are wrong, Madison.” Standing stiffly before me, Ron fisted his hands, his eyes going blue for an instant as he touched the divine. “You cannot change a person’s fate after their soul dies.”

“You can if you catch them soon enough, before it dies completely!” I shouted, hearing my voice become lost in the desert, shredded by the wind. “What is your problem? You’re the one who believes in choice. Or is it that you believe in choice only when it’s done your way?”

Ron paced to me, and I stood firm, head even and lips pressed defiantly. “What did you do?!” he demanded.

“Nothing.” I backed up a step, not liking him that close. My amulet wasn’t working at all, and if I died before the seraph got here . . . well, who knew if it would listen to me, anyway. “Paul helped me find Tammy since my connection with my amulet is less than it should be. We flashed forward,” I said, and Ron’s face went gray. “It wasn’t happy-happy, Ron. We both saw what happens to the people you save with guardian angels who don’t manage to rekindle their souls. Paul wasn’t too thrilled about it. I wasn’t, either. No wonder the dark timekeepers kill people to prevent that. I’m starting to think they are right. No one deserves to be eaten by black wings. Their entire existence erased like they never existed. When were you planning on telling him? When you were on your deathbed and you’d brainwashed him into being a second you?”

“You turned him dark . . .” It was a breathy whisper, but I could see the tension in him building.

“I did not!” I stated firmly, but I wondered. “We saw the truth! And the truth sucks!”

“You turned him dark!” he shouted, face going red. “He’s my acolyte! You are toxic, Madison, poisoning everything you touch!”

“We were trying to save someone!” I shouted back, still holding myself like I was afraid. “Guardian angels are not guarding the living. They are guarding the dead in the vain hope that they will somehow rekindle their souls. People can’t change unless they see the good and the bad. The light and the dark. The system doesn’t work anymore!”

But he wasn’t listening, his bony feet slapping the gritty pavers as he paced, his fury needing an outlet. “He was my student and you turned him against me!”

I took a breath to yell at him some more, but it came out in a gasp as he snatched his amulet, and a brilliant sword glittered into existence.

“Hey!” I shrieked, stepping backward to get space between us, but I stepped off the patio and into the soft sand. My arms pinwheeled and I went down. My air huffed out, and I could do nothing as he bore down on me, sword gleaming in the new sun.

I widened my eyes, and my breath sucked in as the sword glittered. And then Ron swung, his sword catching the first rays of the new day.

I’m going to die. Again, I thought, not knowing what that meant anymore. But a matte-black sword swung to block Ron’s. The two met in a ping that was more feeling than sound, and I felt dizzy at the bubble of energy that was released, pressing out and away to color the sun and stir an echo from the sky itself. The sword above me looked as immutable as time, soaking in the light. My eyes struggled to shift, and I blinked at the seraph above me. I couldn’t tell if it was the same one as before or not, the white glow hurting my eyes. Its face was terrible with anger, short of understanding and patience.

“Give me that,” the seraph demanded, snatching Ron’s sword from his slack grip.

Ron’s sword in the seraph’s hand made a ping, cracking from the hilt to the point. Ron stumbled back, his amulet on his chest glowing briefly before it went out. My lips parted at the new crack in the stone, leaking a silver line of infinity. Seeing it, Ron covered it, shamed.

But he was still angry.

I sat up at the seraph’s feet, stunned. That awful black sword was gone, and the seraph was extending a hand to help me rise. Watching my hand move as if in a dream, I put my fingers out. It was a perfect hand, too strong to be feminine, but too thin to be masculine. And as I put mine into it, I could feel a divine strength humming, tightly leashed.

“Chronos? Is there an issue you wish to discuss?” the high angel said as it drew me effortlessly to my feet.

“She . . .” he stammered, eyes rising from his sword still in the seraph’s hand. “She poisoned the rising light timekeeper against me!”

“Mmmm.”

It was a slow sound, and I swear, I heard thunder rumble against the distant mountains, the seraph’s thoughts echoing between heaven and earth. My pulse was fast, and I backed away from both of them, finding the patio and not knowing what to do with my hands. It had saved me, but saved me for what? They were going to take my amulet away.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, and both Ron and I took several prudent steps back as the angel moved to stand on the pavers as well. It was getting easier to look at it, and I snuck glances, its beauty still hurting me somehow.

“You showed Paul the truth of the guardian angels,” the seraph said, looking too kindly at me for me to bear. “They are rejoicing that their torment finally be understood, and your praises are being sung whether anything changes or not. Paul made the choice he was fated to. Rest easy.”

“That’s not it,” I said, and Ron made a frustrated noise.

“She turned him against me!” he protested. “My own student!”

I jumped when the angel abruptly looked at Ron. I hadn’t even seen him move. Ron, too, had closed his mouth, scared. “You turned him against you yourself with your hoarding of knowledge in fear,” the seraph said. “Be still for a moment. I want to know why Madison sorrows, and while here on earth, I can only do one thing at a time. It’s bothersome. How do you exist able to do only one thing at a time, see one outcome from a thing instead of many?”

The seraph turned to me, concern pinching its brow to make it look more beautiful yet. “Madison, why do you sorrow?”

I couldn’t look up, and I felt like I was before God himself. “I took some of Tammy’s soul,” I admitted. “In the flash forward.”

“Abomination!” Ron all but hissed, and I agreed with him.

My head came up, and I squinted at the seraph, pleading, “The memory was so beautiful. I didn’t want the black wings to eat it and have it be gone forever. I’d give it back if I could. Can you give it back to her for me?” Only now could I meet the angel’s eyes, and I blinked at the understanding, no, the pleased expression it wore. “I gave them a part of my own soul instead, and they didn’t know the difference,” I added more confidently. “I couldn’t let that much joy be forgotten by . . . everyone.”

“Mmmm.” Again the thunder rumbled in a clear blue sky, and the sun rose higher. “You claimed her with ancient law, giving an equal sacrifice for her soul. There is no need to make repairs,” it said, touching my shoulder in support, and I felt lifted, buoyed. “Memories grow with the sharing, as do souls. You took a memory of the future, not the present. She still has it. There is a long life for her now with much sorrow, and memories too beautiful to forget are what sustain us. The trick . . .” The seraph hesitated, its lips quirking in what had to be humor. “. . . is to recognize them.”

I was almost in tears, but Ron was smug as he set his feet wide apart and crossed his arms over his chest in a confident manner. “Then Paul got her a guardian angel after all,” he stated. “If she lives, then she must have her guardian. Good for Paul.”

The angel let go of my shoulder and laughed. The sound pealed forth, shaking the air. Frightened, I wanted to run, but the angel was focused on Ron, not me.

“No!” it said, and a cool breeze touched my face, heavy with moisture, odd here in the desert. “But good for Paul, yes. Madison showed a lost soul how to recognize joy, and Paul’s counsel gave her the strength to fight for it. Her fate is changing this very moment, and her life is lived, not endured. She dies with grace and touches many souls.” The seraph turned to me as I stared, openmouthed. “You and Paul did well.”

“Tammy is okay!” I said, elated. We’d done it. We’d done it twice! Surely they had to see now? But then my mood softened, ebbed, and died. Tammy’s fate wasn’t my only worry. Fingering my amulet, I thought of my body. I had said I’d give the amulet back if I ever found my body. I didn’t want to. I wanted to stay. They’d let me stay if I wanted to, right?

“Tammy is okay,” the seraph said, beaming warmth into me to make me feel good despite my world falling apart around me. “Because of you and Paul. Because you worked together.”

Ron lost his confident stance, grim and ugly. “Paul is not going to succeed me,” he said vehemently. “This is an outrage! Light and dark working together. It isn’t done! I’ve served for a hundred lifetimes—”

“And you’ll continue to do so,” the seraph interrupted him, beautiful bare feet grinding the grit as the angel turned. “You are going to forget Paul’s intentions and what has passed this morning.”

My eyes widened as it raised Ron’s sword over his head, and plunged it deep into the paving stones. The earth shook, and both Ron and I fell. He scrambled up, but I stayed where I was, feeling the air grow damp against me. Above us, thick rain clouds had formed. Rain in the desert, a gift out of time, out of place.

The angel stood before us, terrible in its beauty and anger. “Reclaim your sword to bring about heaven’s will,” it intoned, and Ron looked in horror at his blade sticking out of the patio like Excalibur. “Use the time before you find your bravery to reflect,” the seraph added. “There is one last task for me before I leave this confused maelstrom of existence, and you are not required for it, Chronos.”

I didn’t understand why Ron was staring at me so hatefully, standing before his sword as if it was a snake. If he didn’t reclaim it, his amulet wouldn’t work at full strength.

“He takes it, and his memory of what Paul did this night is gone,” the seraph said, crouching down to be at my level. It was an odd position for an angel, and my breath caught at his nearness.

Slowly I stood up, my eyebrows rising in understanding. “And if he leaves it there, he won’t have the strength to stop us,” I said, and the angel beamed, holding out a hand as it knelt before me.

I looked at it, feeling my face going cold. The seraph was asking for my amulet. “One last thing,” it said, and I clutched at the stone.

“You want my amulet,” I whispered, and Ron snorted, clearly not upset that I was going to lose everything as well.

“Yes.” The seraph gracefully rose to a stand as well, still holding a hand out.

“But I proved fate can be changed, that a dying soul can be rekindled,” I said, looking over the cooling desert as if my past deeds would be out there somewhere to find and collect, like pretty rocks. “All of us together, light and dark. We saved Tammy’s soul and her life. I know I said I’d give it up when I found my body, but I saw what happened to those who are given guardian angels but aren’t able to rekindle their souls on their own, and that is awful.”

“Agreed,” the seraph said. “The songs of the guardian angels did much to sway heaven.”

“But to kill a person outright to save his or her soul,” I lamented. “That is awful, too.”

“Agreed,” the seraph said again, a touch of impatience in its tone, a hand still outstretched. “Your amulet, please. It is confusing here. I want to leave.”

“Give it to the angel, Madison, or it will take it,” Ron said smugly, and my reach to pull it over my head almost stopped. I wanted to cry as I felt the amulet leave me, felt the bond between us stretch and hold. “Paul and I,” I said as the seraph cupped its hands around it, hiding it from me. “We changed things. I can understand why I need to forget, but don’t make him forget.”

A glow leaked from between the seraph’s fingers, pure and divine. The angel opened its hand, and my white-hot stone slowly cooled, shifting through the spectrum until it was again black. “We have no intention of making him forget,” the seraph said, extending my amulet back to me.

I stared at it, unbelieving. They are giving it back?

“It took several hundred years of searching the time lines to find someone able to manipulate time and have the fate, to make the choice he has made,” the seraph said. “Here. Take your amulet. I want to leave.”

I stared at my amulet, dangling from the seraph’s fingers. They’re giving it back?

Slowly I reached out, fingers closing on air an instant before I touched it. “B-but,” I stammered as I looked at it still in the seraph’s possession. “I found my body. Claimed it.”

The seraph lowered its arm as Ron began to pace, his sword between us. “Do you want to be the dark timekeeper?” the seraph asked.

“Yes!” I exclaimed, looking at my amulet. “But I want to be alive, too!”

The seraph shrugged. “So you changed your mind,” it said, smiling. “We knew you would. It was fated such. Take your amulet. It has been adjusted.”

Not breathing, I reached out, hesitating.

“Take it!” the seraph thundered, and I jumped, grabbing it.

“There once was a girl named Madison,” sang a familiar voice, and my eyes shot to the seraph’s shoulder. It was Grace, and I could see her. I mean, really see her! She was beautiful, glowing with spiderwebs and dew. I couldn’t seem to breathe, and she laughed, almost falling off the seraph’s shoulder.

“Check out the time line,” she suggested, and I closed my eyes, gasping. It was so clear, so precise, and tears pricked at my eyes. I could see everything intertwined, one thing affecting the other, until it was singing a glorious, resonant hum of existence. My dad was worried about me. Shoe was thinking of me, curious after having talked to Tammy. Josh was at home, sending me a worried text message. Wendy wasn’t thinking about me at all—and that was okay. She was living her life . . . joyfully.

“I’m the dark timekeeper,” I whispered, and my eyes flew open to see Grace beaming.

“You always have been,” the seraph said, kneeling as if trying to get closer to my happiness. “But now you have the chance to be a person, too, to live as those you’re trying to save. Even a superhero needs a place to be normal,” it finished with a wry smile.

I sat on the tile and blinked. Far above us, the clouds thickened. It was raining, but the drops were evaporating before reaching the ground. I had my amulet. I had my body. They were going to let me do things my way. “Then you agree?” I said, needing to hear it. “No more scythings?”

Again the seraph laughed, an echo of thunder above following it. “The scythings will continue,” it said, and Ron, standing before his sword with his hands fisted, grunted.

“But you agreed . . .” I started, not caring I was arguing with one of God’s angels.

The seraph shifted, standing up to tower over me. “Your plans are sound. But, Madison, the reapers are a different drawer of spoons.”

My shoulders slumped as Ron harrumphed. “Not so easy, Madison,” he taunted, almost reaching for his sword, but not yet ready to consign his memory of Paul’s intent to the crapper.

“Reapers serve their timekeepers out of respect,” the seraph said, frowning at Ron’s glee. “It is their . . . choice to change or not. The guardian angels are behind this shift as one, but the reapers?”

Depressed, I slumped on Ron’s patio, hating his smile at me. “Then I’ve gained nothing,” I whispered.

The seraph’s touch was almost not there, it was so soft as it tilted my chin up to look me in the eye. Grace was behind it, smiling, and my head hurt at their combined beauty. “You’ve gained everything. You will work with reapers as they come to you seeking answers. And they will come seeking answers. Word of what has happened is echoing between heaven and earth. That you and Paul have worked together has reapers questioning. Both the light and dark. Light and dark, they will come to you, and light and dark, you will send them out together as one to save or damn souls. That’s why we sent Demus to you. He has doubt. Your questions will be his answers.”

My eyebrows rose. They had sent Demus to me because he might listen? “Then the cullings will stop?” I whispered.

But the seraph was shaking its head, smiling benevolently. “I told you, light and dark, you will pair them up, and light and dark, you will send them out. Together the reapers will try to change fate, but if it is determined that the soul will remain steadfast to ruin despite their efforts, a dark reaper will cull their soul, and a light reaper will weep.”

“I don’t understand,” I stammered.

“The cullings will continue,” the seraph insisted. “But it will be the light reaper who deems the soul lost, not the dark.”

My mouth made an O of understanding. The light, who once assigned the guardian angels, would be less likely to write a soul off. A person would have to truly be beyond hope for that to happen. It was enough. This, I decided, I could do.

Seeing my resolve reflected in my eyes, the seraph nodded and drew back. “If a change can be made, then fate will intervene and a life will be lived. I hope this happens. It’s up to you.” The seraph smiled, and I almost burst with happiness. “And your reapers. There is no more using the ancient law, though. It worked this time, but you are not to risk yourself in such a way again. Understand?”

I exhaled, smiling wryly up at it. “This is the best I’m going to get, isn’t it?”

The seraph arced its wings to touch over its head, an angel’s version of a shrug I’d seen Barnabas do. It extended a hand for me, and feeling renewed, I slipped my hand among the angel’s fingers as we turned to the sun.

A clear light filled me at the touch, thrilling me down to my toes. The desert vanished with a crack of real lightning. I gasped, and then felt myself go misty. The first patters of large, heavy drops of rain hit my face. I was both there to feel it, and gone, half of me feeling the warm plops of rain, and half the emptiness of nothing. And then the warm wetness vanished and I was nowhere.

I panicked, disembodied and unreal. I clutched at my amulet as if it could save me, but I wasn’t sure I even had hands anymore.

A girl once dared walk the line, came Grace’s thought into mine, and I grasped it. Seeking union of soul and divine. Light and dark work together, for now, perhaps forever, but it’s going to take eons of time.

Eons of time, I mused, calming as I realized I was safe. I just wasn’t sure where I was anymore. I felt my body seem to lift, finishing the move that the angel had started in the Arizona desert. I took a breath not knowing if it was real. It made my heart beat and my blood move.

A blinding light pulsed over me, and I cowered, my hand that had been in the seraph’s grip falling to my side. Blinking, I brought my head up to see that I was standing in my room, not Ron’s patio. My reflection stared back at me from my mirror, and Grace darted over everything as if she hadn’t seen it in years. Numb, I stared at myself in that ridiculous black outfit. I looked tired, small, and really dirty.

Heart pounding, I turned, not believing it. I was home. Alive.

I looked down, the hand clenching my amulet falling open.

And I still had my amulet.

“Now what?” I wondered aloud, peering into its depths to see sparkles and rainbows.