Angelfire

  I poked at my lunch. "I don't think I feel like going to see a movie."

  "Uh, too bad," Kate said. "You don't have a choice. I need to hang out with you, so you're going."

  I forced a smile. "I know, I'm so sorry."

  "Bring Wil ."

  I laughed for real this time. "Yeah, right."

  "Why not?"

  "He's not real y a movie person." I tried to imagine sixhundred-year-old Wil sitting in a crowded movie theater digging through a tub of buttery popcorn. Then I pictured him wearing oversize 3D glasses, and it was very difficult not to laugh out loud.

  Kate made an unintel igible noise. "Who doesn't like going to the movies? That's a load of bul ."

  "He's a pretty serious guy," I admitted. "Very focused on what he's supposed to be doing. He doesn't put having fun very high on his priority list."

  "He's never taken you on a date?" She seemed appal ed.

  "He's not my boyfriend, Kate."

  "You hang out with him all the time. How are you two not dating?"

  I took a bite and averted my gaze; I knew how bad a liar I was. "He's my tutor. That's al ."

  "Don't lie to me. If you're going out with him, just admit it. I won't judge you for it. He seems nice and he's hot. I don't know why you'd be embarrassed to admit he's your boyfriend. Not to mention he's already graduated. Col ege guys are way better than high school boys. They know things. They know how to do things."

  I didn't want to know what she meant by that. "He's just my tutor. He's been helping me with econ. It's real y embarrassing to have to admit it, but that's al he is, I swear."

  It would have felt real y, real y strange cal ing Wil my boyfriend, because it was very untrue; but thinking about the idea made me realize that I did kind of like him. He probably wouldn't be my parents' first choice, to say the least, but I couldn't help it. My mom wouldn't like it if I dated someone I said was in col ege. My dad . . . Wel , he'd never like me going out with anyone--so, whatever. His opinion didn't count. I didn't remember knowing Wil forever, but I could feel it. And it was kind of romantic thinking of him as my protector. I liked that. He was like a security blanket . . . only less fluffy. I wondered, for a moment, if he was cuddly. Probably not. Kate sat back with a crafty smile on her face. "You're a dirty liar."

  "Am not."

  "Nobody hangs out with their tutor," she chal enged.

  "Tutors suck. Even hot ones."

  "He's a cool guy," I insisted. "We're kind of friends now."

  "I thought you said he wasn't that nice."

  "He can be nice when he wants to, but he's also moody."

  "Sounds like a typical boy. Are you bringing him tonight?"

  "I real y doubt it."

  She frowned. "That'd sure piss Landon off, wouldn't it? I feel kind of bad for the guy."

  "He'l have to get over it." I sipped on the straw sticking out of my Mountain Dew.

  Kate folded her arms over her chest and sighed. "You're being na naively optimistic."

  Landon looked up. "Mmm? What about me?"

  "We're talking crap about your ugly roots," Kate sneered, poking the top of his head. "You might want to get those touched up. David Beckham would weep at the sight of you."

  He scowled and flipped her off before going back to his conversation. She laughed.

  After the final bel , I stayed an hour after school to go over our next lit assignment with Mr. Levine. When our meeting ended, I went to my locker, retrieved what I needed, and headed to the student parking lot. My friends had al left, and the lot wasn't as ful as usual. As I walked to my car, I caught a glimpse of Josephine Newport standing by her sparkly red Range Rover. Boldly, I changed my path and strol ed up to her. She was texting away on her phone.

  "Hey, Josie," I said.

  She looked up and gave me a genuine smile. "Oh, hey, El ie. What's up?"

  "Just got out of a session with Levine," I said. "I've been fal ing behind, so he's been helping me out after class. What are you stil doing here?"

  She waved her phone dismissively. "Eh, got out of track early for a doctor's appointment. I'm just kil ing a few minutes before I have to leave. It beats sitting in a waiting room for forty-five minutes. At least I can enjoy the sun out here and get rid of the raccoon tan my sunglasses made on my face."

  "Very true," I laughed. "Hey, listen, about my party--"

  "Don't worry about it," she said, slipping her phone into her purse. "Shit happens."

  I blushed scarlet. "It was real y embarrassing."

  "I know some people tried to make a big deal out of it."

  She glowered. "But seriously, I've made an ass out of myself many times. It happens to everyone when they get drunk--

  wel , not quite flying through the window, but you get what I mean. I got sick once and ruined the interior of my ex's car. Everyone messes up sometimes. You just kind of have to laugh it off and be thankful you weren't hurt."

  I smiled, feeling a little better. "Thanks, Josie."

  "No problem," she said with a sympathetic grin. "I mean it. Sorry about your window."

  "I'm sorry about your ex's car."

  We smiled at each other for a moment. It was good to know that we were stil cool.

  She took her cel back out and glanced at it. "I should get going."

  "See you later," I said.

  She smiled. "Definitely." She got into her car and left the parking lot.

  I turned to walk back to my car and suddenly the world began to slip away. I rocked back on my heels, suddenly fearful that the haziness of my vision might mean that I was going blind for some reason, but as soon as that thought had crossed my mind, the world came back into focus. Only, it wasn't a world I immediately recognized.

  I was in a much darker world, an ancient, golden world lit by torchlight, and a woman's face--a reaper's--appeared inches away from mine, her hand clamped around my chin, her nails digging into my cheeks and jaw. She had me shoved up against a wall that felt cold and hard at my back. The sheer pleated dress she wore was cool against my arms and legs. Her skin was dark brown and her eyes were inhumanly large, the pupils melting into black irises so wide that only slivers of white curled around their sides. Her hair was long and dark and separated into thin braids, I supposed in order to allow her to blend in.

  "You shouldn't have come here," the reaper hissed in a language I somehow recognized as ancient Egyptian and knew to be her native tongue . "Those who love God are slaves, and you are a stranger here."

  I could barely speak through her grip. "The business of man is of no matter to me. My only concern lies with their souls--free and captive alike."

  "You're a fool. Not even the angelic venture here."

  "We both know that is a lie."

  Her snarl became a sneer. "Do you mean your Guardian? Ah, yes. I tore her throat out myself. Now even the archangels have forgotten this land."

  I set my jaw and ground my teeth in churning rage. "If they'd forgotten it, they wouldn't have sent me here to kill the reaper posing as the pharaoh and stop you all from claiming more human souls."

  She cracked the back of my skull into the wall. Pain shot down my back, and blackness crept around the edges of my eyes. "They sent you here to die, killer. Just like your Guardian."

  Talons like a harpy's grew from her fingertips, but I didn't wait for her to cut me. My power surged and shoved into the reaper in a flash of white light, but she strained against it. Her face twisted with fury, and her own power exploded as her ash-colored wings burst from her back and she shoved me deeper into the wall, shattering the painting of the pharaoh's gods. I slammed my palm into her chest and sent her crashing to the floor. Unable to catch her balance on her feet, she took to the air, filling up the palace throne room with her massive wings, which smashed through the room's stone columns as if they were made of reeds. A section of the ceiling came crashing down around us, and I sprang to avoid the falling debris. The reaper flew backward toward the throne, where she landed, perching on the gild
ed chair, her wings spread wide. The torchlight gleaming off the golden walls gave the reaper an unearthly glow. I called forth my swords and swept them upward, instantly lighting them with angelfire. I held them tight as the reaper leaped off the pharaoh's throne and took flight again, her dress billowing around her, wings flapping once, talons slashing. She descended on me, but I made my aim true and swung. My fiery blades sliced the reaper's head clean off, and I ducked as her flaming body exploded above me and was gone.

  Ash and embers settled around me, and I stood, letting the angelfire die. I took a deep breath to steady my heart and focused at the next task at hand. I ran from the throne room into a far darker hall to find the pharaoh's reaper imposter, but I stopped dead when I turned around the next corner.

  One of the bear reapers blocked my path. I spun around to find another at my back; I was surrounded. Angelfire returned to my blades, and I launched myself at the first reaper. I spun and twisted and sliced, but one of them struck. I jutted a blade straight into the gaping jaws of the first bear reaper and its head went up in flames, but talons wrapped around my waist and yanked me back. I cried out and flailed . . . .

  The world spun once more, and a pickup truck blared its horn as it blurred by, narrowly missing me. I wheeled around and bumped into a firm, warm body. I looked up to find myself in Wil 's arms, and I was back in my school parking lot. He'd pul ed me out of the truck's path.

  "El ie? El ie!"

  My heart pounded and my eyes whipped around me wildly. "Where is it?" I asked breathlessly. "Where's the reaper? My swords?"

  He held both my shoulders firmly. "There's no reaper. Relax."

  My pulse began to slow down and I took long, deep breaths. It must have been another flashback, like the one I had experienced in my history class. As I steadied my nerves, more of the memory came back to me. I'd been surrounded and alone.

  "Where was I?" I asked fearful y. "Who was that?"

  He studied my face with a puzzled look. "Who? Who are you talking about?"

  "The reaper!" I cried. "She was a vir, I think. And there were more. There were Ursids everywhere. The pharaoh--"

  "Pharaoh?"

  "Yes, he'd been kil ed and a vir reaper had shape-shifted and mimicked his appearance to take his place. They'd kil ed so many in Egypt already, taken so many souls, and I was fighting them alone. My Guardian then was dead. It was before I knew you, long before. It must have been thousands of years ago."

  My thoughts were scattered and incoherent as I tried to make sense of too many details at once. It had been long before Wil came into my life, long before I started to feel human, as he had told me I gradual y had as the centuries passed. Had I been in direct contact with the archangels?

  When had I stopped receiving orders from them? With a reaper posing as the pharaoh, the demonic forces were able to kil an immense number of humans, so many in fact that I had been sent to Ancient Egypt to intervene.

  But who had sent me? An angel?

  "They sent you here to die, killer." The reaper's words haunted me.

  "El ie," Wil said, laying a hand on my shoulder. "Are you okay?"

  I nodded. "Yeah. I'm just . . . thinking."

  "Wel , let's think out of the way of speeding vehicles." He led me back to my car, and we sat inside for a moment.

  "Something else," I said. "The reaper cal ed me a kil er. They usual y just cal me Preliator. What exactly does my name mean?"

  "You didn't always go by that name," he explained. "The origin is Latin, so I assume that people began cal ing you

  'Preliator' while that was an important language in the ancient world. It means 'warrior.'"

  Warrior. "I guess I have quite the reputation to live up to."

  "Don't worry about it. You'l get there. You always do."

  "I hope you're right," I said. "What are you doing at my school, anyway?"

  "You were distressed. It must have been the flashback. I rushed here as quickly as I could and I saw a reaper about a mile away."

  That caught me off guard. "In broad daylight?"

  He nodded. "It might have been looking for you or fol owing your scent. You should get home so there won't be any fight in public."

  "It won't attack anyone, wil it?"

  "No," he assured me. "They don't feed during the day, and it's very rare for one to be out at this hour. The reaper was smoking like a chimney in the sun. Whatever it is out for must be important, which is why we should get you home."

  I looked at him in surprise. "You're riding in my car?"

  "Yes" was al he said.

  "You're not going to be flying back to my house, then?" I asked sarcastical y.

  He turned to give me a surprised, questioning look. "No."

  "That memory real y freaked me out, Wil ."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I was so cold and just . . . different. I took my job very seriously. Too seriously. It was kind of scary. It was like I wasn't even human." I was glad there wasn't a mirror, so I couldn't see my face. The darkness in my expression would have been too much for me to take.

  "You can be very intense," he confessed.

  "And something else," I continued. "In my memory, I told the reaper that I was sent by the angels. Do they give me orders?"

  He blinked at me and I took that as a no before he said anything at al . "Not that I ever remember."

  "If they did give me orders before, why not now? Why did they stop? Why don't I remember speaking to them?"

  "I don't know when or why they stopped."

  But why didn't I remember it? Was I slowly becoming so human that I was forgetting myself? Had I forgotten where I came from? What I truly was? Was my humanity a weakness? Or was it a strength? Was it my own fault that I no longer spoke to the angels? Had I done something wrong?

  Wil had told me the angelic reapers served the angels in Heaven. What if I was part of their plan? Who was I supposed to serve? What if they had created me?

  I scoffed at the idea that I might be some twisted science experiment of the divine, but something was obviously bringing me back every time I died.

  Was it angels?

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF--NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Children's Books

  ..................................................................... 15

  "GET UP TO YOUR ROOM AND I'LL MEET YOU THERE," Wil said when we got back to my house.

  I shot him a suspicious look. "My mom wil --"

  "No, she won't know I'm here. Just get upstairs."

  I nodded. There was no use fighting him. As soon as I walked in the front door, I heard my mom cal me from her office.

  "Hey, El ie? Can you come here for a minute?"

  I stopped dead. My heart thumped like crazy as I went into her office. She looked up when I entered.

  "Hey, sweetie," she said. "How was school?"

  I shrugged. It took effort to behave normal y instead of like a complete lunatic. "It was okay. I'm doing a little better in econ. I stil don't real y get it, though. So what did you want to talk to me about?"

  "Oh, yes!" she said. "The dealership final y cal ed. They can take your car in now. I guess they had a real y busy few weeks. We can drop it off tonight or Sunday night, if you'd like. Are you going to the movies again?"

  That's right. We were taking my car to get the scratches and dents cleaned up and repainted. "Yeah. You know, we might as wel just wait until Sunday to drop it off. They won't start working on it until Monday anyway, and I'd like to use my car this weekend."

  "Sounds good."

  "Okay. Wel , I've got to work on some econ homework before I leave. Talk to you later, Mom."

  I jogged up the stairs and found Wil standing by my desk looking at some photographs of my friends and me. "Are we hunting tonight?" he asked.

  I frowned with a twinge of disappointment. "Yeah, I guess so. Tonight's Movie Night, remember?"

  He groaned and turned toward me. "I forgot." He paused.

  "Do you real y ha
ve to go to that?"

  "Yes," I said firmly. "I want to try and stay a normal teenage girl."

  "But you're not."

  "Wel , then I'd like to maintain the facade."

  "I'm real y sure if that reaper from earlier doesn't track you tonight, another wil , like Ragnuk. I don't think you should be going places with your friends without me, especial y at night."

  I remembered my conversation with Kate from earlier.

  "You could . . . come with me." My voice lilted hopeful y at the end.

  He didn't answer at first, and my heart sank. "I can't real y think of a better way to keep a close eye on you."

  "Then you're coming. Have you ever been to a movie theater before?"

  "Of course I have," he said. He sounded offended. "I don't live under a rock."

  "Could've fooled me," I said.

  Wil sat down on the edge of my bed, leaning forward lazily. "What are you seeing?" he asked, looking up at me.

  "Kate said something about a comedy."

  "Like what?" He seemed nervous.

  "Are you saying you don't have any suggestions?" I smiled slyly.

  "Just because I've seen a couple movies in the last hundred years doesn't mean I'm savvy about Hol ywood these days."

  "I was just curious. I didn't think you would be. Are you cool with seeing a movie? I'l pay." I walked over to my vanity to put on some eye shadow and mascara. I peeked at Wil 's reflection in the mirror.

  "I'm not going so I can enjoy myself," he grumbled. "I'm going to make sure Ragnuk doesn't snap your neck on the way out the door."

  "Eww! Why are you always so graphic?" I stroked my lashes with the mascara brush.

  "I like to get my point across."

  "Apparently." I turned back to him and stepped up to where he sat. "Anyway, I think tonight wil be good for you. You shouldn't be so moody and brooding."

  "I'm not moody or brooding," he insisted.

  I looked down at him quizzical y. "Oh, you are."

  "Are we sparring first?" he asked, choosing to ignore what I had just said. "Maybe we should go for a run."

  "No," I said. "I don't want to get al gross and have to shower again. How about after?"

  "That's fine," he said, his voice grim. "If you ask me, I don't think you're taking your duty seriously enough."